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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Crimson Tide, by Robert W. Chambers
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Crimson Tide
+
+Author: Robert W. Chambers
+
+Illustrator: A. I. Keller
+
+Release Date: September 1, 2009 [EBook #29880]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CRIMSON TIDE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: "I HATE IT AS YOU HATED THE BEASTS WHO SLEW YOUR FRIEND"]
+
+
+
+
+THE CRIMSON TIDE
+
+A NOVEL
+
+By ROBERT W. CHAMBERS
+
+Author of "The Moonlit Way," "The Laughing Girl," "The Restless Sex,"
+etc.
+
+WITH FRONTISPIECE BY A. I. KELLER
+
+A. L. BURT COMPANY
+
+Publishers--New York
+
+Published by arrangement with D. Appleton and Company
+
+
+
+
+COPYRIGHT, 1919, BY ROBERT W. CHAMBERS
+
+Copyright, 1919, by The International Magazine Company
+
+PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
+
+
+
+
+To
+
+MARGARET ILLINGTON BOWES
+
+AND
+
+EDWARD J. BOWES
+
+
+
+
+                                   I
+
+              I'd rather walk with Margaret,
+              I'd rather talk with Margaret,
+              And anchor in some sylvan nook
+              And fish Dream Lake with magic hook
+              Than sit indoors and write this book.
+
+                                   II
+
+              An author's such an ass, alas!
+              To watch the world through window glass
+              When out of doors the skies are fair
+              And pretty girls beyond compare--
+              Like Margaret--are strolling there.
+
+                                  III
+
+              I'd rather walk with E. J. Bowes,
+              I'd rather talk with E. J. Bowes,
+              In woodlands where the sunlight gleams
+              Across the golden Lake of Dreams
+              Than drive a quill across these reams.
+
+                                   IV
+
+              If I could have my proper wish
+              With these two friends I'd sit and fish
+              Where sheer cliffs wear their mossy hoods
+              And Dream Lake widens in the woods,
+              But Fate says "No! Produce your goods!"
+
+                                 ENVOI
+
+              Inspect my goods and choose a few
+              Dear Margaret, and Edward, too;
+              Then sink them in the Lake of Dreams
+              In dim, gold depths where sunshine streams
+              Down from the sky's unclouded blue,
+              And I'll be much obliged to you.
+
+                                                R. W. C.
+
+
+
+
+FOREWORD
+
+
+An American ambulance going south stopped on the snowy road; the
+driver, an American named Estridge, got out; his companion, a young
+woman in furs, remained in her seat.
+
+Estridge, with the din of the barrage in his ears, went forward to
+show his papers to the soldiers who had stopped him on the snowy
+forest road.
+
+His papers identified him and the young woman; and further they
+revealed the fact that the ambulance contained only a trunk and some
+hand luggage; and called upon all in authority to permit John Henry
+Estridge and Miss Palla Dumont to continue without hindrance the
+journey therein described.
+
+The soldiers--Siberian riflemen--were satisfied and seemed friendly
+enough and rather curious to obtain a better look at this American
+girl, Miss Dumont, described in the papers submitted to them as
+"American companion to Marie, third daughter of Nicholas Romanoff,
+ex-Tzar."
+
+An officer came up, examined the papers, shrugged.
+
+"Very well," he said, "if authority is to be given this American lady
+to join the Romanoff family, now under detention, it is not my
+affair."
+
+But he, also, appeared to be perfectly good natured about the matter,
+accepting a cigarette from Estridge and glancing at the young woman in
+the ambulance as he lighted it.
+
+"You know," he remarked, "if it would interest you and the young
+lady, the Battalion of Death is over yonder in the birch woods."
+
+"The woman's battalion?" asked Estridge.
+
+"Yes. They make their debut to-day. Would you like to see them?
+They're going forward in a few minutes, I believe."
+
+Estridge nodded and walked back to the ambulance.
+
+"The woman's battalion is over in those birch woods, Miss Dumont.
+Would you care to walk over and see them before they leave for the
+front trenches?"
+
+The girl in furs said very gravely:
+
+"Yes, I wish to see women who are about to go into battle."
+
+She rose from the seat, laid a fur-gloved hand on his offered arm, and
+stepped down onto the snow.
+
+"To serve," she said, as they started together through the silver
+birches, following a trodden way, "is not alone the only happiness in
+life: it is the only reason for living."
+
+"I know you think so, Miss Dumont."
+
+"You also must believe so, who are here as a volunteer in Russia."
+
+"It's a little more selfish with me. I'm a medical student; it's a
+liberal education for me even to drive an ambulance."
+
+"There is only one profession nobler than that practised by the
+physician, who serves his fellow men," she said in a low, dreamy
+voice.
+
+"Which profession do you place first?"
+
+"The profession of those who serve God alone."
+
+"The priesthood?"
+
+"Yes. And the religious orders."
+
+"Nuns, too?" he demanded with the slightest hint of impatience in his
+pleasant voice.
+
+The girl noticed it, looked up at him and smiled slightly.
+
+"Had my dear Grand Duchess not asked for me, I should now he entering
+upon my novitiate among the Russian nuns.... And she, too, I think,
+had there been no revolution. She was quite ready a year ago. We
+talked it over. But the Empress would not permit it. And then came the
+trouble about the Deaconesses. That was a grave mistake----"
+
+She checked herself, then:
+
+"I do not mean to criticise the Empress, you understand."
+
+"Poor lady," he said, "such gentle criticism would seem praise to her
+now."
+
+They were walking through a pine belt, and in the shadows of that
+splendid growth the snow remained icy, so that they both slipped
+continually and she took his arm for security.
+
+"I somehow had not thought of you, Miss Dumont, as so austerely
+inclined," he said.
+
+She smiled: "Because I've been a cheerful companion--even gay? Well,
+my gaiety made my heart sing with the prospect of seeing again my
+dearest friend--my closest spiritual companion--my darling little
+Grand Duchess.... So I have been, naturally enough, good company on
+our three days' journey."
+
+He smiled: "I never suspected you of such extreme religious
+inclinations," he insisted.
+
+"Extreme?"
+
+"Well, a novice----" he hesitated. Then, "And you mean, ultimately, to
+take the black veil?"
+
+"Of course. I shall take it some day yet."
+
+He turned and looked at her, and the man in him felt the pity of it as
+do all men when such fresh, virginal youth as was Miss Dumont's turns
+an enraptured face toward that cloister door which never again opens
+on those who enter.
+
+Her arm rested warmly and confidently within his; the cold had made
+her cheeks very pink and had crisped the tendrils of her brown hair
+under the fur toque.
+
+"If," she said happily, "you have found in me a friend, it is because
+my heart is much too small for all the love I bear my fellow beings."
+
+"That's a quaint thing to say," he said.
+
+"It's really true. I care so deeply, so keenly, for my fellow beings
+whom God made, that there seemed only one way to express it--to give
+myself to God and pass my life in His service who made these fellow
+creatures all around me that I love."
+
+"I suppose," he said, "that is one way of looking at it."
+
+"It seemed to be the only way for me. I came to it by stages.... And
+first, as a child, I was impressed by the loveliness of the world and
+I used to sit for hours thinking of the goodness of God. And then
+other phases came--socialistic cravings and settlement work--but you
+know that was not enough. My heart was too full to be satisfied. There
+was not enough outlet."
+
+"What did you do then?"
+
+"I studied: I didn't know what I wanted, what I needed. I seemed lost;
+I was obsessed with a desire to aid--to be of service. I thought that
+perhaps if I travelled and studied methods----"
+
+She looked straight ahead of her with a sad little reflective smile:
+
+"I have passed by many strange places in the world.... And then I saw
+the little Grand Duchess at the Charity Bazaar.... We seemed to love
+each other at first glance.... She asked to have me for her
+companion.... They investigated.... And so I went to her."
+
+The girl's face became sombre and she bent her dark eyes on the snow
+as they walked.
+
+All the world was humming and throbbing with the thunder of the
+Russian guns. Flakes continually dropped from vibrating pine trees. A
+pale yellow haze veiled the sun.
+
+Suddenly Miss Dumont lifted her head:
+
+"If anything ever happens to part me from my friend," she said, "I
+hope I shall die quickly."
+
+"Are you and she so devoted?" he asked gravely.
+
+"Utterly. And if we can not some day take the vows together and enter
+the same order and the same convent, then the one who is free to do so
+is so pledged.... I do not think that the Empress will consent to the
+Grand Duchess Marie taking the veil.... And so, when she has no
+further need of me, I shall make my novitiate.... There are soldiers
+ahead, Mr. Estridge. Is it the woman's battalion?"
+
+He, also, had caught sight of them. He nodded.
+
+"It is the Battalion of Death," he said in a low voice. "Let's see
+what they look like."
+
+The girl-soldiers stood about carelessly, there in the snow among the
+silver birches and pines. They looked like boys in overcoats and boots
+and tall wool caps, leaning at ease there on their heavy rifles. Some
+were only fifteen years of age. Some had been servants, some
+saleswomen, stenographers, telephone operators, dressmakers, workers
+in the fields, students at the university, dancers, laundresses. And a
+few had been born into the aristocracy.
+
+They came, too, from all parts of the huge, sprawling Empire, these
+girl-soldiers of the Battalion of Death--and there were Cossack girls
+and gypsies among them--girls from Finland, Courland, from the Urals,
+from Moscow, from Siberia--from North, South, East, West.
+
+There were Jewesses from the Pale and one Jewess from America in the
+ranks; there were Chinese girls, Poles, a child of fifteen from
+Trebizond, a Japanese girl, a French peasant lass; and there were
+Finns, too, and Scandinavians--all with clipped hair under the
+astrakhan caps--sturdy, well shaped, soldierly girls who handled their
+heavy rifles without effort and carried a regulation equipment as
+though it were a sheaf of flowers.
+
+Their commanding officer was a woman of forty. She lounged in front of
+the battalion in the snow, consulting with half a dozen officers of a
+man's regiment.
+
+The colour guard stood grouped around the battalion colours, where its
+white and gold folds swayed languidly in the breeze, and clots of
+virgin snow fell upon it, shaken down from the pines by the
+cannonade.
+
+Estridge gazed at them in silence. In his man's mind one thought
+dominated--the immense pity of it all. And there was a dreadful
+fascination in looking at these girl soldiers, whose soft, warm flesh
+was so soon to be mangled by shrapnel and slashed by bayonets.
+
+"Good heavens," he muttered at last under his breath. "Was this
+necessary?"
+
+"The men ran," said Miss Dumont.
+
+"It was the filthy boche propaganda that demoralised them," rejoined
+Estridge. "I wonder--_are_ women more level headed? Is propaganda
+wasted on these girl soldiers? Are they really superior to the male
+of the species?"
+
+"I think," said Miss Dumont softly, "that their spiritual intelligence
+is deeper."
+
+"They see more clearly, morally?"
+
+"I don't know.... I think so sometimes.... We women, who are born
+capable of motherhood, seem to be fashioned also to realise Christ
+more clearly--and the holy mother who bore him.... I don't know if
+that's the reason--or if, truly, in us a little flame burns more
+constantly--the passion which instinctively flames more brightly
+toward things of the spirit than of the flesh.... I think it is true,
+Mr. Estridge, that, unless taught otherwise by men, women's
+inclination is toward the spiritual, and the ardour of her passion
+aspires instinctively to a greater love until the lesser confuses and
+perplexes her with its clamorous importunity."
+
+"Woman's love for man you call the lesser love?" he asked.
+
+"Yes, it is, compared to love for God," she said dreamily.
+
+Some of the girl-soldiers in the Battalion of Death turned their heads
+to look at this young girl in furs, who had come among them on the arm
+of a Red Cross driver.
+
+Estridge was aware of many bib brown eyes, many grey eyes, some blue
+ones fixed on him and on his companion in friendly or curious inquiry.
+They made him think of the large, innocent eyes of deer or channel
+cattle, for there was something both sweet and wild as well as honest
+in the gaze of these girl-soldiers.
+
+One, a magnificent blond six-foot creature with the peaches-and-cream
+skin of Scandinavia and the clipped gold hair of the northland,
+smiled at Miss Dumont, displaying a set of superb teeth.
+
+"You have come to see us make our first charge?" she asked in Russian,
+her sea-blue eyes all a-sparkle.
+
+Miss Dumont said "Yes," very seriously, looking at the girl's
+equipment, her blanket roll, gas-mask, boots and overcoat.
+
+Estridge turned to another girl-soldier:
+
+"And if you are made a prisoner?" he enquired in a low voice. "Have
+you women considered that?"
+
+"Nechevo," smiled the girl, who had been a Red Cross nurse, and who
+wore two decorations. She touched the red and black dashes of colour
+on her sleeve significantly, then loosened her tunic and drew out a
+tiny bag of chamois. "We all carry poison," she said smilingly. "We
+know the boche well enough to take that precaution."
+
+Another girl nodded confirmation. They were perfectly cheerful about
+it. Several others drew near and showed their little bags of poison
+slung around their necks inside their blouses. Many of them wore holy
+relics and medals also.
+
+Miss Dumont took Estridge's arm again and looked over at the big blond
+girl-soldier, who also had been smilingly regarding her, and who now
+stepped forward to meet them halfway.
+
+"When do you march to the first trenches?" asked Miss Dumont gravely.
+
+"Oh," said the blond goddess, "so you are English?" And she added in
+English: "I am Swedish. You have arrived just in time. I t'ink we go
+forward immediately."
+
+"God go with you, for Russia," said Miss Dumont in a clear, controlled
+voice.
+
+But Estridge saw that her dark eyes were suddenly brilliant with
+tears. The big blond girl-soldier saw it, too, and her splendid blue
+eyes widened. Then, somehow, she had stepped forward and taken Miss
+Dumont in her strong arms; and, holding her, smiled and gazed intently
+at her.
+
+"You must not grieve for us," she said. "We are not afraid. We are
+happy to go."
+
+"I know," said Palla Dumont; and took the girl-soldier's hands in
+hers. "What is your name?" she asked.
+
+"Ilse Westgard. And yours?"
+
+"Palla Dumont."
+
+"English? No?"
+
+"American."
+
+"Ah! One of our dear Americans! Well, then, you shall tell your
+countrymen that you have seen many women of many lands fighting rifle
+in hand, so that the boche shall not strangle freedom in Russia. Will
+you tell them, Palla?"
+
+"If I ever return."
+
+"You shall return. I, also, shall go to America. I shall seek for you
+there, pretty comrade. We shall become friends. Already I love you
+very dearly."
+
+She kissed Palla Dumont on both cheeks, holding her hands tightly.
+
+"Tell me," she said, "why you are in Russia, and where you are now
+journeying?"
+
+Palla looked at her steadily: "I am the American companion to the
+Grand Duchess Marie; and I am journeying to the village where the
+Imperial family is detained, because she has obtained permission for
+me to rejoin her."
+
+There was a short silence; the blue eyes of the Swedish girl had
+become frosty as two midwinter stars. Suddenly they glimmered warm
+again as twin violets:
+
+"Kharasho!" she said smiling. "And do you love your little comrade
+duchess?"
+
+"Next only to God."
+
+"That is very beautiful, Palla. She is a child to be enlightened.
+Teach her the greater truth."
+
+"She has learned it, Ilse."
+
+"_She_?"
+
+"Yes. And, if God wills it, she, and I also, take the vows some day."
+
+"The veil!"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"You! A nun!"
+
+"If God accepts me."
+
+The Swedish girl-soldier stood gazing upon her as though fascinated,
+crushing Palla's slim hands between her own.
+
+Presently she shook her head with a wearied smile:
+
+"That," she said, "is one thing I can not understand--the veil. No. I
+can understand _this_----" turning her head and glancing proudly
+around her at her girl comrades. "I can comprehend this thing that I
+am doing. But not what you wish to do, Palla. Not such service as you
+offer."
+
+"I wish to serve the source of all good. My heart is too full to be
+satisfied by serving mankind alone."
+
+The girl-soldier shook her head: "I try to understand. I can not. I am
+sorry, because I love you."
+
+"I love you, Ilse. I love my fellows."
+
+After another silence:
+
+"You go to the imperial family?" demanded Ilse abruptly.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"I wish to see you again. I shall try."
+
+The battalion marched a few moments later.
+
+It was rather a bad business. They went over the top with a cheer.
+Fifty answered roll call that night.
+
+However, the hun had learned one thing--that women soldiers were
+inferior to none.
+
+Russia learned it, too. Everywhere battalions were raised, uniformed,
+armed, equipped, drilled. In the streets of cities the girl-soldiers
+became familiar sights: nobody any longer turned to stare at them.
+There were several dozen girls in the officers' school, trying for
+commissions. In all the larger cities there were infantry battalions
+of girls, Cossack troops, machine gun units, signallers; they had a
+medical corps and transport service.
+
+But never but once again did they go into action. And their last stand
+was made facing their own people, the brain-crazed Reds.
+
+And after that the Battalion of Death became only a name; and the
+girl-soldiers bewildered fugitives, hunted down by the traitors who
+had sold out to the Germans at Brest-Litovsk.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE
+
+
+A door opened; the rush of foggy air set the flames of the altar
+candles blowing wildly. There came the clank of armed men.
+
+Then, in the dim light of the chapel, a novice sprang to her feet,
+brushing the white veil from her pallid young face.
+
+At that the ex-Empress, still kneeling, lifted her head from her
+devotions and calmly turned it, looking around over her right
+shoulder.
+
+The file of Red infantry advanced, shuffling slowly forward as though
+feeling their way through the candle-lit dusk across the stone floor.
+Their accoutrements clattered and clinked in the intense stillness. A
+slovenly officer, switching a thin, naked sword in his ungloved fist,
+led them. Another officer, carrying a sabre and marching in the rear,
+halted to slam and lock the heavy chapel door; then he ran forward to
+rejoin his men, while the chapel still reverberated with the echoes of
+the clanging door.
+
+A chair or two fell, pushed aside by the leading soldiers and hastily
+kicked out of the way as the others advanced more swiftly now. For
+there seemed to be some haste. These men were plainly in a hurry,
+whatever their business there might be.
+
+The Tzesarevitch, kneeling beside his mother, got up from his knees
+with visible difficulty. The Empress also rose, leisurely, supporting
+herself by one hand resting on the prie-dieu.
+
+Then several young girls, who had been kneeling behind her at their
+devotions, stood up and turned to stare at the oncoming armed men, now
+surrounding them.
+
+The officer carrying the naked sword, and reeking with fumes of
+brandy, counted these women in a loud, thick voice.
+
+"That's right," he said. "You're all present--one! two! three! four!
+five! six!--the whole accursed brood!" pointing waveringly with his
+sword from one to another.
+
+Then he laughed stupidly, leering out of his inflamed eyes at the five
+women who all wore the garbs of the Sisters of Mercy, their white
+coiffes and tabliers contrasting sharply with the sombre habits of the
+Russian nuns who had gathered in the candle-lit dusk behind them.
+
+"What do you wish?" demanded the ex-Empress in a fairly steady voice.
+
+"Answer to your names!" retorted the officer brutally. The other
+officer came up and began to fumble for a note book in the breast of
+his dirty tunic. When he found it he licked the lead of his pencil and
+squinted at the ex-Empress out of drunken eyes.
+
+"Alexandra Feodorovna!" he barked in her face. "If you're here, say
+so!"
+
+She remained calm, mute, cold as ice.
+
+A soldier behind her suddenly began to shout:
+
+"That's the German woman. That's the friend of the Staretz Novykh!
+That's Sascha! Now we've got her, the thing to do is to shoot
+her----"
+
+"Mark her present," interrupted the officer in command. "No
+ceremony, now. Mark the cub Romanoff present. Mark 'em all--Olga,
+Tatyana, Marie, Anastasia!--no matter which is which--they're all
+Romanoffs----"
+
+But the same soldier who had interrupted before bawled out again:
+"They're not Romanoffs! There are no German Romanoffs. There are no
+Romanoffs in Russia since a hundred and fifty years----"
+
+The little Tzesarevitch, Alexis, red with anger, stepped forward to
+confront the man, his frail hands fiercely clenched. The officer in
+command struck him brutally across the breast with the flat of his
+sword, shoved him aside, strode toward the low door of the chapel
+crypt and jerked it open.
+
+"Line them up!" he bawled. "We'll settle this Romanoff dispute once
+for all! Shove them into line! Hurry up, there!"
+
+But there seemed to be some confusion between the nuns and the
+soldiers, as the latter attempted to separate the ex-Empress and the
+young Grand Duchesses from the sisters.
+
+"What's all that trouble about!" cried the officer commanding. "Drive
+back those nuns, I tell you! They're Germans, too! They're Sascha's
+new Deaconesses! Kick 'em out of the way!"
+
+Then the novice, who had cried out in fear when the Red infantry first
+entered the chapel, forced her way out into the file formed by the
+Empress and her daughters.
+
+"There's a frightful mistake!" she cried, laying one hand on the arm
+of a young girl dressed, like the others, as a Sister of Mercy. "This
+woman is Miss Dumont, my American companion! Release her! =I= am the
+Grand Duchess Marie!"
+
+The girl, whose arm had been seized, looked at the young novice over
+her shoulder in a dazed way; then, suddenly her lovely face flushed
+scarlet; tears sprang to her eyes; and she said to the infuriated
+officer:
+
+"It is not true, Captain! I am the Grand Duchess Marie. She is trying
+to save me!"
+
+"What the devil is all this row!" roared the officer, who now came
+tramping and storming among the prisoners, switching his sword to and
+fro with ferocious impatience.
+
+The little Sister of Mercy, frightened but resolute, pointed at the
+novice, who still clutched her by the arm: "It is not true what she
+tells you," she repeated. "I am the Grand Duchess Marie, and this
+novice is my American companion, Miss Dumont, who loves me devotedly
+and who now attempts to sacrifice herself in my place----"
+
+"I _am_ the Grand Duchess Marie!" interrupted the novice excitedly.
+"This young girl dressed like a Sister of Mercy is only my American
+companion----"
+
+"Damnation!" yelled the officer. "I'll take you both, then!" But the
+girl in the Sister of Mercy's garb turned and violently pushed the
+novice from her so that she stumbled and fell on her knees among the
+nuns.
+
+Then, confronting the officer: "You Bolshevik dog," she said
+contemptuously, "don't you even know the daughter of your dead Emperor
+when you see her!" And she struck him across the face with her prayer
+book.
+
+As he recoiled from the blow a soldier shouted: "There's your proof!
+There's your insolent Romanoff for you! To hell with the whole litter!
+Shoot them!" Instantly a savage roar from the Reds filled that dim
+place; a soldier violently pushed the young Tzesarevitch into the file
+behind the Empress and held him there; the Grand Duchess Olga was
+flung bodily after him; the other children, in their hospital dresses,
+were shoved brutally toward their places, menaced by butt and
+bayonet.
+
+"March!" bawled the officer in command.
+
+But now, among the dark-garbed nuns, a slender white figure was
+struggling frantically to free herself:
+
+"You red dogs!" she cried in an agonised voice. "Let that English
+woman go! It is I you want! Do you hear! I mock at you! I mock at your
+resolution! Boje Tzaria Khrani! Down with the Bolsheviki!"
+
+A soldier turned and fired at her; the bullet smashed an ikon above
+her head.
+
+"I am the Grand Duchess Marie!" she sobbed. "I demand my place! I
+demand my fate! Let that American girl go! Do you hear what I say? Red
+beasts! Red beasts! I am the Grand Duchess!----"
+
+The officer who closed the file turned savagely and shook his heavy
+cavalry sabre at her: "I'll come back in a moment and cut your throat
+for you!" he yelled.
+
+Then, in the file, and just as the last bayonets were vanishing
+through the crypt door, one of the young girls turned and kissed her
+hand to the sobbing novice--a pretty gesture, tender, gay, not tragic,
+even almost mischievously triumphant.
+
+It was the adieu of the Grand Duchess Tatyana to the living world--her
+last glimpse of it through the flames of the altar candles gilding the
+dead Christ on his jewelled cross--the image of that Christ she was so
+soon to gaze upon when those lovely, mischievous young eyes of hers
+unclosed in Paradise....
+
+The door of the crypt slammed. A terrible silence reigned in the
+chapel.
+
+Then the novice uttered a cry, caught the foot of the cross with
+desperate hands, hung there convulsively.
+
+To her the Mother Superior turned, weeping. But at her touch the girl,
+crazed with grief, lifted both hands and tore from her own face the
+veil of her novitiate just begun;--tore her white garments from her
+shoulders, crying out in a strangled voice that if a Christian God let
+such things happen then He was no God of hers--that she would never
+enter His service--that the Lord Christ was no bridegroom for her;
+and, her novitiate was ended--ended together with every vow of
+chastity, of humility, of poverty, of even common humanity which she
+had ever hoped to take.
+
+The girl was now utterly beside herself; at one moment flaming and
+storming with fury among the terrified, huddling nuns; the next
+instant weeping, stamping her felt-shod foot in ungovernable revolt at
+this horror which any God in any heaven could permit.
+
+And again and again she called out on Christ to stop this thing and
+prove Himself a real God to a pagan world that mocked Him.
+
+Dishevelled, her rent veil in tatters on her naked shoulders, she
+sprang across the chapel to the crypt door, shook it, tore at it,
+seized chair after chair and shattered them to splinters against the
+solid panels of oak and iron.
+
+Then, suddenly motionless, she crouched and listened.
+
+"Oh, Mother of God!" she panted, "intervene now--_now_!--or never!"
+
+The muffled rattle of a rather ragged volley answered her prayer.
+
+Outside the convent a sentry--a Kronstadt sailor--stood. He also heard
+the underground racket. He nodded contentedly to himself. Other shots
+followed--pistol shots--singly.
+
+After a few moments a wisp of smoke from the crypt crept lazily out of
+the low oubliettes. The day was grey and misty; rain threatened; and
+the rifle smoke clung low to the withered grass, scarcely lifting.
+
+The sentry lighted a third cigarette, one eye on the barred
+oubliettes, from which the smoke crawled and spread out over the
+grass.
+
+After a while a sweating face appeared behind the bars and a
+half-stifled voice demanded why there was any delay about fetching
+quick-lime. And, still clinging to the bars with bloody fingers, he
+added:
+
+"There's a damned novice in the chapel. I promised to cut her throat
+for her. Go in and get her and bring her down here."
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+The novice was nowhere to be found.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+They searched the convent thoroughly; they went out into the garden
+and beat the shrubbery, kicking through bushes and saplings, their
+cocked rifles poised for a snap shot.
+
+Peasants, gathering there more thickly now, watched them stupidly; the
+throng increased in the convent grounds. Some Bolshevik soldiers
+pushed through the rapidly growing crowd and ran toward a birch wood
+east of the convent. Beyond the silvery fringe of birches, larger
+trees of a heavy, hard-wood forest loomed. Among these splendid trees
+a number of beeches were being felled on both sides of the road.
+
+"Did you see a White Nun run this way?" demanded the soldiers of the
+wood-cutters. The latter shook their heads:
+
+"Nothing has passed," they said seriously, "except some Ural Cossacks
+riding north like lost souls in a hurricane."
+
+An officer of the Red battalion, who had now hastened up with pistol
+swinging, flew into a frightful rage:
+
+"Cossacks!" he bellowed. "You cowardly dogs, what do you mean by
+letting Kaledines' horsemen gallop over you like that--you with your
+saws and axes--twenty lusty comrades to block the road and pull the
+Imperialists off their horses! Shame! For all I know you've let a
+Romanoff escape alive into the world! That's probably what you've
+done, you greasy louts!"
+
+The wood-cutters gaped stupidly; the Bolshevik officer cursed them
+again and gesticulated with his pistol. Other soldiers of the Red
+battalion ran up. One nudged the officer's elbow without saluting:
+
+"That other prisoner can't be found----"
+
+"What! That Swedish girl!" yelled the officer.
+
+Several soldiers began speaking excitedly:
+
+"While we were in the cellar, they say she ran away----"
+
+"Yes, Captain, while we were about that business in the crypt,
+Kaledines' horsemen rode up outside----"
+
+"Who saw them?" demanded the officer hoarsely. "God curse you, who saw
+them?"
+
+Some peasants had now come up. One of them began:
+
+"Your _honour_, I saw Prince Kaledines' riders----"
+
+"_Whose!_"
+
+"The Hetman's----"
+
+"Your _honour_! _Prince_ Kaledines! The Hetman! Damnation! Who do you
+think you are! Who do you think I am!" burst out the Red officer in a
+fury. "Get out of my way!----" He pushed the peasants right and left
+and strode away toward the convent. His soldiers began to straggle
+after him. One of them winked at the wood-cutters with his tongue in
+his cheek, and slung the rifle he carried over his right shoulder _en
+bandouliere_, muzzle downward.
+
+"The Tavarish is in a temper," he said with a jerk of his thumb
+toward the officer. "We arrested that Swedish girl in the uniform
+of the woman's battalion. One shoots that breed on sight, you know.
+But we were in such a hurry to finish with the Romanoffs----" He
+shrugged: "You see, comrades, we should have taken her into the crypt
+and shot her along with the Romanoffs. That's how one loses these
+birds--they're off if you turn your back to light a cigarette in
+the wind."
+
+One of the wood-cutters said: "Among Kaledines' horsemen were two
+women. One was crop-headed like a boy, and half naked."
+
+"A White Nun?"
+
+"God knows. She had some white rags hanging to her body, and dark hair
+clipped like a boy's."
+
+"That--was--she!" said the soldier with slow conviction. He turned and
+looked down the long perspective of the forest road. Only a raven
+stalked there all alone over the fallen leaves.
+
+"Certainly," he said, "that was our White Nun. The Cossacks took her
+with them. They must have ridden fast, the horsemen of Kaledines."
+
+"Like a swift storm. Like the souls of the damned," replied a
+peasant.
+
+The soldier shrugged: "If there's still a Romanoff loose in the
+world, God save the world!... And that big heifer of a Swedish
+wench!--she was a bad one, I tell you!--Took six of us to catch her
+and ten to hold her by her ten fingers and toes! Hey! God bless me,
+but she stands six feet and is made of steel cased in silk--all white,
+smooth and iron-hard--the blond young snow-tiger that she is!--the
+yellow-haired, six-foot, slippery beastess! God bless me--God bless
+me!" he muttered, staring down the wood-road to its vanishing point
+against the grey horizon.
+
+Then he hitched his slung rifle to a more comfortable position,
+turned, gazed at the convent across the fields, which his distant
+comrades were now approaching.
+
+"A German nest," he said aloud to himself, "full of their damned
+Deaconesses! Hey! I'll be going along to see what's to be done with
+them, also!"
+
+He nodded to the wood-cutters:
+
+"Vermin-killing time," he remarked cheerily. "After the dirty work is
+done, peace, land enough for everybody, ease and plenty and a full
+glass always at one's elbows--eh, comrades?"
+
+He strode away across the fields.
+
+It had begun to snow.
+
+
+
+
+ARGUMENT
+
+
+The Cossacks sang as they rode:
+
+                                   I
+
+                     "Life is against us
+                     We are born crying:
+                     Life that commenced us
+                     Leaves us all dying.
+                            We were born crying;
+                            We shall die sighing.
+
+                     "Shall we sit idle?
+                     Follow Death's dance!
+                     Pick up your bridle,
+                     Saddle and lance!
+                     Cossacks, advance!"
+
+They were from the Urals: they sat their shaggy little grey horses,
+lance in hand, stirrup deep in saddle paraphernalia--kit-bags, tents,
+blankets, trusses of straw, a dead fowl or two or a quarter of beef.
+And from every saddle dangled a balalaika and the terrible Cossack
+whip.
+
+The steel of their lances flashed red in the setting sun; snow whirled
+before the wind in blinding pinkish clouds, powdering horse and rider
+from head to heel.
+
+Again one rider unslung his balalaika, struck it, looking skyward as
+he rode:
+
+                    "Stars in your courses,
+                    This is our answer;
+                    Women and horses,
+                    Singer and dancer
+                             Fall to the lancer!
+                             That is your answer!
+
+                    "Though the Dark Raider
+                    Rob us of joy----
+                    Death, the Invader,
+                    Come to destroy----
+                    _Nichevo! Stoi!_"
+
+They rode into a forest, slowly, filing among the silver birches, then
+trotting out amid the pines.
+
+The Swedish girl towered in her saddle, dwarfing the shaggy pony. She
+wore her grey wool cap, overcoat, and boots. Pistols bulged in the
+saddle holsters; sacks of grain and a bag of camp tins lay across
+pommel and cantle.
+
+Beside her rode the novice, swathed to the eyes in a sheepskin
+greatcoat, and a fur cap sheltering her shorn head.
+
+Her lethargy--a week's reaction from the horrors of the convent--had
+vanished; and a feverish, restless alertness had taken its place.
+
+Nothing of the still, white novice was visible now in her brilliant
+eyes and flushed cheeks.
+
+Her tragic silence had given place to an unnatural loquacity; her
+grief to easily aroused mirth; and the dark sorrow in her haunted eyes
+was gone, and they grew brown and sunny and vivacious.
+
+She talked freely with her comrade, Ilse Westgard; she exchanged
+gossip and banter with the Cossacks, argued with them, laughed with
+them, sang with them.
+
+At night she slept in her sheepskin in Ilse Westgard's vigorous arms;
+morning, noon and evening she filled the samovar with snow beside
+Cossack fires, or in the rare cantonments afforded in wretched
+villages, where whiskered and filthy mujiks cringed to the Cossacks,
+whispering to one another: "There is no end to death; there is no end
+to the fighting and the dying, God bless us all. There is no end."
+
+In the glare of great fires in muddy streets she stood, swathed in her
+greatcoat, her cap pushed back, looking like some beautiful, impudent
+boy, while the Cossacks sang "Lada oy Lada!"--and let their slanting
+eyes wander sideways toward her, till her frank laughter set the
+singers grinning and the _gusli_ was laid aside.
+
+And once, after a swift gallop to cross a railroad and an exchange of
+shots with the Red guards at long range, the sotnia of the Wild
+Division rode at evening into a little hamlet of one short, miserable
+street, and shouted for a fire that could be seen as far as Moscow.
+
+That night they discovered vodka--not much--enough to set them
+singing first, then dancing. The troopers danced together in the
+fire-glare--clumsily, in their boots, with interims of the _pas
+seul_ savouring of the capers of those ancient Mongol horsemen in
+the _Hezars_ of Genghis Khan.
+
+But no dancing, no singing, no clumsy capers were enough to satisfy
+these riders of the Wild Division, now made boisterous by vodka and
+horse-meat. Gossip crackled in every group; jests flew; they shouted
+at the peasants; they roared at their own jokes.
+
+"Comrade novice!--Pretty boy with a shorn head!" they bawled.
+"Harangue us once more on law and love."
+
+She stood with legs apart and thumbs hooked in her belt, laughing at
+them across the fire. And all around crowded the wretched _mujiks_,
+peering at her through shaggy hair, out of little wolfish eyes.
+
+A Cossack shouted: "My law first! Land for all! That is what we have,
+we Cossacks! Land for the people, one and all--land for the _mujik_;
+land for the bourgeois; land for the aristocrat! That law solves all,
+clears all questions, satisfies all. It is the Law of Peace!"
+
+A Cossack shoved a soldier-deserter forward into the firelight. He
+wore a patch of red on his sleeve.
+
+"Answer, comrade! Is that the true law? Or have you and your comrades
+made a better one in Petrograd?"
+
+The deserter, a little frightened, tried to grin: "A good law is, kill
+all generals," he said huskily. "Afterward we shall have peace."
+
+A roar of laughter greeted him; these dark, thickset Cossacks with
+slanting eyes were from the Urals. What did they care how many
+generals were killed? Besides, their hetman had already killed
+himself.
+
+Their officer moved out into the firelight--a reckless rider but a
+dull brain--and stood lashing at his snow-crusted boots with the
+silver-mounted quirt.
+
+"Like gendarmes," he said, "we Cossacks are forever doing the dirty
+work of other people. Why? It begins to sicken me. Why are we forever
+executing the law! What law? Who made it? The Tzar. And he is dead,
+and what is the good of the law he made?
+
+"Why should free Cossacks be policemen any more when there is no law?
+
+"We played gendarme for the Monarchists. We answered the distress call
+of the Cadets and the bourgeoisie! Where are they? Where is the law
+they made?"
+
+He stood switching his dirty boots and swinging his heavy head right
+and left with the stupid, lowering menace of a bull.
+
+"Then came the Mensheviki with their law," he bellowed suddenly.
+"Again we became policemen, galloping to their whistle. Where are
+they? Where is their law?"
+
+He spat on the snow, twirled his quirt.
+
+"There is only one law to govern the land," he roared. "It is the law
+of hands off and mind your business! It's a good law."
+
+"A good law for those who already have something," cried a high, thin
+voice from the throng of peasants.
+
+The Cossacks, who all possessed their portion of land, yelled with
+laughter. One of them called out to the Swedish girl for her opinion,
+and the fair young giantess strode gracefully out into the fire-ring,
+her cap in her hand and the thick blond ringlets shining like gold on
+her beautiful head.
+
+"Listen! Listen to this soldier of the Death Battalion!" shouted the
+Cossacks in great glee. "She will tell us what the law should be!"
+
+She laughed: "We fought for it--we women soldiers," she said. "And the
+law we fought for was made when the first tyrant fell.
+
+"This is the law: Freedom of mind; liberty of choice; an equal chance
+for all; no violence; only orderly debate to determine the will of the
+land."
+
+A Cossack said loudly: "_Da volna!_ Those who have nothing would take,
+then, from those who have!"
+
+"I think not!" cried another,"--not in the Urals!"
+
+Thunderous laughter from their comrades and cries of, "Palla! Let us
+hear our pretty boy, who has made for the whole world a law."
+
+Palla Dumont, her slender hands thrust deep in her great coat sleeves,
+and standing like a nun lost in mystic revery, looked up with gay
+audacity--not like a nun at all, now, save for the virginal allure
+that seemed a part of the girl.
+
+"There is only one law, Tavarishi," she said, turning slightly from
+her hips as she spoke, to include those behind her in the circle: "and
+that law was not made by man. That law was born, already made, when
+the first man was born. It has never changed. It comprehends
+everything; includes everything and everybody; it solves all
+perplexity, clears all doubts, decides all questions.
+
+"It is a living law; it exists; it is the key to every problem; and it
+is all ready for you."
+
+The girl's face had altered; the half mischievous audacity in defiance
+of her situation--the gay, impudent confidence in herself and in these
+wild comrades of hers, had given place to something more serious, more
+ardent--the youthful intensity that smiles through the flaming
+enchantment of suddenly discovered knowledge.
+
+"It is the oldest of all laws," she said. "It was born perfect. It is
+yours if you accept it. And this law is the Law of Love."
+
+A peasant muttered: "One gives where one loves."
+
+The girl turned swiftly: "That is the soul of the Law!" she cried, "to
+give! Is there any other happiness, Tavarishi? Is there any other
+peace? Is there need of any other law?
+
+"I tell you that the Law of Love slays greed! And when greed dies, war
+dies. And hunger, and misery die, too!
+
+"Of what use is any government and its lesser laws and customs, unless
+it is itself governed by that paramount Law?
+
+"Of what avail are your religions, your churches, your priests, your
+saints, relics, ikons--all your candles and observances--unless
+dominated by that Law?
+
+"Of what use is your God unless that Law of Love also governs Him?"
+
+She stood gazing at the firelit faces, the virginal half-smile on her
+lips.
+
+A peasant broke the silence: "Is she a new saint, then?" he said
+distinctly.
+
+A Cossack nodded to her, grinning respectfully:
+
+"We always like your sermons, little novice," he said. And, to the
+others: "Nobody wishes to deny what she says is quite true"--he
+scratched his head, still grinning--"only--while there are Kurds in
+the world----"
+
+"And Bolsheviki!" shouted another.
+
+"True! And Turks! God bless us, Tavarishi," he added with a wry face,
+"it takes a stronger stomach to love these beasts than is mine----"
+
+In the sudden shout of laughter the girl, Palla, looked around at her
+comrade, Ilse.
+
+"Until each accepts the Law of Love," said the Swedish girl-soldier,
+laughing, "it can not be a law."
+
+"I have accepted it," said Palla gaily; but her childishly lovely
+mouth was working, and she clenched her hands in her sleeves to
+control the tremor.
+
+Silent, the smile still stamped on her tremulous lips, she stood for a
+few moments, fighting back the deep emotions enveloping her in surging
+fire--the same ardent and mystic emotions which once had consumed her
+at the altar's foot, where she had knelt, a novice, dreaming of
+beatitudes ineffable.
+
+If that vision, for her, was ended--its substance but the shadow of a
+dream--the passion that created it, the fire that purified it, the
+ardent heart that needed love--love sacred, love unalloyed--needed
+love still, burned for it, yearning to give.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+As she lifted her head and looked around her with dark eyes still a
+little dazed, there was a sudden commotion among the _mujiks_; a
+Cossack called out something in a sharp voice; their officer walked
+hastily out into the darkness; a shadowy rider spurred ahead of him.
+
+Suddenly a far voice shouted: "Who goes there! _Stoi!_"
+
+Then red flashes came out of the night; Cossacks ran for their horses;
+Ilse appeared with Palla's pony as well as her own, and halted to
+listen, the fearless smile playing over her face.
+
+"Mount!" cried many voices at once. "The Reds!"
+
+Palla flung herself astride her saddle; Ilse galloped beside her,
+freeing her pistols; everywhere in the starlight the riders of the
+Wild Division came galloping, loosening their long lances as they
+checked their horses in close formation.
+
+Then, with scarcely a sound in the unbroken snow, they filed away
+eastward at a gentle trot, under the pale lustre of the stars.
+
+
+
+
+THE CRIMSON TIDE
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+
+On the 7th of November, 1917, the Premier of the Russian Revolutionary
+Government was a hunted fugitive, his ministers in prison, his troops
+scattered or dead. Three weeks later, the irresponsible Reds had begun
+their shameful career of treachery, counselled by a pallid, black-eyed
+man with a muzzle like a mouse--one L. D. Bronstein, called Trotzky;
+and by two others--one a bald, smooth-shaven, rotund little man with
+an expression that made men hesitate, and features not trusted by
+animals and children.
+
+The Red Parliament called him Vladimir Ulianov, and that's what he
+called himself. He had proved to be reticent, secretive, deceitful,
+diligent, and utterly unhuman. His lower lip was shaped as though
+something dripped from it. Blood, perhaps. His eyes were brown and not
+entirely unattractive. But God makes the eyes; the mouth is fashioned
+by one's self.
+
+The world knew him as Lenine.
+
+The third man squinted. He wore a patch of sparse cat-hairs on his
+chin and upper lip.
+
+His head was too big; his legs too short, but they were always in a
+hurry, always in motion. He had a persuasive and ardent tongue, and
+practically no mind. The few ideas he possessed inclined him to
+violence--always the substitute for reason in this sort of agitator.
+It was this ever latent violence that proved persuasive. His name was
+Krylenko. His smile was a grin.
+
+These three men betrayed Christ on March 3d, 1918.
+
+On the Finland Road, outside of Petrograd, the Red ragamuffins held a
+perpetual carmagnole, and all fugitives danced to their piping, and
+many paid for the music.
+
+But though White Guards and Red now operated in respectively hostile
+gangs everywhere throughout the land, and the treacherous hun armies
+were now in full tide of their Baltic invasion, there still remained
+ways and means of escape--inconspicuous highways and unguarded roads
+still open that led out of that white hell to the icy but friendly
+seas clashing against the northward coasts.
+
+Diplomats were inelegantly "beating it." A kindly but futile
+Ambassador shook the snow of Petrograd from his galoshes and solemnly
+and laboriously vanished. Mixed bands of attaches, consular personnel,
+casuals, emissaries, newspaper men, and mission specialists scattered
+into unfeigned flight toward those several and distant sections of
+"God's Country," divided among civilised nations and lying far away
+somewhere in the outer sunshine.
+
+Sometimes White Guards caught these fugitives; sometimes Red Guards;
+and sometimes the hun nabbed them on the general hunnish principle
+that whatever is running away is fair game for a pot shot.
+
+Even the American Red Cross was "suspect"--treachery being alleged in
+its relations with Roumania; and hun and Bolshevik became very
+troublesome--so troublesome, in fact, that Estridge, for example, was
+having an impossible time of it, arrested every few days, wriggling
+out of it, only to be collared again and detained.
+
+Sometimes they questioned him concerning gun-running into Roumania;
+sometimes in regard to his part in conducting the American girl, Miss
+Dumont, to the convent where the imperial family had been detained.
+
+That the de facto government had requested him to undertake this
+mission and to employ an American Red Cross ambulance in the affair
+seemed to make no difference.
+
+He continued to be dogged, spied on, arrested, detained, badgered,
+until one evening, leaving the Smolny, he encountered an American--a
+slim, short man who smiled amiably upon him through his glasses,
+removed a cigar from his lips, and asked Estridge what was the nature
+of his evident and visible trouble.
+
+So they walked back to the hotel together and settled on a course of
+action during the long walk. What this friend in need did and how he
+did it, Estridge never learned; but that same evening he was
+instructed to pack up, take a train, and descend at a certain station
+a few hours later.
+
+Estridge followed instructions, encountered no interference, got off
+at the station designated, and waited there all day, drinking boiling
+tea.
+
+Toward evening a train from Petrograd stopped at the station, and from
+the open door of a compartment Estridge saw his chance acquaintance of
+the previous day making signs to him to get aboard.
+
+Nobody interfered. They had a long, cold, unpleasant night journey,
+wedged in between two soldiers wearing arm-bands, who glowered at a
+Russian general officer opposite, and continued to mutter to each
+other about imperialists, bourgeoisie, and cadets.
+
+At every stop they were inspected by lantern light, their papers
+examined, and sometimes their luggage opened. But these examinations
+seemed to be perfunctory, and nobody was detained.
+
+In the grey of morning the train stopped and some soldiers with red
+arm-bands looked in and insulted the general officer, but offered no
+violence. The officer gave them a stony glance and closed his cold,
+puffy eyes in disdain. He was blond and looked like a German.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+At the next stop Estridge received a careless nod from his chance
+acquaintance, gathered up his luggage and descended to the frosty
+platform.
+
+Nobody bothered to open their bags; their papers were merely glanced
+at. They had some steaming tea and some sour bread together.
+
+A little later a large sleigh drove up behind the station; their light
+baggage was stowed aboard, they climbed in under the furs.
+
+"Now," remarked his calm companion to Estridge, "we're all right if
+the Reds, the Whites and the boches don't shoot us up."
+
+"What are the chances?" inquired Estridge.
+
+"Excellent, excellent," said his companion cheerily, "I should say we
+have about one chance in ten to get out of this alive. I'll take
+either end--ten to one we don't get out--ten to two we're shot up and
+not killed--ten to three we are arrested but not killed--one to ten we
+pull through with whole skins."
+
+Estridge smiled. They remained silent, probably preoccupied with the
+hazards of their respective fortunes. It grew colder toward noon.
+
+The young man seated beside Estridge in the sleigh smoked continually.
+
+He was attached to one of the American missions sent into Russia by an
+optimistic administration--a mission, as a whole, foredoomed to
+political failure.
+
+In every detail, too, it had already failed, excepting only in that
+particular part played by this young man, whose name was Brisson.
+
+He, however, had gone about his occult business in a most amazing
+manner--the manner of a Yankee who knows what he wants and what his
+country ought to want if it knew enough to know it wanted it.
+
+He was the last American to leave Petrograd: he had taken his time; he
+left only when he was quite ready to leave.
+
+And this was the man, now seated beside Estridge, who had coolly and
+cleverly taken his sporting chance in remaining till the eleventh hour
+and the fifty-ninth minute in the service of his country. Then, as the
+twelfth hour began to strike, he bluffed his way through.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+During the first two or three days of sleigh travel, Brisson learned
+all he desired to know about Estridge, and Estridge learned almost
+nothing about Brisson except that he possessed a most unholy genius
+for wriggling out of trouble.
+
+Nothing, nobody, seemed able to block this young man's progress. He
+bluffed his way through White Guards and Red; he squirmed affably out
+of the clutches of wandering Cossacks; he jollied officials of all
+shades of political opinion; but he always continued his journey from
+one etape to the next. Also, he was continually lighting one large
+cigar after another. Buttoned snugly into his New York-made arctic
+clothing, and far more comfortable at thirty below zero than was
+Estridge in Russian costume, he smoked comfortably in the teeth of the
+icy gale or conversed soundly on any topic chosen. And the range was
+wide.
+
+But about himself and his mission in Russia he never conversed except
+to remark, once, that he could buy better Russian clothing in New York
+than in Petrograd.
+
+Indeed, his only concession to the customs of the country was in the
+fur cap he wore. But it was the galoshes of Manhattan that saved his
+feet from freezing. He had two pair and gave one to Estridge.
+
+During several hundreds of miles in sleighs, Brisson's constant regret
+was the absence of ferocious wolves. He desired to enjoy the whole
+show as depicted by the geographies. He complained to Estridge quite
+seriously concerning the lack of enterprise among the wolves.
+
+But there seemed to be no wolves in Russia sufficiently polite to
+oblige him; so he comforted himself by patting his stomach where,
+sewed inside his outer underclothing, reposed documents destined to
+electrify the civilised world with proof infernal of the treachery of
+those three men who belong in history and in hell to the fraternity
+which includes Benedict Arnold and Judas.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+One late afternoon, while smoking his large cigar and hopefully
+inspecting the neighbouring forest for wolves, this able young man
+beheld a sotnia of Ural Cossacks galloping across the snow toward the
+flying sleigh, where he and Estridge sat so snugly ensconced.
+
+There was, of course, only one thing to do, and that was to halt.
+Kaledines had blown his brains out, but his riders rode as swiftly as
+ever. So the sleigh stopped.
+
+And now these matchless horsemen of the Wild Division came galloping
+up around the sleigh. Brilliant little slanting eyes glittered under
+shaggy head-gear; broad, thick-lipped mouths split into grins at sight
+of the two little American flags fluttering so gaily on the sleigh.
+
+Then two booted and furred riders climbed out of their saddles, and,
+under their sheepskin caps, Brisson saw the delicate features of two
+young women, one a big, superb, blue-eyed girl; the other slim,
+dark-eyed, and ivory-pale.
+
+The latter said in English: "Could you help us? We saw the flags on
+your sleigh. We are trying to leave the country. I am American. My
+name is Palla Dumont. My friend is Swedish and her name is Ilse
+Westgard."
+
+"Get in, any way," said Brisson briskly. "We can't be in a worse mess
+than we are. I imagine it's the same case with you. So if we're all
+going to smash, it's pleasanter, I think, to go together."
+
+At that the Swedish girl laughed and aided her companion to enter the
+sleigh.
+
+"Good-bye!" she called in her clear, gay voice to the Cossacks. "When
+we come back again we shall ride with you from Vladivostok to Moscow
+and never see an enemy!"
+
+When the young women were comfortably ensconced in the sleigh, the
+riders of the Wild Division crowded their horses around them and
+shook hands with them English fashion.
+
+"When you come back," they cried, "you shall find us riding through
+Petrograd behind Korniloff!" And to Brisson and Estridge, in a
+friendly manner: "Come also, comrades. We will show you a monument
+made out of heads and higher than the Kremlin. That would be a funny
+joke and worth coming back to see."
+
+Brisson said pleasantly that such an exquisite jest would be well
+worth their return to Russia.
+
+Everybody seemed pleased; the Cossacks wheeled their shaggy mounts and
+trotted away into the woods, singing. The sleigh drove on.
+
+"This is very jolly," said Brisson cheerfully. "Wherever we're bound
+for, now, we'll all go together."
+
+"Is not America the destination of your long journey?" inquired the
+big, blue-eyed girl.
+
+Brisson chuckled: "Yes," he said, "but bullets sometimes shorten
+routes and alter destinations. I think you ought to know the worst."
+
+"If that's the worst, it's nothing to frighten one," said the Swedish
+girl. And her crystalline laughter filled the icy air.
+
+She put one persuasive arm around her slender, dark-eyed comrade:
+
+"To meet God unexpectedly is nothing to scare one, is it, Palla?" she
+urged coaxingly.
+
+The other reddened and her eyes flashed: "What God do you mean?" she
+retorted. "If I have anything to say about my destination after death
+I shall go wherever love is. And it does not dwell with the God or in
+the Heaven that we have been taught to desire and hope for."
+
+The Swedish girl patted her shoulder and smiled in good humoured
+deprecation at Brisson and Estridge.
+
+"God let her dearest friend die under the rifles of the Reds," she
+explained cheerfully, "and my little comrade can not reconcile this
+sad affair with her faith in Divine justice. So she concludes there
+isn't any such thing. And no Divinity." She shrugged: "That is what
+shakes the faith in youth--the seeming indifference of the Most
+High."
+
+Palla Dumont sat silent. The colour had died out in her cheeks, her
+dark, indifferent eyes became fixed.
+
+Estridge opened the fur collar of his coat and pulled back his fur
+cap.
+
+"Do you remember me?" he said to Ilse Westgard.
+
+The girl laughed: "Yes, I remember you, now!"
+
+To Palla Dumont he said: "And do _you_ remember?"
+
+At that she looked up incuriously; leaned forward slowly; gazed
+intently at him; then she caught both his hands in hers with a swift,
+sobbing intake of breath.
+
+"You are John Estridge," she said. "You took me to her in your
+ambulance!" She pressed his hands almost convulsively, and he felt her
+trembling under the fur robe.
+
+"Is it true," he said, "--that ghastly tragedy?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"All died?"
+
+"All."
+
+Estridge turned to Brisson: "Miss Dumont was companion to the Grand
+Duchess Marie," he said in brief explanation.
+
+Brisson nodded, biting his cigar.
+
+The Swedish girl-soldier said: "They were devoted--the little Grand
+Duchess and Palla.... It was horrible, there in the convent
+cellar--those young girls----" She gazed out across the snow; then,
+
+"The Reds who did it had already made me prisoner.... They arrested me
+in uniform after the decree disbanding us.... I was on my way to join
+Kaledines' Cossacks--a rendezvous.... Well, the Reds left me outside
+the convent and went in to do their bloody work. And I gnawed the rope
+and ran into the chapel to hide among the nuns. And there I saw a
+White Nun--quite crazed with grief----"
+
+"I had heard the volley that killed her," said Palla, in explanation,
+to nobody in particular. She sat staring out across the snow with dry,
+bright eyes.
+
+Brisson looked askance at her, looked significantly at the Swedish
+girl, Ilse Westgard: "And what happened then?" he inquired, with the
+pleasant, impersonal manner of a physician.
+
+Ilse said: "Palla had already begun her novitiate. But what happened
+in those terrible moments changed her utterly.... I think she went mad
+at the moment.... Then the Superior came to me and begged me to hide
+Palla because the Bolsheviki had promised to return and cut her throat
+when they had finished their bloody business in the crypt.... So I
+caught her up in my arms and I ran out into the convent grounds. And
+at that very moment, God be thanked, a sotnia of the Wild Division
+rode up looking for me. And they had led horses with them. And we were
+in the saddle and riding like maniacs before I could think. That is
+all, except, an hour ago we saw your sleigh."
+
+"You have been hiding with the Cossacks ever since!" exclaimed
+Estridge to Palla.
+
+"That is her history," replied Ilse, "and mine. And," she added
+cheerfully but tenderly, "my little comrade, here, is very, very
+homesick, very weary, very deeply and profoundly unhappy in the loss
+of her closest friend... and perhaps in the loss of her faith in
+God."
+
+"I am tranquil and I am not unhappy,"--said Palla. "And if I ever win
+free of this murderous country I shall, for the first time in my life,
+understand what the meaning of life really is. And shall know how to
+live."
+
+"You thought you knew how to live when you took the white veil," said
+Ilse cheerfully. "Perhaps, after all, you may make other errors before
+you learn the truth about it all. Who knows? You might even care to
+take the veil again----"
+
+"Never!" cried Palla in a clear, hard little voice, tinged with the
+scorn and anger of that hot revolt which sometimes shakes youth to the
+very source of its vitality.
+
+Ilse said very calmly to Estridge: "With me it is my reason and not
+mere hope that convinces me of God's existence. I try to reason with
+Palla because one is indeed to be pitied who has lost belief in
+God----"
+
+"You are mistaken," said Palla drily; "--one merely becomes one's self
+when once the belief in that sort of God is ended."
+
+Ilse turned to Brisson: "That," she said, "is what seems so impossible
+for some to accept--so terrible--the apparent indifference, the lack
+of explanation--God's dreadful reticence in this thunderous whirlwind
+of prayer that storms skyward day and night from our martyred world."
+
+Palla, listening, sat forward and said to Brisson: "There is only one
+religion and it has only two precepts--love and give! The rest--the
+forms, observances, creeds, ceremonies, threats, promises, are
+man-made trash!
+
+"If man's man-made God pleases him, let him worship him. That kind of
+deity does not please me. I no longer care whether He pleases me or
+not. He no longer exists as far as I am concerned."
+
+Brisson, much interested, asked Palla whether the void left by
+discredited Divinity did not bewilder her.
+
+"There is no void," said the girl. "It is already filled with my own
+kind of God, with millions of Gods--my own fellow creatures."
+
+"Your fellow beings?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"You think your fellow creatures can fill that void?"
+
+"They have filled it."
+
+Brisson nodded reflectively: "I see," he said politely, "you intend to
+devote your life to the cult of your fellow creatures."
+
+"No, I do not," said the girl tranquilly, "but I intend to love them
+and live my life that way unhampered." She added almost fiercely: "And
+I shall love them the more because of their ignorant faith in an
+all-seeing and tender and just Providence which does not exist! I
+shall love them because of their tragic deception and their
+helplessness and their heart-breaking unconsciousness of it all."
+
+Ilse Westgard smiled and patted Palla's cheeks: "All roads lead
+ultimately to God," she said, "and yours is a direct route though you
+do not know it."
+
+"I tell you I have nothing in common with the God you mean," flashed
+out the girl.
+
+Brisson, though interested, kept one grey eye on duty, ever hopeful of
+wolves. It was snowing hard now--a perfect geography scene, lacking
+only the wolves; but the etape was only half finished. There might be
+hope.
+
+The rather amazing conversation in the sleigh also appealed to him,
+arousing all his instincts of a veteran newspaper man, as well as his
+deathless curiosity--that perpetual flame which alone makes any
+intelligence vital.
+
+Also, his passion for all documents--those sewed under his underclothes,
+as well as these two specimens of human documents--were now keeping
+his lively interest in life unimpaired.
+
+"Loss of faith," he said to Palla, and inclined toward further debate,
+"must be a very serious thing for any woman, I imagine."
+
+"I haven't lost faith in love," she said, smilingly aware that he was
+encouraging discussion.
+
+"But you say you have lost faith in spiritual love--"
+
+"I did not say so. I did not mean the other kind of love when I said
+that love is sufficient religion for me."
+
+"But spiritual love means Deity----"
+
+"It does _not_! Can you imagine the all-powerful father watching his
+child die, horribly--and never lifting a finger! Is that love? Is that
+power? _Is_ that Deity?"
+
+"To penetrate the Divine mind and its motives for not intervening is
+impossible for us----"
+
+"That is priest's prattle! Also, I care nothing now about Divine
+motives. Motives are human, not divine. So is policy. That is why the
+present Pope is unworthy of respect. He let his flock die. He deserted
+his Cardinal. He let the hun go unrebuked. He betrayed Christ. I care
+nothing about any mind weak enough, politic enough, powerless enough,
+to ignore love for motives!
+
+"One loves, or one does not love. Loving is giving--" The girl sat up
+in the sleigh and the thickening snowflakes drove into her flushed
+face. "Loving is giving," she repeated, "--giving life to love; giving
+_up_ life for love--giving! _giving!_ always giving!--always
+forgiving! That is love! That is the only God!--the indestructible,
+divine God within each one of us!"
+
+Brisson appraised her with keen and scholarly eyes. "Yet," he said
+pleasantly, "you do not forgive God for the death of your friend.
+Don't you practise your faith?"
+
+The girl seemed nonplussed; then a brighter tint stained her cheeks
+under the ragged sheepskin cap.
+
+"Forgive God!" she cried. "If there really existed that sort of God,
+what would be the use of forgiving what He does? He'd only do it
+again. That is His record!" she added fiercely, "--indifference to
+human agony, utter silence amid lamentations, stone deaf, stone dumb,
+motionless. It is not in me to fawn and lick the feet of such an
+image. No! It is not in me to believe it alive, either. And I do not!
+But I know that love lives: and if there be any gods at all, it must
+be that they are without number, and that their substance is of that
+immortality born inside us, and which we call love! Otherwise, to me,
+now, symbols, signs, saints, rituals, vows--these things, in my mind,
+are all scrapped together as junk. Only, in me, the warm faith
+remains--that within me there lives a god of sorts--perhaps that
+immortal essence called a soul--and that its only name is love. And it
+has given us only one law to live by--the Law of Love!"
+
+Brisson's cigar had gone out. He examined it attentively and found it
+would be worth relighting when opportunity offered.
+
+Then he smiled amiably at Palla Dumont:
+
+"What you say is very interesting," he remarked. But he was too polite
+to add that it had been equally interesting to numberless generations
+through the many, many centuries during which it all had been said
+before, in various ways and by many, many people.
+
+Lying back in his furs reflectively, and deriving a rather cold
+satisfaction from his cigar butt, he let his mind wander back through
+the history of theocracy and of mundane philosophy, mildly amused to
+recognize an ancient theory resurrected and made passionately original
+once more on the red lips of this young girl.
+
+But the Law of Love is not destined to be solved so easily; nor had it
+ever been solved in centuries dead by Egyptian, Mongol, or Greek--by
+priest or princess, prophet or singer, or by any vestal or acolyte of
+love, sacred or profane.
+
+No philosophy had solved the problem of human woe; no theory
+convinced. And Brisson, searching leisurely the forgotten corridors of
+treasured lore, became interested to realise that in all the history
+of time only the deeds and example of one man had invested the human
+theory of divinity with any real vitality--and that, oddly enough,
+what this girl preached--what she demanded of divinity--had been both
+preached and practised by that one man alone--Jesus Christ.
+
+Turning involuntarily toward Palla, he said: "Can't you believe in
+Him, either?"
+
+She said: "He was one of the Gods. But He was no more divine than any
+in whom love lives. Had He been more so, then He would still
+intervene to-day! He is powerless. He lets things happen. And we
+ourselves must make it up to the world by love. There is no other
+divinity to intervene except only our own hearts."
+
+But that was not, as the young girl supposed, her fixed faith,
+definite, ripened, unshakable. It was a phase already in process of
+fading into other phases, each less stable, less definite, and more
+dangerous than the other, leaving her and her ardent mind and heart
+always unconsciously drifting toward the simple, primitive and natural
+goal for which all healthy bodies are created and destined--the
+instinct of the human being to protect and perpetuate the race by the
+great Law of Love.
+
+Brisson's not unkindly cynicism had left his lips edged with a slight
+smile. Presently he leaned back beside Estridge and said in a low
+voice:
+
+"Purely pathological. Ardent religious instinct astray and running
+wild in consequence of nervous dislocations due to shock. Merely
+over-storage of superb physical energy. Intellectual and spiritual
+wires overcrowded. Too many volts.... That girl ought to have been
+married early. Only a lot of children can keep her properly occupied.
+Only outlet for her kind. Interesting case. Contrast to the Swedish
+girl. Fine, handsome, normal animal that. She could pick me up between
+thumb and finger. Great girl, Estridge."
+
+"She is really beautiful," whispered Estridge, glancing at Ilse.
+
+"Yes. So is Mont Blanc. That sort of beauty--the super-sort. But it's
+the other who is pathologically interesting because her wires are
+crossed and there's a short circuit somewhere. Who comes in contact
+with her had better look out."
+
+"She's wonderfully attractive."
+
+"She is. But if she doesn't disentangle her wires and straighten out
+she'll burn out.... What's that ahead? A wolf!"
+
+It was the rest house at the end of the etape--a tiny, distant speck
+on the snowy plain.
+
+Brisson leaned over and caught Palla's eye. Both smiled.
+
+"Well," he said, "for a girl who doesn't believe in anything, you seem
+cheerful enough."
+
+"I am cheerful because I _do_ believe in everything and in everybody."
+
+Brisson laughed: "You shouldn't," he said. "Great mistake. Trust in
+God and believe nobody--that's the idea. Then get married and close
+your eyes and see what God will send you!"
+
+The girl threw back her pretty head and laughed.
+
+"Marriage and priests are of no consequence," she said, "but I adore
+little children!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+
+They were a weary, half-starved and travel-stained quartette when the
+Red Guards stopped them for the last time in Russia and passed them
+through, warning them that the White Guards would surely do murder if
+they caught them.
+
+The next day the White Guards halted them, but finally passed them
+through, counselling them to keep out of the way of the Red Guards if
+they wished to escape being shot at sight.
+
+In the neat, shiny, carefully scrubbed little city of Helsingfors they
+avoided the huns by some miracle--one of Brisson's customary
+miracles--but another little company of Americans and English was
+halted and detained, and one harmless Yankee among them was arrested
+and packed off to a hun prison.
+
+Also, a large and nervous party of fugitives of mixed nationalities
+and professions--consuls, charges, attaches, and innocent, agitated
+citizens--was summarily grabbed and ordered into indefinite limbo.
+
+But Brisson's daily miracles continued to materialise, even in the
+land of the Finn. By train, by sleigh, by boat, his quartette
+floundered along toward safety, and finally emerged from the white
+hell of the Red people into the sub-arctic sun--Estridge with
+painfully scanty luggage, Palla Dumont with none at all, Ilse
+Westgard carrying only her Cossack saddle-bags, and Brisson with his
+damning papers still sewed inside his clothes, and owing Estridge ten
+dollars for not getting murdered.
+
+They all had become excellent comrades during those anxious days of
+hunger, fatigue and common peril, but they were also a little tired of
+one another, as becomes all friends when subjected to compulsory
+companionship for an unreasonable period.
+
+And even when one is beginning to fall in love, one can become
+surfeited with the beloved under such circumstances.
+
+Besides, Estridge's budding sentiment for Ilse Westgard, and her
+wholesome and girlish inclination for him, suffered an early chill.
+For the poor child had acquired trench pets from the Cossacks, and had
+passed on a few to Estridge, with whom she had been constantly seated
+on the front seat.
+
+Being the frankest thing in Russia, she told him with tears in her
+blue eyes; and they had a most horrid time of it before they came
+finally to a sanitary plant erected to attend to such matters.
+
+Episodes of that sort discourage sentiment; so does cold, hunger and
+discomfort incident on sardine-like promiscuousness.
+
+Nobody in the party desired to know more than they already knew
+concerning anybody else. In fact, there was little more to know,
+privacy being impossible. And the ever instinctive hostility of the
+two sexes, always and irrevocably latent, became vaguely apparent at
+moments.
+
+Common danger swept it away at times; but reaction gradually revealed
+again what is born under the human skin--the paradox called
+sex-antipathy. And yet the men in the party would not have hesitated
+to sacrifice their lives in defence of these women, nor would the
+women have faltered under the same test.
+
+Brisson was the philosophical stoic of the quartette. Estridge groused
+sometimes. Palla, when she thought herself unnoticed, camouflaged her
+face in her furs and cried now and then. And occasionally Ilse
+Westgard tried the patience of the others by her healthy capacity for
+unfeigned laughter--sometimes during danger-laden and inopportune
+moments, and once in the shocking imminence of death itself.
+
+As, for example, in a vile little village, full of vermin and typhus,
+some hunger-crazed peasants, armed with stolen rifles and ammunition,
+awoke them where they lay on the straw of a stable, cursed them for
+aristocrats, and marched them outside to a convenient wall, at the
+foot of which sprawled half a dozen blood-soaked, bayoneted and
+bullet-riddled landlords and land owners of the district.
+
+And things had assumed a terribly serious aspect when, to their
+foolish consternation, the peasants discovered that their purloined
+cartridges did not fit their guns.
+
+Then, in the very teeth of death, Ilse threw back her blond head and
+laughed. And there was no mistaking the genuineness of the girl's
+laughter.
+
+Some of their would-be executioners laughed too;--the hilarity spread.
+It was all over; they couldn't shoot a girl who laughed that way. So
+somebody brought a samovar; tea was boiled; and they all went back to
+the barn and sat there drinking tea and swapping gossip and singing
+until nearly morning.
+
+That was a sample of their narrow escapes. But Brisson's only comment
+before he went to sleep was that Estridge would probably owe him a
+dollar within the next twenty-four hours.
+
+They had a hair-raising time in Helsingfors. On one occasion, German
+officers forced Palla's door at night, and the girl became ill with
+fear while soldiers searched the room, ordering her out of bed and
+pushing her into a corner while they ripped up carpets and tore the
+place to pieces in a swinishly ferocious search for "information."
+
+But they did nothing worse to her, and, for some reason, left the
+hotel without disturbing Brisson, whose room adjoined and who sat on
+the edge of his bed with an automatic in each hand--a dangerous
+opportunist awaiting events and calmly determined to do some
+recruiting for hell if the huns harmed Palla.
+
+She never knew that. And the worst was over now, and the Scandinavian
+border not far away. And in twenty-four hours they were over--Brisson
+impatient to get his papers to Washington and planning to start for
+England on a wretched little packet-boat, in utter contempt of mines,
+U-boats, and the icy menace of the North Sea.
+
+As for the others, Estridge decided to cable and await orders in
+Copenhagen; Palla, to sail for home on the first available Danish
+steamer; Ilse, to go to Stockholm and eventually decide whether to
+volunteer once more as a soldier of the proletariat or to turn
+propagandist and carry the true gospel to America, where, she had
+heard, the ancient liberties of the great Democracy were becoming
+imperilled.
+
+The day before they parted company, these four people, so oddly thrown
+together out of the boiling cauldron of the Russian Terror, arranged
+to dine together for the last time.
+
+Theirs were the appetites of healthy wolves; theirs was the thirst of
+the marooned on waterless islands; and theirs, too, was the feverish
+gaiety of those who had escaped great peril by land and sea; and who
+were still physically and morally demoralized by the glare and the
+roar of the hellish conflagration which was still burning up the world
+around them.
+
+So they met in a private dining room of the hotel for dinner on the
+eve of separation.
+
+Brisson and Estridge had resurrected from their luggage the remains of
+their evening attire; Ilse and Palla had shopped; and they now
+included in a limited wardrobe two simple dinner gowns, among more
+vital purchases.
+
+There were flowers on the table, no great variety of food but plenty
+of champagne to make up--a singular innovation in apology for short
+rations conceived by the hotel proprietor.
+
+There was a victrola in the corner, too, and this they kept going to
+stimulate their nerves, which already were sufficiently on edge
+without the added fillip of music and champagne.
+
+"As for me," said Brisson, "I'm in sight of nervous dissolution
+already;--I'm going back to my wife and children, thank God--" he
+smiled at Palla. "I'm grateful to the God you don't believe in, dear
+little lady. And if He is willing, I'll report for duty in two weeks."
+He turned to Estridge:
+
+"What about you?"
+
+"I've cabled for orders but I have none yet. If they're through with
+me I shall go back to New York and back to the medical school I came
+from. I hate the idea, too. Lord, how I detest it!"
+
+"Why?" asked Palla nervously.
+
+"I've had too much excitement. You have too--and so have Ilse and
+Brisson. I'm not keen for the usual again. It bores me to contemplate
+it. The thought of Fifth Avenue--the very idea of going back to all
+that familiar routine, social and business, makes me positively ill.
+What a dull place this world will be when we're all at peace again!"
+
+"We won't be at peace for a long, long while," said Ilse, smiling. She
+lifted a goblet in her big, beautifully shaped hand and drained it
+with the vigorous grace of a Viking's daughter.
+
+"You think the war is going to last for years?" asked Estridge.
+
+"Oh, no; not this war. But the other," she explained cheerfully.
+
+"What other?"
+
+"Why, the greatest conflict in the world; the social war. It's going
+to take many years and many battles. I shall enlist."
+
+"Nonsense," said Brisson, "you're not a Red!"
+
+The girl laughed and showed her snowy teeth: "I'm one kind of Red--not
+the kind that sold Russia to the boche--but I'm very, very red."
+
+"Everybody with a brain and a heart is more or less red in these
+days," nodded Palla. "Everybody knows that the old order is
+ended--done for. Without liberty and equal opportunity civilisation is
+a farce. Everybody knows it except the stupid. And they'll have to be
+instructed."
+
+"Very well," said Brisson briskly, "here's to the universal but
+bloodless revolution! An acre for everybody and a mule to plough it!
+Back to the soil and to hell with the counting house!"
+
+They all laughed, but their brimming glasses went up; then Estridge
+rose to re-wind the victrola. Palla's slim foot tapped the parquet in
+time with the American fox-trot; she glanced across the table at
+Estridge, lifted her head interrogatively, then sprang up and slid
+into his arms, delighted.
+
+While they danced he said: "Better go light on that champagne, Miss
+Dumont."
+
+"Don't you think I can keep my head?" she demanded derisively.
+
+"Not if you keep up with Ilse. You're not built that way."
+
+"I wish I were. I wish I were nearly six feet tall and beautiful in
+every limb and feature as she is. What wonderful children she could
+have! What magnificent hair she must have had before she sheared it
+for the Woman's Battalion! Now it's all a dense, short mass of
+gold--she looks like a lovely boy who requires a barber."
+
+"Your hair is not unbecoming, either," he remarked, "--short as it is,
+it's a mop of curls and very fetching."
+
+"Isn't it funny?" she said. "I sheared mine for the sake of Mother
+Church; Ilse cut off hers for the honour of the Army! Now we're
+both out of a job--with only our cropped heads to show for the
+experience!--and no more army and no more church--at least, as far
+as I am concerned!"
+
+And she threw back hers with its thick, glossy curls and laughed,
+looking up at him out of her virginal brown eyes of a child.
+
+"I'm sorry I cut my hair," she added presently. "I look like a
+Bolshevik."
+
+"It's growing very fast," he said encouragingly.
+
+"Oh, yes, it grows fast," she nodded indifferently. "Shall we return
+to the table? I am rather thirsty."
+
+Ilse and Brisson were engaged in an animated conversation when they
+reseated themselves. The waiter arrived about that time with another
+course of poor food.
+
+Palla, disregarding Estridge's advice, permitted the waiter to refill
+her glass.
+
+"I can't eat that unappetising entree," she insisted, "and champagne,
+they say, is nourishing and I'm still hungry."
+
+"As you please," said Brisson; "but you've had two glasses already."
+
+"I don't care," she retorted childishly; "I mean to live to the utmost
+in future. For the first time in my silly existence I intend to be
+natural. I wonder what it feels like to become a little intoxicated?"
+
+"It feels rotten," remarked Estridge.
+
+"Really? _How_ rotten?" She laughed again, laid her hand on the
+goblet's stem and glanced across at him defiantly, mischievously.
+However, she seemed to reconsider the matter, for she picked up a
+cigarette and lighted it at a candle.
+
+"Bah!" she exclaimed with a wry face. "It stings!"
+
+But she ventured another puff or two before placing it upon a saucer
+among its defunct fellows.
+
+"Ugh!" she complained again with a gay little shiver, and bit into a
+pear as though to wash out the contamination of unaccustomed
+nicotine.
+
+"Where are you going when we all say good-bye?" inquired Estridge.
+
+"I? Oh, I'm certainly going home on the first Danish boat--home to
+Shadow Hill, where I told you I lived."
+
+"And you have nobody but your aunt?"
+
+"Only that one old lady."
+
+"You won't remain long at Shadow Hill," he predicted.
+
+"It's very pretty there. Why don't you think I am likely to remain?"
+
+"You won't remain," he repeated. "You've slipped your cable. You're
+hoisting sail. And it worries me a little."
+
+The girl laughed. "It's a pretty place, Shadow Hill, but it's dull.
+Everybody in the town is dull, stupid, and perfectly satisfied:
+everybody owns at least that acre which Ilse demands; there's no
+discontent at Shadow Hill, and no reason for it. I really couldn't
+bear it," she added gaily; "I want to go where there's healthy
+discontent, wholesome competition, natural aspiration--where things
+must be bettered, set right, helped. You understand? That is where I
+wish to be."
+
+Brisson heard her. "Can't you practise your loving but godless creed
+at Shadow Hill?" he inquired, amused. "Can't you lavish love on the
+contented and well-to-do?"
+
+"Yes, Mr. Brisson," she replied with sweet irony, "but where the poor
+and loveless fight an ever losing battle is still a better place for
+me to practise my godless creed and my Law of Love."
+
+"Aha!" he retorted, "--a brand new excuse for living in New York
+because all young girls love it!"
+
+"Indeed," she said with some little heat, "I certainly do intend to
+live and not to stagnate! I intend to live as hard as I can--live and
+enjoy life with all my might! Can one serve the world better than by
+loving it enough to live one's own life through to the last happy
+rags? Can one give one's fellow creatures a better example than to
+live every moment happily and proclaim the world good to live in, and
+mankind good to live with?"
+
+Ilse whispered, leaning near: "Don't take any more champagne, Palla."
+
+The girl frowned, then looked serious: "No, I won't," she said
+naively. "But it is wonderful how eloquent it makes one feel, isn't
+it?"
+
+And to Estridge: "You know that this is quite the first wine I have
+ever tasted--except at Communion. I was brought up to think it meant
+destruction. And afterward, wherever I travelled to study, the old
+prejudice continued to guide me. And after that, even when I began to
+think of taking the veil, I made abstinence one of my first
+preliminary vows.... And _look_ what I've been doing to-night!"
+
+She held up her glass, tasted it, emptied it.
+
+"There," she said, "I desired to shock you. I don't really want any
+more. Shall we dance? Ilse! Why don't you seize Mr. Brisson and make
+him two-step?"
+
+"Please seize me," added Brisson gravely.
+
+Ilse rose, big, fresh, smilingly inviting; Brisson inspected her
+seriously--he was only half as tall--then he politely encircled her
+waist and led her out.
+
+They danced as though they could not get enough of it--exhilaration
+due to reaction from the long strain during dangerous days.
+
+It was already morning, but they danced on. Palla's delicate
+intoxication passed--returned--passed--hovered like a rosy light in
+her brain, but faded always as she danced.
+
+There were snapping-crackers and paper caps; and they put them on and
+pelted each other with the drooping table flowers.
+
+Then Estridge went to the piano and sang an ancient song, called "The
+Cork Leg"--not very well--but well intended and in a gay and
+inoffensive voice.
+
+But Ilse sang some wonderful songs which she had learned in the
+Battalion of Death.
+
+And that is what was being done when a waiter knocked and asked
+whether they might desire to order breakfast.
+
+That ended it. The hour of parting had arrived.
+
+No longer bored with one another, they shook hands cordially,
+regretfully.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+It was not a very long time, as time is computed, before these four
+met again.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+
+The dingy little Danish steamer _Elsinore_ passed in at dawn, her
+camouflage obscured by sea-salt, her few passengers still prostrated
+from the long battering administered by the giant seas of the northern
+route.
+
+A lone Yankee soldier was aboard--an indignant lieutenant of infantry
+named Shotwell--sent home from a fighting regiment to instruct the
+ambitious rookie at Camp Upton.
+
+He had hailed his assignment with delight, thankfully rid himself of
+his cooties, reported in Paris, reported in London; received orders to
+depart via Denmark; and, his mission there fullfilled, he had sailed
+on the _Elsinore_, already disenchanted with his job and longing to be
+back with his regiment.
+
+And now, surly from sea-sickness, worried by peace rumours, but still
+believing that the war would last another year and hopeful of getting
+back before it ended, he emerged from his stuffy quarters aboard the
+_Elsinore_ and gazed without enthusiasm at the minarets of Coney
+Island, now visible off the starboard bow.
+
+Near him, in pasty-faced and shaky groups, huddled his fellow
+passengers, whom he had not seen during the voyage except when lined
+up for life-drill.
+
+He had not wished to see them, either, nor, probably, had they
+desired to lavish social attentions on him or upon one another.
+
+These pallid, discouraged voyagers were few--not two dozen cabin
+passengers in all.
+
+Who they might be he had no curiosity to know; he had not exchanged
+ten words with any of them during the entire and nauseating voyage; he
+certainly did not intend to do so now.
+
+He favoured them with a savage glance and walked over to the port
+side--the Jersey side--where there seemed to be nobody except a tired
+Scandinavian sailor or two.
+
+In the grey of morning the Hook loomed up above the sea, gloomy as a
+thunder-head charged with lightning.
+
+After a while the batteries along the Narrows slipped into view.
+Farther on, camouflaged ships rode sullenly at anchor, as though
+ashamed of their frivolous and undignified appearance. A battleship
+was just leaving the Lower Bay, smoke pouring from every funnel.
+Destroyers and chasers rushed by them, headed seaward.
+
+Then, high over the shore mists and dimly visible through rising
+vapours, came speeding a colossal phantom.
+
+Vague as a shark's long shadow sheering translucent depths, the huge
+dirigible swept eastward and slid into the Long Island fog.
+
+And at that moment somebody walked plump into young Shotwell; and the
+soft, fragrant shock knocked the breath out of both.
+
+She recovered hers first:
+
+"I'm sorry!" she faltered. "It was stupid. I was watching the balloon
+and not looking where I was going. I'm afraid I hurt you."
+
+He recovered his breath, saluted ceremoniously, readjusted his
+overseas cap to the proper angle.
+
+Then he said, civilly enough: "It was my fault entirely. It was I who
+walked into you. I hope I didn't hurt you."
+
+They smiled, unembarrassed.
+
+"That was certainly a big dirigible," he ventured. "There are bigger
+Zeps, of course."
+
+"Are there really?"
+
+"Oh, yes. But they're not much good in war, I believe."
+
+She turned her trim, small head and looked out across the bay; and
+Shotwell, who once had had a gaily receptive eye for pulchritude,
+thought her unusually pretty.
+
+Also, the steady keel of the _Elsinore_ was making him feel more human
+now; and he ventured a further polite observation concerning the
+pleasures of homecoming after extended exile.
+
+She turned with a frank shake of her head: "It seems heartless to say
+so, but I'm rather sorry I'm back," she said.
+
+He smiled: "I must admit," he confessed, "that I feel the same way. Of
+course I want to see my people. But I'd give anything to be in France
+at this moment, and that's the truth!"
+
+The girl nodded her comprehension: "It's quite natural," she remarked.
+"One does not wish to come home until this thing is settled."
+
+"That's it exactly. It's like leaving an interesting play half
+finished. It's worse--it's like leaving an absorbing drama in which
+you yourself are playing an exciting role."
+
+She glanced at him--a quick glance of intelligent appraisal.
+
+"Yes, it must have seemed that way to you. But I've been merely one
+among a breathless audience.... And yet I can't bear to leave in the
+very middle--not knowing how it is to end. Besides," she added
+carelessly, "I have nobody to come back to except a rather remote
+relative, so my regrets are unmixed."
+
+There ensued a silence. He was afraid she was about to go, but
+couldn't seem to think of anything to say to detain her.
+
+For the girl was very attractive to a careless and amiably casual man
+of his sort--the sort who start their little journey through life with
+every intention of having the best kind of a time on the way.
+
+She was so distractingly pretty, so confidently negligent of
+convention--or perhaps disdainful of it--that he already was
+regretting that he had not met her at the beginning of the voyage
+instead of at the end.
+
+She had now begun to button up her ulster, as though preliminary to
+resuming her deck promenade. And he wanted to walk with her. But
+because she had chosen to be informal with him did not deceive him
+into thinking that she was likely to tolerate further informality on
+his part. And yet he had a vague notion that her inclinations were
+friendly.
+
+"I'm sorry," he said rather stupidly, "that I didn't meet you in the
+beginning."
+
+The slightest inclination of her head indicated that although possibly
+she might be sorry too, regrets were now useless. Then she turned up
+the collar of her ulster. The face it framed was disturbingly lovely.
+And he took a last chance.
+
+"And so," he ventured politely, "you have really been on board the
+_Elsinore_ all this time!"
+
+She turned her charming head toward him, considered him a moment; then
+she smiled.
+
+"Yes," she said; "I've been on board all the time. I didn't crawl
+aboard in mid-ocean, you know."
+
+The girl was frankly amused by the streak of boyishness in him--the
+perfectly transparent desire of this young man to detain her in
+conversation. And, still amused, she leaned back against the rail. If
+he wanted to talk to her she would let him--even help him. Why not?
+
+"Is that a wound chevron?" she inquired, looking at the sleeve of his
+tunic.
+
+"No," he replied gratefully, "it's a service stripe."
+
+"And what does the little cord around your shoulder signify?"
+
+"That my regiment was cited."
+
+"For bravery?"
+
+"Well--that was the idea, I believe."
+
+"Then you've been in action."
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Over the top?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"How many times?"
+
+"Several. Recently it's been more open work, you know."
+
+"And you were not hit?"
+
+"No."
+
+She regarded him smilingly: "You are like all soldiers have faced
+death," she said. "You are not communicative."
+
+At that he reddened. "Well, everybody else was facing it, too, you
+know. We all had the same experience."
+
+"Not all," she said, watching him. "Some died."
+
+"Oh, of course."
+
+The girl's face flushed and she nodded emphatically: "Of course! And
+_that_ is our Yankee secret;--embodied in those two words--'of
+course.' That is exactly why the boche runs away from our men. The
+boche doesn't know why he runs, but it is because you all say, 'of
+course!--of course we're here to kill and get killed. What of it? It's
+in the rules of the game, isn't it? Very well; we're playing the
+game!'
+
+"But the rules of the hun game are different. According to their
+rules, machine guns are not charged on. That is not according to plan.
+Oh, no! But it is in your rules of the game. So after the boche has
+killed a number of you, and you say, 'of course,' and you keep coming
+on, it first bewilders the boche, then terrifies him. And the next
+time he sees you coming he takes to his heels."
+
+Shotwell, amused, fascinated, and entirely surprised, began to laugh.
+
+"You seem to know the game pretty well yourself," he said. "You are
+quite right. That is the idea."
+
+"It's a wonderful game," she mused. "I can understand why you are not
+pleased at being ordered home."
+
+"It's rather rotten luck when the outfit had just been cited," he
+explained.
+
+"Oh. I should think you _would_ hate to come back!" exclaimed the
+girl, with frank sympathy.
+
+"Well, I was glad at first, but I'm sorry now. I'm missing a lot, you
+see."
+
+"Why did they send you back?"
+
+"To instruct rookies!" he said with a grimace. "Rather inglorious,
+isn't it? But I'm hoping I'll have time to weather this detail and get
+back again before we reach the Rhine."
+
+"I want to get back again, too," she reflected aloud, biting her lip
+and letting her dark eyes rest on the foggy statue of Liberty,
+towering up ahead.
+
+"What was your branch?" he inquired.
+
+"Oh, I didn't do anything," she exclaimed, flushing. "I've been in
+Russia. And now I must find out at once what I can do to be sent to
+France."
+
+"The war caught you over there, I suppose," he hazarded.
+
+"Yes.... I've been there since I was twenty. I'm twenty-four. I had a
+year's travel and study and then I became the American companion of
+the little Russian Grand Duchess Marie."
+
+"They all were murdered, weren't they?" he asked, much interested.
+
+"Yes.... I'm trying to forget----"
+
+"I beg your pardon----"
+
+"It's quite all right. I, myself, mentioned it first; but I can't talk
+about it yet. It's too personal----" She turned and looked at the
+monstrous city.
+
+After a silence: "It's been a rotten voyage, hasn't it?" he remarked.
+
+"Perfectly rotten. I was so ill I could scarcely keep my place during
+life-drill.... I didn't see you there," she added with a faint smile,
+"but I'm sure you were aboard, even if you seem to doubt that I was."
+
+And then, perhaps considering that she had been sufficiently amiable
+to him, she gave him his conge with a pleasant little nod.
+
+"Could I help you--do anything--" he began. But she thanked him with
+friendly finality.
+
+They sauntered in opposite directions; and he did not see her again to
+speak to her.
+
+Later, jolting toward home in a taxi, it occurred to him that it might
+have been agreeable to see such an attractively informal girl again.
+Any man likes informality in women, except among the women of his own
+household, where he would promptly brand it as indiscretion.
+
+He thought of her for a while, recollecting details of the episode and
+realising that he didn't even know her name. Which piqued him.
+
+"Serves me right," he said aloud with a shrug of finality. "I had more
+enterprise once."
+
+Then he looked out into the sunlit streets of Manhattan, all brilliant
+with flags and posters and swarming with prosperous looking
+people--his own people. But to his war-enlightened and disillusioned
+eyes his own people seemed almost like aliens; he vaguely resented
+their too evident prosperity, their irresponsible immunity, their
+heedless preoccupation with the petty things of life. The acres of
+bright flags fluttering above them, the posters that made a gay
+back-ground for the scene, the sheltered, undisturbed routine of peace
+seemed to annoy him.
+
+An odd irritation invaded him; he had a sudden impulse to stop his
+taxi and shout, "Fat-heads! Get into the game! Don't you know the
+world's on fire? Don't you know what a hun really is? You'd better
+look out and get busy!"
+
+Fifth Avenue irritated him--shops, hotels, clubs, motors, the
+well-dressed throngs began to exasperate him.
+
+On a side street he caught a glimpse of his own place of business; and
+it almost nauseated him to remember old man Sharrow, and the walls
+hung with plans of streets and sewers and surveys and photographs; and
+his own yellow oak desk----
+
+"Good Lord!" he thought. "If the war ends, have I got to go back to
+that!----"
+
+The family were at breakfast when he walked in on them--only two--his
+father and mother.
+
+In his mother's arms he suddenly felt very young and subdued, and very
+glad to be there.
+
+"Where the devil did you come from, Jim?" repeated his father, with
+twitching features and a grip on his son's strong hand that he could
+not bring himself to loosen.
+
+Yes, it was pretty good to get home, after all-- ... And he might not
+have come back at all. He realised it, now, in his mother's arms,
+feeling very humble and secure.
+
+His mother had realised it, too, in every waking hour since the day
+her only son had sailed at night--that had been the hardest!--at
+night--and at an unnamed hour of an unnamed day!--her only son--gone
+in the darkness----
+
+On his way upstairs, he noticed a red service flag bearing a single
+star hanging in his mother's window.
+
+He went into his own room, looked soberly around, sat down on the
+lounge, suddenly tired.
+
+He had three days' leave before reporting for duty. It seemed a
+miserly allowance. Instinctively he glanced at his wrist-watch. An
+hour had fled already.
+
+"The dickens!" he muttered. But he still sat there. After a while he
+smiled to himself and rose leisurely to make his toilet.
+
+"Such an attractively informal girl," he thought regretfully.
+
+"I'm sorry I didn't learn her name. Why didn't I?"
+
+Philosophy might have answered: "But to what purpose? No young man
+expects to pick up a girl of his own kind. And he has no business with
+other kinds."
+
+But Shotwell was no philosopher.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+The "attractively informal girl," on whom young Shotwell was
+condescending to bestow a passing regret while changing his linen,
+had, however, quite forgotten him by this time. There is more
+philosophy in women.
+
+Her train was now nearing Shadow Hill; she already could see the
+village in its early winter nakedness--the stone bridge, the old-time
+houses of the well-to-do, Main Street full of automobiles and farmers'
+wagons, a crowded trolley-car starting for Deepdale, the county seat.
+
+After four years the crudity of it all astonished her--the stark
+vulgarity of Main Street in the sunshine, every mean, flimsy
+architectural detail revealed--the dingy trolley poles, the telegraph
+poles loaded with unlovely wires and battered little electric light
+fixtures--the uncompromising, unrelieved ugliness of street and
+people, of shop and vehicle, of treeless sidewalks, brick pavement,
+car rails, hydrants, and rusty gasoline pumps.
+
+Here was a people ignorant of civic pride, knowing no necessity for
+beauty, having no standards, no aspirations, conscious of nothing but
+the grosser material needs.
+
+The hopelessness of this American town--and there were thousands like
+it--its architectural squalor, its animal unconsciousness, shocked her
+after four years in lands where colour, symmetry and good taste are
+indigenous and beauty as necessary as bread.
+
+And the girl had been born here, too; had known no other home except
+when at boarding school or on shopping trips to New York.
+
+Painfully depressed, she descended at the station, where she climbed
+into one of the familiar omnibuses and gave her luggage check to the
+lively young driver.
+
+Several drummers also got in, and finally a farmer whom she recognised
+but who had evidently forgotten her.
+
+The driver, a talkative young man whom she remembered as an obnoxious
+boy who delivered newspapers, came from the express office with her
+trunk, flung it on top of the bus, gossiped with several station
+idlers, then leisurely mounted his seat and gathered up the reins.
+
+Rattling along the main street she became aware of changes--a brand
+new yellow brick clothing store--a dreadful Quick Lunch--a moving
+picture theatre--other monstrosities. And she saw familiar faces on
+the street.
+
+The drummers got out with their sample cases at the Bolton House--Charles
+H. Bolton, proprietor. The farmer descended at the "Par Excellence
+Market," where, as he informed the driver, he expected to dispose of a
+bull calf which he had finally decided "to veal."
+
+"Which way, ma'am?" inquired the driver, looking in at her through the
+door and chewing gum very fast.
+
+"To Miss Dumont's on Shadow Street."
+
+"Oh!..." Then, suddenly he knew her. "Say, wasn't you her niece?" he
+demanded.
+
+"I _am_ Miss Dumont's niece," replied Palla, smiling.
+
+"Sure! I didn't reckonise you. Used to leave the _Star_ on your
+doorstep! Been away, ain't you? Home looks kinda good to you, even if
+it's kinda lonesome--" He checked himself as though recollecting
+something else. "Sure! You been over in Rooshia livin' with the Queen!
+There was a piece in the _Star_ about it. Gee!" he added affably.
+"That was pretty soft! Some life, I bet!"
+
+And he grinned a genial grin and climbed into his seat, chewing
+rapidly.
+
+"He means to be friendly," thought the heart-sick girl, with a
+shudder.
+
+When Palla got out she spoke pleasantly to him as she paid him, and
+inquired about his father--a shiftless old gaffer who used, sometimes,
+to do garden work for her aunt.
+
+But the driver, obsessed by the fact that she had lived with the
+"Queen of Rooshia," merely grinned and repeated, "Pretty soft," and,
+shouldering her trunk, walked to the front door, chewing furiously.
+
+Martha opened the door, stared through her spectacles.
+
+"Land o' mercy!" she gasped. "It's Palla!" Which, in Shadow Hill, is
+the manner and speech of the "hired girl," whose "folks" are
+"neighbours" and not inferiors.
+
+"How do you do, Martha," said the girl smilingly; and offered her
+gloved hand.
+
+"Well, I'm so's to be 'round--" She wheeled on the man with the trunk:
+"Here, _you_! Don't go-a-trackin' mud all over my carpet like that!
+Wipe your feet like as if you was brought up respectful!"
+
+"Ain't I wipin' em?" retorted the driver, in an injured voice. "Now
+then, Marthy, where does this here trunk go to?"
+
+"Big room front--wait, young fellow; you just follow me and be careful
+don't bang the banisters----"
+
+Half way up she called back over her shoulder: "Your room's all ready,
+Palla--" and suddenly remembered something else and stood aside on the
+landing until the young man with the trunk had passed her; then waited
+for him to return and get himself out of the house. Then, when he had
+gone out, banging the door, she came slowly back down the stairs and
+met Palla ascending.
+
+"Where is my aunt?" asked Palla.
+
+And, as Martha remained silent, gazing oddly down at her through her
+glasses:
+
+"My aunt isn't ill, is she?"
+
+"No, she ain't ill. H'ain't you heard?"
+
+"Heard what?"
+
+"Didn't you get my letter?"
+
+"_Your_ letter? Why did _you_ write? What is the matter? Where is my
+aunt?" asked the disturbed girl.
+
+"I wrote you last month."
+
+"_What_ did you write?"
+
+"You never got it?"
+
+"No, I didn't! What has happened to my aunt?"
+
+"She had a stroke, Palla."
+
+"What! Is--is she dead!"
+
+"Six weeks ago come Sunday."
+
+The girl's knees weakened and she sat down suddenly on the stairs.
+
+"Dead? My Aunt Emeline?"
+
+"She had a stroke a year ago. It made her a little stiff in one leg.
+But she wouldn't tell you--wouldn't bother you. She was that proud of
+you living as you did with all those kings and queens. 'No,' sez she
+to me, 'no, Martha, I ain't a-goin' to worry Palla. She and the Queen
+have got their hands full, what with the wicked way those Rooshian
+people are behaving. No,' sez she, 'I'll git well by the time she
+comes home for a visit after the war----'"
+
+Martha's spectacles became dim. She seated herself on the stairs and
+wiped them on her apron.
+
+"It came in the night," she said, peering blindly at Palla.... "I
+wondered why she was late to breakfast. When I went up she was lying
+there with her eyes open--just as natural----"
+
+Palla's head dropped and she covered her face with both hands.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+
+There remained, now, nothing to keep Palla in Shadow Hill.
+
+She had never intended to stay there, anyway; she had meant to go to
+France.
+
+But already there appeared to be no chance for that in the scheme of
+things. For the boche had begun to squeal for mercy; the frightened
+swine was squirting life-blood as he rushed headlong for the home sty
+across the Rhine; his death-stench sickened the world.
+
+Thicker, ranker, reeked the bloody abomination in the nostrils of
+civilisation, where Justice strode ahead through hell's own
+devastation, kicking the boche to death, kicking him through Belgium,
+through France, out of Light back into Darkness, back, back to his
+stinking sty.
+
+The rushing sequence of events in Europe since Palla's arrival in
+America bewildered the girl and held in abeyance any plan she had
+hoped to make.
+
+The whole world waited, too, astounded, incredulous as yet of the
+cataclysmic debacle, slowly realising that the super-swine were but
+swine--maddened swine, devil driven. And that the Sea was very near.
+
+No romance ever written approached in wild extravagance the story of
+doom now unfolding in the daily papers.
+
+Palla read and strove to comprehend--read, laid aside her paper, and
+went about her own business, which alone seemed dully real.
+
+And these new personal responsibilities--now that her aunt was
+dead--must have postponed any hope of an immediate departure for
+France.
+
+Her inheritance under her aunt's will, the legal details, the
+inventory of scattered acreage and real estate, plans for their proper
+administration, consultations with an attorney, conferences with Mr.
+Pawling, president of the local bank--such things had occupied and
+involved her almost from the moment of her arrival home.
+
+At first the endless petty details exasperated her--a girl fresh from
+the tremendous tragedy of things where, one after another, empires
+were crashing amid the conflagration of a continent. And she could not
+now keep her mind on such wretched little personal matters while her
+heart battered passionately at her breast, sounding the exciting
+summons to active service.
+
+To concentrate her thoughts on mortgages and deeds when she was
+burning to be on her way to France--to confer power of attorney, audit
+bills for taxes, for up-keep of line fences, when she was mad to go to
+New York and find out how quickly she could be sent to France--such
+things seemed more than a girl could endure.
+
+In Shadow Hill there was scarcely anything to remind her that the fate
+of the world was being settled for all time.
+
+Only for red service flags here and there, here and there a burly
+figure in olive-drab swaggering along Main Street, nothing except
+war-bread, the shortage of coal and sugar, and outrageous prices
+reminded her that the terrific drama was still being played beyond
+the ocean to the diapason of an orchestra thundering from England to
+Asia and from Africa to the Arctic.
+
+But already the eternal signs were pointing to the end. She read the
+_Republican_ in the morning, the _Star_ at night. Gradually it became
+apparent to the girl that the great conflagration was slowly dying
+down beyond the seas; that there was to be no chance of her returning;
+that there was to be no need of her services even if she were already
+equipped to render any, and now, certainly, no time for her to learn
+anything which might once have admitted her to comradeship in the
+gigantic conflict between man and Satan. She was too late. The world's
+tragedy was almost over.
+
+With the signing of the armistice, all dreams of service ended
+definitely for her.
+
+False news of the suspension of hostilities should have, in a measure,
+prepared her. Yet, the ultimately truthful news that the war was over
+made her almost physically ill. For the girl's ardent religious
+fervour had consumed her emotional energy during the incessant
+excitement of the past three years. But now, for this natural ardour,
+there was no further employment. There was no outlet for mind or heart
+so lately on fire with spiritual fervour. God was no more; her friend
+was dead. And now the war had ended. And nobody in the world had any
+need of her--any need of this woman who needed the world--and
+love--spiritual perhaps, perhaps profane.
+
+The false peace demonstration, which set the bells of Shadow Hill
+clanging in the wintry air and the mill whistles blowing from distant
+villages, left her tired, dazed, indifferent. The later celebration,
+based on official news, stirred her spiritually even less. And she
+felt ill.
+
+There was a noisy night celebration on Main Street, but she had no
+desire to see it. She remained indoors reading the _Star_ in the
+sitting room with Max, the cat. She ate no dinner. She cried herself
+to sleep.
+
+However, now that the worst had come--as she naively informed the
+shocked Martha next morning--she began to feel relieved in a restless,
+feverish way.
+
+A healthful girl accumulates much bodily energy over night; Palla's
+passionate little heart and her active mind completed a storage
+battery very quickly charged--and very soon over-charged--and an
+outlet was imperative.
+
+Always, so far in her brief career, she had had adequate outlets. As a
+child she found satisfaction in violent exercises; in flinging herself
+headlong into every outdoor game, every diversion among the urchins of
+her circle. As a school girl her school sports and her studies, and
+whatever social pleasures were offered, had left the safety valve
+open.
+
+Later, mistress of her mother's modest fortune, and grown to restless,
+intelligent womanhood, Palla had gone abroad with a married
+school-friend, Leila Vance. Under her auspices she had met nice people
+and had seen charming homes in England--Colonel Vance being somebody
+in the county and even somebody in London--a diffident, reticent,
+agriculturally inclined land owner and colonel of yeomanry. And long
+ago dead in Flanders. And his wife a nurse somewhere in France.
+
+But before the war a year's travel and study had furnished the
+necessary outlet to Palla Dumont. And then--at a charity bazaar--a
+passionate friendship had flashed into sacred flame--a friendship born
+at sight between her and the little Grand Duchess Marie.
+
+War was beginning; Colonel Vance was dead; but imperial inquiry
+located Leila. And imperial inquiry was satisfied. And Palla became
+the American companion and friend of the youthful Grand Duchess Marie.
+For three years that blind devotion had been her outlet--that and
+their mutual inclination for a life to be dedicated to God.
+
+What was to be her outlet now?--now that the little Grand Duchess was
+dead--now that God, as she had conceived him, had ceased to exist for
+her--now that the war was ended, and nobody needed that warm young
+heart of hers--that ardent little heart so easily set throbbing with
+the passionate desire to give.
+
+The wintry sunlight flooded the familiar sitting room, setting potted
+geraniums ablaze, gilding the leather backs of old books, staining
+prisms on the crystal chandelier with rainbow tints, and causing Max,
+the family cat, to blink until the vertical pupils of his amber eyes
+seemed to disappear entirely.
+
+There was some snow outside--not very much--a wild bird or two among
+the naked apple trees; green edges, still, where snowy lawn and flower
+border met.
+
+And there was colour in the leafless shrubbery, too--wine-red stems of
+dogwood, ash-blue berry-canes, and the tangled green and gold of
+willows. And over all a pale cobalt sky, and a snow-covered hill,
+where, in the woods, crows sat cawing on the taller trees, and a slow
+goshawk sailed.
+
+A rich land, this, even under ice and snow--a rich, rolling land
+hinting of fat furrows and heavy grain; and of spicy, old-time gardens
+where the evenings were heavy with the scent of phlox and lilies.
+
+Palla, her hands behind her back, seeming very childish and slim in
+her black gown, stood searching absently among the books for
+something to distract her--something in harmony with the restless glow
+of hidden fires hot in her restless heart.
+
+But war is too completely the great destroyer, killing even the
+serener pleasures of the mind, corrupting normal appetite, dulling all
+interest except in what pertains to war.
+
+War is the great vandal, too, obliterating even that interest in the
+classic past which is born of respect for tradition. War slays all
+yesterdays, so that human interest lives only in the fierce and
+present moment, or blazes anew at thought of what may be to-morrow.
+
+Only the chronicles of the burning hour can hold human attention where
+war is. For last week is already a decade ago; and last year a dead
+century; but to-day is vital and to-morrow is immortal.
+
+It was so with Palla. Her listless eyes swept the ranks of handsome,
+old-time books--old favourites bound in gold and leather, masters of
+English prose and poetry gathered and garnered by her grand-parents
+when books were rare in Shadow Hill.
+
+Not even the modern masters appealed to her--masters of fiction
+acclaimed but yesterday; virile thinkers in philosophy, in science;
+enfranchised poets who had stridden out upon Olympus only yesterday to
+defy the old god's lightning with unshackled strophes--and sometimes
+unbuttoned themes.
+
+But it was with Palla as with others; she drifted back to the morning
+paper, wherein lay the interest of the hour. And nothing else
+interested her or the world.
+
+Martha announced lunch. Max accompanied her on her retreat to the
+kitchen. Palla loitered, not hungry, nervous and unquiet under the
+increasing need of occupation for that hot heart of hers.
+
+After a while she went out to the dining room, ate enough, endured
+Martha to the verge, and retreated to await the evening paper.
+
+Her attorney, Mr. Tiddley, came at three. They discussed quit-claims,
+mortgages, deeds, surveys, and reported encroachments incident to the
+decay of ancient landmarks. And the conversation maddened her.
+
+At four she put on a smart mourning hat and her black furs, and walked
+down to see the bank president, Mr. Pawling. The subject of their
+conversation was investments; and it bored her. At five she returned
+to the house to receive a certain Mr. Skidder--known in her childhood
+as Blinky Skidder, in frank recognition of an ocular peculiarity--a
+dingy but jaunty young man with a sheep's nose, a shrewd upper lip,
+and snapping red-brown eyes, who came breezily in and said: "Hello,
+Palla! How's the girl?" And took off his faded mackinaw uninvited.
+
+Mr. Skidder's business had once been the exploitation of farmers and
+acreage; his specialty the persuasion of Slovak emigrants into the
+acquisition of doubtful land. But since the war, emigrants were few;
+and, as honest men must live, Mr. Skidder had branched out into
+improved real estate and city lots. But the pickings, even here, were
+scanty, and loans hard to obtain.
+
+"I've changed my mind," said Palla. "I'm not going to sell this house,
+Blinky."
+
+"Well, for heaven's sake--ain't you going to New York?" he insisted,
+taken aback.
+
+"Yes, I am. But I've decided to keep my house."
+
+"That," said Mr. Skidder, snapping his eyes, "is silly sentiment, not
+business. But please yourself Palla. I ain't saying a word. I ain't
+trying to tell you I can get a lot more for you than your house is
+worth--what with values falling and houses empty and the mills letting
+men go because there ain't going to be any more war orders!--but
+please yourself, Palla. I ain't saying a word to urge you."
+
+"You've said several," she remarked, smilingly. "But I think I'll keep
+the house for the present, and I'm sorry that I wasted your time."
+
+"Please yourself, Palla," he repeated. "I guess you can afford to from
+all I hear. I guess you can do as you've a mind to, now.... So you're
+fixing to locate in New York, eh?"
+
+"I think so."
+
+"Live in a flat?"
+
+"I don't know."
+
+"What are you going to do in New York?" he asked curiously.
+
+"I'm sure I don't know. There'll be plenty to do, I suppose."
+
+"You bet," he said, blinking rapidly, "there's always something doing
+in that little old town." He slapped his knee: "Palla," he said, "I'm
+thinking of going into the movie business."
+
+"Really?"
+
+"Yes, I'm considering it. Slovaks and bum farms are played out.
+There's no money in Shadow Hill--or if there is, it's locked up--or
+the income tax has paralysed it. No, I'm through. There's nothing
+doing in land; no commissions. And I'm considering a quick getaway."
+
+"Where do you expect to go?"
+
+"Say, Palla, when you kiss your old home good-bye, there's only one
+place to go. Get me?"
+
+"New York?" she inquired, amused.
+
+"That's me! There's a guy down there I used to correspond with--a
+feller named Puma--Angelo Puma--not a regular wop, as you might say,
+but there's some wop in him, judging by his map--or Mex--or kike,
+maybe--or something. Anyway, he's in the moving picture business--The
+Ultra-Fillum Company. I guess there's a mint o' money in fillums."
+
+She nodded, a trifle bored.
+
+"I got a chance to go in with Angelo Puma," he said, snapping his
+eyes.
+
+"Really?"
+
+"You know, Palla, I've made a little money, too, since you been over
+there living with the Queen of Russia."
+
+"I'm very glad, Blinky."
+
+"Oh, it ain't much. And," he added shrewdly, "it ain't so paltry,
+neither. Thank the Lord, I made hay while the Slovaks lasted.... So,"
+he added, getting up from his chair, "maybe I'll see you down there in
+New York, some day----"
+
+He hesitated, his blinking eyes redly intent on her as she rose to her
+slim height.
+
+"Say, Palla."
+
+She looked at him inquiringly.
+
+"Ever thought of the movies?"
+
+"As an investment?"
+
+"Well--that, too. There's big money in it. But I meant--I mean--it
+strikes me you'd make a bird of a movie queen."
+
+The suggestion mildly amused her.
+
+"I mean it," he insisted. "Grab it from me, Palla, you've got the
+shape, and you got the looks and you got the walk and the ways and the
+education. You got something peculiar--like you had been born a rich
+swell--I mean you kinda naturally act that way--kinda cocksure of
+yourself. Maybe you got it living with that Queen----"
+
+Palla laughed outright.
+
+"So you think because I've seen a queen I ought to know how to act
+like a movie queen?"
+
+"Well," he said, picking up his hat, "maybe if I go in with Angelo
+Puma some day I'll see you again and we'll talk it over."
+
+She shook hands with him.
+
+"Be good," he called back as she closed the front door behind him.
+
+The early winter night had fallen over Shadow Hill. Palla turned on
+the electric light, stood for a while looking sombrely at the framed
+photographs of her father and mother, then, feeling lonely, went into
+the kitchen where Martha was busy with preparations for dinner.
+
+"Martha," she said, "I'm going to New York."
+
+"Well, for the land's sake----"
+
+"Yes, and I'm going day after to-morrow."
+
+"What on earth makes you act like a gypsy, Palla?" she demanded
+querulously, seasoning the soup and tasting it. "Your pa and ma wasn't
+like that. They was satisfied to set and rest a mite after being away.
+But you've been gone four years 'n more, and now you're up and off
+again, hippity-skip! clippity-clip!----"
+
+"I'm just going to run down to New York and look about. I want to look
+around and see what----"
+
+"That's _you_, Palla! That's what you allus was doing as a
+child--allus looking about you with your wide brown eyes, to see what
+you could see in the world!... You know what curiosity did to the
+cat?"
+
+"What?"
+
+"Pinched her paw in the mouse-trap."
+
+"I'll be careful," said the girl, laughing.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+
+In touch with his unexciting business again, after many months of
+glorious absence, and seated once more at his abhorred yellow-oak
+desk, young Shotwell discovered it was anything except agreeable for
+him to gather up the ravelled thrums of civilian life after the
+thrilling taste of service over seas.
+
+For him, so long accustomed to excitement, the zest of living seemed
+to die with the signing of the armistice.
+
+In fact, since the Argonne drive, all luck seemed to have deserted
+him; for in the very middle of operations he had been sent back to the
+United States as instructor; and there the armistice had now caught
+him. Furthermore, then, before he realised what dreadful thing was
+happening to him, he had been politely assigned to that vague limbo
+supposedly inhabited by a mythical organisation known as The Officers'
+Reserve Corps, and had been given indefinite leave of absence
+preliminary to being mustered out of the service of the United
+States.
+
+To part from his uniform was agonising, and he berated the fate that
+pried him loose from tunic and puttees. So disgusted was he that,
+although the Government allowed three months longer before discarding
+uniforms, he shed his in disgust for "cits."
+
+But James Shotwell, Jr., was not the only man bewildered and
+annoyed by the rapidity of events which followed the first days of
+demobilisation. Half a dozen other young fellows in the big real
+estate offices of Clarence Sharrow & Co. found themselves yanked out
+of uniform and seated once more at their familiar, uninviting desks
+of yellow oak--very young men, mostly, assigned to various camps of
+special three-month instruction; and now cruelly interrupted while
+scrambling frantically after commissions in machine-gun companies,
+field artillery, flying units, and tank corps.
+
+And there they were, back again at the old grind before they could
+realise their horrid predicament--the majority already glum and
+restless under the reaction, and hating Shotwell, who, among them all,
+had been the only man to cross the sea.
+
+This war-worn and envied veteran of a few months, perfectly aware that
+his military career had ended, was now trying to accept the situation
+and habituate himself to the loathly technique of commerce.
+
+Out of uniform, out of humour, out of touch with the arts of peace;
+still, at times, all a-quiver with the nervous shock of his
+experience, it was very hard for him to speak respectfully to Mr.
+Sharrow.
+
+As instructor to rookie aspirants he would have been somebody: he had
+already been somebody as a lieutenant of infantry in the thunderous
+scheme of things in the Argonne.
+
+But in the offices of Clarence Sharrow & Co. he was merely a rather
+nice-looking civilian subordinate, whose duties were to aid clients in
+the selection and purchase of residences, advise them, consult with
+them, make appointments to show them dwelling houses, vacant or still
+tenanted, and in every stage of repair or decrepitude.
+
+On the wall beside his desk hung a tinted map of the metropolis. Upon
+a table at his elbow were piled ponderous tomes depicting the Bronx in
+all its beauty, and giving details of suburban sewers. Other volumes
+contained maps of the fashionable residential district, showing every
+consecrated block and the exact location as well as the linear
+dimensions of every awesome residence and back yard from Washington
+Square to Yorkville.
+
+By referring to a note-book which he carried in his breast pocket,
+young Shotwell could inform any grand lady or any pompous or fussy
+gentleman what was the "asking price" of any particular residence
+marked for sale upon the diagrams of the ponderous tomes.
+
+Also--which is why Sharrow selected him for that particular
+job--clients liked his good manners and his engaging ways.
+
+The average client buys a freshly painted house in preference to a
+well-built one, but otherwise clamours always for a bargain. The
+richer the client the louder the clamour. And to such demands Shotwell
+was always sympathetic--always willing to inquire whether or not the
+outrageous price asked for a dwelling might possibly be "shaded" a
+little.
+
+It always could be shaded; but few clients knew that; and the
+majority, much flattered at their own business acumen, entertained
+kind feelings toward Sharrow & Co. and sentiments almost cordial
+toward young Shotwell when the "shading" process had proved to be
+successful.
+
+But the black-eye dealt the residential district long ago had not yet
+cleared up. Real property of that sort was still dull and inactive
+except for a flare-up now and then along Park Avenue and Fifth.
+
+War, naturally, had not improved matters; and, as far as the
+residential part of their business was concerned, Sharrow & Co.
+transacted the bulk of it in leasing apartments and, now and then, a
+private house, usually on the West Side.
+
+That morning, in the offices of Sharrow & Co., a few clients sat
+beside the desks of the various men who specialised in the particular
+brand of real estate desired: several neat young girls performed
+diligently upon typewriters; old man Sharrow stood at the door of his
+private office twirling his eyeglasses by the gold chain and urbanely
+getting rid of an undesirable visitor--one Angelo Puma, who wanted
+some land for a moving picture studio, but was persuasively unwilling
+to pay for it.
+
+He was a big man, too heavy, youngish, with plump olive skin, black
+hair, lips too full and too red under a silky moustache, and eyes that
+would have been magnificent in a woman--a Spanish dancer, for
+example--rich, dark eyes, softly brilliant under curling lashes.
+
+He seemed to covet the land and the ramshackle stables on it, but he
+wanted somebody to take back a staggering mortgage on the property.
+And Mr. Sharrow shook his head gently, and twirled his eyeglasses.
+
+"For me," insisted Puma, "I do not care. It is good property. I would
+pay cash if I had it. But I have not. No. My capital at the moment is
+tied up in production; my daily expenses, at present, require what
+cash I have. If your client is at all reasonable----"
+
+"He isn't," said Sharrow. "He's a Connecticut Yankee."
+
+For a moment Angelo Puma seemed crestfallen, then his brilliant smile
+flashed from every perfect tooth:
+
+"That is very bad for me," he said, buttoning-his showy overcoat.
+"Pardon me; I waste your time--" pulling on his gloves. "However, if
+your client should ever care to change his mind----"
+
+"One moment," said Sharrow, whose time Mr. Puma had indeed wasted at
+intervals during the past year, and who heartily desired to be rid of
+property and client: "Suppose you deal directly with the owner. We are
+not particularly anxious to carry the property; it's a little out of
+our sphere. Suppose I put you in direct communication with the
+owner."
+
+"Delighted," said Puma, flashing his smile and bowing from the waist;
+and perfectly aware that his badgering had bored this gentleman to the
+limit.
+
+"I'll write out his address for you," said Sharrow, "--one moment,
+please----"
+
+Angelo Puma waited, his glossy hat in one hand, his silver-headed
+stick and folded suede gloves in the other.
+
+Like darkly brilliant searchlights his magnificent eyes swept the
+offices of Sharrow & Co.; at a glance he appraised the self-conscious
+typists, surmised possibilities in a blond one; then, as a woman
+entered from the street, he rested his gaze upon her. And he kept it
+there.
+
+Even when Sharrow came out of his private office with the slip of
+paper, Angelo Puma's eyes still remained fastened upon the young girl
+who had spoken to a clerk and then seated herself in a chair beside
+the desk of James Shotwell, Jr.
+
+"The man's name," repeated Sharrow patiently, "is Elmer Skidder. His
+address is Shadow Hill, Connecticut."
+
+Puma turned to him as though confused, thanked him effusively, took
+the slip of paper, pulled on his gloves in a preoccupied way, and very
+slowly walked toward the street door, his eyes fixed on the girl who
+was now in animated conversation with young Shotwell.
+
+As he passed her she was laughing at something the young man had just
+said, and Puma deliberately turned and looked at her again--looked her
+full in the face.
+
+She was aware of him and of his bold scrutiny, of course--noticed his
+brilliant eyes, no doubt--but paid no heed to him--was otherwise
+preoccupied with this young man beside her, whom she had neither seen
+nor thought about since the day she had landed in New York from the
+rusty little Danish steamer _Elsinore_.
+
+And now, although he had meant nothing at all to her except an episode
+already forgotten, to meet him again had instantly meant something to
+her.
+
+For this man now represented to her a link with the exciting
+past--this young soldier who had been fresh from the furnace when she
+had met him on deck as the _Elsinore_ passed in between the forts in
+the grey of early morning.
+
+The encounter was exciting her a little, too, over-emphasising its
+importance.
+
+"Fancy!" she repeated, "my encountering you here and in civilian
+dress! Were you dreadfully disappointed by the armistice?"
+
+"I'm ashamed to say I took it hard," he admitted.
+
+"So did I. I had hoped so to go to France. And you--oh, I _am_ sorry
+for you. You were so disgusted at being detailed from the fighting
+line to Camp Upton! And now the war is over. What a void!"
+
+"You're very frank," he said. "We're supposed to rejoice, you know."
+
+"Oh, of course. I really do rejoice----"
+
+They both laughed.
+
+"I mean it," she insisted. "In my sober senses I am glad the war is
+over. I'd be a monster if I were not glad. But--_what_ is going to
+take its place? Because we must have something, you know. One can't
+endure a perfect void, can one?"
+
+Again they laughed.
+
+"It was such a tremendous thing," she explained. "I did want to be
+part of it before it ended. But of course peace is a tremendous thing,
+too----"
+
+And they both laughed once more.
+
+"Anybody overhearing us," she confided to him, "would think us mere
+beasts. Of course you are glad the war is ended: that's why you
+fought. And I'm glad, too. And I'm going to rent a house in New York
+and find something to occupy this void I speak of. But isn't it nice
+that I should come to you about it?"
+
+"Jolly," he said. "And now at last I'm going to learn your name."
+
+"Oh. Don't you know it?"
+
+"I wanted to ask you, but there seemed to be no proper opportunity----"
+
+"Of course. I remember. There seemed to be no reason."
+
+"I was sorry afterward," he ventured.
+
+That amused her. "You weren't really sorry, were you?"
+
+"I really was. I thought of you----"
+
+"Do you mean to say you remembered me after the ship docked?"
+
+"Yes. But I'm very sure you instantly forgot me."
+
+"I certainly did!" she admitted, still much amused at the idea. "One
+doesn't remember everybody one sees, you know," she went on
+frankly,"--particularly after a horrid voyage and when one's head is
+full of exciting plans. Alas! those wonderful plans of mine!--the
+stuff that dreams are made of. And here I am asking you kindly to find
+me a modest house with a modest rental.... And by the way," she added
+demurely, "my name is Palla Dumont."
+
+"Thank you," he said smilingly. "Do you care to know mine?"
+
+"I know it. When I came in and told the clerk what I wanted, he said I
+should see Mr. Shotwell."
+
+"James Shotwell, Jr.," he said gravely.
+
+"That _is_ amiable. You don't treasure malice, do you? I might merely
+have known you as _Mr._ Shotwell. And you generously reveal all from
+James to Junior."
+
+They were laughing again. Mr. Sharrow noticed them from his
+private office and congratulated himself on having Shotwell in his
+employment.
+
+"When may I see a house?" inquired Palla, settling her black-gloved
+hands in her black fox muff.
+
+"Immediately, if you like."
+
+"How wonderful!"
+
+He took out his note-book, glanced through several pages, asked her
+carelessly what rent she cared to pay, made a note of it, and resumed
+his study of the note-book.
+
+"The East Side?" he inquired, glancing at her with curiosity not
+entirely professional.
+
+"I prefer it."
+
+From his note-book he read to her the descriptions and situations of
+several twenty-foot houses in the zone between Fifth and Third
+Avenues.
+
+"Shall we go to see some of them, Mr. Shotwell? Have you, perhaps,
+time this morning?"
+
+"I'm delighted," he said. Which, far from straining truth, perhaps
+restrained it.
+
+So he got his hat and overcoat, and they went out together into the
+winter sunshine.
+
+Angelo Puma, seated in a taxi across the street, observed them. He
+wore a gardenia in his lapel. He might have followed Palla had she
+emerged alone from the offices of Sharrow & Co.
+
+Shotwell Junior had a jolly morning of it. And, if the routine proved
+a trifle monotonous, Palla, too, appeared to amuse herself.
+
+She inspected various types of houses, expensive and inexpensive,
+modern and out of date, well built and well kept and "jerry-built" and
+dirty.
+
+Prices and rents painfully surprised her, and she gave up any idea of
+renting a furnished house, and so informed Shotwell.
+
+So they restricted their inspection to three-story unfurnished and
+untenanted houses, where the neighbourhood was less pretentious and
+there was a better light in the rear.
+
+But they all were dirty, neglected, out of repair, destitute of decent
+plumbing and electricity.
+
+On the second floor of one of these Palla stood, discouraged,
+perplexed, gazing absently out, across a filthy back yard full of
+seedling ailanthus trees and rubbish, at the rear fire escapes on the
+tenements beyond.
+
+Shotwell, exploring the closely written pages of his note-book, could
+discover nothing desirable within the terms she was willing to make.
+
+"There's one house on our books," he said at last, "which came in only
+yesterday. I haven't had time to look at it. I don't even know where
+the keys are. But if you're not too tired----"
+
+Palla gave him one of her characteristic direct looks:
+
+"I'm not too tired, but I'm starved. I could go after lunch."
+
+"Fine!" he said. "I'm hungry, too! Shall we go to Delmonico's?"
+
+The girl seemed a trifle nonplussed. She had not supposed that
+luncheon with clients was included in a real estate transaction.
+
+She was not embarrassed, nor did the suggestion seem impertinent. But
+she said:
+
+"I had expected to lunch at the hotel."
+
+He reddened a little. Guilt shows its colors.
+
+"Had you rather?" he asked.
+
+"Why, no. I'd rather lunch with you at Delmonico's and talk houses."
+And, a little amused at this young man's transparent guile, she added:
+"I think it would be very agreeable for us to lunch together."
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+She came from the dressing-room fresh and flushed as a slightly
+chilled rose, rejoining him in the lobby, and presently they were
+seated in the palm room with a discreet and hidden orchestra playing,
+"Oh! How I Hate To Get Up in the Morning," and rather busy with a
+golden Casaba melon between them.
+
+"Isn't this jolly!" he said, expanding easily, as do all young men in
+the warmth of the informal.
+
+"Very. What an agreeable business yours seems to be, Mr. Shotwell."
+
+"In what way?" he asked innocently.
+
+"Why, part of it is lunching with feminine clients, isn't it?"
+
+His close-set ears burned. She glanced up with mischief brilliant in
+her brown eyes. But he was busy with his melon. And, not looking at
+her:
+
+"Don't you want to know me?" he asked so clumsily that she hesitated
+to snub so defenceless a male.
+
+"I don't know whether I wish to," she replied, smiling slightly. "I
+hadn't aspired to it; I hadn't really considered it. I was thinking
+about renting a house."
+
+He said nothing, but, as the painful colour remained in his face, the
+girl decided to be a little kinder.
+
+"Anyway," she said, "I'm enjoying myself. And I hope you are."
+
+He said he was. But his voice and manner were so subdued that she
+laughed.
+
+"Fancy asking a girl such a question," she said. "You shouldn't ask a
+woman whether she doesn't want to know you. It would be irregular
+enough, under the circumstances, to say that you wanted to know her."
+
+"That's what I meant," he replied, wincing. "Would you consider it?"
+
+She could not disguise her amusement.
+
+"Yes; I'll consider it, Mr. Shotwell. I'll give it my careful
+attention. I owe you something, anyway."
+
+"What?" he asked uncertainly, prepared for further squelching.
+
+"I don't know exactly what. But when a man remembers a woman, and the
+woman forgets the man, isn't something due him?"
+
+"I think there is," he said so naively that Palla was unable to
+restrain her gaiety.
+
+"This is a silly conversation," she said, "--as silly as though I had
+accepted the cocktail you so thoughtfully suggested. We're both
+enjoying each other and we know it."
+
+"Really!" he exclaimed, brightening.
+
+His boyish relief--everything that this young man said to her--seemed
+to excite the girl to mirth. Perhaps she had been starved for laughter
+longer than is good for anybody. Besides, her heart was naturally
+responsive--opened easily--was easily engaged.
+
+"Of course I'm inclined to like you," she said, "or I wouldn't be here
+lunching with you and talking nonsense instead of houses----"
+
+"We'll talk houses!"
+
+"No; we'll _look_ at them--later.... Do you know it's a long, long
+time since I have laughed with a really untroubled heart?"
+
+"I'm sorry."
+
+"Yes, it isn't good for a girl. Sadness is a sickness--a physical
+disorganisation that infects the mind. It makes a strange emotion of
+love, too, perverting it to that mysticism we call religion--and
+wasting it.... I suppose you're rather shocked," she said smilingly.
+
+"No.... But have you no religion?"
+
+"Have you?"
+
+"Well--yes."
+
+"Which?"
+
+"Protestant.... Are you Catholic?"
+
+The girl rested her cheek on her hand and dabbed absently at her
+orange ice.
+
+"I was once," she said. "I was very religious--in the accepted sense
+of the term.... It came rather suddenly;--it seemed to be born as part
+of a sudden and close friendship with a girl--began with that
+friendship, I think.... And died with it."
+
+She sat quite silent for a while, then a tremulous smile edged her
+lips:
+
+"I had meant to take the veil," she said. "I did begin my novitiate."
+
+"Here?"
+
+"No, in Russia. There are a few foreign cloistered orders there....
+But I had a tragic awakening...." She bent her head and quoted softly,
+"'For the former things have passed away.'"
+
+The orange ice was melting; she stirred it idly, watching it
+dissolve.
+
+"No," she said, "I had utterly misunderstood the scheme of things.
+Divinity is not a sad, a solemn, a solitary autocrat demanding selfish
+tribute, blind allegiance, inexorable self-abasement. It is not an
+insecure tyrant offering bribery for the cringing, frightened
+servitude demanded."
+
+She looked up smilingly at the man: "Nor, within us, is there any soul
+in the accepted meaning,--no satellite released at death to revolve
+around or merge into some super-divinity. No!
+
+"For I believe,--I _know_--that the body--every one's body--is
+inhabited by a complete god, immortal, retaining its divine entity,
+beholden to no other deity save only itself, and destined to encounter
+in a divine democracy and through endless futures, unnumbered brother
+gods--the countless divinities which have possessed and shall possess
+those tenements of mankind which we call our bodies.... You do not, of
+course, subscribe to such a faith," she added, meeting his gaze.
+
+"Well----" He hesitated. She said:
+
+"Autocracy in heaven is as unthinkable, as unbelievable, and as
+obnoxious to me as is autocracy on earth. There is no such thing as
+divine right, here or elsewhere,--no divine prerogatives for tyranny,
+for punishment, for cruelty."
+
+"How did you happen to embrace such a faith?" he asked, bewildered.
+
+"I was sick of the scheme of things. Suffering, cruelty, death
+outraged my common sense. It is not in me to say, 'Thy will be done,'
+to any autocrat, heavenly or earthly. It is not in me to fawn on the
+hand that strikes me--or that strikes any helpless thing! No! And the
+scheme of things sickened me, and I nearly died of it----"
+
+She clenched her hand where it rested on the table, and he saw her
+face flushed and altered by the fire within. Then she smiled and
+leaned back in her chair.
+
+"In you," she said gaily, "dwells a god. In me a goddess,--a joyous
+one,--a divine thing that laughs,--a complete and free divinity that
+is gay and tender, that is incapable of tyranny, that loves all things
+both, great and small, that exists to serve--freely, not for
+reward--that owes allegiance and obedience only to the divine and
+eternal law within its own godhead. And that law is the law of
+love.... And that is my substitute for the scheme of things. Could you
+subscribe?"
+
+After a silence he quoted: "_Could you and I with Him conspire_----"
+
+She nodded: "'_To grasp this sorry scheme of things entire_----' But
+there is no '_Him_.' It's you and I.... Both divine.... Suppose we
+grasp it and '_shatter it to bits_.' Shall we?"
+
+"'_And then remould it nearer to the heart's desire?_'"
+
+"Remould it nearer to the logic of common sense."
+
+Neither spoke for a few moments. Then she drew a swift, smiling
+breath.
+
+"We're getting on rather rapidly, aren't we?" she said. "Did you
+expect to lunch with such a friendly, human girl? And will you now
+take her to inspect this modest house which you hope may suit her, and
+which, she most devoutly hopes may suit her, too?"
+
+"This has been a perfectly delightful day," he said as they rose.
+
+"Do you want me to corroborate you?"
+
+"Could you?"
+
+"I've had a wonderful time," she said lightly.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+
+John Estridge, out of a job--as were a million odd others now arriving
+from France by every transport--met James Shotwell, Junior, one wintry
+day as the latter was leaving the real estate offices of Sharrow &
+Co.
+
+"The devil," exclaimed Estridge; "I supposed you, at least, were safe
+in the service, Jim! Isn't your regiment in Germany?"
+
+"It is," replied Shotwell wrathfully, shaking hands. "Where do you
+come from, Jack?"
+
+"From hell--via Copenhagen. In milder but misleading metaphor, I come
+from Holy Russia."
+
+"Did the Red Cross fire you?"
+
+"No, but they told me to run along home like a good boy and get my
+degree. I'm not an M.D., you know. And there's a shortage. So I had to
+come."
+
+"Same here; I had to come." And Shotwell, for Estridge's enlightenment,
+held a post-mortem over the premature decease of his promising military
+career.
+
+"Too bad," commented the latter. "It sure was exciting while it
+lasted--our mixing it in the great game. There's pandemonium to pay in
+Russia, now;--I rather hated to leave.... But it was either leave or
+be shot up. The Bolsheviki are impossible.... Are you walking up
+town?"
+
+They fell into step together.
+
+"You'll go back to the P. & S., I suppose," ventured Shotwell.
+
+"Yes. And you?"
+
+"Oh, I'm already nailed down to the old oaken desk. Sharrow's my boss,
+if you remember?"
+
+"It must seem dull," said Estridge sympathetically.
+
+"Rotten dull."
+
+"You don't mean business too, do you?"
+
+"Yes, that's also on the bum.... I did contrive to sell a small house
+the other day--and blew myself to this overcoat."
+
+"Is that so unusual?" asked Estridge, smiling,"--to sell a house in
+town?"
+
+"Yes, it's a miracle in these days. Tell me, Jack, how did you get on
+in Russia?"
+
+"Too many Reds. We couldn't do much. They've got it in for everybody
+except themselves."
+
+"The socialists?"
+
+"Not the social revolutionists. I'm talking about the Reds."
+
+"Didn't they make the revolution?"
+
+"They did not."
+
+"Well, who are the Reds, and what is it they want?"
+
+"They want to set the world on fire. Then they want to murder and
+rob everybody with any education. Then they plan to start things
+from the stone age again. They want loot and blood. That's really
+all they want. Their object is to annihilate civilisation by
+exterminating the civilised. They desire to start all over from
+first principles--without possessing any--and turn the murderous
+survivors of the human massacre into one vast, international pack of
+wolves. And they're beginning to do it in Russia."
+
+"A pleasant programme," remarked Shotwell. "No wonder you beat it,
+Jack. I recently met a woman who had just arrived from Russia. They
+murdered her best friend--one of the little Grand Duchesses. She
+simply can't talk about it."
+
+"That was a beastly business," nodded Estridge. "I happen to know a
+little about it."
+
+"Were _you_ in that district?"
+
+"Well, no,--not when that thing happened. But some little time
+before the Bolsheviki murdered the Imperial family I had occasion to
+escort an American girl to the convent where they were held under
+detention.... An exceedingly pretty girl," he added absently. "She
+was once companion to one of the murdered Imperial children."
+
+Shotwell glanced up quickly: "Her name, by any chance, doesn't happen
+to be Palla Dumont?"
+
+"Why, yes. Do you know her?"
+
+"I sold her that house I was telling you about. Do you know her well,
+Jack?"
+
+Estridge smiled. "Yes and no. Perhaps I know her better than she
+suspects."
+
+Shotwell laughed, recollecting his friend's inclination for analysing
+character and his belief in his ability to do so.
+
+"Same old scientific vivisectionist!" he said. "So you've been
+dissecting Palla Dumont, have you?"
+
+"Certainly. She's a type."
+
+"A charming one," added Shotwell.
+
+"Oh, very."
+
+"But you don't know her well--outside of having mentally vivisected
+her?"
+
+Estridge laughed: "Palla Dumont and I have been through some rather
+hair-raising scrapes together. And I'll admit right now that she
+possesses all kinds of courage--perhaps too many kinds."
+
+"How do you mean?"
+
+"She has the courage of her convictions and her convictions,
+sometimes, don't amount to much."
+
+"Go on and cut her up," said Shotwell, sarcastically.
+
+"That's the only fault I find with Palla Dumont," explained the
+other.
+
+"I thought you said she was a type?"
+
+"She is,--the type of unmarried woman who continually develops too
+much pep for her brain to properly take care of."
+
+"You mean you consider Palla Dumont neurotic?"
+
+"No. Nothing abnormal. Perhaps super-normal--pathologically speaking.
+Bodily health is fine. But over-secretion of ardent energy sometimes
+disturbs one's mental equilibrium. The result, in a crisis, is likely
+to result in extravagant behavior. Martyrs are made of such stuff, for
+example."
+
+"You think her a visionary?"
+
+"Well, her reason and her emotions sometimes become rather badly
+entangled, I fancy."
+
+"Don't everybody's?"
+
+"At intervals. Then the thing to do is to keep perfectly cool till the
+fit is over."
+
+"So you think her impulsive?"
+
+"Well, I should say so!" smiled Estridge. "Of course I mean nicely
+impulsive--even nobly impulsive.... But that won't help her. Impulse
+never helped anybody. It's a spoke in the wheel--a stumbling block--a
+stick to trip anybody.... Particularly a girl.... And Palla Dumont
+mistakes impulse for logic. She honestly thinks that she reasons." He
+smiled to himself: "A disturbingly pretty girl," he murmured, "with a
+tender heart ... which seems to do all her thinking for her.... How
+well do you know her, Jim?"
+
+"Not well. But I'm going to, I hope."
+
+Estridge glanced up interrogatively, suddenly remembering all the
+uncontradicted gossip concerning a tacit understanding between
+Shotwell, Jr., and Elorn Sharrow. It is true that no engagement had
+been announced; but none had been denied, either. And Miss Sharrow had
+inherited her mother's fortune. And Shotwell, Jr., made only a young
+man's living.
+
+"You ought to be rather careful with such a girl," he remarked
+carelessly.
+
+"How, careful?"
+
+"Well, she's rather perilously attractive, isn't she?" insisted
+Estridge smilingly.
+
+"She's extremely interesting."
+
+"She certainly is. She's rather an amazing girl in her way. More
+amazing than perhaps you imagine."
+
+"Amazing?"
+
+"Yes, even astounding."
+
+"For example?"
+
+"I'll give you an example. When the Reds invaded that convent and
+seized the Czarina and her children, Palla Dumont, then a novice of
+six weeks, attempted martyrdom by pretending that she herself was the
+little Grand Duchess Marie. And when the Reds refused to believe her,
+she demanded the privilege of dying beside her little friend. She even
+insulted the Reds, defied them, taunted them until they swore to
+return and cut her throat as soon as they finished with the Imperial
+family. And then this same Palla Dumont, to whom you sold a house in
+New York the other day, flew into an ungovernable passion; tried to
+batter her way into the cellar; shattered half a dozen chapel chairs
+against the oak door of the crypt behind which preparations for the
+assassination were taking place; then, helpless, called on God to
+interfere and put a stop to it. And, when deity, as usual, didn't
+interfere with the scheme of things, this girl tore the white veil
+from her face and the habit from her body and denounced as nonexistent
+any alleged deity that permitted such things to be."
+
+Shotwell gazed at Estridge in blank astonishment.
+
+"Where on earth did you hear all that dope?" he demanded incredulously.
+
+Estridge smiled: "It's all quite true, Jim. And Palla Dumont escaped
+having her slender throat slit open only because a sotnia of
+Kaladines' Cossacks cantered up, discovered what the Reds were up to
+in the cellar, and beat it with Palla and another girl just in the
+nick of time."
+
+"Who handed you this cinema stuff?"
+
+"_The other girl._"
+
+"You believe her?"
+
+"You can judge for yourself. This other girl was a young Swedish
+soldier who had served in the Battalion of Death. It's really cinema
+stuff, as you say. But Russia, to-day, is just one hell after another
+in an endless and bloody drama. Such picturesque incidents,--the
+wildest episodes, the craziest coincidences--are occurring by
+thousands every day of the year in Russia.... And, Jim, it was due to
+one of those daily and crazy coincidences that my sleigh, in which I
+was beating it for Helsingfors, was held up by that same sotnia of the
+Wild Division on a bitter day, near the borders of a pine forest.
+
+"And that's where I encountered Palla Dumont again. And that's where I
+heard--not from her, but from her soldier comrade, Ilse Westgard--the
+story I have just told you."
+
+For a while they continued to walk up and down in silence.
+
+Finally Estridge said: "_There_ was a girl for you!"
+
+"Palla Dumont!" nodded Shotwell, still too astonished to talk.
+
+"No, the other.... An amazing girl.... Nearly six feet; physically
+perfect;--what the human girl ought to be and seldom is;--symmetrical,
+flawless, healthy--a super-girl ... like some young daughter of the
+northern gods!... Ilse Westgard."
+
+"One of those women soldiers, you say?" inquired Shotwell, mildly
+curious.
+
+"Yes. There were all kinds of women in that Death Battalion. We saw
+them,--your friend Palla Dumont and I,--saw them halted and standing
+at ease in a birch wood; saw them marching into fire.... And there were
+all sorts of women, Jim; peasant, bourgeoise and aristocrat;--there
+were dressmakers, telephone operators, servant-girls, students, Red
+Cross nurses, actresses from the Marinsky, Jewesses from the Pale,
+sisters of the Yellow Ticket, Japanese girls, Chinese, Cossack,
+English, Finnish, French.... And they went over the top cheering for
+Russia!... They went over to shame the army which had begun to run from
+the hun.... Pretty fine, wasn't it?"
+
+"Fine!"
+
+"You bet!... After this war--after what women have done the world
+over--I wonder whether there are any asses left who desire to
+restrict woman to a 'sphere'?... I'd like to see Ilse Westgard again,"
+he added absently.
+
+"Was she a peasant girl?"
+
+"No. A daughter of well-to-do people. Quite the better sort, I should
+say. And she was more thoroughly educated than the average girl of our
+own sort.... A brave and cheerful soldier in the Battalion of
+Death.... Ilse Westgard.... Amazing, isn't it?"
+
+After another brief silence Shotwell ventured: "I suppose you'd find
+it agreeable to meet Palla Dumont again, wouldn't you?"
+
+"Why, yes, of course," replied the other pleasantly.
+
+"Then, if you like, she'll ask us to tea some day--after her new house
+is in shape."
+
+"You seem to be very sure about what Palla Dumont is likely to do,"
+said Estridge, smiling.
+
+"Indeed, I'm not!" retorted Shotwell, with emphasis. "Palla Dumont has
+a mind of her own,--although you don't seem to think so,----"
+
+"I think she has a _will_ of her own," interrupted the other, amused.
+
+"Glad you concede her _some_ mental attribute."
+
+"I do indeed! I never intimated that she is weak-willed. She isn't.
+Other and stronger wills don't dominate hers. Perhaps it would be
+better if they did sometimes....
+
+"But no; Palla Dumont arrives headlong at her own red-hot decisions.
+It is not the will of others that influences her; it is their
+indecision, their lack of willpower, their very weakness that seems to
+stimulate and vitally influence such a character as Palla Dumont's--"
+
+"--Such a _character_?" repeated Shotwell. "What sort of character do
+you suppose hers to be, anyway? Between you and your psychological
+and pathological surmises you don't seem to leave her any character at
+all."
+
+"I'm telling you," said Estridge, "that the girl is influenced not by
+the will or desire of others, but by their necessities, their
+distress, their needs.... Or what she believes to be their needs....
+And you may decide for yourself how valuable are the conclusions of an
+impulsive, wilful, fearless, generous girl whose heart regulates her
+thinking apparatus."
+
+"According to you, then, she is practically mindless," remarked
+Shotwell, ironically. "You medically minded gentlemen are wonders!--all
+of you."
+
+"You don't get me. The girl is clever and intelligent when her
+accumulated emotions let her brain alone. When they interfere, her
+logic goes to smash and she does exaggerated things--like trying to
+sacrifice herself for her friend in the convent there--like tearing
+off the white garments of her novitiate and denouncing deity!--like
+embracing an extravagant pantheistic religion of her own manufacture
+and proclaiming that the Law of Love is the only law!
+
+"I've heard the young lady on the subject, Jim. And, medically minded
+or not, I'm medically on to her."
+
+They walked on together in silence for nearly a whole block; then
+Estridge said bluntly:
+
+"She'd be better balanced if she were married and had a few children.
+Such types usually are."
+
+Shotwell made no comment. Presently the other spoke again:
+
+"The Law of Love! What rot! That's sheer hysteria. Follow that law and
+you become a saint, perhaps, perhaps a devil. Love sacred, love
+profane--both, when exaggerated, arise from the same physical
+condition--too much pep for the mind to distribute.
+
+"What happens? Exaggerations. Extravagances. Hallucinations.
+Mysticisms.
+
+"What results? Nuns. Hermits. Yogis. Exhorters. Fanatics. Cranks.
+_Sometimes._ For, from the same chrysalis, Jim, may emerge either a
+vestal, or one of those tragic characters who, swayed by this same
+remarkable Law of Love, may give ... and burn on--slowly--from the
+first lover to the next. And so, into darkness."
+
+He added, smiling: "The only law of love subscribed to by sane people
+is framed by a balanced brain and interpreted by common sense. Those
+who obey any other code go a-glimmering, saint and sinner, novice and
+Magdalene alike.... This is your street, I believe."
+
+They shook hands cordially.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+After dining _en famille_, Shotwell Junior considered the various
+diversions offered to young business men after a day of labour.
+
+There were theatres; there was the Club de Vingt and similar agreeable
+asylums; there was also a telephone to ring, and unpremeditated
+suggestions to make to friends, either masculine or feminine.
+
+Or he could read and improve his mind. Or go to Carnegie Hall with his
+father and mother and listen to music of sorts.... Or--he could call
+up Elorn Sharrow.
+
+He couldn't decide; and his parents presently derided him and departed
+music-ward without him. He read an evening paper, discarded it, poked
+the fire, stood before it, jingled a few coins and keys in his
+pocket, still undecided, still rather disinclined to any exertion,
+even as far as the club.
+
+"I wonder," he thought, "what that girl is doing now. I've a mind to
+call her up."
+
+He seemed to know whom he meant by "that girl." Also, it was evident
+that he did not mean Elorn Sharrow; for it was not her number he
+called and presently got.
+
+"Miss Dumont?"
+
+"Yes? Who is it?"
+
+"It's a mere nobody. It's only your broker----"
+
+"_What!!_"
+
+"Your real-estate broker----"
+
+"Mr. Shotwell! How absurd of you!"
+
+"Why absurd?"
+
+"Because I don't think of you merely as a real-estate broker."
+
+"Then you _do_ sometimes think of me?"
+
+"What power of deduction! What logic! You seem to be in a particularly
+frivolous frame of mind. Are you?"
+
+"No; I'm in a bad one."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Because I haven't a bally thing to do this evening."
+
+"That's silly!--with the entire town outside.... I'm glad you called
+me up, anyway. I'm tired and bored and exceedingly cross."
+
+"What are you doing, Miss Dumont?"
+
+"Absolutely and idiotically nothing. I'm merely sitting here on the
+only chair in this scantily furnished house, and trying to plan what
+sort of carpets, draperies and furniture to buy. Can you imagine the
+scene?"
+
+"I thought you had some things."
+
+"I haven't anything! Not even a decent mirror. I stand on the
+slippery edge of a bath tub to get a complete view of myself. And then
+it's only by sections."
+
+"That's tragic. Have you a cook?"
+
+"I have. But no dining room table. I eat from a tray on a packing
+case."
+
+"Have you a waitress?"
+
+"Yes, and a maid. They're comfortable. I bought their furniture
+immediately and also the batterie-de-cuisine. It's only I who slink
+about like a perplexed cat, from one empty room to another, in search
+of familiar comforts.... But I bought a sofa to-day.
+
+"It's a wonderful sofa. It's here, now. It's an antique. But I can't
+make up my mind how to upholster it."
+
+"Would you care for a suggestion?"
+
+"Please!"
+
+"Well, I'd have to see it----"
+
+"I thought you'd say that. Really, Mr. Shotwell, I'd like most awfully
+to see you, but this place is too uncomfortable. I told you I'd ask
+you to tea some day."
+
+"Won't you let me come down for a few moments this evening----"
+
+"No!"
+
+"--And pay you a formal little call----"
+
+"No.... Would you really like to?"
+
+"I would."
+
+"You wouldn't after you got here. There's nothing for you to sit on."
+
+"What about the floor?"
+
+"It's dusty."
+
+"What about that antique sofa?"
+
+"It's not upholstered."
+
+"What do I care! May I come?"
+
+"Do you really wish to?"
+
+"I do."
+
+"How soon?"
+
+"As fast as I can get there."
+
+He heard her laughing. Then: "I'll be perfectly delighted to see you,"
+she said. "I was actually thinking of taking to my bed out of sheer
+boredom. Are you coming in a taxi?"
+
+"Why?"
+
+He heard her laughing again.
+
+"Nothing," she answered, "--only I thought that might be the quickest
+way--" Her laughter interrupted her, "--to bring me the evening
+papers. I haven't a thing to read."
+
+"_That's_ why you want me to take a taxi!"
+
+"It is. News is a necessity to me, and I'm famishing.... What other
+reason could there be for a taxi? Did you suppose I was in a hurry to
+see you?"
+
+He listened to her laughter for a moment:
+
+"All right," he said, "I'll take a taxi and bring a book for myself."
+
+"And please don't forget my evening papers or I shall have to
+requisition your book.... Or possibly share it with you on the
+upholstered sofa.... And I read very rapidly and don't like being kept
+waiting for slower people to turn the page.... Mr. Shotwell?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"This is a wonderful floor. Could you bring some roller skates?"
+
+"No," he said, "but I'll bring a music box and we'll dance."
+
+"You're not serious----"
+
+"I am. Wait and see."
+
+"Don't do such a thing. My servants would think me crazy. I'm mortally
+afraid of them, too."
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+He found a toy-shop on Third Avenue still open, and purchased a solemn
+little music-box that played ting-a-ling tunes.
+
+Then, in his taxi, he veered over to Fifth Avenue and Forty-second
+Street, where he bought roses and a spray of orchids. Then, adding to
+his purchases a huge box of bon-bons, he set his course for the three
+story and basement house which he had sold to Palla Dumont.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+
+Shotwell Senior and his wife were dining out that evening.
+
+Shotwell Junior had no plans--or admitted none, even to himself. He
+got into a bath and later into a dinner jacket, in an absent-minded
+way, and finally sauntered into the library wearing a vague scowl.
+
+The weather had turned colder, and there was an open fire there, and a
+convenient armchair and the evening papers.
+
+Perhaps the young gentleman had read them down town, for he shoved
+them aside. Then he dropped an elbow on the table, rested his chin
+against his knuckles, and gazed fiercely at the inoffensive _Evening
+Post_.
+
+Before any open fire any young man ought to be able to make up
+whatever mind he chances to possess. Yet, what to do with a winter
+evening all his own seemed to him a problem unfathomable.
+
+Perhaps his difficulty lay only in selection--there are so many
+agreeable things for a young man to do in Gotham Town on a winter's
+evening.
+
+But, oddly enough, young Shotwell was trying to persuade himself that
+he had no choice of occupation for the evening; that he really didn't
+care. Yet, always two intrusive alternatives continually presented
+themselves. The one was to change his coat for a spike-tail, his black
+tie for a white one, and go to the Metropolitan Opera. The other and
+more attractive alternative was _not_ to go.
+
+Elorn Sharrow would be at the opera. To appear, now and then, in the
+Sharrow family's box was expected of him. He hadn't done it recently.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+He dropped one lean leg over the other and gazed gravely at the fire.
+He was still trying to convince himself that he had no particular plan
+for the evening--that it was quite likely he might go to the opera or
+to the club--or, in fact, almost anywhere his fancy suggested.
+
+In his effort to believe himself the scowl came back, denting his
+eyebrows. Presently he forced a yawn, unsuccessfully.
+
+Yes, he thought he'd better go to the opera, after all. He ought to
+go.... It seemed to be rather expected of him.
+
+Besides, he had nothing else to do--that is, nothing in
+particular--unless, of course----
+
+But _that_ would scarcely do. He'd been _there_ so often recently....
+No, _that_ wouldn't do.... Besides it was becoming almost a habit with
+him. He'd been drifting there so frequently of late!... In fact, he'd
+scarcely been anywhere at all, recently, except--except where he
+certainly was not going that evening. And that settled it!... So he
+might as well go to the opera.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+His mother, in scarf and evening wrap, passing the library door on her
+way down, paused in the hall and looked intently at her only son.
+
+Recently she had been observing him rather closely and with a vague
+uneasiness born of that inexplicable sixth sense inherent in mothers.
+
+Perhaps what her son had faced in France accounted for the change in
+him;--for it was being said that no man could come back from such
+scenes unchanged;--none could ever again be the same. And it was being
+said, too, that old beliefs and ideals had altered; that everything
+familiar was ending;--and that the former things had already passed
+away under the glimmering dawn of a new heaven and a new earth.
+
+Perhaps all this was so--though she doubted it. Perhaps this son she
+had borne in agony might become to her somebody less familiar than the
+baby she had nursed at her own breast.
+
+But so far, to her, he continued to remain the same familiar baby she
+had always known--the same and utterly vital part of her soul and
+body. No sudden fulfilment of an apocalypse had yet wrought any occult
+metamorphosis in this boy of hers.
+
+And if he now seemed changed it was from that simple and familiar
+cause instinctively understood by mothers,--trouble!--the most ancient
+plague of all and the only malady which none escapes.
+
+She was a rather startlingly pretty woman, with the delicate features
+and colour and the snow-white hair of an 18th century belle. She
+stood, now, drawing on her gloves and watching her son out of
+dark-fringed deep blue eyes, until he glanced around uneasily. Then he
+rose at once, looking at her with fire-dazzled eyes.
+
+"Don't rise, dear," she said; "the car is here and your father is
+fussing and fuming in the drawing-room, and I've got to run.... Have
+you any plans for the evening?"
+
+"None, mother."
+
+"You're dining at home?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Why don't you go to the opera to-night? It's the Sharrows' night."
+
+He came toward her irresolutely. "Perhaps I shall," he said. And
+instantly she knew he did not intend to go.
+
+"I had tea at the Sharrows'," she said, carelessly, still buttoning
+her gloves. "Elorn told me that she hadn't laid eyes on you for
+ages."
+
+"It's happened so.... I've had a lot of things to do----"
+
+"You and she still agree, don't you, Jim?"
+
+"Why, yes--as usual. We always get on together."
+
+Helen Shotwell's ermine wrap slipped; he caught it and fastened it for
+her, and she took hold of both his hands and drew his arms tightly
+around her pretty shoulders.
+
+"What troubles you, darling?" she asked smilingly.
+
+"Why, nothing, mother----"
+
+"Tell me!"
+
+"Really, there is nothing, dear----"
+
+"Tell me when you are ready, then," she laughed and released him.
+
+"But there isn't anything," he insisted.
+
+"Yes, Jim, there is. Do you suppose I don't know you after all these
+years?"
+
+She considered him with clear, amused eyes: "Don't forget," she added,
+"that I was only seventeen when you arrived, my son; and I have grown
+up with you ever since----"
+
+"For heaven's sake, Helen!--" protested Sharrow Senior plaintively
+from the front hall below. "Can't you gossip with Jim some other
+time?"
+
+"I'm on my way, James," she announced calmly. "Put your overcoat on."
+And, to her son: "Go to the opera. Elorn will cheer you up. Isn't that
+a good idea?"
+
+"That's--certainly--an idea.... I'll think it over.... And, mother, if
+I seem solemn at times, please try to remember how rotten every fellow
+feels about being out of the service----"
+
+Her gay, derisive laughter checked him, warning him that he was not
+imposing on her credulity. She said smilingly:
+
+"You have neglected Elorn Sharrow, and you know it, and it's on your
+conscience--whatever else may be on it, too. And that's partly why you
+feel blue. So keep out of mischief, darling, and stop neglecting
+Elorn--that is, if you ever really expect to marry her----"
+
+"I've told you that I have never asked her; and I never intend to ask
+her until I am making a decent living," he said impatiently.
+
+"Isn't there an understanding between you?"
+
+"Why--I don't think so. There couldn't be. We've never spoken of that
+sort of thing in our lives!"
+
+"I think she expects you to ask her some day. Everybody else does,
+anyway."
+
+"Well, that is the one thing I _won't_ do," he said, "--go about with
+the seat out of my pants and ask an heiress to sew on the patch for
+me----"
+
+"Darling! You _can_ be so common when you try!"
+
+"Well, it amounts to that--doesn't it, mother? I don't care what busy
+gossips say or idle people expect me to do! There's no engagement, no
+understanding between Elorn and me. And I don't care a hang what
+anybody----"
+
+His mother framed his slightly flushed face between her gloved hands
+and inspected him humorously.
+
+"Very well, dear," she said; "but you need not be so emphatically
+excited about it----"
+
+"I'm not excited--but it irritates me to be expected to do anything
+because it's expected of me--" He shrugged his shoulders:
+
+"After all," he added, "if I ever should fall in love with anybody
+it's my own business. And whatever I choose to do about it will be my
+own affair. And I shall keep my own counsel in any event."
+
+His mother stepped forward, letting both her hands fall into his.
+
+"Wouldn't you tell me about it, Jim?"
+
+"I'd tell you before I'd tell anybody else--if it ever became
+serious."
+
+"If _what_ became serious?"
+
+"Well--anything of that sort," he replied. But a bright colour stained
+his features and made him wince under her intent scrutiny.
+
+She was worried, now, though her pretty, humorous smile still
+challenged him with its raillery.
+
+But it was becoming very evident to her that if this boy of hers were
+growing sentimental over any woman the woman was not Elorn Sharrow.
+
+So far she had held her son's confidence. She must do nothing to
+disturb it. Yet, as she looked at him with the amused smile still
+edging her lips, she began for the first time in her life to be
+afraid.
+
+They kissed each other in silence.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+In the limousine, seated beside her husband, she said presently: "I
+wish Jim would marry Elorn Sharrow."
+
+"He's likely to some day, isn't he?"
+
+"I don't think so."
+
+"Well, there's no hurry," remarked her husband. "He ought not to marry
+anybody until he's thirty, and he's only twenty-four. I'm glad enough
+to have him remain at home with us."
+
+"But that's what worries me; he _doesn't_!"
+
+"Doesn't what?"
+
+"Doesn't remain at home."
+
+Her husband laughed: "Well, I meant it merely in a figurative sense.
+Of course Jim goes out----"
+
+"Where?"
+
+"Why, everywhere, I suppose," said her husband, a little surprised at
+her tone.
+
+She said calmly: "I hear things--pick up bits of gossip--as all women
+do.... And at a tea the other day a man asked me why Jim never goes to
+his clubs any more. So you see he doesn't go to any of his clubs when
+he goes 'out' in the evenings.... And he's been to no dances--judging
+from what is said to me.... And he doesn't go to see Elorn Sharrow any
+more. She told me that herself. So--where does he go?"
+
+"Well, but----"
+
+"Where _does_ he go--every evening?"
+
+"I'm sure I couldn't answer----"
+
+"Every evening!" she repeated absently.
+
+"Good heavens, Helen----"
+
+"And what is on that boy's mind? There's something on it."
+
+"His business, let us hope----"
+
+She shook her head: "I know my son," she remarked.
+
+"So do I. What is particularly troubling you, dear? There's something
+you haven't told me."
+
+"I'm merely wondering who that girl was who lunched with him at
+Delmonico's--_three times_--last week," mused his wife.
+
+"Why--she's probably all right, Helen. A man doesn't take the other
+sort there."
+
+"So I've heard," she said drily.
+
+"Well, then?"
+
+"Nothing.... She's very pretty, I understand.... And wears mourning."
+
+"What of it?" he asked, amused. She smiled at him, but there was a
+trace of annoyance in her voice.
+
+"Don't you think it very natural that I should wonder who any girl is
+who lunches with my son three times in one week?... And is remarkably
+pretty, besides?"
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+The girl in question looked remarkably pretty at that very moment,
+where she sat at her desk, the telephone transmitter tilted toward
+her, the receiver at her ear, and her dark eyes full of gayest
+malice.
+
+"Miss Dumont, please?" came a distant and familiar voice over the
+wire. The girl laughed aloud; and he heard her.
+
+"You _said_ you were not going to call me up."
+
+"Is it _you_, Palla?"
+
+"How subtle of you!"
+
+He said anxiously. "Are you doing anything this evening--by any
+unhappy chance----"
+
+"I am."
+
+"Oh, hang it! What _are_ you doing?"
+
+"How impertinent!"
+
+"You know I don't mean it that way----"
+
+"I'm not sure. However, I'll be kind enough to tell you what I'm
+doing. I'm sitting here at my desk, listening to an irritable young
+man----"
+
+"That's wonderful luck!" he exclaimed joyously.
+
+"Wonderful luck for a girl to sit at a desk and listen to an irritable
+young man?"
+
+"If you'll stop talking bally nonsense for a moment----"
+
+"If you bully me, I shall stop talking altogether!"
+
+"For heaven's sake----"
+
+"I hear you, kind sir; you need not shout!"
+
+He said humbly: "Palla, would you let me drop in----"
+
+"Drop into what? Into poetry? Please do!"
+
+"For the love of----"
+
+"Jim! You told me last evening that you expected to be at the opera
+to-night."
+
+"I'm not going."
+
+"--So I didn't expect you to call me!"
+
+"Can't I see you?" he asked.
+
+"I'm sorry----"
+
+"The deuce!"
+
+"I'm expecting some people, Jim. It's your own fault; I didn't expect
+a tete-a-tete with you this evening."
+
+"Is it a party you're giving?"
+
+"Two or three people. But my place is full of flowers and as pretty as
+a garden. Too bad you can't see it."
+
+"Couldn't I come to your garden-party?" he asked humbly.
+
+"You mean just to see my garden for a moment?"
+
+"Yes; let me come around for a moment, anyway--if you're dressed. Are
+you?"
+
+"Certainly I'm dressed. Did you think it was to be a garden-of-Eden
+party?"
+
+Her gay, mischievous laughter came distinctly to him over the wire.
+Then her mood changed abruptly:
+
+"You funny boy," she said, "don't you understand that I want you to
+come?"
+
+"You enchanting girl!" he exclaimed. "Do you really mean it?"
+
+"Of course! And if you come at once we'll have nearly an hour together
+before anybody arrives."
+
+She had that sweet, unguarded way with her at moments, and it always
+sent a faint shock of surprise and delight through him.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+Her smiling maid admitted him and took his hat, coat and stick as
+though accustomed to these particular articles.
+
+Palla was alone in the living-room when he was announced, and as soon
+as the maid disappeared she gave him both hands in swift welcome--an
+impulsive, unconsidered greeting entirely new to them both.
+
+"You didn't mind my tormenting you. Did you, Jim? I was so happy that
+you did call me up, after all. Because you know you _did_ tell me
+yesterday that you were going to the opera to-night. But all the
+same, when the 'phone rang, somehow I knew it was you--I knew
+it--somehow----"
+
+She loosened one hand from his and swung him with the other toward the
+piano: "Do you like my flower garden? Isn't the room attractive?"
+
+"Charming," he said. "And you are distractingly pretty to-night!"
+
+"In this dull, black gown? But, _merci_, anyway! See how effective
+your roses are!--the ones you sent yesterday and the day before!
+They're all opening. And I went out and bought a lot more, and all
+that fluffy green camouflage----"
+
+She withdrew her other hand from his without embarrassment and went
+over to rearrange a sheaf of deep red carnations, spreading the
+clustered stems to wider circumference.
+
+"What is this party you're giving, anyway?" he asked, following her
+across the room and leaning beside her on the piano, where she still
+remained very busily engaged with her decorations.
+
+"An impromptu party," she exclaimed. "I was shopping this morning--in
+fact I was buying pots and pans for the cook--when somebody spoke to
+me. And I recognised a university student whom I had known in
+Petrograd after the first revolution--Marya Lanois, her name is----"
+
+She moved aside and began to fuss with a huge bowl of crimson roses,
+loosening the blossoms, freeing the foliage, and talking happily all
+the while:
+
+"Marya Lanois," she repeated, "--an interesting girl. And with her was
+a man I had met--a pianist--Vanya Tchernov. They told me that another
+friend of mine--a girl named Ilse Westgard--is now living in New York.
+They couldn't dine with me, but they're coming to supper. So I also
+called up Ilse Westgard, she's coming, too;--and I also asked your
+friend, Mr. Estridge. So you see, Monsieur, we shall have a little
+music and much valuable conversation, and then I shall give them some
+supper----"
+
+She stepped back from the piano, surveyed her handiwork critically,
+then looked around at him for his opinion.
+
+"Fine," he said. "How jolly your new house is"--glancing about the
+room at the few well chosen pieces of antique furniture, the
+harmonious hangings and comfortably upholstered modern pieces.
+
+"It really is beginning to be livable; isn't it, Jim?" she ventured.
+"Of course there are many things yet to buy----"
+
+They leisurely made the tour of the white-panelled room, looking with
+approval at the delicate Georgian furniture; the mezzotints; the
+damask curtains of that beautiful red which has rose-tints in it, too;
+the charming old French clock and its lovely gilded garniture; the
+deep-toned ash-grey carpet under foot.
+
+Before the mantel, with its wood fire blazing, they paused.
+
+"It's so enchantingly homelike," she exclaimed. "I already love it
+all. When I come in from shopping I just stand here with my hat and
+furs on, and gaze about and adore everything!"
+
+"Do you adore me, too?" he asked, laughing at her warmth. "You see I'm
+becoming one of your fixtures here, also."
+
+In her brown eyes the familiar irresponsible gaiety began to glimmer:
+
+"I do adore you," she said, "but I've no business to."
+
+"Why not?"
+
+She seated herself on the sofa and cast a veiled glance at him,
+enchantingly malicious.
+
+"Do you think you know me well enough to adore me?" she inquired with
+misleading gravity.
+
+"Indeed I do----"
+
+"Am I as easy to know as that? Jim, you humiliate me."
+
+"I didn't say that you are easy to know----"
+
+"You meant it!" she insisted reproachfully. "You think so, too--just
+because I let myself be picked up--by a perfectly strange man----"
+
+"Good heavens, Palla--" he began nervously; but caught the glimmer in
+her lowered eyes--saw her child's mouth tremulous with mirth
+controlled.
+
+"Oh, Jim!" she said, still laughing, "do you think I care how we met?
+How absurd of you to let me torment you. You're altogether too boyish,
+too self-conscious. You're loaded down with all the silly traditions
+which I've thrown away. I don't care how we met. I'm glad we know each
+other."
+
+She opened a silver box on a little table at her elbow, chose a
+cigarette, lighted it, and offered it to him.
+
+"I rather like the taste of them now," she remarked, making room for
+him on the sofa beside her.
+
+When he was seated, she reached up to a jar of flowers on the piano,
+selected a white carnation, broke it short, and then drew the stem
+through his lapel, patting the blossom daintily into a pom-pon.
+
+"Now," she said gaily, "if you'll let me, I'll straighten your tie.
+Shall I?"
+
+He turned toward her; she accomplished that deftly, then glanced
+across at the clock.
+
+"We've only half an hour longer to ourselves," she exclaimed, with
+that unconscious candour which always thrilled him. Then, turning to
+him, she said laughingly: "Does it really matter how two people meet
+when time races with us like that?"
+
+"And do you realise," he said in a low, tense voice, "that since I met
+you every racing minute has been sweeping me headlong toward you?"
+
+She was so totally unprepared for the deeper emotion in his voice and
+bearing--so utterly surprised--that she merely gazed at him.
+
+"Haven't you been aware of it, Palla?" he said, looking her in the
+eyes.
+
+"Jim!" she protested, "you are disconcerting! You never before have
+taken such a tone toward me."
+
+She rose, walked over to the clock, examined it minutely for a few
+moments. Then she turned, cast a swift, perplexed glance at him, and
+came slowly back to resume her place on the sofa.
+
+"Men should be very, very careful what they say to me." As she
+lifted her eyes he saw them beginning to glimmer again with that
+irresponsible humour he knew so well.
+
+"Be careful," she said, her brown gaze gay with warning; "--I'm
+godless and quite lawless, and I'm a very dangerous companion for any
+well-behaved and orthodox young man who ventures to tell me that I'm
+adorable. Why, you might as safely venture to adore Diana of the
+Ephesians! And you know what she did to her admirers."
+
+"She was really Aphrodite, wasn't she?" he said, laughing.
+
+"Aphrodite, Venus, Isis, Lada--and the Ephesian Diana--I'm afraid they
+all were hussies. But I'm a hussy, too, Jim! If you doubt it, ask any
+well brought up girl you know and tell her how we met and how we've
+behaved ever since, and what obnoxious ideas I entertain toward all
+things conventional and orthodox!"
+
+"Palla, are you really serious?--I'm never entirely sure what is under
+your badinage."
+
+"Why, of course I am serious. I don't believe in any of the things
+that you believe in. I've often told you so, though you don't believe
+me----"
+
+"Nonsense!"
+
+"I don't, I tell you. I did once. But I'm awake. No 'threats of hell
+or hopes of any sugary paradise' influence me. Nor does custom and
+convention. Nor do the laws and teachings of our present civilisation
+matter one straw to me. I'd break every law if it suited me."
+
+He laughed and lifted her hand from her lap: "You funny child," he
+said, "you wouldn't steal, for example--would you?"
+
+"I don't desire to."
+
+"Would you commit perjury?"
+
+"No!"
+
+"Murder?"
+
+"I have a law of my own, kind sir. It doesn't happen to permit murder,
+arson, forgery, piracy, smuggling----"
+
+Their irresponsible laughter interrupted her.
+
+"What else wouldn't you do?" he managed to ask.
+
+"I wouldn't do anything mean, deceitful, dishonest, cruel. But it's
+not your antiquated laws--it's my own and original law that governs my
+conduct."
+
+"You always conform to it?"
+
+"I do. But you don't conform to yours. So I'll try to help you
+remember the petty but always sacred conventions of our own accepted
+code----"
+
+And, with unfeigned malice, she began to disengage her hand from
+his--loosened the slim fingers one by one, all the while watching him
+sideways with prim lips pursed and lifted eyebrows.
+
+"Try always to remember," she said, "that, according to your code, any
+demonstration of affection toward a comparative stranger is
+exceedingly bad form."
+
+However, he picked up her hand again, which she had carelessly left
+lying on the sofa near his, and again she freed it, leisurely.
+
+They conversed animatedly, as always, discussing matters of common
+interest, yet faintly in her ears sounded the unfamiliar echo of
+passion.
+
+It haunted her mind, too--an indefinable undertone delicately
+persistent--until at last she sat mute, absent-minded, while he
+continued speaking.
+
+Her stillness--her remote gaze, perhaps--presently silenced him. And
+after a little while she turned her charming head and looked at him
+with that unintentional provocation born of virginal curiosity.
+
+What had moved him so unexpectedly to deeper emotion? Had she? Had
+she, then, that power? And without effort?--For she had been conscious
+of none.... But--if she tried.... Had she the power to move him
+again?
+
+Naive instinct--the emotionless curiosity of total
+inexperience--everything embryonic and innocently ruthless in her was
+now in the ascendant.
+
+She lifted her eyes and considered him with the speculative candour of
+a child. She wished to hear once more that unfamiliar _something_ in
+his voice--see it in his features----
+
+And she did not know how to evoke it.
+
+"Of what are you thinking, Palla?"
+
+"Of you," she answered candidly, without other intention than the
+truth. And saw, instantly, the indefinable _something_ born again into
+his eyes.
+
+Calm curiosity, faintly amused, possessed her--left him possessed of
+her hand presently.
+
+"Are you attempting to be sentimental?" she asked.
+
+Very leisurely she began once more to disengage her hand--loosening
+the fingers one by one--and watching him all the while with a slight
+smile edging her lips. Then, as his clasp tightened:
+
+"Please," she said, "may I not have my freedom?"
+
+"Do you want it?"
+
+"You never did this before--touched me--unnecessarily."
+
+As he made no answer, she fell silent, her dark eyes vaguely
+interrogative as though questioning herself as well as him concerning
+this unaccustomed contact.
+
+His head had been bent a little. Now he lifted it. Neither was
+smiling.
+
+Suddenly she rose to her feet and stood with her head partly averted.
+He rose, too. Neither spoke. But after a moment she turned and looked
+straight at him, the virginal curiosity clear in her eyes. And he took
+her into his arms.
+
+Her arms had fallen to her side. She endured his lips gravely, then
+turned her head and looked at the roses beside her.
+
+"I was afraid," she said, "that we would do this. Now let me go,
+Jim."
+
+He released her in silence. She walked slowly to the mantel and set
+one slim foot on the fender.
+
+Without looking around at him she said: "Does this spoil me for you,
+Jim?"
+
+"You darling----"
+
+"Tell me frankly. Does it?"
+
+"What on earth do you mean, Palla! Does it spoil _me_ for you?"
+
+"I've been thinking.... No, it doesn't. But I wondered about you."
+
+He came over to where she stood.
+
+"Dear," he said unsteadily, "don't you know I'm very desperately in
+love with you?"
+
+At that she turned her enchanting little head toward him.
+
+"If you are," she said, "there need be nothing desperate about it."
+
+"Do you mean you care enough to marry me, you darling?" he asked
+impetuously. "Will you, Palla?"
+
+"Why, no," she said candidly. "I didn't mean that. I meant that
+I care for you quite as much as you care for me. So you need not
+be desperate. But I really don't think we are in love--I mean
+sufficiently--for anything serious."
+
+"Why don't you think so!" he demanded impatiently.
+
+"Do you wish me to be quite frank?"
+
+"Of course!"
+
+"Very well." She lifted her head and let her clear eyes rest on his.
+"I like you," she said. "I even like--what we did. I like you far
+better than any man I ever knew. But I do not care for you enough to
+give up my freedom of mind and of conduct for your asking. I do not
+care enough for you to subscribe to your religion and your laws. And
+that's the tragic truth."
+
+"But what on earth has all that to do with it? I haven't asked you to
+believe as I believe or to subscribe to any law----"
+
+Her enchanting laughter filled the room: "Yes, you have! You asked me
+to marry you, didn't you?"
+
+"Of course!"
+
+"Well, I can't, Jim, because I don't believe in the law of marriage,
+civil or religious. If I loved you I'd live with you unmarried. But
+I'm afraid to try it. And so are you. Which proves that I'm not really
+in love with you, or you with me----"
+
+The door bell rang.
+
+"But I do care for you," she whispered, bending swiftly toward him.
+Her lips rested lightly on his a moment, then she turned and walked
+out into the centre of the room.
+
+The maid announced: "Mr. Estridge!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+
+Young Shotwell, still too incredulous to be either hurt or angry,
+stood watching Palla welcoming her guests, who arrived within a few
+minutes of each other.
+
+First came Estridge,--handsome, athletic, standing over six feet, and
+already possessed of that winning and reassuring manner which means
+success for a physician.
+
+"It's nice of you to ask me, Palla," he said. "And is Miss Westgard
+really coming to-night?"
+
+"But here she is now!" exclaimed Palla, as the maid announced her.
+"--Ilse! You astonishing girl! How long have you been in New York?"
+
+And Shotwell beheld the six-foot goddess for the first time--gazed
+with pleasurable awe upon this young super-creature with the sea-blue
+eyes and golden hair and a skin of roses and cream.
+
+"Fancy, Palla!" she said, "I came immediately back from Stockholm, but
+you had sailed on the _Elsinore_, and I was obliged to wait!--Oh!--"
+catching sight of Estridge as he advanced--"I am so very happy to see
+you again!"--giving him her big, exquisitely sculptured hand. "Except
+for Mr. Brisson, we are quite complete in our little company of
+death!" She laughed her healthy, undisturbed defiance of that human
+enemy as she named him, gazed rapturously at Palla, acknowledged
+Shotwell's presentation in her hearty, engaging way, then turned
+laughingly to Estridge:
+
+"The world whirls like a wheel in a squirrel cage which we all
+tread:--only to find ourselves together after travelling many, many
+miles at top speed!... Are you well, John Estridge?"
+
+"Fairly," he laughed, "but nobody except the immortals could ever be
+as well as you, Ilse Westgard!"
+
+She laughed in sheer exuberance of her own physical vigour: "Only that
+old and toothless nemesis of Loki can slay me, John Estridge!" And, to
+Palla: "I had some slight trouble in Stockholm. Fancy!--a little
+shrimp of a man approached me on the street one evening when there
+chanced to be nobody near.
+
+"And the first I knew he was mouthing and grinning and saying to me in
+Russian: 'I know you, hired mercenary of the aristocrats!--I know
+you!--big white battle horse that carried the bloody war-god!'
+
+"I was too astonished, my dear; I merely gazed upon this small and
+agitated toad, who continued to run alongside and grimace and pull
+funny faces at me. He appeared to be furious, and he said some very
+vile things to me.
+
+"I was disgusted and walked faster, and he had to run. And all the
+while he was squealing at me: 'I know you! You keep out of America, do
+you hear? If you sail on that steamer, we follow you and kill you! You
+hear it what I say? We kill! Kill! Kill!----'"
+
+She threw up her superb head and laughed:
+
+"Can you see him--this insect--Palla!--so small and hairy, with crazy
+eyes like little sparks among the furry whiskers!--and running,
+running at heel, underfoot, one side and then the other, and squealing
+'Kill! Kill? Kill'----"
+
+She had made them see the picture and they all laughed.
+
+"But all the same," she added, turning to Estridge, "from that evening
+I became conscious that people were watching me.
+
+"It was the same in Copenhagen and in Christiania--always I felt that
+somebody was watching me."
+
+"Did you have any trouble?" asked Estridge.
+
+"Well--there seemed to be so many unaccountable delays, obstacles
+in securing proper papers, trouble about luggage and steamer
+accommodations--petty annoyances," she added. "And also I am sure
+that letters to me were opened, and others which I should have
+received never arrived."
+
+"You believe it was due to the Reds?" asked Palla. "Have they
+emissaries in Scandinavia?"
+
+"My dear, their agents and spies swarm everywhere over the world!"
+said Ilse calmly.
+
+"Not here," remarked Shotwell, smiling.
+
+"Oh," rejoined Ilse quickly, "I ask your pardon, but America, also, is
+badly infested by these people. As their Black Plague spreads out over
+the entire world, so spread out the Bolsheviki to infect all with the
+red sickness that slays whole nations!"
+
+"We have a few local Reds," he said, unconvinced, "but I had scarcely
+supposed----"
+
+The bell rang: Miss Lanois and Mr. Tchernov were announced, greeted
+warmly by Palla, and presented.
+
+Both spoke the beautiful English of educated Russians; Vanya Tchernov,
+a wonderfully handsome youth, saluted Palla's hand in Continental
+fashion, and met the men with engaging formality.
+
+Shotwell found himself seated beside Marya Lanois, a lithe, warm,
+golden creature with greenish golden eyes that slanted, and the
+strawberry complexion that goes with reddish hair.
+
+"You are happy," she said, "with all your streets full of bright flags
+and your victorious soldiers arriving home by every troopship.
+Ah!--but Russia is the most unhappy of all countries to-day, Mr.
+Shotwell."
+
+"It's terribly sad," he said sympathetically. "We Americans don't seem
+to know whether to send an army to help you, or merely to stand aside
+and let Russia find herself."
+
+"You should send troops!" she said. "Is it not so, Ilse?"
+
+"Sane people should unite," replied the girl, her beautiful face
+becoming serious. "It will arrive at that the world over--the sane
+against the insane."
+
+"And it is only the bourgeoisie that is sane," said Vanya Tchernov,
+in his beautifully modulated voice. "The extremes are both
+abnormal--aristocrats and Bolsheviki alike."
+
+"We social revolutionists," said Marya Lanois, "were called extremists
+yesterday and are called reactionists to-day. But we are the world's
+balance. This war was fought for our ideals; your American soldiers
+marched for them: the hun failed because of them."
+
+"And there remains only one more war," said Ilse Westgard,--"the war
+against those outlaws we call Capital and Labour--two names for two
+robbers that have disturbed the world's peace long enough!"
+
+"Two tyrants," said Marya, "who trample us to war upon each other--who
+outrage us, crush us, cripple us with their ferocious feuds. What are
+the Bolsheviki? 'Those who want more.' Then the name belongs as well
+to the capitalists. They, also, are Bolsheviki--'men who always want
+more!' And these are the two quarrelling Bolsheviki giants who
+trample us--Lord Labour, Lord Capital--the devil of envy against the
+devil of greed!--war to the death! And, to the survivor, the bones!"
+
+Shotwell, a little astonished to hear from the red lips of this warm
+young creature the bitter cynicisms of the proletariat, asked her to
+define more clearly where the Bolsheviki stood, and for what they
+stood.
+
+"Why," she said, lying back on the sofa and adjusting her lithe body
+to a more luxurious position among the pillows, "it amounts to this,
+Mr. Shotwell, that a new doctrine is promulgated in the world--the
+cult of the under-dog.
+
+"And in all dog-fights, if the under-dog ever gets on top, then he,
+also, will try to kill the ci-devant who has now become the
+under-dog." And she laughed at him out of her green eyes that slanted
+so enchantingly.
+
+"You mean that there always will be an under-dog in the battle between
+capital and labour?"
+
+"Surely. Their snarling, biting, and endless battle is a nuisance."
+She smiled again: "We should knock them both on the head."
+
+"You know," explained Ilse, "that when we speak of the two outlaws as
+Capital and Labour, we don't mean legitimate capital and genuine
+labour."
+
+"They never fight," added Tchernov, smiling, "because they are one and
+the same."
+
+"Of course," remarked Marya, "even the united suffer occasionally from
+internal pains."
+
+"The remedy," added Vanya, "is to consult a physician. That
+is--arbitration."
+
+Ilse said: "Force is good! But one uses it legitimately only against
+rabid things." She turned affectionately to Palla and took her hands:
+"Your wonderful Law of Love solves all phenomena except insanity.
+With rabies it can not deal. Only force remains to solve that
+problem."
+
+"And yet," said Palla, "so much insanity can be controlled by kind
+treatment."
+
+Estridge agreed, but remarked that strait-jackets and padded cells
+would always be necessary in the world.
+
+"As for the Bolsheviki," said Marya, turning her warm young face to
+Shotwell with a lissome movement of the shoulders, almost caressing,
+"in the beginning we social revolutionists agreed with them and
+believed in them. Why not? Kerensky was an incapable dreamer--so
+sensitive that if you spoke rudely to him he shrank away wounded to
+the soul.
+
+"That is not a leader! And the Cadets were plotting, and the Cossacks
+loomed like a tempest on the horizon. And then came Korniloff! And the
+end."
+
+"The peace of Brest," explained Vanya, in his gentle voice, "awoke us
+to what the Red Soviets stood for. We saw Christ crucified again. And
+understood."
+
+Marya sat up straight on the sofa, running her dazzling white fingers
+over her hair--hair that seemed tiger-red, and very vaguely scented.
+
+"For thirty pieces of silver," she said, "Judas sold the world. What
+Lenine and Trotsky sold was paid for in yellow metal, and there were
+more pieces."
+
+Ilse said: "Babushka is dying of it. That is enough for me."
+
+Vanya replied: "Where the source is infected, drinkers die at the
+river's mouth. Little Marie Spiridonova perished. Countess Panina
+succumbed. Alexandria Kolontar will die from its poison. And, as these
+died, so shall Ivan and Vera die also, unless that polluted source be
+cleansed."
+
+Marya rested her tawny young head on the cushions again and smiled at
+Shotwell:
+
+"It's confusing even to Russians," she said, "--like a crazy Bakst
+spectacle at the Marinsky. I wonder what you must think of us."
+
+But on her expressive mouth the word "us" might almost have meant
+"me," and he paid her the easy compliment which came naturally to him,
+while she looked at him out of lazy and very lovely eyes as green as
+beryls.
+
+"_Tiche_," she murmured, smiling, "_ce n'est pas moi l'etat,
+monsieur_." And laughed while her indolent glance slanted sideways on
+Vanya, and lingered there as though in leisurely but amiable
+appraisal.
+
+The girl was evidently very young, but there seemed to be an
+indefinable something about her that hinted of experience beyond her
+years.
+
+Palla had been looking at her--from Shotwell to her--and Marya's sixth
+sense was already aware of it and asking why.
+
+For between two females of the human species the constant occult
+interplay is like steady lighting. With invisible antennae they touch
+one another incessantly, delicately exploring inside that grosser aura
+which is all that the male perceives.
+
+And finally Marya looked back at Palla.
+
+"May Mr. Tchernov play for us?" asked Palla, smiling, as though some
+vague authority in the matter were vested in this young girl with the
+tiger-hair.
+
+Her eyes closed indolently, and opened again as though digesting the
+subtlety: then, disdainfully accepting the assumption: "Oh, Vanya,"
+she called out carelessly, "play a little for us."
+
+The handsome youth bowed in his absent, courteous way. There was
+about him a simplicity entirely winning as he seated himself at the
+piano.
+
+But his playing revealed a maturity and nobility of mind scarcely
+expected of such gentleness and youth.
+
+Never had Palla heard Beethoven until that moment.
+
+He did not drift. There was no caprice to offend when he turned with
+courtly logic from one great master to another.
+
+Only when Estridge asked for something "typically Russian" did the
+charming dignity of the sequence break. Vanya laughed and looked at
+Marya Lanois:
+
+"That means you must sing," he said.
+
+She sang, resting where she was among the silken cushions;--the song,
+one of those epics of ancient Moscow, lauded Ivan IV. and the taking
+of Kazan.
+
+The music was bizarre; the girl's voice bewitching; and though the
+song was of the _Beliny_, it had been made into brief couplets, and it
+ended very quickly.
+
+Laughing at the applause, she sang a song of the _Skomorokhi_; then a
+cradle song, infinitely tender and strange, built upon the Chinese
+scale; and another--a Cossack song--built, also, upon the pentatonic
+scale.
+
+Discussions intruded then; the diversion ended the music.
+
+Palla presently rose, spoke to Vanya and Estridge, and came over to
+where Jim Shotwell sat beside Marya.
+
+Interrupted, they both looked up, and Jim rose as Estridge also
+presented himself to Marya.
+
+Palla said: "If you will take me out, Jim, we can show everybody the
+way." And to Marya: "Just a little supper, you know--but the dining
+room is below."
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+Her pretty drawing-room was only partly furnished--an expensive but
+genuine set of old Aubusson being her limit for the time.
+
+But beyond, in the rear, the little glass doors opened on a charming
+dining-room, the old Georgian mahogany of which was faded to a golden
+hue. Curtains, too, were golden shot with palest mauve; and two
+Imperial Chinese panels of ancient silk, miraculously embroidered and
+set with rainbow Ho-ho birds, were the only hangings on the walls. And
+they seemed to illuminate the room like sunshine.
+
+Shotwell, who knew nothing about such things but envisaged them with
+reverence, seated Palla and presently took his place beside her.
+
+His neighbour on his left was Marya, again--an arrangement which Palla
+might have altered had it occurred to her upstairs.
+
+Estridge, very animated, and apparently happy, recalled to Palla their
+last dinner together, and their dance.
+
+Palla laughed: "You said I drank too much champagne, John Estridge! Do
+you remember?"
+
+"You bet I do. You had a cunning little bunn, Palla----"
+
+"I did not! I merely asked you and Mr. Brisson what it felt like to be
+intoxicated."
+
+"You did your best to be a sport," he insisted, "but you almost passed
+away over your first cigarette!"
+
+"Darling!" cried Ilse, "don't let them tease you!"
+
+Palla, rather pink, laughingly denied any aspirations toward sportdom;
+and she presently ventured a glance at Shotwell, to see how he took
+all this.
+
+But already Marya had engaged him in half smiling, low-voiced
+conversation; and Palla looked at her golden-green eyes and warm, rich
+colouring, cooled by a skin of snow. Tiger-golden, the _rousse_
+ensemble; the supple movement of limb and body fascinated her; but
+most of all the lovely, slanting eyes with their glint of beryl amid
+melting gold.
+
+Estridge spoke to Marya; as the girl turned slightly, Palla said to
+Shotwell:
+
+"Do you find them interesting--my guests?"
+
+He turned instantly to her, but it seemed to her as though there were
+a slight haze in his eyes--a fixedness--which cleared, however, as he
+spoke.
+
+"They are delightful--all of them," he said. "Your blond goddess
+yonder is rather overpowering, but beautiful to gaze upon."
+
+"And Vanya?"
+
+"Charming; astonishing."
+
+"Lovable," she said.
+
+"He seems so."
+
+"And--Marya?"
+
+"Rather bewildering," he replied. "Fascinating, I should say. Is she
+very learned?"
+
+"I don't know."
+
+"She's been in the universities."
+
+"Yes.... I don't know how learned she is."
+
+"She is very young," he remarked.
+
+It was on the tip of Palla's tongue to say something; and she remained
+silent--lest this man misinterpret her motive--and, perhaps, lest her
+own conscience misinterpret it, too.
+
+Ilse said it to Estridge, however, frankly insouciant:
+
+"You know Marya and Vanya are married--that is, they live together."
+
+And Shotwell heard her.
+
+"Is that true?" he said in a low voice to Palla.
+
+"Why, yes."
+
+He remained silent so long that she added: "The tie is not looser than
+the old-fashioned one. More rigid, perhaps, because they are on their
+honour."
+
+"And if they tire of each other?"
+
+"You, also, have divorce," said the girl, smiling.
+
+"Do you?"
+
+"It is beastly to live together where love does not exist. People who
+believe as they do--as I do--merely separate."
+
+"And contract another alliance if they wish?"
+
+"Do not your divorcees remarry if they wish?"
+
+"What becomes of the children?" he demanded sullenly.
+
+"What becomes of them when your courts divorce their parents?"
+
+"I see. It's all a parody on lawful regularity."
+
+"I'm sorry you speak of it that way----"
+
+The girl's face flushed and she extended her hand toward her wine
+glass.
+
+"I didn't intend to hurt you, Palla," he said.
+
+She drew a quick breath, looked up, smiled: "You didn't mean to," she
+said. Then into her brown eyes came the delicious glimmer:
+
+"May I whisper to you, Jim? Is it too rude?"
+
+He inclined his head and felt the thrill of her breath:
+
+"Shall we drink one glass together--to each other alone?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"To a dear comradeship, and close!... And not too desperate!" she
+added, as her glance flashed into hidden laughter.
+
+They drank, not daring to look toward each other. And Palla's careless
+gaze, slowly sweeping the circle, finally met Marya's--as she knew it
+must. Both smiled, touching each other at once with invisible
+antennae--always searching, exploring under the glimmering aura what no
+male ever discovered or comprehended.
+
+There was, in the living room above, a little more music--a song or
+two before the guests departed.
+
+Marya, a little apart, turned to Shotwell:
+
+"You find our Russian folk-song amusing?"
+
+"Wonderful!"
+
+"If, by any chance, you should remember that I am at home on
+Thursdays, there is a song I think that might interest you." She let
+her eyes rest on him with a curious stillness in their depths:
+
+"The song is called _Lada_," she said in a voice so low that he just
+heard her. The next moment she was taking leave of Palla; kissed her.
+Vanya enveloped her in her wrap.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+Estridge called up a taxi; and presently went away with Ilse.
+
+Very slowly Palla came back to the centre of the room, where Shotwell
+stood. The scent of flowers was in his nostrils, his throat; the girl
+herself seemed saturated with their perfume as he took her into his
+arms.
+
+"So you didn't like my friends, Jim," she ventured.
+
+"Yes, I did."
+
+"I was afraid they might have shocked you."
+
+He said drily: "It isn't a case of being shocked. It's more like being
+bored."
+
+"Oh. My friends bore you?"
+
+"Their morals do.... Is Ilse that sort, too?"
+
+"That sort?"
+
+"You know what I mean."
+
+"I suppose she is."
+
+"Not inclined to bother herself with the formalities of marriage?"
+
+"I suppose not."
+
+"It's a mischievous, ridiculous, immoral business!" he said hotly.
+"Why, to look at you--at Ilse--at Miss Lanois----"
+
+"We don't look like very immoral people, do we?" she said, laughingly.
+
+The light raillery in her laughter angered him, and he released her
+and began to pace the room nervously.
+
+"See here, Palla," he said roughly, "suppose I accept you at your own
+valuation!"
+
+"I value myself very highly, Jim."
+
+"So do I. That's why I ask you to marry me."
+
+"And I tell you I don't believe in marriage," she rejoined coolly.
+
+"A magistrate can marry us----"
+
+"It makes no difference. A ceremony, civil or religious, is entirely
+out of the question."
+
+"You mean," he said, incensed, "that you refuse to be married by any
+law at all?"
+
+"My own law is sufficient."
+
+"Well--well, then," he stammered; "--what--what sort of procedure----"
+
+"None."
+
+"You're crazy," he said; "_you_ wouldn't do that!"
+
+"If I were in love with you I'd not be afraid."
+
+Her calm candour infuriated him:
+
+"Do you imagine that you and I could ever get away with a situation
+like that!" he blazed out.
+
+"Why do you become so irritable and excited, Jim? We're not going to
+try----"
+
+"Damnation! I should think not!" he retorted, so violently that her
+mouth quivered. But she kept her head averted until the swift emotion
+was under control.
+
+Then she said in a low voice: "If you really think me immoral, Jim, I
+can understand your manner toward me. Otherwise----"
+
+"Palla, dear! Forgive me! I'm just worried sick----"
+
+"You funny boy," she said with her quick, frank smile, "I didn't mean
+to worry you. Listen! It's all quite simple. I care for you very much
+indeed. I don't mind your--caressing--me--sometimes. But I'm not in
+love. I just care a lot for you.... But not nearly enough to love
+you."
+
+"Palla, you're hopeless!"
+
+"Why? Because I am so respectful toward love? Of course I am. A girl
+who believes as I do can't afford to make a mistake."
+
+"Exactly," he said eagerly, "but under the law, if a mistake is made
+every woman has her remedy----"
+
+"Her _remedy_! What do you mean? You can't pass one of those roses
+through the flame of that fire and still have your rose, can you?"
+
+He was silent.
+
+"And that's what happens under _your_ laws, as well as outside of
+them. No! I don't love you. Under your law I'd be afraid to marry you.
+Under mine I'm deathly afraid.... Because--I know--that where love is
+there can be no fear."
+
+"Is that your answer, Palla?"
+
+"Yes, Jim."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+
+He had called her up the following morning from the office, and had
+told her that he thought he had better not see her for a while.
+
+And she had answered with soft concern that he must do what he thought
+best without considering her.
+
+What other answer he expected is uncertain; but her gentle acquiescence
+in his decision irritated him and he ended the conversation in a tone
+of boyish resentment.
+
+To occupy his mind there was, that day, not only the usual office
+routine, but some extra business most annoying to Sharrow. For Angelo
+Puma had turned up again, as shiny and bland as ever, flashing his
+superb smile over clerk and stenographer impartially.
+
+So Sharrow shunted him to Mr. Brooke, that sort of property being his
+specialty; and Brooke called in Shotwell.
+
+"Go up town with that preposterous wop and settle this business one
+way or another, once for all," he whispered. "A crook named Skidder
+owns the property; but we can't do anything with him. The office is
+heartily sick of both Skidder and Puma; and Sharrow desires to be rid
+of them."
+
+Then, very cordially, he introduced Puma to young Shotwell; and they
+took Puma's handsome car and went up town to see what could be done
+with the slippery owner of the property in question, who was now
+permanently located in New York.
+
+On the way, Puma, smelling oppressively aromatic and looking
+conspicuously glossy as to hair, hat, and boots, also became
+effusively voluble. For he had instantly recognised Shotwell as
+the young man with whom that disturbingly pretty girl had been in
+consultation in Sharrow's offices; and his mind was now occupied
+with a new possibility as well as with the property which he so
+persistently desired to acquire.
+
+"With me," he said in his animated, exotic way, and all creased with
+smiles, "my cinema business is not business alone! No! It is Art! It
+is the art hunger that ever urges me onward, not the desire for
+commercial gain. For me, beauty is ever first; the box-office last!
+You understand, Mr. Shotwell? With me, art is supreme! Yes. And
+afterward my crust of bread."
+
+"Well, then," said Jim, "I can't see why you don't pay this man
+Skidder what he asks for the property."
+
+"I tell you why. I make it clear to you. For argument--Skidder he has
+ever the air of one who does not care to sell. It is an attitude! I
+know! But he has that air. Well! I say to him, 'Mr. Skidder, I offer
+you--we say for argument, one dollar! Yes?' Well, he do not say yes or
+no. He do not say, 'I take a dollar and also one quarter. Or a dollar
+and a half. Or two dollars.' No. He squint and answer: 'I am not
+anxious to sell!' My God! What can one say? What can one do?"
+
+"Perhaps," suggested Jim, "he really doesn't want to sell."
+
+"Ah! That is not so. No. He is sly, Mr. Skidder, like there never has
+been in my experience a man more sly. What is it he desires? I ask. I
+do not know. But all the time he inquire about my business if it pays,
+and is there much money in it. Also, I hear, by channels, that he
+makes everywhere inquiries if the film business shall pay."
+
+"Maybe he wants to try it himself."
+
+"Also, that has occurred to me. But to him I say nothing. No. He is
+too sly. Me, I am all art and all heart. Me, I am frank like there
+never was a man in my business! But Skidder, he squint at me. My God,
+those eye! And I do not know what is in his thought."
+
+"Well, Mr. Puma, what do you wish me to do? As I understand it, you
+are our client, and if I buy for you this Skidder property I shall
+look to you, of course, for my commission. Is that what you
+understand?"
+
+"My God! Why should he not pay that commission if you are sufficiently
+obliging to buy from him his property?"
+
+"It isn't done that way," explained Jim drily.
+
+"You suppose you can buy me this property? Yes?"
+
+"I don't know. Of course, I can buy anything for you if you'll pay
+enough."
+
+"My God! I do not enjoy commercial business. No. I enjoy art. I enjoy
+qualities of the heart. I----" He looked at Jim out of his magnificent
+black eyes, touched his full lips with a perfumed handkerchief.
+
+"Yes, sir," he said, flashing a brilliant smile, "I am all heart. But
+my heart is for art alone! I dedicate it to the film, to the moving
+picture, to beauty! It is my constant preoccupation. It is my only
+thought. Art, beauty, the picture, the world made happier, better, for
+the beauty which I offer in my pictures. It is my only thought. It is
+my life."
+
+Jim politely suppressed a yawn and said that a life devoted purely to
+art was a laudable sacrifice.
+
+"As example!" explained Puma, all animation and childlike frankness;
+"I pay my artists what they ask. What is money when it is a question
+of art? I must have quality; I must have beauty--" He shrugged: "I
+must pay. Yes?"
+
+"One usually pays for pulchritude."
+
+"Ah! As example! I watch always on the streets as I pass by. I see a
+face. It has beauty. It has quality. I follow. I speak. I am frank
+like there never was a man. I say, 'Mademoiselle, you shall not be
+offended. No. Art has no frontiers. It is my art, not I who address
+you. I am Angelo Puma. The Ultra-Film Company is mine. In you I
+perceive possibilities. This is my card. If it interests you to have a
+test, come! Who knows? It may be your life's destiny. The projection
+room should tell. Adieu!'"
+
+"Is that the way you pick stars?" asked Jim curiously.
+
+"Stars? Bah! I care nothing for stars. No. I should go bankrupt. Why?
+Beauty alone is my star. Upon it I drape the mantle of Art!"
+
+He kissed his fat finger-tips and gazed triumphantly at Jim.
+
+"You see? Out of the crowd of passersby I pick the perfect and
+unconscious rosebud. In my temple it opens into perfect bloom. And Art
+is born! And I am content. You comprehend?"
+
+Jim said that he thought he did.
+
+"As example," exclaimed Puma vivaciously, "while in conversation once
+with Mr. Sharrow, I beheld entering your office a young lady in
+mourning. Hah! Instantly I was all art!" Again he kissed his gloved
+fingers. "A face for a picture! A form for the screen! I perceive. I
+am convinced.... You recall the event, perhaps, Mr. Shotwell?"
+
+"No."
+
+"A young lady in mourning, seated beside your desk? I believe she was
+buying from you a house."
+
+"Oh."
+
+"Her name--Miss Dumont--I believe."
+
+Jim glanced at him. "Miss Dumont is not likely to do anything of that
+sort," he said.
+
+"And why?"
+
+"You mean go into the movies?" He laughed. "She wouldn't bother."
+
+"But--my God! It is Art! What you call movies, and, within, this young
+lady may hide genius. And genius belongs to Art. And Art belongs to
+the world!"
+
+The unthinkable idea of Palla on the screen was peculiarly distasteful
+to him.
+
+"Miss Dumont has no inclination for the movies," he said.
+
+"Perhaps, Mr. Shotwell," purred Puma, "if your amiable influence could
+induce the young lady to have a test made----"
+
+"There isn't a chance of it," said Jim bluntly. Their limousine
+stopped just then. They got out before one of those new apartment
+houses on the upper West Side.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+Mr. Skidder, it appeared, was in and would receive them.
+
+A negro servant opened the door and ushered them into a parlour where
+Mr. Elmer Skidder, sprawling over the debris of breakfast, laid aside
+newspaper and coffee cup and got up to receive them in bath robe and
+slippers.
+
+And when they were all seated: "Now, Mr. Skidder," said Jim, with his
+engaging frankness, "the simplest way is the quickest. My client, Mr.
+Puma, wants to purchase your property; and he is, I understand,
+prepared to pay considerably more than it is worth. We all have a very
+fair idea of its actual value. Our appraiser, yours, and other
+appraisers from other companies and corporations seem, for a wonder,
+to agree in their appraisal of this particular property.
+
+"Now, how much more than it is worth do you expect us to offer you?"
+
+Skidder had never before been dealt with in just this way. He squinted
+at Jim, trying to appraise him. But within his business experience in
+a country town no similar young man had he encountered.
+
+"Well," he said, "I ain't asking you to buy, am I?"
+
+"We understand that," rejoined Jim, good humouredly; "_we_ are asking
+_you_ to sell."
+
+"You seem to want it pretty bad."
+
+"We do," said the young fellow, laughing.
+
+"All right. Make your offer."
+
+Jim named the sum.
+
+"No, sir!" snapped Skidder, picking up his newspaper.
+
+"Then," remarked Jim, looking: frankly at Puma, "that definitely lets
+us out." And, to Skidder: "Many thanks for permitting us to interrupt
+your breakfast. No need to bother you again, Mr. Skidder." And he
+offered his hand in smiling finality.
+
+"Look here," said Skidder, "the property is worth all I ask."
+
+"If it's worth that to you," said Jim pleasantly, "you should keep
+it." And he turned away toward the door, wondering why Puma did not
+follow.
+
+"Are you two gentlemen in a rush?" demanded Skidder.
+
+"I have other business, of course," said Jim.
+
+"Sit down. Hell! Will you have a drink?"
+
+When they were again seated, Skidder squinted sideways at Angelo
+Puma.
+
+"Want a partner?" he inquired.
+
+"Please?" replied Puma, as though mystified.
+
+"Want more capital to put into your fillum concern?" demanded
+Skidder.
+
+Puma, innocently perplexed, asked mutely for an explanation out of his
+magnificent dark eyes.
+
+"I got money," asserted Skidder.
+
+Puma's dazzling smile congratulated him upon the accumulation of a
+fabulous fortune.
+
+"I had you looked up," continued Skidder. "It listened good. And--I
+got money, too. And I got that property in my vest pocket. See. And
+there's a certain busted fillum corporation can be bought for a
+postage stamp--all 'ncorporated 'n everything. You get me?"
+
+No; Mr. Puma, who was all art and heart, could not comprehend what Mr.
+Skidder was driving at.
+
+"This here busted fillum company is called the _Super-Picture
+Fillums_," said Skidder. "What's the matter with you and me buying it?
+Don't you ever do a little tradin'?"
+
+Jim rose, utterly disgusted, but immensely amused at himself, and
+realising, now, how entirely right Sharrow had been in desiring to be
+rid of this man Skidder, and of Puma and the property in question.
+
+He said, still smiling, but rather grimly: "I see, now, that this is
+no place for a broker who lives by his commissions." And he bade them
+adieu with perfect good humour.
+
+"Have a seegar?" inquired Skidder blandly.
+
+"Why do you go, sir?" asked Puma innocently. No doubt, being all heart
+and art, he did not comprehend that brokers can not exist on cigars
+alone.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+His commission had gone glimmering. Sharrow, evidently foreseeing
+something of that sort, had sent him out with Puma to meet Skidder and
+rid the office of the dubious affair.
+
+This Jim understood, and yet he was not particularly pleased to be
+exploited by this bland pair who had come suddenly to an understanding
+under his very nose--the understanding of two petty, dickering,
+crossroad traders, which coolly excluded any possibility both of his
+services and of his commission.
+
+"No; only a kike lawyer is required now," he said to himself, as he
+crossed the street and entered Central Park. "I've been properly
+trimmed by a perfumed wop and a squinting yap," he thought with
+intense amusement. "But we're well clear of them for good."
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+The park was wintry and unattractive. Few pedestrians were abroad, but
+motors sparkled along distant drives in the sunshine.
+
+Presently his way ran parallel to one of these drives. And he had been
+walking only a little while when a limousine veered in, slowing down
+abreast of him, and he saw a white-gloved hand tapping the pane.
+
+He felt himself turning red as he went up, hat in hand, to open the
+door and speak to the girl inside.
+
+"What on earth are you doing?" she demanded, laughingly, "--walking
+all by your wild lone in the park on a wintry day!"
+
+He explained. She made room for him and he got in.
+
+"We rather hoped you'd be at the opera last night," she said, but
+without any reproach in her voice.
+
+"I meant to go, Elorn--but something came up to prevent it," he added,
+flushing again. "Were they singing anything new?"
+
+"Yes, but you missed nothing," she reassured him lightly. "Where on
+earth have you kept yourself these last weeks? One sees you no more
+among the haunts of men."
+
+He said, in the deplorable argot of the hour: "Oh, I'm off all that
+social stuff."
+
+"But I'm not social stuff, am I?"
+
+"No. I've meant to call you up. Something always seems to happen--I
+don't know, Elorn, but ever since I came back from France I haven't
+been up to seeing people."
+
+She glanced at him curiously.
+
+He sat gazing out of the window, where there was nothing to see except
+leafless trees and faded grass and starlings and dingy sparrows.
+
+The girl was more worth his attention--one of those New York examples,
+built on lean, rangy, thoroughbred lines--long limbed, small of hand
+and foot and head, with cinder-blond hair, greyish eyes, a sweet but
+too generous mouth, and several noticeable freckles.
+
+Minute grooming and a sure taste gave her that ultra-smart appearance
+which does everything for a type that is less attractive in a dinner
+gown, and still less in negligee. And which, after marriage, usually
+lets a straight strand of hair sprawl across one ear.
+
+But now, coiffeur, milliner, modiste, and her own maiden cleverness
+kept her immaculate--the true Gotham model found nowhere else.
+
+They chatted of parties already past, where he had failed to
+materialise, and of parties to come, where she hoped he would appear.
+And he said he would.
+
+They chatted about their friends and the gossip concerning them.
+
+Traffic on Fifth Avenue was rather worse than usual. The competent
+police did their best, but motors and omnibuses, packed solidly, moved
+only by short spurts before being checked again.
+
+"It's after one o'clock," she said, glancing at her tiny platinum
+wrist-watch. "Here's Delmonico's, Jim. Shall we lunch together?"
+
+He experienced a second's odd hesitation, then: "Certainly," he said.
+And she signalled the chauffeur.
+
+The place was beginning to be crowded, but there was a table on the
+Fifth Avenue side.
+
+As they crossed the crowded room toward it, women looked up at Elorn
+Sharrow, instantly aware that they saw perfection in hat, gown and
+fur, and a face and figure not to be mistaken for any imitation of the
+Gotham type.
+
+She wore silver fox--just a stole and muff. Every feminine eye
+realised their worth.
+
+When they were seated:
+
+"I want," she said gaily, "some consomme and a salad. You, of course,
+require the usual nourishment of the carnivora."
+
+But it seemed not. However, he ordered a high-ball, feeling curiously
+depressed. Then he addressed himself to making the hour agreeable,
+conscious, probably, that reparation was overdue.
+
+Friends from youthful dancing-class days, these two had plenty to
+gossip about; and gradually he found himself drifting back into the
+lively, refreshing, piquant intimacy of yesterday. And realised that
+it was very welcome.
+
+For, about this girl, always a clean breeze seemed to be blowing; and
+the atmosphere invariably braced him up.
+
+And she was always responsive, whether or not agreeing with his views;
+and he was usually conscious of being at his best with her. Which
+means much to any man.
+
+So she dissected her pear-salad, and he enjoyed his whitebait, and
+they chatted away on the old footing, quite oblivious of people around
+them.
+
+Elorn was having a very happy time of it. People thought her
+captivating now--freckles, mouth and all--and every man there envied
+the fortunate young fellow who was receiving such undivided attention
+from a girl like this.
+
+But whether in Elorn's heart there really existed all the gaiety that
+laughed at him out of her grey eyes, is a question. Because it seemed
+to her that, at moments, a recurrent shadow fell across his face. And
+there were, now and then, seconds suggesting preoccupation on his
+part, when it seemed to her that his gaze grew remote and his smile a
+trifle absent-minded.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+She was drawing on her gloves; he had scribbled his signature across
+the back of the check. Then, as he lifted his head to look for their
+waiter, he found himself staring into the brown eyes of Palla Dumont.
+
+The heavy flush burnt his face--burnt into it, so it seemed to him.
+
+She was only two tables distant. When he bowed, her smile was the
+slightest; her nod coolly self-possessed. She was wearing orchids.
+There seemed to be a girl with her whom he did not know.
+
+Why the sudden encounter should have upset him so--why the quiet glance
+Elorn bestowed upon Palla should have made him more uncomfortable
+still, he could not understand.
+
+He lighted a cigarette.
+
+"A wonderfully pretty girl," said Elorn serenely. "I mean the girl you
+bowed to."
+
+"Yes, she is very charming."
+
+"Who is she, Jim?"
+
+"I met her on the steamer coming back. She is a Miss Dumont."
+
+Elorn's smile was a careless dismissal of further interest. But in her
+heart perplexity and curiosity contended with concern. For she had
+seen Jim's face. And had wondered.
+
+He laid away his half-consumed cigarette. She was quite ready to go.
+She rose, and he laid the stole around her shoulders. She picked up
+her muff.
+
+As she passed through the narrow aisle, she permitted herself a casual
+side-glance at this girl in black; and Palla looked up at her, kept
+her quietly in range of her brown eyes to the limit of breeding, then
+her glance dropped as Jim passed; and he heard her speaking serenely
+to the girl beside her.
+
+At the revolving doors, Elorn said: "Shall I drop you at the office,
+Jim?"
+
+"Thanks--if you don't mind."
+
+In the car he talked continually, not very entertainingly, but there
+was more vivacity about him than there had been.
+
+"Are you doing anything to-night?" he inquired.
+
+She was, of course. Yet, she felt oddly relieved that he had asked
+her.... But the memory of the strange expression in his face persisted
+in her mind.
+
+Who was this girl with whom he had crossed the ocean? And why should
+he lose his self-possession on unexpectedly encountering her?
+
+Had there been anything about Palla--the faintest hint of inferiority
+of any sort--Elorn Sharrow could have dismissed the episode with
+proud, if troubled, philosophy. For many among her girl friends had
+cub brothers. And the girl had learned that men are men--sometimes
+even the nicest--although she could not understand it.
+
+But this brown-eyed girl in black was evidently her own sort--Jim's
+sort. And that preoccupied her; and she lent only an inattentive ear
+to the animated monologue of the man beside her.
+
+Before the offices of Sharrow & Co. her car stopped.
+
+"I'm sorry, Jim," she said, "that I'm so busy this week. But we ought
+to meet at many places, unless you continue to play the recluse. Don't
+you really go anywhere any more?"
+
+"No. But I'm going," he said bluntly.
+
+"Please do. And call me up sometimes. Take a sporting chance whenever
+you're free. We ought to get in an hour together now and then. You're
+coming to my dance of course, are you not?"
+
+"Of course I am."
+
+The girl smiled in her sweet, generous way and gave him her hand
+again.
+
+And he went into the office feeling rather miserable and beginning to
+realise why.
+
+For in spite of what he had said to Palla about the wisdom of
+absenting himself, the mere sight of her had instantly set him afire.
+
+And now he wanted to see her--needed to see her. A day was too long to
+pass without seeing her. An evening without her--and another--and
+others, appalled him.
+
+And all the afternoon he thought of her, his mind scarcely on his
+business at all.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+His parents were dining at home. He was very gay that evening--very
+amusing in describing his misadventures with Messrs. Puma and Skidder.
+But his mother appeared to be more interested in the description of
+his encounter with Elorn.
+
+"She's such a dear," she said. "If you go to the Speedwells' dinner on
+Thursday you'll see her again. You haven't declined, I hope; have you,
+Jim?"
+
+It appeared that he had.
+
+"If you drop out of things this way nobody will bother to ask you
+anywhere after a while. Don't you know that, dear?" she said. "This
+town forgets overnight."
+
+"I suppose so, mother. I'll keep up."
+
+His father remarked that it was part of his business to know the sort
+of people who bought houses.
+
+Jim agreed with him. "I'll surely kick in again," he promised
+cheerfully.... "I think I'll go to the club this evening."
+
+His mother smiled. It was a healthy sign. Also, thank goodness, there
+were no girls in black at the club.
+
+At the club he resolutely passed the telephone booths and even got as
+far as the cloak room before he hesitated.
+
+Then, very slowly, he retraced his steps; went into the nearest booth,
+and called a number that seemed burnt into his brain. Palla answered.
+
+"Are you doing anything, dear?" he asked--his usual salutation.
+
+"Oh. It's you!" she said calmly.
+
+"It is. Who else calls you dear? May I come around for a little
+while?"
+
+"Have you forgotten what you----"
+
+"No! May I come?"
+
+"Not if you speak to me so curtly, Jim."
+
+"I'm sorry."
+
+She deliberated so long that her silence irritated him.
+
+"If you don't want me," he said, "please say so."
+
+"I certainly don't want you if you are likely to be ill-tempered,
+Jim."
+
+"I'm not ill-tempered.... I'll tell you what's the trouble if I may
+come. May I?"
+
+"Is anything troubling you?"
+
+"Of course."
+
+"I'm so sorry!"
+
+"Am I to come?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+She herself admitted him. He laid his hat and coat on a chair in the
+hall and followed her upstairs to the living-room.
+
+When she had seated herself she looked up at him interrogatively,
+awaiting his pleasure. He stood a moment with his back to the fire,
+his hands twisting nervously behind him. Then:
+
+"My trouble," he explained naively, "is that I am restless and unhappy
+when I remain away from you."
+
+The girl laughed. "But, Jim, you seemed to be having a perfectly good
+time at Delmonico's this noon."
+
+He reddened and gave her a disconcerted look.
+
+"I don't see," she added, "why any man shouldn't have a good time
+with such an attractive girl. May I ask who she is?"
+
+"Elorn Sharrow," he replied bluntly.
+
+Palla's glance had sometimes wandered over social columns in the
+papers and periodicals, and she was not ignorant concerning the
+identity and local importance of Miss Sharrow.
+
+She looked up curiously at Jim. He was so very good to look at!
+Better, even, to know. And Miss Sharrow was his kind. They had seemed
+to belong together. And it came to Palla, hazily, and for the first
+time, that she herself seemed to belong nowhere in particular in the
+scheme of things.
+
+But that was quite all right. She had now established for herself a
+habitation. She had some friends--would undoubtedly make others. She
+had her interests, her peace of mind, and her independence. And behind
+her she had the dear and tragic past--a passionate memory of a dead
+girl; a terrible remembrance of a dead God.
+
+The heart of the world alone could make up to her these losses. For
+now she was already preparing to seek it in her own way, under her own
+Law of Love.
+
+"Jim," she said almost timidly, "I have not intended to make you
+unhappy. Don't you understand that?"
+
+He seated himself: she lighted a cigarette for him.
+
+"I suppose you can't help doing it," he said glumly.
+
+"I really can't, it seems. I don't love you. I wish I did."
+
+"Do you mean that?"
+
+"Of course I do.... I wish I were in love with you."
+
+After a moment she said: "I told you how much I care for you. But--if
+you think it is easier for you--not to see me----"
+
+"I can't seem to stay away."
+
+"I'm glad you can't--for my sake; but I'm troubled on your account. I
+do so adore to be with you! But--but if----"
+
+"Hang it all!" he exclaimed, forcing a wry smile. "I act like an
+unbaked fool! You've gone to my head, Palla, and I behave like a
+drunken kid.... I'll buck up. I've got to. I'm not the blithering,
+balmy, moon-eyed, melancholy ass you think me----"
+
+Her quick laughter rang clear, and his echoed it, rather uncertainly.
+
+"You poor dear," she said, "you're nearest my heart of anybody. I told
+you so. It's only that one thing I don't dare do."
+
+He nodded.
+
+"Can't you really understand that I'm afraid?"
+
+"Afraid!" he repeated. "I should think you might be, considering your
+astonishing point of view. I should think you'd be properly scared to
+death!"
+
+"I am. No girl, afraid, should ever take such a chance. Love and Fear
+cannot exist together. The one always slays the other."
+
+He looked at her curiously, remembering what Estridge had told him
+about her--how, on that terrible day in the convent chapel, this
+girl's love had truly slain the fear within her as she faced the Red
+assassins and offered to lay down her life for her friend. Than which,
+it is said, there is no greater love....
+
+"Of what are you thinking?" she asked, watching his expression.
+
+"Of you--you strange, generous, fearless, wilful girl!" Then he
+squared his shoulders and shook them as though freeing himself of
+something oppressive.
+
+"What you _may_ need is a spanking!" he suggested coolly.
+
+"Good heavens, Jim!----"
+
+"But I'm afraid you're not likely to get it. And what is going to
+happen to you--and to me--I don't know--I don't know, Palla."
+
+"May I prophesy?"
+
+"Go to it, Miriam."
+
+"Behold, then: I shall never care for any man more than I care now
+for you; I shall never care more for you than I do now.... And
+if you are sweet-tempered and sensible, we shall be very happy
+with each other.... Even after you marry.... Unless your wife
+misunderstands----"
+
+"My wife!" he repeated derisively.
+
+"Miss Sharrow, for instance."
+
+He turned a dull red; the girl's heart missed a beat, then hurried a
+little before it calmed again under her cool recognition and instant
+disdain of the first twinge of jealousy she could remember since
+childhood.
+
+The absurdity of it, too! After all, it was this man's destiny to
+marry. And, if it chanced to be that girl----
+
+"You know," he said in a detached, musing way, "it is well for you to
+remember that I shall never marry unless I marry you.... Life is long.
+There are other women.... I may forget you--at intervals.... But I
+shall never marry except with you, Palla."
+
+Her smile forced the gravity from her lips and eyes:
+
+"If you behave like a veiled prophet you'll end by scaring me," she
+said.
+
+But he merely gathered her into his arms and kissed her--laid back her
+head and looked down into her face and kissed her lips, without haste,
+as though she belonged to him.
+
+Her head rested quite motionless on his shoulder. Perhaps she was
+still too taken aback to do anything about the matter. Her heart had
+hurried a little--not much--stimulated, possibly, by the rather
+agreeable curiosity which invaded her--charmingly expressive, now, in
+her wide brown eyes.
+
+"So that's the way of it," he concluded, still looking down at her.
+"There are other women in the world. And life is long. But I marry you
+or nobody. And it's my opinion that I shall not die unmarried."
+
+She smiled defiantly.
+
+"You don't seem to think much of my opinions," she said.
+
+"Are you more friendly to mine?"
+
+"Certain opinions of yours," he retorted, "originated in the diseased
+bean of some crazy Russian--never in your mind! So of course I hold
+them in contempt."
+
+She saw his face darken, watched it a moment, then impulsively drew
+his head down against hers.
+
+"I do care for your opinions," she said, her cheek, delicately warm,
+beside his. "So, even if you can not comprehend mine, be generous to
+them. I'm sincere. I try to be honest. If you differ from me, do it
+kindly, not contemptuously. For there is no such thing as 'noble
+contempt!' There is respectability in anger and nobility in tolerance.
+But none in disdain, for they are contradictions."
+
+"I tell you," he said, "I despise and hate this loose socialistic
+philosophy that makes a bonfire of everything the world believes in!"
+
+"Don't hate other creeds; merely conform to your own, Jim. It will
+keep you very, very busy. And give others a chance to live up to their
+beliefs."
+
+He felt the smile on her lips and cheek:
+
+"I can't live up to my belief if I marry you," she said. "So let us
+care for each other peacefully--accepting each other as we are. Life
+is long, as you say.... And there are other women.... And ultimately
+you will marry one of them. But until then----"
+
+He felt her lips very lightly against his--cool young lips, still and
+fragrant and sweet.
+
+After a moment she asked him to release her; and she rose and walked
+across the room to the mirror.
+
+Still busy with her hair, she turned partly toward him:
+
+"Apropos of nothing," she said, "a man was exceedingly impudent to me
+on the street this evening. A Russian, too. I was so annoyed!"
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"It happened just as I started to ascend the steps.... There was a man
+there, loitering. I supposed he meant to beg. So I felt for my purse,
+but he jumped back and began to curse me roundly for an aristocrat and
+a social parasite!"
+
+"What did he say?"
+
+"I was so amazed--quite stupefied. And all the while he was swearing
+at me in Russian and in English, and he warned me to keep away from
+Marya and Vanya and Ilse and mind my own damned business. And he said,
+also, that if I didn't there were people in New York who knew how to
+deal with any friend of the Russian aristocracy."
+
+She patted a curly strand of hair into place, and came toward him in
+her leisurely, lissome way.
+
+"Fancy the impertinence of that wretched Red! And I understand that
+both Vanya and Marya have received horribly insulting letters. And
+Ilse, also. Isn't it most annoying?"
+
+She seated herself at the piano and absently began the Adagio of the
+famous sonata.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+
+There was still, for Palla, much shopping to do. The drawing room she
+decided to leave, for the present, caring as she did only for a few
+genuine and beautiful pieces to furnish the pretty little French grey
+room.
+
+The purchase of these ought to be deferred, but she could look about,
+and she did, wandering into antique shops of every class along Fifth
+and Madison Avenues and the inviting cross streets.
+
+But her chiefest quest was still for pots and pans and china; for
+napery, bed linen, and hangings; also for her own and more intimate
+personal attire.
+
+To her the city was enchanting and not at all as she remembered it
+before she had gone abroad.
+
+New York, under its canopy of tossing flags and ablaze with brilliant
+posters, swarmed with unfamiliar people. Every other pedestrian seemed
+to be a soldier; every other vehicle contained a uniform.
+
+There were innumerable varieties of military dress in the thronged
+streets; there was the universal note of khaki and olive drab,
+terminating in leather vizored barrack cap or jaunty overseas service
+cap, and in spiral puttees, leather ones, or spurred boots.
+
+Silver wings of aviators glimmered on athletic chests; chevrons, wound
+stripes, service stripes, an endless variety of insignia.
+
+Here the grey-green and oxidised metal of the marines predominated;
+there, the conspicuous sage-green and gold of naval aviators. On
+campaign hats were every hue of hat cord; the rich gilt and blue of
+naval officers and the blue and white of their jackies were everywhere
+to be encountered.
+
+And then everywhere, also, the brighter hue and exotic cut of foreign
+uniforms was apparent--splashes of gayer tints amid khaki and sober
+civilian garb--the beautiful _garance_ and horizon-blue of French
+officers; the familiar "brass hat" of the British; the grey-blue and
+maroon of Italians. And there were stranger uniforms in varieties
+inexhaustible--the schapska-shaped head-gear of Polish officers, the
+beret of Czecho-Slovaks. And everywhere, too, the gay and well-known
+red pom-pon bobbed on the caps of French blue-jackets, and British
+marines stalked in pairs, looking every inch the soldier with their
+swagger sticks and their vizorless forage-caps.
+
+Always, it seemed to Palla, there was military music to be heard above
+the roar of traffic--sometimes the drums and bugles of foreign
+detachments, arrived in aid of "drives" and loans of various sorts.
+
+Ambulances painted grey and bright blue, and driven by smartly
+uniformed young women, were everywhere.
+
+And to women's uniforms there seemed no end, ranging all the way from
+the sober blue of the army nurse and the pretty white of the Red
+Cross, to bizarre but smart effects carried smartly by well set up
+girls representing scores of service corps, some invaluable, some of
+doubtful utility.
+
+Eagle huts, canteens, soldiers' rest houses, Red Cross quarters,
+clubs, temporary barracks, peppered the city. Everywhere the service
+flags were visible, also, telling their proud stories in five-pointed
+symbols--sometimes tragic, where gold stars glittered.
+
+Never had New York seemed to contain so many people; never had the
+overflow so congested avenue and street, circle and square, and the
+wretchedly inadequate and dirty street-car and subway service.
+
+And into the heart of it all went Palla, engulfed in the great tides
+of Fifth Avenue, drifting into quieter back-waters to east and west,
+and sometimes caught and tossed about in the glittering maelstrom of
+Broadway when she ventured into the theatre district.
+
+Opera, comedy, musical show and cinema interested her; restaurant and
+cabaret she had evaded, so far, but what most excited and fascinated
+her was the people themselves--these eager, restless moving millions
+swarming through the city day and night, always in motion under blue
+skies or falling rain, perpetually in quest of what the world
+eternally offered, eternally concealed--that indefinite, glimmering
+thing called "heart's desire."
+
+To discover, to comprehend, to help, to guide their myriad aspirations
+in the interminable and headlong hunt for happiness, was, to Palla,
+the most vital problem in the world.
+
+For her there existed only one solution of this problem: the Law of
+Love.
+
+And in this world-wide Hunt for Happiness, where scrambling millions
+followed the trail of Heart's Desire, she saw the mad huntsman, Folly,
+leading, and Black Care, the whipper-in; and, at the bitter end, only
+the bones of the world's woe; and a Horseman seated on his Pale
+Horse.
+
+But the problem that still remained was how to swerve the headlong
+hunt to the true trail toward the only goal where the world's quarry,
+happiness, lies asleep.
+
+How to make service the Universal Heart's Desire? How to transfigure
+self-love into Love?
+
+To preach her faith from the street corners--to cry it aloud in the
+wilderness where no ear heeded--violence, aggression, the campaign
+militant, had never appealed to the girl.
+
+Like her nation, only when cornered did she blaze out and strike. But
+to harangue, threaten, demand of the world that it accept the Law of
+Service and of Love, seemed to her a mockery of the faith she had
+embraced, which, unless irrevocably in liaison with freedom, was no
+faith at all.
+
+So, for Palla, the solution lay in loyalty to the faith she professed;
+in living it; in swaying ignorance by example; in overcoming
+incredulity by service, scepticism by love.
+
+Love and Service? Why, all around her among these teeming millions
+were examples--volunteers in khaki, their sisters in the garments of
+mercy! Why must the world stop there? This was the right scent. Why
+should the hunt swerve for the devil's herring drawn across the
+trail?
+
+One for all; all for one! She had read it on one of the war-posters.
+Somebody had taken the splendid Guardsman's creed and had made it the
+slogan for this war against darkness.
+
+And that was her creed--the true faith--the Law of Love. Then, was it
+good only in war? Why not make it the nation's creed? Why not emblazon
+it on the wall of every city on earth?--one for all; all for one;
+Love, Service, Freedom!
+
+Before such a faith, autocracy and tyranny die. Under such a law
+every evil withers, every question is unravelled. There are no more
+problems of poverty and riches, none of greed and oppression.
+
+The tyranny of convention, of observance, of taboo, of folkways, ends.
+And into the brain of all living beings will be born the perfect
+comprehension of their own indestructible divinity.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+Part of this she ventured to say to Ilse Westgard one day, when they
+had met for luncheon in a modest tea-room on Forty-third Street.
+
+But Ilse, always inclined toward militancy, did not entirely agree
+with Palla.
+
+"To embody in one's daily life the principles of one's living faith is
+scarcely sufficient," she said. "Good is a force, not an inert
+condition. So is evil. And we should not sit still while evil moves."
+
+"Example is not inertia," protested Palla.
+
+"Example, alone, is sterile, I think," said the ex-girl-soldier of the
+Battalion of Death, buttering a crescent. She ate it with the
+delightful appetite of flawless health, and poured out more
+chocolate.
+
+"For instance, dear," she went on, "the forces of evil--of degeneration,
+ignorance, envy, ferocity, are gathering like a tornado in Russia.
+Virtuous example, sucking its thumbs and minding its own business, will
+be torn to fragments when the storm breaks."
+
+"The Bolsheviki?"
+
+"The Reds. The Terrorists, I mean. You know as well as I do what they
+really are--merely looters skulking through the smoke of a world in
+flames--buzzards on the carcass of a civilisation dead. But, Palla,
+they do not sit still and suck their thumbs and say, 'I am a
+Terrorist. Behold me and be converted.' No, indeed! They are moving,
+always in motion, preoccupied by their hellish designs."
+
+"In Russia, yes," admitted Palla.
+
+"Everywhere, dearest. Here, also."
+
+"I believe there are scarcely any in America," insisted Palla.
+
+"The country crawls with them," retorted Ilse. "They work like moles,
+but already if you look about you can see the earth stirring above
+their tunnels. They are here, everywhere, active, scheming, plotting,
+whispering treason, stirring discontent, inciting envy, teaching
+treason.
+
+"They are the Russians--Christians and Jews--who have filtered in here
+to do the nation mischief. They are the Germans who blew up factories,
+set fires, scuttled ships. They are foreigners who came here poisoned
+with envy; who have acquired nothing; whose greed and ferocity are
+whetted and ready for a universal conflagration by which they alone
+could profit.
+
+"They are the labour leaders who break faith and incite to violence;
+they are the I. W. W.; they are the Black Hand, the Camorra; they are
+the penniless who would slay and rob; the landless who would kill and
+seize; the ignorant, nursing suspicion; the shiftless, brooding crimes
+to bring them riches quickly.
+
+"And, Palla, your Law of Love and Service is good. But not for
+these."
+
+"What law for them, then?"
+
+"Education. Maybe with machine guns."
+
+Palla shook her head. "Is that the way to educate defectives?"
+
+"When they come at you _en masse_, yes!"
+
+Palla laughed. "Dear," she said, "there is no nation-wide Terrorist
+plot. These mental defectives are not in mass anywhere in America."
+
+"They are in dangerous groups everywhere. And every group is devoting
+its cunning to turning the working masses into a vast mob of the Black
+Hundred! They did it in Russia. They are working for it all over the
+world. You do not believe it?"
+
+"No, I don't, Ilse."
+
+"Very well. You shall come with me this evening. Are you busy?"
+
+The thought of Jim glimmered in her mind. He might feel aggrieved. But
+he ought to begin to realise that he couldn't be with her every
+evening.
+
+"No, I haven't any plans, Ilse," she said, "no definite engagement, I
+mean. Will you dine at home with me?"
+
+"Early, then. Because there is a meeting which you and I shall attend.
+It is an education."
+
+"An anarchist meeting?"
+
+"Yes, Reds. I think we should go--perhaps take part----"
+
+"What?"
+
+"Why not? I shall not listen to lies and remain silent!" said Ilse,
+laughing. "The Revolution was good. But the Bolsheviki are nothing but
+greedy thieves and murderers. You and I know that. If anybody teaches
+people the contrary, I certainly shall have something to say."
+
+Palla desired to purchase silk for sofa pillows, having acquired a
+chaise-longue for her bedroom.
+
+So she and Ilse went out into the sunshine and multi-coloured crowd;
+and all the afternoon they shopped very blissfully--which meant, also,
+lingering before store windows, drifting into picture-galleries,
+taking tea at Sherry's, and finally setting out for home through a
+beflagged avenue jammed with traffic.
+
+Dusk fell early but the drooping, orange-tinted globes which had
+replaced the white ones on the Fifth Avenue lamps were not yet
+lighted; and there still remained a touch of sunset in the sky when
+they left the bus.
+
+At the corner of Palla's street, there seemed to be an unusual
+congestion, and now, above the noise of traffic, they caught the sound
+of a band; and turned at the curb to see, supposing it to be a
+military music.
+
+The band was a full one, not military, wearing a slatternly sort of
+uniform but playing well enough as they came up through the thickening
+dusk, marching close to the eastern curb of the avenue.
+
+They were playing _The Marseillaise_. Four abreast, behind them,
+marched a dingy column of men and women, mostly of foreign aspect and
+squatty build, carrying a flag which seemed to be entirely red.
+
+Palla, perplexed, incredulous, yet almost instantly suspecting the
+truth, stared at the rusty ranks, at the knots of red ribbon on every
+breast.
+
+Other people were staring, too, as the unexpected procession came
+shuffling along--late shoppers, business men returning home,
+soldiers--all paused to gaze at this sullen visaged battalion clumping
+up the avenue.
+
+"Surely," said Palla to Ilse, "these people can't be Reds!"
+
+"Surely they are!" returned the tall, fair girl calmly. Her face had
+become flushed, and she stepped to the edge of the curb, her blue,
+wrathful eyes darkening like sapphires.
+
+A soldier came up beside her. Others, sailors and soldiers, stopped
+to look. There was a red flag passing. Suddenly Ilse stepped from the
+sidewalk, wrenched the flag from the burly Jew who carried it, and,
+with the same movement, shattered the staff across her knee.
+
+Men and women in the ranks closed in on her; a shrill roar rose from
+them, but the soldiers and sailors, cheering and laughing, broke into
+the enraged ranks, tearing off red rosettes, cuffing and kicking the
+infuriated Terrorists, seizing every seditious banner, flag, emblem
+and placard in sight.
+
+Female Reds, shrieking with rage, clawed, kicked and bit at soldier,
+sailor and civilian. A gaunt man, with a greasy bunch of hair under a
+bowler, waved dirty hands above the melee and shouted that he had the
+Mayor's permission to parade.
+
+Everywhere automobiles were stopping, crowds of people hurrying up,
+policemen running. The electric lights snapped alight, revealed a mob
+struggling there in the yellowish glare.
+
+Ilse had calmly stepped to the sidewalk, the fragments of flag and
+staff in her white-gloved hands; and, as she saw the irresponsible
+soldiers and blue-jackets wading lustily into the Reds--saw the lively
+riot which her own action had started--an irresistible desire to laugh
+seized her.
+
+Clear and gay above the yelling of Bolsheviki and the "Yip--yip!" of
+the soldiers, peeled her infectious laughter. But Palla, more gentle,
+stood with dark eyes dilated, fearful of real bloodshed in the furious
+scene raging in the avenue before her.
+
+A little shrimp of a Terrorist, a huge red rosette streaming from his
+buttonhole, suddenly ran at Ilse and seized the broken staff and the
+rags of the red flag. And Palla, alarmed, caught him by the
+coat-collar and dragged him screeching and cursing away from her
+friend, rebuking him in a firm but excited voice.
+
+Ilse came over, shouldering her superb figure through the crowd;
+looked at the human shrimp a moment; then her laughter pealed anew.
+
+"That's the man who abused me in Denmark!" she said. "Oh, Palla,
+_look_ at him! Do you really believe you could educate a thing like
+that!"
+
+The man had wriggled free, and now he turned a flat, whiskered visage
+on Palla, menaced her with both soiled fists, inarticulate in his
+fury.
+
+But police were everywhere, now, sweeping this miniature riot from the
+avenue, hustling the Reds uptown, checking the skylarking soldiery,
+sending amused or indignant citizens about their business.
+
+A burly policeman said to Ilse with a grin: "I'll take what's left of
+that red flag, Miss;" and the girl handed it to him still laughing.
+
+Soldiers wearing overseas caps cheered her and Palla. Everybody on the
+turbulent sidewalk was now laughing.
+
+"D'yeh see that blond nab the red flag outer that big kike's fists?"
+shouted one soldier to his sweating bunkie. "Some skirt!"
+
+"God love the Bolsheviki she grabs by the slack o' the pants!" cried a
+blue-jacket who had lost his cap. A roar followed.
+
+"Only one flag in this little old town!" yelled a citizen nursing a
+cut cheek with reddened handkerchief.
+
+"G'wan, now!" grumbled a policeman, trying to look severe; "it's all
+over; they's nothing to see. Av ye got homes----"
+
+"Yip! Where do we go from here?" demanded a marine.
+
+"Home!" repeated the policeman; "--that's the answer. G'wan, now,
+peaceable--lave these ladies pass!----"
+
+Ilse and Palla, still walled in by a grinning, admiring soldiery, took
+advantage of the opening and fled, followed by cheers as far as
+Palla's door.
+
+"Good heavens, Ilse," she exclaimed in fresh dismay, as she began to
+realise the rather violent roles they both had played, "--is that your
+idea of education for the masses?"
+
+A servant answered the bell and they entered the house. And presently,
+seated on the chaise-longue in Palla's bedroom, Ilse Westgard
+alternately gazed upon her ruined white gloves and leaned against the
+cane back, weak with laughter.
+
+"How funny! How degrading! But how funny!" she kept repeating. "That
+large and enraged Jew with the red flag!--the wretched little
+Christian shrimp you carried wriggling away by the collar! Oh, Palla!
+Palla! Never shall I forget the expression on your face--like a bored
+housewife, who, between thumb and forefinger, carries a dead mouse by
+the tail----"
+
+"He was trying to kick you, my dear," explained Palla, beginning to
+remove the hairpins from her hair.
+
+Ilse touched her eyes with her handkerchief.
+
+"They might have thrown bombs," she said. "It's all very well to
+laugh, darling, but sometimes such affairs are not funny."
+
+Palla, seated at her dresser, shook down a mass of thick, bright-brown
+hair, and picked up her comb.
+
+"I am wondering," she said, turning partly toward Ilse, "what Jim
+Shotwell would think of me."
+
+"Fighting on the street!"--her laughter rang out uncontrolled. And
+Palla, too, was laughing rather uncertainly, for, as her recollection
+of the affair became more vivid, her doubts concerning the entire
+procedure increased.
+
+"Of course," she said, "that red flag was outrageous, and you were
+quite right in destroying it. One could hardly buttonhole such a
+procession and try to educate it."
+
+Ilse said: "One can usually educate a wild animal, but never a rabid
+one. You'll see, to-night."
+
+"Where are we going, dear?"
+
+"We are going to a place just west of Seventh Avenue, called the Red
+Flag Club."
+
+"Is it a club?"
+
+"No. The Reds hire it several times a week and try to fill it with
+people. There is the menace to this city and to the nation, Palla--for
+these cunning fomenters of disorder deluge the poorer quarters of the
+town with their literature. That's where they get their audiences. And
+that is where are being born the seeds of murder and destruction."
+
+Palla, combing out her hair, gazed absently into the mirror.
+
+"Why should not we do the same thing?" she asked.
+
+"Form a club, rent a room, and talk to people?"
+
+"Yes; why not?" asked Palla.
+
+"That is exactly why I wish you to come with me to-night--to realise
+how we should combat these criminal and insane agents of all that is
+most terrible in Europe.
+
+"And you are right, Palla; that is the way to fight them. That is the
+way to neutralise the poison they are spreading. That is the way to
+educate the masses to that sane socialism in which we both believe. It
+can be done by education. It can be done by matching them with club
+for club, meeting for meeting, speech for speech. And when, in some
+local instances, it can not be done that way, then, if there be
+disorder, force!"
+
+"It can be done entirely by education," said Palla. "But remember!--Marx
+gave the forces of disorder their slogan--'Unite!' Only a rigid
+organisation of sane civilisation can meet that menace."
+
+"You are very right, darling, and a club to combat the Bolsheviki
+already exists. Vanya and Marya already have joined; there are workmen
+and working women, college professors and college graduates among its
+members. Some, no doubt, will be among the audience at the Red Flag
+Club to-night.
+
+"I shall join this club. I think you, also, will wish to enroll. It is
+called only 'Number One.' Other clubs are to be organised and
+numbered.
+
+"And now you see that, in America, the fight against organised
+rascality and exploited insanity has really begun."
+
+Palla, her hair under discipline once more, donned a fresh but severe
+black gown. Ilse unpinned her hat, made a vigorous toilet, then
+lighted a cigarette and sauntered into the living room where the
+telephone was ringing persistently.
+
+"Please answer," said Palla, fastening her gown before the pier
+glass.
+
+Presently Ilse called her: "It's Mr. Shotwell, dear."
+
+Palla came into the room and picked up the receiver:
+
+"Yes? Oh, good evening, Jim! Yes.... Yes, I am going out with Ilse....
+Why, no, I had no engagement with you, Jim! I'm sorry, but I didn't
+understand--No; I had no idea that you expected to see me--wait a
+moment, please!"--she put one hand over the transmitter, turned to
+Ilse with flushed cheeks and a shyly interrogative smile: "Shall I
+ask him to dine with us and go with us?"
+
+"If you choose," called Ilse, faintly amused.
+
+Then Palla called him: "--Jim! Come to dinner at once. And wear your
+business clothes.... What?... Yes, your every day clothes.... What?...
+Why, because I ask you, Jim. Isn't that a reason?... Thank you....
+Yes, come immediately.... Good-bye, de----"
+
+She coloured crimson, hung up the receiver, and picked up the evening
+paper, not daring to glance at Ilse.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+
+When Shotwell arrived, dinner had already been announced, and Palla
+and Ilse Westgard were in the unfurnished drawing-room, the former on
+a step-ladder, the latter holding that collapsible machine with one
+hand and Palla's ankle with the other.
+
+Palla waved a tape-measure in airy salute: "I'm trying to find out how
+many yards it takes for my curtains," she explained. But she climbed
+down and gave him her hand; and they went immediately into the
+dining-room.
+
+"What's all this nonsense about the Red Flag Club?" he inquired, when
+they were seated. "Do you and Ilse really propose going to that dirty
+anarchist joint?"
+
+"How do you know it's dirty?" demanded Palla, "--or do you mean it's
+only morally dingy?"
+
+Both she and Ilse appeared to be in unusually lively spirits, and they
+poked fun at him when he objected to their attending the meeting in
+question.
+
+"Very well," he said, "but there may be a free fight. There was a row
+on Fifth Avenue this evening, where some of those rats were parading
+with red flags."
+
+Palla laughed and cast a demure glance at Ilse.
+
+"What is there to laugh at?" demanded Jim. "There was a small riot on
+Fifth Avenue! I met several men at the club who witnessed it."
+
+The sea-blue eyes of Ilse were full of mischief. He was aware of
+Palla's subtle exhilaration, too.
+
+"Why hunt for a free fight?" he asked.
+
+"Why avoid one if it's free?" retorted Ilse, gaily.
+
+They all laughed.
+
+"Is that your idea of liberty?" he asked Palla.
+
+"What is all human progress but a free fight?" she retorted. "Of
+course," she added, "Ilse means an intellectual battle. If they
+misbehave otherwise, I shall flee."
+
+"I don't see why you want to go to hear a lot of Reds talk bosh," he
+remarked. "It isn't like you, Palla."
+
+"It _is_ like me. You see you don't really know me, Jim," she added
+with smiling malice.
+
+"The main thing," said Ilse, "is for one to be one's self. Palla and I
+are social revolutionists. Revolutionists revolt. A revolt is a row.
+There can be no row unless people fight."
+
+He smiled at their irresponsible gaiety, a little puzzled by it and a
+little uneasy.
+
+"All right," he said, as coffee was served; "but it's just as well
+that I'm going with you."
+
+The ex-girl-soldier gave him an amused glance, lighted a cigarette,
+glanced at her wrist-watch, then rose lightly to her graceful,
+athletic height, saying that they ought to start.
+
+So they went away to pin on their hats, and Jim called a taxi.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+The hall was well filled when they arrived. There was a rostrum, on
+which two wooden benches faced a table and a chair in the centre. On
+the table stood a pitcher of drinking water, a soiled glass, and a jug
+full of red carnations.
+
+A dozen men and women occupied the two benches. At the table a man
+sat writing. He held a lighted cigar in one hand; a red silk
+handkerchief trailed from his coat pocket.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+As Ilse and Palla seated themselves on an empty bench and Shotwell
+found a place beside them, somebody on the next bench beyond leaned
+over and bade them good evening in a low voice.
+
+"Mr. Brisson!" exclaimed Palla, giving him her hand in unfeigned
+pleasure.
+
+Brisson shook hands, also, with Ilse, cordially, and then was
+introduced to Jim.
+
+"What are you doing here?" he inquired humorously of Palla. "And, by
+the way,"--dropping his voice--"these Reds don't exactly love me, so
+don't use my name."
+
+Palla nodded and whispered to Jim: "He secured all that damning
+evidence at the Smolny for our Government."
+
+Brisson and Ilse were engaged in low-voiced conversation: Palla
+ventured to look about her.
+
+The character of the gathering was foreign. There were few American
+features among the faces, but those few were immeasurably superior
+in type--here and there the intellectual, spectacled visage of
+some educated visionary, lured into the red tide and left there
+drifting;--here and there some pale girl, carelessly dressed, seated
+with folded hands, and intense gaze fixed on space.
+
+But the majority of these people, men and women, were foreign in
+aspect--round, bushy heads with no backs to them were everywhere;
+muddy skins, unhealthy skins, loose mouths, shifty eyes!--everywhere
+around her Palla saw the stigma of degeneracy.
+
+She said in a low voice to Jim: "These poor things need to be properly
+housed and fed before they're taught. Education doesn't interest empty
+stomachs. And when they're given only poison to stop the pangs--what
+does civilisation expect?"
+
+He said: "They're a lot of bums. The only education they require is
+with a night-stick."
+
+"That's cruel, Jim."
+
+"It's law."
+
+"One of your laws which does not appeal to me," she remarked, turning
+to Brisson, who was leaning over to speak to her.
+
+"There are half a dozen plain-clothes men in the audience," he said.
+"There are Government detectives here, too. I rather expect they'll
+stop the proceedings before the programme calls for it."
+
+Jim turned to look back. A file of policemen entered and carelessly
+took up posts in the rear of the hall. Hundreds of flat-backed heads
+turned, too; hundreds of faces darkened; a low muttering arose from
+the benches.
+
+Then the man at the table on the rostrum got up abruptly, and pulled
+out his red handkerchief as though to wipe his face.
+
+At the sudden flourish of the red fabric, a burst of applause came
+from the benches. Orator and audience were _en rapport_; the former
+continued to wave the handkerchief, under pretence of swabbing his
+features, but the intention was so evident and the applause so
+enlightening that a police officer came part way down the aisle and
+held up a gilded sleeve.
+
+"Hey!" he called in a bored voice, "Cut that out! See!"
+
+"That man on the platform is Max Sondheim," whispered Brisson. "He'll
+skate on thin ice before he's through."
+
+Sondheim had already begun to speak, ignoring the interruption from
+the police:
+
+"The Mayor has got cold feet," he said with a sneer. "He gave us a
+permit to parade, but when the soldiers attacked us his police clubbed
+us. That's the kind of government we got."
+
+"Shame!" cried a white-faced girl in the audience.
+
+"Shame?" repeated Sondheim ironically. "What's shame to a cop? They
+got theirs all the same----"
+
+"That's enough!" shouted the police captain sharply. "Any more of that
+and I'll run you in!"
+
+Sondheim's red-rimmed eyes measured the officer in silence for a
+moment.
+
+"I have the privilege," he said to his audience, "of introducing to
+you our comrade, Professor Le Vey."
+
+"Le Vey," whispered Brisson in Palla's ear. "He's a crack-brained
+chemist, and they ought to nab him."
+
+The professor rose from one of the benches on the rostrum and came
+forward--a tall, black-bearded man, deathly pale, whose protruding,
+bluish eyes seemed almost stupid in their fixity.
+
+"Words are by-products," he said, "and of minor importance. Deeds
+educate. T. N. T., also, is a byproduct, and of no use in conversation
+unless employed as an argument--" A roar of applause drowned his
+voice: he gazed at the audience out of his stupid pop-eyes.
+
+"Tyranny has kicked you into the gutter," he went on. "Capital makes
+laws to keep you there and hires police and soldiers to enforce those
+laws. This is called civilisation. Is there anything for you to do
+except to pick yourselves out of the gutter and destroy what kicked
+you into it and what keeps you there?"
+
+"No!" roared the audience.
+
+"Only a clean sweep will do it," said Le Vey. "If you have a single
+germ of plague in the world, it will multiply. If you leave a single
+trace of what is called civilisation in the world, it will hatch out
+more tyrants, more capitalists, more laws. So there is only one
+remedy. Destruction. Total annihilation. Nothing less can purify this
+rotten hell they call the world!"
+
+Amid storms of applause he unrolled a manuscript and read without
+emphasis:
+
+"Therefore, the Workers of the World, in council assembled, hereby
+proclaim at midnight to-night, throughout the entire world:
+
+"1. That all debts, public and private, are cancelled.
+
+"2. That all leases, contracts, indentures and similar instruments,
+products of capitalism, are null and void.
+
+"3. All statutes, ordinances and other enactments of capitalist
+government are repealed.
+
+"4. All public offices are declared vacant.
+
+"5. The military and naval organisations will immediately dissolve
+and reorganise themselves upon a democratic basis for speedy
+mobilisation.
+
+"6. All working classes and political prisoners will be immediately
+freed and all indictments quashed.
+
+"7. All vacant and unused land shall immediately revert to the people
+and remain common property until suitable regulations for its
+disposition can be made.
+
+"8. All telephones, telegraphs, cables, railroads, steamship lines and
+other means of communication and transportation shall be immediately
+taken over by the workers and treated henceforth as the property of
+the people.
+
+"9. As speedily as possible the workers in the various industries will
+proceed to take over these industries and organise them in the spirit
+of the new epoch now beginning.
+
+"10. The flag of the new society shall be plain red, marking our unity
+and brotherhood with similar republics in Russia, Germany, Austria and
+elsewhere----"
+
+"That'll be about all from you, Professor," interrupted the police
+captain, strolling down to the platform. "Come on, now. Kiss your
+friends good-night!"
+
+A sullen roar rose from the audience; Le Vey lifted one hand:
+
+"I told you how to argue," he said in his emotionless voice. "Anybody
+can talk with their mouths." And he turned on his heel and went back
+to his seat on the bench.
+
+Sondheim stood up:
+
+"Comrade Bromberg!" he shouted.
+
+A small, shabby man arose from a bench and shambled forward. His hair
+grew so low that it left him practically no forehead. Whiskers blotted
+out the remainder of his features except two small and very bright
+eyes that snapped and sparkled, imbedded in the hairy ensemble.
+
+"Comrades," he growled, "it has come to a moment when the only law
+worth obeying is the law of force!----"
+
+"You bet!" remarked the police captain, genially, and, turning his
+back, he walked away up the aisle toward the rear of the hall, while
+all around him from the audience came a savage muttering.
+
+Bromberg's growling voice grew harsher and deeper as he resumed: "I
+tell you that there is only one law left for proletariat and tyrant
+alike! It is the law of force!"
+
+As the audience applauded fiercely, a man near them stood up and
+shouted for a hearing.
+
+"Comrade Bromberg is right!" he cried, waving his arms excitedly.
+"There is only one real law in the world! The fit survive! The unfit
+die! The strong take what they desire! The weak perish. That is the
+law of life! That is the----"
+
+An amazing interruption checked him--a clear, crystalline peal of
+laughter; and the astounded audience saw a tall, fresh, yellow-haired
+girl standing up midway down the hall. It was Ilse Westgard, unable to
+endure such nonsense, and quite regardless of Brisson's detaining hand
+and Shotwell's startled remonstrance.
+
+"What that man says is absurd!" she cried, her fresh young voice still
+gay with laughter. "He looks like a Prussian, and if he is he ought to
+know where the law of force has landed his nation."
+
+In the ominous silence around her, Ilse turned and gaily surveyed the
+audience.
+
+"The law of force is the law of robbers," she said. "That is why this
+war has been fought--to educate robbers. And if there remain any
+robbers they'll have to be educated. Don't let anybody tell you that
+the law of force is the law of life!----"
+
+"Who are you?" interrupted Bromberg hoarsely.
+
+"An ex-soldier of the Death Battalion, comrade," said Ilse cheerfully.
+"I used a rifle in behalf of the law of education. Sometimes bayonets
+educate, sometimes machine guns. But the sensible way is to have a
+meeting, and everybody drink tea and smoke cigarettes and discuss
+their troubles without reserve, and then take a vote as to what is
+best for everybody concerned."
+
+And she seated herself with a smile just as the inevitable uproar
+began.
+
+All around her now men and women were shouting at her; inflamed faces
+ringed her; gesticulating fists waved in the air.
+
+"What are you--a spy for Kerensky?" yelled a man in Russian.
+
+"The bourgeoisie has its agents here!" bawled a red-haired Jew. "I
+offer a solemn protest----"
+
+"Agent provocateur!" cried many voices. "Pay no attention to her! Go
+on with the debate!"
+
+An I. W. W.--a thin, mean-faced American--half arose and pointed an
+unwashed finger at Ilse.
+
+"A Government spy," he said distinctly. "Keep your eye on her,
+comrades. There seems to be a bunch of them there----"
+
+"Sit down and shut up!" said Shotwell, sharply. "Do you want to start
+a riot?"
+
+"You bet I'll start something!" retorted the man, showing his teeth
+like a rat. "What the hell did you come here for----"
+
+"Silence!" bawled Bromberg, hoarsely, from the platform. "That woman
+is recognised and known. Pay no attention to her, but listen to me. I
+tell you that your law is the law of hatred!----"
+
+Palla attempted to rise. Jim tried to restrain her: she pushed his arm
+aside, but he managed to retain his grasp on her arm.
+
+"Are you crazy?" he whispered.
+
+"That man lies!" she said excitedly. "Don't you hear him preaching
+hatred?"
+
+"Well, it's not your business----"
+
+"It _is_! That man is lying to these ignorant people! He's telling
+them a vile untruth! Let me go, Jim----"
+
+"Better keep cool," whispered Brisson, leaning over. "We're all in
+dutch already."
+
+Palla said to him excitedly: "I'm afraid to stand up and speak, but
+I'm going to! I'd be a coward to sit here and let that man deceive
+these poor people----"
+
+"Listen to Bromberg!" motioned Ilse, her blue eyes frosty and her
+cheeks deeply flushed.
+
+The orator had come down into the aisle. Every venomous word he was
+uttering now he directed straight at the quartette.
+
+"Russia is showing us the way," he said in his growling voice. "Russia
+makes no distinctions but takes them all by the throat and wrings
+their necks--aristocrats, bourgeoisie, cadets, officers, land owners,
+intellectuals--all the vermin, all the parasites! And that is the law,
+I tell you! The unfit perish! The strong inherit the earth!----"
+
+Palla sprang to her feet: "Liar!" she said hotly. "Did not Christ
+Himself tell us that the meek shall inherit the earth!"
+
+"Christ?" thundered Bromberg. "Have you come here to insult us with
+legends and fairy-tales about a god?"
+
+"Who mentioned God?" retorted Palla in a clear voice. "Unless we
+ourselves are gods there is none! But Christ did live! And He was as
+much a god as we are. And no more. But He was wiser! And what He told
+us is the truth! And I shall not sit silent while any man or woman
+teaches robbery and murder. That's what you mean when you say that the
+law of the stronger is the only law! If it is, then the poor and
+ignorant are where they belong----"
+
+"They won't be when they learn the law of life!" roared Bromberg.
+
+"There is only one law of life!" cried Palla, turning to look around
+her at the agitated audience. "The only law in the world worth
+obedience is the Law of Love and of Service! No other laws amount to
+anything. Under that law every problem you agitate here is already
+solved. There is no injustice that cannot be righted under it! There
+is no aspiration that cannot be realised!"
+
+She turned on Bromberg, her hazel eyes very bright, her face surging
+with colour.
+
+"You came here to pervert the exhortation of Karl Marx, and unite
+under the banner of envy and greed every unhappy heart!
+
+"Very well. Others also can unite to combat you. A league of evil is
+not the only league that can be formed under this roof. Nor are the
+soldiers and police the only or the better weapons to use against you.
+What you agitators and mischief makers are really afraid of is that
+somebody may really educate your audiences. And that's exactly what
+such people as I intend to do!"
+
+A score or more of people had crowded around her while she was
+speaking. Shotwell and Brisson, too, had risen and stepped to her
+side. And the entire audience was on its feet, craning hundreds of
+necks and striving to hear and see.
+
+Somewhere in the crowd a shrill American voice cried: "Throw them guys
+out! They got Wall Street cash in their pockets!"
+
+Sondheim levelled a finger at Brisson:
+
+"Look out for that man!" he said. "He published those lies about
+Lenine and Trotsky, and he's here from Washington to lie about us in
+the newspapers!"
+
+The I. W. W. lurched out of his seat and shoved against Shotwell.
+
+"Get the hell out o' here," he snarled; "--go on! Beat it! And take
+your lady-friends, too."
+
+Brisson said: "No use talking to them. You'd better take the ladies
+out while the going is good."
+
+But as they moved there was an angry murmur: the I. W. W. gave Palla a
+violent shove that sent her reeling, and Shotwell knocked him
+unconscious across a bench.
+
+Instantly the hall was in an uproar: there was a savage rush for
+Brisson, but he stopped it with levelled automatic.
+
+"Get the ladies out!" he said coolly to Shotwell, forcing a path
+forward at his pistol's point.
+
+Plain clothes men were active, too, pushing the excited Bolsheviki
+this way and that and clearing a lane for Palla and Ilse.
+
+Then, as they reached the rear of the hall, there came a wild howl
+from the audience, and Shotwell, looking back, saw Sondheim unfurl a
+big red flag.
+
+Instantly the police started for the rostrum. The din became deafening
+as he threw one arm around Palla and forced her out into the street,
+where Ilse and Brisson immediately joined them.
+
+Then, as they looked around for a taxi, a little shrimp of a man came
+out on the steps of the hall and spat on the sidewalk and cursed them
+in Russian.
+
+And, as Palla, recognising him, turned around, he shook his fists at
+her and at Ilse, promising that they should be attended to when the
+proper moment arrived.
+
+Then he spat again, laughed a rather ghastly and distorted laugh, and
+backed into the doorway behind him.
+
+They walked east--there being no taxi in sight. Ilse and Brisson led;
+Palla followed beside Jim.
+
+"Well," said the latter, his voice not yet under complete control,
+"don't you think you'd better keep away from such places in the
+future?"
+
+She was still very much excited: "It's abominable," she exclaimed,
+"that this country should permit such lies to be spread among the
+people and do nothing to counteract this campaign of falsehood! What
+is going to happen, Jim, unless educated people combine to educate the
+ignorant?"
+
+"How?" he asked contemptuously.
+
+"By example, first of all. By the purity and general decency of their
+own lives. I tell you, Jim, that the unscrupulous greed of the
+educated is as dangerous and vile as the murderous envy of the
+Bolsheviki. We've got to reform ourselves before we can educate
+others. And unless we begin by conforming to the Law of Love and
+Service, some day the Law of Hate and Violence will cut our throats
+for us."
+
+"Palla," he said, "I never dreamed that you'd do such a thing as you
+did to-night."
+
+"I was afraid," she said with a nervous tightening of her arm under
+his, "but I was still more afraid of being a coward."
+
+"You didn't have to answer that crazy anarchist!"
+
+"Somebody had to. He lied to those poor creatures. I--I couldn't stand
+it!--" Her voice broke a little. "And if there is truly a god in me,
+as I believe, then I should show Christ's courage ... lacking His
+wisdom," she added so low that he scarcely heard her.
+
+Ilse, walking ahead with Brisson, looked back over her shoulder at
+Palla laughing.
+
+"Didn't I tell you that there are some creatures you can't educate?
+What do you think of your object lesson, darling?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+
+On a foggy afternoon, toward midwinter, John Estridge strolled into
+the new Overseas Club, which, still being in process of incubation,
+occupied temporary quarters on Madison Avenue.
+
+Officers fresh from abroad and still in uniform predominated; tunics
+were gay with service and wound chevrons, citation cords, stars,
+crosses, strips of striped ribbon.
+
+There was every sort of head-gear to be seen there, too, from the
+jaunty overseas _bonnet de police_, piped in various colours, to the
+corded campaign hat and leather-visored barrack-cap.
+
+Few cavalry officers were in evidence, but there were plenty of spurs
+glittering everywhere--to keep their owners' heels from slipping off
+the desks, as the pleasantry of the moment had it.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+Estridge went directly to a telephone booth, and presently got his
+connection.
+
+"It's John Estridge, as usual," he said in a bantering tone. "How are
+you, Ilse?"
+
+"John! I'm so glad you called me! Thank you so much for the roses!
+They're exquisite!--matchless!----"
+
+"Not at all!"
+
+"What?"
+
+"If you think they're matchless, just hold one up beside your cheek
+and take a slant at your mirror."
+
+"I thought you were not going to say such things to me!"
+
+"I thought I wasn't."
+
+"Are you alone?" She laughed happily. "Where are you, Jack?"
+
+"At the Overseas Club. I stopped on my way from the hospital."
+
+"Y--es."
+
+A considerable pause, and then Ilse laughed again----a confused, happy
+laugh.
+
+"Did you think you'd--come over?" she inquired.
+
+"Shall I?"
+
+"What do _you_ think about it, Jack?"
+
+"I suppose," he said in a humourous voice, "you're afraid of that
+tendency which you say I'm beginning to exhibit."
+
+"The tendency to drift?"
+
+"Yes;--toward those perilous rocks you warned me of."
+
+"They _are_ perilous!" she insisted.
+
+"You ought to know," he rejoined; "you're sitting on top of 'em like a
+bally Lorelei!"
+
+"If that's your opinion, hadn't you better steer for the open sea,
+John?"
+
+"Certainly I'd better. But you look so sweet up there, with your
+classical golden hair, that I think I'll risk the rocks."
+
+"Please don't! There's a deadly whirlpool under them. I'm looking down
+at it now."
+
+"What do you see at the bottom, Ilse? Human bones?"
+
+"I can't see the bottom. It's all surface, like a shining mirror."
+
+"I'll come over and take a look at it with you."
+
+"I think you'll only see our own faces reflected.... I think you'd
+better not come."
+
+"I'll be there in about half an hour," he said gaily.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+He sauntered out and on into the body of the club, exchanging with
+friends a few words here, a smiling handclasp there; and presently he
+seated himself near a window.
+
+For a while he rested his chin on his clenched hand, staring into
+space, until a waiter arrived with his order.
+
+He signed the check, drained his glass, and leaned forward again with
+both elbows on his knees, twirling his silver-headed stick between
+nervous hands.
+
+"After all," he said under his breath, "it's too late, now.... I'm
+going to see this thing through."
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+As he rose to go he caught sight of Jim Shotwell, seated alone by
+another window and attempting to read an evening paper by the foggy
+light from outside. He walked over to him, fastening his overcoat on
+the way. Jim laid aside his paper and gave him a dull glance.
+
+"How are things with you?" inquired Estridge, carelessly.
+
+"All right. Are you walking up town?"
+
+"No."
+
+Jim's sombre eyes rested on the discarded paper, but he did not pick
+it up. "It's rotten weather," he said listlessly.
+
+"Have you seen Palla lately?" inquired Estridge, looking down at him
+with a certain curiosity.
+
+"No, not lately."
+
+"She's a very busy girl, I hear."
+
+"So I hear."
+
+Estridge seated himself on the arm of a leather chair and began to
+pull on his gloves. He said:
+
+"I understand Palla is doing Red Cross and canteen work, besides
+organising her celebrated club;--what is it she calls it?--Combat Club
+No. 1?"
+
+"I believe so."
+
+"And you haven't seen her lately?"
+
+Shotwell glanced at the fog and shrugged his shoulders: "She's rather
+busy--as you say. No, I haven't seen her. Besides, I'm rather out of
+my element among the people one runs into at her house. So I simply
+don't go any more."
+
+"Palla's parties are always amusing," ventured Estridge.
+
+"Very," said the other, "but her guests keep you guessing."
+
+Estridge smiled: "Because they don't conform to the established scheme
+of things?"
+
+"Perhaps. The scheme of things, as it is, suits me."
+
+"But it's interesting to hear other people's views."
+
+"I'm fed up on queer views--and on queer people," said Jim, with
+sudden and irritable emphasis. "Why, hang it all, Jack, when a fellow
+goes out among apparently well bred, decent people he takes it for
+granted that ordinary, matter of course social conventions prevail.
+But nobody can guess what notions are seething in the bean of any girl
+you talk to at Palla's house!"
+
+Estridge laughed: "What do you care, Jim?"
+
+"Well, I wouldn't care if they all didn't seem so exactly like one's
+own sort. Why, to look at them, talk to them, you'd never suppose them
+queer! The young girl you take in to dinner usually looks as though
+butter wouldn't melt in her mouth. And the chances are that she's all
+for socialism, self-determination, trial marriages and free love!
+
+"Hell's bells! I'm no prude. I like to overstep conventions, too. But
+this wholesale wrecking of the social structure would be ruinous for a
+girl like Palla."
+
+"But Palla doesn't believe in free love."
+
+"She hears it talked about by cracked illuminati."
+
+"Rain on a duck's back, Jim!"
+
+"Rain drowns young ducks."
+
+"You mean all this spouting will end in a deluge?"
+
+"I do. And then look for dead ducks."
+
+"You're not very respectful toward modernism," remarked Estridge,
+smiling.
+
+Then Jim broke loose:
+
+"Modernism? You yourself said that all these crazy social notions--crazy
+notions in art, literature, music--arise from some sort of physical
+degeneration, or from the perversion or checking of normal physical
+functions."
+
+"Usually they do----"
+
+"Well," continued Shotwell, "it's mostly due to perversion, in my
+opinion. Women have had too much of a hell of a run for their money
+during this war. They've broken down all the fences and they're loose
+and running all over the world.
+
+"If they'd only kept their fool heads! But no. Every germ in the wind
+lodged in their silly brains! Biff. They want sex equality and a pair
+of riding breeches! Bang! They kick over the cradle and wreck the
+pantry.
+
+"Wifehood? Played out! Motherhood? In the discards! Domestic
+partnership?--each sex to its own sphere? Ha-ha! That was all very
+well yesterday. But woman as a human incubator and brooder is an
+obsolete machine. Why the devil should free and untramelled womanhood
+hatch out young?
+
+"If they choose to, casually, all right. But it's purely a matter for
+self-determination. If a girl cares to take off her Sam Brown belt and
+her puttees long enough to nurse a baby, it's a matter that concerns
+her, not humanity at large. Because the social revolution has settled
+all such details as personal independence and the same standard for
+both sexes. So, _a bas_ Madame Grundy! _A la lanterne_ with the old
+regime! No--hang it all, I'm through!"
+
+"Don't you like Palla any more?" inquired Estridge, still laughing.
+
+Jim gave him a singular look: "Yes.... Do you like Ilse Westgard?"
+
+Estridge said coolly: "I am accepting her as she is. I like her that
+much."
+
+"Oh. Is that very much?" sneered the other.
+
+"Enough to marry her if she'd have me," replied Estridge pleasantly.
+
+"And she won't do that, I suppose?"
+
+"Not so far."
+
+Jim eyed him sullenly: "Well, I don't accept Palla as she is--or
+thinks she is."
+
+"She's sincere."
+
+"I understand that. But no girl can get away with such notions. Where
+is it all going to land her? What will she be?"
+
+Estridge quoted: "'It hath not yet appeared what we shall be.'"
+
+Shotwell rose impatiently, and picked up his overcoat: "All I know is
+that when two healthy people care for each other it's their
+business--their _business_, I repeat--to get together legally and do
+the decent thing by the human race."
+
+"Breed?"
+
+"Certainly! Breed legally the finest, healthiest, best of specimens;--and
+as many as they can feed and clothe! For if they don't--if we don't--I
+mean our own sort--the land will be crawling with the robust get of
+all these millions of foreigners, who already have nearly submerged us in
+America; and whose spawn will, one day, smother us to death.
+
+"Hang it all, aren't they breeding like vermin now? All yellow dogs
+do--all the unfit produce big litters. That's the only thing they ever
+do--accumulate progeny.
+
+"And what are we doing?--our sort, I mean? I'll tell you! Our sisters
+are having such a good time that they won't marry, if they can avoid
+it, until they're too mature to get the best results in children. Our
+wives, if they condescend to have any offspring at all, limit the
+output to one. Because more than one _might_ damage their beauty.
+Hell! If the educated classes are going to practise race suicide and
+the Bolsheviki are going to breed like lice, you can figure out the
+answer for yourself."
+
+They walked to the foggy street together. Shotwell said bitterly:
+
+"I do care for Palla. I like Ilse. All the women one encounters at
+Palla's parties are gay, accomplished, clever, piquant. The men also
+are more or less amusing. The conversation is never dull. Everybody
+seems to be well bred, sincere, friendly and agreeable. But there's
+something lacking. One feels it even before one is enlightened
+concerning the ultra-modernism of these admittedly interesting people.
+And I'll tell you what it is. Actually, deep in their souls, they
+don't believe in themselves.
+
+"Take Palla. She says there is no God--no divinity except in herself.
+And I tell you she may think she believes it, but she doesn't.
+
+"And her school-girl creed--Love and Service! Fine. Only there's a
+prior law--self-preservation; and another--race preservation! By God,
+how are you going to love and serve if girls stop having babies?
+
+"And as for this silly condemnation of the marriage ceremony, merely
+because some sanctified Uncle Foozle once inserted the word 'obey' in
+it--just because, under the marriage laws, tyranny and cruelty have
+been practised--what callow rot!
+
+"Laws can be changed; divorce made simple and non-scandalous as it
+should be; all rights safeguarded for the woman; and still have
+something legal and recognised by one of those necessary conventions
+which make civilisation possible.
+
+"But this irresponsible idea of procedure through mere inclination--this
+sauntering through life under no law to safeguard and govern, except
+the law of personal preference--that's anarchy! That code spells
+demoralisation, degeneracy and disaster!... And the whole damned
+thing to begin again--a slow development of the human race, once more,
+out of the chaos of utter barbarism."
+
+Estridge, standing there on the sidewalk in the fog, smiled:
+
+"You're very eloquent, Jim. Why don't you say all this to Palla?"
+
+"I did. I told her, too, that the root of the whole thing was
+selfishness. And it is. It's a refusal to play the game according to
+rule. There are only two sexes and one of 'em is fashioned to bear
+young, and the other is fashioned to hustle for mother and kid. You
+can't alter that, whether it's fair or not. It's the game as we found
+it. The rules were already provided for playing it. The legal father
+and mother are supposed to look out for their own legal progeny. And
+any alteration of this rule, with a view to irresponsible mating and
+turning the offspring over to the community to take care of, would
+create an unhuman race, unconscious of the highest form of love--the
+love for parents.
+
+"A fine lot we'd be as an incubated race!"
+
+Estridge laughed: "I've got to go," he said, "And, if you care for
+Palla as you say you do, you oughtn't to leave her entirely alone with
+her circle of modernist friends. Stick around! It may make you mad,
+but if she likes you, at least she won't commit an indiscretion with
+anybody else."
+
+"I wish I could find my own sort as amusing," said Jim, naively. "I've
+been going about recently--dances, dinners, theatres--but I can't seem
+to keep my mind off Palla."
+
+Estridge said: "If you'd give your sense of humour half a chance you'd
+be all right. You take yourself too solemnly. You let Palla scare you.
+That's not the way. The thing to do is to have a jolly time with her,
+with them all. Accept her as she thinks she is. There's no damage done
+yet. Time enough to throw fits if she takes the bit and bolts----"
+
+He extended his hand, cordially but impatiently:
+
+"You remember I once said that girl ought to be married and have
+children? If you do the marrying part she's likely to do the rest very
+handsomely. And it will be the making of her."
+
+Jim held on to his hand:
+
+"Tell me what to do, Jack. She isn't in love with me. And she wouldn't
+submit to a legal ceremony if she were. You invoke my sense of humour.
+I'm willing to give it an airing, only I can't see anything funny in
+this business."
+
+"It _is_ funny! Palla's funny, but doesn't know it. You're funny!
+They're all funny--unintentionally. But their motives are tragically
+immaculate. So stick around and have a good time with Palla until
+there's really something to scare you."
+
+"And then?"
+
+"How the devil do I know? It's up to you, of course, what you do about
+it."
+
+He laughed and strode away through the fog.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+It had seemed to Jim a long time since he had seen Palla. It wasn't
+very long. And in all that interminable time he had not once called
+her up on the telephone--had not even written her a single line. Nor
+had she written to him.
+
+He had gone about his social business in his own circle, much to his
+mother's content. He had seen quite a good deal of Elorn Sharrow; was
+comfortably back on the old, agreeable footing; tried desperately to
+enjoy it; pretended that he did.
+
+But the days were long in the office; the evenings longer, wherever he
+happened to be; and the nights, alas! were becoming interminable, now,
+because he slept badly, and the grey winter daylight found him
+unrefreshed.
+
+Which, recently, had given him a slightly battered appearance,
+commented on jestingly by young rakes and old sports at the Patroon's
+Club, and also observed by his mother with gentle concern.
+
+"Don't overdo it, Jim," she cautioned him, meaning dances that ended
+with breakfasts and that sort of thing. But her real concern was
+vaguer than that--deeper, perhaps. And sometimes she remembered the
+girl in black.
+
+Lately, however, that anxiety had been almost entirely allayed. And
+her comparative peace of mind had come about in an unexpected manner.
+
+For, one morning, entering the local Red Cross quarters, where for
+several hours she was accustomed to sew, she encountered Mrs.
+Speedwell and her lively daughter, Connie--her gossiping informants
+concerning her son's appearance at Delmonico's with the mysterious
+girl in black.
+
+"Well, what do you suppose, Helen?" said Mrs. Speedwell, mischievously.
+"Jim's pretty mystery in black is here!"
+
+"Here?" repeated Mrs. Shotwell, flushing and looking around her at the
+rows of prophylactic ladies, all sewing madly side by side.
+
+"Yes, and she's prettier even than I thought her in Delmonico's,"
+remarked Connie. "Her name is Palla Dumont, and she's a friend of
+Leila Vance."
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+During the morning, Mrs. Shotwell found it convenient to speak to
+Leila Vance; and they exchanged a pleasant word or two--merely the
+amiable civilities of two women who recognise each other socially as
+well as personally.
+
+And it happened in that way, a few days later, that Helen Shotwell met
+this pretty friend of Leila Vance--Palla Dumont--the girl in black.
+
+And Palla had looked up from her work with her engaging smile, saying:
+"I know your son, Mrs. Shotwell. Is he quite well? I haven't seen him
+for such a long time."
+
+And instantly the invisible antennae of these two women became busy
+exploring, probing, searching, and recognising in each other all that
+remains forever incomprehensible to man.
+
+For Palla somehow understood that Jim had never spoken of her to his
+mother; and yet that his mother had heard of her friendship with her
+son.
+
+And Helen knew that Palla was quietly aware of this, and that the
+girl's equanimity remained undisturbed.
+
+Only people quite sure of themselves preserved serenity under the
+merciless exploration of the invisible feminine antennae. And it was
+evident that the girl in black had nothing to conceal from her in
+regard to her only son--whatever that same son might think he ought to
+make an effort to conceal from his mother.
+
+To herself Helen thought: "Jim has had his wings singed, and has fled
+the candle."
+
+To Palla she said: "Mrs. Vance tells me such interesting stories of
+your experiences in Russia. Really, it's like a charming romance--your
+friendship for the poor little Grand Duchess."
+
+"A tragic one," said Palla in a voice so even that Helen presently
+lifted her eyes from her sewing to read in her expression something
+more than the mere words that this young girl had uttered. And saw a
+still, pale face, sensitive and very lovely; and the needle flying
+over a bandage no whiter than the hand that held it.
+
+"It was a great shock to you--her death," said Helen.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And--you were there at the time! How dreadful!"
+
+Palla lifted her brown eyes: "I can't talk about it yet," she said so
+simply that Helen's sixth sense, always alert for information from the
+busy, invisible antennae, suddenly became convinced that there were no
+more hidden depths to explore--no motives to suspect, no pretense to
+expose.
+
+Day after day she chose to seat herself between Palla and Leila Vance;
+and the girl began to fascinate her.
+
+There was no effort to please on Palla's part, other than that natural
+one born of sweet-tempered consideration for everybody. There seemed
+to be no pretence, no pose.
+
+Such untroubled frankness, such unconscious candour were rather
+difficult to believe in, yet Helen was now convinced that in Palla
+these phenomena were quite genuine. And she began to understand more
+clearly, as the week wore on, why her son might have had a hard time
+of it with Palla Dumont before he returned to more familiar pastures,
+where camouflage and not candour was the rule in the gay and endless
+game of blind-man's buff.
+
+"This girl," thought Helen Shotwell to herself, "could easily have
+taken Jim away from Elorn Sharrow had she chosen to do so. There is no
+doubt about her charm and her goodness. She certainly is a most
+unusual girl."
+
+But she did not say this to her only son. She did not even tell him
+that she had met his girl in black. And Palla had not informed him;
+she knew that; because the girl herself had told her that she had not
+seen Jim for "a long, long time." It really was not nearly as long as
+Palla seemed to consider it.
+
+Helen lunched with Leila Vance one day. The former spoke pleasantly of
+Palla.
+
+"She's such a darling," said Mrs. Vance, "but the child worries me."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Well, she's absorbed some ultra-modern Russian notions--socialistic
+ones--rather shockingly radical. Can you imagine it in a girl who
+began her novitiate as a Carmelite nun?"
+
+Helen said: "She does not seem to have a tendency toward extremes."
+
+"She has. That awful affair in Russia seemed to shock her from one
+extreme to another. It's a long way from the cloister to the radical
+rostrum."
+
+"She spoke of this new Combat Club."
+
+"She organised it," said Leila. "They have a hall where they invite
+public discussion of social questions three nights a week. The other
+three nights, a rival and very red club rents the hall and howls for
+anarchy and blood."
+
+"Isn't it strange?" said Helen. "One can not imagine such a girl
+devoting herself to radical propaganda."
+
+"Too radical," said Leila. "I'm keeping an uneasy eye on that very
+wilful and wrong-headed child. Why, my dear, she has the most
+fastidious, the sweetest, the most chaste mind, and yet the things she
+calmly discusses would make your hair curl."
+
+"For example?" inquired Helen, astonished.
+
+"Well, for example, they've all concluded that it's time to strip poor
+old civilisation of her tinsel customs, thread-worn conventions,
+polite legends, and pleasant falsehoods.
+
+"All laws are silly. Everybody is to do as they please, conforming
+only to the universal law of Love and Service. Do you see where that
+would lead some of those pretty hot-heads?"
+
+"Good heavens, I should think so!"
+
+"Of course. But they can't seem to understand that the unscrupulous
+are certain to exploit them--that the most honest motives--the
+purest--invite that certain disaster consequent on social irregularities.
+
+"Palla, so far, is all hot-headed enthusiast--hot-hearted theorist.
+But I remember that she did take the white veil once. And, as I tell
+you, I shall try to keep her within range of my uneasy vision.
+Because," she added, "she's really a perfect darling."
+
+"She is a most attractive girl," said Helen slowly; "but I think she'd
+be more attractive still if she were happily married."
+
+"And had children."
+
+Their eyes met, unsmilingly, yet in silent accord.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+Their respective cars awaited them at the Ritz and took them in
+different directions. But all the afternoon Helen Shotwell's mind was
+occupied with what she now knew of Palla Dumont. And she realised that
+she wished the girl were back in Russia in spite of all her charm and
+fascination--yes, on account of it.
+
+Because this lovely, burning asteroid might easily cross the narrow
+orbit through which her own social world spun peacefully in its
+orderly progress amid that metropolitan galaxy called Society.
+
+Leila Vance was part of that galaxy. So was her own and only son.
+Wandering meteors that burnt so prettily might yet do damage.
+
+For Helen, having known this girl, found it not any too easy to
+believe that her son could have relinquished her completely in so
+disturbingly brief a time.
+
+Had she been a young man she knew that she would not have done so.
+And, knowing it, she was troubled.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+Meanwhile, her only son was troubled, too, as he walked slowly
+homeward through the winter fog.
+
+And by the time he was climbing his front steps he had concluded to
+accept this girl as she was--or thought she was--to pull no more long
+faces or sour faces, but to go back to her, resolutely determined to
+enjoy her friendship and her friends too; and give his long
+incarcerated sense of humour an airing, even if he suffered acutely
+while it revelled.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+
+Palla's activities seemed to exhilarate her physically and mentally.
+Body and brain were now fully occupied; and, if the profit to her soul
+were dubious, nevertheless the restless spirit of the girl now had an
+outlet; and at home and in the Combat Club she planned and discussed
+and investigated the world's woes to her ardent heart's content.
+
+Physically, too, Red Cross and canteen work gave her much needed
+occupation; and she went everywhere on foot, never using bus, tram or
+taxicab. The result was, in spite of late and sometimes festive hours,
+that Palla had become something more than an unusually pretty girl,
+for there was much of real beauty in her full and charming face and in
+her enchantingly rounded yet lithe and lissome figure.
+
+About the girl, also, there seemed to be a new freshness like
+fragrance--a virginal sweetness--that indefinable perfume of something
+young and vigorous that is already in bud.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+That morning she went over to the dingy row of buildings to sign the
+lease of the hall for three evenings a week, as quarters for Combat
+Club No. 1.
+
+The stuffy place where the Red Flag Club had met the night before was
+still reeking with stale smoke and the effluvia of the unwashed; but
+the windows were open and a negro was sweeping up a litter of defunct
+cigars.
+
+"Yaas'm, Mr. Puma's office is next do'," he replied to Palla's
+inquiry; "--Sooperfillum Co'poration. Yaas'm."
+
+Next door had been a stable and auction ring, and odours characteristic
+still remained, although now the ring had been partitioned, boarded over
+and floored, and Mr. Hewitt's glass rods full of blinding light were
+suspended above the studio ceilings of the Super-Picture Corporation.
+
+Palla entered the brick archway. An office on the right bore the name
+of Angelo Puma; and that large, richly coloured gentleman hastily got
+out of his desk chair and flashed a pair of magnificent as well as
+astonished eyes upon Palla as she opened the door and walked in.
+
+When she had seated herself and stated her business, Puma, with a
+single gesture, swept from the office several men and a stenographer,
+and turned to Palla.
+
+"Is it you, then, who are this Combat Club which would rent from me
+the hall next door!" he exclaimed, showing every faultless tooth in
+his head.
+
+Palla smiled: "I am empowered by the club to sign a lease."
+
+"That is sufficient!" exclaimed Puma, with a superb gesture. "So! It
+is signed! Your desire is enough. The matter is accomplished when you
+express the wish!"
+
+Palla blushed a little but smilingly affixed her signature to the
+papers elaborately presented by Angelo Puma.
+
+"A lease?" he remarked, with a flourish of his large, sanguine, and
+jewelled hand. "A detail merely for your security, Miss Dumont. For
+me, I require only the expression of your slightest wish. That, to
+me, is a command more binding than the seal of the notary!"
+
+And he flashed his dazzling smile on Palla, who was tucking her copy
+of the agreement into her muff.
+
+"Thank you so much, Mr. Puma," she said, almost inclined to laugh at
+his extravagances. And she laid down a certified check to cover the
+first month's rental.
+
+Mr. Puma bowed; his large, heavily lashed black eyes were very
+brilliant; his mouth much too red under the silky black moustache.
+
+"For me," he said impulsively, "art alone matters. What is money? What
+is rent? What are all the annoying details of commerce? Interruptions
+to the soul-flow! Checks to the fountain jet of inspiration! Art only
+is important. Have you ever seen a cinema studio, Miss Dumont?"
+
+Palla never had.
+
+"Would it interest you, perhaps?"
+
+"Thank you--some time----"
+
+"It is but a step! They are working. A peep will take but a moment--if
+you please--a thousand excuses that I proceed to show you the
+way!----"
+
+She stepped through a door. From a narrow anteroom she saw the
+set-scene in a ghastly light, where men in soiled shirt-sleeves
+dragged batteries of electric lights about, each underbred face as
+livid as the visage of a corpse too long unburied.
+
+There were women there, too, looking a little more human in their
+makeups under the horrible bluish glare. Camera men were busy; a
+cadaverous and profane director, with his shabby coat-collar turned
+up, was talking loudly in a Broadway voice and jargon to a bewildered
+girl wearing a ball gown.
+
+As Puma led Palla through the corridor from partition to partition,
+disclosing each set with its own scene and people--the whole studio
+full of blatant noise and ghastly faces or painted ones, Palla thought
+she had never before beheld such a concentration of every type of
+commonness in her entire existence. Faces, shapes, voices, language,
+all were essentially the properties of congenital vulgarity. The
+language, too, had to be sharply rebuked by Puma once or twice amid
+the wrangling of director, camera man and petty subordinates.
+
+"So intense are the emotions evoked by a fanatic devotion to art," he
+explained to Palla, "that, at moments, the old, direct and vigorous
+Anglo-Saxon tongue is heard here, unashamed. What will you? It is art!
+It is the fervour that forgets itself in blind devotion--in rapturous
+self-dedication to the god of Truth and Beauty!"
+
+As she turned away, she heard from a neighbouring partition the hoarse
+expostulations of one of Art's blind acolytes: "Say, f'r Christ's
+sake, Delmour, what the hell's loose in your bean! Yeh done it wrong
+an' yeh know damn well yeh done it wrong----"
+
+Puma opened another door: "One of our projection rooms, Miss Dumont.
+If it is your pleasure to see a few reels run off----"
+
+"Thank you, but I really must go----"
+
+The office door stood open and she went out that way. Mr. Puma
+confronted her, moistly brilliant of eye:
+
+"For me, Miss Dumont, I am frank like there never was a child in arms!
+Yes. I am all art; all heart. For me, beauty is God!--" he kissed his
+fat fingers and wafted the caress toward the dirty ceiling.
+
+"Please excuse," he said with his powerful smile, "but have you ever,
+perhaps, thought, Miss Dumont, of the screen as a career?"
+
+"I?" asked Palla, surprised and amused. "No, Mr. Puma, I haven't."
+
+"A test! Possibly, in you, latent, sleeps the exquisite apotheosis of
+Art incarnate! Who can tell? You have youth, beauty, a mind! Yes. Who
+knows if, also, happily, genius slumbers within? Yes?"
+
+"I'm very sure it doesn't," replied Palla, laughing.
+
+"Ah! Who can be sure of anything--even of heaven!" cried Puma.
+
+"Very true," said Palla, trying to speak seriously, "But the career of
+a moving picture actress does not attract me."
+
+"The emoluments are enormous!"
+
+"Thank you, no----"
+
+"A test! We try! It would be amusing for you to see yourself upon the
+screen as you are, Miss Dumont? As you _are_--young, beautiful,
+vivacious----"
+
+He still blocked her way, so she said, laying her gloved hand on the
+knob:
+
+"Thank you very much. Some day, perhaps. But I really must go----"
+
+He immediately bowed, opened the glass door, and went with her to the
+brick arch.
+
+"I do not think you know," he said, "that I have entered partnership
+with a friend of yours?"
+
+"A friend of mine?"
+
+"Mr. Elmer Skidder."
+
+"Oh," she exclaimed, smilingly, "I hope the partnership will be a
+fortunate one. Will you kindly inform Mr. Skidder of my congratulations
+and best wishes for his prosperity? And you may say that I shall be
+glad to hear from him about his new enterprise."
+
+To Mr. Puma's elaborate leave-taking she vouchsafed a quick, amused
+nod, then hurried away eastward to keep her appointment at the
+Canteen.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+About five o'clock she experienced a healthy inclination for tea and
+wavered between the Plaza and home. Ilse and Marya were with her, but
+an indefinable something caused her to hesitate, and finally to let
+them go to the Plaza without her.
+
+What might be the reason of this sudden whim for an unpremeditated cup
+of tea at home she scarcely took the trouble to analyse. Yet, she was
+becoming conscious of a subtle and increasing exhilaration as she
+approached her house and mounted the steps.
+
+Suddenly, as she fitted the latch-key, her heart leaped and she knew
+why she had come home.
+
+For a moment her fast pulse almost suffocated her. Was she mad to
+return here on the wildest chance that Jim might have come--might be
+inside, waiting? And what in the world made her suppose so?--for she
+had neither seen him nor heard from him in many days.
+
+"I'm certainly a little crazy," she thought as she opened the door. At
+the same moment her eyes fell on his overcoat and hat and stick.
+
+Her skirt was rather tight, but her limbs were supple and her feet
+light, and she ran upstairs to the living room.
+
+As he rose from an armchair she flung her arms out with a joyous
+little cry and wrapped them tightly around his neck, muff, reticule
+and all.
+
+"You darling," he was saying over and over in a happy but rather
+stupid voice, and crushing her narrow hands between his; "--you
+adorable child, you wonderful girl----"
+
+"Oh, I'm so glad, Jim! Shall we have tea?... You dear fellow! I'm so
+very happy that you came! Wait a moment--" she leaned wide from him
+and touched an electric bell. "Now you'll have to behave properly,"
+she said with delightful malice.
+
+He released her; she spoke to the maid and then went over with him to
+the sofa, flinging muff, stole and purse on a chair.
+
+"Pure premonition," she explained, stripping the gloves from her
+hands. "Ilse and Marya were all for the Plaza, but something sent me
+homeward! Isn't it really very strange, Jim? Why, I almost had an
+inclination to run when I turned into our street--not even knowing
+why, of course----"
+
+"You're so sweet and generous!" he blurted out. "Why don't you raise
+hell with me?"
+
+"You know," she said demurely, "I don't raise hell, dear."
+
+"But I've behaved so rottenly----"
+
+"It really wasn't friendly to neglect me so entirely."
+
+He looked down--laid one hand on hers in silence.
+
+"I understand, Jim," she said sweetly. "Is it all right now?"
+
+"It's all right.... Of course I haven't changed."
+
+"Oh."
+
+"But it's all right."
+
+"Really?"
+
+"Yes.... What is there for me to do but to accept things as they
+are?"
+
+"You mean, 'accept _me_ as I am!' Oh, Jim, it's so dear of you. And
+you know well enough that I care for no other man as I do for
+you----"
+
+The waitress with the tea-tray cut short that sort of conversation.
+Palla's appetite was a healthy one. She unpinned her hat and flung it
+on the piano. Then she nestled down sideways on the sofa, one leg
+tucked under the other knee, her hair in enough disorder to worry any
+other girl--and began to tuck away tea and cakes. Sometimes, in
+animated conversation, she gesticulated with a buttered bun--once she
+waved her cup to emphasise her point:
+
+"The main idea, of course, is to teach the eternal law of Love and
+Service," she explained. "But, Jim, I have become recently, and in a
+measure, militant."
+
+"You're going to love the unwashed with a club?"
+
+"You very impudent boy! We're going to combat this new and terrible
+menace--this sinister flood that threatens the world--the crimson tide
+of anarchy!"
+
+"Good work, darling! I enlist for a machine gun uni----"
+
+"Listen! The battle is to be entirely verbal. Our Combat Club No. 1,
+the first to be established--is open to anybody and everybody. All are
+at liberty to enter into the discussions. We who believe in the Law of
+Love and Service shall have our say every evening that the club is
+open----"
+
+"The Reds may come and take a crack at you."
+
+"The Reds are welcome. We wish to face them across the rostrum, not
+across a barricade!"
+
+"Well, you dear girl, I can't see how any Red is going to resist you.
+And if any does, I'll knock his bally block off----"
+
+"Oh, Jim, you're so vernacularly inclined! And you're very flippant,
+too----"
+
+"I'm not really," he said in a lower voice. "Whatever you care about
+could not fail to appeal to me."
+
+She gave him a quick, sweet glance, then searched the tea-tray to
+reward him.
+
+As she gave him another triangle of cinnamon toast, she remembered
+something else. It was on the tip of her tongue, now; and she checked
+herself.
+
+_He_ had not spoken of it. Had his mother mentioned meeting her at the
+Red Cross? If not--was it merely a natural forgetfulness on his
+mother's part? Was her silence significant?
+
+Nibbling pensively at her cinnamon toast, Palla pondered this. But the
+girl's mind worked too directly for concealment to come easy.
+
+"I'm wondering," she said, "whether your mother mentioned our meeting
+at the Red Cross." And she knew immediately by his expression that he
+heard it for the first time.
+
+"I was introduced at our headquarters by Leila Vance," said Palla, in
+her even voice; "and your mother and she are acquaintances. That is
+how it happened, Jim."
+
+He was still somewhat flushed but he forced a smile: "Did you find my
+mother agreeable, Palla?"
+
+"Yes. And she is so beautiful with her young face and pretty white
+hair. She always sits between Leila and me while we sew."
+
+"Did you say you knew me?"
+
+"Yes, of course."
+
+"Of course," he repeated, reddening again.
+
+No man ever has successfully divined any motive which any woman
+desires to conceal.
+
+Why his mother had not spoken of Palla to him he did not know. He was
+aware, of course, that nobody within the circle into which he had been
+born would tolerate Palla's social convictions. Had she casually and
+candidly revealed a few of them to his mother in the course of the
+morning's conversation over their sewing?
+
+He gave Palla a quick look, encountered her slightly amused eyes, and
+turned redder than ever.
+
+"You dear boy," she said, smiling, "I don't think your very charming
+mother would be interested in knowing me. The informality of
+ultra-modern people could not appeal to her generation."
+
+"Did you--talk to her about----"
+
+"No. But it might happen. You know, Jim, I have nothing to conceal."
+
+The old troubled look had come back into his face. She noticed it and
+led the conversation to lighter themes.
+
+"We danced last night after dinner," she said. "There were some
+amusing people here for dinner. Then we went to see such a charming
+play--_Tea for Three_--and then we had supper at the Biltmore and
+danced.... Will you dine with me to-morrow?"
+
+"Of course."
+
+"Do you think you'd enjoy it?--a lot of people who entertain the same
+shocking beliefs that I do?"
+
+"All right!" he said with emphasis. "I'm through playing the role of
+death's-head at the feast. I told you that I'm going to take you as
+you are and enjoy you and our friends--and quit making an ass of
+myself----"
+
+"Dear, you never did!"
+
+"Oh, yes, I did. And maybe I'm a predestined ass. But every ass has a
+pair of heels and I'm going to flourish mine very gaily from now on!"
+
+She protested laughingly at his self-characterisation, and bent toward
+him a little, caressing his sleeve in appeal, or shaking it in
+protest as he denounced himself and promised to take the world more
+gaily in the future.
+
+"You'll see," he remarked, rising to take his leave: "I may even call
+the bluff of some of your fluffy ultra-modern friends and try a few
+trial marriages with each of 'em----"
+
+"Oh, Jim, you're absolutely horrid! As if my friends believed in such
+disgusting ideas!"
+
+"They do--some of 'em."
+
+"They don't!"
+
+"Well, then, I do!" he announced so gravely that she had to look at
+him closely in the rather dim lamplight to see whether he was
+jesting.
+
+She walked to the top of the staircase with him; let him take her into
+his arms; submitted to his kiss. Always a little confused by his
+demonstrations, nevertheless her hand retained his for a second
+longer, as though shyly reluctant to let him go.
+
+"I am so glad you came," she said. "Don't neglect me any more."
+
+And so he went his way.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+His mother discovered him in the library, dressed for dinner.
+Something, as he rose--his manner of looking at her, perhaps--warned
+her that they were not perfectly _en rapport_. Then the subtle,
+invisible antennae, exploring caressingly what is so palpable in the
+heart of man, told her that once more she was to deal with the girl in
+black.
+
+When his mother was seated, he said: "I didn't know you had met Palla
+Dumont, mother."
+
+Helen hesitated: "Mrs. Vance's friend? Oh, yes; she comes to the Red
+Cross with Leila Vance."
+
+"Do you like her?"
+
+In her son's eyes she was aware of that subtle and unconscious appeal
+which all mothers of boys are, some day, fated to see and understand.
+
+Sometimes the appeal is disguised, sometimes it is so subtle that only
+mothers are able to perceive it.
+
+But what to do about it is the perennial problem. For between lack of
+sympathy and response there are many nuances; and opposition is always
+to be avoided.
+
+Helen said, pleasantly, that the girl appeared to be amiable and
+interesting.
+
+"I know her merely in that way," she continued. "We sit there sewing
+slings, pads, compresses, and bandages, and we gossip at random with
+our neighbours."
+
+"I like her very much," said Jim.
+
+"She does seem to be an attractive girl," said his mother carelessly....
+"Are you going to Yama Farms for the week end?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Oh, I'm sorry. The Speedwells' party is likely to be such a jolly
+affair, and I hear there's lots of snow up there."
+
+"I haven't met Mrs. Vance," said her son. "Is she nice?"
+
+"Leila Vance? Why, of course."
+
+"Who is she?"
+
+"She married an embassy attache, Captain Vance. He was in the old
+army--killed at Mons four years ago."
+
+"She and Palla are intimate?"
+
+"I believe they are good friends," remarked his mother, deciding not
+to attempt to turn the current of conversation for the moment.
+
+"Mother?"
+
+"Yes, dear."
+
+"I am quite sure I never met a girl I like as well."
+
+Helen laughed: "That is a trifle extravagant, isn't it?"
+
+"No.... I asked her to marry me."
+
+Helen's heart stood still, then a bright flush stained her face.
+
+"She refused me," said the boy.
+
+His mother said very quietly: "Of course this is news to us, Jim."
+
+"Yes, I didn't tell you. I couldn't, somehow. But I've told you now."
+
+"Dearest," she said, dropping her hand over his, "don't think me
+unsympathetic if I say that it really is better that she refused
+you."
+
+"I understand, mother."
+
+"I hope you do."
+
+"Oh, yes. But I don't think you do. Because I am still in love with
+her."
+
+"You poor dear!"
+
+"It's rotten luck, isn't it?"
+
+"Time heals--" She checked herself, turned and kissed him.
+
+"After all," she said, "a soldier learns how to take things."
+
+And presently: "I do wish you'd go up to Yama Farms."
+
+"That," he said, "would be the obvious thing to do. Anything to keep
+going and keep your mind ticking away until you're safely wound up
+again.... But I'm not going, dear."
+
+Helen looked at him in silence, not wondering what he might be going
+to do with his week-end instead, because she already guessed.
+
+Before she said anything more his father came in; and a moment later
+dinner was announced.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+Jim slept soundly for the first night in a long time. His mother
+scarcely closed her eyes at all.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+
+There had been a row at the Red Flag Club--a matter of differing
+opinions between members--nothing sufficient to attract the police,
+but enough to break several heads, benches and windows. And it was
+evident that some gentleman's damaged nose had bled all over the
+linoleum in the lobby.
+
+Elmer Skidder, arriving at the studio next morning in his brand new
+limousine, heard about the shindy and went into the club to inspect
+the wreckage. Then, mad all through, he started out to find Puma. But
+a Sister Art had got the best of Angelo Puma in a questionable cabaret
+the night before, and he had not yet arrived at the studio of the
+Super-Picture Corporation.
+
+Skidder, thrifty by every instinct, and now smarting under his wrongs
+at the hands--and feet--of the Red Flag Club, went away in his
+gorgeous limousine to find Sondheim, who paid the rental and who lived
+in the Bronx.
+
+It was a long way; every mile and every gallon of gasoline made
+Skidder madder; and when at length he arrived at the brand new,
+jerry-built apartment house inhabited by Max Sondheim, he had
+concluded that the Red Flag Club was an undesirable tenant and that it
+must be summarily kicked out.
+
+Sondheim was still in bed, but a short-haired and pallid young woman,
+with assorted spots on her complexion, bade Skidder enter, and opened
+the chamber door for him.
+
+The bedroom, which smelled of sour fish, was very cold, very dirty,
+and very blue with cigar smoke. The remains of a delicatessen
+breakfast stood on a table near the only window, which was tightly
+shut, and under the sill of which a radiator emitted explosive
+symptoms of steam to come.
+
+Sondheim sprawled under the bed-covers, smoking; two other men sat on
+the edge of the bed--Karl Kastner and Nathan Bromberg. Both were
+smoking porcelain pipes. Three slopping quarts of beer decorated the
+wash stand.
+
+Skidder, who had halted in the doorway as the full aroma of the place
+smote him, now entered at the curt suggestion of Sondheim, but refused
+a chair.
+
+"Say, Sondheim," he began, "I been to the club this morning, and I've
+seen what you've done to the place."
+
+"Well?" demanded Sondheim, in a growling voice, "what haf we done?"
+
+"Oh, nothing;--smashed the furniture f'r instance. That's all. But it
+don't go with me. See?"
+
+Kastner got up and gave him a sinister, near-sighted look: "If ve done
+damach ve pay," he remarked.
+
+"Sure you'll pay!" blustered Skidder. "And that's all right, too. But
+no more for yours truly. I'm through. Here's where your bunch quits
+the hall for keeps. Get me?"
+
+"Please?" inquired Kastner, turning a brick red.
+
+"I say I'm through!" blustered Skidder. "You gotta get other quarters.
+It don't pay us to keep on buying benches and mending windows, even if
+you cough up for 'em. It don't pay us to rent the hall to your club
+and get all this here notoriety, what with your red flags and the
+_po_-lice hanging around and nosin' into everything----"
+
+"Ach wass!" snapped Kastner, "of vat are you speaking? Iss it for you
+to concern yourself mit our club und vat iss it ve do?"
+
+"Say, who d'yeh think you're talkin' to?" retorted Skidder, his eyes
+snapping furiously. "Grab this from me, old scout?--I'm half owner of
+that hall and I'm telling you to get out! Is that plain?"
+
+"So?" Kastner sneered at him and nudged Sondheim, who immediately sat
+up in bed and levelled an unwashed hand at Skidder.
+
+"You think you fire us?" he shouted, his eyes inflamed and his dirty
+fingers crisping to a talon. "You go home and tell Puma what you say
+to us. Then you learn something maybe, what you don't know already!"
+
+"I'll learn _you_ something!" retorted Skidder. "Just wait till I show
+Puma the wreckage----"
+
+"Let him look at it and be damned!" roared Bromberg. "Go home and show
+it to him! And see if he talks about firing us!"
+
+"Say," demanded Skidder, astonished, "do you fellows think you got any
+drag with Angy Puma?"
+
+"Go back and ask him!" growled Bromberg. "And don't try to come around
+here and get fresh again. Listen! You go buy what benches you say we
+broke and send the bill to me, and keep your mouth shut and mind your
+fool business!"
+
+"I'll mind my own and yours too!" screamed Skidder, seized by an
+ungovernable access of fury. "Say, you poor nut!--you sick mink!--you
+stale hunk of cheese!--if you come down my way again I'll kick your
+shirttail for you! Get that?" And he slammed the door and strode out
+in a flaming rage.
+
+But when, still furiously excited, he arrived once more at the
+office,--and when Puma, who had just entered, had listened in sullen
+consternation to his story, he received another amazing and most
+unpleasant shock. For Puma told him flatly that the tenancy of the Red
+Flag Club suited him; that no lease could be broken, except by mutual
+consent of partners; and that he, Skidder, had had no business to go
+to Sondheim with any such threat of eviction unless he had first
+consulted his partner's wishes.
+
+"Well, what--what--" stammered Skidder--"what the hell drag have those
+guys got with you?"
+
+"Why is it you talk foolish?" retorted Puma sharply. "Drag? Did
+Sondheim say----"
+
+"No! _I_ say it. I ask you what have those crazy nuts got on you that
+you stand for all this rumpus?"
+
+Puma's lustrous eyes, battered but still magnificent, fixed themselves
+on Skidder.
+
+"Go out," he said briefly to his stenographer. Then, when the girl had
+gone, and the glass door closed behind her, he turned heavily and
+gazed at Skidder some more. And, after a few moments' silence: "Go
+on," he said. "What did Sondheim say about me?"
+
+Skidder's small, shifty eyes were blinking furiously and his
+essentially suspicious mind was also operating at full speed. When he
+had calculated what to say he took the chance, and said:
+
+"Sondheim gave me to understand that he's got such a hell of a pull
+with you that I can't kick him out of my property. What do you know
+about that, Angelo?"
+
+"Go on," said Puma impatiently, "what else did he say about me?"
+
+"Ain't I telling you?"
+
+"Tell more."
+
+Skidder had no more to tell, so he manufactured more.
+
+"Well," he continued craftily, "I didn't exactly get what that kike
+said." But his grin and his manner gave his words the lie, as he
+intended they should. "Something about your being in dutch--" He
+checked himself as Puma's black eyes lighted with a momentary glare.
+
+"What? He tells you I am in with Germans!"
+
+"Naw;--in dutch!"
+
+Puma's sanguinary skin reddened; his puffy fingers fished for a cigar
+in the pocket of his fancy waistcoat; he found one and lighted it, not
+looking at his partner. Then he picked up the morning paper.
+
+Skidder shrugged; stood up, pretending to yawn; started to open the
+door.
+
+"Elmer?"
+
+"Yeh? What y'want?"
+
+"I want to know exactly what Max Sondheim said to you about me."
+
+"Well, you better go ask Sondheim."
+
+"No. I ask you--my friend--my associate in business----"
+
+"A fine associate!--when I can't kick in when I want to kick out a
+bunch of nuts that's wrecking the hall, just because they got a drag
+with you----"
+
+"Listen. I am frank like there never was a----"
+
+"Sure. Go on!"
+
+"I say it! Yes! I am frank like hell. From my friend and partner I
+conceal nothing----"
+
+"Not even the books," grinned Skidder.
+
+"Elmer. You pain me. I who am all heart! Elmer, I ask it of you if you
+will so kindly tell me what it is that Sondheim has said to you about
+this 'drag.'"
+
+"He said," replied the other viciously, "that he had you cinched. He
+said you'd hand me the ha-ha when I saw you. And you've done it."
+
+"Pardon. I did not say to you a ha-ha, Elmer. I was surprised when you
+have told me how you have gone to Sondheim so roughly, without one
+word to me----"
+
+"You was soused to the gills last night. I didn't know when you'd show
+up at the studio----"
+
+"It was not just to me that you go to Sondheim in this so surprising
+manner, without informing me." He looked at his cigar; the wrapper was
+broken and he licked the place with a fat tongue. "Elmer?"
+
+"That's me," replied the other, who had been slyly watching him. "Spit
+it out, Angy. What's on your mind?"
+
+"I tell you, Elmer!"
+
+Puma's face became suddenly wreathed in guileless smiles: "Me, I am
+frank like there never--but no matter," he added; "listen attentively
+to what I shall say to you secretly, that I also desire to be rid of
+this Red Flag Club."
+
+"Well, then----"
+
+"A moment! I am embarrass. Yes. You ask why? I shall tell you. It is
+this. Formerly I have reside in Mexico. My business has been in Mexico
+City. I have there a little cinema theatre. In 1913 I arrive in New
+York. You ask me why I came? And I am frank like--" his full smile
+burst on Skidder--"like a heaven angel! But it is God's truth I came
+here to make of the cinema a monument to Art."
+
+"And make your little pile too, eh, Angy?"
+
+"As you please. But this I affirm to you, Elmer; of politics I am
+innocent like there never was a cherubim! Yes! And yet your Government
+has question me. Why? you ask so naturally. My God! I know no one in
+New York. I arrive. I repair to a recommended hotel. I make
+acquaintance--unhappily--with people who are under a suspicion of
+German sympathy!"
+
+"What the devil did you do that for?" demanded Skidder.
+
+Puma spread his jewelled fingers helplessly.
+
+"How am I to know? I encounter people. I seek capital for my art. Me,
+I am all heart: I suspect nobody. I say: 'Gentlemen, my art is my
+life. Without it I cease to exist. I desire capital; I desire
+sympathy; I desire intelligent recognition and practical aid.' Yes. In
+time some gentlemen evince confidence. I am offered funds. I produce,
+with joy, my first picture. Ha! The success is extravagant!
+But--alas!"
+
+"What tripped you?"
+
+"Alas," repeated Puma, "your Government arrests some gentlemen who
+have lend to me much funds. Why? Imagine my grief, my mortification!
+They are suspect of German propaganda! Oh, my God!"
+
+"How is it they didn't pinch _you_?" asked Skidder coldly, and
+beginning to feel very uneasy.
+
+"Me? No! They investigate. They discover only Art!"
+
+Skidder squinted at him nervously. If he had heard anything of that
+sort in connection with Puma he never would have flirted with him
+financially.
+
+"Well, then, what's this drag they got with you?--Sondheim and the
+other nuts?"
+
+"I tell you. Letters quite innocent but polite they have in
+possession----"
+
+"Blackmail, by heck!"
+
+"I must be considerate of Sondheim."
+
+"Or he'll squeal on you. Is that it?"
+
+Puma's black eyes were flaring up again; the heavy colour stained his
+face.
+
+"Me, I am----"
+
+"All right. Sondheim's got something on you, then. Has he?"
+
+"It is nothing. Yet, it has embarrass me----"
+
+"That ratty kike! I get you, Angy. You were played. Or maybe you did
+some playing too. Aw! wait!"--as Puma protested--"I'm getting you, by
+gobs. Sure. And you're rich, now, and business is pretty good, and you
+wish Sondheim would let you alone."
+
+"Yes, surely."
+
+"How much hush-cash d'yeh pay him?"
+
+"I?"
+
+"Yaas, you! Come on, now, Angy. What does he stick you up for per
+month?"
+
+Puma's face became empurpled: "He is a scoundrel," he said thickly.
+"Me--I wish to God and Jesus Christ I saw the last of him!" He got up,
+and his step was lithe as a leopard's as he paced the room, ranging
+the four walls as though caged. And, for the first time, then Skidder
+realised that this velvet-eyed, velvet-footed man might possibly be
+rather dangerous--dangerous to antagonise, dangerous to be associated
+with in business.
+
+"Say," he blurted out, "what else did you let me in for when I put my
+money into your business? Think I'm going to be held up by any game
+like that? Think I'm going to stand for any shake-down from that
+gang? Watch me."
+
+Puma stopped and looked at him stealthily: "What is it you would do,
+Elmer?"
+
+But Skidder offered no suggestion. He remained, however, extremely
+uneasy. For it was plain enough that Puma had been involved in
+dealings sufficiently suspicious to warrant Government surveillance.
+
+All Skidder's money and real estate were now invested in Super-Pictures.
+No wonder he was anxious. No wonder Puma, also, seemed worried.
+
+For, whatever he might have done in the past of a shady nature, now he
+had become prosperous and financially respectable and, if let alone,
+would doubtless continue to make a great deal of money for Skidder as
+well as for himself. And Skidder, profoundly troubled, wondered
+whether his partner had ever been guiltily involved in German
+propaganda, and had escaped Government detection only to fall a
+victim, in his dawning prosperity, to blackmailing associates of
+earlier days.
+
+"That mutt Sondheim looks like a bad one to me, and the other
+guy--Kastner," he observed gloomily.
+
+"It is better that we should not offend them."
+
+"Just as you say, brother."
+
+"I say it. Yes. We shall be wise to turn to them a pleasing face."
+
+"Sure. The best thing to do for a while is to stall along," nodded
+Skidder, "--but always be ready for a chance to hand it to them.
+That's safest; wait till we get the goods on them. Then slam it to 'em
+plenty!"
+
+"If they annoy me too much," purred Puma, displaying every dazzling
+tooth, "it may not be so agreeable for them. I am bad man to
+crowd.... Meanwhile----"
+
+"Sure; we'll stall along, Angy!"
+
+They opened the glass door and went out into the studio. And Puma
+began again on his favourite theme, the acquiring of Broadway property
+and the erection of a cinema theatre. And Skidder, with his limited
+imagination of a cross-roads storekeeper, listened cautiously, yet
+always conscious of agreeable thrills whenever the subject was
+mentioned.
+
+And, although he knew that capital was shy and that conditions were
+not favourable, his thoughts always reverted to a man he might be
+willing to go into such a scheme with--the president of the Shadow
+Hill Trust Company, Alonzo Pawling.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+At that very moment, too, it chanced that Mr. Pawling's business had
+brought him to New York--in fact, his business was partly with Palla
+Dumont, and they were now lunching together at the Ritz.
+
+Alonzo Pawling stood well over six feet. He still had all his
+hair--which was dyed black--and also an inky pair of old-fashioned
+side whiskers. For the beauty of his remaining features less could be
+said, because his eyes were a melancholy and faded blue, his nose very
+large and red, and his small, loose mouth seemed inclined to sag, as
+though saturated with moisture.
+
+Many years a widower he had, when convenient opportunity presented
+itself, never failed to offer marriage to Palla Dumont. And when, as
+always, she refused him in her frank, amused fashion, they returned
+without embarrassment to their amiable footing of many years--she as
+child of his old friend and neighbour, Judge Dumont, he as her
+financial adviser, and banker.
+
+As usual, Mr. Pawling had offered Palla his large, knotty hand in
+wedlock that morning. And now that this inevitable preliminary was
+safely over, they were approaching the end of a business luncheon on
+entirely amiable terms with each other.
+
+Financial questions had been argued, investments decided upon, news of
+the town discussed, and Palla was now telling him about Elmer Skidder
+and his new and apparently prosperous venture into moving pictures.
+
+"He came to see me last evening," she said, smiling at the recollection,
+"and he arrived in a handsome limousine with an extra man on the
+front--oh, very gorgeous, Mr. Pawling!--and we had tea and he told me
+how prosperous he had become in the moving picture business."
+
+"I guess," said Mr. Pawling, "that there's a lot of money in moving
+pictures. But nobody ever seems to get any of it except the officials
+of the corporation and their favourite stars."
+
+"It seems to be an exceedingly unattractive business," said Palla,
+recollecting her unpleasant impressions at the Super-Picture studios.
+
+"The right end of it," said Mr. Pawling, "is to own a big theatre."
+
+She smiled: "You wouldn't advise me to make such an investment, would
+you?"
+
+Mr. Pawling's watery eyes rested on her reflectively and he sucked in
+his lower lips as though trying to extract the omnipresent moisture.
+
+"I dunno," he said absently.
+
+"Mr. Skidder told me that he would double his invested capital in a
+year," she said.
+
+"I guess he was bragging."
+
+"Perhaps," she rejoined, laughing, "but I should not care to make such
+an investment."
+
+"Did he ask you?"
+
+"No. But it seemed to me that he hinted at something of that nature.
+And I was not at all interested because I am contented with my little
+investments and my income as it is. I don't really need much money."
+
+Mr. Pawling's pendulous lip, released, sagged wetly and his jet-black
+eyebrows were lifted in a surprised arch.
+
+"You're the first person I ever heard say they had enough money," he
+remarked.
+
+"But I have!" she insisted gaily.
+
+Mr. Pawling's sad horse-face regarded her with faded surprise. He
+passed for a rich man in Shadow Hill.
+
+"Where is Elmer's place of business?" he inquired finally, producing a
+worn note-book and a gold pencil. And he wrote down the address.
+
+There was in all the world only one thing that seriously worried Mr.
+Pawling, and that was this worn note-book. Almost every day of his
+life he concluded to burn it. He lived in a vague and daily fear that
+it might be found on him if he died suddenly. Such things could
+happen--automobile or railroad accidents--any one of numberless
+mischances.
+
+And still he carried it, and had carried it for years--always in a
+sort of terror while the recent Mrs. Pawling was still alive--and in
+dull but perpetual anxiety ever since.
+
+There were in it pages devoted to figures. There were, also, memoranda
+of stock transactions. There were many addresses, too, mostly
+feminine.
+
+Now he replaced it in the breast pocket of his frock-coat, and took
+out a large wallet strapped with a rubber band.
+
+While he was paying the check, Palla drew on her gloves; and, at the
+Madison Avenue door, stood chatting with him a moment longer before
+leaving for the canteen.
+
+Then, smilingly declining his taxi and offering her slender hand in
+adieu, she went westward on foot as usual. And Mr. Pawling's
+directions to the chauffeur were whispered ones as though he did not
+care to have the world at large share in his knowledge of his own
+occult destination.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+Palla's duty at the canteen lasted until six o'clock that afternoon,
+and she hurried on her way home because people were dining there at
+seven-thirty.
+
+With the happy recollection that Jim, also, was dining with her, she
+ran lightly up the steps and into the house; examined the flowers
+which stood in jars of water in the pantry, called for vases, arranged
+a centre-piece for the table, and carried other clusters of blossoms
+into the little drawing-room, and others still upstairs.
+
+Then she returned to criticise the table and arrange the name-cards.
+And, this accomplished, she ran upstairs again to her own room, where
+her maid was waiting.
+
+Two or three times in a year--not oftener--Palla yielded to a rare
+inclination which assailed her only when unusually excited and happy.
+That inclination was to whistle.
+
+She whistled, now, while preparing for the bath; whistled like a
+blackbird as she stood before the pier-glass before the maid hooked
+her into a filmy, rosy evening gown--her first touch of colour since
+assuming mourning.
+
+The bell rang, and the waitress brought an elaborate florist's box.
+There were pink orchids in it and Jim's card;--perfection.
+
+How could he have known! She wondered rapturously, realising all the
+while that they'd have gone quite as well with her usual black.
+
+Would he come early? She had forgotten to ask it. Would he? For, in
+that event--and considering his inclination to take her into his
+arms--she decided to leave off the orchids until the more strenuous
+rites of friendship had been accomplished.
+
+She was carrying the orchids and the long pin attached, in her left
+hand, when the sound of the doorbell filled her with abrupt and
+delightful premonitions. She ventured a glance over the banisters,
+then returned hastily to the living room, where he discovered her and
+did exactly what she had feared.
+
+Her left hand, full of orchids, rested on his shoulder; her cool,
+fresh lips rested on his. Then she retreated, inviting inspection of
+the rosy dinner gown; and fastened her orchids while he was admiring
+it.
+
+Her guests began to arrive before either was quite ready, so engrossed
+were they in happy gossip. And Palla looked up in blank surprise that
+almost amounted to vexation when the bell announced that their
+tete-a-tete was ended.
+
+Shotwell had met the majority of Palla's dinner guests. Seated on her
+right, he received from his hostess information concerning some of
+those he did not know.
+
+"That rather talkative boy with red hair is Larry Rideout," she said
+in a low voice. "He edits a weekly called _The Coming Race_. The Post
+Office authorities have refused to pass it through the mails. It's
+rather advanced, you know."
+
+"Who is the girl on his right--the one with the chalky map?"
+
+"Questa Terrett. Don't you think her pallor is fascinating?"
+
+"No. What particular stunt does she perform?"
+
+"Don't be flippant. She writes."
+
+"Ads?"
+
+"Jim! She writes poems. Haven't you seen any of them?"
+
+"I don't think so."
+
+"They're rather modern poems. The lines don't rhyme and there's no
+metrical form," explained Palla.
+
+"Are they any good?"
+
+"They're a little difficult to understand. She leaves out so many
+verbs and nouns----"
+
+"I know. It's a part of her disease----"
+
+"Jim, please be careful. She is taken seriously----"
+
+"Taken seriously ill? There, dear, I won't guy your guests. What an
+absolutely deathly face she has!"
+
+"She is considered beautiful."
+
+"She has the profile of an Egyptian. She's as dead-white as an
+Egyptian leper----"
+
+"Hush!"
+
+"Hush it is, sweetness! Who's the good-looking chap over by Ilse?"
+
+"Stanley Wardner."
+
+"And his star trick?"
+
+"He's a secessionist sculptor."
+
+"What's that?"
+
+"He is one of the ultra-modern men who has seceded from the Society
+of American Sculptors to form, with a few others, a new group."
+
+"Is he any good?"
+
+"Well, Jim, I don't know," she said candidly. "I don't think I am
+quite in sympathy with his work."
+
+"What sort is it?"
+
+"If I understand him, he is what is termed, I believe, a concentrationist.
+For instance, in a nude figure which he is exhibiting in his studio, it's
+all a rough block of marble except, in the middle of the upper part,
+there is a nose."
+
+"A nose!"
+
+"Really, it is beautifully sculptured," insisted Palla.
+
+"But--good heavens!--isn't there any other anatomical feature to that
+block of marble?"
+
+"I explained that he is a concentrationist. His school believes in
+concentrating on a single feature only, and in rendering that feature
+as minutely and perfectly as possible."
+
+Jim said: "He looks as sane as a broker, too. You never can tell, can
+you, sweetness?"
+
+He glanced at several other people whose features were not familiar,
+but Palla's explanations of her friends had slightly discouraged him
+and he made no further inquiries.
+
+Vanya Tchernov was there, dreamy and sweet-mannered; Estridge sat by
+Ilse, looking a trifle careworn, as though hospital work were taking
+it out of him. Marya Lanois was there, too, with her slightly slanting
+green eyes and her tiger-red hair--attracting from him a curious sort
+of stealthy admiration, inexplicable to him because he knew he was so
+entirely in love with Palla.
+
+A woman of forty sat on his right--he promptly forgot her name each
+time he heard it--who ate fastidiously and chose birth-control as the
+subject for conversation. And he dodged it in vain, for her
+conversation had become a monologue, and he sat fiddling with his
+food, very red, while the silky voice, so agreeable in pitch and
+intonation, slid smoothly on.
+
+Afterward Palla explained that she was a celebrated sociologist, but
+Jim remained shy of her.
+
+Other people came in after dinner. Vanya seated himself at the piano
+and played from one of his unpublished scores. Ilse sang two
+Scandinavian songs in her fresh, wholesome, melodious voice--the song
+called _Ygdrasil_, and the _Song of Thokk_. Wardner had brought a
+violin, and he and Vanya accompanied Marya's Asiatic songs, but with
+some difficulty on the sculptor's part, as modern instruments are
+scarcely adapted to the sort of Russian music she chose to sing.
+
+Marya had a way, when singing, which appeared almost insolent. Seated,
+or carelessly erect, her supple figure fell into lines of indolently
+provocative grace; and the warm, golden notes welling from her throat
+seemed to be flung broadcast and indifferently to her listeners, as
+alms are often flung, without interest, toward abstract poverty and
+not to the poor breathing thing at one's elbow.
+
+She sang, in her preoccupied way, one of her savage, pentatonic songs,
+more Mongol than Cossack; then she sang an impudent _burlatskiya_
+lazily defiant of her listeners; then a so-called "dancing song," in
+which there was little restraint in word or air.
+
+The subtly infernal enchantment of girl and music was felt by everybody;
+but several among the illuminati and the fair ultra-modernettes had
+now reached their limit of breadth and tolerance, and were becoming
+bored and self-conscious, when abruptly Marya's figure straightened
+to a lovely severity, her mouth opened sweetly as a cherub's, and,
+looking up like a little, ruddy bird, she sang one of the ancient
+_Kolyadki_, Vanya alone understanding as his long, thin fingers
+wandered instinctively into an improvised accompaniment:
+
+                                   I
+
+                     "Young tears
+                     Your fears disguise;
+                     He is not coming!
+                     Sweet lips
+                     Let slip no sighs;
+                     Cease, heart, your drumming!
+                     He is not coming,
+                                   [A]_Lada!_
+                     He is not coming.
+                     _Lada oy Lada!_
+
+                     "Gaze not in wonder,--
+                     Yonder no rider comes;
+                     Hark how the kettle-drums
+                     Mock his hoofs' thunder;
+                     Hark to their thudding,
+                     Pretty breasts budding,--
+                     Setting the Buddhist bells
+                     Clanking and banging,--
+                     Wheels at the hidden wells
+                     Clinking and clanging!
+                     (_Lada oy Lada!_)
+                     Plough the flower under;
+                     Tear it asunder!
+
+                     "Young eyes
+                     In swift surprise,
+                     What terror veils you?
+                     Clear eyes,
+                     Who gallops here?
+                     What wolf assails you?
+                     What horseman hails you,
+                                     _Lada!_
+                     What pleasure pales you?
+                     _Lada oy Lada!_
+
+                     "Knight who rides boldly,
+                     May Erlik impale you,--
+                     Your mother bewail you,
+                     If you use her coldly!
+                     Health to the wedding!
+                     Joy to the bedding!
+                     Set all the Christian bells
+                     Swinging and ringing--
+                     Monks in their stony cells
+                     Chanting and singing
+                     (_Lada oy Lada!_)
+                     Bud of the rose,
+                     Gently unclose!"
+
+Marya, her gemmed fingers bracketed on her hips, the last sensuous
+note still afloat on her lips, turned her head so that her rounded
+chin rested on her bare shoulder; and looked at Shotwell. He rose,
+applauding with the others, and found a chair for her.
+
+But when she seated herself, she addressed Ilse on the other side of
+him, leaning so near that he felt the warmth of her hair.
+
+"Who was it wrestled with Loki? Was it Hel, goddess of death? Or was
+it Thor who wrestled with that toothless hag, Thokk?"
+
+Ilse explained.
+
+The conversation became general, vaguely accompanied by Vanya's
+drifting improvisations, where he still sat at the piano, his lost
+gaze on Marya.
+
+Bits of the chatter around him came vaguely to Shotwell--the
+birth-control lady's placid inclination toward obstetrics; Wardner on
+concentration, with Palla listening, bending forward, brown eyes wide
+and curious and snowy hands framing her face; Ilse partly turned where
+she was seated, alert, flushed, half smiling at what John Estridge,
+behind her shoulder, was saying to her,--some improvised nonsense, of
+which Jim caught a fragment:
+
+                   "If he who dwells in Midgard
+                   With cunning can not floor her,
+                   What hope that Mistress Westgard
+                   Will melt if I implore her?
+
+                   "And yet I've come to Asgard,
+                   And hope I shall not bore her
+                   If I tell Mistress Westgard
+                   How deeply I adore her----"
+
+Through the hum of conversation and capricious laughter, Vanya's vague
+music drifted like wind-blown thistle-down, and his absent regard
+never left Marya, where she rested among the cushions in low-voiced
+dialogue with Jim.
+
+"I had hoped," she smiled, "that you had perhaps remembered me--enough
+to stop for a word or two some day at tea-time."
+
+He had had no intention of going; but he said that he had meant to and
+would surely do so,--the while she was leisurely recognising the lie
+as it politely uncoiled.
+
+"Why won't you come?" she asked under her breath.
+
+"I shall certainly----"
+
+"No; you won't come." She seemed amused: "Tell me, are you too a
+concentrationist?" And her beryl-green eyes barely flickered toward
+Palla. Then she smiled and laid her hand lightly on her breast: "I, on
+the contrary, am a Diffusionist. It's merely a matter of how God
+grinds the lens. But prisms colour one's dull white life so gaily!"
+
+"And split it up," he said, smiling.
+
+"And disintegrate it," she nodded, "--so exquisitely."
+
+"Into rainbows."
+
+"You do not believe that there is hidden gold there?" And, looking at
+him, she let one hand rest lightly against her hair.
+
+"Yes. I believe it," he said, laughing at her enchanting effrontery.
+"But, Marya, when the rainbow goes a-glimmering, the same old grey
+world is there again. It's always there----"
+
+"Awaiting another rainbow!"
+
+"But storms come first."
+
+"Is another rainbow not worth the storm?"
+
+"Is it?" he demanded.
+
+"Shall we try?" she asked carelessly.
+
+He did not answer. But presently he looked across at Vanya.
+
+"Who is there who would not love him?" said Marya serenely.
+
+"I was wondering."
+
+"No need. All love Vanya. I, also."
+
+"I thought so."
+
+"Think so. For it is quite true.... Will you come to tea alone with me
+some afternoon?"
+
+He looked at her; reddened. Marya turned her head leisurely, to hear
+what Palla was saying to her. At the sound of her voice, Jim turned
+also, and saw Palla bending near his shoulder.
+
+"I'm sorry," she was saying to Marya, "but Questa Terrett desires to
+know Jim----"
+
+"Is it any wonder," said Marya, "that women should desire to know
+him? Alas!--" She laughed and turned to Ilse, who seated herself as
+Jim stood up.
+
+Palla, her finger-tips resting lightly on his arm, said laughingly:
+"Our youthful and tawny enchantress seemed unusually busy with you
+this evening. Has she turned you into anything very disturbing?"
+
+"Would you care?"
+
+"Of course."
+
+"Enough to come to earth and interfere?"
+
+"Good heavens, has it gone as far as that!" she whispered in gay
+consternation. "And could I really arrive in time, though breathless?"
+
+He laughed: "You don't need to stir from your niche, sweetness. I
+swept your altar once. I'll keep the fire clean."
+
+"You adorable thing--" He felt the faintest pressure of her fingers;
+then he heard himself being presented to Questa Terrett.
+
+The frail and somewhat mortuary beauty of this slim poetess, with her
+full-lipped profile of an Egyptian temple-girl and her pale, still
+eyes, left him guessing--rather guiltily--recollecting his recent but
+meaningless disrespect.
+
+"I don't know," she said, "just why you are here. Soldiers are no
+novelty. Is somebody in love with you?"
+
+It was a toss-up whether he'd wither or laugh, but the demon of gaiety
+won out.
+
+She also smiled.
+
+"I asked you," she added, "because you seem to be quite featureless."
+
+"Oh, I've a few eyes and noses and that sort----"
+
+"I mean psychologically accentless."
+
+"Just plain man?"
+
+"Yes. That is all you are, isn't it?"
+
+"I'm afraid it is," he admitted, quite as much amused as she appeared
+to be.
+
+"I see. Some crazy girl here is enamoured of you. Otherwise, you
+scarcely belong among modern intellectuals, you know."
+
+At that he laughed outright.
+
+She said: "You really are delightful. You're just a plain, fighting
+male, aren't you?"
+
+"Well, I haven't done much fighting----"
+
+"Unimaginative, too! You could have led yourself to believe you had
+done a lot," she pointed out. "And maybe you could have interested
+me."
+
+"I'm sorry. But suppose you try to interest _me_?"
+
+"Don't I? I've tried."
+
+"Do your best," he encouraged her cheerfully. "You never can be sure
+I'm not listening."
+
+At that she laughed: "You nice youth," she said, "if you'd talk that
+way to your sweetheart she'd sit up and listen.... Which I'm afraid
+she doesn't, so far."
+
+He felt himself flushing, but he refused to wince under her amused
+analysis.
+
+"You've simply got to have imagination, you know," she insisted.
+"Otherwise, you don't get anywhere at all. Have you read my smears?"
+
+"Smears?"
+
+"Bacteriologists take a smear of something on a glass slide and slip
+it under a microscope. My poems are like that. The words are the
+bacteria. Few can identify them."
+
+"Are you serious?"
+
+"Entirely."
+
+He maintained his gravity: "Would you be kind enough to take a smear
+and let me look?" he inquired politely.
+
+"Certainly: the experiment is called 'Unpremeditation.'"
+
+She dropped one thin and silken knee over the other and crossed her
+hands on it as she recited her poem.
+
+                           "UNPREMEDITATION."
+
+                     "In the tube.
+                     Several,
+                     With intonation.
+                     Red, red, red.
+                     A square fabric
+                     Once white
+                     With intention.
+                     Soiled, soiled, soiled.
+                     Six hundred hundred million
+                     Swarm like vermin,
+                     Without intention.
+                     Redder. Redder.
+                     Drip, drip, drip.
+                     A goes west,
+                     B goes east,
+                     C goes north,
+                     Pink, pink, pink.
+                     Two white squares.
+                     And a coat-sleeve.
+                     Without intention,
+                     Intonations.
+                     Pinker. Redder.
+                     Six hundred hundred million.
+                     Billions. Trillions.
+                     A week. Two weeks.
+                     Otherwise?
+                     Eternity."
+
+Jim's features had become a trifle glassy. "You do skip a few words,"
+he said, "don't you?"
+
+"Words are animalculae. Some skip, some gyrate, some sub-divide."
+
+He put a brave face on the matter: "If you're not really guying me,"
+he ventured, "would you tell me a little about your poem?"
+
+"Why, yes," she replied amiably. "To put it redundantly, then, I have
+sketched in my poem a man in the subway, with influenza, which infects
+others in his vicinity."
+
+She rose, smiled, and sauntered off, leaving him utterly unable to
+determine whether or not he had been outrageously imposed upon. Palla
+rescued him, and he went with her, a little wild-eyed, downstairs to
+the nearly empty and carpetless drawing-room, where a music box was
+playing and people were already dancing.
+
+Toward midnight, Marya, passing Jim on her way to the front door,
+leaned wide from Vanya's arm:
+
+"Let us at least discuss my rainbow theory," she said, laughing, and
+her face a shade too close to his; and continued on, still clinging to
+the sleeve of Vanya's fur-lined coat.
+
+Ilse was the last to leave, with Estridge waiting behind her to hold
+her wrap.
+
+She came up to Palla, took both her hands in an odd, subdued, wistful
+way.
+
+After a moment she kissed her, and, close to her ear: "Wait,
+darling."
+
+Palla did not understand.
+
+Ilse said: "I mean--wait before you ever take any step to--to prove
+any theory--or belief."
+
+Still Palla did not comprehend.
+
+"With--Jim," said Ilse in a low voice.
+
+"Oh. Why, of course. But--it could never happen."
+
+"Why?"
+
+Palla said honestly: "One reason is because he wouldn't anyway."
+
+"You must not be certain."
+
+"I am. I'm absolutely certain."
+
+Ilse gazed at her, then laughed and pressed her hand. "Are you cold?"
+asked Palla.
+
+"No."
+
+"I thought I felt you shiver, dearest."
+
+Ilse flushed and held out her arms for the sleeves of her fur coat,
+which Estridge was holding.
+
+They went away together, leaving Palla alone with Shotwell, among the
+fading flowers.
+
+  [A] The ancient Slavonic Venus.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+
+"So," said Puma, "you are quite convinced he has much wealth. Yes?"
+
+"You betcha," replied Elmer Skidder. "That pious guy has got all kinds
+of it. Why, Alonzo D. Pawling can buy you and me like we were two
+subway tickets and then forget which pocket he put us in."
+
+"He also is a sport? Yes?"
+
+"On the quiet. Oh, I got his number some years ago. Ran into him once
+in New York, where you used to knock three times and ring twice before
+they slid the panel on you."
+
+"A bank president?"
+
+"Did you ever know one that didn't?" grinned Skidder, inserting pearl
+studs in his shirt.
+
+"It is very bad--for a shake-down," mused Puma, smoothing his glossy
+top hat with one of Skidder's silk mufflers.
+
+"Aw, you can't scare Alonzo D. Pawling. Say, Angy, what dames have you
+commandeered?"
+
+"I ask Barclay and West. Also, they got another--Vanna Brown."
+
+"Pictures?"
+
+"No, she has a friend."
+
+Skidder continued to attire himself in an over-braided evening dress;
+Puma, seated behind him, gazed absently at his partner's features
+reflected in the looking glass.
+
+"A theatre on Broadway," he mused. "You say he has seemed interested,
+Elmer?"
+
+"He didn't run away screaming."
+
+"How did he behave?"
+
+"Well, it's hard to size up Alonzo D. Pawling. He's a fly guy, Angy.
+What a man says at a little supper for four, with a peach pulling his
+Depews and a good looker sticking gardenias in his buttonhole, ain't
+what he's likely to say next day in your office."
+
+"You have accompany him to Broadway and you have shown him the
+parcel?"
+
+"I sure did."
+
+"You explain how we can not lose out? You mention the option?"
+
+Skidder cast aside his white tie and tried another, constructed on the
+butterfly plan.
+
+"I put the whole thing up to him," he said. "No use stalling with
+Alonzo D. Pawling. I know him too well. So I let out straight from the
+shoulder, and he knows the scheme we've got in mind and he knows we
+want his money in it. That's how it stands to-night."
+
+Puma nodded and softly joined his over-manicured finger-tips:
+
+"We give him a good time," he said. "We give him a little dinner like
+there never was in New York. Yes?"
+
+"You betcha."
+
+"Barclay is a devil. You think she please him?"
+
+"Alonzo D. Pawling is some bird himself," remarked Skidder, picking up
+his hat and turning to Puma, who rose with lithe briskness, put on his
+hat, and began to pull at his white gloves.
+
+They went down to the street, where Puma's car was waiting.
+
+"I stop at the office a moment," he said, as they entered the
+limousine. "You need not get out, Elmer."
+
+At the studio he descended, saying to Skidder that he'd be back in a
+moment.
+
+But it was very evident when he entered his office that he had not
+expected to find Max Sondheim there; and he hesitated on the
+threshold, his white-gloved hand still on the door-knob.
+
+"Come in, Puma; I want to see you," growled Sondheim, retaining his
+seat but pocketing _The Call_, which he had been reading.
+
+"To-morrow," said Puma coolly; "I have no time----"
+
+"No, _now_!" interrupted Sondheim.
+
+They eyed each other for a moment in silence, then Puma shrugged:
+
+"Very well," he said. "But be quick, if you please----"
+
+"Look here," interrupted the other in a menacing voice, "you're
+getting too damned independent, telling me to be quick! I had a date
+with you here at five o'clock. You thought you wouldn't keep it and
+you left at four-thirty. But I stuck around till you 'phoned in that
+you'd stop here to get some money. It's seven o'clock now, and I've
+waited for you. And I guess you've got enough time to hear what I'm
+going to say."
+
+Puma looked at him without any expression at all on his sanguine
+features. "Go on," he said.
+
+"What I got to say to you is this," began Sondheim. "There's a kind of
+a club that uses our hall on off nights. It's run by women."
+
+Puma waited.
+
+"They meet this evening at eight in our hall,--your hall, if you
+choose."
+
+Puma nodded carelessly.
+
+"All right. Put them out."
+
+"What?"
+
+"Put 'em out!" growled Sondheim. "We don't want them there to-night or
+any other night."
+
+"You ask me to evict respectable people who pay me rent?"
+
+"I don't ask you; I _tell_ you."
+
+Puma turned a deep red: "And whose hall do you think it is?" he
+demanded in a silky voice.
+
+"Yours. That's why I tell you to get rid of that bunch and their
+Combat Club."
+
+"Why have you ask me such a----"
+
+"Because they're fighting us and you know it. That's a good enough
+reason."
+
+"I shall not do so," said Puma, moistening his lips with his tongue.
+
+"Oh, I guess you will when you think it over," sneered Sondheim,
+getting up from his chair and stuffing his newspaper into his overcoat
+pocket. He crossed the floor and shot an ugly glance at Puma _en
+passant_. Then he jerked open the door and went out briskly.
+
+Puma walked into the inner waiting room, where a telephone operator
+sat reading a book.
+
+"Where's McCabe?" he asked.
+
+"Here he comes now, Governor."
+
+The office manager sauntered up, eating a slice of apple pie, and Puma
+stepped forward to meet him.
+
+"For what reason have you permit Mr. Sondheim to wait in my office?"
+he demanded.
+
+"He said you told him to go in and wait there."
+
+"He is a liar! Hereafter he shall wait out here. You understand,
+McCabe?"
+
+"Yes, sir. You're always out when he calls, ain't you?"
+
+Puma meditated a few moments: "No. When he calls you shall let me
+know. Then I decide. But he shall not wait in my office."
+
+"Very good, sir." And, as Puma turned to go: "The police was here
+again this evening, sir."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"They heard of the row in the hall last night."
+
+"What did you tell them?"
+
+"Oh, the muss was all swept up--windows fixed and the busted benches
+in the furnace, so I said there had been no row as far as I knew, and
+I let 'em go in and nose around."
+
+"Next time," said Puma, "you shall say to them that there was a very
+bad riot."
+
+"Sir?"
+
+"A big fight," continued Puma. "And if there is only a little damage
+you shall make more. And you shall show it to the police."
+
+"I get you, Governor. I'll stage it right; don't worry."
+
+"Yes, you shall stage it like there never was in all of France any
+ruins like my hall! And afterward," he said, half to himself, "we
+shall see what we shall see."
+
+He went back to his office, took a packet of hundred dollar bills from
+the safe, and walked slowly out to where the limousine awaited him.
+
+"Say, what the hell--" began Skidder impatiently; but Puma leaped
+lightly to his seat and pulled the fur robe over his knees.
+
+"Now," he said, in excellent humour, "we pick up Mr. Pawling at the
+Astor."
+
+"Where are the ladies?"
+
+"They join us, Hotel Rajah. It will be, I trust, an amusing evening."
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+About midnight, dinner merged noisily into supper in the private
+dining room reserved by Mr. Puma for himself and guests at the new
+Hotel Rajah.
+
+There had been intermittent dancing during the dinner, but now the
+negro jazz specialists had been dismissed with emoluments, and a
+music-box substituted; and supper promised to become even a more
+lively repetition of the earlier banquet.
+
+Puma was superb--a large, heavy man, he danced as lightly as any
+ballerina; and he and Tessa Barclay did a Paraguayan dance together,
+with a leisurely and agile perfection of execution that elicited
+uproarious demonstrations from the others.
+
+Not a whit winded, Puma resumed his seat at table, laughing as Mr.
+Pawling insisted on shaking hands with him.
+
+"You are far too kind to my poor accomplishments," he said in
+deprecation. "It was not at all difficult, that Paraguayan dance."
+
+"It was art!" insisted Mr. Pawling, his watery eyes brimming with
+emotion. And he pressed the pretty waist of Tessa Barclay.
+
+"Art," rejoined Puma, laying a jewelled hand on his shirt-front, "is
+an ecstatic outburst from within, like the song of the bird. Art is
+simple; art is not difficult. Where effort begins, art ends. Where
+self-expression becomes a labour, art already has perished!"
+
+He thumped his shirt-front with an impassioned and highly-coloured
+fist.
+
+"What is art?" he cried, "if it be not pleasure? And pleasure ceases
+where effort begins. For me, I am all heart, all art, like there never
+was in all the history of the Renaissance. As expresses itself the
+little innocent bird in song, so in my pictures I express myself. It
+is no effort. It is in me. It is born. Behold! Art has given birth to
+Beauty!"
+
+"And the result," added Skidder, "is a _ne plus ultra par excellence_
+which gathers in the popular coin every time. And say, if we had a
+Broadway theatre to run our stuff, and Angelo Puma to soopervise the
+combine--oh boy!--" He smote Mr. Pawling upon his bony back and dug
+him in the ribs with his thumb.
+
+Mr. Pawling's mouth sagged and his melancholy eyes shifted around him
+from Tessa Barclay--who was now attempting to balance a bon-bon on her
+nose and catch it between her lips--to Vanna Brown, teaching Miss West
+to turn cart-wheels on one hand.
+
+Evidently Art had its consolations; and the single track genius who
+lived for art alone got a bonus, too. Also, what General Sherman once
+said about Art seemed to be only too obvious.
+
+A detail, however, worried Mr. Pawling. Financially, he had always
+been afraid of Jews. And the nose of Angelo Puma made him uneasy every
+time he looked at it.
+
+But an inch is a mile on a man's nose; and his own was bigger, yet
+entirely Yankee; so he had about concluded that there was no racial
+occasion for financial alarm.
+
+What he should have known was that no Jew can compete with a
+Connecticut Yankee; but that any half-cast Armenian is master of both.
+Especially when born in Mexico of a Levantine father.
+
+Now, in spite of Angelo Puma's agile gaiety and exotic exuberances,
+his brain remained entirely occupied with two matters. One of these
+concerned the possibility of interesting Mr. Pawling in a plot of
+ground on Broadway, now defaced by several taxpayers.
+
+The other matter which fitfully preoccupied him was his unpleasant and
+unintentional interview with Sondheim.
+
+For it had come to a point, now, that the perpetual bullying of former
+associates was worrying Mr. Puma a great deal in his steadily
+increasing prosperity.
+
+The war was over. Besides, long ago he had prudently broken both his
+pledged word and his dangerous connections in Mexico, and had started
+what he believed to be a safe and legitimate career in New York,
+entirely free from perilous affiliations.
+
+Government had investigated his activities; Government had found
+nothing for which to order his internment as an enemy alien.
+
+It had been a close call. Puma realised that. But he had also realised
+that there was no law in Mexico ten miles outside of Mexico City;--no
+longer any German power there, either;--when he severed all
+connections with those who had sent him into the United States
+camouflaged as a cinema promoter, and under instruction to do all the
+damage he could to everything American.
+
+But he had not counted on renewing his acquaintance with Karl Kastner
+and Max Sondheim in New York. Nor did they reveal themselves to him
+until he had become too prosperous to denounce them and risk
+investigation and internment under the counter-accusations with which
+they coolly threatened him.
+
+So, from the early days of his prosperity in New York, it had been
+necessary for him to come to an agreement with Sondheim and Kastner.
+And the more his prosperity increased the less he dared to resent
+their petty tyranny and blackmail, because, whether or not they might
+suffer under his public accusations, it was very certain that
+internment, if not imprisonment for a term of years, would be the fate
+reserved for himself. And that, of course, meant ruin.
+
+So, although Puma ate and drank and danced with apparent abandon, and
+flashed his dazzling smile over everybody and everything, his mind,
+when not occupied by Alonzo D. Pawling, was bothered by surmises
+concerning Sondheim. And also, at intervals, he thought of Palla
+Dumont and the Combat Club, and he wondered uneasily whether
+Sondheim's agents had attempted to make any trouble at the meeting in
+his hall that evening.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+There had been some trouble. The meeting being a public one, under
+municipal permission, Kastner had sent a number of his Bolshevik
+followers there, instructed to make what mischief they could. They
+were recruited from all sects of the Reds, including the American
+Bolsheviki, known commonly as the I. W. W. Also, among them were
+scattered a few pacifists, hun-sympathisers, conscientious objectors
+and other birds of analogous plumage, quite ready for interruptions
+and debate.
+
+Palla presided, always a trifle frightened to find herself facing any
+audience, but ashamed to avoid the delegated responsibility.
+
+Among others on the platform around her were Ilse and Marya and Questa
+Terrett and the birth-control lady--Miss Thane--neat and placid and
+precise as usual, and wearing long-distance spectacles for a more
+minute inspection of the audience.
+
+Palla opened the proceedings in a voice which was clear, and always
+became steadier under heckling.
+
+Her favourite proposition--the Law of Love and Service--she offered
+with such winning candour that the interruption of derisive laughter,
+prepared by several of Kastner's friends, was postponed; and Terry
+Hogan, I. W. W., said to Jerry Smith, I. W. W.:
+
+"God love her, she's but a baby. Lave her chatter."
+
+However, a conscientious objector got up and asked her whether she
+considered that the American army abroad had conformed to her Law of
+Love and Service, and when she answered emphatically that every
+soldier in the United States army was fulfilling to the highest degree
+his obligations to that law, both pacifists and conscientious
+objectors dissented noisily, and a student from Columbia College got
+up and began to harangue the audience.
+
+Order was finally obtained: Palla added a word or two and retired; and
+Ilse Westgard came forward.
+
+Somebody in the audience called out: "Say, just because you're a
+good-looker it don't mean you got a brain!"
+
+Ilse threw back her golden head and her healthy laughter rang
+uncontrolled.
+
+"Comrade," she said, "we all have to do the best we can with what
+brain we have, don't we?"
+
+"Sure!" came from her grinning heckler, who seemed quite won over by
+her good humour.
+
+So, an armistice established, Ilse plunged vigorously into her theme:
+
+"Let me tell you something which you all know in your hearts: any
+class revolution based on violence and terrorism is doomed to
+failure."
+
+"Don't be too sure of that!" shouted a man.
+
+"I am sure of it. And you will never see any reign of terror in
+America."
+
+"But you may see Bolshevism here--Bolshevist propaganda--Bolshevist
+ideas penetrating. You may see these ideas accepted by Labor. You may
+see strikes--the most senseless and obsolete weapon ever wielded by
+thinking men; you may see panics, tie-ups, stagnation, misery. But you
+never shall see Bolshevism triumphant here, or permanently triumphant
+anywhere.
+
+"Because Bolshevism is autocracy!"
+
+"The hell it is!" yelled an I. W. W.
+
+"Yes," said Ilse cheerfully, "as you have said it is hell. And hell is
+an end, not a means, not a remedy.
+
+"Because it is the negation of all socialism; the death of civilisation.
+And civilisation has an immortal destiny; and that destiny is
+socialism!"
+
+A man interrupted, but she asked him so sweetly for a few moments more
+that he reseated himself.
+
+"Comrades," she said, "I know something about Bolshevism and
+revolution. I was a soldier of Russia. I carried a rifle and full
+pack. I was part of what is history. And I learned to be tolerant in
+the trenches; and I learned to love this unhappy human race of ours.
+And I learned what is Bolshevism.
+
+"It is one of many protests against the exploitation of men by men. It
+is one of the many reactions against intolerable wrong. It is not a
+policy; it is an outburst against injustice; against the stupidity of
+present conditions, where the few monopolise the wealth created by the
+many; and the many remain poor.
+
+"And Bolshevism is the remedy proposed--the violent superimposition
+of a brand new autocracy upon the ruins of the old!
+
+"It does not work. It never can work, because it imposes the will of
+one class upon all other classes. It excludes all parties excepting
+its own from government. It is, therefore, not democratic. It is a
+tyranny, imposing upon capital and labour alike its will.
+
+"And I tell you that Labour has just won the greatest of all wars. Do
+you suppose Labour will endure the autocracy of the Bolsheviki? The
+time is here when a more decent division is going to be made between
+the employer and the labourer.
+
+"I don't care what sort of production it may be, the producer is going
+to receive a much larger share; the employer a much smaller. And the
+producer is going to enjoy a better standard of living, opportunities
+for leisure and self-cultivation; and the three spectres that haunt
+him from childhood to grave--lack of money to make a beginning; fear
+for a family left on its own resources by his death; terror of poverty
+in old age--shall vanish.
+
+"Against these three evil ghosts that haunt his bedside when the long
+day is done, there are going to be guarantees. Because those who won
+for us this righteous war, whether abroad or at home, are going to
+have something to say about it.
+
+"And it will be they, not the Bolsheviki--it will be labourer and
+employer, not incendiary and assassin, who shall determine what is to
+be the policy of this Republic toward those to whom it owes its
+salvation!"
+
+A man stood up waving his arms: "All right! All right! The question is
+whether the sort of government we have is worth saving. You talk very
+flip about the Bolsheviki, but I'll tell you they'll run this country
+yet, and every other too, and run 'em to suit themselves! It's our
+turn; you've had your inning. Now, you'll get a dose of what you hand
+to us if we have to ram it down with a gun barrel!"
+
+There was wild cheering from Kastner's men scattered about the hall;
+cries of "That's the stuff! Take away their dough! Kick 'em out of
+their Fifth Avenue castles and set 'em to digging subways!"
+
+Ilse said calmly: "Thank you very much for proving my contention for
+all these people who have been so kind as to listen to me.
+
+"I said to you that Bolshevism is merely a new and more immoral
+autocracy which wishes to confiscate all property, annihilate all
+culture and set up in the public places a new god--the god of
+Ignorance!
+
+"You have been good enough to corroborate me. And I and my audience
+now know that Bolshevism is on its way to America, and that its agents
+are already here.
+
+"It is in view of such a danger that this Combat Club has been
+organised. And it was time to organise it.
+
+"It is evident, too, that the newspapers agree with us. Let us read
+you what one of them has to say:
+
+  "'We fully realise the atrocity of the Bolshevik propaganda, which
+  is really the doctrine of communism and anarchy. We realise the
+  perilous ferment which endangers civilisation. But in the
+  countries which have held fast to moral standards during the war
+  we believe the factors of safety are sufficiently great, the
+  forces of sanity are far stronger than those of chaos----'"
+
+Here, those whose role it was to interrupt with derisive laughter,
+broke out at a preconcerted signal. But Ilse read on:
+
+  "'In a word, as a mere matter of self-interest and common sense,
+  we can only see the people, as a whole, in any country, as opposed
+  to anarchy in any form. In our own land, even granted that there
+  are a hundred thousand "red" agitators, or say a quarter of a
+  million--and we have no real belief that this is so--what are
+  these in a population of one hundred and five millions? Are the
+  ninety and nine sane, moral, law abiding men and women going to
+  allow themselves to be stampeded into ruin by a handful of
+  criminals and lunatics?
+
+  "'We do not for a moment believe it. These agitators and
+  incendiaries have a sort of maniacal impetus that fills the air
+  with dust and noise and alarms the credulous. Perhaps it may be
+  wise to counteract this with a little quiet promotion of ideas of
+  safety and prosperity, based on order and law. It may be well to
+  calm the nerves of the timorous and it can do no harm to set in
+  motion a counter wave of horror and repulsion against those who
+  are planning to lead the world back to conditions of tribal
+  savagery. Educational work is always beneficent. Let us have much
+  of that but no panic. The power of truth and reason is in calm
+  confidence.'"
+
+And now a bushy-headed man got on his feet and levelled his forefinger
+at Ilse: "Take shame for your-selluf!" he shouted. "I know you! You
+fought mit Korniloff! You took orders from Kerensky, from aristocrats,
+from cadets!"
+
+Ilse said pleasantly. "I fought for Russia, my friend. And when the
+robbers and despoilers of Russia became the stronger, I took a
+vacation."
+
+Some people laughed, but a harsh voice cried: "We know what you did.
+You rescued the friend of the Romanoffs--that Carmelite nun up there
+on the platform behind you, who calls herself Miss Dumont!"
+
+And from the other side of the hall another man bawled out: "You and
+the White Nun have done enough mischief. And you and your club had
+better get out of here while the going is good!"
+
+Estridge, who was standing in the rear of the hall with Shotwell, came
+down along the aisle. Jim followed.
+
+"Who said that?" he demanded, scanning the faces on that side while
+Shotwell looked among the seats beyond.
+
+Nobody said anything, for John Estridge stood over six feet and Jim
+looked physically very fit.
+
+Estridge, standing in the aisle, said in his cool, penetrating voice:
+
+"This club is a forum for discussion. All are free to argue any point.
+Only swine would threaten violence.
+
+"Now go on and argue. Say what you like. But the next man who
+threatens these ladies or this club with violence will have to leave
+the hall."
+
+"Who'll put him out?" piped an unidentified voice.
+
+Then the two young men laughed; and their mirth was not reassuring to
+the violently inclined.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+There were disturbances during the evening, but no violence, and only
+a few threats--those that made them remaining in prudent incognito.
+
+Miss Thane made a serene, precise and perfectly logical address upon
+birth control.
+
+Somebody yelled that the millionaires didn't have to resort to it,
+being already sufficiently sterile to assure the dwindling of their
+class.
+
+A woman rose and said she had always done what she pleased in the
+matter, law or no law, but that if it were true the Bolsheviki in
+America were but a quarter of a million to a hundred million of the
+bourgeoisie, then it was time to breed and breed to the limit.
+
+"And let the kids starve?" cried another woman--a mere girl. "That
+isn't the way. The way to do is to even things with a hundred million
+hand grenades!"
+
+Instantly the place was in an uproar; but Palla came forward and said
+that the meeting was over, and Estridge and Shotwell and two policemen
+kept the aisles fairly clear while the wrangling audience made their
+way to the street.
+
+"Aw, it's all lollipop!" said a man. "What d' yeh expect from a bunch
+of women?"
+
+"The Red Flag Club is better," rejoined another. "Say, bo! There's
+somethin' doin' when Sondheim hands it out!"
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+Ilse went away with Estridge. Palla came along among the other women,
+and turned aside to offer her hand to Jim.
+
+"Did you expect to take me home?" she asked demurely.
+
+"Didn't you expect me to?" he inquired uneasily.
+
+"I? Why should I?" She slipped her arm into his with a little nestling
+gesture. "And it's a very odd thing, Jim, that they left the chafing
+dish on the table. And that before she went to bed my waitress laid
+covers for two."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+
+"Are you worried about this Dumont girl?" asked Shotwell Senior
+abruptly.
+
+His wife did not look up from her book. After an interval:
+
+"Yes," she said, "I am."
+
+Her husband watched her over the top of his newspaper.
+
+"I can't believe there's anything in it," he said. "But it's a shame
+that Jim should worry you so."
+
+"He doesn't mean to."
+
+"Probably he doesn't, but what's the difference? You're unhappy and
+he's the reason of it. And it isn't as though he were a cub any
+longer, either. He's old enough to know what he's about. He's no Willy
+Baxter."
+
+"That is what makes me anxious," said Helen Shotwell. "Do you know,
+dear, that he hasn't dined here once this week, yet he seems to go
+nowhere else--nowhere except to her."
+
+"What sort of woman is she?" he demanded, wiping his eyeglasses as
+though preparing to take a long-distance look at Palla.
+
+"I know her only at the Red Cross."
+
+"Well, is she at all common?"
+
+"No.... That is why it is difficult for me to talk to Jim about her.
+There's nothing of that sort to criticise."
+
+"No social objections to the girl?"
+
+"None. She's an unusual girl."
+
+"Attractive?"
+
+"Unfortunately."
+
+"Well, then----"
+
+"Oh, James, I _want_ him to marry Elorn! And if he's going to make
+himself conspicuous over this Dumont girl, I don't think I can bear
+it!"
+
+"What _is_ the objection to the girl, Helen?" he asked, flinging his
+paper onto a table and drawing nearer the fire.
+
+"She isn't at all our kind, James----"
+
+"But you just said----"
+
+"I don't mean socially. And still, as far as that goes, she seems to
+care nothing whatever for position or social duties or obligations."
+
+"That's not so unusual in these days," he remarked. "Lots of nice
+girls are fed up on the social aspects of life."
+
+"Well, for example, she has not made the slightest effort to know
+anybody worth knowing. Janet Speedwell left cards and then asked her
+to dinner, and received an amiable regret for her pains. No girl can
+afford to decline invitations from Janet, even if her excuse is a club
+meeting.
+
+"And two or three other women at the Red Cross have asked her to lunch
+at the Colony Club, and have made advances to her on Leila Vance's
+account, but she hasn't responded. Now, you know a girl isn't going to
+get on by politely ignoring the advances of such women. But she
+doesn't even appear to be aware of their importance."
+
+"Why don't you ask her to something?" suggested her husband.
+
+"I did," she said, a little sharply. "I asked her and Leila Vance to
+dine with us. I intended to ask Elorn, too, and let Jim realise the
+difference if he isn't already too blind to see."
+
+"Did she decline?"
+
+"She did," said Helen curtly.
+
+"Why?"
+
+"It happened that she had asked somebody to dine with her that
+evening. And I have a horrid suspicion it was Jim. If it was, she
+could have postponed it. Of course it was a valid excuse, but it
+annoyed me to have her decline. That's what I tell you, James, she has
+a most disturbing habit of declining overtures from everybody--even
+from----"
+
+Helen checked herself, looked at her husband with an odd smile, in
+which there was no mirth; then:
+
+"You probably are not aware of it, dear, but that girl has also
+declined Jim's overtures."
+
+"Jim's what?"
+
+"Invitation."
+
+"Invitation to do what?"
+
+"Marry him."
+
+Shotwell Senior turned very red.
+
+"The devil she did! How do you know?"
+
+"Jim told me."
+
+"That she turned him down?"
+
+"She declined to marry him."
+
+Her husband seemed unable to grasp such a fact. Never had it occurred
+to Shotwell Senior that any living, human girl could decline such an
+invitation from his only son.
+
+After a painful silence: "Well," he said in a perplexed and mortified
+voice, "she certainly seems to be, as you say, a most unusual girl....
+But--if it's settled--why do you continue to worry, Helen?"
+
+"Because Jim is very deeply in love with her.... And I'm sore at
+heart."
+
+"Hard hit, is he?"
+
+"Very unhappy."
+
+Shotwell Senior reddened again: "He'll have to face it," he said....
+"But that girl seems to be a fool!"
+
+"I--wonder."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"A girl may change her mind." She lifted her head and looked with sad
+humour at her husband, whom she also had kept dangling for a while.
+Then:
+
+"James, dear, our son _is_ as fine as we think him. But he's just a
+splendid, wholesome, everyday, unimaginative New York business man.
+And he's fallen in love with his absolute antithesis. Because this
+girl is all ardent imagination, full of extravagant impulses, very
+lovely to look at, but a perfectly illogical fanatic!
+
+"Mrs. Vance has told me all about her. She really belongs in some
+exotic romance, not in New York. She's entirely irresponsible,
+perfectly unstable. There is in her a generous sort of recklessness
+which is quite likely to drive her headlong into any extreme. And what
+sort of mate would such a girl be for a young man whose ambition is to
+make good in the real estate business, marry a nice girl, have a
+pleasant home and agreeable children, and otherwise conform to the
+ordinary conventions of civilisation?"
+
+"I think," remarked her husband grimly, "that she'd keep him
+guessing."
+
+"She would indeed! And that's not all, James. For I've got to tell you
+that the girl entertains some rather weird and dreadful socialistic
+notions. She talks socialism--a mild variety--from public platforms.
+She admits very frankly that she entertains no respect for accepted
+conventions. And while I have no reason to doubt her purity of mind
+and personal chastity, the unpleasant and startling fact remains that
+she proposes that humanity should dispense with the marriage ceremony
+and discard it and any orthodox religion as obsolete superstitions."
+
+Her husband stared at her.
+
+"For heaven's sake," he began, then got frightfully red in the face
+once more. "What that girl needs is a plain spanking!" he said
+bluntly. "I'd like to see her or any other girl try to come into this
+family on any such ridiculous terms!"
+
+"She doesn't seem to want to come in on any terms," said Helen.
+
+"Then what are you worrying about?"
+
+"I am worrying about what might happen if she ever changed her mind."
+
+"But you say she doesn't believe in marriage!"
+
+"She doesn't."
+
+"Well, that boy of ours isn't crazy," insisted Shotwell Senior.
+
+But his mother remained silent in her deep misgiving concerning the
+sanity of the simpler sex, when mentally upset by love. For it seemed
+very difficult to understand what to do--if, indeed, there was
+anything for her to do in the matter.
+
+To express disapproval of Palla to Jim or to the girl herself--to show
+any opposition at all--would, she feared, merely defeat its own
+purpose and alienate her son's confidence.
+
+The situation was certainly a most disturbing one, though not at
+present perilous.
+
+And Helen would not permit herself to believe that it could ever
+really become an impossible situation--that this young girl would
+deliberately slap civilisation in the face; or that her only son would
+add a kick to the silly assault and take the ruinous consequences of
+social ostracism.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+The young girl in question was at that moment seated before her piano,
+her charming head uplifted, singing in the silvery voice of an
+immaculate angel, to her own accompaniment, the heavenly Mass of Saint
+Hilde:
+
+                        "Love me,
+                      Adorable Mother!
+                        Mary,
+                      I worship no other.
+                        Save me,
+                      O, graciously save me
+                        I pray!
+                  Let my Darkness be turned into Day
+                  By the Light of Thy Grace
+                      And Thy Face,
+                        I pray!"
+
+She continued the exquisite refrain on the keys for a while, then
+slowly turned to the man beside her.
+
+"The one Mass I still love," she murmured absently, "--memories of
+childhood, I suppose--when the Sisters made me sing the solo--I was
+only ten years old." ... She shrugged her shoulders: "You know, in
+those days, I was a little devil," she said seriously.
+
+He smiled.
+
+"I really was, Jim,--all over everything and wild as a swallow. I led
+the pack; Shadow Hill held us in horror. I remember I fought our
+butcher's boy once--right in the middle of the street----"
+
+"Why?"
+
+"He did something to a cat which I couldn't stand."
+
+"Did you whip him?"
+
+"Oh, Jim, it was horrid. We both were dreadfully battered. And the
+constable caught us both, and I shall never, never forget my mother's
+face!----"
+
+She gazed down at the keys of the piano, touched them pensively.
+
+"The very deuce was in me," she sighed. "Even now, unless I'm occupied
+with all my might, something begins--to simmer in me----"
+
+She turned and looked at him: "--A sort of enchanted madness that
+makes me wild to seize the whole world and set it right!--take it into
+my arms and defend it--die for it--or slay it and end its pain."
+
+"Too much of an armful," he said with great gravity. "The thing to do
+is to select an individual and take _him_ to your heart."
+
+"And slay him?" she inquired gaily.
+
+"Certainly--like the feminine mantis--if you find you don't like him.
+Individual suitors must take their chances of being either eaten or
+adored."
+
+"Jim, you're so funny."
+
+She swung her stool, rested her elbow on the piano, and gazed at him
+interrogatively, the odd, half-smile edging her lips and eyes. And,
+after a little _duetto_ of silence:
+
+"Do you suppose I shall ever come to care for you--imprudently?" she
+asked.
+
+"I wouldn't let you."
+
+"How could you help it? And, as far as that goes, how could I, if it
+happened?"
+
+"If you ever come to care at all," he said, "you'll care enough."
+
+"That is the trouble with you," she retorted, "you don't care
+enough."
+
+A slight flush stained his cheek-bones: "Sometimes," he said, "I
+almost wish I cared less. And that would be what you call enough."
+
+Colour came into her face, too:
+
+"Do you know, Jim, I really don't know how much I do care for you? It
+sounds rather silly, doesn't it?"
+
+"Do you care more than you did at first?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Much more?"
+
+"I told you I don't know how much."
+
+"Not enough to marry me?"
+
+"Must we discuss that again?"
+
+He got up, went out to the hall, pulled a book from his overcoat
+pocket, and returned.
+
+"Would you care to hear what the greatest American says on the
+subject, Palla?"
+
+"On the subject of marriage?"
+
+"No; he takes the marriage for granted. It's what he has to say
+concerning the obligations involved."
+
+"Proceed, dear," she said, laughingly.
+
+He read, eliminating what was not necessary to make his point:
+
+"'A race is worthless and contemptible if its men cease to work hard
+and, at need, to fight hard; and if its women cease to breed freely.
+If the best classes do not reproduce themselves the nation will, of
+course, go down.
+
+"'When the ordinary decent man does not understand that to marry the
+woman he loves, as early as he can, is the most desirable of all
+goals; when the ordinary woman does not understand that all other
+forms of life are but makeshift substitutes for the life of the wife,
+the mother of healthy children; then the State is rotten at heart.
+
+"'The woman who shrinks from motherhood is as low a creature as a man
+of the professional pacifist, or poltroon, type, who shirks his duty
+as a soldier.
+
+"'The only full life for man or woman is led by those men and women
+who together, with hearts both gentle and valiant, face lives of love
+and duty, who see their children rise up to call them blessed, and who
+leave behind them their seed to inherit the earth.
+
+"'No celibate life approaches such a life in usefulness. The mother
+comes ahead of the nun.
+
+"'But if the average woman does not marry and become the mother of
+enough healthy children to permit the increase of the race; and if the
+average man does not marry in times of peace and do his full duty in
+war if need arises, then the race is decadent and should be swept
+aside to make room for a better one.
+
+"'Only that nation has a future whose sons and daughters recognise and
+obey the primary laws of their racial being!'"
+
+He closed the book and laid it on the piano.
+
+"Now," he said, "either we're really a rotten and decadent race, and
+might as well behave like one, or we're sound and sane."
+
+Something unusual in his voice--in the sudden grim whiteness of his
+face--disturbed Palla.
+
+"I want you to marry me," he said. "You care for no other man. And if
+you don't love me enough to do it, you'll learn to afterward."
+
+"Jim," she said gently, and now rather white herself, "that is an
+outrageous thing to say to me. Don't you realise it?"
+
+"I'm sorry. But I love you--I need you so that I'm fit for nothing else.
+I can't keep my mind on my work; I can't think of anybody--anything
+but you.... If you didn't care for me more or less I wouldn't come
+whining to you. I wouldn't come now until I'd entirely won your
+heart--except that--if I did--and if you refused me marriage and
+offered the other thing--I'd be about through with everything! And
+I'd know damned well that the nation wasn't worth the powder to blow
+it to hell if such women as you betray it!"
+
+The girl flushed furiously; but her voice seemed fairly under
+control.
+
+"Hadn't you better go, Jim, before you say anything more?"
+
+"Will you marry me?"
+
+"No."
+
+He stood up very straight, unstirring, for a long time, not looking at
+her.
+
+Then he said "good-bye," in a low voice, and went out leaving her
+quite pale again and rather badly scared.
+
+As the lower door closed, she sprang to the landing and called his
+name in a frightened voice that had no carrying power.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+Later she telephoned to his several clubs. At eleven she called each
+club again; and finally telephoned to his house.
+
+At midnight he had not telephoned in reply to the messages she had
+left requesting him to call her.
+
+Her anxiety had changed to a vague bewilderment. Her dismayed
+resentment at what he had said to her was giving place to a strange
+and unaccustomed sense of loneliness.
+
+Suddenly an overwhelming desire to be with Ilse seized her, and she
+would have called a taxi and started immediately, except for the dread
+that Jim might telephone in her absence.
+
+Yet, she didn't know what it was that she wanted of him, except to
+protest at his attitude toward her. Such a protest was due them
+both--an appeal in behalf of the friendship which meant so much to
+her--which, she had abruptly discovered, meant far more to her than
+she supposed.
+
+At midnight she telephoned to Ilse. A sleepy maid replied that Miss
+Westgard had not yet returned.
+
+So Palla called a taxi, pinned on her hat and struggled into her fur
+coat, and, taking her latch-key, started for Ilse's apartment, feeling
+need of her in a blind sort of way--desiring to listen to her friendly
+voice, touch her, hear her clear, sane laughter.
+
+A yawning maid admitted her. Miss Westgard had dined out with Mr.
+Estridge, but had not yet returned.
+
+So Palla, wondering a little, laid aside her coat and went into the
+pretty living room.
+
+There were books and magazines enough, but after a while she gave up
+trying to read and sat staring absently at a photograph of Estridge in
+uniform, which stood on the table at her elbow.
+
+Across it was an inscription, dated only a few days back: "To Ilse
+from Jack, on the road to Asgard."
+
+Then, as she gazed at the man's handsome features, for the first time
+a vague sense of uneasiness invaded her.
+
+Of a gradually growing comradeship between these two she had been
+tranquilly aware. And yet, now, it surprised her to realise that their
+comradeship had drifted into intimacy.
+
+Lying back in her armchair, her thoughts hovered about these two; and
+she went back in her mind to recollect something of the beginning of
+this intimacy;--and remembered various little incidents which, at the
+time, seemed of no portent.
+
+And, reflecting, she recollected now what Ilse had said to her after
+the last party she had given--and which Palla had not understood.
+
+What had Ilse meant by asking her to "wait"? Wait for what?... Where
+was Ilse, now? Why did she remain out so late with John Estridge? It
+was after one o'clock.
+
+Of course they must be dancing somewhere or other. There were plenty
+of dances to go to.
+
+Palla stirred restlessly in her chair. Evidently Ilse had not told her
+maid that she meant to be out late, for the girl seemed to have
+expected her an hour ago.
+
+Palla's increasing restlessness finally drove her to the windows,
+where she pulled aside the shades and stood looking out into the
+silent night.
+
+The night was cold and clear and very still. Rarely a footfarer
+passed; seldom a car. And the stillness of the dark city increased her
+nervousness.
+
+New York has rare phases of uncanny silence, when, for a space, no
+sound disturbs the weird stillness.
+
+The clang of trains, the feathery whirr of motors, the echo of
+footsteps, the immense, indefinable breathing vibration of the iron
+monster, drowsing on its rock between three rivers and the sea, ceases
+utterly. And a vast stillness reigns, mournful, ominous, unutterably
+sad.
+
+Palla looked down into the empty street. The dark chill of it seemed
+to rise and touch her; and she shivered unconsciously and turned back
+into the lighted room.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+It was two o'clock. Her eyes were heavy, her heart heavier. Why should
+everything suddenly happen to her in that way? Where had Jim gone when
+he left her? And who was it answered the telephone at his house when
+she had called up and asked to speak to him? It was a woman's voice--a
+maid, no doubt--yet, for an instant, she had fancied that the voice
+resembled his mother's.
+
+But it couldn't have been, for Palla had given her name, and
+Mrs. Shotwell would have spoken to her--unless--perhaps his
+mother--disapproved of something--of her calling Jim at such an
+hour.... Or of something ... perhaps of their friendship ... of
+herself, perhaps----
+
+She heard the clock strike and looked across at the mantel.
+
+What was Ilse doing at half-past two in the morning? Where could she
+be?
+
+Palla involuntarily turned her head and looked at the photograph. Of
+course Ilse was safe with a man like John Estridge.... That is to say
+...
+
+Without warning, her face grew hot and the crimson tide mounted to the
+roots of her hair, dyeing throat and temples.
+
+A sort of stunning reaction followed as the tide ebbed; she found
+herself stupidly repeating the word "safe," as though to interpret
+what it meant.
+
+Safe? Yes, Ilse was safe. She knew how to take care of herself ...
+unless....
+
+Again the crimson tide invaded her skin to the temples.... A sudden
+and haunting fear came creeping after it had ebbed once more, leaving
+her gazing fixedly into space through the tumult of her thoughts. And
+always in dull, unmeaning repetition the word "safe" throbbed in her
+ears.
+
+Safe? Safe from what? From the creed they both professed? From their
+common belief? From the consequences of living up to it?
+
+At the thought, Palla sprang to her feet and stood quivering all over,
+both hands pressed to her throat, which was quivering too.
+
+Where was Ilse? What had happened? Had she suddenly come face to face
+with that creed of theirs--that shadowy creed which they believed in,
+perhaps because it seemed so unreal!--because the ordeal by fire
+seemed so vague, so far away in that ghostly bourne which is called
+the future, and which remains always so inconceivably distant to the
+young--star-distant, remote as inter-stellar dust--aloof as death.
+
+It was three o'clock. There were velvet-dark smears under Palla's
+eyes, little colour in her lips. The weight of fatigue lay heavily on
+her young shoulders; on her mind, too, partly stupefied by the
+violence of her emotions.
+
+Once she had risen heavily, had gone into the maid's room and had told
+her to go to bed, adding that she herself would wait for Miss
+Westgard.
+
+That, already, was nearly an hour ago, and the gilt hands of the clock
+were already creeping around the gilded dial toward the half hour.
+
+As it struck on the clear French bell, a key turned in the outside
+door; then the door closed; and Palla rose trembling from her chair as
+Ilse entered, her golden hair in lovely disorder, the evening cloak
+partly flung from her shoulders.
+
+There was a moment's utter silence. Then Ilse stepped swiftly forward
+and took Palla in her arms.
+
+"My darling! What has happened?" she asked. "Why are you here at this
+hour? You look dreadfully ill!----"
+
+Palla's head dropped on her breast.
+
+"What is it?" whispered Ilse. "Darling--darling--you did--you did
+wait--didn't you?"
+
+Palla's voice was scarcely audible: "I don't know what you mean.... I
+was only frightened about you.... I've been so unhappy.... And Jim
+said--good-bye--and I can't--find him----"
+
+"I want you to answer me! Are you in love with him?"
+
+"No.... I don't--think so----"
+
+Ilse drew a deep breath.
+
+"It's all right, then," she said.
+
+Then, suddenly, Palla seemed to understand what Ilse had meant when
+she had said, "Wait!"
+
+And she lifted her head and looked blindly into the sea-blue
+eyes--blindly, desperately, striving to see through those clear
+soul-windows what it might be that was looking out at her.
+
+And, gazing, she knew that she dared not ask Ilse where she had been.
+
+The latter smiled; but her voice was very tender when she spoke.
+
+"We'll telephone your maid in the morning. You must go to bed,
+Palla."
+
+"Alone?"
+
+Ilse turned carelessly and laid her cloak across a chair. There was a
+second chamber beyond her own. She went into it, turned down the bed
+and called Palla, who came slowly after her.
+
+They kissed each other in silence. Then Ilse went back to her own
+room.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+
+"Jim," said his mother, "Miss Dumont called you on the telephone at an
+unusual hour last night. You had gone to your room, and on the chance
+that you were asleep I did not speak to you."
+
+That was all--sufficient explanation to discount any reproach from her
+son incident on his comparing notes with the girl in question. Also
+just enough in her action to convey to the girl a polite hint that the
+Shotwell family was not at home to people who telephoned at that
+unconventional hour.
+
+On his way to business that morning, Jim telephoned to Palla, but,
+learning she was not at home, let the matter rest.
+
+In his sullen and resentful mood he no longer cared--or thought he
+didn't, which resulted in the same thing--the accumulation of
+increasing bitterness during a dull, rainy working day at the office,
+and a dogged determination to keep clear of this woman until effort to
+remain away from her was no longer necessary.
+
+For the thing was utterly hopeless; he'd had enough. And in his
+bruised heart and outraged common sense he was boyishly framing an
+indictment of modern womanhood--lumping it all and cursing it
+out--swearing internally at the entire enfranchised pack which the war
+had set afoot and had licensed to swarm all over everything and raise
+hell with the ancient and established order of things.
+
+The stormy dark came early; and in this frame of mind when he left the
+office he sulkily avoided the club.
+
+He very rarely drank anything; but, not knowing what to do, he drifted
+into the Biltmore bar.
+
+He met a man or two he knew, but declined all suggestions for the
+evening, turned up his overcoat collar, and started through the hotel
+toward the northern exit.
+
+And met Marya Lanois face to face.
+
+She was coming from the tea-room with two or three other people, but
+turned immediately on seeing him and came toward him with hand
+extended.
+
+"Dear me," she said, "you look very wet. And you don't look
+particularly well. Have you arrived all alone for tea?"
+
+"I had my tea in the bar," he said. "How are you, Marya?--but I musn't
+detain you--" he glanced at the distant group of people who seemed to
+be awaiting her.
+
+"You are not detaining me," she said sweetly.
+
+"Your people seem to be waiting----"
+
+"They may go to the deuce. Are you quite alone?"
+
+"I--yes----"
+
+"Shall we have tea together?"
+
+He laughed. "But you've had yours----"
+
+"Well, you know there are other things that one sometimes drinks."
+
+There seemed no way out of it. They went into the tea-room together
+and seated themselves.
+
+"How is Vanya?" he inquired.
+
+"Vanya gives a concert to-night in Baltimore."
+
+"And you didn't go!"
+
+"No. It was rainy. Besides, I hear Vanya play when I desire to hear
+him."
+
+Their order was served.
+
+"So you wouldn't go to Baltimore," said Jim smilingly. "It strikes me,
+Marya, that you can be a coldblooded girl when you wish to be."
+
+"After all, what do you know about me?"
+
+He laughed: "Oh, I don't mean that I've got your number----"
+
+"No. Because I have many numbers. I am a complicated combination," she
+added, smiling; "--yet after all, a combination only. And quite simple
+when one discovers the key to me."
+
+"I think I know what it is," he said.
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"Mischief."
+
+They laughed. Marya, particularly, was intensely amused. She was
+extremely fetching in her bicorne toque and narrow gown of light
+turquoise, and her golden beaver scarf and muff.
+
+"Mischief," she repeated. "I should say not. There seems to be already
+sufficient mischief loose in the world, with the red tide rising
+everywhere--in Russia, in Germany, Austria, Italy, England--yes, and
+here also the crimson tide of Bolshevism begins to move.... Tell me;
+you are coming to the club to-morrow evening, I hope."
+
+"No."
+
+"Oh. Why?"
+
+"No," he repeated, almost sullenly. "I've had enough of queerness for
+a while----"
+
+"Jim! Do you dare include me?"
+
+He had to laugh at her pretence of fury: "No, Marya, you're just a
+pretty mischief-maker, I suppose----"
+
+"Then what do you mean by 'queerness'? Don't you think it's sensible
+to combat Bolshevism and fight it with argument and debate on its own
+selected camping ground? Don't you think it is high time somebody
+faced this crimson tide--that somebody started to build a dyke against
+this threatened inundation?"
+
+"The best dykes have machine guns behind them, not orators," he said
+bluntly.
+
+"My friend, I have seen that, also. And to what have machine guns led
+us in Petrograd, in Moscow, in Poland, Finland, Courland--" She
+shrugged her pretty shoulders. "No. I have seen enough blood."
+
+He said: "I have seen a little myself."
+
+"Yes, I know. But a soldier is always a soldier, as a hound is always
+a hound. The blood of the quarry is what their instinct follows. Your
+goal is death; we only seek to tame."
+
+"The proper way to check Bolshevism in America is to police the
+country properly, and kick out the outrageous gang of domestic
+Bolsheviki who have exploited us, tricked us, lied to us, taxed us
+unfairly, and in spite of whom we have managed to help our allies win
+this war.
+
+"Then, when this petty, wretched, crooked bunch has been swept out,
+and the nation aired and disinfected, and when the burden of taxation
+is properly distributed, and business dares lift its head again, then
+start your debates and propaganda and try to educate your enemies if
+you like. But keep your machine guns oiled."
+
+"You speak in an uncomplimentary fashion of government," said the
+girl, smiling.
+
+"I am all for government. That does not mean that I am for the
+particular incumbents in office under the present Government. I have
+no use for them. Know that this war was won, not through them but in
+spite of them.
+
+"Yet I place loyalty first of all--loyalty to the true ideals of that
+Government which some of the present incumbents so grotesquely
+misrepresent.
+
+"That means, stand by the ship and the flag she flies, no matter who
+steers or what crew capers about her decks.
+
+"That means, watch out for all pirates;--open fire on anything that
+flies a hostile flag, red or any other colour.
+
+"And that's my creed, Marya!"
+
+"To shoot; not to debate?"
+
+"An inquest is safer."
+
+"We shall never agree," said the girl, laughing. "And I'm rather
+glad."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Because disagreements are more amusing than any _entente cordiale_,
+_mon ami_. It is the opposing forces that never bore each other. In
+life, too--I mean among human beings. Once they agree, interest
+lessens."
+
+"Nonsense," he said, smiling.
+
+"Oh, it is quite true. Behold us. We don't agree. But I am interested,"
+she added with pretty audacity; "so please take me to dinner
+somewhere."
+
+"You mean now, as we are?"
+
+"Parbleu! Did you wish to go home and dress?"
+
+"I don't care if you don't," he said.
+
+"Suppose," she suggested, "we dine where there is something to see."
+
+"A Broadway joint?" he asked, amused.
+
+"A joint?" she repeated, smilingly perplexed. "Is that a place where
+we may dine and see a spectacle too and afterward dance?"
+
+"Something of that sort," he admitted, laughing. But under his
+careless gaiety an ugly determination had been hardening; he meant
+to go no more to Palla; he meant to welcome any distraction of the
+moment to help tide him over the long, grey interval that loomed
+ahead--welcome any draught that might mitigate the bitter waters he
+was tasting--and was destined to drain to their revolting dregs.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+They went to the Palace of Mirrors and were lucky enough to secure a
+box.
+
+The food was excellent; the show a gay one.
+
+Between intermissions he took Marya to the floor for a dance or two.
+The place was uncomfortably crowded: uniforms were everywhere, too;
+and Jim nodded to many men he knew, and to a few women.
+
+And, in the vast, brilliant place, there was not a man who saw Marya
+and failed to turn and follow her with his eyes. For Marya had been
+fashioned to trouble man. And that primitively constructed and
+obviously-minded sex never failed to become troubled.
+
+"We'd better enjoy our champagne," remarked Marya. "We'll be a
+wineless nation before long, I suppose."
+
+"It seems rather a pity," he remarked, "that a man shouldn't be free
+to enjoy a glass of claret. But if the unbaked and the half-baked, and
+the unwashed and the half-washed can't be trusted to practise
+moderation, we others ought to abstain, I suppose. Because what is
+best for the majority ought to be the law for all."
+
+"If it were left to me," said the girl, "I'd let the submerged drink
+themselves to death."
+
+"What on earth are you talking about?" he said. "I thought you were a
+socialist!"
+
+"I am. I desire no law except that of individual inclination."
+
+"Why, that's Bolshevism!"
+
+Her laughter rang out unrestrained: "I believe in Bolshevism--for
+myself--but not for anybody else. In other words, I'd like to be
+autocrat of the world. If I were, I'd let everybody alone unless they
+interfered with me."
+
+"And in that event?" he asked, laughing, as the lights all over the
+house faded to a golden glimmer in preparation for the second part of
+the spectacle. He could no longer see her clearly across the little
+table. "What would you do if people interfered with you?" he
+repeated.
+
+Marya smiled. The last ray of light smouldered in her tiger-red hair;
+the warm, fragrant, breathing youth of her grew vaguer, merging with
+the shadows; only the beryl-tinted eyes, which slanted slightly,
+remained distinct.
+
+Her voice came to him through the music: "If I were autocrat, any man
+who dared oppose me would have his choice."
+
+"What choice?"
+
+The music swelled toward a breathless crescendo.
+
+She said: "Oppose me and you shall learn!----"
+
+The house burst into a dazzling flood of moon-tinted light, all
+thronged with slim shapes whirling in an enchanted dance. Then clouds
+seemed to gather; the moon slid behind them, leaving a frosty
+demi-darkness through which, presently, snow began to fall.
+
+The girl leaned toward him, watching the spectacle in silence. Perhaps
+unconsciously her left hand, satin-smooth, slipped over his--as though
+the contact were a symbol of enjoyment shared.
+
+Light broke the next moment, revealing the spectacle on stage and
+floor in all its tinsel magnificence--snow-nymphs, polar-bears, all
+capering madly until an unearthly shriek heralded the coming of a
+favorite clown, who tumbled all the way down the stage steps and
+continued hysterically turning flip-flaps, cart-wheels, and
+somersaults until he landed with a crash at the foot of the steps
+again.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+A large, highly coloured and over-glossy man, passing under their box
+during a dancing intermission, bowed rather extravagantly to Jim. He
+recognised Angelo Puma, with contemptuous amusement at his impudence.
+
+It was evident, too, that Puma was quite ready to linger if
+encouraged--anxious, in fact, to extend his hand.
+
+But his impudence had already ceased to amuse Jim, and he said
+carelessly to Marya, in a voice perfectly audible to Puma:
+
+"There goes a man who, in collusion with a squinting partner of his,
+once beat me out of a commission."
+
+Puma's heavy, burning face turned abruptly from Marya, whom he had
+been looking at; and he continued on across the floor. And Jim forgot
+him.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+They remained until the place closed. Then he took her home.
+
+It was an apartment overlooking the park from Fifty-ninth Street--a
+big studio and apparently many comfortable rooms--a large, still place
+where no servants were in evidence and where thick velvety carpets
+from Ushak and Sultanabad muffled every footfall.
+
+She had insisted on his entering for a moment. He stood looking about
+him in the great studio, where Vanya's concert-grand loomed up, a
+sprawling, shadowy shape under the dim drop-light which once had been
+a mosque-lamp in Samarcand.
+
+The girl flung stole and muff from her, rolled up her gloves and took
+a shot at the piano, then, laughing, unpinned her hat and sent it
+scaling away into the golden dusk somewhere.
+
+"Are you sleepy, Jim?"
+
+A sudden vision of his trouble in the long, long night to face--trouble,
+insomnia, and the bitterness welling ever fresher with the interminable
+thoughts he could not suppress, could not control----
+
+"I'm not sleepy," he said. "But don't you want to turn in?"
+
+She went over to the piano, and, accompanying herself on deadened
+pedal where she stood, sang in a low voice the "_Snow-Tiger_," with
+its uncanny refrain:
+
+                            "Tiger-eyes
+                            Tiger-eyes,
+                            What do you see
+                             Far in the dark
+                             Over the snow?
+                             Far in the dark
+                             Over the snow,
+                Slowly the ghosts of dead men go,--
+                Horses and riders under the moon
+                Trample along to the dead men's rune,
+                            _Slava! Slava!_
+                            Over the snow."
+
+"That's too hilarious a song," said Jim, laughing. "May I suggest a
+little rag to properly subdue us?"
+
+"You don't like _Tiger-eyes_?"
+
+"I've heard more cheerful ditties."
+
+"When I'm excited by pleasure," said the girl, "I sing _Tiger-eyes_."
+
+"Does it subdue you?"
+
+She looked at him. "No."
+
+Still standing, she looked down at the keys, struck the muffled chords
+softly.
+
+                     "Tiger-eyes
+                      Tiger-eyes,
+                      Where do they go,
+                      Far in the dark
+                      Over the snow?
+                      Into the dark,
+                      Over the snow,
+              Only the ghosts of the dead men know
+              Where they have come from, whither they go,
+              Riding at night by the corpse-light glow,
+                      _Slava!_ _Slava!_
+                      Over the snow."
+
+"Well, for the love of Mike----"
+
+Marya's laughter pealed.
+
+"So you don't like _Tiger-eyes_?" she demanded, coming from behind the
+piano.
+
+"I sure don't," he admitted.
+
+"The real Russian name of the song is 'Words! Words!' And that's all
+the song is--all that any song is--all that anything amounts
+to--words! words!--" She dropped onto the long couch,--"Anything
+except--love."
+
+"You may include that, too," he said, lighting a cigarette for her;
+and she blew a ring of smoke at him, saying:
+
+"I may--but I won't. For goodness sake leave me the last one of my
+delusions!"
+
+They both laughed and he said she was welcome to her remaining
+delusion.
+
+"Won't you share it with me?" she said, her smile innocent enough,
+save for the audacity of the red mouth.
+
+"Share your delusion?"
+
+"Yes, that too."
+
+This wouldn't do. He lighted a cigarette for himself and sauntered
+over to the piano.
+
+"I hope Vanya's concert is a success," he said. "He's such a charming
+fellow, Vanya--so considerate, so gentle--" He turned and looked at
+Marya, and his eyes added: "Why the devil don't you marry him and have
+a lot of jolly children?"
+
+There seemed to be in his clear eyes enough for the girl to comprehend
+something of the question they flung at her.
+
+"I don't love Vanya," she said.
+
+"Of course you do!"
+
+"As I might love a child--yes."
+
+After a silence: "It strikes me," he said, "that you're passionately
+in love."
+
+"I am."
+
+"With yourself," he added, smiling.
+
+"With _you_."
+
+This wouldn't do any longer. The place slightly stifled him with its
+stillness, rugs--the odours that came from lacquered shapes, looming
+dimly, flowered and golden in the dusk--the aromatic scent of her
+cigarette----
+
+"Hell!" he muttered under his breath. "This is no place for a white
+man." But aloud he said pleasantly: "My very best wishes for Vanya
+to-night. Tell him so when he returns--" He put on his overcoat and
+picked up hat and stick.
+
+"It's infernally late," he added, "and I've been a beast to keep you
+up. It was awfully nice of you."
+
+She rose from the lounge and walked with him to the door.
+
+"Good night," he said cheerily; but she retained his hand, added her
+other to it, and put up her face.
+
+"Look here," he said, smilingly, "I can't do that, Marya."
+
+"Why can't you?"
+
+Her soft breath was on his face; the mouth too near--too near----
+
+"No, I can't!" he said curtly, but his voice trembled a little.
+
+"Why?" she whispered.
+
+"Because--there's Vanya. No, I won't do it!"
+
+"Is that the reason?"
+
+"It's a reason."
+
+"I don't love Vanya. I do love you."
+
+"Please remember----"
+
+"No! No! I have nothing to remember--unless you give me something----"
+
+"You had better try to remember that Vanya loves you. You and I can't
+do a thing like that to Vanya--"
+
+"Are there no other reasons?"
+
+He reddened to the temples: "No, there are not--now. There is no other
+reason--except myself."
+
+"Yourself?"
+
+"Yes, damn it, myself! That's all that remains now to keep me
+straight. And I've been so. That may be news to you. Perhaps you don't
+believe it."
+
+"Is it so, Jim?" she asked in a voice scarcely audible.
+
+"Yes, it is. And so I shall keep on, and play the game that way--play
+it squarely with Vanya, too----"
+
+He had lost his heavy colour; he stood looking at her with a white,
+strained, grim expression that tightened the jaw muscles; and she felt
+his powerful hand clenching between hers.
+
+"It's no use," he said between his set lips, "I've got to go on--see
+it through in my own fashion--this rotten thing called life. I'm
+sorry, Marya, that I'm not a better sport----"
+
+A wave of colour swept her face and her hands suddenly crushed his
+between them.
+
+"You're wonderful," she said. "I do love you."
+
+But the tense, grey look had come back into his face. Looking at her
+in silence, presently his gaze seemed to become remote, his absent
+eyes fixed on something beyond her.
+
+"I've a rotten time ahead of me," he said, not knowing he had spoken.
+When his eyes reverted to her, his features remained expressionless,
+but his voice was almost tender as he said good night once more.
+
+Her hands fell away; he opened the door and went out without looking
+back.
+
+He found a taxi at the Plaza. He was swearing when he got into it. And
+all the way home he kept repeating to himself: "I'm one of those
+cursed, creeping Josephs; that's what I am,--one of those pepless,
+sanctimonious, creeping Josephs.... And I always loathed that poor
+fish, too!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+
+Shotwell Junior discovered in due course of time the memoranda of the
+repeated messages which Palla had telephoned to his several clubs,
+asking him to call her up immediately.
+
+It was rather late to do that now, but his pulses began to quicken
+again in the old, hopeless way; and he went to the telephone booth and
+called the number which seemed burnt into his brain forever.
+
+A maid answered; Palla came presently; and he thought her voice seemed
+colourless and unfamiliar.
+
+"Yes, I'm perfectly well," she replied to his inquiry; "where in the
+world did you go that night? I simply couldn't find you anywhere."
+
+"What had you wished to say to me?"
+
+"Nothing--except--that I was afraid you were angry when you left, and
+I didn't wish you to part with me on such terms. Were you annoyed?"
+
+"No."
+
+"You say it very curtly, Jim."
+
+"Is that all you desired to say to me?"
+
+"Yes.... I was a little troubled.... Something else went wrong,
+too;--everything seemed to go wrong that night.... I thought
+perhaps--if I could hear your voice--if you'd say something kind----"
+
+"Had you nothing else to tell me, Palla?"
+
+"No.... What?"
+
+"Then you haven't changed your attitude?"
+
+"Toward you? I don't expect to----"
+
+"You know what I mean!"
+
+"Oh. But, Jim, we can't discuss _that_ over the telephone."
+
+"I suppose not.... Is anything wrong with you, Palla? Your voice
+sounds so tired----"
+
+"Does it? I don't know why. Tell me, please, what did you do that
+unhappy night?"
+
+"I went home."
+
+"Directly?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"I telephoned your house about twelve, and was informed you were not
+at home."
+
+"They thought I was asleep. I'm sorry, Palla----"
+
+"I shouldn't have telephoned so late," she interrupted, "I'm afraid
+that it was your mother who answered; and if it was, I received the
+snub I deserved!"
+
+"Nonsense! It wasn't meant that way----"
+
+"I'm afraid it was, Jim. It's quite all right, though. I won't do it
+again.... Am I to see you soon?"
+
+"No, not for a while----"
+
+"Are you so busy?"
+
+"There's no use in my going to you, Palla."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Because I'm in love with you," he said bluntly, "and I'm trying to
+get over it."
+
+"I thought we were _friends_, too."
+
+After a lengthy silence: "You're right," he said, "we are."
+
+She heard his quick, deep breath like a sigh. "Shall I come
+to-night?"
+
+"I'm expecting some people, Jim--women who desire to establish a
+Combat Club in Chicago, and they have come on here to consult me."
+
+"To-morrow night, then?"
+
+"Please."
+
+"Will you be alone?"
+
+"I expect to be."
+
+Once more he said: "Palla, is anything worrying you? Are you ill? Is
+Ilse all right?"
+
+There was a pause, then Palla's voice, resolutely tranquil.
+"Everything is all right in the world as long as you are kind to me,
+Jim. When you're not, things darken and become queer----"
+
+"Palla!"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Listen! This is to serve notice on you. I'm going to make a fight for
+you."
+
+After a silence, he heard her sweet, uncertain laughter.
+
+"Jim?"
+
+"Yes, dear."
+
+"I suppose it would shock you if I made a fight for--_you_!"
+
+He took it as a jest and laughed at her perverse humour. But what
+she had meant she herself scarcely realised; and she turned away
+from the telephone, conscious of a vague excitement invading her and
+of a vaguer consternation, too. For behind the humorous audacity
+of her words, she seemed to realise there remained something
+hidden--something she was on the verge of discovering--something
+indefinable, menacing, grave enough to dismay her and drive from her
+lips the last traces of the smile which her audacious jest had
+left there.
+
+The ladies from Chicago were to dine with her; her maid had hooked
+her gown; orchids from Jim had just arrived, and she was still pinning
+them to her waist--still happily thrilled by this lovely symbol of
+their renewed accord, when the bell rang.
+
+It was much too early to expect anybody: she fastened her orchids and
+started to descend the stairs for a last glance at the table, when, to
+her astonishment, she saw Angelo Puma in the hall in the act of
+depositing his card upon the salver extended by the maid.
+
+He looked up and saw her before she could retreat: she made the best
+of it and continued on down, greeting him with inquiring amiability:
+
+"Miss Dumont, a thousand excuses for this so bold intrusion," he
+began, bowing extravagantly at every word. "Only the urgent importance
+of my errand could possibly atone for a presumption like there never
+has been in all----"
+
+"Please step into the drawing room, Mr. Puma, if you have something of
+importance to say."
+
+He followed her on tiptoe, flashing his magnificent eyes about the
+place, still wearing over his evening dress the seal overcoat with its
+gardenia, which was already making him famous on Broadway.
+
+Palla seated herself, wondering a little at the perfumed splendour of
+her landlord. He sat on the extreme edge of an arm chair, his glossy
+hat on his knee.
+
+"Miss Dumont," he said, laying one white-gloved paw across his
+shirt-front, "you shall behold in me a desolate man!"
+
+"I'm sorry." She looked at him in utter perplexity.
+
+"What shall you say to me?" he cried. "What just reproaches shall you
+address to me, Miss Dumont!"
+
+"I'm sure I don't know, Mr. Puma," she said, inclined to laugh,
+"--until you tell me what is your errand."
+
+"Miss Dumont, I am most unhappy and embarrass. Because you have pay me
+in advance for that which I am unable to offer you."
+
+"I don't think I understand."
+
+"Alas! You have pay to me by cheque for six months more rent of my
+hall."
+
+"Yes."
+
+"I have given to you a lease for six months more, and with it an
+option for a year of renewal."
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Miss Dumont, behold me desolate."
+
+"But why?"
+
+"Because I am force by circumstance over which I have no control to
+cancel this lease and option, and ask you most respectfully to be so
+kind as to secure other quarters for your club."
+
+"But we can't do that!" exclaimed Palla in dismay.
+
+"I am so very sorry----"
+
+"We can't do it," added Palla with decision. "It's utterly impossible,
+Mr. Puma. All our meetings are arranged for months in advance; all the
+details are completed. We could not disarrange the programme adopted.
+From all over the United States people are invited to come on certain
+fixed dates. All arrangements have been made; you have my cheque and I
+have your signed lease. No, we are obliged to hold you to your
+contract, and I'm very sorry if it inconveniences you."
+
+Puma's brilliant eyes became tenderly apprehensive.
+
+"Miss Dumont," he said in a hushed and confidential voice, "believe me
+when I venture to say to you that your club should leave for reasons
+most grave, most serious."
+
+"What reasons?"
+
+"The others--the Red Flag Club. Who knows what such crazy people might
+do in anger? They are very angry already. They complain that your club
+has interfere with them----"
+
+"That is exactly why we're there, Mr. Puma--to interfere with them,
+neutralise their propaganda, try to draw the same people who listen to
+their violent tirades. That is why we're there, and why we refuse to
+leave. Ours is a crusade of education. We chose that hall because we
+desired to make the fight in the very camp of the enemy. And I must
+tell you plainly that we shall not give up our lease, and that we
+shall hold you to it."
+
+The dark blood flooded his heavy features:
+
+"I do not desire to take it to the courts," he said. "I am willing to
+offer compensation."
+
+"We couldn't accept. Don't you understand, Mr. Puma? We simply must
+have that particular hall for the Combat Club."
+
+Puma remained perfectly silent for a few moments. There was still, on
+his thick lips, the suave smile which had been stamped there since his
+appearance in her house.
+
+But in this man's mind and heart there was growing a sort of dull and
+ferocious fear--fear of elements already gathering and combining to
+menace his increasing prosperity.
+
+Sullenly he was aware that this hard-won prosperity was threatened.
+Always its conditions had been unstable at best, but now the
+atmospheric pressure was slowly growing, and his sky of promise was
+not as clear.
+
+Some way, somehow, he must manage to evict these women. Twice Sondheim
+had warned him. And that evening Sondheim had sent him an ultimatum by
+Kastner.
+
+And Puma was perfectly aware that Karl Kastner knew enough about him
+to utterly ruin him in the great Republic which was now giving him a
+fortune and which had never discovered that his own treacherous
+mission here was the accomplishment of her ruin.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+Puma stood up, heavily, cradling his glossy hat. But his urbane smile
+became brilliant again and he made Palla an extravagant bow.
+
+"It shall be arrange," he said cheerfully. "I consult my partner--your
+_friend_, Mr. Skidder! Yes! So shall we arrive at entente."
+
+His large womanish eyes swept the room. Suddenly they were arrested by
+a photograph of Shotwell Junior--in a silver frame--the only ornament,
+as yet, in the little drawing room.
+
+And instantly, within Angelo Puma, the venomous instinct was aroused
+to do injury where it might be done safely and without suspicion of
+intent.
+
+"Ah," he exclaimed gaily, "my friend, Mr. Shotwell! It is from him,
+Miss Dumont, you have purchase this so beautiful residence!"
+
+He bent to salute with a fanciful inclination the photograph of the
+man who had spoken so contemptuously of him the evening previous.
+
+"Mr. Shotwell also adores gaiety," he said laughingly. "Last night I
+beheld him at the Palace of Mirrors--and with an attractive young lady
+of your club, Miss Dumont--the charming young Russian lady with whom
+you came once to pay me the rent--" He kissed his hand in an ecstasy
+of recollection. "So beautiful a young lady! So gay were they in their
+box! Ah, youth! youth! Ah, the happiness and folly when laughter
+bubbles in our wine!--the magic wine of youth!"
+
+He took his leave, moving lightly to the door, almost grotesque in his
+elaborate evolutions and adieux.
+
+Palla went slowly upstairs.
+
+The evening paper lay on a table in the living room. She unfolded it
+mechanically; looked at it but saw no print, merely an unsteady haze
+of greyish tint on which she could not seem to concentrate.
+
+Marya and Jim ... together.... That was the night he went away
+angry.... The night he told her he had gone directly home.... But it
+couldn't have been.... He couldn't have lied....
+
+She strove to recollect as she sat there staring at the newspaper....
+What was it that beast had said about it?... Of course--_last_
+night!... Marya and Jim had been together last night.... But where was
+Vanya?... Oh, yes.... Last night Vanya was away ... in Baltimore.
+
+The paper dropped to her lap; she sat looking straight ahead of her.
+
+What had so shocked her then about Jim and Marya being together? True,
+she had not supposed them to be on such terms--had not even thought
+about it....
+
+Yes, she _had_ thought about it, scarcely conscious of her own
+indefinable uneasiness--a memory, perhaps, of that evening when the
+Russian girl had been at little pains to disguise her interest in this
+man. And Palla had noticed it--noticed that Marya was seated too near
+him--noticed that, and the subtle attitude of provocation, and the
+stealthy evolution of that occult sorcery which one woman instantly
+divines in another and finds slightly revolting.
+
+Was it merely that memory which had been evoked when Puma's laughing
+revelation so oddly chilled her?--the suspected and discovered
+predilection of this Russian girl for Jim? Or was it something else,
+something deeper, some sudden and more profound illumination which
+revealed to her that, in the depths of her, she was afraid?
+
+Afraid? Afraid of what?
+
+Her charming young head sank; the brown eyes stared at the floor.
+
+She was beginning to understand what had chilled her, what she had
+unconsciously been afraid of--_her own creed!_--when applied to
+another woman.
+
+And this was the second time that this creed of hers had risen to
+confront her, and the second time she had gazed at it, chilled by
+fear: once, when she had waited for Ilse to return; and now once
+again.
+
+For now she began to comprehend how ruthless that creed could become
+when professed by such a girl as Marya Lanois.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+She was still seated there when Marya came in, her tiger-red hair in
+fascinating disorder from the wind, her skin fairly breathing the warm
+fragrance of exotic youth.
+
+"My Palla! How pale you seem!" she exclaimed, embracing her. "You are
+quite well? Really? Then I am reassured!"
+
+She went to the mirror and tucked in a burnished strand or two of
+hair.
+
+"These Chicago ladies--they have not arrived, I see. Am I then so
+early? For I see that Ilse is not yet here----"
+
+"It is only a quarter to eight," said Palla, smiling; but the brown
+eyes were calmly measuring this lithe and warm and lovely thing with
+green eyes--measuring it intently--taking its measure--taking, for the
+first time in her life, her measure of any woman.
+
+"Was Vanya's concert a great success?" she asked.
+
+"Vanya has not yet returned." She shrugged. "There was nothing in New
+York papers."
+
+"I suppose you were very nervous last night," said Palla.
+
+For a moment Marya continued to arrange her hair by the aid of the
+mantel mirror, then she turned very lithely and let her green gaze
+rest full on Palla's face.
+
+What she might possibly have divined was hidden behind the steady
+brown eyes that met hers may have determined her attitude and words;
+for she laughed with frank carelessness and plunged into it all:
+
+"Fancy, Palla, my encountering Jim Shotwell in the Biltmore, and
+dining with him at that noisy Palace of Mirrors last night! Did he
+tell you?"
+
+"I haven't seen him."
+
+"--Over the telephone, perhaps?"
+
+"No, he did not mention it."
+
+"Well, it was most amusing. It is the unpremeditated that is
+delightful. And can you see us in that dreadful place, as gay as a
+pair of school children? And we must laugh at nothing and find it
+enchanting--and we must dance amid the hoi polloi and clap our hands
+for the encore too!----"
+
+A light peal of laughter floated from her lips at the recollections
+evoked:
+
+"And after! Can you see us, Palla, in Vanya's studio, too wide awake
+to go our ways!--and the song I sang at that unearthly hour--the song
+I sing always when happily excited----"
+
+The bell rang; the first guest had arrived.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+
+Vanya's concert had been enough of a success to attract the
+attention of genuine music-lovers and an impecunious impresario--an
+irresponsible promoter celebrated for rushing headlong into things
+and being kicked headlong out of them.
+
+All promising virtuosi had cut their wisdom teeth on him; all had
+acquired experience and its accompanying toothache; none had acquired
+wealth until free of this ubiquitous impresario.
+
+His name was Wilding: he seized upon Vanya; and that gentle and
+disconcerted dreamer offered no resistance.
+
+So Wilding began to haunt Vanya's apartment at all hours of the day,
+rushing in with characteristic enthusiasm to discuss the vast campaign
+of nation-wide concerts which in his mind's eye were already
+materialising.
+
+Marya had no faith in him and was becoming very tired of his noise and
+bustle in the stillness and subdued light which meant home to her, and
+which this loud, excitable, untidy man was eternally invading.
+
+Always he was shouting at Vanya: "It's a knock-out! It will go big!
+big! big! We got 'em started in Baltimore!"--a fact, but none of his
+doing! "We'll play Philadelphia next; I'm fixin' it for you. All you
+gotta do is go there and the yelling starts. Well, I guess. Some riot,
+believe _me_!"
+
+Wilding had no money in the beginning. After a while, Vanya had none,
+or very little; but the impresario wore a new fur coat and spats. And
+Broadway winked wearily and said: "He's got another!"--doubtless
+deeming specification mere redundancy.
+
+Yet, somehow, Wilding did manage to book Vanya in Philadelphia--at a
+somewhat distant date, it is true--but it was something with which to
+begin the promised "nation-wide tour" under the auspices of Dawson B.
+Wilding.
+
+Marya had money of her own, but trusted none of it in Wilding's
+schemes. In fact, she had come to detest him thoroughly, and whenever
+he was announced she would rise like some beautiful, disgusted feline,
+which something has disturbed in her dim and favourite corner, and
+move lithely away to another room. And it almost seemed as though her
+little, warm, closely-chiselled ears actually flattened with bored
+annoyance as the din of Wilding's vociferous greeting to Vanya arose
+behind her.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+One day toward Christmas time, she said to Vanya, in her level,
+satin-smooth voice:
+
+"You know, _mon ami_, I am tiring rapidly of this great fool who comes
+shouting and tramping into our home. And when I am annoyed beyond my
+nerve capacity, I am likely to leave."
+
+Vanya said gently that he was sorry that he had entered into financial
+relations with a man who annoyed her, but that it could scarcely be
+helped now.
+
+He was seated at his piano, not playing, but scoring. And he resumed
+his composition after he had spoken, his grave, delicate head bent
+over the ruled sheets, a gold pencil held between his long fingers.
+
+Marya lounged near, watched him. Not for the first time, now, did his
+sweet temper and gentleness vaguely irritate her--string her nerves a
+little tighter until they began to vibrate with an indefinable longing
+to say something to arouse this man--startle him--awaken him to a
+physical tensity and strength.... Such as Shotwell's for example....
+
+"Vanya?"
+
+He looked up absently, the beauty of dreams still clouding his eyes.
+
+And suddenly, to her own astonishment, her endurance came to its end.
+She had never expected to say what she was now going to say to him.
+She had never dreamed of confession--of enlightening him. And now, all
+at once, she knew she was going to do it, and that it was a needless
+and cruel and insane and useless thing to do, for it led her nowhere,
+and it would leave him in helpless pain.
+
+"Vanya," she said, "I am in love with Jim Shotwell."
+
+After a few moments, she turned and slowly crossed the studio. Her hat
+and coat lay on a chair. She put them on and walked out.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+The following morning, Palla, arriving to consult Marya on a matter of
+the Club's business, discovered Vanya alone in the studio.
+
+He was lying on the lounge when she entered, and he looked ill, but he
+rose with all his characteristic grace and charm and led her to a
+chair, saluting her hand as he seated her.
+
+"Marya has not yet arrived?" she inquired.
+
+His delicate features became very grave and still.
+
+"I thought," added Palla, "that Marya usually breakfasted at
+eleven----"
+
+Something in his expression checked her; and she fell silent,
+fascinated by the deathly whiteness of his face.
+
+"I am sorry to tell you," he said, in a pleasant and steady voice,
+"that Marya has not returned."
+
+"Why--why, I didn't know she was away----"
+
+"Yesterday she decided. Later she was good enough to telephone from
+the Hotel Rajah, where, for the present, she expects to remain."
+
+"Oh, Vanya!" Palla's involuntary exclamation brought a trace of colour
+into his cheeks.
+
+He said: "It is not her fault. She was loyal and truthful. One may not
+control one's heart.... And if she is in love--well, is she not free
+to love him?"
+
+"Who--is--it?" asked Palla faintly.
+
+"Mr. Shotwell, it appears."
+
+In the dead silence, Vanya passed his hand slowly across his temples;
+let it drop on his knee.
+
+"Freedom above all else," he said, "--freedom to love, freedom to
+cease loving, freedom to love anew.... Well ... it is curious--the
+scheme of things.... Love must remain inexplicable. For there is no
+analysis. I think there never could be any man who cared as I have
+cared, as I do care for her...."
+
+He rose, and to Palla he seemed already a trifle stooped;--it may have
+been his studio coat, which fitted badly.
+
+"But, Vanya dear--" Palla looked at him miserably, conscious of her
+own keen fears as well as of his sorrow. "Don't you think she'll come
+back? Do you suppose it is really so serious--what she thinks
+about--Mr. Shotwell?"
+
+He shook his head: "I don't know.... If it is so, it is so. Freedom is
+of first importance. Our creed is our creed. We must abide by what we
+teach and believe."
+
+"Yes."
+
+He nodded absently, staring palely into space.
+
+Perhaps his lost gaze evoked the warm-skinned, sunny-haired girl who
+had gone out of the semi-light of this still place, leaving the void
+unutterably vast around him. For this had been the lithe thing's
+silken lair--the slim and supple thing with beryl eyes--here where
+thick-piled carpets of the East deadened every human movement--where
+no sound stirred, nor any air--where dull shapes loomed, lacquered and
+indistinct, and an odour of Chinese lacquer and nard haunted the
+tinted dusk.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+Like one of those lazy, golden, jewelled sea-creatures of irresponsible
+freedom brought seemed to fill the girl cooler currents arouses a
+restlessness infernal, Marya's first long breath of freedom subtly
+excited her.
+
+She had no definite ideas, no plans. She was merely tired of Vanya.
+
+Perhaps her fresh, wholesome contact with Jim had started it--the
+sense of a clean vitality which had seemed to envelop her like the
+delicious, half-resented chill of a spring-pool plunge. For the
+exhilaration possessed her still; and the sudden stimulation which the
+sense of irresponsible freedom brought seemed to fill the girl with a
+new vigour.
+
+Foot-loose, heart-loose, her green eyes on the open world where it
+stretched away into infinite horizons, she paced her new nest in the
+Hotel Rajah, tingling with subdued excitement, innocent of the
+faintest regret for what had been.
+
+For a week she lived alone, enjoying the sensation of being hidden,
+languidly savouring the warm comfort of isolation.
+
+She had not sent for her belongings. She purchased new personal
+effects, enchanted to be rid of familiar things.
+
+There was no snow. She walked a great deal, moving in unaccustomed
+sections of the city at all hours, skirting in the early winter dusk
+the glitter of Christmas preparations along avenues and squares,
+lunching where she was unlikely to encounter anybody she knew, dining,
+too, at hazard in unwonted places--restaurants she had never heard of,
+tea-rooms, odd corners.
+
+Vanya wrote her. She tossed his letters aside, scarcely read. Ilse and
+Palla wrote her, and telephoned her. She paid them no attention.
+
+The metropolitan jungle fascinated her. She adored her liberty, and
+looked out of beryl-green eyes across the border of license, where
+ghosts of the half-world swarmed in no-man's-land.
+
+Conscious that she had been fashioned to trouble man, the knowledge
+merely left her indefinitely contented, save when she remembered Jim.
+But that he had checked her drift toward him merely excited her; for
+she knew she had been made to trouble such as he; and she had seen his
+face that night....
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+Ilse, on her way home to dress--for she was going out somewhere with
+Estridge--stopped for tea at Palla's house, and found her a little
+disturbed over an anonymous letter just delivered--a typewritten sheet
+bluntly telling her to take her friends and get out of the hall where
+the Combat Club held its public sessions; and warning her of serious
+trouble if she did not heed this "friendly" advice.
+
+"Pouf!" exclaimed Ilse contemptuously, "I get those, too, and tear
+them up. People who talk never strike. Are you anxious, darling?"
+
+Palla smiled: "Not a bit--only such cowardice saddens me.... And the
+days are grey enough...."
+
+"Why do you say that? I think it is a wonderful winter--a beautiful
+year!"
+
+Palla lifted her brown eyes and let them dwell on the beauty of this
+clear-skinned, golden-haired girl who had discovered beauty in the
+aftermath of the world's great tragedy.
+
+Ilse smiled: "Life is good," she said. "This world is all to be done
+over in the right way. We have it all before us, you and I, Palla, and
+those who love and understand."
+
+"I am wondering," said Palla, "who understands us. I'm not discouraged,
+but--there seems to be so much indifference in the world."
+
+"Of course. That is our battle to overcome it."
+
+"Yes. But, dear, there seems to be so much hatred, too, in the world.
+I thought the war had ended, but everywhere men are still in
+battle--everywhere men are dying of this fierce hatred that seems to
+flame up anew across the world; everywhere men fight and slay to gain
+advantage. None yields, none renounces, none gives. It is as though
+love were dead on earth."
+
+"Love is being reborn," said Ilse cheerfully. "Birth means pain,
+always----"
+
+Without warning, a hot flush flooded her face; she averted it as the
+tea-tray was brought and set on a table before Palla. When her face
+cooled, she leaned back in her chair, cup in hand, a sort of confused
+sweetness in her blue eyes.
+
+Palla's heart was beating heavily as she leaned on the table, her cup
+untasted, her idle fingers crumbing the morsel of biscuit between
+them.
+
+After a moment she said: "So you have concluded that you care for John
+Estridge?"
+
+"Yes, I care," said Ilse absently, the same odd, sweet smile curving
+her cheeks.
+
+"That is--wonderful," said Palla, not looking at her.
+
+Ilse remained silent, her blue gaze aloof.
+
+A maid came and turned up the lamps, and went away again.
+
+Palla said in a low voice: "Are you--afraid?"
+
+"No."
+
+They both remained silent until she rose to go. Palla, walking with
+her to the head of the stairs, holding one of her hands imprisoned,
+said with an effort: "I am frightened, dear.... I can't help it....
+You will be certain, first, won't you?----"
+
+"It is as certain as death," said Ilse in a low, still voice.
+
+Palla shivered; she passed one arm around her; and they stood so for a
+while. Then Ilse's arm tightened, and the old gaiety glinted in her
+sea-blue eyes:
+
+"Is your house in order too, Palla?" she asked. "Turn around, little
+enigma! There; I can look into those brown eyes now. And I see nothing
+in them to answer me my question."
+
+"Do you mean Jim?"
+
+"I do."
+
+"I haven't seen him."
+
+"For how long?"
+
+"Weeks. I don't know how long it has been----"
+
+"Have you quarrelled?"
+
+"Yes. We seem to. This is quite the most serious one yet."
+
+"You are not in love with him."
+
+"Oh, Ilse, I don't know. He simply can't understand me. I feel so
+bruised and tired after a controversy with him. He seems to be so
+merciless to my opinions--so violent----"
+
+"You poor child.... After all, Palla, freedom also means the liberty
+to change one's mind.... If you should care to change yours----"
+
+"I can't change my inmost convictions."
+
+"Those--no."
+
+"I have not changed them. I almost wish I could. But I've got to be
+honest.... And he can't understand me."
+
+Ilse smiled and kissed her: "That is scarcely to be wondered at, as
+you don't seem to know your own mind. Perhaps when you do he, also,
+may understand you. Good-bye! I must run----"
+
+Palla watched her to the foot of the stairs; the door closed; the
+engine of a taxi began to hum.
+
+Her telephone was ringing when she returned to the living room, and
+the quick leap of her heart averted her of the hope revived.
+
+But it was a strange voice on the wire,--a man's voice, clear,
+sinister, tainted with a German accent:
+
+"Iss this Miss Dumont? Yess? Then this I haff to say to you: You shall
+find yourself in serious trouble if you do not move your foolish club
+of vimmen out of the vicinity of which you know. We giff you one more
+chance. So shall you take it or you shall take some consequences!
+_Goot-night!_"
+
+The instrument clicked in her ear as the unknown threatener hung up,
+leaving her seated there, astonished, hurt, bewildered.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+The man who "hung up on her" stepped out of a saloon on Eighth Avenue
+and joined two other men on the corner.
+
+The man was Karl Kastner; the other two were Sondheim and Bromberg.
+
+"Get her?" growled the latter, as all three started east.
+
+"Yess. And now we shall see what we shall see. We start the finish now
+already. All foolishness shall be ended. Now we fix Puma."
+
+They continued on across the street, clumping along with their
+overcoat collars turned up, for it had turned bitter cold and the wind
+was rising.
+
+"You don't think it's a plant?" inquired Sondheim, for the third
+time.
+
+Bromberg blew his red nose on a dirty red handkerchief.
+
+"We'll plant Puma if he tries any of that," he said thickly.
+
+Kastner added that he feared investigation more than they did because
+he had more at stake.
+
+"Dot guy he iss rich like a millionaire," he added. "Ve make him pay
+some dammach, too."
+
+"How's he going to fire that bunch of women if they got a lease?"
+demanded Bromberg.
+
+"Who the hell cares how he does it?" grunted Sondheim.
+
+"Sure," added Kastner; "let him dig up. You buy anybody if you haff
+sufficient coin. Effery time! Yess. Also! Let him dig down into his
+pants once. So shall he pay them, these vimmen, to go avay und shut
+up mit their mischief what they make for us already!"
+
+Sondheim was still muttering about "plants" in the depths of his
+soiled overcoat-collar, when they arrived at the hall and presented
+themselves at the door of Puma's outer office.
+
+A girl took their message. After a while she returned and piloted them
+out, and up a wide flight of stairs to a door marked, "No admittance."
+Here she knocked, and Puma's voice bade them enter.
+
+Angelo Puma was standing by a desk when they trooped in, keeping their
+hats on. The room was ventilated and illumined in the daytime only by
+a very dirty transom giving on a shaft. Otherwise, there were no
+windows, no outlet to any outer light and air.
+
+Two gas jets caged in wire--obsolete stage dressing-room effects--lighted
+the room and glimmered on Puma's polished top-hat and the gold knob of
+his walking-stick.
+
+As for Puma himself, he glanced up stealthily from the scenario he was
+reading as he stood by the big desk, but dropped his eyes again, and,
+opening a drawer, laid away the typed manuscript. Then he pulled out
+the revolving desk chair and sat down.
+
+"Well?" he inquired, lighting a cigar.
+
+There was an ominous silence among the three men for another moment.
+Then Puma looked up, puffing his cigar, and Sondheim stepped forward
+from the group and shook his finger in his face.
+
+"What yah got planted around here for us? Hey?" he demanded in a low,
+hoarse voice. "Come on now, Puma! What yeh think yeh got on us?" And
+to Kastner and Bromberg: "Go ahead, boys, look for a dictaphone and
+them kind of things. And if this wop hollers I'll do him."
+
+A ruddy light flickered in Puma's eyes, but the cool smile lay
+smoothly on his lips, and he did not even turn his head to watch them
+as they passed along the walls, sounding, peering, prying, and jerking
+open the door of the cupboard--the only furniture there except the
+desk and the chair on which Puma sat.
+
+"What the hell's the matter with yeh?" snarled Sondheim, suddenly
+stooping to catch Puma's eye, which had wandered as though bored by
+the proceedings.
+
+"Nothing," said Puma, coolly; "what's the matter with you, Max?"
+
+Kastner came around beside him and said in his thin, sinister tone:
+
+"You know it vat I got on you, Angelo?"
+
+"I do."
+
+"So? Also! Vas iss it you do about doze vimmen?"
+
+"They won't go."
+
+In Bromberg's voice sounded an ominous roar: "Don't hand us nothing
+like that! You hear what I'm telling you?"
+
+Puma shrugged: "I hand you what I have to hand you. They have the
+lease. What is there for me to do?"
+
+"Buy 'em off!"
+
+"I try. They will not."
+
+"You offer 'em enough and they'll quit!"
+
+"No. They will not. They say they are here to fight you. They laugh at
+my money. What shall I do?"
+
+"I'll tell you one thing you'll do, and do it damn quick!" roared
+Bromberg. "Hand over that money we need!"
+
+"If you bellow in so loud a manner," said Puma, "they could hear you
+in the studio.... How much do you ask for?"
+
+"Two thousand."
+
+"No."
+
+"What yeh mean by 'No'?"
+
+"What I say to you, that I have not two thousand."
+
+"You lying greaser----"
+
+"I do not lie. I have paid my people and there remains but six hundred
+dollars in my bank."
+
+"When do we get the rest?" asked Sondheim, as Puma tossed the packet
+of bills onto the desk.
+
+"When I make it," replied Puma tranquilly. "You will understand my
+receipts are my capital at present. What else I have is engaged
+already in my new theatre. If you will be patient you shall have what
+I can spare."
+
+Bromberg rested both hairy fists on the desk and glared down at Puma.
+
+"Who's this new guy you got to go in with you? What's the matter with
+our getting a jag of his coin?"
+
+"You mean Mr. Pawling?"
+
+"Yeh. Who the hell is that duck what inks his whiskers?"
+
+"A partner."
+
+"Well, let him shove us ours then."
+
+"You wish to ruin me?" inquired Puma placidly.
+
+"Not while you're milkin'," said Sondheim, showing every yellow fang
+in a grin.
+
+"Then do not frighten Mr. Pawling out. Already you have scared my
+other partner, Mr. Skidder, like there never was any rabbits scared.
+You are foolish. If you are reasonable, I shall make money and you
+shall have your share. If you are not, then there is no money to give
+you."
+
+Sondheim said: "Take a slant at them yellow-backs, Karl." And Kastner
+screwed a powerful jeweller's glass into his eye and began a minute
+examination of the orange-coloured treasury notes, to find out whether
+they were marked bills.
+
+Bromberg said heavily: "See here, Angelo, you gotta quit this damned
+stalling! You gotta get them women out, and do it quick or we'll blow
+your dirty barracks into the North River!"
+
+Sondheim began to wag his soiled forefinger again.
+
+"Yeh quit us cold when things was on the fritz. Now, yeh gotta pay. If
+you wasn't nothing but a wop skunk yeh'd stand in with us. The way
+you're fixed would help us all. But now yeh makin' money and yeh
+scared o' yeh shadow!----"
+
+Bromberg cut in: "And you'll be outside when the band starts playing.
+Look what's doing all over the world! Every country is starting
+something! You watch Berlin and Rosa Luxemburg and her bunch. Keep
+your eye peeled, Angy, and see what we and the I. W. W. start in every
+city of the country!"
+
+Kastner, having satisfied himself that the bills had not been marked,
+and pocketed his jeweller's glass, pushed back his lank blond hair.
+
+"Yess," he said in his icy, incisive voice, "yoost vatch out already!
+Dot crimson tide it iss rising the vorld all ofer! It shall drown
+effery aristocrat, effery bourgeois, effery intellectual. It shall be
+but a red flood ofer all the vorld vere noddings shall live only our
+peoble off the proletariat!"
+
+"And where the hell will you be then, Angelo?" sneered Bromberg. "By
+God, we won't have to ask you for our share of your money then!"
+
+Again Sondheim leaned over him and wagged his nicotine-dyed finger:
+
+"You get the rest of our money! Understand? And you get them women
+out!--or I tell you we'll blow you and your joint to Hoboken! Get
+that?"
+
+"I have understood," said Puma quietly; but his heavy face was a muddy
+red now, and he choked a little when he spoke.
+
+"Give us a date and stick to it," added Bromberg. "Set it yourself.
+And after that we won't bother to do any more jawin'. We'll just
+attend to business--_your_ business, Puma!"
+
+After a long silence, Puma said calmly: "How much you want?"
+
+"Ten thousand," said Sondheim.
+
+"And them women out of this," added Bromberg.
+
+"Or ve get you," ended Kastner in his deadly voice.
+
+Puma lifted his head and looked intently at each one of them in turn.
+And seemed presently to come to some conclusion.
+
+Kastner forestalled him: "You try it some monkey trick and you try it
+no more effer again."
+
+"What's your date for the cash?" insisted Sondheim.
+
+"February first," replied Puma quietly.
+
+Kastner wrote it on the back of an envelope.
+
+"Und dese vimmen?" he inquired.
+
+"I'll get a lawyer----"
+
+"The hell with that stuff!" roared Bromberg. "Get 'em out! Scare 'em
+out! Jesus Christ! how long d'yeh think we're going to stand for being
+hammered by that bunch o' skirts? They got a lot o' people sore on us
+now. The crowd what uster come around is gettin' leery. And who are
+these damned women? One of 'em was a White Nun, when they did the
+business for the Romanoffs. One of 'em fired on the Bolsheviki--that
+big blond girl with yellow hair, I mean! Wasn't she one of those
+damned girl-soldiers? And look what she's up to now--comin' over here
+to talk us off the platform!--the dirty foreigner!"
+
+"Yes," growled Bromberg, "and there's that redheaded wench of
+Vanya's!--some Grand Duke's slut, they say, before she quit him for
+the university to start something else----"
+
+Kastner cut in in his steely voice: "If you do not throw out these
+women, Puma, we fix them and your hall and you--all at one time, my
+friend. Also! Iss it then for February the first, our understanding?
+Or iss it, a little later, the end of all your troubles, Angelo?"
+
+Puma got up, nodded his acceptance of their ultimatum, and opened the
+door for them.
+
+When they trooped out, under the brick arch, they noticed his splendid
+limousine waiting, and as they shuffled sullenly away westward,
+Bromberg, looking back, saw Puma come out and jump lightly into the
+car.
+
+"Swine!" he snarled, facing the bitter wind once more and shuffling
+along beside his silent brethren.
+
+Puma went east, then north to the Hotel Rajah, where, in a private
+room, he was to complete a financial transaction with Alonzo B.
+Pawling.
+
+Skidder, too, came in at the same time, squinting rapidly at his
+partner; and together they moved toward the elevator.
+
+The elevator waited a moment more to accommodate a willowy, red-haired
+girl in furs, whose jade eyes barely rested on Puma's magnificent
+black ones as he stepped aside to make way for her with an extravagant
+bow.
+
+"Some skirt," murmured Skidder in his ear, as the car shot upward.
+
+Marya left the car at the mezzanine floor: Puma's eyes were like coals
+for a moment.
+
+"You know that dame?" inquired Skidder, his eyes fairly snapping.
+
+"No." He did not add that he had seen her at the Combat Club and knew
+her to belong to another man. But his black eyes were almost blazing
+as he stepped from the elevator, for in Marya's insolent glance he had
+caught a vague glimmer of fire--merely a green spark, very faint--if,
+indeed, it had been there at all....
+
+Pawling himself opened the door for them.
+
+"Is it all right? Do we get the parcel?" were his first words.
+
+"It's a knock-out!" cried Skidder, slapping him on the back. "We
+got the land, we got the plans, we got the iron, we got the
+contracts!--Oh, boy!--our dough is in--go look at it and smell it for
+yourself! So get into the jack, old scout, and ante up, because we
+break ground Wednesday and there'll be bills before then, you
+betcha!"
+
+When the cocktails were brought, Puma swallowed his in a hurry, saying
+he'd be back in a moment, and bidding Skidder enlighten Mr. Pawling
+during the interim.
+
+He summoned the elevator, got out at the mezzanine, and walked lightly
+into the deserted and cloister-like perspective, his shiny hat in his
+hand.
+
+And saw Marya standing by the marble ramp, looking down at the bustle
+below.
+
+He stopped not far away. He had made no sound on the velvet carpet.
+But presently she turned her head and the green eyes met his black
+ones.
+
+Neither winced. The sheer bulk of the beast and the florid magnificence
+of its colour seemed to fascinate her.
+
+She had seen him before, and scarcely noted him. She remembered. But
+the world was duller, then, and the outlook grey. And then, too, her
+still, green eyes had not yet wandered beyond far horizons, nor had
+her heart been cut adrift to follow her fancy when the tides stirred
+it from its mooring--carrying it away, away through deeps or shallows
+as the currents swerved.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+
+The pale parody on that sacred date which once had symbolised the
+birth of Christ had come and gone; the ghastly year was nearing its
+own death--the bloodiest year, for all its final triumph, that the
+world had ever witnessed--_l'annee horrible_!
+
+Nor was the end yet, of all this death and dying: for the Crimson
+Tide, washing through Russia, eastward, seethed and eddied among the
+wrecks of empires, lapping Poland's bones, splashing over the charred
+threshold of the huns, creeping into the Balkans, crawling toward
+Greece and Italy, menacing Scandinavia, and arousing the stern
+watchers along the French frontier--the ultimate eastward barrier of
+human liberty.
+
+And unless, despite the fools who demur, that barrier be based upon
+the Rhine, that barrier will fall one day.
+
+Even in England, where the captive navies of the anti-Christ now
+sulked at anchor under England's consecrated guns, some talked glibly
+of rule by Soviet. All Ireland bristled now, baring its teeth at
+government; vast armies, disbanding, were becoming dully restless; and
+armed men, disarming, began to wonder what now might be their destiny
+and what the destiny of the world they fought for.
+
+And everywhere, among all peoples, swarmed the stealthy agents of the
+Red Apocalypse, whispering discontent, hinting treasons, stirring the
+unhappy to sullen anger, inciting the simple-minded to insanity, the
+ignorant to revolution. For four years it had been a battle between
+Light and Night; and now there threatened to be joined in battle the
+uttermost forces of Evolution and Chaos--the spiritual Armageddon at
+last, where Life and Light and Order must fight a final fight with
+Degeneracy, Darkness and Death.
+
+And always, everywhere, that hell-born Crimson Tide seemed to be
+rising. All newspapers were full of it, sounding the universal alarm.
+And Civilisation merely stared at the scarlet flood--gawked stupidly
+and unstirring--while the far clamour of massacre throughout Russia
+grew suddenly to a crashing discord in Berlin, shaking the whole world
+with brazen dissonance.
+
+Like the first ominous puff before the tempest, the deadly breath of
+the Black Death--called "influenza," but known of old among the
+verminous myriads of the East--swept over the earth from East to West.
+Millions died; millions were yet to perish of it; yet the dazed world,
+still half blind with blood and smoke, sat helpless and unstirring,
+barring no gates to this pestilence that stalked the stricken earth at
+noon-day.
+
+New York, partly paralysed by sacrifice and the blood-sucking antics
+of half-crazed congressmen, gorged by six years feeding after decades
+of starvation, welcomed the incoming soldiers in a bewildered sort of
+way, making either an idiot's din of dissonance or gaping in stupid
+silence as the huge troop-ships swept up the bay.
+
+The battle fleet arrived--the home squadron and the "6th battle
+squadron"--and lay towering along the Hudson, while officers and
+jackies swarmed the streets--streets now thronged by wounded,
+too--pallid cripples in olive drab, limping along slowly beneath
+lowering skies, with their citations and crosses and ribbons and
+wound chevrons in glinting gold under the relighted lustres of the
+metropolis.
+
+So the false mockery of Christmas came to the city--a forced festival,
+unutterably sad, for all that the end of the war was subject of thanks
+in every church and synagogue. And so the mystic feast ended, scarcely
+heeded amid the slow, half-crippled groping for financial readjustment
+in the teeth of a snarling and vindictive Congress, mean in its envy,
+meaner in revenge--a domestic brand of sectional Bolsheviki as dirty
+and degenerate as any anarchist in all Russia.
+
+The President had sailed away--(_Slava! Slava! Nechevo!_)--and the
+newspapers were preparing to tell their disillusioned public all about
+it, if permitted.
+
+And so dawned the New Year over the spreading crimson flood, flecking
+the mounting tide with brighter scarlet as it crept ever westward,
+ever wider, across a wounded world.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+Palla had not seen Jim for a very long time now. Christmas passed,
+bringing neither gift nor message, although she had sent him a little
+remembrance--_The Divine Pantheon_, by an unfrocked Anglican
+clergyman, one Loxon Fettars, recently under detention pending
+investigation concerning an alleged multiplicity of wives.
+
+The New Year brought no greeting from him, either; nobody she knew had
+seen him, and her pride had revolted at writing him after she had
+telephoned and left a message at his club--her usual concession after
+a stormy parting.
+
+And there was another matter that was causing her a constantly
+increasing unrest--she had not seen Marya for many a day.
+
+Quiet grief for what now appeared to be a friendship ended--at
+other times a tingle of bitterness that he had let it end so
+relentlessly--and sometimes, at night, the secret dread--eternally
+buried yet perennially resurrected--the still, hidden, ever-living
+fear of Marya; these the girl knew, now, as part of life.
+
+And went on, steadily, with her life's business, as though moving
+toward a dark horizon where clouds towered gradually higher,
+reflecting the glimmer of unseen lightning.
+
+Somehow, lately, a vague sensation of impending trouble had invaded
+her; and she never entirely shook it off, even in her lighter moods,
+when there was gay company around her; or in the warm flush of
+optimistic propaganda work; or in the increasingly exciting sessions
+of the Combat Club, now interrupted nightly by fierce outbreaks from
+emissaries of the Red Flag Club, who were there to make mischief.
+
+Also, there had been an innovation established among her company of
+moderate socialists; a corps of missionary speakers, who volunteered
+on certain nights to speak from the classic soap-box on street
+corners, urging the propaganda of their panacea, the Law of Love and
+Service.
+
+Twice already, despite her natural timidity and dread of public
+speaking, Palla had faced idle, half-curious, half sneering crowds
+just east or west of Broadway; had struggled through with what she had
+come to say; had gently replied to heckling, blushed under insult,
+stood trembling by her guns to the end.
+
+Ilse was more convincing, more popular with her gay insouciance and
+infectious laughter, and her unexpected and enchanting flashes of
+militancy, which always interested the crowd.
+
+And always, after these soap-box efforts, both Palla and Ilse were
+insulted over the telephone by unknown men. Their mail, also,
+invariably contained abusive or threatening letters, and sometimes
+vile ones; and Estridge purchased pistols for them both and exacted
+pledges that they carry them at night.
+
+On the evening selected for Palla's third essay in street oratory, she
+slipped her pistol into her muff and set out alone, not waiting for
+Ilse, who, with John Estridge, was to have met her after dinner at her
+house, and, as usual, accompany her to the place selected.
+
+But they knew where she was to speak, and she did not doubt they would
+turn up sooner or later at the rendezvous.
+
+All that day the dull, foreboding feeling had been assailing her at
+intervals, and she had been unable to free herself entirely from the
+vague depression.
+
+The day had been grey; when she left the house a drizzle had begun to
+wet the flagstones, and every lamp-post was now hooded with ghostly
+iridescence.
+
+She walked because she had need of exercise, not even deigning to
+unfurl her umbrella against the mist which spun silvery ovals over
+every electric globe along Fifth Avenue, and now shrouded every
+building above the fourth story in a cottony ocean of fog.
+
+When finally she turned westward, the dark obscurity of the
+cross-street seemed to stretch away into infinite night and she
+hurried a little, scarcely realising why.
+
+There did not seem to be a soul in sight--she noticed that--yet
+suddenly, halfway down the street, she discovered a man walking at her
+elbow, his rubber-shod feet making no sound on the wet walk.
+
+Palla had never before been annoyed by such attentions in New York,
+yet she supposed it must be the reason for the man's insolence.
+
+She hastened her steps; he moved as swiftly.
+
+"Look here," he said, "I know who you are, and where you're going. And
+we've stood just about enough from you and your friends."
+
+In the quick revulsion from annoyance and disgust to a very lively
+flash of fright, Palla involuntarily slackened her pace and widened
+the distance between her and this unknown.
+
+"You better right-about-face and go home!" he said quietly. "You talk
+too damn much with your face. And we're going to stop you. See?"
+
+At that her flash of fear turned to anger:
+
+"Try it," she said hotly; and hurried on, her hand clutching the
+pistol in her wet muff, her eyes fixed on the unknown man.
+
+"I've a mind to dust you good and plenty right here," he said. "Quit
+your running, now, and beat it back again--" His vise-like grip was on
+her left arm, almost jerking her off her feet; and the next moment she
+struck him with her loaded pistol full in the face.
+
+As he veered away, she saw the seam open from his cheek bone to his
+chin--saw the white face suddenly painted with wet scarlet.
+
+The sight of the blood made her sick, but she kept her pistol
+levelled, backing away westward all the while.
+
+There was an iron railing near; he went over and leaned against it as
+though stupefied.
+
+And all the while she continued to retreat until, behind her, his dim
+shape merged into the foggy dark.
+
+Then Palla turned and ran. And she was still breathing fast and
+unevenly when she came to that perfect blossom of vulgarity and
+apotheosis of all American sham--Broadway--where in the raw glare from
+a million lights the senseless crowds swept north and south.
+
+And here, where Jew-manager and gentile ruled the histrionic destiny
+of the United States--here where art, letters, service, industry,
+business had each developed its own species of human prostitute--two
+muddy-brained torrents of humanity poured in opposite directions,
+crowding, shoving, shuffling along in the endless, hopeless Hunt for
+Happiness.
+
+She had made, in the beginning of her street-corner career,
+arrangements with a neighbouring boot-black to furnish one soap-box on
+demand at a quarter of a dollar rent for every evening.
+
+She extracted the quarter from her purse and paid the boy; carried the
+soap-box herself to the curb; and, with that invariable access of
+fright which attacked her at such moments, mounted it to face the
+first few people who halted out of curiosity to see what else she
+meant to do.
+
+Columns of passing umbrellas hid her so that not many people noticed
+her; but gradually that perennial audience of shabby opportunists
+which always gathers anywhere from nowhere, ringed her soap-box. And
+Palla began to speak in the drizzling rain.
+
+For some time there were no interruptions, no jeers, no doubtful
+pleasantries. But when it became more plain to the increasing crowd
+that this smartly though simply gowned young woman had come to
+Broadway in the rain for the purpose of protesting against all forms
+of violence, including the right of the working people to strike, ugly
+remarks became audible, and now and then a menacing word was flung at
+her, or some clenched hand insulted her and amid a restless murmur
+growing rougher all the time.
+
+Once, to prove her point out of the mouth of the proletariat itself,
+she quoted from Rosa Luxemburg; and a well-dressed man shouldered his
+way toward her and in a low voice gave her the lie.
+
+The painful colour dyed her face, but she went on calmly, explaining
+the different degrees and extremes of socialism, revealing how the
+abused term had been used as camouflage by the party committed to the
+utter annihilation of everything worth living for.
+
+And again, to prove her point, she quoted:
+
+"Socialism does not mean the convening of Parliaments and the
+enactment of laws; it means the overthrow of the ruling classes with
+all the brutality at the disposal of the proletariat."
+
+The same well-dressed man interrupted again:
+
+"Say, who pays you to come here and hand out that Wall Street stuff?"
+
+"Nobody pays me," she replied patiently.
+
+"All right, then, if that's true why don't you tell us something about
+the interests and the profiteers and all them dirty games the
+capitalists is rigging up? Tell us about the guy who wants us to pay
+eight cents to ride on his damned cars! Tell us about the geezers who
+soak us for food and coal and clothes and rent!
+
+"You stand there chirping to us about Love and Service and how we
+oughta give. _Give!_ Jesus!--we ain't got anything left to give. They
+ain't anything to give our wives or our children,--no, nor there ain't
+enough left to feed our own faces or pay for a patch on our pants!
+_Give?_ Hell! The interests _took_ it. And you stand there twittering
+about Love and Service! We oughta serve 'em a brick on the neck and
+love 'em with a black-jack!"
+
+"How far would that get you?" asked Palla gently.
+
+"As far as their pants-pockets anyway!"
+
+"And when you empty those, who is to employ and pay you?"
+
+"Don't worry," he sneered, "we'll do the employing after that."
+
+"And will your employees do to you some day what you did to your
+employers with a black-jack?"
+
+The crowd laughed, but her heckler shook his fist at her and yelled:
+
+"Ain't I telling you that we'll be sitting in these damn gold-plated
+houses and payin' wages to these here fat millionaires for blackin'
+our shoes?"
+
+"You mean that when Bolshevism rules there are to be rich and poor
+just the same as at present?"
+
+Again the crowd laughed.
+
+"All right!" bawled the man, waving both arms above his head,
+"--yes, I do mean it! It will be our turn then. Why not? What do we
+want to split fifty-fifty with them soft, fat millionaires for?
+Nix on that stuff! It will be hog-killing time, and you can bet your
+thousand-dollar wrist watch, Miss, that there'll be some killin' in
+little old New York!"
+
+He had backed out of the circle and disappeared in the crowd before
+Palla could attempt further reasoning with him. So she merely shook
+her head in gentle disapproval and dissent:
+
+"What is the use," she said, "of exchanging one form of tyranny for
+another? Why destroy the autocracy of the capitalist and erect on its
+ruins the autocracy of the worker?
+
+"How can class distinctions be eradicated by fanning class-hatred? In
+a battle against all dictators, why proclaim dictatorship--even of the
+proletariat?
+
+"All oppression is hateful, whether exercised by God or man--whether
+the oppressor be that murderous, stupid, treacherous, tyrannical
+bully in the Old Testament, miscalled God, or whether the oppressor be
+the proletariat which screamed for the blood of Jesus Christ and got
+it!
+
+"Free heart, free mind, free soul!--anything less means servitude, not
+service--hatred, not love!"
+
+A man in the outskirts of the crowd shouted: "Say, you're some
+rag-chewer, little girl! Go to it!"
+
+She laughed, then glanced at her wrist watch.
+
+There were a few more words she might say before the time she allowed
+herself had expired, and she found courage to go on, striving to
+explain to the shifting knot of people that the battle which now
+threatened civilisation was the terrible and final fight between Order
+and Disorder and that, under inexorable laws which could never change,
+order meant life and survival; disorder chaos and death for all living
+things.
+
+A few cheered her as she bade them good-night, picked up her soap-box
+and carried it back to her boot-black friend, who inhabited a shack
+built against the family-entrance side of a saloon.
+
+She was surprised that Ilse and John Estridge had not appeared--could
+scarcely understand it, as she made her way toward a taxicab.
+
+For, in view of the startling occurrence earlier in the evening, and
+the non-appearance of Ilse and Estridge, Palla had decided to return
+in a taxi.
+
+The incident--the boldness of the unknown man and vicious brutality of
+his attitude, and also a sickening recollection of her own action and
+his bloody face--had really shocked her, even more than she was aware
+of at the time.
+
+She felt tired and strained, and a trifle faint now, where she lay
+back, swaying there on her seat, her pistol clutched inside her muff,
+as the ramshackle vehicle lurched its noisy way eastward. And always
+that dull sense of something sinister impending--that indefinable
+apprehension--remained with her. And she gazed darkly out on the dark
+streets, possessed by a melancholy which she did not attempt to
+analyse.
+
+Yet, partly it came from the ruptured comradeship which always
+haunted her mind, partly because of Ilse and the uncertainty of what
+might happen to her--may have happened already for all Palla
+knew--and partly because--although she did not realise it--in the
+profound deeps of her girl's being she was vaguely conscious of
+something latent which seemed to have lain hidden there for a long,
+long time--something inert, inexorable, indestructible, which, if
+it ever stirred from its intense stillness, must be reckoned with
+in years to come.
+
+She made no effort to comprehend what this thing might be--if, indeed,
+it really existed--no pains to analyse it or to meditate over the
+vague indications of its presence.
+
+She seemed merely to be aware of something indefinable concealed in
+the uttermost depths of her.
+
+It was Doubt, unborn.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+The taxi drew up before her house. Rain was falling heavily, as she
+ran up the steps--a cold rain through which a few wet snowflakes
+slanted.
+
+Her maid heard the rattle of her night-key and came to relieve her of
+her wet things, and to say that Miss Westgard had telephoned and had
+left a number to be called as soon as Miss Dumont returned.
+
+The slip of paper bore John Estridge's telephone number and Palla
+seated herself at her desk and called it.
+
+Almost immediately she heard Ilse's voice on the wire.
+
+"What is the matter, dear?" inquired Palla with the slightest shiver
+of that premonition which had haunted her all day.
+
+But Ilse's voice was cheerful: "We were so sorry not to go with you
+this evening, darling, but Jack is feeling so queer that he's turned
+in and I've sent for a physician."
+
+"Shall I come around?" asked Palla.
+
+"Oh, no," replied Ilse calmly, "but I've an idea Jack may need a
+nurse--perhaps two."
+
+"What is it?" faltered Palla.
+
+"I don't know. But he is running a high temperature and he says that
+it feels as though something were wrong with his appendix.
+
+"You see Jack is almost a physician himself, so if it really is acute
+appendicitis we must know as soon as possible."
+
+"Is there _anything_ I could do?" pleaded Palla. "Darling, I do so
+want to be of use if----"
+
+"I'll let you know, dear. There isn't anything so far."
+
+"Are you going to stay there to-night?"
+
+"Of course," replied Ilse calmly. "Tell me, Palla, how did the
+soap-box arguments go?"
+
+"Not very well. I was heckled. I'm such a wretched public speaker,
+Ilse;--I can never remember what rejoinders to make until it's too
+late."
+
+She did not mention her encounter with the unknown man; Ilse had
+enough to occupy her.
+
+They chatted a few moments longer, then Ilse promised to call her if
+necessary, and said good-night.
+
+A little after midnight Palla's telephone rang beside her bed and she
+started upright with a pang of fear and groped for the instrument.
+
+"Jack is seriously ill," came the level voice of Ilse. "We have taken
+him to the Memorial Hospital in one of their ambulances."
+
+"W--what is it?" asked Palla.
+
+"They say it is pneumonia."
+
+"Oh, Ilse!----"
+
+"I'm not afraid. Jack is in magnificent physical condition. He is too
+splendid not to win the fight.... And I shall be with him.... I shall
+not let him lose."
+
+"Tell me what I can do, darling!"
+
+"Nothing--except love us both."
+
+"I do--I do indeed----"
+
+"Both, Palla!"
+
+"Y--yes."
+
+"_Do you understand?_"
+
+"Oh, I--I think I do. And I do love you--love you both--devotedly----"
+
+"You must, _now_.... I am going home to get some things. Then I shall
+go to the hospital. You can call me there until he is convalescent."
+
+"Will they let you stay there?"
+
+"I have volunteered for general work. They are terribly short-handed
+and they are glad to have me."
+
+"I'll come to-morrow," said Palla.
+
+"No. Wait.... Good-night, my darling."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+
+As a mischievous caricaturist, in the beginning, draws a fairly good
+portrait of his victim and then gradually habituates his public to a
+series of progressively exaggerated extravagances, so progressed the
+programme of the Bolsheviki in America, revealing little by little
+their final conception of liberty and equality in the bloody and
+distorted monster which they had now evolved, and which they publicly
+owned as their ideal emblem.
+
+In the Red Flag Club, Sondheim shouted that a Red Republic was
+impossible because it admitted on an equality the rich and well-to-do.
+
+Karl Kastner, more cynical, coolly preached the autocracy of the
+worker; told his listeners frankly that there would always be masters
+and servants in the world, and asked them which they preferred to be.
+
+With the new year came sporadic symptoms of unrest;--strikes,
+unwarranted confiscations by Government, increasingly bad service
+in public utilities controlled by Government, loose talk in a
+contemptible Congress, looser gabble among those who witlessly lent
+themselves to German or Bolshevik propaganda--or both--by repeating
+stories of alleged differences between America and England, America
+and France, America and Italy.
+
+The hen-brained--a small minority--misbehaved as usual whenever the
+opportunity came to do the wrong thing; the meanest and most
+contemptible partisanship since the shameful era of the carpet bagger
+prevailed in a section of the Republic where the traditions of great
+men and great deeds had led the nation to expect nobler things.
+
+For the same old hydra seemed to be still alive on earth, lifting, by
+turns, its separate heads of envy, intolerance, bigotry and greed.
+Ignorance, robed with authority, legally robbed those comfortably
+off.
+
+The bleat of the pacifist was heard in the land. Those who had once
+chanted in sanctimonious chorus, "He kept us out of war," now sang
+sentimental hymns invoking mercy and forgiveness for the crucifiers of
+children and the rapers of women, who licked their lips furtively and
+leered at the imbecile choir. Representatives of a great electorate
+vaunted their patriotism and proudly repeated: "We forced him into
+war!" Whereas they themselves had been kicked headlong into it by a
+press and public at the end of its martyred patience.
+
+There appeared to be, so far, no business revival. Prosperity was
+penalised, taxed to the verge of blackmail, constantly suspected and
+admonished; and the Congressional Bolsheviki were gradually breaking
+the neck of legitimate enterprise everywhere throughout the Republic.
+
+And everywhere over the world the crimson tide crept almost
+imperceptibly a little higher every day.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+Toward the middle of January the fever which had burnt John Estridge
+for a week fell a degree or two.
+
+Palla, who had called twice a day at the Memorial Hospital, was seated
+that morning in a little room near the disinfecting plant, talking to
+Ilse, who had just laid aside her mask.
+
+"You look rather ill yourself," said Ilse in her cheery, even voice.
+"Is anything worrying you, darling?"
+
+"Yes.... You are."
+
+"I!" exclaimed the girl, really astonished. "Why?"
+
+"Sometimes," murmured Palla, "my anxiety makes me almost sick."
+
+"Anxiety about _me_!----"
+
+"You know why," whispered Palla.
+
+A bright flush stained Ilse's face: she said calmly:
+
+"But our creed is broad enough to include all things beautiful and
+good."
+
+Palla shrank as though she had been struck, and sat staring out of the
+narrow window.
+
+Ilse lifted a basket of soiled linen and carried it away. When,
+presently, she returned to take away another basket, she inquired
+whether Palla had made up her quarrel with Jim Shotwell, and Palla
+shook her head.
+
+"Do you really suppose Marya has made mischief between you?" asked
+Ilse curiously.
+
+"Oh, I don't know, Ilse," said the girl listlessly. "I don't know what
+it is that seems to be so wrong with the world--with everybody--with
+me----"
+
+She rose nervously, bade Ilse adieu, and went out without turning her
+head--perhaps because her brown eyes had suddenly blurred with tears.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+Half way to Red Cross headquarters she passed the Hotel Rajah. And why
+she did it she had no very clear idea, but she turned abruptly and
+entered the gorgeous lobby, went to the desk, and sent up her name to
+Marya Lanois.
+
+It appeared, presently, that Miss Lanois was at home and would receive
+her in her apartment.
+
+The accolade was perfunctory: Palla's first glance informed her that
+Marya had grown a trifle more svelte since they had met--more
+brilliant in her distinctive coloration. There was a tawny beauty
+about the girl that almost blazed from her hair and delicately
+sanguine skin and lips.
+
+They seated themselves, and Marya lighted the cigarette which Palla
+had refused; and they fell into the animated, gossiping conversation
+characteristic of such reunions.
+
+"Vanya?" repeated Marya, smiling, "no, I have not seen him. That is
+quite finished, you see. But I hope he is well. Do you happen to
+know?"
+
+"He seems--changed. But he is working hard, which is always best for
+the unhappy. And he and his somewhat vociferous friend, Mr. Wilding,
+are very busy preparing for their Philadelphia concert."
+
+"Wilding," repeated Marya, as though swallowing something distasteful.
+"He was the last straw! But tell me, Palla, what are you doing these
+jolly days of the new year?"
+
+"Nothing.... Red Cross, canteen, club--and recently I go twice a day
+to the Memorial Hospital."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"John Estridge is ill there."
+
+"What is the matter with him?"
+
+"Pneumonia."
+
+"Oh. I am so sorry for Ilse!----" Her eyes rested intently on Palla's
+for a moment; then she smiled subtly, as though sharing with Palla
+some occult understanding.
+
+Palla's face whitened a little: "I want to ask you a question,
+Marya.... You know our belief--concerning life in general.... Tell
+me--since your separation from Vanya, do you still believe in that
+creed?"
+
+"Do I still believe in my own personal liberty to do as I choose? Of
+course."
+
+"From the moral side?"
+
+"Moral!" mocked Marya, "--What are morals? Artificial conventions
+accidentally established! Haphazard folkways of ancient peoples whose
+very origin has been forgotten! What is moral in India is immoral in
+England: what is right in China is wrong in America. It's purely a
+matter of local folkways--racial customs--as to whether one is or is
+not immoral.
+
+"Ethics apply to the Greek _Ethos_; morals to the Latin _Mores_--_moeurs_
+in French, _sitte_ in German, _custom_ in English;--and all mean
+practically the same thing--metaphysical hair-splitters to the
+contrary--which is simply this: all beliefs are local, and local
+customs or morals are the result. Therefore, they don't worry me."
+
+Palla sat with her troubled eyes on the careless, garrulous,
+half-smiling Russian girl, and trying to follow with an immature mind
+the half-baked philosophy offered for her consumption.
+
+She said hesitatingly, almost shyly: "I've wondered a little, Marya,
+how it ever happened that such an institution as marriage became
+practically universal----"
+
+"Marriage isn't an institution," exclaimed Marya smilingly. "The
+family, which existed long before marriage, is the institution,
+because it has a definite structure which marriage hasn't.
+
+"Marriage always has been merely a locally varying mode of sex
+association. No laws can control it. Local rules merely try to
+regulate the various manners of entering into a marital state, the
+obligations and personal rights of the sexes involved. What really
+controls two people who have entered into such a relation is local
+opinion----"
+
+She snapped her fingers and tossed aside her cigarette: "You and I
+happen to be, locally, in the minority with our opinions, that's
+all."
+
+Palla rose and walked slowly to the door. "Have you seen Jim
+recently?" she managed to say carelessly.
+
+Marya waited for her to turn before replying: "Haven't _you_ seen
+him?" she asked with the leisurely malice of certainty.
+
+"No, not for a long while," replied Palla, facing with a painful flush
+this miserable crisis to which her candour had finally committed her.
+"We had a little difference.... Have you seen him lately?"
+
+Marya's sympathy flickered swift as a dagger:
+
+"What a shame for him to behave so childishly!" she cried. "I shall
+scold him soundly. He's like an infant--that boy--the way he sulks if
+you deny him anything--" She checked herself, laughed in a confused
+way which confessed and defied.
+
+Palla's fixed smile was still stamped on her rigid lips as she made
+her adieux. Then she went out with death in her heart.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+At the Red Cross his mother exchanged a few words with her at
+intervals, as usual, during the seance.
+
+The conversation drifted toward the subject of religious orders in
+Russia, and Mrs. Shotwell asked her how it was that she came to begin
+a novitiate in a country where Catholic orders had, she understood,
+been forbidden permission to establish themselves in the realm of the
+Greek church.
+
+Palla explained in her sweet, colourless voice that the Czar had
+permitted certain religious orders to establish themselves--very few,
+however,--the number of nuns of all orders not exceeding five hundred.
+Also she explained that they were forbidden to make converts from the
+orthodox religion, which was why the Empress had sternly refused the
+pleading of the little Grand Duchess.
+
+"I do not think," added Palla, "that the Bolsheviki have left any
+Catholic nuns in Russia, unless perhaps they have spared the Sisters
+of Mercy. But I hear that non-cloistered orders like the Dominicans,
+and cloistered orders such as the Carmelites and Ursulines have been
+driven away.... I don't know whether this is true."
+
+Mrs. Shotwell, her eyes on her flying needle, said casually: "Have you
+never felt the desire to reconsider--to return to your novitiate?"
+
+The girl, bending low over her work, drew a deep, still breath.
+
+"Yes," she said, "it has occurred to me."
+
+"Does it still appeal to you at times?"
+
+The girl lifted her honest eyes: "In life there are moments when any
+refuge appeals."
+
+"Refuge from what?" asked Helen quietly.
+
+Palla did not evade the question: "From the unkindness of life," she
+said. "But I have concluded that such a motive for cloistered life is
+a cowardly one."
+
+"Was that your motive when you took the white veil?"
+
+"No, not then.... It seemed to be an overwhelming need for service
+and adoration.... It's strange how faiths change though need
+remains."
+
+"You still feel that need?"
+
+"Of course," said the girl simply.
+
+"I see. Your clubs and other service give you what you require to
+satisfy you and make you happy and contented."
+
+As Palla made no reply, Helen glanced at her askance; and caught a
+fleeting glimpse of tragedy in this girl's still face--the face of a
+cloistered nun burnt white--purged utterly of all save the mystic
+passion of the spirit.
+
+The face altered immediately, and colour came into it; and her slender
+hands were steady as she turned her bandage and cut off the thread.
+
+What thoughts concerning this girl were in her mind, Helen could
+neither entirely comprehend nor analyse. At moments a hot hatred for
+the girl passed over her like flame--anger because of what she was
+doing to her only son.
+
+For Jim had changed; and it was love for this woman that had changed
+him--which had made of him the silent, listless man whose grey face
+haunted his mother's dreams.
+
+That he, dissipating all her hopes of him, had fallen in love with
+Palla Dumont was enough unhappiness, it seemed; but that this girl
+should have found it possible to refuse him--that seemed to Helen a
+monstrous thing.
+
+And even were Jim able to forget the girl and free himself from this
+exasperating unhappiness which almost maddened his mother, still she
+must always afterward remember with bitterness the girl who had
+rejected her only son.
+
+Not since Palla had telephoned on that unfortunate night had she or
+Helen ever mentioned Jim. The mother, expecting his obsession to wear
+itself out, had been only too glad to approve the rupture.
+
+But recently, at moments, her courage had weakened when, evening after
+evening, she had watched her son where he sat so silent, listless, his
+eyes dull and remote and the book forgotten on his knees.
+
+A steady resentment for all this change in her son possessed Helen,
+varied by flashes of impulse to seize Palla and shake her into
+comprehension of her responsibility--of her astounding stupidity,
+perhaps.
+
+Not that she wanted her for a daughter-in-law. She wanted Elorn. But
+now she was beginning to understand that it never would be Elorn
+Sharrow. And--save when the change in Jim worried her too deeply--she
+remained obstinately determined that he should not bring this girl
+into the Shotwell family.
+
+And the amazing paradox was revealed in the fact that Palla fascinated
+her; that she believed her to be as fine as she was perverse; as
+honest as she was beautiful; as spiritually chaste as she knew her to
+be mentally and bodily untainted by anything ignoble.
+
+This, and because Palla was the woman to whom her son's unhappiness
+was wholly due, combined to exercise an uncanny fascination on Helen,
+so that she experienced a constant and haunting desire to be near the
+girl, where she could see her and hear her voice.
+
+At moments, even, she experienced a vague desire to intervene--do
+something to mitigate Jim's misery--yet realising all the while she
+did not desire Palla to relent.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+As for Palla, she was becoming too deeply worried over the darkening
+aspects of life to care what Helen thought, even if she had divined
+the occult trend of her mind toward herself.
+
+One thing after another seemed to crowd more threateningly upon
+her;--Jim's absence, Marya's attitude, and the certainty, now, that
+she saw Jim;--and then the grave illness of John Estridge and her
+apprehensions regarding Ilse; and the increasing difficulties of club
+problems; and the brutality and hatred which were becoming daily more
+noticeable in the opposition which she and Ilse were encountering.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+After a tiresome day, Palla left a new Hostess House which she had
+aided to establish, and took a Fifth Avenue bus, too weary to walk
+home.
+
+The day had been clear and sunny, and she wondered dully why it had
+left with her the impression of grey skies.
+
+Dusk came before she arrived at her house. She went into her unlighted
+living room, and threw herself on the lounge, lying with eyes closed
+and the back of one gloved hand across her temples.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+When a servant came to turn up the lamp, Palla had bitten her lip till
+the blood flecked her white glove. She sat up, declined to have tea,
+and, after the maid had departed, she remained seated, her teeth busy
+with her under lip again, her eyes fixed on space.
+
+After a long while her eyes swerved to note the clock and what its
+gilt hands indicated.
+
+And she seemed to arrive at a conclusion, for she went to her bedroom,
+drew a bath, and rang for her maid.
+
+"I want my rose evening gown," she said. "It needs a stitch or two
+where I tore it dancing."
+
+At six, not being dressed yet, she put on a belted chamber robe and
+trotted into the living room, as confidently as though she had no
+doubts concerning what she was about to do.
+
+It seemed to take a long while for the operator to make the
+connection, and Palla's hand trembled a little where it held the
+receiver tightly against her ear. When, presently, a servant
+answered:
+
+"Please say to him that a client wishes to speak to him regarding an
+investment."
+
+Finally she heard his voice saying: "This is Mr. James Shotwell
+Junior; who is it wishes to speak to me?"
+
+"A client," she faltered, "--who desires to--to participate with
+you in some plan for the purpose of--of improving our mutual
+relationship."
+
+"Palla." She could scarcely hear his voice.
+
+"I--I'm so unhappy, Jim. Could you come to-night?"
+
+He made no answer.
+
+"I suppose you haven't heard that Jack Estridge is very ill?" she
+added.
+
+"No. What is the trouble?"
+
+"Pneumonia. He's a little better to-night."
+
+She heard him utter: "That's terrible. That's a bad business." Then to
+her: "Where is he?"
+
+She told him. He said he'd call at the hospital. But he said nothing
+about seeing her.
+
+"I wondered," came her wistful voice, "whether, perhaps, you would
+dine here alone with me this evening."
+
+"Why do you ask me?"
+
+"Because--I--our last quarrel was so bitter--and I feel the hurt of it
+yet. It hurts even physically, Jim."
+
+"I did not mean to do such a thing to you."
+
+"No, I know you didn't. But that numb sort of pain is always there. I
+can't seem to get rid of it, no matter what I do."
+
+"Are you very busy still?"
+
+"Yes.... I saw--Marya--to-day."
+
+"Is that unusual?" he asked indifferently.
+
+"Yes. I haven't seen her since--since she and Vanya separated."
+
+"Oh! Have they separated?" he asked with such unfeigned surprise that
+the girl's heart leaped wildly.
+
+"Didn't you know it? Didn't Marya tell you?" she asked shivering with
+happiness.
+
+"I haven't seen her since I saw you," he replied.
+
+Palla's right hand flew to her breast and rested there while she
+strove to control her voice. Then:
+
+"Please, Jim, let us forgive and break bread again together. I--" she
+drew a deep, unsteady breath--"I can't tell you how our separation has
+made me feel. I don't quite know what it's done to me, either. Perhaps
+I can understand if I see you--if I could only see you again----"
+
+There ensued a silence so protracted that a shaft of fear struck
+through her. Then his voice, pleasantly collected:
+
+"I'll be around in a few minutes."
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+She was scared speechless when the bell rang--when she heard his
+unhurried step on the stair.
+
+Before he was announced by the maid, however, she had understood one
+problem in the scheme of things--realised it as she rose from the
+lounge and held out her slender hand.
+
+He took it and kept it. The maid retired.
+
+"Well, Palla," he said.
+
+"Well," she said, rather breathlessly, "--I know now."
+
+His voice and face seemed amiable and lifeless; his eyes, too,
+remained dull and incurious; but he said: "I don't think I understand.
+What is it you know?"
+
+"Shall I tell you?"
+
+"If you wish."
+
+His pleasant, listless manner chilled her; she hesitated, then turned
+away, withdrawing her hand.
+
+When she had seated herself on the sofa he dropped down beside her in
+his old place. She lighted a cigarette for him.
+
+"Tell me about poor old Jack," he said in a low voice.
+
+Their dinner was a pleasant but subdued affair. Afterward she played
+for him--interrupted once by a telephone call from Ilse, who said that
+John's temperature had risen a degree and the only thing to do was to
+watch him every second. But she refused Palla's offer to join her at
+the hospital, saying that she and the night nurse were sufficient; and
+the girl went slowly back to the piano.
+
+But, somehow, even that seemed too far away from her lover--or the man
+who once had been her avowed lover. And after idling-with the keys for
+a few minutes she came back to the lounge where he was seated.
+
+He looked up from his revery: "This is most comfortable, Palla," he
+said with a slight smile.
+
+"Do you like it?"
+
+"Of course."
+
+"You need not go away at all--if it pleases you." Her voice was so
+indistinct that for a moment he did not comprehend what she had said.
+Then he turned and looked at her. Both were pale enough now.
+
+"That is what--what I was going to tell you," she said. "Is it too
+late?"
+
+"Too late!"
+
+"To say that I am--in love with you."
+
+He flushed heavily and looked at her in a dazed way.
+
+"What do you mean?" he said.
+
+"I mean--if you want me--I am--am not afraid any more----"
+
+They had both risen instinctively, as though to face something vital.
+She said:
+
+"Don't ask me to submit to any degrading ceremony.... I love you
+enough."
+
+He said slowly: "Do you realise what you say? You are crazy! You and
+your socialist friends pretend to be fighting anarchy. You preach
+against Bolshevism! You warn the world that the Crimson Tide is
+rising. And every word you utter swells it! _You_ are the anarchists
+yourselves! You are the Bolsheviki of the world! You come bringing
+disorder where there is order; you substitute unproven theory for
+proven practice!
+
+"Like the hun, you come to impose your will on a world already content
+with its own God and its own belief! And that is autocracy; and
+autocracy is what you say you oppose!
+
+"I tell you and your friends that it was not wolves that were
+pupped in the sand of the shaggy Prussian forests when the first
+Hohenzollern was dropped. It was swine! Swine were farrowed;--not
+even _sanglier_, but decadent domestic swine;--when Wilhelm and his
+degenerate litter came out to root up Europe! And _they_ were the
+first real Bolsheviki!"
+
+He turned and began to stride to and fro; his pale, sunken face deeply
+shadowed, his hands clenching and unclenching.
+
+"What in God's name," he said fiercely, "are women like you doing to
+us! What do you suppose happens to such a man as I when the girl he
+loves tells him she cares only to be his mistress! What hope is there
+left in him?--what sense, what understanding, what faith?
+
+"You don't have to tell me that the Crimson Tide is rising. I saw it
+in the Argonne. I wish to God I were back there and the hun was still
+resisting. I wish I had never lived to come back here and see what
+demoralisation is threatening my own country from that cursed germ of
+wilful degeneracy born in the Prussian twilight, fed in Russian
+desolation, infecting the whole world----"
+
+His voice died in his throat; he walked swiftly past her, turned at
+the threshold:
+
+"I've known three of you," he said, "--you and Ilse and Marya. I've
+seen a lot of your associates and acquaintances who profess your
+views. And I've seen enough."
+
+He hesitated; then when he could control his voice again:
+
+"It's bad enough when a woman refuses marriage to a man she does not
+love. That man is going to be unhappy. But have you any idea what
+happens to him when the girl he loves, and who says she cares for him,
+refuses marriage?
+
+"It was terrible even when you cared for me only a little. But--but
+now--do you know what I think of your creed? I hate it as you hated
+the beasts who slew your friend! Damn your creed! To hell with it!"
+
+She covered her face with both hands: there was a noise like thunder
+in her brain.
+
+She heard the door close sharply in the hall below.
+
+This was the end.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+
+She felt a trifle weak. In her ears there lingered a dull, confused
+sensation, like the echo of things still falling. Something had gone
+very wrong with the scheme of nature. Even beneath her feet, now, the
+floor seemed unsteady, unreliable.
+
+A half-darkness dimmed her eyes; she laid one slim hand on the sofa-back
+and seated herself, fighting instinctively for consciousness.
+
+She sat there for a long while. The swimming faintness passed away. An
+intense stillness seemed to invade her, and the room, and the street
+outside. And for vast distances beyond. Half hours and hours rang
+clearly through the silence from the mantel-clock. So still was the
+place that a sheaf of petals falling from a fading rose on the piano
+seemed to fill the room with ghostly rustling.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+This, then, was the finish. Love had ended. Youth itself was ending,
+too, here in the dead silence of this lamplit room.
+
+There remained nothing more. Except that ever darkening horizon where,
+at the earth's ends, those grave shapes of cloud closed out the vista
+of remote skies.
+
+There seemed to be no shelter anywhere in the vast nakedness of the
+scheme of things--no shadow under which to crouch--no refuge.
+
+Dim visions of cloistered forms, moving in a blessed twilight, grew
+and assumed familiar shape amid the dumb desolation reigning in her
+brain. The spectral temptation passed, repassed; processional,
+recessional glided by, timed by her heart's low rhythm.
+
+But, little by little, she came to understand that there was no refuge
+even there; no mystic glow in the dark corridors of her own heart; no
+source of light save from the candles glimmering on the high altar; no
+aureole above the crucifix.
+
+Always, everywhere, there seemed to be no shelter, no roof above the
+scheme of things.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+She heard the telephone. As she slowly rose from the sofa she noted
+the hour as it sounded;--four o'clock in the morning.
+
+A man's voice was speaking--an unhurried, precise, low-pitched,
+monotonous voice:
+
+"This--is--the--Memorial Hospital. Doctor--Willis--speaking. Mr.--John--
+Estridge--died--at--ten minutes--to--four. Miss Westgard--wishes--to--
+go--to--your--residence--and--remain--over--night--if--convenient....
+Thank you. Miss--Westgard--will--go--to--you--immediately. Good-night."
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+Palla rose from her chair in the unfurnished drawing-room, went out
+into the hall, admitted Ilse, then locked and chained the two front
+doors.
+
+When she turned around, trembling and speechless, they kissed. But it
+was only Palla's mouth that trembled; and when they mounted the stairs
+it was Ilse's arm that supported Palla.
+
+Except that her eyes were heavy and seemed smeared with deep violet
+under the lower lids, Ilse did not appear very much changed.
+
+She took off her furs, hat, and gloves and sat down beside Palla. Her
+voice was quite clear and steady; there appeared to be no sign of
+shock or of grief, save for a passing tremor of her tired eyes now and
+then.
+
+She said: "We talked a little together, Jack and I, after I telephoned
+to you.
+
+"That was the last. His hand began to burn in mine steadily, like
+something on fire. And when, presently, I found he was not asleep, I
+motioned to the night nurse.
+
+"The change seemed to come suddenly; she went to find one of the
+internes; I sat with my hand on his pulse.... There were three
+physicians there.... Jack was not conscious after midnight."
+
+Palla's lips and throat were dry and aching and her voice almost
+inaudible:
+
+"Darling," she whispered, "--darling--if I could give him back to you
+and take his place!----"
+
+Ilse smiled, but her heavy eyelids quivered:
+
+"The scheme of things is so miserably patched together.... Except for
+the indestructible divinity within each one of us, it all would be so
+hopeless.... I had never been able to imagine Jack and Death
+together--" She looked up at the clock. "He was alive only an hour
+ago.... Isn't it strange--"
+
+"Oh, Ilse, Ilse! I wish this God who deals out such wickedness and
+misery had struck me down instead!"
+
+Neither seemed to notice the agnostic paradox in this bitter cry wrung
+from a young girl's grief.
+
+Ilse closed her eyes as though to rest them, and sat so, her steady
+hand on Palla's. And, so resting, said in her unfaltering voice:
+
+"Jack, of course, lives.... But it seems a long time to wait to see
+him."
+
+"Jack lives," whispered Palla.
+
+"Of course.... Only--it seems so long a time to wait.... I wanted to
+show him--how kind love has been to us--how still more wonderful love
+could have been to us ... for I could have borne him many children....
+And now I shall bear but one."
+
+After a silence, Palla lifted her eyes. In them the shadow of terror
+still lingered; there was not an atom of colour in her face.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+Ilse slept that night, though Palla scarcely closed her eyes. Dreadful
+details of the coming day rose up to haunt her--all the ghastly
+routine necessary before the dead lie finally undisturbed by the stir
+and movement of many footsteps--the coming and going of the living.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+Because what they called pneumonia was the Black Death of the ancient
+East, they had warned Ilse to remain aloof from that inert thing that
+had been her lover. So she did not look upon his face again.
+
+There were relatives of sorts at the chapel. None spoke to her. The
+sunshine on the flower-covered casket was almost spring like.
+
+And in the cemetery, too, there was no snow; and, under the dead
+grass, everywhere new herbage tinted the earth with delicate green.
+
+Ilse returned from the cemetery with Palla. Her black veil and
+garments made of her gold hair and blond skin a vivid beauty that
+grief had not subdued.
+
+That deathless courage which was part of her seemed to sustain the
+clear glow of her body's vigour as it upheld her dauntless spirit.
+
+"Did you see Jim in the chapel?" she asked quietly.
+
+Palla nodded. She had seen Marya, also. After a little while Ilse said
+gravely:
+
+"I think it no treachery to creed when one submits to the equally
+vital belief of another. I think our creed includes submission,
+because that also is part of love."
+
+Palla lifted her face in flushed surprise:
+
+"Is there any compromising with truth?" she asked.
+
+"I think love is the greatest truth. What difference does it make how
+we love?"
+
+"Does not our example count? You had the courage of your belief. Do
+you counsel me to subscribe to what I do not believe by acquiescing in
+it?"
+
+Ilse closed her sea-blue eyes as though fatigued. She said dreamily:
+
+"I think that to believe in love and mating and the bearing of
+children is the only important belief in the world. But under what
+local laws you go about doing these things seems to be of minor
+importance,--a matter, I should say, of personal inclination."
+
+Ilse wished to go home. That is, to her own apartment, where now were
+enshrined all her memories of this dead man who had given to her
+womanhood that ultimate crown which in her eyes seemed perfect.
+
+She said serenely to Palla: "Mine is not the loneliness that craves
+company with the living. I have a long time to wait; that is all. And
+after a while I shall not wait alone.
+
+"So you must not grieve for me, darling. You see I know that Jack
+lives. It's just the long, long wait that calls for courage. But I
+think it is a little easier to wait alone until--until there are two
+to wait--for him----"
+
+"Will you call me when you want me, Ilse?"
+
+"Always, darling. Don't grieve. Few women know happiness. I have known
+it. I know it now. It shall not even die with me."
+
+She smiled faintly and turned to enter her doorway; and Palla
+continued on alone toward that dwelling which she called home.
+
+The mourning which she had worn for her aunt, and which she had worn
+for John Estridge that morning, she now put off, although vaguely
+inclined for it. But she shrank from the explanations in which it was
+certain she must become involved when on duty at the Red Cross and the
+canteen that afternoon.
+
+Undressed, she sent her maid for a cup of tea, feeling too tired for
+luncheon. Afterward she lay down on her bed, meaning merely to close
+her eyes for a moment.
+
+It was after four in the afternoon when she sat up with a start--too
+late for the Red Cross; but she could do something at the canteen.
+
+She went about dressing as though bruised. It seemed to take an
+interminable time. Her maid called a taxi; but the short winter
+daylight had nearly gone when she arrived at the canteen.
+
+She remained there on kitchen duty until seven, then untied her white
+tablier, washed, pinned on her hat, and went out into the light-shot
+darkness of the streets and turned her steps once more toward home.
+
+There is, among the weirder newspapers of the metropolis, a sheet
+affectionately known as "pink-and-punk," the circulation of which
+seems to depend upon its distribution of fake "extras."
+
+As Palla turned into her street, shabby men with hoarse voices were
+calling an extra and selling the newspaper in question.
+
+She bought one, glanced at the headlines, then, folding it, unlocked
+her door.
+
+Dinner was announced almost immediately, but she could not touch it.
+
+She sank down on the sofa, still wearing her furs and hat. After a
+little while she opened her newspaper.
+
+It seemed that a Bolsheviki plot had been discovered to murder the
+premiers and rulers of the allied nations, and to begin simultaneously
+in every capital and principal city of Europe and America a reign of
+murder and destruction.
+
+In fact, according to the account printed in startling type, the
+Terrorists had already begun their destructive programme in
+Philadelphia. Half a dozen buildings--private dwellings and one small
+hotel--had been more or less damaged by bombs. A New York man named
+Wilding, fairly well known as an impresario, had been killed outright;
+and a Russian pianist, Vanya Tchernov, who had just arrived in
+Philadelphia to complete arrangements for a concert to be given by him
+under Mr. Wilding's management, had been fatally injured by the
+collapse of the hotel office which, at that moment, he was leaving in
+company with Mr. Wilding.
+
+A numbness settled over Palla's brain. She did not seem to be able
+to comprehend that this affair concerned Vanya--that this newspaper
+was telling her that Vanya had been fatally hurt somewhere in
+Philadelphia.
+
+Hours later, while she was lying on the lounge with her face buried in
+the cushions, and still wearing her hat and furs, somebody came into
+the room. And when she turned over she saw it was Ilse.
+
+Palla sat up stupidly, the marks of tears still glistening under her
+eyes. Ilse picked up the newspaper from the couch, laid it aside, and
+seated herself.
+
+"So you know about Vanya?" she said calmly.
+
+Palla nodded.
+
+"You don't know all. Marya called me on the telephone a few minutes
+ago to tell me."
+
+"Vanya is dead," whispered Palla.
+
+"Yes. They found an unmailed letter directed to Marya in his pockets.
+That's why they notified her."
+
+After an interval: "So Vanya is dead," repeated Palla under her
+breath.
+
+Ilse sat plaiting the black edges of her handkerchief.
+
+"It's such a--a senseless interruption--death----" she murmured. "It
+seems so wanton, so meaningless in the scheme of things ... to make
+two people wait so long--so long!--to resume where they had been
+interrupted----"
+
+Palla asked coldly whether Marya had seemed greatly shocked.
+
+"I don't know, Palla. She called me up and told me. I asked her if
+there was anything I could do; and she answered rather strangely that
+what remained for her to do she would do alone. I don't know what she
+meant."
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+Whether Marya herself knew exactly what she meant seemed not to be
+entirely clear to her. For, when Mr. Puma, dressed in a travelling
+suit and carrying a satchel, arrived at her apartment in the Hotel
+Rajah, and entered the reception room with his soundless, springy
+step, she came out of her bedroom partly dressed, and still hooking
+her waist.
+
+"What are you doing here?" she demanded contemptuously, looking him
+over from, head to foot. "Did you really suppose I meant to go to
+Mexico with you?"
+
+His heavy features crimsoned: "What pleasantry is this, my Marya?----"
+he began; but the green blaze in her slanting eyes silenced him.
+
+"The difference," she said, "between us is this. You run from those
+who threaten you. I kill them."
+
+"Of--of what nonsense are you speaking!" he stammered. "All is
+arranged that we shall go at eleven----"
+
+"No," she said wearily, "one sometimes plays with stray animals for a
+few moments--and that is all. And that is all I ever saw in you,
+Angelo--a stray beast to amuse and entertain me between two yawns and
+a cup of tea." She shrugged, still twisted lithely in her struggle to
+hook her waist. "You may go," she added, not even looking at him, "or,
+if you are not too cowardly, you may come with me to the Red Flag
+Club."
+
+"In God's name what do you mean----"
+
+"Mean? I mean to take my pistol to the Red Flag Club and kill some
+Bolsheviki. That is what I mean, my Angelo--my ruddy Eurasian pig!"
+
+She slipped in the last hook, turned and enveloped him again with an
+insolent, slanting glance: "_Allons!_ Do you come to the Red Flag?"
+
+"Marya----"
+
+"Yes or no! _Allez!_"
+
+"My God, are--are you then demented?" he faltered.
+
+"My God, I'm not," she mimicked him, "but I can't answer for what I
+might do to you if you hang around this apartment any longer."
+
+She came slowly toward him, her hands bracketed on her hips, her
+strange eyes narrowing.
+
+"Listen to me," she said. "I have loved many times. But never _you_!
+One doesn't love your kind. One experiments, possibly, if idle.
+
+"A man died to-day whom I loved; but was too stupid to love enough.
+Perhaps he knows now how stupid I am.... Unless they blew his soul to
+pieces, also. _Allez!_ Good-night. I tell you I have business to
+attend to, and you stand there rolling your woman's eyes at me!----"
+
+"Damn you!" he said between his teeth. "What is the matter with
+you----"
+
+He had caught her arm; she wrenched it free, tearing the sleeve to her
+naked shoulder.
+
+Then she went to her desk and took a pistol from an upper drawer.
+
+"If you don't go," she said, "I shall have to shoot you and leave you
+here kicking on the carpet."
+
+"In God's name, Marya!" he cried hoarsely, "who is it you shall kill
+at the hall?"
+
+"I shall kill Sondheim and Bromberg and Kastner, I hope. What of it?"
+
+"But--if I go to-night--the others will say _I_ did it! I can't run
+away if you do such thing! I can not go into Mexico but they shall
+arrest me before I am at the border----"
+
+"Eurasian pig, I shall admit the killing!" she said with a green gleam
+in her eyes that perhaps was laughter.
+
+"Yes, my Marya," he explained in agony, the sweat pouring from his
+temples, "but if they think me your accomplice they shall arrest me.
+Me--I can not wait--I shall be ruined if I am arrest! You do not
+comprehend. I have not said it to you how it is that I am compel to
+travel with some money which--which is not--my own."
+
+Marya looked at him for a long while. Suddenly she flung the pistol
+into a corner, threw back her head while peal on peal of laughter rang
+out in the room.
+
+"A thief," she said, fairly holding her slender sides between gemmed
+fingers: "--Just a Levantine thief, after all! Not a thing to shoot.
+Not a man. No! But a giant cockroach from the tropics. Ugh! Too large
+to place one's foot upon!----"
+
+She came leisurely forward, halted, inspected him with laughing
+insolence:
+
+"And the others--Kastner, Sondheim--and the other vermin? You were
+quite right. Why should I kill them--merely because to-day a real man
+died? What if they are the same species of vermin that slew Vanya
+Tchernov? They are not men to pay for it. My pistol could not make a
+dead man out of a live louse! No, you are quite correct. You know your
+own kind. It would be no compliment to Vanya if I should give these
+vermin the death that real men die!"
+
+Puma stood close to the door, furtively passing a thick tongue over
+his dry, blanched lips.
+
+"Then you will not interfere?" he asked softly.
+
+She shrugged her shoulders: one was bare with the torn sleeve
+dangling. "No," she said wearily. "Run home, painted pig. After all,
+the world is mostly swine.... I, too, it seems----" She half raised
+her arms, but the gesture failed, and she stood thinking again and
+staring at the curtained window. She did not hear him leave.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+
+In the strange, springlike weather which prevailed during the last
+days of January, Vanya was buried under skies as fleecy blue as
+April's, and Marya Lanois went back to the studio apartment where she
+and Vanya had lived together. And here, alone, in the first month of
+the new year, she picked up again the ravelled threads of life,
+undecided whether to untangle them or to cut them short and move on
+once more to further misadventure; or to Vanya; or somewhere--or
+perhaps nowhere. So, pending some decision, she left her pistol
+loaded.
+
+Afternoon sunshine poured into the studio between antique silken
+curtains, now drawn wide to the outer day for the first time since
+these two young people had established for themselves a habitation.
+
+And what, heretofore, even the lighted mosque-lamps had scarcely half
+revealed, now lay exposed to outer air and daylight, gilded by the
+sun--cabinets and chests of ancient lacquer; deep-toned carpets in
+which slumbered jewelled fires of Asia; carved gods from the East,
+crusted with soft gold; and tapestries of silk shot with amethyst and
+saffron, centred by dragons and guarded by the burning pearl.
+
+Over all these, and the great mosque lantern drooping from above, the
+false-spring sunshine fell; and through every open window flowed soft,
+deceptive winds, fluttering the leaves of music on the piano,
+stirring the clustered sheafs of growing jonquils and narcissus, so
+that they swayed in their Chinese bowls.
+
+Marya, in black, arranged her tiger-ruddy hair before an ancient
+grotesquerie set with a reflecting glass in which, on some days, one
+could see the form of the Lord Buddha, though none could ever tell
+from whence the image came.
+
+Where Vanya had left his music opened on the piano rack, the sacred
+pages now stirred slightly as the soft wind blew; and scented bells of
+Frisia swayed and bowed around a bowl where gold-fish glowed.
+
+Marya, at the piano, reading at sight from his inked manuscript, came
+presently to the end of what was scored there--merely the first sketch
+for a little spring song.
+
+Some day she would finish it as part of a new debt--new obligations
+she had now assumed in the slowly increasing light of new beliefs.
+
+As she laid Vanya's last manuscript aside, under it she discovered one
+of her own--a cynical, ribald, pencilled parody which she remembered
+she had scribbled there in an access of malicious perversity.
+
+As though curious to sound the obscurer depths of what she had been
+when this jeering cynicism expressed her mood, she began to read from
+her score and words, playing and intoning:
+
+                            "CROQUE-MITAINE.
+
+              "Parfait qu'on attend La Maree Rouge,
+               La chose est positive.
+               On n'sait pas quand el' bouge,
+               Mais on sait qu'el' arrive.
+                  La Maree Rouge arrivera
+                  Et tout le monde en crevera!
+
+              "Croque'morts, sacristains et abbes,
+               Dans leurs sacre's boutiques
+               Se cachent aupres des machabe's
+               En repetant des cantiques.
+               Pape, cardinal, et sacre soeur
+               Miaulent avec tout leurs cliques,
+               Lorsque les Bolsheviks reprenn 'nt en choeur;
+                  Mort aux saligaudes chic!
+
+              "La Maree Rouge montera
+               Et la bourgeoisie en crevera!"
+
+The vicious irony of the atrocious parody--words and music--died out
+in the sunny silence: for a few moments the girl sat staring at the
+scored page; then she leaned forward, and, taking the manuscript in
+both hands, tore it into pieces.
+
+She was still occupied in destroying the unclean thing when a servant
+appeared, and in subdued voice announced Palla and Ilse.
+
+They came in as Marya swept the tattered scraps of paper into an
+incense-bowl, dropped a lighted match upon them, and set the ancient
+bronze vessel on the sill of the open window.
+
+"Some of my vileness I am burning," she said, coming forward and
+kissing Ilse on both cheeks.
+
+Then, looking Palla steadily in the eyes, she bent forward and touched
+her lips with her own.
+
+"Nechevo," she said; "the thing that dwelt within me for a time has
+continued on its way to hell, I hope."
+
+She took the pale girl by both hands: "Do you understand?"
+
+And Palla kissed her.
+
+When they were seated: "What religious order would be likely to accept
+me?" she asked serenely. And answered her own question: "None would
+tolerate me--no order with its rigid systems of inquiry and its
+merciless investigations.... And yet--I wonder.... Perhaps, as a
+lay-sister in some missionary order--where few care to serve--where
+life resembles death as one twin the other.... I don't know: I wonder,
+Palla."
+
+Palla asked her in a low voice if she had seen the afternoon paper.
+Marya did not reply at once; but presently over her face a hot
+rose-glow spread and deepened. Then, after a silence:
+
+"The paper mentioned me as Vanya's wife. Is that what you mean? Yes; I
+told them that.... It made no difference, for they would have
+discovered it anyway. And I scarcely know why I made Vanya lie about
+it to you all;--why I wished people to think otherwise.... Because I
+have been married to Vanya since the beginning.... And I can not
+explain why I have not told you."
+
+She touched a rosebud in the vase that stood beside her, broke the
+stem absently, and sat examining it in silence. And, after a few
+moments:
+
+"As a child I was too imaginative.... We do not change--we women.
+Married, unmarried, too wise, or too innocent, we remain what we were
+when our mothers bore us.... Whatever we do, we never change within:
+we remain, in our souls, what we first were. And unaltered we die....
+In morgue or prison or Potter's Field, where lies a dead female thing
+in a tattered skirt, there, hidden somewhere under rag and skin and
+bone, lies a dead girl-child."
+
+She laid the unopened rosebud on Palla's knees; her preoccupied gaze
+wandered around that silent, sunlit place.
+
+"I could have taken my pistol," she said softly, "and I could have
+killed a few among those whose doctrines at last slew Vanya.... Or I
+could have killed myself."
+
+She turned and her remote gaze came back to fix itself on Palla.
+
+"But, somehow, I think that Vanya would grieve.... And he has grieved
+enough. Do you think so, Palla?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+Ilse said thoughtfully: "There is always enough death on earth. And to
+live honestly, and love undauntedly, and serve humanity with a clean
+heart is the most certain way to help the slaying of that thing which
+murdered Vanya."
+
+Palla gazed at Marya, profoundly preoccupied by the astounding
+revelation that she had been Vanya's legal wife; and in her brown eyes
+the stunned wonder of it still remained, nor could she seem to think
+of anything except of that amazing fact.
+
+When they stood up to take leave of Marya, the rosebud dropped from
+Palla's lap, and Marya picked it up and offered it again.
+
+"It should open," she said, her strange smile glimmering. "Cold water
+and a little salt, my Palla--that is all rosebuds need--that is all we
+women need--a little water to cool and freshen us; a little salt for
+all the doubtful worldly knowledge we imbibe."
+
+She took Palla's hands and bent her lips to them, then lifted her
+tawny head:
+
+"What do words matter? _Slava, slava_, under the moon! Words are
+but symbols of needs--your need and Ilse's and mine--and Jack's
+and Vanya's--and the master-word differs as differ our several
+needs. And if I say Christ and Buddha and I are one, let me so
+believe, if that be my need. Or if, from some high minarette, I
+lift my voice proclaiming the unity of God!--or if I confess the
+Trinity!--or if, for me, the god-fire smoulders only within my own
+accepted soul--what does it matter? Slava, slava--the word and the
+need spell Love--whatever the deed, Palla--my Palla!--whatever the
+deed, and despite it."
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+As they came, together, to Palla's house and entered the empty
+drawing-room, Ilse said:
+
+"In mysticism there seems to be no reasoning--nothing definite save
+only an occult and overwhelming restlessness.... Marya may take the
+veil ... or nurse lepers ... or she may become a famous courtesan....
+I do not mean it cruelly. But, in the mystic, the spiritual, the
+intellectual and the physical seem to be interchangeable, and become
+gradually indistinguishable."
+
+"That is a frightful analysis," murmured Palla. A little shiver passed
+over her and she laid the rosebud against her lips.
+
+Ilse said: "Marya is right: love is the world's overwhelming need. The
+way to love is to serve; and if we serve we must renounce something."
+
+They locked arms and began to pace the empty room.
+
+"What should I renounce?" asked Palla faintly.
+
+Ilse smiled that wise, wholesome smile of hers:
+
+"Suppose you renounce your own omniscience, darling," she suggested.
+
+"I do not think myself omniscient," retorted the girl, colouring.
+
+"No? Well, darling, from where then do you derive your authority to
+cancel the credentials of the Most High?"
+
+"What!"
+
+"On what authority except your own omniscience do you so confidently
+preach the non-existence of omnipotence?"
+
+Palla turned her flushed face in sensitive astonishment under the
+gentle mockery.
+
+Ilse said: "Love has many names; and so has God. And all are good. If,
+to you, God means that little flame within you, then that is good. And
+so, to others, according to their needs.... And it is the same with
+love.... So, if for the man you love, love can be written only as a
+phrase--if the word love be only one element in a trinity of which the
+other two are Law and Wedlock--does it really matter, darling?"
+
+"You mean I--I am to renounce my--creed?"
+
+Ilse shook her head: "Who cares? The years develop and change
+everything--even creeds. Do you think your lover would care whether,
+at twenty-odd, you worship the flaming godhead itself, or whether
+you guard in spirit that lost spark from it which has become
+entangled with your soul?--whether you really do believe the man-made
+law that licenses your mating; or whether you reject it as a silly
+superstition? To a business man, convention is merely a safe
+procedure which, ignored, causes disaster--he knows that whenever
+he ignores it--as when he drives a car bearing no license; and the
+police stop him."
+
+"I never expected to hear this from you, Ilse."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"You are unmarried."
+
+"No, Palla."
+
+The girl stared at her: "Did you _marry_ Jack?" she gasped.
+
+"Yes. In the hospital."
+
+"Oh, Ilse!----"
+
+"He asked me."
+
+"But--" her mouth quivered and she bent her head and placed her hand
+on Ilse's arm for guidance, because the starting tears were
+blinding her now. And at last she found her voice: "I meant I am so
+thankful--darling--it's been a--a nightmare----"
+
+"It would have been one to me if I had refused him. Except that Jack
+wished it, I did not care.... But I have lately learned--some
+things."
+
+"You--you consented because he wished it?"
+
+"Of course. Is not that our law?"
+
+"Do you so construe the Law of Love and Service? Does it permit us to
+seek protection under false pretences; to say yes when we mean no; to
+kneel before a God we do not believe in; to accept immunity under a
+law we do not believe in?"
+
+"If all this concerned only one's self, then, no! Or, if the man
+believed as we do, no! But even then--" she shook her head slowly,
+"unless _all_ agree, it is unfair."
+
+"Unfair?"
+
+"Yes, it is unfair if you have a baby. Isn't it, darling? Isn't it
+unfair and tyrannical?"
+
+"You mean that a child should not arbitrarily be placed by its parents
+at what it might later consider a disadvantage?"
+
+"Of course I mean just that. Do you know, Palla, what Jack once said
+of us? He said--rather brutally, I thought--that you and I were
+immaturely un-moral and pitiably unbaked; and that the best thing for
+both of us was to marry and have a few children before we tried to do
+any more independent thinking."
+
+Palla's reply was: "He was such a dear!" But what she said did not
+seem absurd to either of them.
+
+Ilse added: "You know yourself, darling, what a relief it was to you
+to learn that I had married Jack. I think you even said something
+like, 'Thank God,' when you were choking back the tears."
+
+Palla flushed brightly: "I meant--" but her voice ended in a sob.
+Then, all of a sudden, she broke down--went all to pieces there in the
+dim and empty little drawing-room--down on her knees, clinging to
+Ilse's skirts....
+
+She wished to go to her room alone; and so Ilse, watching her climb
+the stairs as though they led to some dread calvary, opened the front
+door and went her lonely way, drawing the mourning veil around her
+face and throat.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+
+Leila Vance, lunching with Elorn Sharrow at the Ritz, spoke of
+Estridge:
+
+"There seem to be so many of these well-born men who marry women we
+never heard of."
+
+"Perhaps we ought to have heard of them," suggested Elorn, smilingly.
+"The trouble may lie with us."
+
+"It does, dear. But it's something we can't help, unless we change
+radically. Because we don't stand the chance we once did. We never
+have been as attractive to men as the other sort. But once men thought
+they couldn't marry the other sort. Now they think they can. And they
+do if they have to."
+
+"What other sort?" asked Elorn, not entirely understanding.
+
+"The sort of girl who ignores the customs which make us what we are.
+We don't stand a chance with professional women any more. We don't
+compare in interest to girls who are arbiters of their own destinies.
+
+"Take the stage as an illustration. Once the popularity of women who
+made it their profession was due partly to glamour, partly because
+that art drew to it and concentrated the very best-looking among us.
+But it's something else now that attracts men; it's the attraction of
+women who are doing something--clever, experienced, interesting, girls
+who know how to take care of themselves and who are not afraid to give
+to men a frank and gay companionship outside those conventional
+limits which circumscribe us."
+
+Elorn nodded.
+
+"It's quite true," said Leila. "The independent professional girl
+to-day, whatever art or business engages her, is the paramount
+attraction to men.
+
+"A few do sneak back to us after a jolly caper in the open--a few
+timid ones, or snobs of sorts--thrifty, perhaps, or otherwise
+material, or cautious. But that's about all we get as husbands in
+these devilish days of general feminine _bouleversement_. And it's a
+sad and instructive fact, Elorn. But there seems to be nothing to do
+about it."
+
+Elorn said musingly: "The main thing seems to be that men admire a
+girl's effort to get somewhere--when she happens to be good-looking."
+
+"It's a cynical fact, dear; they certainly do. And now that they
+realise they have to marry these girls if they want them--why, they
+do."
+
+Elorn dissected her ice. "You know Stanley Wardner," she remarked.
+
+"Mortimer Wardner's son?"
+
+Elorn nodded. "He became a queer kind of sculptor. I think it is
+called a Concentrationist. Well, he's concentrated for life, now."
+
+"Whom did he marry?" asked Leila, laughing.
+
+"A girl named Questa Terrett. You never heard of her, did you?"
+
+"No. And I can imagine the moans and groans of the Mortimer
+Wardners."
+
+"I have heard so. She lives--_they_ live now, together, in Abdingdon
+Square, where she possesses a studio and nearly a dozen West Highland
+terriers."
+
+"What else does she do?" inquired Leila, still laughing.
+
+"She writes cleverly when she needs an income; otherwise, she produces
+obscure poems with malice aforethought, and laughs in her sleeve, they
+say, when the precious-minded rave."
+
+Leila reverted to Estridge:
+
+"I had no idea he was married," she said. "Palla Dumont introduced his
+widow to me the other day--a most superb and beautiful creature. But,
+oh dear I--can you fancy her having once served as a girl-soldier in
+the Russian Battalion of Death!"
+
+The slightest shadow crossed Elorn's face.
+
+"By the way," added Leila, following quite innocently her trend of
+thought, "Helen Shotwell tells me that her son is going back to the
+army if he can secure a commission."
+
+"Yes, I believe so," said Elorn serenely.
+
+Leila went on: "I fancy there'll be a lot of them. A taste of service
+seems to spoil most young men for a piping career of peace."
+
+"He cares nothing for his business."
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"Real estate. He is with my father, you know."
+
+"Of course. I remember--" She suddenly seemed to recollect something
+else, also--not, perhaps, quite certain of it, but instinctively
+playing safe. So she refrained from saying anything about this young
+man's recent devotion to her friend, Palla Dumont, although that was
+the subject which she had intended to introduce.
+
+And, smiling to herself, she thought it a close call, because she had
+meant to ask Elorn whether she knew why the Shotwell boy had so
+entirely deserted her little friend Palla.
+
+The Shotwell boy himself happened to be involved at that very moment,
+in matters concerning a friend of Mrs. Vance's little friend Palla--in
+fact, he had been trying, for the last half hour, to find this friend
+of Palla's on the telephone. The friend in question was Alonzo D.
+Pawling. And he was being vigorously paged at the Hotel Rajah.
+
+As for Jim, he remained seated in the private office of Angelo Puma,
+whither he had been summoned in professional capacity by one Skidder,
+the same being Elmer, and partner of the Puma aforesaid.
+
+The door was locked; the room in disorder. Safe, letter-files,
+cupboards, desks had been torn open and their contents littered the
+place.
+
+Skidder, in an agony of perspiring fright, kept running about the room
+like a distracted squirrel. Jim watched him, darkly preoccupied with
+other things, including the whereabouts of Mr. Pawling.
+
+"You say," he said to Skidder, "that Mr. Pawling will confirm what you
+have told me?"
+
+"John D. Pawling knows damn well I own this plant!"
+
+Jim shook his head: "I'm sorry, but that isn't sufficient. I can only
+repeat to you that there is no point in calling me in at present. You
+have no legal right to offer this property for sale. It belongs,
+apparently, to the creditors of your firm. What you require first of
+all is a lawyer----"
+
+"I don't want a lawyer and I don't want publicity before I get
+something out of this dirty mess that scoundrel left behind!" cried
+Skidder, snapping his eyes like mad and swinging his arms. "I got to
+get something, haven't I? Isn't this property mine? Can't I sell it?"
+
+"Apparently not, under the terms of your agreement with Puma,"
+replied Jim, wearily. "However, I'm willing to hear what Mr. Pawling
+has to say."
+
+"You mean to tell me, Puma fixed it so I'm stuck with all his debts?
+You mean to say my own personal property is subject to seizure to
+satisfy----"
+
+"I certainly do mean just that, Mr. Skidder. But I'm not a lawyer----"
+
+"I tell you I want to get something for myself before I let loose any
+lawyers on the premises! I'll make it all right with you----"
+
+"It's out of the question. We wouldn't touch the property----"
+
+"I'll take a quarter of its value in spot cash! I'll give you ten
+thousand to put it through to-day!"
+
+"Why can't you understand that what you suggest would amount to
+collusion?"
+
+"What I propose is to get a slice of what's mine!" yelled Skidder,
+fairly dancing with fury. "D'yeh think I'm going to let that crooked
+wop, Puma, do this to me just like that! D'yeh think he's going to get
+away with all my money and all Pawling's money and leave me planted on
+my neck while about a million other guys come and sell me out and fill
+their pants pockets with what's mine?"
+
+Jim said: "If Mr. Pawling is the very rich man you say he is, he's not
+going to let the defalcation of this fellow, Puma, destroy such a
+paying property."
+
+"Damn it, I don't want him to buy it in for himself and freeze me out!
+I can't stop him, either; Puma's got all my money except what's in
+this parcel. And you betcha life I hang onto this, creditors or no
+creditors, and Pawling to the contrary! He knows damn well it belongs
+to me. Try him again at the Rajah----"
+
+"They're paging him. I left the number. But I tell you the proper
+thing for you to do is to go to a lawyer, and then to the police,"
+repeated Jim. "There's nothing else to do. This fellow, Puma, may have
+run for the Mexican border, or he may still be in the United States.
+Without a passport he couldn't very easily get on any trans-Atlantic
+boat or any South American boat either. The proper procedure is to
+notify the police----"
+
+"Nix on the police!" shouted Skidder. "That'll start the land-slide,
+and the whole shooting-match will go. I want _this_ property. If the
+papers show it's subject to the firm's liabilities, then that dirty
+skunk altered the thing. It's forgery.
+
+"I never was fool enough to lump this parcel in with our assets. Not
+me. It's forgery; that's what it is, and this parcel belongs to me,
+privately----"
+
+"See an attorney," repeated Jim patiently. "You can't keep a thing
+like this out of the papers, Mr. Skidder. Why, here's a man, Angelo
+Puma, who pounces on every convertible asset of his firm, stuffs a
+valise full of real money, and beats it for parts unknown.
+
+"That's a matter for the police. You can't hope to hide it for more
+than a day or two longer. Your firm is bankrupt through the rascality
+of a partner. He's gone with all the money he could scrape together.
+He converted everything into cash; he lied, swindled, stole, and
+skipped. And what he didn't take must remain to satisfy the firm's
+creditors. You can't conceal conditions, slyly pocket what Puma has
+left and then call in an attorney. That's criminal. You have your
+contracts to fulfil; you have a studio full of people whose salaries
+are nearly due; you have running expenses; you have notes to meet; you
+have obligations to face when a dozen or so contractors for your new
+theatre come to you on Saturday----"
+
+"You mean that's all up to me?" shrieked Skidder, squinting horribly
+at a framed photograph of Puma. And suddenly he ran at it and hurled
+it to the floor and began to kick it about with strange, provincial
+maledictions:
+
+"Dern yeh, yeh poor blimgasted thing! I'll skin yeh, yeh dumb-faced,
+ring-boned, two-edged son-of-a-skunk!----"
+
+The telephone's clamour silenced him. Jim answered:
+
+"Who? Oh, long-distance. All right." And he waited. Then, again: "Who
+wants him?... Yes, he's here in the office, now.... Yes, he'll come to
+the 'phone."
+
+And to Skidder: "Shadow Hill wants to speak to you."
+
+"I won't go. By God, if this thing is out!--Who the hell is it wants
+to speak to me? Wait! Maybe it's Alonzo D. Pawling!----"
+
+"Shall I inquire?" And he asked for further information over the wire.
+Then, presently, and turning again to Skidder:
+
+"You'd better come to the wire. It seems to be the Chief of Police who
+wants you."
+
+Skidder's unhealthy skin became ghastly. He came over and took the
+instrument:
+
+"What d'ye want, Chief? Sure it's me, Elmer.... Hey? Who? Alonzo D.
+Pawling? My God, is he dead? Took _pizen_! W-what for! He's a rich
+man, ain't he?... Speculated?... You say he took the bank's funds?
+Trust funds? What!" he screeched--"put 'em into _my_ company! He's a
+liar! ... I don't care what letters he left!... Well, all right
+then. Sure, I'll get a lawyer----"
+
+"Tell him to hold that wire!" cut in Jim; and took the receiver from
+Skidder's shaking fingers.
+
+"Is the Shadow Hill Trust Company insolvent?" he asked. "You say that
+the bank closed its doors this morning? Have you any idea of its
+condition? Looted? Is it entirely cleaned out? Is there no chance for
+depositors? I wish to inquire about the trust funds, bonds and other
+investments belonging to a friend of mine, Miss Dumont.... Yes, I'll
+wait."
+
+He turned a troubled and sombre gaze toward Skidder, who sat there
+pasty-faced, with sagging jaw, staring back at him. And presently:
+
+"Yes.... Yes, this is Mr. Shotwell, a friend of Miss Dumont....
+Yes.... Yes.... Yes.... I see.... Yes, I shall try to communicate with
+her immediately.... Yes, I suppose the news will be published in the
+evening papers.... Certainly.... Yes, I have no doubt that she will go
+at once to Shadow Hill.... Thank you.... Yes, it does seem rather
+hopeless.... I'll try to find her and break it to her.... Thank you.
+Good-bye."
+
+He hung up the receiver, took his hat and coat, his eyes fixed
+absently on Skidder.
+
+"You'd better beat it to your attorney," he remarked, and went out.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+He could not find Palla. She was not at the Red Cross, not at the
+canteen, not at the new Hostess House.
+
+He telephoned Ilse for information, but she was not at home.
+
+Twice he called at Palla's house, leaving a message the last time
+that she should telephone him at the club on her arrival.
+
+He went to the club and waited there, trying to read. At a quarter to
+six o'clock no message from her had come.
+
+Again he telephoned Ilse; she had not returned. He even telephoned to
+Marya, loath to disturb her; but she, also, was not at home.
+
+The chances that he could break the news to Palla before she read it
+in the evening paper were becoming negligible. He had done his best to
+forestall them. But at six the evening papers arrived at the club. And
+in every one of them was an account of the defalcation and suicide of
+the Honorable Alonzo D. Pawling, president of the Shadow Hill Trust
+Company. But nothing yet concerning the defalcation and disappearance
+of Angelo Puma.
+
+Jim had no inclination to eat, but he tried to at seven-thirty, still
+waiting and hoping for a message from Palla.
+
+He tried her house again about half past eight. This time the maid
+answered that Miss Dumont had telephoned from down town that she would
+dine out and go afterward to the Combat Club. And that if Mr. Shotwell
+desired to see her he should call at her house after ten o'clock.
+
+So Jim hastened to the cloak-room, got his hat and coat, found the
+starter, secured a taxi, bought an evening paper and stuffed it into
+his pocket, and started out to find Palla at the Combat Club. For it
+seemed evident to him that she had not yet read the evening paper; and
+he hoped he might yet encounter her in time to prepare her for news
+which, according to the newspapers, appeared even blacker than he had
+supposed it might be.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+
+As he left the taxi in front of the dirty brick archway and flight of
+steps leading to the hall, where he expected to find Palla, he noticed
+a small crowd of wrangling foreigners gathered there--men and
+women--and a policeman posted near, calm and indifferent, juggling his
+club at the end of its leather thong.
+
+Jim paused to inquire if there had been any trouble there that
+evening.
+
+"Well," said the policeman, "there's two talking-clubs that chew
+the rag in that joint. It's the Reds' night, but wan o' the ladies
+of the other club showed up--Miss Dumont--and the Reds yonder was all
+for chasing her out. So we run in a couple of 'em--that feller
+Sondheim and another called Bromberg. They're wanted, anyhow, in
+Philadelphia."
+
+"Is there a meeting inside?"
+
+"Sure. The young lady went in to settle it peaceful like; and she's
+inside now jawin' at them Reds to beat a pink tea."
+
+"Do you apprehend any violence?" asked Jim uneasily.
+
+The policeman juggled his club and eyed him. "I--guess--not," he
+drawled. And, to the jabbering, wrangling crowd on pavement and steps:
+"--Hey, you! Go in or stay out, one or the other, now! Step lively;
+you're blockin' the sidewalk."
+
+A number of people mounted the steps and went in with Jim. As the
+doors to the hall opened, a flare of smoky light struck him, and he
+pushed his way into the hall, where a restless, murmuring audience,
+some seated, others standing, was watching a number of men and women
+on the rostrum.
+
+There seemed to be more wrangling going on there--knots of people
+disputing and apparently quite oblivious of the audience.
+
+And almost immediately he caught sight of Palla on the platform. But
+even before he could take a step forward in the crowded aisle, he saw
+her force her way out of an excited group of people and come to the
+edge of the platform, lifting a slim hand for silence.
+
+"Put her out!" shouted some man's voice. A dozen other voices bawled
+out incoherencies; Palla waited; and after a moment or two there were
+no further interruptions.
+
+"Please let me say what I have to say," she said in that shy and
+gentle way she had when facing hostile listeners.
+
+"Speak louder!" yelled a young man. "Come on, silk-stockings!--spit it
+out and go home to mother!"
+
+"I wish I could," she said.
+
+Her rejoinder was so odd and unexpected that stillness settled over
+the place.
+
+"But all I can do," she added, in an even, colourless voice, "is to go
+home. And I shall do that after I have said what I have to say."
+
+At that moment there was a commotion in the rear of the hall. A dozen
+policemen filed into the place, pushing their way right and left and
+ranging themselves along the wall. Their officer came into the aisle:
+
+"If there's any disorder in this place to-night, I'll run in the whole
+bunch o' ye!" he said calmly.
+
+"All right. Hit out, little girl!" cried the young man who had
+interrupted before. "We gotta lot of business to fix up after you've
+gone to bed, so get busy!"
+
+"I, also, have some business to fix up," she said in the same sweet,
+emotionless voice, "--business of setting myself right by admitting
+that I have been wrong.
+
+"Because, on this spot where I am standing, I have spoken against
+the old order of things. I have said that there is no law excepting
+only the law of Love and Service. I have said that there is no God
+other than the deathless germ of deity within each one of us. I have
+said that the conventions and beliefs and usages and customs of
+civilisation were old, outworn, and tyrannical; and that there was
+no need to regard them or to obey the arbitrary laws based on them.
+
+"In other words, I have preached disorder while attempting to combat
+it: I have preached revolution while counselling peace; I have
+preached bigotry where I have demanded toleration.
+
+"For there is no worse bigot than the free-thinker who demands that
+the world subscribe to his creed; no tyrant like the under-dog when he
+becomes the upper one; no autocracy to compare with mob rule!
+
+"You can not obtain freedom for all by imposing that creed upon
+anybody by the violence of revolutionary ukase!
+
+"You can not wreck any edifice until all who enjoy ownership in it
+agree to its demolition. You can not build for all unless each
+voluntarily comes forward to aid with stone and mortar.
+
+"Anarchy leaves the majority roofless. What is the use of saying, 'Let
+them perish'? What is the use of trying to rebuild the world that way?
+You can't do it, even if you set fire to the world and start your
+endless war of human murder.
+
+"If you were the majority you would not need to do it. But you are the
+minority, and there are too many against you.
+
+"Only by infinite pains and patience can you alter the social
+structure to better it. Cautious and wary replacement is the only
+method, not exploding a mine beneath the keystone.
+
+"The world has won out from barbarism so far. It must continue to
+emerge by degrees. And if beliefs and laws and customs be obsolete,
+only by general agreement may they be modified without danger to all.
+Not the violent revolt of one or a dozen or a thousand can alter what
+has, so far, nourished and sustained civilisation.
+
+"That is the Prussian belief. Bolshevism was sired by Karl Marx and
+was hatched out in the shaggy gloom of the Prussian wilderness.
+
+"It does not belong anywhere else; it does not belong on the plains of
+Russia or in her forests or on her mountains. It is a Prussian
+thing--a misbegotten monster born of a vile and decadent race,--a
+horrible parasite, like that one which carries typhus, infects as it
+spreads from the degraded race that hatched it, crawling from country
+to country and leaving behind it dead minds, dead hearts, dead souls,
+and rotting flesh.
+
+"For order and disorder can not both reign paramount on this planet!
+The one shall slay the other. And Bolshevism is disorder--a violent
+and tyrannical and autocratic attempt to utterly destroy the vast
+majority for the benefit of the microscopic minority.
+
+"You can not do it, you Terrorists! Prussia tried terrorism on the
+world. Where is she to-day? You can not teach by frightfulness. You
+can not scare beliefs out of anybody.
+
+"Method, order, education--there is no other chance for any
+propagandist to-day.
+
+"I have stood here night after night proclaiming that my personal
+conception of right and wrong, of truth and falsehood, of law and
+morals was the only intelligent one, and that I should ignore and
+disregard any other opinion.
+
+"What I preached was Bolshevism! And I was such a fool I didn't know
+it. But that's what I preached. For it is an incitement to disorder to
+proclaim one's self above obedience to what has been established as a
+law to govern all.
+
+"It is an insidious counsel to violence, revolution, Bolshevism and
+utter anarchy to say to people that they should disregard any law
+formed by all for the common weal.
+
+"If the marriage law seems unnecessary, unjust, then only by common
+consent can it be altered; and until it is altered, any who disregard
+it strike at civilisation!
+
+"If the laws governing capital and labour seem cruel, stupid,
+tyrannical, only by general consent can they be altered safely.
+
+"You of the Bolsheviki can not come among us dripping with human
+blood, showing us your fangs, and expect from us anything except a
+fusillade.
+
+"And your propaganda, also, is not human. It is Prussian. Do you
+suppose, you foreign-born, that you can come here among this free
+people and begin your operations by cursing our laws and institutions
+and telling us we are not free?
+
+"Because we tolerate you, do you suppose we don't know that in most of
+the larger cities there are now organised Soviets, similar to those
+in Russia, that anarchists are now conducting schools, and that the
+radical propaganda which has taken on new life since the signing of
+the armistice is gaining headway in those parts of the country where
+there are large foreign-born populations?
+
+"Do you suppose we don't know Prussianism when we see it, after these
+last four years?
+
+"Do you suppose we have not read the _Staats-Zeitung_ editorial of
+December 8, which in part was as follows:
+
+"'Hundreds of thousands of our boys are standing now over there in the
+old homeland, which for nineteen months was enemy country and is that
+still, but which, as President Wilson promised, will soon be a land of
+peace again, rich in diligent work, rich in true and good people....
+As the whole happy life of this blessed region presents a picture to
+the spectator, it is to be wondered whether his (the American
+soldier's) memory will awaken on what he read of this country
+(Germany) at home long ago, whether he will feel a slight blush of
+shame in his cheeks and anger for those who, not from their own
+knowledge but from doubtful sources, branded a whole great people,
+70,000,000, as barbarians, huns, murderers of children and church
+robbers. And whether he (the American soldier) will at the same time
+make a pledge in his heart to combat those lies and rumours when he is
+back home again, and to tell the truth about those (the Germans)
+living behind those mountains.'"
+
+Palla's face flushed and she came close to the edge of the platform:
+
+"I have been warned that if I came here to-night I'd have trouble. The
+anonymous writers who send me letters talk about bombs.
+
+"Do you imagine because you murdered Vanya Tchernov in Philadelphia
+the other day that you can frighten anybody dumb?
+
+"I tell you you don't know what you're doing. You're dazed and scared
+and bewildered by finding yourselves suddenly in the open world after
+all those lurking years in hiding. As a forest wolf, his eyes dazzled
+by the sun, runs blindly across a field of new mown hay, dodging where
+there is nothing to dodge, leaping over shadows, so you, emerging from
+darkness, start out across the fertile world, the sun of civilisation
+blinding you so that you run as though stupefied and frightened,
+shying at straws, dodging zephyrs, leaping a pool of dew as though it
+were the Volga.
+
+"What are you afraid of? You have nothing to fear except yourselves
+out here in the sunny open!
+
+"Behold your enemies--yourselves!--selfish, defiant, full of false
+council, of envy, of cowardice, of treachery.
+
+"For there would be no sorrow, no injustice in the world if
+we--each one of us--were true to our better selves! You know it! You
+can not come out of darkness and range the open world like wolves!
+Civilisation will kill you!
+
+"But you can come out of your long twilight bearing yourselves like
+men--and find, by God's grace, that you _are_ men!--that you are
+fashioned like other men to stand upright in the light without
+blinking and slinking and dodging into cover.
+
+"For the haymakers will not climb and stone you; the herds will not
+stampede; no watch-dogs of civilisation will attack you if you come
+out into the fields looking like men, behaving like men, asking to
+share the world's burdens like men, and like men giving brain and
+brawn to make more pleasant and secure the only spot in the solar
+system dedicated by the Most High to the development of mankind!"
+
+There was a dead silence in the place.
+
+Palla slowly lifted her head and raised her right hand.
+
+"I desire," she said in a low, grave voice, "to acknowledge here my
+belief in law, in order, and in a divine, creative, and responsible
+wisdom. And in ultimate continuation."
+
+She turned away as a demonstration began, and Jim saw her putting on
+her coat. There was some scattering applause, but considerable
+disorder where men in the audience began to harangue each other and
+shake dirty fingers under one another's noses. Two personal encounters
+and one hair-pulling were checked by bored policemen: a girl got up
+and began to shout that she was a striking garment worker and that she
+had neither money, time, nor inclination to wait until some amateur
+silk-stocking felt like raising her wages.
+
+On the platform Karl Kastner had come forward, and his icy, incisive,
+menacing voice cut the growing tumult.
+
+"You haff heard with patience thiss so silly prattle of a rich young
+girl--" he began. "Now it is a poor man who speaks to you out of a
+heart full of bitterness against this law and order which you haff
+heard so highly praised.
+
+"For this much-praised law and order it hass to-night assassinated
+free speech; it has arrested our comrades, Nathan Bromberg and Max
+Sondheim; it hass fill our hall with policemen. And I wonder if
+there iss, perhaps, a little too much law and order in the world,
+und iff _vielleicht_, there may be too many policemen as vell as
+capitalist-little-girls in thiss hall.
+
+"Und, sometimes, too, I am wondering why iss it ve do not kill a
+few----"
+
+"That'll do!" interrupted the sergeant of police, striding down the
+aisle. "Come on, now, Karl; you done it that time."
+
+An angry roar arose all around him; he nodded to his men:
+
+"Run in any cut-ups," he said briefly; climbed up to the rostrum, and
+laid his hand on Kastner's arm.
+
+At the same moment a stunning explosion shook the place and plunged it
+into darkness. Out of the smoke-choked blackness burst an uproar of
+shrieks and screams; plaster and glass fell everywhere; police
+whistles sounded; a frantic, struggling mass of humanity fought for
+escape.
+
+As Jim reeled out into the lobby, he saw Palla leaning against the
+wall, with blood on her face.
+
+Before the first of the trampling horde emerged he had caught her by
+the arm and had led her down the steps to the street.
+
+"They've blown up the--the place," she stammered, wiping her face with
+her gloved hand in a dazed sort of way.
+
+"Are you badly hurt?" he asked unsteadily.
+
+"No, I don't think so----"
+
+He had led her as far as the avenue, now echoing with the clang of
+fire engines and the police patrol. And out of the darkness, from
+everywhere, swarmed the crowd that only a great city can conjure
+instantly and from nowhere.
+
+Blood ran down her face from a cut over her temple. A tiny triangular
+bit of glass still glittered in the wound; and he removed it and gave
+her his handkerchief.
+
+"Was Ilse there, too?" he asked.
+
+"No. Nobody went to-night except myself.... Why were you there, Jim?"
+
+"Why in God's name did _you_ go there all alone among those Reds!"
+
+She shook her head wearily:
+
+"I had to.... What a horrible thing to happen!... I am so tired, Jim.
+Could you get me home?"
+
+He found a taxi nearer Broadway and directed the driver to stop at a
+drug-store. Here he insisted that the tiny cut on Palla's temple be
+properly attended to. But it proved a simple matter; there was no
+glass in it, and the bleeding ceased before they reached her house.
+
+At the door he took leave of her, deeming it no time to subject her to
+any further shock that night; but she retained her hold on his arm.
+
+"I want you to come in, Jim."
+
+"You said you were tired; and you've had a terrible shock----"
+
+"That is why I need you," she said in a low voice. Then, looking up at
+him with a pale smile: "I want you--just once more."
+
+They went in together. Her maid, hearing the opening door, appeared
+and took her away; and Jim turned into the living-room. A lighted lamp
+on the piano illuminated his own framed photograph--that was the first
+thing he noticed--the portrait of himself in uniform, flanked on
+either side by little vases full of blue forget-me-nots.
+
+He started to lift one to his face, but reaction had set in and his
+hands were shaking. And he turned away and stood staring into the
+empty fireplace, passionately possessed once more by the eternal
+witchery of this young girl, and under the spell again of the
+enchanted place wherein she dwelt.
+
+The very air breathed her magic; every familiar object seemed to be
+stealthily conspiring in the subdued light to reaccomplish his
+subjection.
+
+Her maid appeared to say that Miss Dumont would be ready in a few
+minutes. She came, presently, in a clinging chamber-gown--a pale
+golden affair with misty touches of lace.
+
+He arranged cushions for her: she lighted a cigarette for him; and he
+sank down beside her in the old place.
+
+Both were still a little shaken. He said that he believed the
+explosion had come from the outside, and that the principal damage had
+been done next door, in Mr. Puma's office.
+
+She nodded assent, listlessly, evidently preoccupied with something
+else.
+
+After a few moments she looked up at him.
+
+"This is the second day of February," she said. "Within the last month
+Jack Estridge died, and Vanya died.... To-day another man died--a man
+I have known from childhood.... His name was Pawling. And his death
+has ruined me."
+
+"When--when did you learn that?" he asked, astounded.
+
+"This morning. My housekeeper in Shadow Hill telephoned me that Mr.
+Pawling had killed himself, that the bank was closed, and that
+probably there was nothing left for those who had funds deposited
+there."
+
+"You knew that this morning?" he asked, amazed.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And you--you still had courage to go to your Red Cross, to your
+canteen and Hostess House--to that horrible Red Flag Club--and face
+those beasts and make the--the perfectly magnificent speech you
+made!----"
+
+"Did--did _you_ hear it!" she faltered.
+
+"Every word."
+
+For a few moments she sat motionless and very white in her knowledge
+that this man had heard her confess her own conversion.
+
+Her brain whirled: she was striving to think steadily trying to find
+the right way to reassure him--to forestall any impulsive chivalry
+born of imaginary obligation.
+
+"Jim," she said in a colorless voice, "there are so many worse things
+than losing money. I think Mr. Pawling's suicide shocked me much more
+than the knowledge that I should be obliged to earn my own living like
+millions of other women.
+
+"Of course it scared me for a few minutes. I couldn't help that. But
+after I got over the first unpleasant--feeling, I concluded to go
+about my business in life until it came time for me to adjust myself
+to the scheme of things."
+
+She smiled without effort: "Besides, it's not really so bad. I have a
+house in Shadow Hill to which I can retreat when I sell this one; and
+with a tiny income from the sale of this house, and with what I can
+earn, I ought to be able to support myself very nicely."
+
+"So you--expect to sell?"
+
+"Yes, I must. Even if I sell my house and land in Connecticut I cannot
+afford this house any longer."
+
+"I see."
+
+She smiled, keeping her head and her courage high without apparent
+effort:
+
+"It's another job for you," she said lightly. "Will you be kind enough
+to put this house on your list?"
+
+"If you wish."
+
+"Thank you, Jim, I do indeed. And the sooner you can sell it for me
+the better."
+
+He said: "And the sooner you marry me the better, Palla."
+
+At that she flushed crimson and made a quick gesture as though to
+check him; but he went on: "I heard what you said to those filthy
+swine to-night. It was the pluckiest, most splendid thing I ever heard
+and saw. And I have seen battles. Some. But I never before saw a woman
+take her life in her hands and go all alone into a cage of the same
+dangerous, rabid beasts that had slain a friend of hers within the
+week, and find courage to face them and tell them they _were_
+beasts!--and more than that!--find courage to confess her own
+mistakes--humble herself--acknowledge what she had abjured--bear
+witness to the God whom once she believed abandoned her!"
+
+She strove to open her lips in protest--lifted her disconcerted eyes
+to his--shrank away a little as his hand fell over hers.
+
+"I've never faltered," he said. "It damned near killed me.... But I'd
+have gone on loving you, Palla, all my life. There never could have
+been anybody except you. There was never anybody before you. Usually
+there has been in a man's life. There never was in mine. There never
+will be."
+
+His firm hand closed on hers.
+
+"I'm such an ordinary, every day sort of fellow," he said wistfully,
+"that, after I began to realise how wonderful you are, I've been
+terribly afraid I wasn't up to you.
+
+"Even if I have cursed out your theories and creeds, it almost seemed
+impertinent for me to do it, because you really have so many talents
+and accomplishments, so much knowledge, so infinite a capacity for
+things of the mind, which are rather out of my mental sphere. And I've
+wondered sometimes, even if you ever consented to marry me, whether
+such a girl as you are could jog along with a business man who likes
+the arts but doesn't understand them very well and who likes some of
+his fellow men but not all of them and whose instinct is to punch
+law-breakers in the nose and not weep over them and lead them to the
+nearest bar and say, 'Go to it, erring brother!'"
+
+"Jim!"
+
+For all the while he had been drawing her nearer as he was speaking.
+And she was in his arms now, laughing a little, crying a little, her
+flushed face hidden on his shoulder.
+
+He drew a deep breath and, holding her imprisoned, looked down at
+her.
+
+"Will you marry me, Palla?"
+
+"Oh, Jim, do you want me now?"
+
+"Now, darling, but not this minute, because a clergyman must come
+first."
+
+It was cruel of him, as well as vigorously indelicate. Her hot blush
+should have shamed him; her conversion should have sheltered her.
+
+But the man had had a hard time, and the bitterness was but just
+going.
+
+"Will you marry me, Palla?"
+
+After a long while her stifled whisper came: "You are brutal. Do you
+think I would do anything else--now?"
+
+"No. And you never would have either."
+
+Lying there close in his arms, she wondered. And, still wondering, she
+lifted her head and looked up into his eyes--watching them as they
+neared her own--still trying to see them as his lips touched hers.
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+He was the sort of man who got hungry when left too long unfed. It was
+one o'clock. They had gone out to the refrigerator together, his arm
+around her supple waist, her charming head against his shoulder--both
+hungry but sentimental.
+
+"And don't you really think," she said for the hundredth time, "that
+we ought to sell this house?"
+
+"Not a bit of it, darling. We'll run it if we have to live on cereal
+and do our own laundry."
+
+"You mean I'll have to do that?"
+
+"I'll help after business hours."
+
+"You wonderful boy!"
+
+There seemed to be some delectable things in the ice chest.
+
+They sat side by side on the kitchen table, blissfully nourishing each
+other. Birds do it. Love-smitten youth does it.
+
+"To think," he said, "that you had the nerve to face those beasts and
+tell them what you thought of them!"
+
+"Darling!" she remonstrated, placing an olive between his lips.
+
+"You should have the Croix de Guerre," he said indistinctly.
+
+"All I aspire to is a very plain gold ring," she said, smiling at him
+sideways.
+
+And she slipped her hand into his.
+
+"_Are_ you going back into the army, Jim?" she asked.
+
+"Who said that?" he demanded.
+
+"I--I heard it repeated."
+
+"Not now," he said. "Unless--" His eyes narrowed and he sat swinging
+his legs with an absent air and puckered brows.
+
+And after a while the same aloof look came into her brown eyes, and
+she swung her slim feet absently.
+
+Perhaps their remote gaze was fixed on visions of a nearing future,
+brilliant with happiness, gay with children's voices; perhaps they saw
+farther than that, where the light grew sombre and where a shadowed
+sky lowered above a blood-red flood, rising imperceptibly, yet ever
+rising--a stealthy, crawling crimson tide spreading westward across
+the world.
+
+
+
+
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+Beloved Traitor, The. By Frank L. Packard.
+
+Beltane the Smith. By Jeffery Farnol.
+
+Betrayal, The. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+Beyond the Frontier. By Randall Parrish.
+
+Big Timber. By Bertrand W. Sinclair.
+
+Black Is White. By George Barr McCutcheon.
+
+Blind Man's Eyes, The. By Wm. MacHarg and Edwin Balmer.
+
+Bob, Son of Battle. By Alfred Ollivant.
+
+Boston Blackie. By Jack Boyle.
+
+Boy with Wings, The. By Berta Ruck.
+
+Brandon of the Engineers. By Harold Bindloss.
+
+Broad Highway, The. By Jeffery Farnol.
+
+Brown Study, The. By Grace S. Richmond.
+
+Bruce of the Circle A. By Harold Titus.
+
+Buck Peters, Ranchman. By Clarence E. Mulford.
+
+Business of Life, The. By Robert W. Chambers.
+
+
+
+
+POPULAR COPYRIGHT NOVELS
+
+AT MODERATE PRICES
+
+Ask Your Dealer for a Complete List of A. L. Burt Company's Popular
+Copyright Fiction
+
+Cabbages and Kings. By O. Henry.
+
+Cabin Fever. By B. M. Bower.
+
+Calling of Dan Matthews, The. By Harold Bell Wright.
+
+Cape Cod Stories. By Joseph C. Lincoln.
+
+Cap'n Abe, Storekeeper. By James A. Cooper.
+
+Cap'n Dan's Daughter. By Joseph C. Lincoln.
+
+Cap'n Eri. By Joseph C. Lincoln.
+
+Cap'n Jonah's Fortune. By James A. Cooper.
+
+Cap'n Warren's Wards. By Joseph C. Lincoln.
+
+Chain of Evidence, A. By Carolyn Wells.
+
+Chief Legatee, The. By Anna Katharine Green.
+
+Cinderella Jane. By Marjorie B. Cooke.
+
+Cinema Murder, The. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+City of Masks, The. By George Barr McCutcheon.
+
+Cleek of Scotland Yard. By T. W. Hanshew.
+
+Cleek, The Man of Forty Faces. By Thomas W. Hanshew.
+
+Cleek's Government Cases. By Thomas W. Hanshew.
+
+Clipped Wings. By Rupert Hughes.
+
+Clue, The. By Carolyn Wells.
+
+Clutch of Circumstance, The. By Marjorie Benton Cooke.
+
+Coast of Adventure, The. By Harold Bindloss.
+
+Coming of Cassidy, The. By Clarence E. Mulford.
+
+Coming of the Law, The. By Chas. A. Seltzer.
+
+Conquest of Canaan, The. By Booth Tarkington.
+
+Conspirators, The. By Robert W. Chambers.
+
+Court of Inquiry, A. By Grace S. Richmond.
+
+Cow Puncher, The. By Robert J. C. Stead.
+
+Crimson Gardenia, The, and Other Tales of Adventure. By Rex Beach.
+
+Cross Currents. By Author of "Pollyanna."
+
+Cry in the Wilderness, A. By Mary E. Waller.
+
+
+Danger, And Other Stories. By A. Conan Doyle.
+
+Dark Hollow, The. By Anna Katharine Green.
+
+Dark Star, The. By Robert W. Chambers.
+
+Daughter Pays, The. By Mrs. Baillie Reynolds.
+
+Day of Days, The. By Louis Joseph Vance.
+
+Depot Master, The. By Joseph C. Lincoln.
+
+Desired Woman, The. By Will N. Harben.
+
+
+
+
+POPULAR COPYRIGHT NOVELS
+
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+Copyright Fiction
+
+Destroying Angel, The. By Louis Jos. Vance.
+
+Devil's Own, The. By Randall Parrish.
+
+Double Traitor, The. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+
+Empty Pockets. By Rupert Hughes.
+
+Eyes of the Blind, The. By Arthur Somers Roche.
+
+Eye of Dread, The. By Payne Erskine.
+
+Eyes of the World, The. By Harold Bell Wright.
+
+Extricating Obadiah. By Joseph C. Lincoln.
+
+
+Felix O'Day. By F. Hopkinson Smith.
+
+54-40 or Fight. By Emerson Hough.
+
+Fighting Chance, The. By Robert W. Chambers.
+
+Fighting Shepherdess, The. By Caroline Lockhart.
+
+Financier, The. By Theodore Dreiser.
+
+Flame, The. By Olive Wadsley.
+
+Flamsted Quarries. By Mary E. Wallar.
+
+Forfeit, The. By Ridgwell Cullum.
+
+Four Million, The. By O. Henry.
+
+Fruitful Vine, The. By Robert Hichens.
+
+Further Adventures of Jimmie Dale, The. By Frank L. Packard.
+
+
+Girl of the Blue Ridge, A. By Payne Erskine.
+
+Girl from Keller's, The. By Harold Bindloss.
+
+Girl Philippa, The. By Robert W. Chambers.
+
+Girls at His Billet, The. By Berta Ruck.
+
+God's Country and the Woman. By James Oliver Curwood.
+
+Going Some. By Rex Beach.
+
+Golden Slipper, The. By Anna Katharine Green.
+
+Golden Woman, The. By Ridgwell Cullum.
+
+Greater Love Hath No Man. By Frank L. Packard.
+
+Greyfriars Bobby. By Eleanor Atkinson.
+
+Gun Brand, The. By James B. Hendryx.
+
+
+Halcyone. By Elinor Glyn.
+
+Hand of Fu-Manchu, The. By Sax Rohmer.
+
+Havoc. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+Heart of the Desert, The. By Honore Willsie.
+
+Heart of the Hills, The. By John Fox, Jr.
+
+
+
+
+POPULAR COPYRIGHT NOVELS
+
+AT MODERATE PRICES
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+Ask Your Dealer for a Complete List of A. L. Burt Company's Popular
+Copyright Fiction
+
+Heart of the Sunset. By Rex Beach.
+
+Heart of Thunder Mountain, The. By Edfrid A. Bingham.
+
+Her Weight in Gold. By Geo. B. McCutcheon.
+
+Hidden Children, The. By Robert W. Chambers.
+
+Hidden Spring, The. By Clarence B. Kelland.
+
+Hillman, The. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+Hills of Refuge, The. By Will N. Harben.
+
+His Official Fiancee. By Berta Ruck.
+
+Honor of the Big Snows. By James Oliver Curwood.
+
+Hopalong Cassidy. By Clarence E. Mulford.
+
+Hound from the North, The. By Ridgwell Cullum.
+
+House of the Whispering Pines, The. By Anna Katharine Green.
+
+Hugh Wynne, Free Quaker. By S. Weir Mitchell, M.D.
+
+
+I Conquered. By Harold Titus.
+
+Illustrious Prince, The. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+In Another Girl's Shoes. By Berta Ruck.
+
+Indifference of Juliet, The. By Grace S. Richmond.
+
+Infelice. By Augusta Evans Wilson.
+
+Initials Only. By Anna Katharine Green.
+
+Inner Law, The. By Will N. Harben.
+
+Innocent. By Marie Corelli.
+
+Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu, The. By Sax Rohmer.
+
+In the Brooding Wild. By Ridgwell Cullum.
+
+Intriguers, The. By Harold Bindloss.
+
+Iron Trail, The. By Rex Beach.
+
+Iron Woman, The. By Margaret Deland.
+
+I Spy. By Natalie Sumner Lincoln.
+
+
+Japonette. By Robert W. Chambers.
+
+Jean of the Lazy A. By B. M. Bower.
+
+Jeanne of the Marshes. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+Jennie Gerhardt. By Theodore Dreiser.
+
+Judgment House, The. By Gilbert Parker.
+
+
+Keeper of the Door, The. By Ethel M. Dell.
+
+Keith of the Border. By Randall Parrish.
+
+Kent Knowles: Ouahaug. By Joseph C. Lincoln.
+
+Kingdom of the Blind, The. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+
+
+
+POPULAR COPYRIGHT NOVELS
+
+AT MODERATE PRICES
+
+Ask Your Dealer for a Complete List of A. L. Burt Company's Popular
+Copyright Fiction
+
+King Spruce. By Holman Day.
+
+King's Widow, The. By Mrs. Baillie Reynolds.
+
+Knave of Diamonds, The. By Ethel M. Dell.
+
+
+Ladder of Swords. By Gilbert Parker.
+
+Lady Betty Across the Water. By C. N. & A. M. Williamson.
+
+Land-Girl's Love Story, A. By Berta Ruck.
+
+Landloper, The. By Holman Day.
+
+Land of Long Ago, The. By Eliza Calvert Hall.
+
+Land of Strong Men, The. By A. M. Chisholm.
+
+Last Trail, The. By Zane Grey.
+
+Laugh and Live. By Douglas Fairbanks.
+
+Laughing Bill Hyde. By Rex Beach.
+
+Laughing Girl, The. By Robert W. Chambers.
+
+Law Breakers, The. By Ridgwell Cullum.
+
+Lifted Veil, The. By Basil King.
+
+Lighted Way, The. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+Lin McLean. By Owen Wister.
+
+Lonesome Land. By B. M. Bower.
+
+Lone Wolf, The. By Louis Joseph Vance.
+
+Long Ever Ago. By Rupert Hughes.
+
+Lonely Stronghold, The. By Mrs. Baillie Reynolds.
+
+Long Live the King. By Mary Roberts Rinehart.
+
+Long Roll, The. By Mary Johnston.
+
+Lord Tony's Wife. By Baroness Orczy.
+
+Lost Ambassador. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+Lost Prince, The. By Frances Hodgson Burnett.
+
+Lydia of the Pines. By Honore Willsie.
+
+
+Maid of the Forest, The. By Randall Parrish.
+
+Maid of the Whispering Hills, The. By Vingie E. Roe.
+
+Maids of Paradise, The. By Robert W. Chambers.
+
+Major, The. By Ralph Connor.
+
+Maker of History, A. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+Malefactor, The. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+Man from Bar 20, The. By Clarence E. Mulford.
+
+Man in Grey, The. By Baroness Orczy.
+
+Man Trail, The. By Henry Oyen.
+
+Man Who Couldn't Sleep, The. By Arthur Stringer.
+
+
+
+
+POPULAR COPYRIGHT NOVELS
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+AT MODERATE PRICES
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+Ask Your Dealer for a Complete List of A. L. Burt Company's Popular
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+Man with the Club Foot, The. By Valentine Williams.
+
+Mary-'Gusta. By Joseph C. Lincoln.
+
+Mary Moreland. By Marie Van Vorst.
+
+Mary Regan. By Leroy Scott.
+
+Master Mummer, The. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes. By A. Conan Doyle.
+
+Men Who Wrought, The. By Ridgwell Cullum.
+
+Mischief Maker, The. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+Missioner, The. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+Miss Million's Maid. By Berta Ruck.
+
+Molly McDonald. By Randall Parrish.
+
+Money Master, The. By Gilbert Parker.
+
+Money Moon, The. By Jeffery Farnol.
+
+Mountain Girl, The. By Payne Erskine.
+
+Moving Finger, The. By Natalie Sumner Lincoln.
+
+Mr. Bingle. By George Barr McCutcheon.
+
+Mr. Grex of Monte Carlo. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+Mr. Pratt. By Joseph C. Lincoln.
+
+Mr. Pratt's Patients. By Joseph C. Lincoln.
+
+Mrs. Belfame. By Gertrude Atherton.
+
+Mrs. Red Pepper. By Grace S. Richmond.
+
+My Lady Caprice. By Jeffrey Farnol.
+
+My Lady of the North. By Randall Parrish.
+
+My Lady of the South. By Randall Parrish.
+
+Mystery of the Hasty Arrow, The. By Anna K. Green.
+
+
+Nameless Man, The. By Natalie Sumner Lincoln.
+
+Ne'er-Do-Well, The. By Rex Beach.
+
+Nest Builders, The. By Beatrice Forbes-Robertson Hale.
+
+Net, The. By Rex Beach.
+
+New Clarion. By Will N. Harben.
+
+Night Operator, The. By Frank L. Packard.
+
+Night Riders, The. By Ridgwell Cullum.
+
+Nobody. By Louis Joseph Vance.
+
+
+Okewood of the Secret Service. By the Author of "The Man with the Club
+Foot."
+
+One Way Trail, The. By Ridgwell Cullum.
+
+Open, Sesame. By Mrs. Baillie Reynolds.
+
+Otherwise Phyllis. By Meredith Nicholson.
+
+Outlaw, The. By Jackson Gregory.
+
+
+
+
+POPULAR COPYRIGHT NOVELS
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+AT MODERATE PRICES
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+Ask Your Dealer for a Complete List of A. L. Burt Company's Popular
+Copyright Fiction
+
+Paradise Auction. By Nalbro Bartley.
+
+Pardners. By Rex Beach.
+
+Parrot & Co. By Harold MacGrath.
+
+Partners of the Night. By Leroy Scott.
+
+Partners of the Tide. By Joseph C. Lincoln.
+
+Passionate Friends, The. By H. G. Wells.
+
+Patrol of the Sun Dance Trail, The. By Ralph Connor.
+
+Paul Anthony, Christian. By Hiram W. Hays.
+
+Pawns Count, The. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+People's Man, A. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+Perch of the Devil. By Gertrude Atherton.
+
+Peter Ruff and the Double Four. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+Pidgin Island. By Harold MacGrath.
+
+Place of Honeymoon, The. By Harold MacGrath.
+
+Pool of Flame, The. By Louis Joseph Vance.
+
+Postmaster, The. By Joseph C. Lincoln.
+
+Prairie Wife, The. By Arthur Stringer.
+
+Price of the Prairie, The. By Margaret Hill McCarter.
+
+Prince of Sinners, A. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+Promise, The. By J. B. Hendryx.
+
+Proof of the Pudding, The. By Meredith Nicholson.
+
+
+Rainbow's End, The. By Rex Beach.
+
+Ranch at the Wolverine, The. By B. M. Bower.
+
+Ranching for Sylvia. By Harold Bindloss.
+
+Ransom. By Arthur Somers Roche.
+
+Reason Why, The. By Elinor Glyn.
+
+Reclaimers, The. By Margaret Hill McCarter.
+
+Red Mist, The. By Randall Parrish.
+
+Red Pepper Burns. By Grace S. Richmond.
+
+Red Pepper's Patients. By Grace S. Richmond.
+
+Rejuvenation of Aunt Mary, The. By Anne Warner.
+
+Restless Sex, The. By Robert W. Chambers.
+
+Return of Dr. Fu-Manchu, The. By Sax Rohmer.
+
+Return of Tarzan, The. By Edgar Rice Burroughs.
+
+Riddle of Night, The. By Thomas W. Hanshew.
+
+Rim of the Desert, The. By Ada Woodruff Anderson.
+
+Rise of Roscoe Paine, The. By J. C. Lincoln.
+
+Rising Tide, The. By Margaret Deland.
+
+
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+POPULAR COPYRIGHT NOVELS
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+Ask Your Dealer for a Complete List of A. L. Burt Company's Popular
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+Rocks of Valpre, The. By Ethel M. Dell.
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+Rogue by Compulsion, A. By Victor Bridges.
+
+Room Number 3. By Anna Katharine Green.
+
+Rose in the Ring, The. By George Barr McCutcheon.
+
+Rose of Old Harpeth, The. By Maria Thompson Daviess.
+
+Round the Corner in Gay Street. By Grace S. Richmond.
+
+
+Second Choice. By Will N. Harben.
+
+Second Violin, The. By Grace S. Richmond.
+
+Secret History. By C. N. & A. M. Williamson.
+
+Secret of the Reef, The. By Harold Bindloss.
+
+Seven Darlings, The. By Gouverneur Morris.
+
+Shavings. By Joseph C. Lincoln.
+
+Shepherd of the Hills, The. By Harold Bell Wright.
+
+Sheriff of Dyke Hole, The. By Ridgwell Cullum.
+
+Sherry. By George Barr McCutcheon.
+
+Side of the Angels, The. By Basil King.
+
+Silver Horde, The. By Rex Beach.
+
+Sin That Was His, The. By Frank L. Packard.
+
+Sixty-first Second, The. By Owen Johnson.
+
+Soldier of the Legion, A. By C. N. & A. M. Williamson.
+
+Son of His Father, The. By Ridgwell Cullum.
+
+Son of Tarzan, The. By Edgar Rice Burroughs.
+
+Source, The. By Clarence Buddington Kelland.
+
+Speckled Bird, A. By Augusta Evans Wilson.
+
+Spirit in Prison, A. By Robert Hichens.
+
+Spirit of the Border, The. (New Edition.) By Zane Grey.
+
+Spoilers, The. By Rex Beach.
+
+Steele of the Royal Mounted. By James Oliver Curwood.
+
+Still Jim. By Honore Willsie.
+
+Story of Foss River Ranch, The. By Ridgwell Cullum.
+
+Story of Marco, The. By Eleanor H. Porter.
+
+Strange Case of Cavendish, The. By Randall Parrish.
+
+Strawberry Acres. By Grace S. Richmond.
+
+Sudden Jim. By Clarence B. Kelland.
+
+
+Tales of Sherlock Holmes. By A. Conan Doyle.
+
+Tarzan of the Apes. By Edgar R. Burroughs.
+
+Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar. By Edgar Rice Burroughs.
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+Ask Your Dealer for a Complete List of A. L. Burt Company's Popular
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+Tempting of Tavernake, The. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
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+Tess of the D'Urbervilles. By Thos. Hardy.
+
+Thankful's Inheritance. By Joseph C. Lincoln.
+
+That Affair Next Door. By Anna Katharine Green.
+
+That Printer of Udell's. By Harold Bell Wright.
+
+Their Yesterdays. By Harold Bell Wright.
+
+Thirteenth Commandment, The. By Rupert Hughes.
+
+Three of Hearts, The. By Berta Ruck.
+
+Three Strings, The. By Natalie Sumner Lincoln.
+
+Threshold, The. By Marjorie Benton Cooke.
+
+Throwback, The. By Alfred Henry Lewis.
+
+Tish. By Mary Roberts Rinehart.
+
+To M. L. G.; or, He Who Passed. Anon.
+
+Trail of the Axe, The. By Ridgwell Cullum.
+
+Trail to Yesterday, The. By Chas. A. Seltzer.
+
+Treasure of Heaven, The. By Marie Corelli.
+
+Triumph, The. By Will N. Harben.
+
+T. Tembarom. By Frances Hodgson Burnett.
+
+Turn of the Tide. By Author of "Pollyanna."
+
+Twenty-fourth of June, The. By Grace S. Richmond.
+
+Twins of Suffering Creek, The. By Ridgwell Cullum.
+
+Two-Gun Man, The. By Chas. A. Seltzer.
+
+
+Uncle William. By Jeannette Lee.
+
+Under Handicap. By Jackson Gregory.
+
+Under the Country Sky. By Grace S. Richmond.
+
+Unforgiving Offender, The. By John Reed Scott.
+
+Unknown Mr. Kent, The. By Roy Norton.
+
+Unpardonable Sin, The. By Major Rupert Hughes.
+
+Up From Slavery. By Booker T. Washington.
+
+
+Valiants of Virginia, The. By Hallie Ermine Rives.
+
+Valley of Fear, The. By Sir A. Conan Doyle.
+
+Vanished Messenger, The. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+Vanguards of the Plains. By Margaret Hill McCarter.
+
+Vashti. By Augusta Evans Wilson.
+
+Virtuous Wives. By Owen Johnson.
+
+Visioning, The. By Susan Glaspell.
+
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+Waif-o'-the-Sea. By Cyrus Townsend Brady.
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+Wall of Men, A. By Margaret H. McCarter.
+
+Watchers of the Plans, The. By Ridgwell Cullum.
+
+Way Home, The. By Basil King.
+
+Way of an Eagle, The. By E. M. Dell.
+
+Way of the Strong, The. By Ridgwell Cullum.
+
+Way of These Women, The. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+We Can't Have Everything. By Major Rupert Hughes.
+
+Weavers, The. By Gilbert Parker.
+
+When a Man's a Man. By Harold Bell Wright.
+
+When Wilderness Was King. By Randall Parrish.
+
+Where the Trail Divides. By Will Lillibridge.
+
+Where There's a Will. By Mary R. Rinehart.
+
+White Sister, The. By Marion Crawford.
+
+Who Goes There? By Robert W. Chambers.
+
+Why Not. By Margaret Widdemer.
+
+Window at the White Cat, The. By Mary Roberts Rinehart.
+
+Winds of Chance, The. By Rex Beach.
+
+Wings of Youth, The. By Elizabeth Jordan.
+
+Winning of Barbara Worth, The. By Harold Bell Wright.
+
+Wire Devils, The. By Frank L. Packard.
+
+Winning the Wilderness. By Margaret Hill McCarter.
+
+Wishing Ring Man, The. By Margaret Widdemer.
+
+With Juliet in England. By Grace S. Richmond.
+
+Wolves of the Sea. By Randall Parrish.
+
+Woman Gives, The. By Owen Johnson.
+
+Woman Haters, The. By Joseph C. Lincoln.
+
+Woman in Question, The. By John Reed Scott.
+
+Woman Thou Gavest Me, The. By Hall Caine.
+
+Woodcarver of 'Lympus, The. By Mary E. Waller.
+
+Wooing of Rosamond Fayre, The. By Berta Ruck.
+
+World for Sale, The. By Gilbert Parker.
+
+
+Years for Rachel, The. By Berta Ruck.
+
+Yellow Claw, The. By Sax Rohmer.
+
+You Never Know Your Luck. By Gilbert Parker.
+
+
+Zeppelin's Passenger, The. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Crimson Tide, by Robert W. Chambers
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