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diff --git a/31858.txt b/31858.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5780c3d --- /dev/null +++ b/31858.txt @@ -0,0 +1,20029 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Ancestors, by Gertrude Atherton + +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: Ancestors + A Novel + +Author: Gertrude Atherton + +Release Date: April 1, 2010 [EBook #31858] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ANCESTORS *** + + + + +Produced by Mark C. Orton, Linda McKeown, Mary Meehan and +the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at +https://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + + Ancestors + + A Novel + + By Gertrude Atherton + + +Copyright, 1907, by HARPER & BROTHERS. +New York and London + +_All rights reserved._ + +Published September, 1907. + + +TO +Emma Beatrice Brunner + + + + +PART I + +1904 + + + + +I + + +Miss Thangue, who had never seen her friend's hand tremble among the +teacups before, felt an edge on her mental appetite, stimulating after +two monotonous years abroad. It was several minutes, however, before she +made any effort to relieve her curiosity, for of all her patron-friends +Victoria Gwynne required the most delicate touch. Flora had learned to +be audacious without taking a liberty, which, indeed, was one secret of +her success; but although she prided herself upon her reading of this +enigma, whom even the ancestral dames of Capheaton looked down upon +inspectively, she was never quite sure of her ground. She particularly +wished to avoid mistakes upon the renewal of an intimacy kept alive by a +fitful correspondence during her sojourn on the Continent. Quite apart +from self-interest, she liked no one as well, and her curiosity was +tempered by a warm sympathy and a genuine interest. It was this capacity +for friendship, and her unlimited good-nature, that had saved her, +penniless as she was, from the ignominious footing of the social +parasite. The daughter of a clergyman in a Yorkshire village, and the +playmate in childhood of the little girls of the castle near by, she had +realized early in life that although pretty and well-bred, she was not +yet sufficiently dowered by either nature or fortune to hope for a +brilliant marriage; and she detested poverty. Upon her father's death +she must earn her bread, and, reasoning that self-support was merely the +marketing of one's essential commodity, and as her plump and indolent +body was disinclined to privations of any sort, she elected the role of +useful friend to fashionable and luxurious women. It was not an exalted +niche to fill in life, but at least she had learned to fill it to +perfection, and her ambitions were modest. Moreover, a certain integrity +of character and girlish enthusiasm had saved her from the more +corrosive properties of her anomalous position, and she was not only +clever enough to be frankly useful without servility, but she had become +so indispensable to certain of her friends, that although still blooming +in her early forties, she would no more have deserted them for a mere +husband than she would have renounced her comfortable and varied +existence for the no less varied uncertainties of matrimony. + +It was not often that a kindly fate had overlooked her for so long a +period as two years, and when she had accepted the invitation of one of +the old castle playmates to visit her in Florence, it had been with a +lively anticipation that made dismay the more poignant in the face of +hypochondria. Nevertheless, realizing her debt to this first of her +patrons, and with much of her old affection revived, she wandered from +one capital and specialist to the next, until death gave her liberty. +She was not unrewarded, but the legacy inspired her with no desire for +an establishment beyond her room at the Club in Dover Street, the +companionship of friends not too exacting, the agreeable sense of +indispensableness, and a certain splendor of environment which gave a +warmth and color to life; and which she could not have commanded had she +set up in middle years as an independent spinster of limited income. She +had received many impatient letters while abroad, to which she had +replied with fluent affection and picturesque gossip, never losing touch +for a moment. When release came she had hastened home to book herself +for the house-parties, and with Victoria Gwynne, although one of the +least opulent of her friends, first on the list. She had had several +correspondents as ardent as herself, and there was little gossip of the +more intimate sort that had not reached her sooner or later, but she +found subtle changes in Victoria for which she could not as yet account. +She had now been at Capheaton and alone with her friend for three days, +but there had been a stress of duties for both, and the hostess had +never been more silent. To-day, as she seemed even less inclined to +conversation, although manifestly nervous, Miss Thangue merely drank her +tea with an air of being too comfortable and happy in England and +Capheaton for intellectual effort, and patiently waited for a cue or an +inspiration. But although she too kept silence, memory and imagination +held rendezvous in her circumspect brain, and she stole more than one +furtive glance at her companion. + +Lady Victoria Gwynne, one of the tallest women of her time and still one +of the handsomest, had been extolled all her life for that fusion of the +romantic and the aristocratic ideals that so rarely find each other in +the same shell; and loved by a few. Her round slender figure, supple +with exercise and ignorant of disease, her black hair and eyes, the +utter absence of color in her smooth Orientally white skin, the mouth, +full at the middle and curving sharply upward at the corners, and the +irregular yet delicate nose that seemed presented as an afterthought to +save that brilliant and subtle face from classic severity, made her +look--for the most part--as if fashioned for the picture-gallery or the +poem, rather than for the commonplaces of life. Always one of those +Englishwomen that let their energy be felt rather than expressed, for +she made no effort in conversation whatever, her once mobile face had of +late years, without aging, composed itself into a sort of illuminated +mask. As far as possible removed from that other ideal, the British +Matron, and still suggesting an untamed something in the complex centres +of her character, she yet looked so aloof, so monumental, that she had +recently been painted by a great artist for a world exhibition, as an +illustration of what centuries of breeding and selection had done for +the noblewomen of England. + +Some years before, a subtle Frenchman had expressed her in such a +fashion that while many vowed he had given to the world an epitome of +romantic youth, others remarked cynically that his handsome subject +looked as if about to seat herself on the corner of the table and smoke +a cigarette. The American artist, although habitually cruel to his +patrons, had, after triumphantly transferring the type to the canvas, +drawn to the surface only so much of the soul of the woman as all that +ran might admire. If there was a hint of bitterness in the lower part of +the face, from the eyes there looked an indomitable courage and much +sweetness. Only in the carnage of the head, the tilt of the chin, was +the insolence expressed that had made her many enemies. Some of the +wildest stories of the past thirty years had been current about her, and +rejected or believed according to the mental habit or personal bias of +those that tinker with reputations. The late Queen, it was well known, +had detested her, and made no secret of her resentment that through the +short-sighted loyalty of one of the first members of her Household, the +dangerous creature had been named after her. But whatever her secrets, +open scandal Lady Victoria had avoided: imperturbably, without even an +additional shade of insolence, never apologizing nor explaining; +wherein, no doubt, lay one secret of her strength. And then her +eminently respectable husband, Arthur Gwynne, second son of the Marquess +of Strathland and Zeal, had always fondly alluded to her as "The +Missus," and lauded her as a repository of all the unfashionable +virtues. To-day, presiding at the tea-table in her son's country-house, +an eager light in her eyes, she looked like neither of her portraits: +more nearly approached, perhaps, poor Arthur Gwynne's ideal of her; not +in the least the frozen stoic of the past three days. When she finally +made an uncontrollable movement that half-overturned the cream-jug, +Flora Thangue's curiosity overcame her, and she murmured, tentatively: + +"If I had ever seen you nervous before, Vicky--" + +"I am not nervous, but allowances are to be made for maternal anxiety." + +"Oh!" Miss Thangue drew a deep breath. She continued, vaguely, "Oh, the +maternal role--" + +"Have I ever failed as a mother?" asked Lady Victoria, dispassionately. + +"No, but you are so many other things, too. Somehow, when I am away from +you I see you in almost every other capacity." + +"Jack is thirty and I am forty-nine." + +"_You_ look thirty," replied Flora, with equal candor. + +"I am thankful that my age is in Lodge; I can never be tempted to enroll +myself with the millions that were married when just sixteen." + +"Oh, you never could make a fool of yourself," murmured her friend. +Then, as Victoria showed signs of relapsing into silence, she plunged in +recklessly; "Jack is bound to be elected. When has he ever failed to get +what he wanted? But you, Vicky dear--is there anything wrong? You had a +bulky letter from California the day I arrived. I do hope that tiresome +property is not giving you trouble. What a pity it is such a long way +off." + +"The San Francisco lease runs out shortly. Half of that, and the +southern ranch, are my only independent sources of income. The northern +ranch belongs to Jack. All three are getting less and less easy to let +in their entirety, my agents write me, and I feel half a pauper +already." + +"This is not so bad," murmured Flora. + +"Strathland would bundle me out in ten minutes if anything happened to +Jack." + +"It would be a pity; it suits you." She was not referring to the hall, +which was somewhat too light and small for the heroic mould of its +chatelaine, but to the noble proportions of the old house itself, and +the treasures that had accumulated since the first foundations were laid +in the reign of Henry VI. There were rooms hung with ugly brocades and +velvets never duplicated, state bed-chambers and boudoirs sacred to the +memory of personages whose dust lay half-forgotten in their marbles; but +above all, Capheaton was famous for its pictures. Not only was there an +unusually large number of portraits by masters scattered about the +twenty rooms that lay behind and on either side of the hall, but many +hundreds of those portraits and landscapes from the brushes of artists +fashionable in their day, unknown in the annals of art, but seeming to +emit a faint scent of lavender and rose leaves from the walls of +England's old manor-houses and castles. In the dining-room there was a +full-length portrait of Mary Tudor, black but for the yellow face and +hands and ruff; and another, the scarlet coat and robust complexion +still fresh, of the fourth George, handsome, gay, devil-may-care; both +painted to commemorate visits to Capheaton, historically hospitable in +the past. But Lord Strathland, besides having been presented with six +daughters and an heir as extravagant as tradition demanded, was poor as +peers go, and had more than once succumbed to the titillating delights +of speculation, less cheering in the retrospect. Having a still larger +estate to keep up, he had been glad to lend Capheaton to his second son, +who, being an excellent manager and assisted by his wife's income, had +lived very comfortably upon its yield. Upon his death Elton Gwynne had +assumed possession as a matter of course; and a handsome allowance from +his doting grandfather supplementing his inheritance, the mind of the +haughty and promising young gentleman was free of sordid anxieties. + +Lady Victoria's satirical gaze swept the simpering portraits of her +son's great-aunts and grandmothers, with which the hall was +promiscuously hung. + +"Of course I am as English as if the strain had never been crossed, if +you mean that. But I'd rather like to get away for a while. I really +ought to visit my California estates, and I have always wanted to see +that part of America. I started for it once, but never even reached the +western boundaries of New York. One of us should spend a year there, at +least; and of course it is out of the question for Jack to leave England +again." + +"You would not spend six months out of Curzon Street. You are the most +confirmed Londoner I know." + +"Do you think so?" + +Miss Thangue replied, impulsively, "I have often wondered if you +numbered satiety among your complexities!" + +This was as far as she had ever adventured into the mysterious +backwaters of Victoria's soul, and she dropped her eyelids lest a +deprecating glance meet the contempt it deserved; both with a due regard +for the limit imposed by good taste, despised the faint heart. + +"I hate the sight of London!" Her tone had changed so suddenly that +Flora winked. "If it were not for Jack I would leave--get out. I am sick +of the whole game." + +"Oh, be on your guard," cried her friend, sharply. "That sort of thing +means the end of youth." + +"Youth after fifty depends upon your doctor, your masseuse, and your +dressmaker. I do not say that my present state of mind is sown with +evergreens and immortelles, but the fact remains that for the present I +have come to the end of myself and am interested in no one on earth but +Jack." + +Miss Thangue stared into her teacup, recalling the gossip of a year ago, +although she had given it little heed at the time: Victoria had been +transiently interested so often! But all the world knew that when Arthur +Gwynne was killed Sir Cadge Vanneck had been off his head about +Victoria; and that when obvious restrictions vanished into the family +vault he had left abruptly for Rhodesia to develop his mines, and had +not found time to return since. Sir Cadge was about the same age as the +famous beauty, and rose quite two inches above her lofty head. People +had grown accustomed to the fine appearance they made when +together--"Artie" was ruddy and stout--and although Victoria reinforced +her enemies, for Vanneck was one of the most agreeable and accomplished +men in London, the artistic sense of that lenient world was tickled at +their congruities and took their future mating for granted; Arthur +Gwynne was sure to meet his death on the hunting-field, for he was far +too heavy for a horse and rode vilely. When he fulfilled his destiny and +Vanneck fled, the world was as much annoyed as amused. But they were +amused, and Flora Thangue knew that this gall must have bitten deeper +than the loss of Vanneck, who may or may not have made an impression on +this woman too proud and too spoiled to accept homage in public +otherwise than passively, whatever may have been the unwritten tale of +her secret hours. The excuses hazarded by Vanneck's friends were neither +humorous nor sentimental, but no one denied that they were eminently +sensible: his first wife had died childless, his estates were large, his +title was one of the oldest in England. But although no one pitied +Victoria Gwynne, many were annoyed at having their mental attitude +disarranged, and this no doubt had kept the gossip alive and been a +constant source of irritation to a woman whose sense of humor was as +deep as her pride. + +Flora replied at random. "Jack couldn't very well get on without you." + +His mother's eyes flashed. "I flatter myself he could not--at present. +If Julia Kaye would only marry him!" + +"She won't," cried Flora, relieved at the change of tone. "And +why do you wish it? She is two years older, of quite dreadful +origin--and--well--I don't like her; perhaps my opinion is a little +biased." + +"She is immensely rich, one of the ablest political women in London, and +Jack is desperately in love with her." + +"I cannot picture Jack in extremities about any one, although I don't +deny that he has his sentimental seizures. He even made love to me when +he was cutting his teeth. But he doesn't need a lot of money, you rank +higher than she among the political women, and--well, I believe her to +be bad-tempered, and more selfish than any woman I have ever known." + +"He loves her. He wants her. He would dominate any woman he married. He +is such a dear that no woman who lived with him could help loving him. +Moreover, she is inordinately ambitious, and Jack's career is the most +promising in England." + +"Jack is far too good for her, and I am glad that he will not get her. I +happen to know that she has made up her mind to marry Lord Brathland." + +"Bratty is a donkey." + +"She would be the last to deny it, but he is certain to be a duke if he +lives, and she would marry a man that had to be led round with a string +for the sake of being called 'your grace' by the servants. She'll never +be anything but a third-rate duchess, and people that tolerate her now +will snub her the moment she gives herself airs. But I suppose she +thinks a duchess is a duchess." + +"Money goes pretty far with us," said Lady Victoria, dryly. + +"Doesn't it? Nevertheless--you know it as well as I do--among the people +that really count other things go further, and duchesses have been put +in their place before this--you have done it yourself. Julia Kaye has +kept her head so far because she has been hunting for strawberry leaves, +and there is no denying she's clever; but once she is in the upper +air--well, I have seen her as rude as she dares be, and if she became a +duchess she would cultivate rudeness as part of the role." + +"We can be rude enough." + +"Yes, and know how to be. A parvenu never does." + +"She is astonishingly clever." + +"Duchesses are born--even the American ones. Julia Kaye has never +succeeded in being quite natural; she has always the effect of +rehearsing the part of the great lady for amateur theatricals. Poor +Gussy Kaye might have coached her better. The moment she mounts she'll +become wholly artificial, she'll patronize, she'll give herself no end +of ridiculous airs; she won't move without sending a paragraph to the +_Morning Post_. The back of her head will be quite in line with her +charming little bust, and I for one shall walk round and laugh in her +face. She is the only person that could inspire me to such a vicious +speech, but I am human, and as she so ingenuously snubs me as a person +of no consequence, my undazzled eyes see her as she is." + +Lady Victoria, instead of responding with the faint, absent, somewhat +irritating smile which she commonly vouchsafed those that sought to +amuse her, lit another cigarette and leaned back among the cushions of +the sofa behind the tea-table. She drew her eyelids together, a rare +sign of perturbation. The only stigma of time on her face was a certain +sharpness of outline and leanness of throat. But the throat was always +covered, and her wardrobe reflected the most fleeting of the fashions, +assuring her position as a contemporary, if driving her dressmaker to +the verge of bankruptcy. When her bright, black, often laughing eyes +were in play she passed with the casual public, and abroad, as a woman +of thirty, but with her lids down the sharpness of the lower part of the +face arrested the lover of detail. + +"Are you sure of that?" she asked, in a moment. + +"Quite." + +"I am sorry. It will be a great blow to Jack. I hoped she would come +round in time." + +"She will marry Brathland. I saw Cecilia Spence in town. She was at +Maundrell Abbey with them both last week. You may expect the +announcement any day--she'll write it herself for the _Morning Post_. +How on earth can Jack find time to think about women with the immense +amount of work he gets through?--and his really immodest ambitions! +By-the-way--isn't this polling-day? I wonder if he has won his seat? But +as I said just now I do not associate Jack with defeat. His trifling +set-backs have merely served to throw his manifest destiny into higher +relief." + +"The telegram should have come an hour ago. I have few doubts--and yet +he has so many enemies. I wonder if we shall be born into a world, after +we have been sufficiently chastened here, where one can get one's head +above the multitude without rousing some of the most hideous qualities +in human nature? It is a great responsibility! But there has been no +such speaker, nor fighter, for a quarter of a century." Her eyes glowed +again. "And heaven knows I have worked for him." + +"What a pity he is not a Tory! He could have a dozen boroughs for the +asking. I wish he were. The whole Liberal party makes me sick. And it is +against every tradition of his family--" + +"As if that mattered. Besides, he is a born fighter. He'd hate anything +he could have for the asking. And he's far too modern, too progressive, +for the Conservative party--even if there were anything but blue-mould +left in it." + +"Well, you know I am not original, and my poor old dad brought us up on +the soundest Tory principles; he never would even compromise on the word +Conservative. But considering that Jack is as Liberal as if the taint +were in the marrow of his bones, what a blessing that poor Artie did not +happen to be the oldest son. Cecilia says they were all talking of it at +Maundrell Abbey, where of course it is a peculiarly interesting topic. +That ornamental and conscientious peer, Lord Barnstable, has never +ceased to regret his father's death, for reasons far removed from +sentimental. He told Cecilia that Lord Strathland almost confessed to +him that he would give his right eye to hand over his old shoes to Jack, +not only because he detests Zeal, but because it would take the backbone +out of his Liberalism--" + +"And ruin _his_ career. Thank heaven Zeal is engaged at last. They will +marry in the spring, and then the only cloud on Jack's horizon will +vanish." + +"What if there were no children?" + +"There are so much more often than not--that is the least of my worries. +He had five girls by his first wife; there is no reason why this +splendid cow I have picked out should not produce a dozen boys. I never +worked so hard over one of Jack's elections--not only to overcome Zeal's +misogyny, which he calls scruples, but I had to fight Strathland every +inch of the way. When I think of Jack's desperation if he were +pitchforked up into the Peers--you do not know him as I do." + +"Well, he is safe for a time, I fancy. There has been consumption in the +family before, and always the slowest sort--" + +A footman entered with a yellow envelope on a tray. + +Lady Victoria opened it without haste or change of color. + +"Jack is returned," she said. + +"How jolly," replied the other, with equal indifference. + + + + +II + + +"You look tired--I will take you up to your room. Vicky has so many on +her hands." + +The American rose slowly, but with a flash of gratitude in her eyes. + +"I am tired, and I don't know a soul here. I almost wish Lady Victoria +had not asked me down, although I have wanted all my life to visit one +of the ancestral homes of England." + +"Oh, you'll get over that, and used to us," said Miss Thangue, smiling. +"Your staircase is behind this door, and we can slip out without +attracting attention. They are all gabbling over Jack's election." + +She opened a door in a corner of the hall where the newly arrived guests +were gathered about Lady Victoria's tea-table, and led the way up a wide +dark and slippery stair. After the first landing the light was stronger, +and the walls were, to an inch, covered with portraits and landscapes, +the effect almost as careless as if the big open space were a +lumber-room. + +"Are they _all_ old masters?" asked Miss Isabel Otis, politely, her eyes +roving over the dark canvases. + +"Oh no; the masters are down-stairs. I'll show them to you to-morrow. +These are not bad, though." + +"What a lot of ancestors to have!" + +"Oh, you'll find them all over the house. These are not Gwynnes. This +house came to Lord Strathland through the female line. It will be Jack's +eventually--one way or another; and Jack must be more like the Eltons +than the Gwynnes--unless, indeed, he is like his American ancestors." +She turned her soft non-committal eyes on the stranger. "You are his +thirty-first cousin, are you not?" + +"Not quite so remote. But why do you call him Jack? He is known to fame +as Elton Gwynne." + +"His name is John Elton Cecil Gwynne. We are given to the nickname these +days--to the abbreviation in general." + +They were walking down a corridor, and Miss Thangue was peering through +her lorgnette at the cards on the doors. + +"I know you are on this side. I wrote your name myself. But exactly +where--ah, here it is." + +She opened the door of a square room with large roses on the white +wall-paper, and fine old mahogany furniture. The sofa and chairs and +windows were covered with a chintz in harmony with the walls. "It is +cheerful, don't you think so?" asked Miss Thangue, drawing one of the +straight curtains aside. "Vicky had all the rooms done over, and I chose +the designs. She is quite intolerantly modern, and holds that when +wall-paper and chintz can save an old house from looking like a +sarcophagus, why not have them? That bell-cord connects with your maid's +room--" + +"I have no maid. I am not well off at all. I wonder Lady Victoria +thought it worth while to ask me down." + +"Dear me, how odd! May I sit with you a little while? I never before saw +a poor American girl." + +"I'll be only too grateful if you will stay with me as long as you can. +I am not exactly poor. I have a ranch near Rosewater, some property and +an old house in San Francisco. All that makes me comfortable, but no +more; and there are so many terribly rich American girls!" + +"There are, indeed!" Miss Thangue sat forward with the frank curiosity +of the Englishwoman when inspecting a foreign specimen. But her +curiosity was kindly, for she was still a girl at heart, interested in +other girls. Miss Otis, looking at her blond, virginal face, took for +granted that she was under thirty, and owed her weight to a fondness for +sweets and sauces. + +"How can you travel in Europe if you are not rich?" demanded Flora. "I +never dare venture over except as the guest of some more fortunate +friend." + +"Are _you_ poor?" asked Miss Otis, her eye arrested by the smart little +afternoon frock of lace and chiffon and crepe-de-chine. + +"Oh, horribly. But then we all are, over here. If it were not for the +Jews and the Americans we'd have to make our own clothes. The +dressmakers never could afford to give us credit." + +"They all looked very wealthy down-stairs." + +"Smart, rather. This happens to be a set that knows how to dress. Many +don't. You know something of it yourself," she added, with a frank +survey of the girl's well-cut travelling-frock and small hat. "Lots of +Americans don't, if you don't mind my saying so--for all their +reputation. I went to a dinner at an American Legation once and two of +your countrywomen came with their hats on. They had brought letters to +the Minister, and he hadn't taken the precaution of looking them over. +He was terribly mortified, poor thing." + +She related the anecdote with philanthropic intention, but Miss Otis put +her half-rejected doubts to flight by remarking, lightly: + +"We don't do that even in Rosewater." + +"Where _is_ Rosewater? What a jolly name!" + +"It is in northern California, not far from Lady Victoria's ranch and +what is left of ours. I have spent most of my life in or near it--my +father was a lawyer." + +"Do tell me about yourself!" Like most amiable spinsters, she was as +interested in the suggestive stranger as in a new novel. She sank with a +sigh of comfort into the depths of the chair. "May I smoke? Are you +shocked?" + +Then she colored apprehensively, fearing that her doubt might be +construed as an insult to Rosewater. + +But Miss Otis met it with her first smile. "Oh no," she replied. "Will +you give me one? Mine are in my trunk and they haven't brought it up." +She took a cigarette from the gayly tendered case and smoked for a few +moments in silence. + +"I don't know why you should be interested in my history," she said at +last in her slow cold voice, so strikingly devoid of the national +animation. "It has been far too uneventful. I have an adopted sister, +six years older than myself, who married twelve years ago. Her husband +is an artist in San Francisco, rather a genius, so they are always poor. +My mother died when I was little. After my sister married I took care of +my father until I was twenty-one, when he died--four years ago. There +are very good schools in Rosewater, particularly the High School. My +father also taught me languages. He had a very fine library. But I do +not believe this interests you. Doubtless you want to know something of +the life with which Lady Victoria is so remotely connected." + +"I am far more interested in you. Tell me whichever you like first. How +_are_ you related, by-the-way?" + +"Father used to draw our family tree whenever he had bronchitis in +winter. One of the most famous of the Spanish Californians was Don Jose +Argueello. We are descended from one of his sons, who had a ranch of a +hundred thousand acres in the south. When the Americans came, long +after, they robbed the Californians shamefully, but fortunately the son +of the Argueello that owned the ranch at the time married an American +girl whose father bought up the mortgages. He left the property to his +only grandchild, a girl, who married my great-grandfather, James Otis--a +northern rancher, born in Boston, and descended from old Sam Adams. He +had two children, a boy and a girl, who inherited the northern and +southern ranches in equal shares. The girl came over to England to visit +an aunt who lived here, was presented at court, and straightway married +a lord." + +"Then you are second cousin to Vicky and third to Jack. I had no idea +the relationship was so close." + +"It has seemed very remote to me ever since I laid eyes on Lady Victoria +down-stairs. Father made me promise, just before he died, that if ever I +visited Europe I would look her up. Somehow I hadn't thought of her +except as Elton Gwynne's mother, so I wrote to her without a qualm. But +I see that she is an individual." + +"Rather! How self-contained our great London is, after all! Vicky has +been a beauty for over thirty years--to be sure her fame was at its +height before you were old enough to be interested in such things. But I +should have thought your father--" + +"He must have known all about her. It comes back to me that he was very +proud of the connection for more than family reasons, but it made no +impression on me at the time." + +"Proud?" + +"Yes, he was rather a snob. He was very clever, but he fell out of +things, and being able to dwell on his English and Spanish connections +meant a good deal to him. I can recite the family history backwards." + +"But if he was clever, why on earth did he live in Rosewater? Surely he +could have practised in San Francisco?" + +"He drank. When a man drinks he doesn't care much where he lives. My +father had fads but no ambition." + +"Great heaven!" exclaimed Miss Thangue, aghast at this toneless +frankness. "You must have been glad to be rid of him!" + +"I was fond of him, but his death was a great relief. He was a hard +steady secret drinker. I nursed him through several attacks of delirium +tremens, and was always in fear that he would get out and disgrace us. +Sometimes he did, although when I saw the worst coming I generally +managed to get him over to the ranch. Of course it tied me down. I +rarely even visited my sister. My father hated San Francisco. He had +practised there in his youth, promised great things, had plenty of +money. The time came--" She shrugged her shoulders, although without the +slightest change of expression. "I never lived my own life until he +died, but I have lived it ever since." + +"And the first thing you did with your liberty was to come to Europe," +said Miss Thangue, with a sympathetic smile. + +"Of course. My father and uncle had got rid of most of their property +long before they died; there isn't an acre left of our share in the +southern estate. But my uncle died six years ago and willed me all that +remained of the northern, as well as some land in the poorer quarter of +San Francisco. I could not touch the principal during the lifetime of my +father, but we lived on the ranch and I managed it and was entitled, by +the terms of the will, to what I could make it yield. When I was finally +mistress of my fortunes I left it in charge of an old servant, sold +enough to pay off the mortgage on a property in San Francisco I +inherited from my mother, and came to Europe with a personally conducted +tour." + +Miss Thangue shuddered. The phrase unrolled a vista of commonness and +attrition. Miss Otis continued, calmly: "That is the way I should feel +now. But it was my only chance then; or rather I had seen enough of +business to avoid making mistakes when I could. In that way I learned +the ropes. After we had been rushed about for six weeks and I could not +have told you whether the Pitti Palace was in Italy or France, and the +celebrated frescos were one vast pink smudge, the party returned and I +wandered on by myself. I spent a winter in Paris, and months in +Brittany, Austria, Italy, Spain--Munich." It was here that her even +tones left their register for a second. "I studied the languages, the +literatures, the peoples, music, pictures. In Munich"--this time Flora's +alert ear detected no vibration--"and also in Rome, I saw something of +society. It was a life full of freedom, and I shall never cease to be +grateful for it, but I must go home soon and look after my affairs. I +left England to the last, like the best things of the banquet. I hope +Lady Victoria--I shall never be able to call her Cousin Victoria, as I +remember father did--will be nice to me. I have seen a good deal of +life, but have never had a real _girl's_ time, and I should love it. +Besides, I have a lot of new frocks." + +"I am sure Vicky will be nice to you. If she isn't, I'll find some one +that will be. You might marry Jack if you had money enough. We are dying +to get him married--and a California cousin--it would be too romantic. +And you would hold your own anywhere!" + +But Miss Otis expanded a fine nostril. "I have no desire to marry. I +feel as if I had had enough of men to last until I am forty--what with +those I have buried, and others I have known at home and in Europe--to +say nothing of the executors of my uncle's will, who did not approve of +my coming abroad alone and delayed the settlement of the estate as long +as possible. And now I have had too much liberty! Besides, I have seen +'Jack's' picture--two years ago, in a magazine. I will confess I had +some romantic notions about him: imagined him very dashing, bold, +handsome; insolent, if you like--the traditional young aristocrat, +glorified by genius. He looks like Uncle Hiram." + +"Is that who Jack looks like? We never could make out. No, Jack is not +much to look at, except when he wakes up--I have seen him quite +transfigured on the platform. But he is as insolent as you could wish, +and has a superb confidence in himself that his enemies call by the most +offensive names. But he is a dear, in spite of all, and I quite adore +him." + +"Perhaps; but life, myself, so many mysteries and problems, upon which +I have barely turned a dark lantern as yet, interest me far more than +any man could, unless he were superlative. I have had my disillusions." + +She lit another cigarette, and for a few moments looked silently out of +the window at the darkening woods beyond the lawn. Flora Thangue +regarded her with a swelling interest. It was a type of which she had no +knowledge, evidently not a common type even in the hypothetical land of +the free; she had visited New York and Newport and known many Americans. +True, she had never met the provincial type before, but she doubted if +Rosewater had produced a crop of Isabel Otises. What was at the source +of that cold-blooded frankness, so different from the English fashion of +alternately speaking out and knowing nothing? Was she merely an +egoist--it ran in the family--or did it conceal much that she had no +intention of revealing? Her very beauty was of a type rarely seen in the +America of to-day, prevalent as it may have been a hundred years ago: +she looked like a feminine edition of the first group of American +statesmen--although black Spanish hair was pulled carelessly over the +high forehead, a heavy coil encircling the head in a long upward sweep, +and the half-dreaming, half-penetrating regard of the light-blue eyes +was softened by a heavy growth of lash. The eyebrows were low and thick, +the upper lip was sensitive, quivering sometimes as she talked, but the +lower was firm and full. It was the brow, the profile, the strength of +character expressed, the general seriousness of the fine face and head, +that made her look like a reversion to the type that gave birth to a +nation. But Miss Thangue had seen too much of the world to judge any one +by his inherited shell. She had observed many Americans with fine heads +and bulging brows concealing practically nothing, insignificant German +heads whose intellects had terrified her, the romantic Spanish eyes of +the most unromantic people in Europe, English pride and an icy mask of +breeding guarding from the casual eye the most lawless and ribald +instincts. Therefore had she no intention of taking this new specimen on +trust, much as she liked her, and she speculated upon her possibilities +in the friendly silence that had fallen between them. Life is composed +of individuals and their choruses, and Flora, humorously admitting the +fact, was far more interested in others than in herself. + +Only in the dense silky masses of her black hair and the almost stolid +absence of gesture did the American betray her Spanish ancestry; but how +much of the Spaniard, subtle, patient, vengeful, treacherous, mighty in +passive resistance and cunning, lay behind those deep fearless blue eyes +of her New England ancestors? Or was she not Spanish at all, but merely +a higher type of American--or wholly herself? Would Jack, susceptible +and passionate, a worshipper of beauty down among the roots of his +abnormal cleverness and egoism, fall in love with her? And what then? +The girl, with her strong stern profile against the shadows, her low +brooding brows, might wield a power far more dangerous than that of the +average fascinating woman, if her will marshalled the rest of her +faculties and drove them in a straight line; although the luminous skin +as polished as ivory, the low full curves and slow graceful movements of +her figure added a potency that Flora, always an amused observer of men, +would have been the last to ignore. Victoria, high-bred, fastidious, +mocking, yet unmistakably passionate and possibly insurgent, was of +that mint of woman about whom men had gone mad since the world began. +But this girl, who might be as cold as the moon, or not, looked, in any +case, capable of clasping a man's throat with her strong little hand, +and gently turning his head from east to west. At this point Miss +Thangue rose impatiently and rang a bell. Jack's career was almost at +the flood. No woman could submerge his intellect and stupendous +interests for more than a moment. + +"Order lights and have your trunks brought up," she said. "I will send +one of the housemaids to help you dress. My room is over on the other +side of the house--go through that door opposite, and down a corridor +until you come to another long hall and staircase like the one on this +side. You will find my name on the door. Knock at about a quarter-past +eight and I will go down with you. Vicky may be in an angelic humor and +she may not. It depends mainly upon whether Jack condescends to turn up. +I suppose you know all about him; it would hardly do for you to face him +and his mother if you didn't. He has travelled quite exhaustively in the +colonies and given us some of the most informing literature on that +subject that we have. He was out in Africa when the Boer War broke out, +and once before in India, when there was fighting, volunteered both +times and did brilliant service. He has no end of medals with clasps. +Then he suddenly went in for politics and announced himself an +uncompromising Liberal. It nearly killed his grandfather--Lord +Strathland--for Jack is the one person on earth that he loves as much as +himself; and it has alienated many of his relatives on both sides--which +gave him one more chance to win against terrific odds; he enjoys that +sort of thing. He had been in but two years when there was a general +election, and he has only just got back--he contested three divisions +before he won his seat this time, and he had almost as hard a fight +before. Vicky, who hates the Gwynnes, with the exception of Lord Zeal, +the heir, besides believing in Jack as you would in Solomon, has +steadily upheld him; and she is a powerful ally--not only one of the +most distinguished of the political women, but still turns heads when +she chooses, and her game is generally in the cabinet preserves, when it +is not in the diplomatic. I must run. Put on your most fetching gown. +Julia Kaye, a detestable little parvenu, is here. Jack is in love with +her and she has chosen another. It will be a cousinly duty to console +him. Then you can turn him over to some one else. Ta, ta!" Her last +words floated back from the depths of the corridor; a clock was striking +and she had pattered off hastily. + + + + +III + + +The "Jack," whose more distinguished patronymic was so gayly caracolling +down the road to posterity, had arrived, and after dressing hastily, +sought his mother. Her hair was done, her gown laced; she dismissed her +maid at once, and while her eyes melted, in the fashion of mothers, she +embraced her son with something more than maternal warmth: a curious +suggestion of relief, of stepping out of her own personality and leaving +it like a heap of clothes on the floor. This attitude had occasionally +puzzled her idol, but he was too masculine to analyze. She was his best +friend and a delightful person to have for a mother; her soul might be +her own possession undisturbed. He admired her almost as much as he did +himself, and to-night he kissed her fondly and told her gallantly that +she was looking even more beautiful than usual. + +"It is all this white after the dead black," said Lady Victoria, smiling +appreciatively. "I am thankful that prolonged mourning is out of date; +it made a fright of me and was getting on my nerves." She wore no jewels +save a high diamond dog-collar and a few sparkling combs in her hair, +but she made a superb appearance with the long white sweep of shoulders +and bust, her brilliant eyes and smart tailed gown of black chiffon and +Irish lace. Her arms, no longer rounded as when artists had fought to +paint her, were but half-revealed under floating sleeves, and her fair +tapering hands were even younger than her face. + +She opened a large black fan and moved it slowly while looking intently +at her son's bent profile. "Something has gone wrong," she said. "Have +you seen Julia Kaye again?" + +"No, I was invited to Maundrell Abbey last week, but couldn't manage it, +of course. And I knew she was to be here. Nothing has gone wrong--but I +had rather a shock this morning. I met Zeal at the club. He looks like a +death's head. He vowed he was taking even better care of himself than +usual, but his chest is bad again. He talked about going to Davos--the +very word makes me sick! In the next breath he said he might go out to +Africa. Can't you hurry on his marriage?--persuade Carry that it is her +duty to go with him?" + +"I should have no difficulty persuading Carry. The rub is with him. +Compulsory asceticism has bred misogyny, and misogyny scruples. He says +that he has sins enough to his account without laying up a reckoning +with posterity. If it were not for you I should agree with him. I feel +like a conspirator--" + +"There is no reason why his children should be consumptive. Carry's +physique is Wagnerian, and she is just the woman to look after her +children herself. Zeal's health was thrown to the dogs by a weak +indulgent frivolous mother, and what she left him he disposed of later +when he made as great an ass of himself as might have been expected. He +is a hypochondriac now and would keep a close watch on his heir's health +and habits; you may be sure of that. He ought not to be in London +now--it is stifling--went up for some business meeting or other--seemed +to wish to avoid details. I hope to heaven he has not been relieving the +monotony of his life by some rotten speculation. I begged him to come +down here, but he wouldn't--says that his hand is no longer steady +enough to hold a gun--it's awful!--worse because I'm not merely fond of +him and regretting the possible loss of a good friend--I have felt like +a beast all day. But I can't help it. For God's sake write and persuade +him to go to Davos at once--and picture the delights of a pretty and +devoted nurse. I feel as if I had ashes in my mouth--and yesterday I was +so happy!" he burst out, with the petulance of a child. + +"I will write to-night," she said, soothingly. "He has a very slow form +of consumption; I have the assurance of his doctors. And at least he has +committed himself with Carry, and announced his intention to marry as +soon as a sojourn somewhere has made him feel fit again. You know how +much better he always is when he comes back. Put it out of your mind +to-night. I want you to be as happy as I am. Everybody is talking of the +brilliance of your campaign--" + +"Much good brilliance will do me if I am to rot in the Upper House!" + +"Put it out of your mind; don't let apprehension control you for a +moment. Believe me, will-power counts in life for more than everything +else combined, and if it isn't watched it weakens." + +"All right, mummy. You are never so original as when you preach. So +Julia Kaye came down this afternoon? Talk about will. Mine should be of +pure steel; I have ordered her out of my consciousness these last weeks +at the point of the bayonet. She has written me exactly three times. +However--those letters were charming," he added, with the sudden smile +that transfigured his face, routing the overbearing and contemptuous +expression that had won him so many enemies; friends and flatterers and +the happy circumstances of his life had combined thoroughly to spoil +him. "Do you maintain that will can win a woman?" he added, sharply. + +She was the woman to laugh outright at such a suggestion. "No, nor that +it can uproot love, although it can give it a good shaking and lock it +in the dark room. I doubt if you love Julia Kaye, but you will find that +out for yourself. You might bring her to terms by flirting a little with +your American cousin--" + +"My what?" He opened his eyes as widely as he had ever done when a +school-boy. + +"Of course--I forgot you know nothing of her. She wrote me from +Ambleside--I infer she has been 'doing' England; and as her credentials +were unimpeachable I asked her down. She has inherited a part of the +northern estate and was brought up in the neighboring town of +Rosewater--the American names are too silly. She seems quite _comme il +faut_ and is remarkably handsome. I detest Americans, as you know, but +there certainly is something in blood. I liked her at once. She looks +clever, and is quite off the type--none of the usual fluff. If she +doesn't bore me I shall keep her here for a while." + +"I wish you would adopt her," he said, fondly. "I shouldn't be jealous, +for I hate to think of you so much alone." He rose and kissed her +lightly on the forehead, experience teaching him to avoid a stray hair +from the carefully built coiffure. "I'll see if I can waylay Julia on +the stairs; she is always late. Keep from eleven to twelve for me +to-morrow morning. I want to tell you about the campaign. It was a +glorious fight!" His eyes sparkled at the memory of it. "I felt as if +every bit of me had never been alive at once before. My opponent was a +splendid chap. It meant something to beat him. The other side was in a +rage!--more than once yelled for half an hour after I took the platform. +When I finished they yelled again for half an hour--to a different +tune." His slight, thin, rather graceless figure seemed suddenly to +expand, even to grow taller. Some hidden magnetism burst from him like +an aura, and his cold pasty face and light gray eyes flamed into +positive beauty. "It was glorious! Glorious! I was intoxicated--I could +have reeled, little as they suspected it. I wouldn't part for a second +with the certainty that I am the biggest figure in young England to-day. +I hate to sleep and forget it. If I cultivated modesty I should renounce +one of the exquisite pleasures of life. Humility is a superstition. The +man who doesn't weed it out is an ass. To be young, well-born, with +money enough, a brain instead of a mere intelligence, an essential +leader of men--Good God! Good God!" Then he subsided and blushed, jerked +up his shoulders and laughed. "Well--I never let myself go to any one +but you," he said. "And I won't inflict _you_ any longer." + + + + +IV + + +"I wish the old homes of England had electric lights," thought Miss +Otis, with a sigh. + +There were four candles on the dressing-table, two on the mantel-shelf; +beyond the radius of their light the room was barely visible. She +carried one of the candles over to the cheval-glass and held it above +her head, close to her face, low on either side. + +"I feel as if I had been put together by some unpleasant mechanical +process. It is well I am not inordinately vain, but when one puts on a +new dress for the first time--" She shrugged her shoulders hopelessly, +replaced the candle, and walked up and down the room swinging the +train--her first--of the charming gown of pale blue satin; patting the +hair coiled softly about the entire head in a line eminently becoming to +the profile, and prolonged by several little curls escaping to the neck. + +She felt happy and excited, her fine almost severe face far more +girlishly alive than when she had told her story, provocatively dry, to +Flora Thangue. She directed an approving glance at the high heels of her +slippers, which, with her lofty carriage, produced the effect of +non-existing inches. She was barely five feet five, but she ranked with +tall women, her height as unchallenged as the chiselling of her profile. + +"What frauds we all are!" she thought, with a humor of which she had +not vouchsafed Miss Thangue a hint. "But what is a cunningly made +slipper on a foot not so small, at the end of a body not quite long +enough, but an encouraging example of the triumph of art over nature? +Not the superiority, perhaps, but they are the best of working +partners." + +She sat down and recalled the conversation with her new friend, giving +an amused little shudder. She had heard much of, and in her travels come +into contact with, the cold-blooded frankness of the English elect; with +whom it was either an instinct or a pose to manifest their careless +sense of impregnability. When pressed to give an account of herself the +dramatic possibilities of the method suddenly appealed to her, +accompanied by a mischievous desire to outdo them at their own game and +observe the effect. She had found herself as absorbed as an actress in a +new and congenial role. + +"After all," she thought, "clever women make themselves over in great +part, uprooting here, adopting there, and as we have so little chance to +_be_ anything, there is a good deal to be got out of it. If one cannot +be a genius one can at least be an artist. I have never had much cause +to be as direct as stage lightning, but as I enjoyed it I suppose I may +infer that even brutal frankness is not foreign to my nature. Perhaps, +like father, I am a snob at heart and liked the sensation of a sort of +artistic alliance with the British aristocracy. Well, if I develop +snobbery I can root out that weed--or persuade myself that some other +motive is at the base of a disposition to adopt any of the +characteristics of this people: a woman can persuade herself of any +sophistry she chooses. Not for anything would I be a man. Absolutely to +accept the facts of life, even the ugly unvarnished fact itself, and at +the same time to invent one's own soul-tunes--that is to be a woman and +free!" + +A printed square of card-board on her writing-table had informed her +that the dinner-hour was half-past eight. She looked at her watch. It +was five minutes to the time. Once more she peered into the glass, shook +out her skirts, then sought a door in a far and dusky corner. It opened +upon a long dimly lit corridor which led into another at right angles, +and Isabel presently found herself at the head of a staircase similar to +the one on her side of the house. Here, too, the walls were hung with +portraits and landscapes, and as far down as the eye could follow; but +after glancing over them for a moment with the recurring weariness of +one who has seen too many pictures in the hard ways of European travel, +her eyes lit and lingered on the figure of a young man who stood on the +landing, his back to her, examining, with a certain tensity, a canvas on +a level with his eyes. + +"Uncle Hiram--John Elton Cecil Gwynne! What a likeness and what a +difference!" + +The young Englishman's hair, pale in color and very smooth, was worn +longer than the fashion, the ends lilting. As he turned slowly at the +rustle of descending skirts, this eccentricity and his colorless skin +made him look the pale student rather than the gallant soldier, the best +fighter on the hustings that England had seen for five-and-twenty years. +As Isabel walked carefully down the slippery stair she veiled her eyes +to hide the wonder in them. She had expected personality, magnetism, as +a compensation for nature's external economies. His apparent lack of +both made him almost repellent, awakened in Isabel a sensation of +antagonism; and the cool speculation in his light gray eyes merely +accentuated his general dearth of charm. True he had height--although +his carriage was unimposing--his head was large and well-proportioned, +his nose and chin salient, but the straight heavy mouth was as +contemptuous as a Prussian officer's, and in spite of his grooming he +looked old-fashioned, absurdly like the Uncle Hiram who had been a +country lawyer and farmer, and had always worn broadcloth in the hottest +weather--except, to be sure, when he wore a linen "duster," or sat on +the veranda in his shirt-sleeves, his feet on the railing. + +However, she smiled, and he smiled politely in return, advancing a few +steps to meet her. "I hope you have heard of me," she said. "Your mother +is so busy--English people are so indifferent to details--I am your +cousin, Isabel Otis--" + +"Of course my mother has spoken of you. I am very glad to see you in my +house," he added, hospitably. "Shall I show you the way?" + +He made no further remark as they descended the darker section of the +stair, and she could think of nothing to say to him. Nor did she +particularly care to think of anything, the American in her resenting +his lack of effort. But as they reached the door she paused abruptly. + +"I forgot! Miss Thangue asked me to knock at her door--" + +"You take us too seriously," he said, with a slight sneer. "Flora has +evidently forgotten you; she came down a quarter of an hour ago." + +Isabel lifted her head still higher, annoyed at the angry blood that +leaped to her face. "I am afraid I am rather literal," she said, with +more hauteur than the occasion demanded. "But perhaps you will tell me +where to go. There seems to be a bewildering number of rooms. After +three years of lodgings in Europe, to say nothing of the modest +architecture of Rosewater, I feel as if astray in a maze." + +"You got that off as if you were a masquerading princess," he said, with +a flicker of humor in his eyes. "Americans generally bluff the other +way." He opened the door. "We meet here in the hall. There is my mother. +You are not obliged to speak to her, you know. We are less formal in +life than in novels." With this parting shot he left her abruptly and +joined a small dark woman with a plebeian face, a sensual mouth, and +magnificent black eyes. + +"The rude beast!--Julia Kaye, of course." But Isabel forgot them both in +the novelty of the scene. The square white hall was lit with wax-candles +and shaded lamps, and filled with the murmur of voices--beautiful +gowns--the sparkle of jewels. Isabel dismissed the memory of early +trials, the long years she had lived in the last three, her philosophic +resignation to the disillusions and disappointments with which her +liberty had been pitted; it was her first appearance in the world of +fashion--which she entered, after all, by a sort of divine right. +Trepidation was undeveloped in her, and when she had stood for a moment, +quite aware that her proud and singular beauty had won her instant +recognition, she walked over to her hostess. + +No fresh demand was made on her courage. Lady Victoria's earlier mood of +colossal indifference had been dissipated by her son's return. She +greeted Isabel with a dazzling smile and a winning gesture. + +"Isn't Jack a darling? Isn't he a dear?" she commanded. "I have put you +on his left, that you may be sure not to be bored. What hair! That is +_your_ legacy from Spain. I have the eyes, but I never had a foot of +hair. I hope you are comfortable. I expect you to remain a week. I am so +glad that Jack will be here. The place is intolerably dull without him." + +Isabel, warming to such maternal ardor in a beauty whose years were +prematurely emphasized by a son as conspicuous as Elton Gwynne, summoned +a few vague words of enthusiasm. She was reproached politely for +wandering about England for two months before discovering herself to her +relatives; then, Lady Victoria's interest waning, she turned to a young +man, handsome and Saxon and orthodox, and said, casually, "Jimmy, you +will take in Miss Otis." + +Dinner had already been announced. The twain, in complete ignorance of +each other's identity, walked through a long line of rooms, almost +unfurnished but for the scowling or smiling dead crowding the walls. +Isabel decided that she would be as effortless as the English and see +what came of it. The practised instinct of the American girl, added to +the excessive hospitality of the Californian, would have led her to put +her companion immediately at ease, but not only was she fond of +experimenting with racial characteristics upon her own hidden +possibilities, but she was intensely proud, and the English attitude had +stung her more than once. + +"Why should I please them?" she thought, contemptuously. "Let them +please me." + +Her companion betrayed no eagerness to please her; and during the first +ten minutes at table he talked to Gwynne about the late elections. +Evidently, he too had emerged from the political fray triumphant. Isabel +sat like a stately picture by Reynolds, and after her slow gaze had +travelled over the dark full-length portraits of the kings and queens +that had honored Capheaton, it dropped to the more animated faces in the +foreground. The men were good-looking, with hardly an exception; judging +by their carriage they might all have been army men, but as every word +that floated to the head of the table was political, they possibly had +followed their successful host's example and adopted an equally +intermittent career. One or two of the women were almost as handsome as +Lady Victoria, with their superb figures, their complexions of claret +and snow, that blending of high breeding and warm palpitating humanity +one never sees outside of England. But others within Isabel's range were +too haggard for beauty, although one had a Burne-Jones face and her eyes +gazed beyond the company with an expression that made her seem pure +spirit; but she too looked tired, delicate, curiously overworked. + +Opposite Isabel was a tall buxom young woman of the purest Saxon type, +who was talking amiably with the man on her right, and occasionally +shaking with deep and silent laughter; her intimate casual manner, her +slight movements, her accentuation, manifestly bred in the bone. +Suddenly it was borne in upon Isabel's always sensitive consciousness +that she was the only haughty and reserved person present, and she felt +provincial and laughed frankly at herself. The lady across the table +claiming the attention of the host, she turned to her own partner. Her +black eyelashes were long, and under their protecting shadow she swept a +glance at the card above the young man's plate. It was inscribed, "Lord +Hexam." She saw her opportunity and asked, ingenuously: + +"How can you be a member of the House of Commons?" + +He looked up from his fish and replied, somewhat cuttingly, "By +contesting a borough and getting elected." + +"But I thought a peer could not be in the House of Commons." + +"He can't." + +"Then how can you be?" + +"I am not a peer." He looked very much annoyed. + +"But you are Lord Hexam." + +He answered, sulkily: "I happen to be the son of a peer." + +"Are you irritated because I know nothing about you?" asked Isabel, +cruelly. "Do you suppose I have wasted my time in England reading +Burke?" + +"No, there are too many sights," he replied, more cruelly still. + +"They are far more interesting than most of the people I have met." Then +she changed her tactics and smiled upon him; and when she smiled she +showed a dimple hardly larger than a pin's head at one corner of her +flexible mouth. For the first time he looked under her eyelashes into +the odd blue eyes, with their dilated pupils and black rim edging the +light iris. He suddenly realized that she was beautiful, in spite of the +three little black moles on her face--he detested moles--and smiled in +return. + +"I am afraid I was rude. But I am really shy, and you quite took it out +of me. I am more afraid of the American girl than of anything on earth." + +"How did you know I was an American?" + +"By your accent." He laughed good-naturedly. "Now I am even with you." + +"Well, you are. Californians pride themselves upon having no accent." + +"Oh, it is not nearly so bad as some. But it is there all the same. Not +a twang nor a drawl, but--well--every country has its unmistakable +stamp." + +"Well, I have no desire to be taken for anything but an American," she +said, defiantly. "A Californian, that is. After all, we are quite +different. But we do have an appalling variety of accents in the United +States. I have lived abroad long enough to discover that. When I am an +old maid I am going to mount the platform and preach the training of the +voice in childhood. I have taken a violent dislike to more than one +clever American man merely because he trailed his voice through his +nose. I don't mind our vices being criticised as much as our crudities." + +"I never before heard an American girl make a remark that indicated the +least interest in her country--even when--pardon me--they brag. They +generally give the impression that they don't even know who happens to +be the President of the moment. Somehow, you look as if you might." + +"I was brought up by a man, and my uncle was a great politician in a +small way. That is to say he was identified with country politics only, +but he and my father were everlastingly discussing the national issues. +Of course you have only met girls from the great cities, where the men +are too busy making money to take any interest in public affairs. The +women rarely hear them mentioned, practically forget there are such +affairs--except on the Fourth of July, which they resent as a personal +grievance. I have met scores of them in Europe. To know anything of +politics they regard as the height of bad form." + +"Sometimes I wish that our women would let them alone for a while. That +is my sister over there," indicating the lady with the Burne-Jones face. +"She has worn herself to a shadow working for her husband, who is in the +House, and she is heart and soul in politics--which she regards as a +sort of divine mission. She is on several committees, is far more useful +to her husband than his secretary, for she has the gift of style--and no +one would accuse Rex of that--and during an election she never rests. +Besides which, of course she has her little family, the usual number of +establishments to look after, and great social pressure. I always +maintain that our women are of immense service to us, but many of them +are physically unfit. I expect to see my sister go to pieces any day, +and as she is little short of an angel it worries me." + +"She does look angelic," said Isabel, sympathetically. "Is that what is +the matter with the rest of them?--the thin ones, I mean?" + +"Generally speaking. The thinnest is my cousin. I went in for a cup of +tea a week or two before the end of last session. There were several of +us about the tea-table when a footman entered and muttered something to +her, and with a vague word of apology she left the room and did not +return for half an hour. I thought the baby must be dying, and was about +to ring, when she reappeared and remarked that she had been sitting at +the telephone listening to a paper her husband had just finished on one +of the questions before the House. Some of them stand it better." He +indicated a fair beautiful creature with a determined profile and deep +womanly figure. "There is Mrs. Sefton, for instance. She presides at +committee meetings--she is great on colonial politics--for three or four +hours at a time, and always sails out as fresh as a rose; but she has +buried her husband and entertains when and whom she chooses. Lady +Cecilia opposite understands politics as well as any woman in England, +but does not go in for them--Spence isn't in the House; that may account +for it!" + +"Your fashionable women do not in the least resemble ours," said Isabel, +meditatively. "They are far more like the women of our small towns." + +"What!" + +"It sounds paradoxical, but it is more than half true. Say two-thirds; +the other third is all in favor of your women, for obvious reasons. But +those I speak of, the best women of every small town, are constantly +active in civic affairs. Most of the sanitary improvements and the +educational, all schemes for parks and better streets, come from them. +There is no village too small to have its 'Woman's Improvement Club.' +And it is the women that have saved all the historical buildings in the +country from destruction." + +"I thought they went in for Browning Societies." + +"Doubtless you would scorn really to know anything of American humor. +Perhaps our comic papers have never heard of the Improvement Clubs, or +find nothing in them that is humorous. Not that I would decry the +Browning Clubs, nor any literary clubs, however crude. It is all in the +line of progress. 'Culture' is a tempting morsel for the jokemaker, but +as an alternative for dull domesticity and the vulgar inanities of +gossip it is not to be despised." + +"By Jove, you are right," said Hexam, not without warmth. + +"Is my fair cousin converting you to something?" asked the host. His +voice had been little heard, and he looked sulky. + +"Cousin?" + +"Yes, he is my cousin," said Isabel, with the accent of resignation. +Hexam laughed. Gwynne looked as if the grace of humor had been left out +of him. Isabel, innocent and impassive, turned her eyelashes upon her +partner. "I was quite wild to meet my cousin," she went on, in the +toneless voice that contrasted so effectively with her occasional +extravagance of speech; "and now I find him the precise image of my +uncle Hiram, who never spoke to me except to say: 'Little girls should +be seen and not heard,' or 'Run off to bed now, little one.'" + +Without repitching her voice she yet infused it with a patronizing +masculinity that once more startled Hexam into laughter, and caused a +silent convulsion in the massive frame of Lady Cecilia Spence. + +"She knows that was a bit of vengeance," thought Isabel. "But of course, +manlike, he'll never suspect it." She turned her deep thoughtful gaze +full upon her cousin. His eyes were glittering under their heavy lids. +He replied, suavely: + +"I hope you will find us more polite--if less picturesque. I cannot +flatter myself that my likeness to your uncle Hiram extends that far. +'Precise image'--is not that perhaps a bit of national exaggeration?" + +"Well, I take that back," said Isabel, sweetly. "But you really might be +his son instead of his second cousin." + +"Perhaps that accounts for a good many things," said Lady Cecilia. "You +know, Jack, I have always said there was something exotic about you. You +are much too energetic and progressive for this settled old country. If +you had been born in America I suppose you would have been president at +the earliest moment the constitution permitted." + +He hesitated a moment, then delivered himself of a bombshell. "I was +born in America," he said. + +His eyes moved slowly from one stupefied face to another. "As I left at +the age of five weeks I can hardly claim that the incident left an +indelible impress. But the fact remains that I should be eligible for +the presidency if I chose to become an American citizen." + +Isabel looked at her relative with an accession of interest; he had +suddenly ceased to be an alien, become in a measure a personal +possession. "Come over and try it," she said, impulsively. "_There_ is a +career worth while! A young country as full of promise as of faults! +Think of the variousness of achievement! England's history is made. If +you are all they claim, you might really make history in the United +States. If I only had a brother--" Her eyes were flashing for the first +time. "However--they say you love the fight. It is far more difficult to +become a president of the United States than a prime-minister of +England, for with us family influence counts for nothing." + +"I am afraid I have not the qualities that do count. To be as frank as +yourself--I don't think I could stand your politics." + +"But think of the excitement of really sounding your capacities!" +Impersonality was an achievement with Isabel and she could always +command it. "You can never do that here, no matter how brilliant your +success. There must always be the question of how far you would have +gone without your family, and friends of equal power. The ugliest lesson +of life is its snobbishness. Even when the herd can expect no return, a +blind instinct--doubtless an inheritance from the days when there were +but two classes--drives it to beat the drums for the socially elect. We +have enough of that in America, heaven knows, but the best thing that +can be said of American politics is that they are free of it. Besides, +if our politics are bad, so much the better for you. You might do for +the United States what your English great-grandfather helped to do for +this country in 1832. You might be another 'Great Revolutioner,' like +your still more illustrious ancestor, Sam Adams. You'll never, never +have such an opportunity to become a great historical figure over here, +for English dissatisfaction hardly counts, and in the United States +there are increasing millions that demand reform, a closer approach to +the ideal republic promised by their ancestors, and the man for the +hour." + +The angry glitter had left his eyes and he was looking at her with +interest and curiosity. He respected her courage and obvious power to +rise above the personal attitude of her sex. + +"I dislike intensely many things in your country," he said, slowly; "but +I will confess that it interests me greatly. If it has failed in some of +its original ideals it has at least continued to be a republic for more +than a century; and when one considers its enormous size and conflicting +elements--for I suppose you will not claim that you are a homogeneous +race--that is very inspiring! It makes one believe that fundamentally +the country must be sound--that unswerving fidelity to an ideal. It is a +great thing! a stupendous thing! I wish I knew that I should live to +see England, all Europe, a republic. There is no other state fit for +self-respecting men--that voice in the selection of their own rulers." + +"By Jove, Jack!" cried Lord Hexam. "I never heard you go as far as that +before." + +"Possibly you never will again. I have no desire to rank with those +brilliant failures that are born before their time, and no intention of +wasting my energies on the unattainable. Moreover, radicals and +socialists per se are merely a nuisance. The Liberal party is the only +choice in England to-day, and when I get it at my back, I can, at least, +after I have led it to a stronger position, fight for the soundest of +the extremist dogmas, as well as for the reorganization of the House of +Peers. Hereditary legislation in the twentieth century and the most +civilized country in the world! Why not an hereditary army and navy? +Russia has few greater anachronisms. And when one thinks of the careers +it has ruined! Look at Barnstaple." + +The two men plunged into discussion, and Isabel, her eyes expressing a +polite interest, studied the face of her cousin. She appreciated for the +first time something of its power. A brief illumination of his eyes had +betrayed the soul of the idealist; a passion that in a less sound mind +might result in fanaticism. He was talking with none of the fiery +enthusiasm that made him so irresistible a public speaker, but his +negative suggestion of vitality, of mature thought, his very lack of +every-day magnetism, fascinated her; not the woman, but the acute, +receptive, and antagonistic intelligence. As he sat there talking, with +hardly a change of expression in his voice or on his cold face, faintly +sneering, he seemed to be holding his powers in solution; to have +resolved them for the time being into their elements, that they might +rest and recuperate. While no doubt in first-rate physical condition, he +looked as if he had not a red corpuscle in his body, and this very +contrast to the warm full-blooded people surrounding him gave him a +distinction of his own, the distinction of pure brain independent of +those auxiliaries that few public men have been able to dispense with. +It was obvious that he was too self-centred, too haughtily indifferent, +or too spoilt, to make any effort in private life to charm or bewilder; +when he vanquished from the platform it was by the awakened rush of the +forces within him; and this very indifference, this contemptuous +knowledge of his mighty reserves, this serene faith in his star, +invested his personal unattractiveness with a formidable significance. +Isabel's imagination dilated him into a disembodied intellect surrounded +by mere statues of human flesh. As she left the dining-room the illusion +vanished. She liked him less than ever, nevertheless wished that he were +her brother and the rising star in American politics. + + + + +V + + +As the women entered a large room on the opposite side of the central +hall, where coffee was to be served, Flora Thangue laid her hand +deprecatingly on Isabel's arm. "I was so sorry not to be able to wait +for you," she said. "But I had a distracted note from Vicky at eight +asking me to dress as quickly as I could and see if the cards on the +table were all right: the new butler is rather a muff, and such a +martinet the footmen dare not interfere. I was delighted to see that +Jack had taken charge of you. What do you think of our infant prodigy?" + +"I have had little chance to think anything," said Isabel, evasively. +"Is he the typical Englishman--I mean apart from his peculiar gifts?" + +"Only in certain qualities. You see he has Celtic blood in him: of +course the Gwynnes had their origin in Wales; and then he is one-fourth +American, isn't he? I can't say how far that inheritance has influenced +his character, but there is no doubt about the Celtic. Outwardly he is +even more impassive than the usual Oxford product, and if he had been +born a generation earlier he would have had all sorts of affectations. +But affectation, thank heaven, is out of date. We wouldn't tolerate a +Grandcourt five minutes. Whom should you like to talk to? You will have +enough of me." + +"I am sure there is no one I shall like half so well," said Isabel, +truthfully; and Flora loved her for not being gracious. "I think I +should like to know Mrs. Kaye." + +"If you ever do, please give me the benefit of your investigations. +There are as many opinions of her as there are of cats. Vicky believes +in her and I don't. Jack is in love with her--with certain of his Celtic +instincts gone wrong." + +She led Isabel over to Mrs. Kaye, who sat alone on a small sofa, sipping +her coffee and absently puffing at a cigarette. She was exquisitely +dressed and jewelled, and her little figure was round and symmetrical; +but nothing could obscure the ignoble modelling of her face. She might +have been misunderstood for a housemaid masquerading had it not been for +an air of assured power, a repose as monumental as that of a Chinese +joss. + +She had cultivated a still radiance of expression which, when she +thought it worth her while, broke into a tender or brilliant smile; +although even then her large, ripe mouth retained a hint of the +austerity her strong will had imposed upon it--to the more complete +undoing of the masculine host. She smiled graciously as Miss Thangue +murmured the introduction and moved away, but did not offer the other +half of the sofa, and Isabel fetched a chair. + +"You are the American cousin, of course," she said, with a slight lisp. +"We were all talking about you down at our end of the table, but I could +not see you until just now. I long to go to America, your novels +interest me so much. But one is always so busy--one never gets time for +the Atlantic. Lady Victoria says you come from that wonderful country, +California, but of course you know New York and Newport still better. +All Americans do." + +"I have never seen Newport, and passed exactly a week in New York before +sailing." + +Mrs. Kaye's expressive eyes, which had dwelt on Isabel with flattering +attention, fell to the tip of her cigarette. "No? I thought that all +smart Americans came from that sacred precinct." + +"I am not in the least smart. I don't really _know_ half a dozen people +in America outside of the county in which I have spent the greater part +of my life--not even in San Francisco, where I was born." Isabel held +her cigarette poised in one slender hand, letting her eyes fall +deliberately on the broad back and flat nails of the exquisitely kept +section on Mrs. Kaye's lap. "So far, in my small social ventures I have +felt the necessity of little beyond good manners and a small independent +income. This is my first excursion into the great world, and of course +my cousin is too secure in her position to care whether I am smart or +not. Miss Thangue, the only other woman I have talked with, is far too +amiable and well-bred. Am I to understand that I shall be tried by New +York measurements and found wanting?" + +"Oh no!" Mrs. Kaye's bright color had darkened. "On the contrary, the +English are always rather amused at American distinctions. It only +happens that all my friends are New-Yorkers." + +She was a very clever woman, for snobbery had blunted and demoralized +only one small chamber of her brain, and she had as comprehensive a +knowledge of the world as any woman in it. Nevertheless, as her powerful +magnetic eyes met the ingenuous orbs opposite, she was unable to +determine whether the barbed words, quivering in a sore spot, had been +uttered in innocence or intent. "Of course one doesn't meet so many +Americans, after all. Naturally, the New-Yorkers bring the best +letters." She paused a moment as if ruminating, then delivered herself +of an epigram: "New York is the great American invention for separating +the wheat from the tares." + +"Indeed!" Isabel was too surprised to strike back. + +"It is well known that it is one of the most exclusive social bodies in +the world. You have far less difficulty over here." + +"That may be merely owing to the fear that affects all new social +bodies. I have the honor to know the leader of society in St. Peter--a +town of ten thousand inhabitants near my own--and she is frightfully +exclusive. She is so afraid of knowing the wrong sort of people that she +is barely on nodding terms with the several thousand new-comers that +have added to the wealth and importance of the town during the last ten +years. Consequently, her circle is as dull as an Anglo-Saxon Sunday. I +fancy the same may be said of New York, for its fashionable set is not +large and its interests are far from various. From all I have heard, +London society alone is perennially interesting, and the reason is, +that, absolutely secure, it keeps itself from staleness by constantly +refreshing its veins with new blood, exclusive only against +offensiveness. Of course you are a daughter of a duke or something," she +added, wickedly. "Everybody here seems to be. Don't you feel that your +ancestors have given you the right to know whom you please?--instead of +eternally plugging the holes in the dike." + +In spite of her sharpened wits, Mrs. Kaye smiled radiantly into Isabel's +guileless eyes. "I am not the daughter of a duke; I wish I were!" she +exclaimed, with a fair assumption of aristocratic frankness. "But your +point is quite correct." Again she appeared to ruminate; then added: +"The British aristocracy is to society what God is to the +world--all-sufficient, all-merciful, all-powerful." + +"And she would sacrifice Him and all his archangels to an epigram," +thought Isabel, who was somewhat shocked. "How fearfully clever you +are!" she murmured. "Do you think in epigrams?" + +"Epigrams? Have I made one? I wish I could. They are immensely the +fashion." + +"I should think you might have set it--" + +She did not finish her sentence, for the ear to which it was addressed +suddenly closed. Lady Cecilia Spence had sauntered up, and Mrs. Kaye +hastily made room for her on the sofa, turning a shoulder upon Isabel. A +faint change, as by the agitation of depths on the far surface of +waters, rippled her features, and Isabel, summoning the impersonal +attitude, watched her curiously. It was her first experience of the snob +in a grandiose setting, but it was the type that had aroused her most +impassioned inward protest all her life: the smallest circles have their +snobs, and, like all the unchosen of mammon, she had had her corroding +experiences. But her high spirit resented the power of the baser +influences, and, with her intellect, commanded her to accept the world +with philosophy and the unsheathed weapon of self-respect. In the +present stage of the world's development it was to be expected that the +pettier characteristics of human nature would predominate; and perhaps +the intellectually exclusive would not have it otherwise. + +Mrs. Kaye, polite tolerance giving place to the accent of intimacy, +began: "Oh, Lady Cecilia, have you heard--" and plunged into a piece of +gossip, no doubt of absorbing interest to those that knew the +contributory circumstances and the surnames of the actors, but to the +uninitiated as puzzling as success. Lady Cecilia's eyes twinkled +appreciatively, and her wells of laughter bubbled close to the surface. +Isabel, completely ignored, waited until the story was finished, and +then made a deliberate move. + +"How interesting!" she exclaimed. "Won't you tell me the names of the +people?" + +Mrs. Kaye, without turning her head, murmured something indistinctly, +and lit another cigarette. "Won't you have a light, Lady Cecilia?" she +asked. + +"Please give me one," said Isabel, sweetly. She reached out and took the +cigarette from Mrs. Kaye's faintly resisting hand. "Thank you. I am lazy +about looking for matches. Do you smoke a lot?" + +But Mrs. Kaye, irritated, or having reached the conclusion that the +newcomer was not in the very least worth while, said with soft fervor to +her who was: "How delightful that dear Jack was returned! Of course you +are as interested in his career as the rest of us." + +"I should be a good deal more so if his mother had turned him across her +knee a little oftener--or if I could shake him myself occasionally." + +Isabel, satisfied, more amazed than ever at the infantile ingenuousness +of the snob, rose, and was about to turn away when she met Lady +Cecilia's eyes. They were full of amusement, and there was no mistaking +its purport. In a flash Isabel had responded with a challenge of appeal, +which that accomplished dame was quick to understand. + +"Please don't go," she said. "I came over here to talk to you. We are +all so interested in the idea that Vicky is half an American--we had +quite forgotten it. Did you ever see any one look less as if she had +American cousins than Vicky? She might easily have a whole tribe of +Spanish ones." + +"Well, she has, in a way." And in response to many questions Isabel +found herself relating the story of Rezanov and Concha Argueello, while +Mrs. Kaye, whatever may have been her sensations, rose with an absent +smile and composedly transferred herself to an equally distinguished +neighborhood. + +"I wonder if she has ever tried to condense rudeness into an epigram," +said Isabel viciously, pausing in her narrative. + +Lady Cecilia shook expressively. "At least she has not made an art of +it," she said. "They never do." + + + + +VI + + +The next morning, Isabel, after little sleep, rose early and went out +for a walk. She had sat up until eleven, listening to the puzzling jets +of conversation, or watching the Bridge-players, and when she had +finally reached her room, tired and excited, Flora Thangue had come in +for a last cigarette and half an hour of chat. Her first evening in the +new world had had its clouded moments, for it was impossible not to feel +the alien, and the kindness of English people, no matter how deep, is +casual in expression. But on the whole she had felt more girlishly happy +and ebullient than since her sister had gone her own way and left a +heavy burden for young shoulders behind her. In the freedom of a girl in +Europe, no matter how prized, there is much of loneliness in idleness, a +constant attitude of defence, moments of bitter wonder and disgust, and, +to the analytical mind, an encroaching dread of a more normal future +with a chronic canker of discontent. + +Isabel had by no means passed her European years in the procession that +winds from the Tiber to the Seine, prostrating itself at each successive +station of architecture or canvas; nor even devoted the major portion of +her time to the investigation of the native, deeply as the varying types +had interested her. Her intellectual ambition, as is often the case with +the American provincial girl, had been even stronger than her desire for +liberty and pleasure, and she had spent several months with the +archaeological society of Rome, read deeply in Italian history and art, +attended lectures at the Sorbonne, and spent nearly a year in Berlin, +Dresden, Munich, and Vienna, studying that modern stronghold of dramatic +literature, the German Theatre. + +It had been the living dream of long winter evenings, when she had not +dared to join in the festivities of the other young folk lest her father +should stray beyond her control; he would, when the demon was quiescent, +sit at home if she read to him, and she had learned to read and dream at +the same time. It was only at the beginning of her third year of +liberty, when, in spite of shifting scenes, the entire absence of daily +cares and of heavy responsibilities involving another had given her +longer hours for thought and introspection, that the poisonous doubt of +the use of it all had begun to work in a mind that had lost something of +the ardor of novelty. The eternal interrogations had obtruded themselves +in her unfortunate girlhood, and she had questioned the voiceless +infinite, but angrily, with youth's blind rebellion against the +injustice of life. The anger and rebellion had been comatose in these +years of freedom, but the maturer brain was the more uneasy, at times +appalled. For what was she developing, perfecting herself? She had no +talent, with its constant promises, its occasional triumphs, its +stimulating rivalries, to give zest to life; and there were times when +she envied the student girls in Munich with their absurd "reform dress," +their cigarettes and beer in cheap restaurants and theatres, their more +than doubtful standards. Although she had her own private faith and +never hesitated to pray for anything she wanted, she was not of those +that can make a career of religion; her mind and temperament were both +too complex, and she was unable to interest herself in creeds and +theologies--and congregations. + +Now and again she had considered seriously the study of medicine, +architecture, law, of perfecting herself for criticism of some sort, for +she had spoken with a measure of truth when she had assured Flora that +she had no wish to marry. In her depths she was--had been--romantic and +given to dreaming, but the manifold weaknesses of her father--who had +been one of the most brilliant and accomplished of men, a graduate of +Harvard, and the possessor of many books--and the selfish and tyrannous +exactions which had tempered his enthusiasm for all things feminine, the +caustic tongue and overbearing masculinity of her uncle, who had been as +weak in his way as her father, for he had lost the greater part of his +patrimony on the stock-market, and the charming inconsequence of her +brother-in-law, who loved his family extravagantly and treated them like +poor relations, had not prepared her to idealize the young men she had +met in Rosewater and Europe. She had been sought and attracted more than +once during her years of liberty, but her prejudices and the deep cold +surface of temperament peculiar to American girls of the best class, +lent a fatal clarity of vision; and although she had studied men as +deeply as she dared, the result had but intensified the sombre threat of +the future. It was quite true that she had half-consciously believed +that hope would live again and justify itself in Elton Gwynne, and the +disappointment, at the first glimpse of his portrait, was so crushing +that she had buried her sex under an avalanche of scorn. + +But scorn is far more volcanic than glacial and a poor barrier between +sex and judgment. It needed more than that, and more than disillusions +of the second class, no matter how inordinate, to give a girl the cool +reality of poise that had stimulated the curiosity of Miss Thangue; and +this Isabel had encountered, during the most critical period of her +inner life, in the beautiful city by the Isar. The experience had been +so brief and tremendous, the incidents so crowding and tense, the climax +so hideous, that she had been stunned for a time, then emerged into her +present state of tranquil and not unpleasant philosophy--when the +present moment, if it contained distraction, was something to be +grateful for; otherwise, to be borne with until the sure compensation +arrived. The future had neither terror for her nor any surpassing +concern, although all her old impersonal interest in life had revived, +and she was still too young not to be very much like other girls when +circumstances were propitious. And at last she had conceived--or +evolved--a definite purpose. + +This morning she was living as eagerly as ever during her first deep +months in Europe. The excitement of the evening still possessed her; she +had held her own, received homage, lived a little chapter in an English +novel; above all, she was young, she was free, she was no longer +unhappy; and she loved the early morning and swift walking. + +It was Sunday; the shooting would not begin until the morrow; everybody +except herself, apparently, still slept; the breakfast-hour was +half-past nine. She walked down a long lane behind the lawns and entered +the first of the coverts. There was a drowsy whir of wings--once--that +was all. There was a glint of dancing water in the heavier shades, a +rosy light beyond the farthest of the trees in the little wood where the +delicate pendent leaves hung asleep in the sweet peace. There was not an +expiring echo of her own wild forests here; nor any likeness to the +splendid royal preserves of Germany and Austria, with their ancient +trees, their miles of garnished floor, the sudden glimpse of chamois or +stag standing on a rocky ledge against the sky as if drilled for his +part. These woods had a quality all their own: of Nature in her last +little strongholds, but smiling, serenely triumphant, of tempered heat +without chill, above all, of perfect peace. + +Nothing in England had impressed Isabel like this atmosphere of peace +that broods over its fields and lanes, its woods and fells, in the +evening and early morning hours; the atmosphere that makes it seem to be +set to the tune of Wordsworth's verses, and to keep it everlastingly +old-fashioned and out of all relation to its towns. As she left the wood +she saw a big hay-stack, as firm and shapely of outline as a house, not +a loose wisp anywhere. A girl, bareheaded, was driving a cow across a +field. A narrow river moved as slowly as if the world had never +awakened. The road turned to her right and led to an old stone village +with a winding broken street and several oak-trees, a pump, and a long +green bench. It might have been the Deserted Village, for the English +rise far later than the Southern races that have fallen so far behind +them in importance and wealth. Beyond the village, on a rise of ground, +was the church, its square gray tower crumbling down upon its ancient +graves. In the distance were farms, coverts, another village, a gray +spire against the blossoming red of the sky; and over all--peace--peace. +Had anything ever really disturbed it? Would there ever be any change? +England had been devastated to the roots, would be again, no doubt, but +unless it became one vast London, it would brood on into eternity with +the slight defiant smile of a beautiful woman in an enchanted sleep. + +"Are you, too, an early bird?" + +Isabel flew out of her reverie. Lady Victoria was approaching from a +forking road. She wore a short skirt, leggings, and heavy boots; and she +was bright, fresh, almost rosy from swift walking. "I have gone five +miles already," she said, smiling. "But I believe you were sauntering." + +"Only just now--to absorb it all. I, too, can do my five miles an hour, +although Californians are the laziest people in the world about +walking." + +"Then if you are up to a sharp trot we'll go to that farthest village. +My land steward has been telling me a painful tale about one of my young +women, and I intend to ask her some embarrassing questions while she is +still too stupid with sleep to lie." + +"Your young women? Is all this your estate?" + +"It belongs to Strathland, but I have lived here since I married, and +now the place is virtually Jack's. These people have been my particular +charge for thirty years and will continue to be until my son marries. +There are only about a hundred families on the estate altogether, but +they keep one busy." + +"I can't imagine you in the working role of the Lady Bountiful. Last +night, at least, if I had written to my friend, Anabel Colton, I should +have devoted pages to your more famous attributes, but I should never +have thought of this." + +"Indeed? If one could languish through life in the shell of a mere +beauty that life would be a good deal simpler proposition than it is. +Unfortunately there are complications, and, agreeable or not, one +accepts them as one does enemies, husbands, stupid servants, and all +other mortal thorns. But I am not uninterested in my people here, not by +any means, and they bore me less than going to court and visiting my +father-in-law. I watch them from birth, see that they are properly +clothed and fed, that they go to school as soon as they are old enough, +later that they find a situation here or elsewhere--those that have no +work to do at home. My son gives the young men and women a complete +wardrobe when they start out to win their way in life, and the details +fall on me. It means correspondence, mothers' meetings, and all that +sort of thing. Even during the London season I come down once a month. +Of course it is a bore, but on the whole tradition is rather kind than +otherwise in making life more or less of a routine." + +"Wouldn't you miss it if your son married?" Isabel wondered if this +woman had really given her the impression of tragic secrets, unlimited +capacities for both license and arrogance. In this early morning +freshness there was hardly a suggestion of the woman of the world, +barely of the great lady; and in the rich tones of her voice there was a +genuine note of interest in her poor. + +"Oh, I should always keep an eye on them; young wives have so many +distractions. If I had to give them up--yes, of course it would mean a +vacancy in my collection of habits; one side of me clings strongly to +traditions and duty. The other--well, I'd like to be a free-lance in the +world for a while--although," she added, with a sharp intonation, "I +don't suppose I should stay away from Jack very long. It is a great +relief to have a vital interest in life outside one's self. You, of +course, are not old enough to have discovered that; and, indeed, I am +not always so sure that it is possible." + +Isabel did not ask her if she would not be jealous of the wife who must, +if he loved her, take the greater part of all that her "Jack" had to +give; she divined in this many-sided woman a quality in her attitude +towards her son with which ordinary maternal affection had little in +common. Her fine eyes flashed with pride at the mention of his name, and +it was more than evident that he was her deep and abiding interest; but +this keen and curious young student of life had never seen any one less +maternal. Lady Victoria's attitude, indeed, might as reasonably be that +of a proud sister or wife. When he was beside her she looked almost +commonplace in her content. The moment he passed out of her sight some +phase of individuality promptly lit its torch. Last night Isabel had +seen her stand for half an hour as motionless as some ivory female +Colossus, only her eyes burning down with slow voluptuous fire upon an +adoring little Frenchman. She had looked like a Messalina petrified with +the complications and commonness of the modern world; possibly with the +burden of years, Isabel had added, in girlish intolerance of the wiles +of which youth is independent. She had been far from falling under her +spell, although not wholly repelled by the glimpse of this worst side of +a woman far too complex to be judged off-hand. This morning she liked +her suddenly and warmly, and, with the lightning of instinct, divined +why she worshipped her son and still was willing to have him marry and +swing aside into an orbit of his own. All she needed was a certain +amount of his society, opportunities to work for him, the assurance of +his success and happiness. He was a refuge from herself; in his +imperious demands her memory slept, her depths were stagnant. But Isabel +was still too young, in spite of her own experience, more than dimly to +apprehend the older woman's attitude, and the innumerable and various +acts and sufferings, disenchantments and contacts that had led up to it. +Victoria seemed to her the most rounded mortal she had met, and yet with +an insistent terror in the depths of her riven and courageous soul, the +terror of the complete, the final disillusion. Between that moment and +her too exhaustive knowledge of life stood the magnetic figure of her +son, safeguarding, almost hypnotizing her. She was as incapable of +jealousy as of aching vanity in the fact of a son whom the world was +never permitted to forget. She had done with little things, and Isabel, +with young curiosity, wondered in what convulsion the last of them had +gone down. + +Lady Victoria, unconscious of the analytical mind groping to conclusions +beside her, was revolving the midnight comments of Flora Thangue, and +her own impressions of this American relative whose sudden advent, taken +in connection with her eighteenth century beauty and undecipherable +quality, wrought the impression of a symbolic figure swimming out of +space. Lady Victoria was far too indifferent to analyze the problems of +any woman's soul, but she was keenly alive to the vital suggestion of +power in the girl, and of the strong will and intellect, the command +over every faculty, evidenced in the strong line of the jaw, the stern +noble profile, the calm searching gaze so difficult to sustain. None +knew better than Victoria the value and rarity of a free and courageous +soul. Such a woman must, when more fully developed, throw the whole +weight of her character into the scales balancing for the few whom she +recognized as equals and accepted as friends. If she had had "some +smashing love affair," as the more romantic Flora suggested, so much +the better. + +She said, with a perfectly simulated impulsiveness: + +"Of course you understand that I meant what I said last evening. And not +merely a week; you must pay us a long visit, if it won't bore you. But +the house will rarely be empty now that the shooting has begun, and +there is always something going on in the neighborhood. Later comes the +hunting, and I am sure you ride." + +"Oh yes, I ride! I have spent about half my life on a horse. I want to +stay more than I can tell you, but before long I must go home. The same +safe old bank that has charge of your ranches looks after my small +affairs, and I have a man on the farm that has been in the family for +forty years; otherwise I should never have dared to leave my precious +chickens; but Mr. Colton writes me that Mac is failing, and before the +rainy season commences I must look into things myself." + +"Chickens?" said Lady Victoria, much amused. "Do you raise chickens?" + +"Rather; and not in the back yard, neither. I have about a thousand of +the most beautiful snow-white Leghorns with blood-red combs you ever +saw; and I have incubators, runs, colony-houses, and all the rest of it. +They are raised on the strictest scientific principles and yield me the +greater part of my income. That is the reason I feel obliged to +return--if Mac is no longer able--or willing--to get up at night. One +must not neglect the chicks--the little ones. I doubt if real babies are +more trouble. I don't mind telling you that I have resolved to make a +fortune out of chickens, if only that I may be able to live as I should +in San Francisco. But I must go back and do the greater part of the work +myself." + +"Make a fortune--out of chickens! How odd that sounds! Not in the least +romantic, but rather the more interesting for that. But why don't you +let your ranch for dairy and grazing purposes, as we do? They bring us +in a very good income--have done, so far." + +"There are about nineteen thousand acres in Lumalitas, and some forty +thousand in the southern ranch. I possess exactly three hundred and +thirty-two, forty-five of which are marsh. You have now nearly the whole +of the original grants, for as my father and uncle sold or mortgaged +portions--and could not pay--your agents bought in. You may remember." + +"There is seldom any correspondence. Mr. Colton has always had a free +hand--yes--I do recall--vaguely. So I am profiting at your expense. I am +afraid that must seem unjust to you." + +"Not in the least. I did not choose my paternal relatives, but I long +since accepted them with philosophy. I am thankful to have anything. Why +don't you go to California and look at your property?--live on it for a +few years? You could make far more out of it if you ran it yourself. The +lease of Lumalitas must expire very soon. I do wish you would come and +pay me a visit, and--Mr.--what on earth am I to call him?" + +"Jack, of course," said Lady Victoria, warmly, although she would have +been swift to resent the liberty had the new relative been so +indiscreet. + +"I never could manage Jack--never! I can't feel, see him, as Jack. I +think Cousin Elton will do." + +"Quite so. I shouldn't wonder at all if we went. Jack is rather keen on +American politics, knows his Bryce--I suppose it is in the blood. He +even takes in an American Review. I have always rather wanted to visit +California, and started for it once upon a time--on my wedding journey. +But we were entertained so delightfully in New York and Washington that +before we realized what an American summer meant it was too hot to cross +the continent, and we accepted an invitation to the Adirondacks, +intending to return to England in the course of a month. But Arthur +broke his leg, and by the time he was well again it was not safe for me +to travel. So we rented a place in Virginia, where there was good sport, +and there Jack was born. Here we are. Rest under that tree while I +interview the erring maiden." + + + + +VII + + +Isabel sat on the bench under an ancient oak for half an hour or more, +but took no note of the time. In rural America one always seems to hear +the whir of distant machinery and responds to its tensity in the depths +of some nerve centre; but in England's open the tendency is to dream +away the hours, the nerves as blunt as in the tropics; unless, indeed, +one happens to be so astir within that one rebels in responding, and +conceives of ultimate hatred for this incompassionate arrogant peace of +England. + +Isabel had been roused from her mood of unreasoning content by her +contact with the older woman, but for a few moments her thoughts waved +to and fro in that large tranquillity like pendent moss in a gentle +breeze. There was a stir of life in the little village; a window was +thrown open; a man came out to the pump and filled a bucket with water; +a child cried for its breakfast; the birds were singing in the trees. +But they barely rippled the calm. Isabel's eyes dwelt absently upon a +white line along a distant hill-top, made, no doubt, by Caesar's troops; +for she had heard that the mosaic floors of Roman houses had been +discovered under one of the fields in the neighborhood. This +information, imparted by Lord Hexam's cousin, Mrs. Throfton, a lady +interested in neither Bridge nor gossip, had not excited her as it might +have done before her archaeological experience at headquarters, but she +was glad to recall it now, for that white road, sharply insistent in the +surrounding green, was one of the perceptible vincula of history. + +It was all old--old--old; an illimitable backward vista. And she was as +new, as out of tune with it as the motorcar flashing like a lost and +distracted comet along that hill-top in a cloud of historied dust: she +with her problems, her egoisms, the fateful independence of the modern +girl. In a fashion she was one of the chosen of earth, but she doubted +if the women who had toiled in these villages, or in centuries past had +lived their lives in the mansions of their indubious lords, had not had +greater compensations than she. Unbroken monotony and a saving sense of +the inevitable must in time create for the soul something of the +illimitable horizon of the vast level spaces of the earth. + +And she? At twenty-five she had lost her old habit of staring with +veiled eyes into some sweet ambiguous future, her girlish intensity of +emotion. But her theories, in general, were sound, and she had ticketed +even her minor experiences. She knew that character was the most +significant of all individual forces, and that if developed in strict +adjustment to the highest demands of society, dragging strength out of +the powers of the universe, were it not inborn, the book of one's +objective future at least need never be closed prematurely by those +inexorable social forces, which, whatever the weak spots on the surface +of life, invariably place a man in the end according to his deserts. She +had seen her father, with all his advantages of birth and talents, and +early importance in the community, gradually shunned, shelved, dismissed +from the daily life of steadier if less gifted men, almost unknown to +the young generation. He had clung to certain strict notions of honor +through it all, however, and at his death the county had experienced a +spasm of remorse and attended his funeral; the sermon had been eloquent +with masterly omissions, and even the newspaper that had vilified him in +his days of political influence came out with an obituary, which, when +included in some future county history, would give to posterity quite as +good an impression of him as he deserved. + +And James Otis had had his virtues. One of his claims to redemption +survived in his daughter. He had reared her in the strict principles and +precepts of his New England ancestors, many of which are generally more +useful in the life of a man. This early instillation, taken in +connection with himself as a commanding illustration in subcontraries, +had given Isabel a directness of vision invaluable to a girl in no haste +to place her life in stronger hands. Whatever her dissatisfactions and +disillusions, her road lay along the upper reaches; the second rate, the +failures from birth, the criminal classes, far below. Her start in life +was indefectible, and she knew that did the necessity arise to-morrow +she could support herself and ask no quarter. + +Perhaps, she mused, she would be happier in the necessity, for the +problem of roof and bread is an abiding substitute for the problem of +what to do with one's life. But she had never known an anxious moment +regarding the bare necessities, and although there was something +pleasantly stimulating in the prospect of making a fortune and being +able to live as she wished in the city of her birth--the only object for +which she retained any passion in her affections--she smiled somewhat +cynically at the modest outlook. + +Environments like the present were uplifting, almost deindividualizing, +and there had been a time when she had known seconds in the face of +nature's surprises that were distinct spiritual experiences. She +believed they would return when she was in her own land once more, and +Europe a book of fading memories. Her love of beauty at least was as +keen as ever, and now that Europe was off her mind, leaving the proper +sense of surfeit behind it, no doubt she would have a sense of actually +beginning life when the time came to take an active part in it, and she +assumed a position of some importance in her own community. She was far +too sensible for ingratitude, and fully appreciated the gifts that life +had so liberally dealt her. And she fully believed in work as the +universal panacea. The mere thought of a busy future brought a glow to +her heart. She rose with a smile as Lady Victoria emerged from the +cottage at the upper end of the village. + +Lady Victoria was not smiling. Her brows were drawn, and she looked +angry and contemptuous. + +"The little idiot!" she exclaimed, as they started briskly for home. +"This is the first failure I have had in ten years. That is one of my +boasts. And I took particular pains with that girl. Now Jack will have +the agreeable task of coercing the man into marrying her, for it appears +that his ardor has cooled." + +Her brow cleared in a few moments, but she seemed to have had enough of +conversation, and it was evident that words for words' sake, or as a +flimsy chain between signposts of genuine interest, had no place in her +social rubric. Isabel, who was equally indifferent, strode along beside +her without so much as a comment, and so confirmed the good impression +she had made on her mettlesome relative. As they approached the house, +Lady Victoria turned to her with a smile that brought sweetness to her +eyes rather than any one of her more dazzling qualities. + +"I am generally in my boudoir at five," she said. "Come in this +afternoon for a chat before tea, if you have nothing better to do. Now +run and get ready for breakfast." + + + + +VIII + + +Whether or not Mr. Gwynne had made up his mind to follow his mother's +advice and employ a new weapon in his siege of Mrs. Kaye, or whether, +like common mortals, he was subject to the natural impulses of youth, +the most novel of the guests of Capheaton found herself on his right in +the informality of breakfast, and the object of his solicitude. He +fetched her bacon and toast from the sideboard, and when he discovered +that she did not like cream in her tea, carried her cup back to his +mother and waited for the more pungent substitute. And then he actually +made an effort to entertain her. There was a flicker of surprised +amusement in the neighborhood, but Isabel accepted his attentions as a +matter of course, assuming that the young gentleman felt refreshed after +a night's rest in his own bed, or had awakened to a sense of her +importance as a member of his family. It was not until she caught Mrs. +Kaye's eye and read a contemptuous power to retaliate, that she +experienced a certain zest in the situation. With the magnetism of +intelligent interest in her own eyes, she turned to Gwynne with a +question that betrayed a flattering acquaintance with one of his less +popular books, then hung upon the monologue of which he promptly +delivered himself. It was characteristic that he either contributed +little to the conversation or monopolized it; and he reflected, as he +talked of the personal experience which led up to the episode of her +interest, that he had never before gazed into eyes at once so lovely and +so fine. He disliked American girls, partly because they had shown no +disposition to join the ranks of those that lived to spoil him, partly +because he believed them to be shallow and cold. Some of the married +women had attracted him, but not before they had lived long enough to +develop the stronger qualities of the older races; he had his ideals and +was not easily satisfied. He was deeply in love with Mrs. Kaye, for her +brilliant subtle mind and powerful appeal to his passions had blinded +him to her defects, and he was convinced that his heart had travelled to +its predestined goal. Nevertheless, he decided that his new cousin, if +as cold as the rest of her youthful compatriots, was worth cultivating +for her intelligence and obvious talent for good-comradeship. + +But in a moment a subject was started that entirely diverted his mind +and upset the lively tenor of the breakfast-table. + +"Where is Lorcutt?" asked some one, abruptly, referring to a brother of +Lord Brathland, who had lost heavily and cheerfully at Bridge the night +before. + +Isabel's eyes happened to have wandered to the face of the man opposite. +To her surprise it became livid. He turned instantly to Gwynne, however, +and said: "I should have told you--I quite forgot--he asked me to make +his excuses. He got a telegram--bad news--Bratty is dead." + +Involuntarily Isabel glanced at Mrs. Kaye; Flora had hinted to her of +the lady's designs. That face for once was ghastly and unmasked, but the +eyes were not glittering with grief. + +"Impossible!" she cried, sharply. "Lord Brathland? Why--I saw him only +two days ago, in London. He was as well as possible." + +The others barely noticed her. Their astonished eyes were fixed on the +first speaker, Captain Ormond, who was sitting very erect, as if to +receive the questions fired at him as a brave man faces the hiss of lead +on the field. + +"I know little," he replied; "except that Brathland was suddenly +attacked by appendicitis two nights ago and that an operation was +immediately performed--" + +"Friday night!" cried Mrs. Kaye. "Why he spent an hour with me that +afternoon, and was to dine with Lord Zeal and Lord Raglin and half a +dozen other men that night--they all came up to London to talk over one +of Sir Cadge Vanneck's mines. Why--I remember you were to be there. +Surely Lord Brathland was well then?" + +"He was looking very seedy when he came in. I happened to sit next to +him--told him he ought to go home. Finally he got so bad he decided +that he would, and as he left the table he fainted. Several of us saw +him to bed. He said he didn't want his family fidgeting him, and the +surgeon said he would be all right in a few days. I thought he was out +of danger when I came down last night, so said nothing about it to +Harold." + +"Was he taken home?" asked Gwynne, whose eyes had never left Ormond's +face. + +"No--to Raglin's room up-stairs. The dinner was at the Club." + +"I cannot understand why his family was not summoned at the last!" +exclaimed Lady Victoria. + +"Well, there's only the old duke and Harold, you see. Dick is out in +Africa. I suppose they didn't want to agitate the duke until the last +moment and couldn't find Harold until this morning. Besides, Raglin was +with him, and he is a relative, at least. It is awfully sudden. I have +been upset ever since Harold woke me up this morning and told me; and +hated to speak of it." + +"Who was the surgeon?" asked Gwynne. + +"Ballast." + +"Ballast? Who is he? Why not one of the big men, in heaven's name?" +cried Mrs. Kaye. + +"Well--they were all out of town--naturally enough at this time of year. +We had to take what we could get. No doubt Lester or Masten was +telegraphed for later. I--all of us--left the affair in Raglin's hands." + +The company broke into general comment, and under cover of the confusion +Isabel distinctly heard Gwynne demand: + +"What's up your sleeve, Ormond?" + +And the response: "For God's sake, old chap, don't ask!" + + + + +IX + + +Gwynne had never recognized the contingency of a serious rival in the +affections of the woman he had elected to mate, and had he heard of the +late Lord Brathland's attentions it would not have occurred to him that +Mrs. Kaye could weigh a prospective dukedom against the reflected +glories of his own career. He intended to be prime-minister before he +was forty, and older and soberer heads shared his confidence. It was +true that Mrs. Kaye was an emphatic Conservative--scorning even the +compromise of Liberal-Unionism--and that so far he had been unable to +convert her; but he did not take any woman's political convictions very +seriously, knowing that they commonly owed their inspiration to social +ambition, a desire for a career, or to marital comradeship. The latter +he made no doubt would operate in his own case as soon as the lady gave +him the opportunity to demand it as his right; and his sharp political +discussions with her were among the spiciest of his experiences. She +rarely expressed herself in every-day language; and although it had +crossed his mind that epigrammatic matrimony might grow oppressive, he +had reminded himself that her speech was but a part of a too cultivated +individuality and would be unable to endure the strain of daily +intercourse. Although he had in his composition little of the femininity +that gives a certain type of man a sympathetic comprehension of women, +his Celtic blood imparted a subtle understanding of their foibles of +which he was but half aware. More than once this subconscious +penetration had induced a speedy recovery from misplaced affections; but +the toils of Julia Kaye, who piqued, allured, repelled, dazzled, now and +again snubbed every one else for his sake, bound him helpless. He was +grateful for his mother's abetment, although it somewhat surprised him; +but his mother was the woman of whom he had the least comprehension. + +So far Mrs. Kaye had ignored his several proposals, but of this he +thought nothing. He would have cared little for a woman to be had for +the asking; and he rather welcomed any treatment that stirred the +somewhat sluggish surfaces of his nature. + +He had determined, however, to force a definite answer from her during +this visit, and although he was far too courteous a host to embarrass a +guest, he knew that were Mrs. Kaye deliberately to grant him a private +interview he should be at liberty to press his suit. + +Immediately after the hour in the smoking-room that followed breakfast, +he started in search of her; but although many of the women were +scattered throughout the lower rooms, reading, writing, gossiping, he +saw nothing of his inamorata. Flora Thangue happened to be standing +alone, and he went up to her impulsively. + +"Do you know if Julia has gone to church?" he asked, without +circumlocution. + +"She went to her room directly after breakfast. I fancy she is rather +cut up over Lord Brathland's death," replied the astute Miss Thangue. + +"Of course; we all are--poor Bratty! He was rather a bounder, but it is +natural to recall his virtues. Flora, go and tell her I want her to come +for a walk. I can't go to her room myself, and I don't care to send a +servant." + +Miss Thangue reflected. Probably this was the most favorable moment for +a repulse that he could have chosen. She was sincerely fond of him and +distrusted Mrs. Kaye as much as she disliked her. + +"Very well," she said. "I will see what I can do." + +Mrs. Kaye admitted her promptly and presented an unstained front, +although her color was lower than usual. She was a woman of too much +natural and acquired poise to remain askew under any shock. But she had +experienced an hour of mixed emotions in which a confused and wondering +sense of defeat was paramount. It had left her a little aghast, for +although she had met with the inevitable snubs in her upward course, she +rarely permitted them to agitate her memory in these days when she had +grown to believe herself one of the spoiled favorites of destiny; and +her fibres were by no means sensitive. But this sudden blow was a +reminder that fate had been capricious to spoiled darlings before. She +had stood almost motionless before the window from the moment she had +entered her room until Miss Thangue knocked at the door, and by that +time she had repoised herself and set her heavy mouth in a hard line as +she reflected upon her own will as a factor in any game with life. + +"Jack wants you to go for a walk," announced Miss Thangue, who saw no +occasion for subtlety. + +"That means he intends to propose again," said Mrs. Kaye, in her +carefully modulated voice. "I don't know that I care about it. I have +letters to write." + +"Why not get it over? You could compel him to believe, if you chose, +that you have no intention of marrying him, and it would be rather a +kindness; he has so much else to think about, and he certainly should +have a free mind before the opening of Parliament. If you really did +Jack any harm," she added, deliberately, "Vicky would never forgive +you--nor a good many others." + +"I wouldn't do him any harm for the world," said Mrs. Kaye, casting down +her eyes and looking very young and innocent. "But I should hate to give +him up. After all, there is no one half so interesting. Well, I'll go +down and have it over." + +A few moments later she joined Gwynne at the foot of the staircase, and +they went out to the woods. She looked her best in a smart walking-frock +of white tweed, and a red toque; for the tailor costume modifies where +the elaborate accentuates. + +Her brilliant eyes melted as Brathland's name was mentioned; naturally +at once. + +"What a dreadful--shocking thing!" she cried. "I do not realize it at +all. Poor dear, we were such friends--and I saw him only a few hours +before. Have you heard anything more?" + +"Ormond ran off to town directly after breakfast--as if he were afraid +of being asked too many questions. I have an idea that he kept the cat +in the bag. I saw my cousin Zeal yesterday, and thought he looked as if +he had something besides his health on his mind." + +"Why?" asked Mrs. Kaye, startled. "What else could it be?" + +"Well, Bratty was rather a flasher," said Gwynne, innocently. "The +dinner may not have been at the Club at all, and there is a little +chorus-girl that engaged the fickle Bratty's affections for a time, and +proclaimed her desire for vengeance from the house-tops when he +transferred himself to a rival at the Adelphi. She is a Neapolitan, and +that sort may carry a stiletto even in prosaic old London. Or perhaps +poor Bratty was despatched with the carving-knife. No wonder he didn't +want his family. But whatever it was, he has paid the penalty himself, +poor chap, and no doubt the matter will be hushed up." + +"How disgusting! I don't want to think of human slums on this heavenly +Sunday morning." + +"Nor to be proposed to, I suppose?" + +"I don't mind, Jack dear." + +She looked girlish and very piquant. Jack took her hand. She did not +withdraw it, and they walked silently in the shadowed quiet of the wood. +His heart beat almost audibly. Never before had she given him such +definite encouragement. He could think of nothing to say that would not +sound banal to this woman of the ready tongue. But agitation unlocks +wayward fancies and sends them scurrying inopportunely across the very +foreground of the mind. The vagrant hope that she would not accept him +in an epigram restored his balance, and he turned to her with his +habitual air of confidence, albeit his eyes and mouth were restless. + +"I want an answer to-day," he said, boldly. "And there is only one +answer I will take. I have let you play with me, as that seemed to be +your caprice, and I love caprice in a woman. But there is an end to +everything and I want to marry before Parliament meets." + +"And you never thought I would not marry you?" she asked, in some +wonder. + +"I have never faced the possibility of failure in my life. And you are +as much to me as my career. I cannot imagine life without either." + +He suddenly put his hand under her chin and lifted her face; she was of +tiny stature and this disadvantage in the presence of man was not the +least subtle of her charms. "Say yes quickly," he cried, and the +strength of his will and passion vibrated to her through the medium he +had established. But she pouted and drew back. + +"Perhaps I want a career of my own. You would swallow me whole." + +"You could become the most powerful woman in the Liberal party--have a +salon and all the rest of it." + +"I happen to be a Conservative." + +"What has that to do with it? Or politics with love, for that matter? +Tell me that you love me. That is all I care about." + +"It is only during the engagement that love is all. Marriage is the +great public school of life; the passions fall meekly into their proper +place--beside the prosaic appetites, the objective demands; somewhat +below the faculties that distinguish the higher kingdom." + +"Indeed? Well, I am sanguine enough to believe that we would prove the +exception. I hardly dare think of it!" he burst out. "For God's sake +keep your epigrams for other people and be a woman pure and simple." + +She looked both as she permitted her full red mouth to tremble and his +arms to take sudden possession of her. + + + + +X + + +In the large liberty of an English country-house Isabel might have found +the long morning tedious had she been of a more sociable habit. Lady +Victoria, Mrs. Throfton, and Lady Cecilia Spence went to church; all +three, as great ladies, having a dutiful eye to the edification of +humbler folk. Flora Thangue spent the greater part of the morning +writing letters for her hostess, the men fled to the golf-links, and the +rest of the women not engaged in vehement political discussion, or +Bridge, were striding across country. Isabel, tempted by the charmingly +fitted writing-table in her room, although an indolent correspondent, +wrote a long and amply descriptive letter to her sister, which her +brother-in-law, being more than usually hard up at the moment of its +arrival, transposed into fiction and illustrated delightfully for a +local newspaper. Then she roamed about looking at the pictures, testing +her European education by discovering for herself the Lelys and Mores, +the Hoppners, Ketels, Holbeins, Knellers, Dahls, and Romneys. She had a +quick instinct for the best in all things, but cared less for pictures +than for other treasures of the past: marbles, the architecture in old +streets, hard brown schlosses on their lonely heights, the Gothic spaces +of cathedrals, the high and fervent imaginations, immortal yet nameless, +in the carvings on stone; the jewelled facades of Orvieto and Siena, +the romantic grandeur of the Alhambra. + +She opened a door at the back of the central hall and found herself in a +pillared corridor with a door at either end. Both rooms were open, and +as a blue cloud hung about the entrance to the left, she turned to what +proved to be the library of Capheaton. It was a square light apartment, +with the orthodox number of books, but with so many desks and +writing-tables that it looked more like the business corner of the +mansion. Here, indeed, as Isabel was to learn, Lady Victoria held daily +conference with her housekeeper and stewards, interviewed the women of +the tenantry, and those active and philanthropic ladies of every +district that aspire to carry the burdens of others. Here Gwynne kept +his Blue Books and thought out his speeches, but it was not a favorite +room with the guests. + +Isabel had found many books scattered about the house, solid and +flippant, old and new, but nothing by her host. She rightly assumed that +his works would be disposed for posterity in the family library, and +found them on a shelf above one of the large orderly tables. As a matter +of fact she had read but two of his books, and she selected another at +random and carried it to a comfortable chair by the window. The work was +an exposition of conditions in one of the South African colonies, +containing much criticism that had been defined by the Conservative +press as youthful impertinence, but surprisingly sound to the +unprejudiced. What had impressed Isabel in his other books and claimed +her admiration anew was his maturity of thought and style; she saw that +this volume had been published when he was twenty-four, written, +doubtless, when he was a year or two younger. She felt a vague pity for +a man that seemed to have had no youth. Since his graduation from +Balliol in a blaze of glory he had worked unceasingly, for he appeared +to have found little of ordinary recreation in travel. She wondered if +he would take his youth in his bald-headed season, like the self-made +American millionaire. + +His style, pure, lucid, virile, distinguished, might have been the +outcome of midnight travail, or, like his eloquence on the platform, a +direct flight from the quickened brain. It certainly bore no resemblance +to his amputated table talk. But in a moment she dismissed her +speculations, for she had discovered a quality, overlooked before, but +arresting in the recent light of his cold arrogance and haughty +self-confidence. Behind his strict regard for facts and the keen insight +and large grasp of his subject, which, without his evident care for the +graces, would have distinguished his work from the dry report of equally +conscientious but less gifted men, was the lonely play of a really lofty +imagination, and a noble human sympathy. As she read on, this warm +full-blooded quality, tempered always by reason, grew more and more +visible to her alert sense; and when the fires in his mind blazed forth +into a revelation of a passionate love of beauty, both in nature and in +human character, Isabel realized what such a man's power over his +audience must be; when this second self, so effectually concealed, +suddenly burst into being. + +"It is too bad a woman would have to live with the other!" she thought, +as she raised her eyes and saw Gwynne emerge from the woods with Mrs. +Kaye. "I cannot say that I envy her." + +"By Jove, they have an engaged look!" + +Isabel turned with a start, but greeted Lord Hexam with a smile. He was +as yet her one satisfactory experience of the young English nobleman, +whom, like most American girls, she had unconsciously foreshadowed in +doublet and hose. Hexam was quite six feet, with a fine military +carriage; he had been in the Guards and had not left the army until +after two years of active service; his blue eyes were both honest and +intelligent, and he was generally clean cut and highly bred. + +He drew up a chair beside Isabel and reflected that she was even +handsomer than he had thought, with the sunlight warming the ivory +whiteness of her skin, although it contracted the mobile pupils of her +eyes; and that little black moles when rightly placed were more +attractive than he had thought possible. They gave a sort of daring +unconscious eighteenth-century coquetry to what was otherwise a somewhat +severe style of beauty. But he was a man for whom a woman's hair had a +peculiar fascination, and while they were uttering commonplaces at +random his eyes wandered to the soft yet massive coils encircling +Isabel's shapely head, and lingered there. + +"Pardon me!" he said, boyishly. "But I always thought--don't you +know?--that hair like that was only in novels and poems and that sort of +thing. Is it all your own?" he asked, with sudden suspicion. + +"You would think so if you had to carry it for a day. I should have had +it cut off long ago if it had happened to be coarse hair. It is an +inherited evil of which I am too vain to rid myself. The early Spanish +women of my family all had hair that touched the ground when they stood +up. I have an old sketch of a back view of three of them taken side by +side; you see nothing but billows of fine silky hair. But I have put it +out of sight, as it looks rather like an advertisement for a famous hair +restorer." + +"I'd give a lot to see yours down. It's wonderful--wonderful!" + +"Well, I have promised a private view to some of the women. If Lady +Victoria thinks it quite proper perhaps I'll admit you." + +"I'll ask her for a card directly she comes home. Let it be this +afternoon just after tea." + +"I wonder if they really are engaged," said Isabel, who had been told +that Englishmen never paid compliments, and was growing embarrassed +under the round-eyed scrutiny. Gwynne and Mrs. Kaye had paused by a +sundial. + +"Who? Oh yes, I should think so, although there was some talk that poor +Bratty--but no doubt that was mere rumor, or Mrs. Kaye wouldn't be on +with Jack like that. By Jove, he is engaged. I never saw him look +so--so--well, I hardly know what." + +"Do you approve of the match?" + +"If my consent is asked I shall give them my blessing. He is the salt of +the earth, although a bit lumpy now and then; and she is such a jolly +little thing, full of genuine affection--just the wife for Jack." + +"You believe in her, then?" Isabel wondered, as many another has done, +at the miasma that seems to rise and dim a man's perceptive faculties +when he is called upon to estimate the worth of a fascinating woman. + +"Rather! Don't you?" + +"She struck me as being one of the few people without a redeeming +virtue. To be sure that has a distinction of its own." + +"Oh!" He wondered if so handsome a girl shared the common rancor of her +age and sex against charming young widows. + +"And the worst mannered," continued Isabel, who knew exactly what he +thought. "And plebeian in her marrow. I wish my cousin had chosen Miss +Thangue or any one else." + +"But he couldn't marry Flora," said the literal young nobleman. "She +hasn't a penny, and is the friend of all our mothers. But I'm sorry +you've such a bad opinion of Mrs. Kaye. She's tremendously popular with +us. I'm not one of her circle--retinue would be more like it; but I've +always thought her the brightest little thing going, and I'm sure she +wouldn't harm a fly." + +"I'm sure she would do nothing so little worth her while. Well, there is +no need for your eyes to be opened; but I wish that my cousin's might +be. I suppose that you have the same faith in him that so many +others--himself included--seem to have." + +"Rather!--You are a most critical person. Haven't you?" + +"I think I have. In fact I am sure of it. That is the reason I have been +wishing he were an American." + +He laughed boyishly. "That is a good one! But we need him over here. You +haven't the slightest idea how much. We get into a blue funk every time +Zeal takes a cold on his chest. To quote Mrs. Kaye, 'A Liberal peer is +as useful as a fifth wheel to a coach, and as ornamental as whitewash.' +Clever, ain't it?" + +"I think people are touchingly easy to satisfy! I have been treated to +several of Mrs. Kaye's epigrams and heard as many more quoted. It seems +to me that nothing could be easier than the manufacture of that popular +superfluity." + +"Perhaps--with time to think them out beforehand. Anyhow, it's rather +jolly to hear things you can remember." + +"I should be the last to deny her cleverness," said Isabel, dryly. But +being by no means desirous that he should find her too acid, she dropped +her eyes for a moment, then raised two dazzling wells of innocence. "I +am tired of the subject of my cousin and Mrs. Kaye," she murmured. "Are +you as ambitious as Jack?" + +"No use." He stared helplessly down into the blue flood. "There is no +escape from the 'Peers' for me, although my father, I am happy to say, +is as healthy as I am. But after the brain cells become brittle--one +never knows. I too am a Liberal, and am getting in all the good work of +which I am capable while there is yet time. I don't go as far as +Jack--don't want to see the 'Peers' chucked. I have a strong reverence +for traditions, and no taste whatever for democracy--that would be too +long a step. And I think a man should be content to be useful, do the +best he can, in his own class; and be loyal to that class whatever +happens. Of course I understand Jack's point of view, because I +understand him so well, and know that he would be the most maimed and +wretched man on earth in the Upper House; but personally, I think one +should be prepared to accept inherited responsibilities." + +And then, as they were both young, and mutually attracted, they found +many subjects of common interest to keep them in the library until the +gong summoned them to luncheon. + + + + +XI + + +Flora Thangue, after luncheon, took Isabel out in a pony cart, and +although too loyal to gossip intimately about her patrons, incidentally +directed a search-light into certain of their recesses; a light that was +to prove useful to Isabel in her future intercourse with them, although +it did not in the least prepare her for an experience that awaited her +later in the day. Miss Thangue's mind was occupied at first with the +obvious engagement of Gwynne and Mrs. Kaye. + +"That woman was born to upset calculations!" she exclaimed. "Yonder is +the castle of the dukes of Arcot. We are going over to a party to-morrow +night. It really looks like a castle with all those gray battlements and +towers, doesn't it? We don't call every tuppeny-hapenny villa inhabited +by a nobleman a 'castle' as they do in Germany and Austria. Well--that +clever little panther! I'd like to pack her into one of her own epigrams +and bury her alive. I _know_ she was as good as engaged to Brathland. +Now, having decided that, all things considered, Jack is the best match +going--for everybody believes Lord Zeal to be worse than he is--well! +there is something appalling in a woman who can adjust herself as +quickly as that; whose caprices, sentiments, passions, all natural +impulses, are completely controlled by her reason. I wish Vicky saw +through her; she has so much influence over Jack, and such deadly +powers of ridicule. But Vicky, like all spoiled women of the world, is +as much the victim of the subtle flatterer as any man, and Julia Kaye +has managed her beautifully. She considered Jack for a bit before she +was sure of Brathland. Vicky's real reason for indorsing Julia +Kaye--between us--is because she believes her to be one of that small +and select band that can hold a man on all his various sides, and she +wants to avoid the probability of an absorbing and possibly tragic +liaison--like Parnell's, for instance--which might interfere with, +perhaps ruin, Jack's career. That is all very well, as far as it goes, +but I believe Julia Kaye to be so entirely selfish that when Jack finds +her out he will sicken of life. I have had the best of opportunities to +study women, and I have brought Jack up--I had the honor to be the +highly idealized heroine of his calf-love, and have been more or less in +his confidence ever since. In certain ways I understand him better than +his mother does, for she has seen too much of the worst side of men, and +is at heart too _blasee_ to have much respect for or knowledge of their +spiritual side; and if I have ever had any maternal spasms in my +virtuous spinsterhood they have been over Jack. Can't you help us out?" +she asked, turning suddenly to the stranger, to whom she was powerfully +attracted. "Are you as indifferent as you look?" + +"I have no idea! But although I should not in the least object to be +cast for a part in this domestic drama, I don't care for it at the price +of too much 'Jack.' To attempt to cut out Mrs. Kaye I should need a +little genuine enthusiasm; and frankly, your beloved prodigy does not +inspire it. I like Lord Hexam far better." + +"Oh, Jimmy! He's a fine fellow, but only a type." + +"He hasn't a rampant ego, if that is what you mean. And for every-day +purposes--" She shrugged her shoulders. "I could endure and even be +deeply interested in Elton Gwynne if he happened to be my brother and I +could hook my finger in his destiny; but in any other capacity--no, +thank you!" + +"Are you going to marry Jimmy?" + +"I did not even know he was not already married. Do you see nothing in a +man but a husband over here? If I ever do marry it will not be before I +am forty." + +"That is rather long--if you see much of the world meanwhile! And Jimmy, +although there is not much money in the family--about twenty thousand a +year--would be a very good match. He will be Earl of Hembolt--a fine old +title." + +"You assume that such a plum may be pulled by the first comer." + +"Rather not! But you Americans have such a way with you! What is more to +the point, I never saw him so bowled over." + +"Well," said Isabel, imperturbably, "I will think of it. This English +country and these wonderful old houses, with their inimitable +atmosphere, appeal to me very strongly. I have more the feeling of being +at home here than I had even in Spain, where I have roots. And socially +and picturesquely, there is nothing to compare with the position of an +English noblewoman." + +Flora turned her eyes frankly to the classic profile beside her. Isabel +had removed her hat, and, framed in the heavy coils of her hair, her +features impressed the anxious observer as even more Roman than early +American; although had she but reflected she would have remembered that +the type of the Caesars had its last stronghold in the United States of +the eighteenth century. Isabel looked like a very young Roman matron, +but her resemblance to the stately effigies in the galleries of Florence +and Rome, strong in virtue or vice, was so striking that once more Flora +longed for her support. A woman with such capabilities would be wasted +in the role of a mere countess--but as the wife of an aspiring Liberal +statesman! She devoutly wished that the American had arrived six months +earlier, or that Brathland still lived. + +But she was a very tactful person and was about to drop the subject, +when Isabel slowly turned her eyes. They looked so much like steel that +for the moment they seemed to have lost their blue. + +"I have made up my mind to do something to prevent this marriage," she +announced. "I do not know what, as yet. I shall be guided by events." + +And Flora devoutly kissed her, then gossipped pleasantly about the other +guests and the people in the neighborhood. Isabel was curious to know +something of the duchess she was to meet on the morrow. + +"Does she really look like a duchess?" she asked, so innocently that +Flora laughed and forgot the Roman-American profile, and the fateful +eyes that had given her an uncomfortable sensation a moment before. + +"Well--yes--she does--rather. It is the fashion in these days not to--to +be smart above all things, excessively democratic, animated, unaffected, +clever. But our duchess here is rather old-fashioned, very lofty of head +and expression. She has a look of floating from peak to peak, and +although passee is still a beauty. To be honest, she is hideously dull, +but as good a creature as ever lived, and all that the ideal duchess +should be--so high-minded that she has never suspected the larkiest of +her friends." + +"Well, I am glad she looks the role. I have artistic cravings." + +They drove for an hour through the beautiful quiet green country, past +many old stone villages that might have been the direct sequence of the +cave era. An automobile skimmed past and the pony sat down on its +haunches. Isabel had a glimpse of a delicate high-bred face set like a +panel in a parted curtain. + +"That is the duchess," said Miss Thangue. "She wouldn't wear goggles for +the world, and only gets into an automobile occasionally to please the +duke. There is nothing old-fashioned about him." + +"She looks as if her name ought to be Lucy," said Isabel, to whom the +pure empty face had appeared like a vision from some former dull +existence, and left behind it an echo of insupportable ennui. + + + + +XII + + +Isabel had looked forward all day to the promised talk with the somewhat +formidable relative for whom, however, she had conceived one of those +enthusiasms peculiar to her age and sex. Her wardrobe was barren of the +costly afternoon gowns smart women affect, but she put on an organdie, +billowy with many ruffles, that consorted with the season, at least. +Blue cornflowers were scattered over the white transparent surface, and +she possessed no more becoming frock. Had she been on her way to a tryst +with Lord Hexam she would have thrust a rose in her hair, accentuated +the smallness of her waist with a blue ribbon, the whiteness of her +throat with a line of black velvet; but she had the instinct of dress, +which teaches, among many things, that self-consciousness in external +adornment provokes amusement in other women. + +She had not the least idea where to find Lady Victoria's boudoir, +although a casual reference by Flora Thangue suggested that it was on +the bedroom floor. She lost herself in the interminable corridors and +finally ran into Elton Gwynne. + +"Your mother expects me--where is her boudoir?" she asked. + +He was at peace with the world, and answered, good-naturedly: "I'll +pilot you. Her rooms are over on the other side." + +"You look as if you should be congratulated about something," she said, +demurely. "There are all sorts of rumors flying about." + +She had half-expected to be snubbed, but he was not in the humor to snub +anybody. "You can congratulate me!" he said, emphatically. "The most +wonderful woman in the world has promised to marry me." + +"I hope you will be happy," said Isabel, conventionally. She resented +his sudden drop from his pedestal, for he looked sentimental and +somewhat sheepish. Still, her youth warmed to his in spite of herself, +and again he noticed with a passing surprise that her eyes were both +lovely and intellectual. He was hardly aware that coincidentally his +Julia's eyes met his mental vision with a glance somewhat too hard and +brilliant, but he caught Isabel's hand and gave it a little shake. + +"Thank you!" he exclaimed. "That was said as if you jolly well meant it. +There are my mother's rooms." + +He went off whistling, and Isabel raised her hand and looked at it +meditatively; his own had been unexpectedly warm and magnetic. She had +imagined that his grasp would be cold and loose. + +He had indicated a private corridor, and she entered it and approached a +door ajar. There was no response to her knock, but as she was expected, +and Lady Victoria no doubt was still dressing, she pushed open the door +and entered. The room was empty, but Isabel was instantly impressed with +its reflection of an individuality, although of a side that had +attracted her least. Here was none of the old-time stiffness of +Capheaton, and there was a conspicuous absence of dead masters and their +pupils. It was not a large room. The walls were covered with a Japanese +gold paper to within four feet of the floor where it was met by a +tapestry of Indian cashmeres, and from it was separated by a narrow +shelf set thick with photographs in silver frames, and with odd and +exquisite bibelots. On the walls were artists' sketches, and two or +three canvases of the Impressionist and Secessionist schools, expressive +of the ardent temperaments of their creators. In the place of honor was +a painting of Salambo in the folds of her python. + +There were several deep chairs and a mighty divan covered with +gold-colored cushions and a tiger-skin, whose mate was on the floor. The +gloom of the afternoon was excluded by heavy gold-colored curtains, and +the only, but quite sufficient light, filtered through an opalescent +globe upheld by a twisted bronze female of the modern Munich school, +that looked like nothing so much as Alice elongating in Wonderland. + +Isabel suddenly felt herself and her organdie absurdly out of place in +this room with its enchantress atmosphere. She wished that Lady Victoria +had made the appointment for the library, which was equally in tune with +another side of her. + +She was even meditating a retreat, inexplicably embarrassed, when an +inner door opened and Lady Victoria entered. She wore a tea-gown of a +sort, black and yellow, open over the soft lace of a chemisette, +although a dog-collar of tiny golden sequins clasped her throat. In her +hair a golden butterfly trembled, and in that light she would have +looked little older than her guest had it not been for the expression of +her face. It was this expression that arrested Isabel even more than the +toilette, as she moved towards the divan without a word of greeting. It +looked as if it had been put on with the costume, both intended to +express a mood of the wearer: which might have been that of a tigress +whose ferocity was slowly awakening with the approach of the victim. The +black eyes were heavy with the lust of conquest, the points of the mouth +turned up more sharply than usual; there was an insatiable vanity in the +commanding poise of her head. She was as little like the woman of the +morning as the sun is like the midnight, and Isabel experienced a +positive terror of her. + +Feeling sixteen and very foolish, she sank to the edge of a chair and +muttered something about the charm of the room. Then, as Lady Victoria, +who had arranged herself among the shining pillows, continued to stare +at her with absolutely no change of expression, it dawned upon her that +she had not been expected but that some one else was. With too little +presence of mind left to retire gracefully and too much pride to appear +to have ventured into the cave of Venus unasked, she managed to +articulate her gratitude for the invitation of the morning. + +"Oh!" Lady Victoria's eyebrows expressed a flicker of intelligence. "I +hope you have managed not to bore yourself." + +Isabel plunged into an account of her drive, to which Lady Victoria, who +had lit a long Russian cigarette, paid no attention whatever. Her +expression was still petrified, except that she might have had the scent +of blood in her slightly dilating nostrils. + +Suddenly the slow flame in her eyes burned upward, and Isabel, her head +fairly jerking about, saw that a man had entered and was advancing +rapidly across the room, his heavy eyes wide with admiration. It was the +Frenchman whom Lady Victoria had honored with so much of her attention +the evening before. + +He raised to his lips the pointed fingers negligently extended, and +murmured something to which Lady Victoria replied in French as pure and +fluent as his own; and in a low rich voice, with not an echo in it of +her habitual abruptness or haughty languor. + +The Frenchman accepted a cigarette and a low chair opposite the divan, +whose golden cushions seemed subtly to embrace the yielding flexible +figure against them. Neither took the slightest notice of the third +person beyond a muttered introduction and acknowledgment, and as the man +embarked on a soft torrent of speech, bearing the burden of his +beatitude in at last meeting the only Englishwoman whose fame in Paris +was as great as among her native fogs, Isabel rose and retreated with +what dignity she could summon. Then Lady Victoria, seeing that she was +rid of her, and courteous under all her idiosyncrasies, rose with a long +motion of repressed energy and accompanied her to the door, her hand +resting lightly against the crisp organdie belt. + +"Will you pour out the tea for me?" she asked, sweetly. "I doubt if I go +down." + +No small part of her dangerous fascination lay in her sincerity. She +really liked Isabel, although it was characteristic of her that she did +not in the least care at what conclusions that puzzled young woman might +arrive in a more solitary meditation. + +When Isabel found herself in the long cool corridor, set thick with +gentle landscapes, and hunting squires, and dames haughty and humble, +she drew a long breath of relief, as if she had escaped from a jungle. +But she felt oddly wounded in her self-love, young and silly. She had +thought herself old in the last three years, tremendously modern. What +did she know? The easy morals of students in France and Germany had +repelled her at first, but she had ended by accepting them as a matter +of course, and had rather plumed herself upon her accumulating grains +and blends of human nature. She felt a rush of contempt for their +crudity. What children they were with their simple unmorality of +artists, as ignorant of the real world as babes in a wood! + +When she reached her own room she astonished herself by bursting into a +passion of tears. It was some time before she understood what had +induced it. It was not that the illusions of youth had received a hard +blow, for many of them had disappeared long since in Paris, when she had +supported an American girl of decent family but too much liberty through +the most desperate experience that a young woman, alone and friendless +in a foreign city, well could have. The girl had died cursing all men +and the folly of women, and after Isabel had buried her and the leading +cause of her repentance, she returned to her lonely flat in a state of +disillusion and disgust which seemed to encase her by no means +susceptible heart in a triple panoply. This state of mind had lasted for +at least three months. And there was little of which she had not +abstract knowledge, nor had she lived a quarter of a century to learn +for the first time of the license which the world permits to women so +highly placed that they have come to believe themselves above all laws. + +But all her experience and abstract knowledge counted for nothing, and +she had for the first time a sudden and complete appreciation of the +evil of the world and of its odd association with even the higher +virtues; of the fact that in the upper walks of life the balance was +more nearly even than on planes where there existed scantier +opportunities for development. There was no question that Victoria +Gwynne was made on a magnificent plan, as capable of heroism, no doubt, +as any of the salient women of history. She was an ornament in her +world, useful, sympathetic, the author of much good, a devoted and +inspiring mother. And yet there was no more question that this Frenchman +was the last of a long line of favored adorers than that Victoria, for +all her individualities, was but a type of her kind: a kind that was +sufficiently distinct from the hundreds of wholly estimable women that +were proud to know her, or accepted her as a matter of course. + +And even these good women? Had they not the same passions, the same +inclinations in the secrecies of their souls? What was the determining +cause of their indisputable virtue? A happy marriage? Too many children? +Timidity? Absence of temptation? Or were they merely orthodox through a +more uneven balancing of their qualities, the animal in abeyance? For +this very reason were they not frequently narrow, unsympathetic, +unuseful--unless, indeed, they were of the few who, with the mighty +temptations of the Victoria Gwynnes, were mightier still in their +fidelity to some inner and cherished ideal. This lofty ideal of +womanhood Isabel had unconsciously set up in her soul, and the sudden +conviction of its imperfection was, after all, the reason of her sudden +despair. For the soul with its immemorial and often incommunicable +knowledge may have its moments of terror while the mind wonders. + +And she was disheartened at the sense of insignificance and +mortification inspired by this contact with a side of life, as real and +consequent as motherhood or government, instead of feeling merely +repelled, infinitely superior in her unstained maidenhood. She had no +wish to emulate, but neither did she relish feeling provincial, a chit, +an outsider. Her youthful vanity had its way in a mind too speculative, +intelligent, observant, merely to be shocked. Her memory reverted to +experiences that had made her feel as much older than the ordinary girl +as she now felt at sea. What was she, Isabel Otis, after all? She felt a +mere assortment of fluids, which might or might not crystallize into +some such being as she had dimly apprehended, or into something quite +commonplace; realized with a shock that her own deep personal experience +had left her less definitely moulded than she had imagined. + +She rose impatiently and bathed her eyes before ringing for the maid to +lace her for dinner--it was long past tea-time. "Perhaps I had better +marry Lord Hexam and have ten children," she thought. "That sort of +existence has kept more women up to the correct standard than anything +else except poverty." + + + + +XIII + + +"And is this really your first big party?" asked Hexam, wonderingly. + +"The first! The first! And I am twenty-five! Just think of it! Of course +I have been to students' balls, and little parties in Rosewater. But a +function--never before." + +"This is hardly a function--parties even in the big political +country-houses are more or less informal." + +"Informal! The jewels fairly blind my provincial eyes. And this is a +real castle!" + +"Oh yes, it is a castle," he said, laughing outright. "I suppose you +have read up its record?" he added, teasingly. "You industrious and +curious Americans know a lot more about us than we know about +ourselves." + +"Of course I know the history of this castle. I haven't the least doubt +you know every word of it yourself. I have already learned that the +English are not nearly so vacant-minded as, in their curious pride, they +would have one believe." + +She threw back her head, half-closing her eyes in the ecstasy of her new +experience. The dancing was in the picture-gallery, an immense room, in +which there were many dark paintings of the old Italian and Spanish +schools, besides the presentments of innumerable Arcots by the usual +popular masters of the Dutch and English. The ceiling was of stone and +vaulted, but set thick with electric lights, blazing down from their +great height like the crystal stars of the tropics. It had seemed to +Isabel that after entering the castle she had walked for ten minutes +before reaching this room, where as brilliant a company was disporting +itself as she was likely to look upon in England. The Duke of Arcot was +an energetic Conservative and a member of the present cabinet, but his +social attentions were ever directed to the prominent and interesting of +whatever party or creed. As he found a particular zest in being +surrounded by smart, bright and pretty women, the parties at the castle, +and at Arcot House in London, were seldom surpassed in either brilliancy +or interest. And as his rent-roll was abnormal, there was no sign of +dilapidation within the gray walls and towers of the ancient castle, but +much comfort and luxury against a background of countless treasures +accumulated throughout the centuries. He had taken an immediate fancy to +Isabel and promised to show her the lower rooms as soon as she tired of +dancing. + +Hexam watched her with an amused indulgence that in no wise tempered his +mounting admiration. She was radiant. Her blue eyes were shining and +almost black, her cheeks flooded with a delicate pink. She wore a gown +of white tulle upon whose floating surface were a few dark-blue lilies. +The masses of her black hair were piled on her head in the fashion of +her Californian grandmothers, and confined by a high Spanish comb of +gold and tortoise-shell. Her only other jewel was a long string of Baja +California pearls that had glistened on warm white necks in many an old +California ballroom before ever an American had crossed the threshold of +Arcot Castle. They had been given by Concha Argueello, when she assumed +the gray habit of the Third Order of the Franciscan nuns, to the wife of +her brother Santiago and so had come down to Isabel. + +And to-night this descendant of that powerful clan, unimaginable in her +modern complexities to their simple minds, was receiving homage in the +ballroom of one of the greatest houses in Europe. For there was no +question, even in the minds of the young married women, who carry all +before them in English society, that the American girl had created a +furore among the men. Isabel had confided to the duke, who had lunched +that day at Capheaton, and to Hexam, her haunting fear of being a +wall-flower, and both had vowed that she should have no lack of partners +at her first English ball. But to Hexam's disgust, at least, their +solicitude came to an untimely end, and he was able to secure but two +waltzes and a square dance. The duke had spoken for the cotillon, which +he had no intention of dancing. He was a most estimable person, but he +never ignored an opportunity to talk with a new and interesting woman. + +Isabel could hardly have failed to be a belle that night, for her spirit +was pitched to a height of joy and triumph that charged her whole being +with a powerful magnetism. Possibly with a presentiment that it was to +be an isolated experience, she abandoned herself recklessly to the mere +delight of living, her will imperious for the fulness of one of the +dearest of girlhood's ideals. She was one of those women, cast, as she +well knew, for tragic and dramatic contacts with life, but Nature in +compensation had granted her a certain wildness of spirit that sprang +spontaneously to meet the pleasure, trifling or great, of the mere +present; no matter for how long a period, or how hard, its wings had +been smitten. + +So she danced, and talked far more than was her wont, surpassing herself +in every way, and no more interested in poor Hexam than in twenty +others. He took her in to supper, however, and after three hours of +dancing she was glad to rest and be sheltered by his determined bulk, +planted squarely before her corner. She knew that she had a coronet very +close to her footstool, and that this brilliant night might be but the +prologue to a lifetime of the only society in the world worth while, but +she was not conscious of any desire beyond the brimming cup of the +moment. Moreover, she had never so thoroughly enjoyed being a girl, and +love-making would have bored her grievously. + +The duke claimed her, and after a desultory tour of the great +reception-rooms and an infinite number of little cabinets, containing +some of the most valuable of the Japanese and Indian treasures, he led +her to the library, a luxurious room conducive to rapid friendship. + +With that amiable desire, peculiar to the kindly Englishman, to gratify +the ingenuous curiosity of the American, he produced a huge leather +volume containing the various patents of nobility that marked the upward +evolution of his house from a barony in some remote period of the +world's history to the present dukedom, and the royal letters that had +accompanied them. It was something he never would have dreamed of doing +for a stranger of his own country, or of any state in Europe, but the +English humor Americans that please them much as they would engaging +children; and Isabel's eyes sparkled with so lively an intelligence that +the duke fancied she had literary intentions and might one day find +such information useful. He even showed her his complicated +coat-of-arms, which included a bend sinister, for he had royal blood in +his veins; and this slanting rod interested Isabel as deeply as the moat +under the window. She was even more interested in the duke's attitude; +it was evident that he felt no more vanity in his royal descent than +deprecation of its irregular cause and enduring emblem. It was, and that +was the end of it; but he had quite enough imagination to appreciate the +effect of so picturesque an incident in family history upon the mind of +the young republican. + +"The best we can do is to descend irrelevantly from Washington, +Hamilton, or Jefferson," said Isabel. "Only we have not yet reached the +stage where we dare to acknowledge it on our coat-of-arms. The illusions +of the American youth must be preserved. Even the fact that one of our +Presidents was a son of Aaron Burr is still to be read only in the great +volume of unwritten history. My father was a sort of walking edition of +that work." + +"That is new to me!" The duke was quite famous as a student of history, +and took a personal interest in America, having been over twice in +search of big game. He asked her many questions; but his interest in the +general subject was as nothing to the enthusiasm she aroused by a chance +allusion to the chicken-ranch. The duke was agricultural above all +things; he had a model estate bristling with scientific improvement. He +was enchanted at Isabel's picture of her wire-enclosed "runs" and yards +containing industrious chickens of all ages, engaged, however +innocently, in the pursuit of wealth. Isabel, when she chose, could +invest any subject with glamour, and her account, delivered in tones +notably accelerated, of the snow-white, red-crowned flocks, their +aristocratic little white mansions, the luxurious nurseries for the +"chicks," and the astonishing and costly banquets with which they were +daily regaled, was so lively that the duke vowed he would raise Leghorns +forthwith. He asked her so many practical questions, taking copious +notes, and inevitably embracing California ranch life in its entirety, +in his thirst for knowledge, that Isabel had no more dancing that night; +but she made an enduring impression upon the eminently practical mind of +her host. + +It was quite two hours after supper, and Isabel was beginning to reflect +with some humor upon the brevity of all illusions, when Hexam and Miss +Thangue appeared simultaneously and announced that the Capheaton guests +were leaving. Hexam looked sulky and suspicious. Flora was smiling. + +"For the first time--" she murmured. + +Isabel and the duke laughed outright, and then shook hands warmly. + +"When I go home we can correspond," she said to him, "and I will tell +you all the new kinks. We are always improving." + +"The duke looked positively rejuvenated," said Hexam, spitefully, as +they walked down the corridor. "Have you discovered the elixir of life +in California, and promised him the prescription." + +"No," said Isabel, demurely. "I have merely been initiating him into the +mysteries of raising Leghorns." + +Hexam looked stupefied, but Miss Thangue burst into a merry peal of +laughter. + +"Isabel!" she exclaimed. "I begin to suspect you are a minx!" + +And Isabel laughed, too, in sheer excess of animal spirits and gratified +vanity. She had excellent cause to remember the ebullition, for it was +some time before she laughed again. + +The duchess, with her light sweet smile, her old-fashioned +Book-of-Beauty style, a certain affectation of shabbiness in her +black-and-silver gown, looked a more indispensable part of the picture +than any of her guests, as she stood in the middle of the great +drawing-room with a group of her more intimate friends. Among them was +Lady Victoria, more normal of mood this evening, sufficiently gracious, +superbly indifferent, although she had held her court as usual. + +She tapped Isabel lightly on the cheek with her fan. "You were quite the +rage," she said. "I never should have forgiven you if you had not been." +And Isabel had not the slightest doubt of her sincerity. + +The duchess, in the immensity of her castle, did not pretend to keep an +eye on any one, and would have been the last to suspect that Miss Otis +had inspired her husband with a sudden passion for chickens. She shook +hands approvingly with the young American and asked her to come over +informally to luncheon on the morrow. + +"Is your head turning?" asked Miss Thangue, as they drove home. "You +must reap the results of your success; it would be a pity not to. After +a few weeks here with Vicky you must go on a round of visits and then +have a season in London." + +"It would be glorious!" exclaimed Isabel, in whom problems were +moribund. "I certainly believe I shall." + +She was in the second of the carriages to reach Capheaton, and Gwynne, +who was still standing on the steps, helped her down, and asked her +pleasantly if she had enjoyed herself. + +"I had such a good time I know I sha'n't sleep a wink for twenty-four +hours. I believe I'll go to the library and get a book of yours I began +on Sunday--only--" She hesitated. A talk with this enigmatical cousin +would be a proper climax to the triumphs of the night. She raised her +eyes, full of flattering appeal. "There are one or two points I did not +quite understand--I have hesitated to go on--" + +He too was wakeful, and rose to the bait promptly. "Suppose you give me +an hour by the empty hearth. Will you? Well, go on ahead and I'll follow +in a moment--after I see that the men have all they want in the +smoking-room." + +In the depths of the most independent woman's soul is a lingering taint +of servility to the lordly male, and in Isabel it warmed into subtle +life under the flattering response of this illustrious specimen. She +fairly sailed towards the library, wondering if any of the famous +old-time California belles, Concha Argueello, Chonita Iturbe y Moncada, +with their caballeros flinging gold and silver at their feet, Nina +Randolph and Chonita Hathaway and Helena Belmont, with their pugnacious +"courts," had ever felt as exultant as she. That last moment, as she +stepped lightly over the threshold of the library, was a sort of climax +to the intoxication of youth. + +And then she stopped short, stifling a cry of terror. The library, +except for the wandering moonshine, was unlit, but a ray fell directly +across a shadowy figure in the depths of a chair, half-way down the +room. It was a relaxed figure, the head fallen on the chest; the arms +were hanging limply over the sides of the chair, the hands ghastly in +the moonlight. At the rustle of skirts the figure slowly raised its +head, and the eyes of a man, haunted rather than haunting, looked out of +a drawn and livid face. But the movement was not followed by speech, and +Isabel stood, stiff with horror, convinced that she was in the presence +of the Capheaton ghost. Of course, like all old manor-houses, it had +one, and she was too imaginative not to accept with her nerves if not +with her intelligence this ugly proof of a restless domain beyond the +grave. But her petrifaction was mercifully brief. There was a quick step +behind her, and then an exclamation of horror as Gwynne shot past and +caught the lugubrious visitant by the shoulder. + +"Good God, Zeal!" he cried, and his voice shook. "What is it, old man? +You look--you look--" + +The man in the chair rose slowly and drew a long breath, which seemed to +infuse him with life again. + +"I probably look much as I feel," he said, grimly. "I'm about to go on a +journey, and if you can give me a few minutes--" + +He paused and looked with cold politeness at Isabel. She waited for no +further formalities, but shaken with the sure foreboding of calamity, +turned and fled the room. + + + + +XIV + + +That night had also been one of triumph for Elton Gwynne. He had dined +at the castle, and--his Julia having flitted to another +country-house--spent the greater part of the evening in the smoking-room +with half a score of the most eminent men in political England; and +others whose recognition was not to be despised. + +As there were many guests at the castle the dinner took place in the +banquet-hall, but at six or eight round tables, and Gwynne had found +himself distinguished above all the other young men present by being +seated at that of the duchess. The prime-minister, the chancellor of the +exchequer, two other members of the cabinet, and an ambassador were his +companions. All the women were of exalted station, but for this fact +Gwynne cared nothing, being entirely free of that snobbery which so +often agitates even the best-born of the world; indeed, would have been +resentful of the ripe age of the ladies--accumulated with their +political values--had it not been for the tremendous compliment paid to +his personal achievement. + +He could not sit beside her grace in that nest of titles, but at the +suggestion of the duke he had been placed as nearly opposite her as the +round table permitted, and he soon forgot the broken circle of +immemorial bosoms in the manifest disapproval of the Conservative +premier towards himself, and in the attitude of the other men, which, +whether hostile or friendly, evinced a recognition of the rising star +and a tolerance of his ideas. + +There is always a glamour about a very young man who has given +cumulative evidence of genius and compelled the attention of the world, +always distrustful of youth. His enemies had long since--and he was but +thirty--admitted his gift for letters, fiercely as they might scoff at +his conclusions; and his rewards for bravery in the field had aroused no +adverse comment. But while his most persistent critics had never +discovered him truthless and corruptible, his political sincerity had +been called into question even by his colleagues, and almost unanimously +by the opposition. His principles were by no means so rigidly outlined +as those of the great Whig families, nor of the men who belonged to the +Liberal party as a natural result of their more modest station and +protesting spirit. He was strong on the fundamental principles of the +party, and far more energetic in his advocacy of the rights and needs of +the working-man than any Liberal of his own class, but he rarely, if +ever, alluded to the question of Home Rule; a question somnolent but by +no means dead; and the omission savored of Unionism, in spite of his +avowed scorn of all compromises. + +These facts, taken in connection with the pride and arrogance of the +young scion of the house of Strathland and Zeal, generated the suspicion +that he had allied himself with the Liberal party for two reasons only: +its weakness in first-class men, and his passion for self-advertising. +No one disputed his pre-eminence in this branch of industrial art, for +although he never descended to commonplace methods, and the interviewer, +far from being sought, rather dreaded him than otherwise, there was no +man in England who was such a mine for "copy," nor of a perennially +greener growth in the select front lawn of "news." When he attacked the +government he was eminently quotable, and this endeared him to both +reporters and editors. When he was interviewed, fearsome in manner as he +was, he sent the worm away packed with ideas and phrases. But although +he was almost continuously on the tongue, and the object of more +acrimonious discussion than any young man in England, distrust of him +had grown to such proportions that he had been dropped after one brief +sojourn in the House; and to regain his seat had taken two years of the +hardest and most brilliant fighting Great Britain had seen since the +Conservative majority of 1874 permitted Disraeli to rest on his prickly +laurels. But this memorable battle of one young man against a mighty +phalanx of enemies and doubting friends had battered down the prejudices +of his own party, and won a meed of applause from even those of stout +old Tory principles. The humbler class, upon whom the election largely +depended, were captivated by his eloquence, his insidious manipulation +of the best in their natures, filling them with a judicious mixture of +ideals and self-approval; while the phenomenon he invariably presented +on the platform of the gradual awakening into life of a warm-blooded +generous magnetic and earnest inner man, so effectually concealed at +other times within a repellent exterior, never failed to induce in them +the belief that something responsive in their own personalities awakened +that rare spirit from its stifled sleep. That the glamour of his birth +and condescension to their plane had aught to do with the dazzling +quality of his charm, they might have admitted had their minds been +driven by the enemy into the regions of self-analysis, but in any case +he was the theme of two-thirds of the "pubs" and reading-rooms in +England. He had achieved a sweeping victory that loomed portentously as +a forerunner of greater triumphs in the future; for the personal +popularity he had achieved, the gift for leadership he had demonstrated, +the self-control he showed at all times, and the fatally adhesive +quality of his biting wit, had strengthened the Liberal party and caused +the Conservative to wish that he had never been born. + +And flushed with self-love and the conquest of the woman of his desire, +he had never talked better than on that night at Arcot; nor less +offensively, for his arrogance and assertiveness were tempered by the +warm high tide of his emotions. It was a magnificent room, the +banquet-hall at Arcot, as large as that of many royal palaces, hung with +old Gobelins and frescoed by a pupil of Giotto. It was a fit setting for +the triumphant hour of the "most remarkable young man since the younger +Pitt," a phrase which, if not notably suave, at least possessed an +astonishing vigor, and was almost as familiar in American and +continental newspapers as in his own proud nation; a nation always so +keen to possess the first in all departments of excellence--creating +them out of second-class material when the first is lacking--that the +wonder was she had been so long accepting Elton Gwynne. Nothing, +perhaps, but a noble desire for a really great man restrained her. + +Opposite Gwynne, the duchess, sweet and tactful, if little more than an +ornamental husk in which the juices of her race possibly recuperated to +invigorate the future generations, was as fair and stately as her castle +demanded; and if her gown was shabby her jewels were not. On either +side of her table, which occupied the central position in the great +room, were some of the most beautiful women in England, the smartest, +the most politically important; all, without exception, of an inherited +status that brought them once a year as a matter of course within the +sternly guarded portals of Arcot. Gwynne did not know that Mrs. Kaye had +knocked at these sacred portals in vain; for such gossip, if by chance +he heard it, made no impression upon him whatever. But he was by no +means insensible to the salient fact that he was one among the chosen of +Earth to-night, and that it was good to be the hero of such an assembly. + +For that he was the hero there was no manner of doubt, and when the +dinner was over he spent but half an hour in the drawing-room, +preferring the conversation of the heads of state, who so seldom +gratified the vanity of a man of his years, but whom he had the power to +interest whether they approved of him or not. He had many friends among +women, some conquered by the magic of notoriety, others, like Flora +Thangue, sensible of his finer side, or tolerant of him through +life-long intimacy; and there were times when he was as alive to the +pleasures of their society as any young sprig about town; but to-night +their admiration was too illogical to administer to the self-love which +in the last few days had palpitated with so exquisite a sense of +fruition. Moreover, it gave him the keenest satisfaction to read in the +manner of these older and long-tried men the grudging belief in his own +sincerity. + +In reality his motives for joining a party at war with every tradition +of his house had been, primarily, as mixed as are all motives that bring +about great voluntary changes in a man's life. It was quite true that +he was inordinately ambitious, that he had a distinct preference for the +sensational method, as productive of speedier results; for he had no +intention of waiting until middle-age for the activities and honors he +craved in his insatiable youth; and it was also true that he was even +more of an aristocrat than many of his class, with whom a simpler +attitude had become the fashion, even if it were not marrow-deep. But +the ruling motive had been his passionate love of battle, a trait +inherited perhaps from his pioneer ancestors, whose roots were in the +soil. This desire to prove his mettle and fill his life with the only +excitement worthy of his gifts, would alone have made him turn from the +broad ancestral paths, but, like a lawyer fascinated by his brief, he +had long since been heart and soul with the party he had chosen, and, +with the exercise of his faculties, become possessed of a mounting +desire not only to be of genuine use to his country, but to lift the +family name from the comparative obscurity where it had rested during +the half of a century. + +The present head of the family had been an invalid in his early life, +and Italy had withered whatever ambitions may have pricked him in his +youth. When he finally found himself able to live the year round in +England he saw no fault in a nation so superior to any of his exile, and +he had settled down to the life of a country squire, devoted to sport, +and supremely satisfied with himself. His eldest son, an estimable young +man, who had worked at Christ Church as if he had been qualifying for a +statesman or a don, died of typhoid-fever before the birth of his boy. +The present heir, brilliant, weak, cynical, absolutely selfish, had +rioted to such an extent that he had fatally injured his health and +incurred the detestation of his grandfather; Lord Strathland was not +only a virtuous old gentleman but was also inclined to be miserly. The +subjects upon which they did not quarrel bitterly every time they met +were those relating to Elton Gwynne, whom both loved, in so far as they +loved any one but themselves. Deeply as they disapproved of his +politics, they respected his independence and were inordinately proud of +him. Zeal's daughters, who bored him inexpressibly, were parcelled out +among relatives, and he led a roving life in search of beneficent air +for his weary lungs. All women had become hateful to him since he had +been forced to sit in the ashes of repentance, but he had consented to +enter upon a second marriage through the most disinterested sentiment of +his life, his love of his cousin, whose haunting fear of being shelved +in his youth had been poured into his ears many times. That he also +enraged his grandfather, who wanted nothing so much as the assurance +that his favorite should inherit the territorial honors of his house, +may have given zest to his act of renunciation. Not that he had the +least intention of giving his cousin a solid basis for despair for many +years to come, for no mother ever nursed her babe more tenderly than he +his weak but by no means exhausted chest. During his last interview with +Elton in London he had assured his anxious relative that he was taking +the best of care of himself, and that, in spite of blood-shot eyes and +haggard cheeks, his disease was quiescent; although he had decided to +start for Davos or some other popular climate before the advent of harsh +weather. Davos is a word of hideous portent in English ears, but Gwynne +had expelled it with all other cares from his mind, and on this night +when he returned from Arcot feeling a far greater man than any of his +house had ever dreamed of being, and with a song in his heart, the +awful face of his cousin, whom in the shock of the moment he thought +stricken with death, gave him the first stab of terror and doubt that he +had experienced in his triumphant life. + + + + +XV + + +"Come up-stairs," said Zeal. "We are liable to interruption here." + +"Have they put you up decently?" asked Gwynne, with his mind's surface. +"The house is rather full." + +"I shall leave by the seven-o'clock train, and it must be three now. I +have no intention of going to bed." + +"Is that wise? You look pretty seedy, old man. You haven't had a +hemorrhage?" He almost choked as he brought the word out, and yet he was +not in the least surprised when Zeal replied, tonelessly, "I had +forgotten I ever had a chest;" for his mind was vibrating with a +telepathic message which his wits attacked fiercely and without avail. + +As they entered his room he pushed his cousin into an easy-chair and +turned up the lamp on the writing-table. Then he planted his feet on the +hearth-rug with a blind instinct to die standing. + +"Fire away, for God's sake," he said. "Something has happened. You know +you can count on me, whatever it is." + +Zeal, who was sitting stiffly forward, his hands gripping the arms of +his chair, laughed dryly. "You will be the chief sufferer. The others +don't count." + +"Has my grandfather speculated once too often? Are we gone completely +smash?" Gwynne was rapidly assuring himself that he was now prepared for +the worst, that nothing should knock the props from under him again, +that it was the sight of Zeal's face that had upset him; he was not one +to collapse before the stiff blows of life. + +"It is likely. Anyhow, if he lives long enough he'll make a mess of what +is left." He raised his head slowly, and once more Gwynne, as he met +those terrible haunted eyes, felt as Adam may have felt when he was +being bundled towards the exit of Eden. He braced himself unconsciously, +and after Zeal's next words did not relax his body, although his lips +turned white and stiff. + +"I am going to kill myself some time to-day," said Zeal, in a voice so +emotionless that Gwynne wondered idly if all his capacity for expression +had gone to his eyes. "I should have done it several hours earlier, but +I felt that I owed you an explanation. You can pass it on to my +grandfather when the time comes." + +He paused a moment, and then he too seemed to brace himself. + +"I killed Brathland," he said. + +Gwynne moistened his lips. "Poor old Zeal," he muttered. "It must be a +horrid sensation--" + +"To be a murderer? I can assure you it is." + +Gwynne's mind seemed to darken until only one luminous point confronted +it, the visible tormented soul of his kinsman. He walked over to the +table and mixed two tumblers of whiskey-and-soda, wondering why he had +not thought of it before. They drank without haste, and then Gwynne took +the chair opposite Zeal's. + +"Tell me all about it," he said. + +"Brathland and I had not been friends for some years. He was a bounder, +and an ass in the bargain. I never, even when we were on speaking +terms, made any particular effort to hide what I thought of him--it +wasn't worth while. Of course, with every mother firing her girls at his +head, and the flatterers and toadies from whom a prospective duke cannot +escape if he would, he had an opinion of himself that would have made me +the object of his particular rancor, even if I hadn't cut him out with +three different women that couldn't marry either of us. When I got the +verdict that I must pull up or go under, he chose that particular moment +to take up with Stella Starr, the only woman I ever cared a pin for. +Somehow, he got wind of my condition, and knowing that I would prefer to +retire as gracefully as possible, it struck him as the refinement of +vengeance to make a laughing-stock of me when I was no longer in a +condition to play the game out; to advertise me as a worn-out rake for +whom the world of Stella Starrs had no further use. We never spoke again +until Friday night." + +He paused, then mixed and drank another whiskey-and-soda, lit a +cigarette, and resumed. + +"I had objected to his being let into the mine, which Vanneck's agent +and private letters had persuaded the rest of us would make our +fortunes; but I was helpless, for he was not only Vanneck's cousin, but +his brother is out in Africa and also interested in the mine. I +therefore consented to attend the dinner at which the whole business was +to be discussed, fully intending to treat him as I should any stranger +to whom I had just been introduced. + +"At first all went well enough. We had the private dining-room and +smoking-room on the second floor at the Club, the dinner was excellent, +and Brathland, although nearly opposite me, behaved as decently as he +always did when sober. It was champagne that let loose the bounder in +him, and that was one reason I always so thoroughly despised him: the +man that is not a gentleman when he is drunk has no right to be alive at +all. + +"We were not long discussing the mine threadbare, for we did not know +enough about it to enlarge into any picturesque details, and the agent, +who had seen each of us separately, was not present. Raglin read a +personal letter from Vanneck, and Brathland another from Dick. Then, the +subject being exhausted long before we reached the end of dinner, we +drifted off to other topics; and went into the smoking-room with the +coffee. + +"It was at least six years since I had tasted anything stronger than +whiskey-and-water, and what devil entered into me that night to drink a +quart of champagne, and liqueurs, and pour port and brandy on top, the +devil himself only knows. Perhaps the old familiar sight of a lot of +good fellows; most likely the vanity of forcing Brathland to believe +that he beheld a rival as vigorous and dangerous as of old--I had gained +ten pounds and was looking and feeling particularly fit. At all events +the mess affected me as alcohol never had done in even my salet days, +and although my thoughts seemed to be moving in a crystal procession, I +became slowly obsessed with the desire to kill Brathland; whose face, +chalky white, as it always was when he was drunk--and he always got +drunk on less than any one else--filled me with a fury of disgust and +hatred. My mind kept assuring this thing that straddled it that I had +not the least intention of making an ass of myself; and that procession +of thought, in order to support its confidence, entered into an argument +with my conscience, which was in a corner and looked like a codfish +standing on its tail and grinning impotently. A jig of words escaped +from the mouth of the codfish: copy-book maxims, Bible admonitions, the +commandments, legal statutes; all in one hideous mess that annoyed me so +I slipped out, went up to my room, and pocketed a pistol. That logical +procession of thought in my mind assured me that this unusual move at a +friendly business dinner was merely in the way of self-protection, for +Brathland had once been heard to say that he wished we were both +cow-boys on an American ranch so that he could put a bullet into me +without taking the consequences--he never had a brain above shilling +shockers. My thoughts, as they visibly combined and recombined in the +crystal vault of my skull, asserted confidently that he had been reading +such stuff lately, and that, ten to one, he had a pistol in his pocket. + +"When I returned Brathland was standing by the hearth, supporting +himself by the chimney-piece. The rest were lying about in long chairs, +smoking, and drinking whiskey-and-sodas. They were all sober enough, and +Brathland looked the more of a beast by contrast. + +"I took a chair opposite him and ordered my thoughts to arrange +themselves in phrases that should pierce his mental hide and wither the +very roots of his self-esteem--his vanity was the one big thing about +him. But he took his doom into his own hands and built it up like a +house of cards. + +"'How does it feel to be drunk once more?' he asked, with his damnable +sneer. 'It makes you look less of a hypochondriac, anyhow. "Granny +Zeal"--that's what the girls call you.' + +"'If they do I've no doubt you taught them,' I replied, in tones as low +as his own. Several men were seated not far off, but neither of us hung +out a storm signal. + +"'I did,' he said. 'Not but that I had had revenge enough. I had made +you ridiculous--you with your damned superior airs--like that infant +phenomenon cousin of yours who is making the family ass of himself over +Julia Kaye--' + +"Those were his last words. I pulled the pistol and fired straight into +his abdomen--knew I couldn't miss him there. + +"God! what a commotion there was. He doubled up with a yell--just like +him. The men fairly bounded out of their chairs. There were two waiters +in the room--just come in with Apollinaris. Raglin slammed the doors to, +and, while Ormond and Hethrington laid Brathland out on a sofa, asked +the servants if they would hold their tongues until it was known whether +he would die or not. They assented readily enough, knowing how damned +well worth their while it was. Then he went off for a surgeon--didn't +dare telephone--went straight for a young fellow named Ballast he +happened to know, and asked him if he would probe for a bullet and call +it appendicitis, for a thousand pounds. Apparently there was no time +wasted in argument, for he returned in half an hour with his man. The +surgeon probed for the bullet, but without success. Then he bandaged +Brathland, had him carried up to Raglin's room, and sent for a nurse +that he could trust. + +"We all regathered in the smoking-room, shut the waiters in the +dining-room, and talked the matter over. By this time I was more +hideously sober than I ever had been in my life. What they thought of me +I neither knew nor cared, and it is doubtful if they knew themselves; +their one thought was to keep the matter from getting out and dragging +the Club into a scandal; and of course Raglin was equally keen on +sheltering the family, whether Brathland lived or died. Anyhow, I fancy +they would have stood by me, for if we have no other virtue we do stand +by each other. + +"Practically the only question was the amount to be paid in blackmail, +for every trace of the affair had been removed; even the smell of +antiseptics and ether had gone. We finally called the waiters in and +offered them four hundred each for their silence, or in the case of +Brathland's death--the surgeon held out hopes--a thousand. They coolly +replied they would take a thousand apiece before noon on the following +day, and ten thousand each in case of death. We--or rather Raglin and +one or two others--jawed for an hour; but the wretches never yielded an +inch. They had us on the hip and were not likely to be put off by any +amount of eloquence. Of course we caved in and God knows what amount of +future blackmail the Club is in for. Then there was the thousand for the +surgeon, and the nurse would expect a thousand more. Of course I made +myself responsible for the entire amount. Raglin insisted for a time +upon going halves--blood may be blood, but he had despised Bratty as +much as I ever did--but of course I would not hear of it. + +"The next afternoon the surgeon probed again, and Brathland died under +the ether. The wound after probing looked sufficiently like an ordinary +incision to deceive any one. Raglin and Harold Lorcutt--who, of course, +was told the truth--naturally had the body sealed up in lead before +taking it north. The old duke and the women of the family are in a fair +way to know nothing." + +He paused abruptly and lifted his eyes once more to Gwynne's, bursting +into a laugh that sounded like the crackling of fire under dry leaves. + +"Lovely story, ain't it?" + +But Gwynne made no reply. His mind, released, was working abnormally, +and his face was as livid as his cousin's had been. + +Zeal rose. The narrative had excited him out of his apathy and physical +exhaustion, the confession shaken the rigidity from his mind. He planted +himself on the hearth-rug with an air that approached nonchalance. His +thin clever face had a burning spot on either cheek, his sunken eyes +were no longer haunted, but brilliant and staring; his thin high nose +and fine hands twitched slightly, as if his nerves were enjoying a too +sudden release. + +"Heavenly sensation--to be a murderer. What beastly names things have +and how we are obsessed by them! The word rings in my brain night and +day--I haven't slept three hours since it happened, and I never had the +remotest hope that he would live. It's the second time in my life I've +been up against a cold ugly fact that stands by itself in a region where +rhetoric doesn't enter. I believe I could tolerate the situation if I'd +done it in cold blood, if I'd thought it out, determined to gratify my +hatred of the man; if, in short, the deed had been the offspring of my +intelligence, for which I have always had a considerable respect. But to +have been under the control of a Thing, like any navvy, to be a criminal +without the consent of my will-- + +"I don't know that that fact alone would make life insupportable. But +there are other and sufficient reasons. I shall never get the hideous +sight of Brathland as he doubled up, and his horrid gurgling shriek, out +of my mind this side of the grave. And I am practically cleaned out. You +know how much I have left of my mother's property! It barely covers +what I paid out to-day. There isn't a penny for the girls. They will be +dependent on Strathland--as I should be if I lived; a position for which +I have as little relish as for that of a murderer on the loose. And +should I ever be really safe? If this stinking quartet takes it into its +head to levy annual blackmail, where is the money coming from? I won't +have the others let in while I'm alive. If it did come to that--and of +course it would--I'd get out anyhow, so I may as well go now and save +myself further horrors. Besides, with all our precautions, we may have +overlooked some significant detail, there may have been an eavesdropper, +the undertakers may have had their suspicions--for all I know I may be +arrested to-morrow--well, Jack, what would you do in my place?" + +Gwynne shook himself and stood up. "I don't know. I have been feeling as +if I had killed Bratty myself. But I cannot imagine myself committing +suicide--talk about ugly words! In the first place I don't think that +one crime is any reason for committing another, and in the second--" + +"It is cowardly! You don't suppose that old standby slipped my mind, do +you? Well, I am a coward. There you have my dispassionate opinion of +myself. I don't see myself in the prisoner's dock, in the graceful act +of dangling from the end of a rope; or, if the judge was inclined to +have pity on the family, of dying in a prison hospital. Even if I +trumped up the necessary fortitude I should be a blacker villain than I +am to bring disgrace upon my five poor girls and the woman that has +promised to marry me, to say nothing of Vicky and yourself. Nor, on the +other hand, do I see myself skulking in some hole abroad with the hue +and cry after me. I have just as little appetite for the role of the +haunted man in comparative security. Well, what would you do yourself?" + +Gwynne shuddered. His own eyes were hunted. "How, in God's name, can any +man tell what he would do until he is in the same hole? I should like to +think that I would speak out and take the consequences. There is little +danger of your swinging, and as for imprisonment--one way or another +you've got to answer for your crime, and it seems to me that the honest +thing is to accept the penalty of the law you live under." + +"Well, it doesn't to me," said Zeal, coolly, and lighting another +cigarette. "I asked the question merely out of curiosity, as the +workings of your mind always interest me. But I have quite made up my +own mind. The only reason I hesitated a moment--to be exact, it was half +a day--was on your account. Of course I know what my death will mean to +you." + +"It was for that reason I was almost coward enough not to remonstrate." +Gwynne scratched a match several times before he succeeded in getting a +light. "Nevertheless, I meant it." + +"Don't doubt it. And I am sorry--it is about the only regret I shall +take with me, that and some remorse on account of the girls. I suppose +Strathland will throw them a bone each--" + +"I will look out for them. But you are not bent on this horror!" he +burst out. Wild plans of drugging his cousin, of locking him up, chased +through his mind, and at the same time he was sick with the certainty of +his own impotence. He knew his cousin, and he had the sensation that an +illuminated scroll of fate dangled before his eyes. + +Zeal nodded. His excitement, his fears, had left him. He felt something +of the swagger in calm peculiar to the condemned in their final hour, +that last great rally of the nerves to feed the fires of courage. He +finished his cigarette and flung himself on the sofa. + +"Wake me at twenty to seven, will you?" he asked. "I have ordered the +trap." + + + + +XVI + + +The young Marquess of Strathland and Zeal sat alone in the smoking-room +at Capheaton--the guests, with the exception of Flora Thangue and Isabel +Otis had departed six days ago--sunk in a melancholy so profound that +his brain was mercifully inactive: if the history of the past week was +dully insistent the future was not. + +He had witnessed the descent of his grandfather and cousin into the +vault of the chapel at Strathland Abbey two days before, and after the +necessary interviews with stewards and family solicitors had returned +this afternoon to Capheaton with his mother. Lady Victoria, even her +dauntless soul sick with grief and horrors, had gone to bed at once, and +after a funereal dinner, where he had made no response whatever to the +feeble efforts of the girls to illuminate the darkness in which he +moved, had gone to the smoking-room alone, wishing to think and plan, +yet grateful that he could not. + +He had known nothing of the weakness of his grandfather's heart, and the +old gentleman, as ruddy and debonair as ever, had just come in from the +coverts when he arrived at the Abbey a few hours after Zeal's departure +from Capheaton. Always vain of his health and appearance since his +complete recovery, now many years ago, Lord Strathland had turned a +haughty back upon the one physician that had dared to warn him; not even +his valet was permitted to suspect that he had been forced to pay to +Time any debt beyond bleaching hair and an occasional twinge of gout. +The care he had taken of himself in his delicate youth had given him a +finer constitution than he would have been likely to enjoy had he been +able to go the wild way of many of his family; and it was his familiar +boast that he intended to live until ninety. + +Elton's visit roused no curiosity in his complacent breast, for the +favorite seldom announced his coming, and it was quite in order that he +should run down for congratulations, and delight his affectionate if +disapproving relative with personal details of the great fight. He had +come with the intention of being the one to break the news of his +cousin's death to his grandfather, should it be necessary; but he +permitted himself to hope that Zeal would rise above his type. He had +driven him to the station himself, dispensing with the groom as well, +and pleaded with him to wait at least a month; to consider the matter +more coolly and carefully than had hitherto been possible; begged him to +return to Capheaton; offered to travel with him if he preferred to leave +England. Whatever might threaten in the future there could be no +immediate danger of arrest, for if the shot had carried beyond the +private rooms of the Club there would have been evidence of the fact at +once, and if the undertakers had suspected the truth and delayed giving +information, their purpose was blackmail and could be dealt with. + +And while he argued and pleaded he wondered, as he had during the hours +he watched beside his cousin sleeping, if, in spite of certain +principles which he had believed to be immutable, he could have found +any other solution himself. Honor has many arbitrary inflections, and +Zeal's act, being wholly abominable, there must seem, in his code, to be +no place for him among men. To walk among them unscathed, punished only +by a conscience that time would inevitably dull, and the loss of a small +fortune that his promised wife would more than replace, while some +passionate creature without powerful friends or money for blackmail went +to the noose, was an outrage abroad in the secret regions of the spirit +even if it made no assault upon public standards. He deserved +extinction, one way or another, and it would be almost as great an +outrage were he to cover his family with his own disgrace. Certain men +might, after such a lesson, live on to devote their lives to repentance +and beneficent works, but not Zeal; and Gwynne had no great respect for +a character made over after some terrifying explosion among its baser +parts. And the question would always remain if the highest honor would +not have commanded confession. + +He made a deliberate effort to put himself in Zeal's place, and after +several failures accomplished the feat. He was willing to believe that +his first impulse would have been to destroy himself, not so much +through fear as through a blind sense of atonement, for when he +endeavored to argue that the crime belonged to the law and the public, +he swore at himself for a prig. Either way was suicide, and if the more +deliberate might damn a man's soul, no doubt he deserved nothing less, +and at least he had done his duty by his family and his class. Gwynne +had in the base of his character a puritanical stratum by no means mined +as yet, but with too many outcroppings to have been overlooked. But the +very strength it gave him served to confuse the simplicity of the +religious instinct; and duty, like the code of honor, endures many +interpretations in complex minds. He was quite sure that ultimately he +would have decided with his cold intelligence; and he was equally sure +that if he had doggedly determined to conquer life and be conquered by +nothing, that the best part of his mental existence would have gone into +the grave with his ideals. + +Although there was still some confusion in his mind, he kept it out of +his words, and as he drove home from the station he was sanguine enough +to hope that he had at least dissuaded Zeal from precipitancy; for his +cousin, flippant, cynical, appeared to be quite his usual self, and as +he nodded from the window of the train bore little resemblance to the +demoralized wretch of the night. + +Nevertheless, he hastened to his grandfather, for he knew how little the +mood of the moment may presage that of an hour hence; although he was +reasonably sure that if Zeal lived until the following morning it would +be some time before he brought himself to the sticking-point again. He +announced to his mother and his guests that it was his duty to spend +twenty-four hours with his grandfather, promising to return in time for +two hours' shooting on the morrow. + +He took for granted that Zeal had gone to London. What then was his +foreboding horror when Lord Strathland, as they sat alone at +luncheon--the unmarried aunts were visiting--remarked with acerbity: + +"Zeal arrived on the train before yours--went straight to his room, +giving orders he was not to be called until dinner--has not honored me +with so much as an intimation that he was in the house--Where are you +going?" + +Gwynne had half risen. He sat down hastily. + +"I was afraid he might be ill," he replied, coolly. "But doubtless he +merely had a bad night and wants sleep." + +In a flash he had understood. It was like Zeal's cynicism to die as +close to the family vault as possible. + +No meal had ever seemed as long as that last luncheon with his +grandfather, who promptly dismissed the subject of his detested heir and +asked a hundred questions about the campaign. A fierce sense of +protecting the two men he loved best enabled Gwynne to answer as +collectedly as if he had not been possessed with the sickening idea that +the very bones had gone out of him. When luncheon was over he +accompanied his grandfather to the library, then after smoking a third +of a cigar, left him to his nap, frankly stating that he thought he had +better look up Zeal, who had been rather seedy of late; he would risk +being unwelcome. + +He walked slowly up the stair and along the corridor to his cousin's +suite; he was in no hurry to reach it, but neither could he wait for the +possible discovery of the servants at the dinner-hour. + +He knocked at the door of the sitting-room. There was no answer. He +turned the handle. The door was locked. Then he pounded and called. He +was about to fling himself against the door when he heard a quick step +in the corridor, and before he could retreat Lord Strathland was beside +him. There was no defect in the old gentleman's eyesight nor in his +perceptions. Zeal's abrupt arrival without servant or luggage, and his +more than usual rudeness, had charged him with vague suspicions as well +as annoyance. When Gwynne, in spite of his self-control, had turned +livid upon hearing that Zeal was in the Abbey, and had risen as if to +fly to his rescue, a dark if undefined foreboding had entered his +grandfather's mind. But Lord Strathland respected the reserve of his +guests, no matter how nearly related, and, dismissing the subject, had +forgotten his apprehension until Gwynne revived it by his untimely +pilgrimage. Then Lord Strathland thought the time had come to hear the +truth. + +"Well?" he demanded, sharply. "What is it? What's up? Why doesn't Zeal +open? I saw him in Piccadilly on Saturday and he stared at me as if he +had never seen me before. I thought at the moment it was some of his +damned impertinence, but concluded that he had something on his mind. He +looked more dead than alive." + +Gwynne's back was to the light, and he controlled his voice, although +his heart was thumping. "Well, he has been, poor chap--awfully seedy--I +am really worried. He may have anticipated a final hemorrhage, and +crawled home to die." He cherished the hope that Zeal had been at pains +to procure an untraceable drug. + +"Ah! Well--I hope that is it if the poor fellow is dead. He looked as if +he had more than ill-health on his mind. I thought he had pulled up, but +no doubt he went to pieces over some wretched woman again. Come, let us +get in. I don't want the servants to know anything of this at present." + +They threw themselves against the door. The old gentleman was heavy and +Gwynne sound and wiry in spite of his delicate appearance. The door was +stout but its hinges were old, and after several attempts they drove it +in. Lord Strathland's face was pale and he was panting, but he led the +way rapidly through the sitting-room into the bedroom. + +Zeal had undressed, extended himself on the bed, and covered his body +with an eider-down quilt. Lord Strathland jerked it off, and both saw +what they had expected to see, for a faint odor of burnt powder lingered +in the rooms. + +Lord Strathland's face was ghastly, almost blue. He had anticipated +death, not with the imagination of the young, but dully, through the +atrophied faculties of his age, and the shock could hardly have been +greater had he found his grandson without warning. + +"What does this mean?" he demanded, thickly. "You know and I will know." + +Gwynne took him firmly by the arm and turned him about. "Not here," he +said. "Come to the library. I will tell you, but I am no more fit to +talk just now than you are to listen." + +His grandfather submitted, and Gwynne dropped his arm and rearranged the +quilt over his cousin's body. At the same moment Lord Strathland's eyes +lit on a sealed letter addressed to himself. Before Gwynne could +interfere he had broken the seal. It ran: + + MY LORD,--I murdered Brathland. In cold blood--saving the fact + that I was drunk. My entire private fortune has gone for purposes + of blackmail. Even that might not have saved me eventually from the + hangman, we have grown so damned democratic. All things considered, + I am sure you will agree that it is quite proper I should make the + exit of a gentleman while there is yet time. Jack will give you + further particulars, should you care to listen to them. ZEAL." + +He too had known nothing of the condition of his grandfather's heart, +and it had amused him to plan a last shock to the perennial optimism +and complacency of the person he disliked most on earth. The smile was +still on his frozen lips that expressed the amused anticipation of his +brain. Death, to do him justice, he had met with none of the cowardice +he had vaunted, and consistently with his arid cynical soul. + +"Don't read it! Don't!" Gwynne had exclaimed, in agony, and forgetting +the awful figure on the bed in his alarm at the sight of his +grandfather's face. "If you must know the truth let me tell it in my own +way." + +But Lord Strathland read, and fell at his feet like a bundle of old +clothes. + + + + +XVII + + +Gwynne wondered if he should ever shake off the pall-like memories of +the past week: the testimony before the coroner, in which every word had +to be weighed as carefully as if life instead of the honor of the +worthless dead were at stake, the reporters from the less dignified of +the British newspapers, and the American correspondents, two of whom +dodged the vigilance of the servants, entered the Abbey by a window, and +took snap shots of the lower rooms and of the coffins in the +death-chamber; the painful scenes with the women of the family, who had +descended in a body; the wearisome interview with the family solicitor, +in the course of which he had learned that he was heir to little more +than the entailed properties; which must be let in order to insure an +income for his three unmarried aunts, Zeal's five girls, and himself; +the hideous reiteration of "your lordship" by the obsequious servants, +that reproduced in his mind the slow deep notes of the passing bell, +tolled in the village for his grandfather and cousin. + +A letter from Julia Kaye had fluttered in like a dove of promise, but he +had never been able to recall anything in the six pages of graceful +sympathy but her allusions to the dead as "the marquess" and "the earl." +He told himself angrily that his brain must have weakened to notice a +solecism at such a time, but it is in moments of abnormal mental strain +that trifles have their innings; and during the beautiful service in the +chapel he caught himself wondering if any woman of his own class could +have made such a slip. Always deaf to gossip, he had no suspicion that +his Julia had been laughed at more than once for her inability to grasp +all the unwritten laws of a world which she had entered too late. With +an ear in which a title lingered like a full voluptuous note of music, +she was blunt to certain of the democratic canons of modern society. +Although it gave her the keenest pleasure to address the highest +bulwarks of the peerage off-handedly as "duke" and "duchess," there had +been moments of confusion when she had lapsed naturally into "your +grace." And it would have seemed like a lost opportunity to have alluded +to a titled foreigner without his "von" or "de," even where there was a +more positive title to use as often as she pleased. It was the one weak +spot in a singularly acute and accomplished mind. + +But of all this Gwynne knew nothing, and he was dully wondering if a +great love could be affected by trifles, and if his brain and character +were of less immutable material than he had believed, his mental vision +still straying through the insupportable gloom of the past week, when he +heard a light foot-fall beyond the door. He sprang to his feet, cursing +his nerves, and was by no means reassured upon seeing the long figure of +a woman, dressed entirely in white, a candle in her hand, approaching +him down the dark corridor. He had never given a moment's thought in his +active life to psychic phenomena, but he was in a state of mind where +nothing would have surprised him, and he had turned cold to his +finger-tips when a familiar voice reassured him. + +"I am not Lady Macbeth," said Isabel, with a tremor in her own voice, as +she entered and blew out the candle. "But I felt like her as I braved +the terrors of all those dark corridors and that staircase in my wild +desire to talk to a living person. I had arrived at that stage where all +your ancestors gibbered at the foot of my bed. Flora has been sleeping +with me, but your mother wanted her to-night, and I am deserted." + +"What a lot of babies you are!" Gwynne was delighted to wreak his +self-contempt on some one else, but glad of the interruption, and +unexpectedly mellowed by the sight of a pretty woman after the red noses +and sable plumage of the past week. It was true that he had seen Isabel +at dinner, but like Flora she had worn a black gown out of respect to +the family woe, and he hated the sight of black. + +Now she wore a gown of soft white wool fastened at the throat and waist +with a blue ribbon; and even her profile, whose severity he had +disapproved, having a masculine weakness for pugs, was softened by the +absence of the coils or braids that commonly framed it: her hair hung in +one tremendous plait to the heels of her slippers. + +"I see that you have no more sleep in you than I have," he said. "Let us +make a night of it." + +It had rained all day and he was suddenly alive to a sense of physical +discomfort. He rang and ordered a servant to make a fire and bring the +tea-service. + +"How did you know I was here?" he asked Isabel, when they were alone +again. + +"I felt that you were, but I went first to your room and tapped. I was +quite capable of waking you up. Thank heaven I summoned the courage to +come down. This is delightful." + +The fire was crackling in the grate, the water boiling in the big silver +kettle. Isabel made his tea almost black, but diluted her own, lest she +should be left alone before she too was ready for sleep. + +"You have had a beastly time these last days," he said, for he was +genuinely hospitable. "I am sorry you did not happen to come a month +earlier. Have you seen anything of Hexam? He was going on to Arcot." + +"He rode over, or walked over, every day. We should have fallen a prey +to melancholy without him, although you may believe me when I assure you +that we thought more of you than we did of ourselves. I am your own +blood-relation, so I have a right to feel dreadfully sympathetic--may I +have a cigarette?" + +"What a brick you are to smoke! I don't mind being sympathized with for +a change. I have had to do so much sympathizing with others in the last +week that I have not had time to pity myself. Even my mother went to +pieces, for she was fond of Zeal, poor old chap, and her conscience +scorched her because she was always rather nasty to my grandfather--she +likes and dislikes tremendously, you know; although to most people she +is merely indifferent. But when she dislikes--" He blew the ashes from +the tip of his cigarette with a slight whistling sound. + +Flora Thangue had extracted all the particulars of the death and suicide +from Lady Victoria--who knew nothing, however, of the tragic cause of +both--and imparted them to Isabel, whose mind, in consequence, was free +of morbid curiosity. She had also read the newspapers. The speculations +and veiled hints of the sensational sheets had not interested her, but +she had pondered deeply over leaders in the more dignified organs, which +had abounded in comment upon the changed conditions in the meteoric +career of the young man who was no longer Elton Gwynne, but a peer of +the realm. + +"Do you mind it so awfully much?" she asked, after a short silence +during which they had both smoked absently and gazed at the fire. + +"What?" Gwynne turned the cold surprise of his eyes upon her. "Losing +two of the four people I cared most for on earth?" + +"Of course not. Being suddenly made a peer and having to begin all over. +You never will be called Elton Gwynne again, and you will have as much +trouble educating the public up to your new name as if you were emerging +from obscurity for the first time." + +The words, brutally direct, rolled away the last clouds of his lethargy. +He vividly realized that he had been skulking before the closed shutters +of his understanding, accepting the new conditions with but the dulled +surface of his brain. + +Now his naked soul stared at her out of his white face and tortured +eyes, and she looked away. She had not believed that he could be racked +with feeling of any sort, and it was as if she heard him cry: "Oh, God! +Oh, God!" although his lips were silent. + +But she did not change the subject. + +"I suppose you haven't seen the newspapers," she said. "I cut out all +the editorials and paragraphs I thought would interest you. One of the +big dailies, I forget which, said that the interruption of your career +was a greater political tragedy than Parnell's or Lord Randolph +Churchill's." + +"Do they say that?" asked Gwynne, eagerly. "Well, God knows, it is a +tragedy for me." + +"Don't you like being a peer the least little bit? I am too feminine, +possibly too American, not to see a certain picturesqueness in a title, +especially in such a pretty one as yours; and there is no doubt that you +are a more imposing figure in the eyes of the world to-day than you were +a week ago. Are you really indifferent to that side of it?" + +"Am I? One does such a lot of self-posing and self-imposition. There are +few things in this world that gratify a man's vanity more than being a +peer of Great Britain, and, no doubt, had I happened to be born without +what you might call a fighting ambition, and certain abilities, I +should--barring natural grief--feel that I was one of the favorites of +destiny--that is to say if I had a commensurate income. The fact that I +must let the Abbey and Capheaton, and after portioning off all the +unmarried women of the family, shall have barely enough left to keep up +my flat in Charles Street, may have something to do with my absence of +enthusiasm. But--yes--I _am_ sure of myself!" he burst out. "I am the +most miserable man on earth to-night, and the reason is not that I have +lost two good friends, but because my career is ruined, broken off in +the middle." + +"You could become a militant Liberal peer." + +"Paradoxes don't happen to appeal to me. And the only chance for a +genuine fighter is the House of Commons. Besides, it is impossible for a +man to be a peer and remain a true Liberal. Power, and inherited +influence, and exalted social position have a deadly insinuation. I +don't believe any man is strong enough to withstand them. There is never +an hour that a peer is not reminded of his difference from the mass of +humanity; and human nature is too weak to resist complacency in the +end--long before the end. And complacency is the premature old age of +the brain and character. If this tragedy had not occurred, even if my +grandfather had lived on for fifteen years more, as there was every +reason to believe he would, I might have gone on that much longer before +discovering weak points in my character. Now God knows what I shall +develop." + +"Have you made any plans?" + +"Plans? I hadn't faced the situation until you spoke." + +"You have weak spots like other people, of course. You would be a horrid +prig if you hadn't. But you surely must know if your Liberalism is +sincere, ingrained. There is no question that you are a hopeless +aristocrat in essentials. But so have been certain of America's greatest +patriots--Washington and Hamilton, for instance. I do not see that it +matters. One can hold to what seems to me the first principles of +advanced civilization--that hereditary monarchy is an insult to +self-respecting and enlightened men--without wishing to associate with +those that offend grammar and good taste. Education, intellect, +breeding, would create an aristocracy among anarchists on a desert +island--supposing any possessed them; and in time it would become as +intolerant of liberties as if it harked back to the battle of Hastings. +There is no plant that grows so rapidly in the human garden as +self-superiority, and it is ridiculous only when watered by nothing more +excusable than the arbitrary social conditions that exist in the United +States. I don't see that the qualities you have inherited should +interfere with your ability to see the justice and rationality of +self-government." + +"They do not!" She seemed to beat his thoughts into their old coherent +and logical forms. "Whatever may have been the various motives that +impelled me into the Liberal party in the beginning, there is no +question that I have become even more extreme and single-minded than I +have let the world know. Perhaps it is my American blood, although I +never thought of that before. At all events, had the time been ripe I +should have devoted all the gift for leadership I now possess, and all +the power I could build up, to overturning monarchy in this country and +establishing a republic. There! I never confessed as much to a living +soul, but I think you have bewitched me, for I never have been less--or +more--myself!" + +"With yourself as President?" + +"Sooner or later--the sooner the better. But I waste no time in dreams, +my fair cousin--although I have something of a tendency that way. It was +enough that I had a great and useful career before me and might have +gone into history as the prime factor of the great change." + +"Well, that is over," said Isabel, conclusively. "There is only one +thing left you and that is to come over and be an American." + +"What?" He stared, and then laughed. "Ah!" + +"You will have all the fighting you want over there. You will have to +work twenty times harder than you ever did here, for your accent, your +personality, the thirty years you have lived out of the country you were +born in, all will be against you. You will have to be naturalized in +spite of your birth--I happen to know of a similar case in my father's +practice--and that will take five years. In those five years you will +encounter all the difficulties that strew the way of the foreigner who +would gain the confidence of the shrewd American people--they are most +characteristic in the small towns and farming districts. You will win +because you were born to win, but you will learn for the first time what +it is to stand and fight absolutely alone--for if they learn of your +exalted birth they will but distrust you the more; and you will taste +the sweets of real success for the first time in your life. In spite of +your youth and enthusiasm, there is in you a vein of inevitable +cynicism, for you have had far too much experience of the flatterer and +the toady. You are too honest not to confess that if you had been born +John Smith there would have been no editorial comments of any sort upon +the tragic end of your relatives, and the great world would have taken +as little notice of your abilities until you had compelled its unwilling +attention by many more years of hard work. America will take you for +exactly what you are and no more. But you will have to become more +American than the Americans; although you may continue to say 'ain't it' +and 'it's me' and drop your final gs, because those are all the +hall-marks of the half-educated in the United States, and will rather +help you than otherwise. Of course you will assume charge of your own +ranch, for that will not only give you plenty to do, but it will be the +quickest way of becoming one of the people; and after you have been out +in all weathers for a year or two, turned a dark brown down to your +chest, ridden a loping horse on a Mexican saddle, talked politics on +street corners and in saloons, left your muddy or dusty wagon once a +week at the Rosewater hitching-rail while you transact business in a +linen duster, or yellow oil-skin overalls and rubber boots, you will +feel so American--Californian, to be exact--that the mere memory of this +formal cut-and-dried Old World will fill you with ennui." + +There was a glint of laughter in Gwynne's eyes, but they were widely +open and very bright. + +"I see! You are determined to make a convert of me. You began the night +of your arrival. I suspect you of having come over on a crusade." + +"That was the moment of inspiration--that first night. I won't deny that +I have thought a great deal about it since--of little else since I read +those editorials." + +He leaned back and regarded the sole of his shoe as if it were a +familiar. "That is a large order," he said, in a moment. "Colossal! +There might be worse solutions. And the life of a cow-boy, for a while +at least--" + +"Don't delude yourself. You would not be the least bit of a cow-boy. +You wouldn't even look picturesque--if you did you might be sorry. +You would just be a plain northern California rancher. Of course +you would have all the riding you wanted, but there are no round-ups +worth speaking of on a ranch the size of Lumalitas. And probably you +would continue to let sections of it to men that wanted to raise cattle +or horses on a small scale. You had better devote yourself to the dairy +and to raising hay and grain, and turn about five hundred acres into a +chicken-ranch--nothing pays like that." + +He threw back his head and laughed as heartily as if death and disaster +had never been. + +"From the English hustings and the greatest parliamentary body the world +has ever known to chickens and butter in California! From Capheaton to +Rosewater, oil-skin overalls and a linen 'Duster!' Oh, Lord! Oh, Lord! +But give me a comprehensive idea of the place, in your own inimitable +unvarnished diction. That will keep the ghosts off, at all events." + + + + +XVIII + + +Julia Kaye was one of those women designed by nature for the role of a +Valerie Marneffe, or of that astute Parisian's bourgeoise and more +romantic daughter, Emma Bovary; but tossed, in the gamble of the fates, +into a setting of respectable opulence, where her instincts for prey +were trimmed of their crudities, and the vehemence of her passions +subdued by the opportunity to gratify all other whims and desires. + +Her father, born in the sooty alley of a manufacturing town in the north +of England, had run away to sea in his boyhood, deserted in the port of +New York, starved, stolen, peddled, washed dishes in cheap restaurants, +shovelled snow, tramped to Chicago, starved and peddled and shovelled +again, finally found a position with a firm of wholesale druggists. He +attended a night school, proved himself a lad of uncommon sharpness, and +in less than a year was first packing and then dispensing drugs. Five +years later he was drawing a large salary, and at the age of thirty he +had opened a retail drug store of his own. + +It was during his earlier period of comparative leisure and peace of +mind that he began to test the inventive faculty that had pricked him in +small but significant ways during his boyhood. His first inventions were +of a minor importance, although they increased his income and were +permanently remunerative; but when he turned the torch of his genius +upon the fatal antipathies of vermin, his success was so deservedly +rewarded that he was a millionaire in less than three years. He returned +to England, and, avoiding the alley of inglorious memory, courted and +won the daughter of a manufacturer, his ambition driving him to compel +social recognition in his native city. It soared no higher, but his +wife, now no longer one of a large family, but with the income of a +generous millionaire at her disposal, was open to higher promptings; and +he to conversion. They moved to London and laid their plans with some +skill. + +But although London can stand a good deal in the cause of resupply and +novelty, the violence of Mrs. Tippett's accent, and the terrible +solecisms of a gentleman whose education had begun in a Lancashire alley +and finished in the business purlieus of Chicago, who had acquired the +American vice of brag in its acutest form, and who, when in his cups, +shouted and spat and swore, were more than the most enterprising among +them had been called upon to endure. The social ambitions of the +Tippetts were so definitely quenched that the indignant millionaire +threatened to return to Chicago. But Mrs. Tippett moved him firmly to +Brighton, where, in the course of time, she toned him down. They made +their way slowly into society of a sort, and attracted the attention of +the public. There was no law to prevent them from dining at the +fashionable hotels, where Paris gowns could not pass unobserved; and +their turnouts were irreproachable. + +Mrs. Tippet, an astute woman, by this time had realized that hers was +not the destiny of the social star, and she concentrated her hopes and +ambitions upon her one child, an uncommonly clever little girl. This +child grew up in a luxury that would have stifled even her precocious +mind had it not been for the rigid laws of the school-room. Her +governesses and tutors were selected with a sharp eye to the number of +titles in their reference-books, but dismissed promptly if they were +unworthy of their hire. Later, the little Julia was sent to a +distinguished school near Paris, where, with an eye to her future +well-being, remarkable in one so young, she divided her affectionate +affluence among the few whose exalted station made them worth the while +of a maiden with an indefinite future. + +These friends did not prove as useful as she had hoped. At home there +were her parents to terrify theirs, and although she visited at several +chateaux, and more than one title was laid at her gilded feet, she made +up her mind to read her name in Burke. + +She took her parents for a tour round the world with a view to polishing +off their lingering idiosyncrasies, and her chance came in India, where +she buried them both. They succumbed to cholera, and the kindly wife of +the viceroy, to whom she had had the forethought to secure a letter, +sent for her to come to Simla and remain as her guest until she found +courage and a chaperon for the return to England. Here she met Captain, +the Honorable Augustus Kaye, heir to an ancient barony, chivalrous, +impressionable, and hard-up. They were married with the blessings of old +friends and new, and, to do her full justice, she made him a good wife +according to her lights. She was quite insanely in love with him at +first, for he looked like one of Ouida's guardsmen, and his pedigree was +so long, and so varied with romantic historic episode, that she was +fully a week committing it to memory. + +When he left the army and they had returned to England--via Paris--she +had the wardrobe and establishment of a princess, the right to dine at +the Queen's table, and not a relative in London. She was immoderately +happy, and during the five years of her wedded life she exhausted the +first strength of her affections, buried her feminine caprice, and +whatever of impulse youth may have clung to as its right. When Gussy +Kaye died, the predominant feeling in her bosom was rage at his +inconsiderateness in leaving the world before his father, and nothing +behind him but a courtesy prefix which she could not even use on her +cards. + +She opened her soul to searching, and decided that five years of love +were quite enough for any woman, and that her attentions hereafter +should be directed towards the highest worldly success obtainable with +brains, talents, and wealth. To be merely a rich woman in the right set +did not come within measurable distance of her ambition's apex, and she +determined to gratify her passionate self-love by becoming a +personality. + +She had long since simulated the repose of the high-born Englishwoman, +until, like all imitators, she far surpassed her models, and her manners +were marked not so much by the caste of Vere de Vere as by an almost +negative stolidity. This at least provided her with an unruffled front +for trying occasions--others besides the Arcots were insensible of her +offerings--which in the United States of America would have been +admiringly characterized as "nerve." This manner became solidified after +her popular husband's death, and if it was generally referred to as +"aplomb" or "poise," allowances must be made for the poverty of the +average vocabulary. + +It is not difficult for a clever, handsome, correct, and wealthy woman +to reach and hold a distinctive position even in London, that world's +headquarters of individualities. In addition to a judiciously lavish +hospitality, it is only necessary to personalize intelligently, and this +Mrs. Kaye did with an industry that would have carried her to greatness +had she been granted a spark of the divine fire. She cultivated the +great and the fashionable in art, letters, and the drama, mixed them +tactfully with her titles, attended the banquets of the ruling class in +Bohemia attired flatteringly in her best, and founded a society for the +study of Leonardo da Vinci. She became intimate with several royal +ladies, who were charmed with her endless power to amuse them and her +magnificent patronage of their charities; and she formed close relations +with other dames but a degree less exalted, and generally more +discriminating. She cultivated a witty habit of speech, the society of +cabinet ministers, and her _chef_ was a celebrity. Her gowns would have +been notable in New York, and she was wise enough to avoid eccentricity +and openly to regard all forms of sensationalism with a haughty disdain. + +Her attitude to men was equally well-advised. Detrimentals and +ineligibles never so much as came up for inspection; she had a +far-reaching sense of selection and a proper notion of the value of +time. Therefore, the many that had the run of her luxurious mansion +contributed personally to her prestige, and she flattered herself that +her particular band was little less distinguished than the Royal +Household. And they invariably found her witty, entertaining, or, like +Madame Recamier, ready to listen "avec seduction." Her knowledge of +politics was practically unbounded. + +In such moments as she happened to be alone with any of her swains, she +became distractingly personal, inviting, gently repelling, afforded +dazzling glimpses of possibilities awaiting time and the man: so +accomplishing the double purpose of agreeably titillating her own depths +and wearing the halo of a well-behaved Circe. Altogether her success was +what it always must be when brains and ambition, money and a cold heart +are allied; but it was small wonder if the head of the daughter of the +House of Tippett was a trifle turned and certain of her perceptions were +blunted. + +Although ofttimes large with complacency, she by no means lost sight of +her original purpose to wed a coronet, and if she endured four years of +widowhood it was merely because she knew that she could afford to wait +for transcendence. This she had finally run to earth in Lord Brathland, +imminent heir to a dukedom, and personally more agreeable to her than +any man in London. That he was notoriously inconstant but added zest to +the chase, and it was, perhaps, the illusion she at times achieved of a +certain resemblance to the ladies of his preference that finally +overcame his intense aversion from respectability. He had offered +himself to her on the day of his undoing. + +This was the woman with whom Elton Gwynne was infatuated at the most +critical moment of his career. Of her profound aybsses he suspected +nothing. She reigned in his imagination as the unique woman in whom +intellect and passion, tenderness and all the social graces united in an +exquisite harmony. There had been a time when, dazzled by the brilliancy +of his ascending star, and Brathland being but a name to her, she had +considered marriage with a man who assuredly would be the next leader of +a Liberal House, and was no less certain of being prime-minister. She +was under no delusion that she could one day induce him to accept a +peerage, but she was reasonably sure that Zeal would not marry again, +and there were times when the heir looked so ill that she tightened her +bonds about the heir-presumptive, while assuring him that she was too +much in love with liberty to think of marriage. Even when Zeal came back +from Norway or Sorrento looking almost well, she never permitted Gwynne +to escape, to see so much as a corner of her ego that might disturb the +image of herself she had created in his mind; and when she met Brathland +and her senses swam with the subtle scent of strawberry leaves, she saw +no reason for losing the stimulating society and flattering attentions +of the brightest star in the political firmament. Therefore, when he was +ready to hand, in the crushing hour of her riven ambitions, and his own +of serenest effulgence, she promptly reflected that the distance between +a marquisate and a dukedom was quickly traversed by a powerful +statesman. Meanwhile, although Elton Gwynne would no doubt be a hideous +trial as a husband, his wife's position, supported by a million in the +funds and another in Chicago, would be one of the most brilliant in +England. And she too had seen Lord Zeal in Piccadilly on Saturday. + + + + +XIX + + +The sudden elevation of her Jack to a marquisate, beside whose roots, +gripping the foundations of Britain's aristocracy, and ramifying the +length and breadth of its society, the lost dukedom was a mere mushroom, +created for a favorite of the last George, and notorious for its +_mesalliances_, did not cost Mrs. Kaye a moment's loss of poise. She +merely wondered that she had ever questioned her star. People that +disliked her found a subtle suggestion of arrogance in her manner, and +the slight significant smile on her large firm lips was a trifle more +stereotyped. Those that she favored with the abundance of her offerings +remembered afterwards that she had never been so brilliant as during the +month that followed the announcement of her bethrothal, and attributed +the fact to the electrified springs of affection. + +Gwynne and she had been invited to the same houses for the rest of the +autumn, but he cancelled his engagements while begging her to fulfil +hers, as he should be too busy to entertain her were she so sweet as to +insist upon coming to Capheaton. This she had not the least intention of +doing, for she not only yearned for the additional tribute due to her, +but she always avoided long sojourns in Lady Victoria's vicinity, +knowing her as a woman of caprice, who often dropped people as abruptly +as she took them up. Susceptible to the charm of novelty, so far Mrs. +Kaye had wholly pleased her; but the clever Julia gauged the depths of +her future mother-in-law's credulity and kept her distance. With all her +reason for self-gratulation, in the depths of her cynical soul she was +quite aware of her natural inferiority to the women she emulated in all +but their license. That prerogative, with the wisdom that had marked her +upward course, she had flagrantly avoided, knowing that the world is +complacent only to those that fire its snobbishness, never to those that +fan the flame; and while she bitterly envied these women, she never +forgot the market value of her own unimpeachable virtue. She could not +in any case have been the slave of her passions, but her serenity was +sometimes ruffled as she reflected that, in spite of eminence achieved, +her caution in this and in other respects branded her in her secret soul +as second rate. + +But if she tactfully did not insist upon flying to Capheaton, she wrote +such charming letters, happily free of solecisms, that Gwynne wondered +at his failure to sound the depths of her charm. But he refrained from +meeting her, and the reason was that he was slowly working towards a +momentous decision, and wished to arm himself at all points before +braving her possible disapproval. When he was his cool normal collected +self again, he gave way to his impatience to see the woman he had every +reason to believe was deeply in love with him. He telegraphed her a +peremptory appeal to go up to her house in London, and she was too wise +to refuse. It was now October and London quite bearable. She telegraphed +to her servants to strip her house of its summer shroud, and returned +early on the day of his choice. + +It is hardly necessary to state that Mrs. Kaye lived in Park Lane. She +had cultivated half-tones with a notable success, but to symbolize her +new estate was a temptation it had not occurred to her to resist. +Shortly after her return from India she had bought a large house in the +facade of London, and furnished it with a luxury that satisfied one of +the deepest cravings of her being, while her admirable sense of balance +saved her from the peculiar extravagances of the cocotte. + +She had seen Lady Victoria's expressive boudoir at Capheaton, and its +mate in Curzon Street, and relieved the envy they inspired in a caustic +epigram that happily did not reach the insolent beauty's ear. "These old +coquettes," she had lisped, with an amused uplift of one eyebrow. "They +surround themselves with the atmosphere of the demi-monde and forget +that a wrinkle is as fatal as a chaperon." + +The pictures in her own house were as correct as they were costly, and +she had no boudoir. She invariably received her guests in the +drawing-room, an immense and unique apartment, with a frieze of dusky +copies of old masters, all of a size, and all framed in gilt as dim with +time. From them depended a tapestry of crimson silk brocade of +uncheckered surface. By a cunning arrangement of furniture the great +room was broken up into a semblance of smaller ones, each with its group +of comfortable chairs, its tea-table, or book case, or cabinet of +bibelots, or open hearth. And all exhaled the inviting atmosphere of +occupation. + +Mrs. Kaye, rested, and more self-possessed than if the hastening lover +had been the late Lord Brathland, but agreeably stirred nevertheless, +awaited the new peer in a charming corner before a screen of dull gold, +the last reviews on a table beside her, the afternoon sun shining in on +her healthy unworn face. When he entered and advanced impetuously across +the room she decided that he certainly was a dear, even if he lacked the +fascination of Brathland and his kind. And his halo was almost visible. +She therefore yielded enchantingly when he enveloped her, smothered her, +stormed her lips, and even pulled her hair. She finally got him over to +the little sofa--she had advanced to meet him--but remained in his arm, +the very picture of tender voluptuous young womanhood. Indeed, she was +well pleased, and found her Jack, with that light blazing in his eyes, +quite handsome, and fascinating in his own boyish imperious +self-confident way. + +It was half an hour before she rang for tea, and then she looked so +pretty and domestic on the other side of the little table, with its +delicate and costly service, that Gwynne was obliged to pause and summon +all his resolution before proceeding to another subject that possessed +him as fully as herself; but he succeeded, for not even passion could +turn him from his course; and she gave him his opening. + +"Poor Lord Strathland!" she exclaimed, with a tear in her throat. "He +was always so jolly and amusing, quite the most cheerful person I ever +met. And before your cousin became--lost his health--we were great +friends. Indeed he never quite forgot me. But it was for you I was so +horribly cut up. I cried for two nights." + +"Did you? But I was positive you did not make those tears in your first +letter with your hair-brush." He laughed like a happy school-boy, while +she protested with a roughish expression that made her look like a very +young girl. + +"It need not prevent our immediate marriage," he said. "What do you say +to the last of this month?" + +"I could get ready. Only girls, who never have any clothes, poor things, +get trousseaux in these days. I had set my heart upon spending the +honeymoon at the Abbey, but it would be rather indecent yet awhile; +don't you think so?" + +He had not an atom of tact and rushed upon his doom. "We shall have to +cut the Abbey," he said, firmly. "I start for California three weeks +from to-day." + +"Indeed?" she said, stiffly. "I should have thought you would have +consulted me. Not but that I shall be enchanted to visit California, +but--well, you _are_ rather lordly, you know." + +"My dear girl, I have been too harassed to consider the amenities. And +when a man is rearranging his whole life he must isolate himself or run +the risk of clouds in his judgment." + +He paused. She disguised her mortification and answered, kindly: "I can +understand that in this sudden demand for readjustment you have had many +bad moments. It was far too soon for you to go up to the Peers'. But +with your marvellous energies, your genius--there is no other word for +it--you can soon astonish the world anew with a patent for +defossilization. At all events the Peers' will enter upon a new life as +a sort of mastodon cave swept out and illuminated by the most energetic +and aspiring of knights-errant." + +Gwynne laughed dryly. "The role does not appeal to me; nor any other in +the same setting. I have done a month of the hardest thinking of my +life. Everything that went before looks like child's play. I have +arrived at the definite conclusion that my career in England has come +to a full stop, and I have made up my mind to create another--out of +whole cloth--in the United States." + +She stared at him, her face not yet unset, but her eyes expanding with +incredulous apprehension. "You mean to desert England?" she asked, +quietly. + +"Forever. Absolutely. It is all or nothing. I cannot become an American +citizen until five years after entering the country, and I do not wish +to lose any valuable time. Having made up my mind, I have ceased to +wonder if I shall like it. That is now beside the question. I shall drop +my title as a matter of course, and hope that I shall pass undiscovered +as John Gwynne. In short, I shall begin life all over again--as if I +were a criminal in disguise instead of the sport of circumstances. I +have ceased to regret the inevitable and begun to be stimulated by the +thought of a struggle to which all that I have had here was a mere game, +and I am sure that you, with your brains and energy, will enjoy the +fight as much as I. I am not going into the wilderness. We shall be only +two hours from San Francisco, which I am told is the only city in +America that in the least suggests Europe; it should be very attractive. +On the ranch you shall have every comfort and luxury. You must be sick +of London, anyhow. You have conquered everything here." + +He paused and regarded her in some trepidation. In spite of his +self-confidence he had had his moments of doubt. And although he had +anticipated tears and remonstrance, he was unprepared for the more +subtle weapon of amusement, flickering through absolute calm. He +suddenly wished that she were younger. He had never given a thought to +her age before, but he remembered that she had lived for two years +longer than himself, and it made him feel even less than thirty. + +"My dear boy," she said, wonderingly, "I never heard anything so +romantic and impossible. Of course it is the American cousin with whom +you have been shut up all these weeks that has been putting such +preposterous ideas into your head. I always said that nature just missed +making you a poet. But if you wish to work out your manifest destiny--to +be immortalized in history--you will remind yourself that England is the +one place on earth where an Anglo-Saxon can cut a really great figure. +Not only because he has the proper background of traditions, but because +he has an audience trained to recognize a man's greatness during his +lifetime. If you go in for those unspeakable American politics you will +never be given credit for anything higher than your medium; in other +words, should you develop into a statesman on American lines you would +never be recognized for anything but a successful politician. Even if +you survived in their hurly-burly of history, you would be judged by +contemporary standards--infused with a certain contempt because you were +not American-born." + +"I have thought it all out. The obstacles to greatness, even more than +to success, have whetted my appetite for the struggle. I must fight! +fight! fight! I must exercise my powers of usefulness to some good end, +and now, now, when I am young and ardent. I should go mad sitting round +doing nothing. I have no temper for attacking the passive resistance of +inertia. I want to fight out in the open. If I fail I will take my +beating like a man. But I have not the least intention of failing. I am +acutely aware of the powers within me, and I can use them anywhere." + +"Then why not in the Upper House?" she asked, quickly. + +"For the reasons I have given you, and because I should fear the results +on my character. You know what it means to be a peer of Great Britain. +Flattery without accomplishment is demoralizing--would be to me, at all +events. It is wine to me when I am achieving, but it would drug me in +idleness. Are you so wedded to London?" + +"London is the _raison d'etre_ of life. Has it occurred to you," she +asked, gently, "that I might refuse to go to America?" + +"I was afraid the idea would be something of a shock, but I was sure you +would see the matter in my light." + +"It is not wanting in power! But it seems that I am. I have never +aspired to the role of Amelia Sedley. I have, in fact, rather a +pronounced individuality; and yet you have taken upon yourself to +dispose of my future as if I were a slip of eighteen--delighted at the +prospect of a husband." + +"Indeed you are wrong!" he cried, distressed to have bruised so beloved +an ego. "But, I repeat, it was a question I was forced to decide alone. +Nor would it have been fair to ask you to assume any part of so great a +responsibility. Do you suppose I did not think of that? Do you suppose I +have ever lost sight of your happiness? Let me think for both and you +shall not regret it." + +She could have smiled outright at this evidence of the ingenuousness of +man, but her breast was raging with a fury of disappointment and +consternation. She kept her eyes down lest they should betray her. But +suddenly she had an inspiration. She controlled herself with a masterly +effort, flooded her eyes with tenderness, raised them, and said, +softly: + +"I do love London, love it with what I called a passion before I--before +we met. And I cannot believe that this extraordinary resolution of yours +has had time to mature. Promise me at least that you will not apply for +letters of citizenship for at least a year after your arrival--" + +"I shall apply the day after I arrive in Rosewater." He steeled himself, +for he had had his experience of woman's wiles; and his faith in +masculine supremacy as a habit did not waver. "I only regret that the +time of probation must be so long. I am on fire to throw myself into the +arena--however, there will be opportunities to make myself known and +felt. I have decided to study law meanwhile--and the law, it seems, is a +career in itself in America." + +And then he watched her eyes, fascinated. They slowly hardened, until, +with the sun slanting into them, they looked like bronze. She was too +intent upon studying his own to hide them, and upon arriving at a final +conclusion. She reached it in a moment, for to her habit of rapid +thought and her understanding of the workings of the masculine mind she +owed no little of her supremacy among the clever women of London. + +"I see that your decision is irrevocable," she said. "You are yourself; +no one could make or unmake you, and God forbid that I should try. +But--and I forbear to lead up to it artistically--I dissever myself from +your chariot wheels. I am not afraid of being crushed, for no doubt you +would always remember to be polite, if not considerate. I am not sure +that you would even permit me to become unrecognizable with dust. But I +am no longer plastic. I am thirty-two, and I am as much I as you are +you. I shall watch you from afar with great interest, and I sincerely +hope, for both your sakes, that Miss Otis will succeed in marrying you. +I cannot fancy anything more suitable." + +He had turned white, but he looked at her steadily. He felt as if the +round globe were slipping from under him; and vaguely wondered if she +had gone about alluding to him as "the marquess." Then he sprang to his +feet, lifted her forcibly from her chair, deposited her on the sofa, and +taking her in his arms defied her to dismiss him, to live without him. +As the body, so yielding before, declined even to become rigid in +resistance, he poured out such a flood of pleading that, believing +passion had conquered reason, she flung her arms about his neck and +offered to marry him on the morrow if he would promise to remain in +England. But there was a crystal quality in Gwynne's intellect that no +passion could obscure. He merely renewed his pleadings; and then she +slipped out of his embrace and rose to her feet. + +"We are wasting time," she said. "I always drive before dinner, and I +cannot go out in a tea-gown." She paused a moment to summon from her +resources the words that would humiliate him most and slake the desire +for vengeance that shrieked within her. She had never hated any one so +bitterly before, not even in her youth, when snubs were frequent. For +the third time she watched a coronet slip through her strong determined +impotent fingers. She could forgive her husband and Brathland their +untimely deaths, but for this young man, passionately in love with her, +who tossed the dazzling prize aside as an actor might a "property +crown," she felt such a rage of hatred that for almost a moment she +thought of giving her inherited self the exquisite satisfaction of +scratching his eyes out. But it was too late in her day to be wholly +natural, and, indeed, she preferred the weapons the world and her +ambitions had given her. As he rose and stared at her doubtingly, she +said, without a high or a sharp note, in her clear lisping voice: + +"I think it wise to put an end to all this by telling you that I was +engaged to Lord Brathland when he died. I was more in love with him than +I ever shall be with any one again. You caught me in the violence of the +rebound, for I was confused with grief, and distraction was welcome: you +are always sufficiently amusing. I have not the least idea it would ever +have come off, for, to tell you the truth, my friend, you are too +hopelessly the _enfant gate_ for a woman who is neither young enough nor +old enough to crave youth on any terms. As a husband, I fear, not to put +too fine a point on it, you would be a bore. At the risk of being +thought a snob--to which I am quite indifferent--I will add that as +plain John Gwynne you seem to have so shrunk in size as to have become +as insignificant as most men are, no doubt, when you catch a glimpse of +their unmanufactured side. However"--with the air of a great lady +dismissing an object of patronage--"I wish you good-fortune, and +sincerely hope that we shall one day read of John Gwynne, senator, and +recall for a moment the brilliant Elton Gwynne so long forgotten in this +busy London of ours." + +During quite half of her discourse Gwynne had felt his soul writhe under +a rain of hot metal, gibber towards some abyss where it could hide its +humiliation and its scars for ever. His brain seemed vacant and his very +nostrils turned white. But like many clever people goaded to words by a +furious sense of failure, she overshot her mark, and before she +finished his pride had made a terrified rebound and taken complete +possession of him. He still felt stripped, lashed, a presumptuous youth +before a scornful woman in the ripeness of her maturity, but it was +imperative for his future self-respect that he should reassert his +manhood and retire in good order. He let her finish, and then, as she +stood with a still impatience, he lifted his eyes and drew himself up. +His face was devoid of expression. His eyes did not even glitter; he +might have been listening with voluntary politeness to the speech of +majesty laying a corner-stone. + +"You are quite right," he said. "You have given me the drubbing I +deserve, and I am grateful to you. It was the only thing I needed to +snap my last tie with England and brace me for the struggle in America. +It emboldens me to ask another favor--that you will regard what I have +told you of my plans as confidential. I shall give out that I am going +to travel for a time. As I believe I mentioned, I do not wish to be +recognized in the United States; and that by the time I have made my new +name my old one will be forgotten, is one of the sure points upon which +I have reckoned. Have I your promise?" + +"My oath!" she said, flippantly; and although she was not generous +enough to admire, and still felt as if the world itself were a corpse, +every inherited instinct in her united in a visible respect for a poise +that was a gift of the centuries, not a deftly manufactured mask. + +She rang the bell and extended her hand. Gwynne shook it politely; and a +moment later was walking down Park Lane in that singular state of +elation that in mercurial natures succeeds one of the brutal blows of +life, when all the forces of the spirit have leaped to the rescue. + + + + +PART II + +1905 + + + + +I + + +For Isabel Otis the _genius loci_ had a more powerful and enduring +magnetism than any man or woman she had ever known. She had felt the +consolation of it, although without analysis, in her lonely girlhood by +the great Rosewater Marsh; definitely in Tyrol, Perugia, Toledo, in +Munich where she had lingered too long, in a hundred tiny high-perched +and low-set villages of Austria and Italy of which the tourist had never +heard, at Konigsee and Pragserwildsee; and deeply in England. But no +place had ever called her, disturbed her, excited her into furious +criticism, mockingly maintained its hold upon the very roots of her +being, like the city of her birth. Her childhood's memories of it +clustered about the old house on Russian Hill where the most cordial +neighbors were goats; the beach by the Cliff House on a stormy day; long +rides up and down the almost perpendicular hills of the city in the +swift cable cars; and certain candy stores on Polk and Kearney streets. +At long intervals there was a children's party at one of the fine houses +on the ledge below her home; or out in the Western Addition, where an +always migratory people were rivalling the splendors of Nob Hill--as +that craggy height had long since humbled South Park and Rincon Hill +into their abundant dust. She also cherished many charming memories of +her mother, with dinner or ball-gown so prudently looped under her +rain-coat that it gave her slender figure the proportions of the +old-fashioned hoop-skirt; always laughing as she kissed the little girls +good-night before braving the two flights of steps to the carriage at +the foot of the cliff. Two years before her death Mrs. Otis was glad to +bury her mortification and misery in Rosewater. After that Isabel had +never so much as a glimpse of San Francisco until she was sixteen, when +her father was induced to visit his adopted daughter and take his +youngest martyr with him. Isabel had planned for this visit throughout +six long months, and arrived in the city of her heart radiant in a frock +every breadth of which was new--heretofore her wardrobe had risen like +an apologetic ph[oe]nix from the moth-eaten remnants of her mother's old +finery--and such uncompromising trust in the benevolence of fate as a +girl rarely knows twice in a lifetime. There were three days of +enchanted prowling about the old house on Russian Hill, where, as the +tenant, in the rocking-chair by the bedroom window, did not invite her +to enter, she consoled herself with the views and the memories; and of +an even more normal delight in the shopping streets and gay restaurants +of a real city. After that the visit existed in her mind with the +confused outlines of a nightmare. + +Her adopted sister's peevish complaints at being obliged to remain in +the foggy windy city all summer, the crying baby, the whirlwinds of dust +and shivering nights, she might have dismissed as unworthy the spirit of +sixteen, and dreamed herself happy. But Mr. Otis, who had been sober for +seven months, selected this occasion for a fall which resounded from +Market Street to Telegraph Hill, and rejuvenated the long line of +saloons that had graced Montgomery Street since the days when "Jim" Otis +had been one of the wildest spirits in the wildest city on earth. That +was "back in the Sixties," when his lapses were as far apart as they +were unrivalled in consumption, span, and pyrotechny. By the late +Eighties he had disappeared into the north, and the careless city knew +him no more. + +During the Seventies and early Eighties there had been a period of +reform, incident upon his marriage with a pretty and high-spirited girl, +and one of the city's estimable attempts to clean out its political +stables. His brilliant and desperate encounter with Boss Buckley was +historic, but its failure, and the indifference of the gay contented +majority to the city's underworld, soured him and struck a fatal blow at +the never vital roots of personal ambition. When he began to water the +roots at his old haunts, the finish of his career and of his splendid +inheritance passed into the region of problems that Time solves so +easily. When she solved his problem he was glad to subside into one of +his cottages in Rosewater. Here he reformed and collapsed, reformed and +collapsed; but, with fewer temptations, and a remnant of his legal +brilliancy, he supported his family after a fashion; and fed his pride +to the day of his death with the fact that his wife, unlike the +forgotten half of many another comet, had never been obliged to do her +own work. + +During that last visit to San Francisco, Isabel, guided by her amused +brother-in-law, routed him out of no less than fourteen saloons, and +spent night after night walking the streets with him to conquer the +restlessness that otherwise would find a prolonged surcease beyond her +influence. When she finally steered him back to Rosewater he fell into +an exuberant fit of repentance, during which he was so charming and so +legal that Isabel forgave him, laid by her bitterness and +mortification, and hoped. But although no repentance could maintain a +grip upon that slippery flabby substance which he still called his +character, at least he never went to San Francisco again. Occasionally +he permitted Isabel to spend a week with her sister, while he pledged +himself to good behavior during her absence; and kept his word. He +always kept his word; and he took care to withhold it except when he was +sure of himself. Isabel decided that as everything was relative it was +better to have a dipsomaniac as her life portion than a drinking-machine +of more steady and industrious habits. + +Finally his patient clients left him, he sold the cottage in +Rosewater--all that remained of his inheritance--to pay its mortgages, +and moved with Isabel out to the ranch-house, preserved with a few +hundred acres by the more canny and less thirsty Hiram. When the elder +brother died James would have returned forthwith to the sources of +supply, but by this time Isabel had the upper hand, and although he +disappeared for days at a time, he was always forced to return to the +ranch when the small monthly sum allowed him by the terms of his +brother's will was exhausted; no one in Rosewater would give him credit. +As he invariably left a note behind him promising to "be quiet about +it," Isabel ceased to haunt his footsteps. His appetite was far beyond +his control or hers, and as he kept his word and spent his time in the +back parlor of a saloon, and had no longer the digestive capacity to +achieve his former distinction, she merely sat at home and waited. +Fortunately he did not live long enough after his brother hopelessly to +embitter his daughter's youth. Liberty came to her when she had ceased +to hate with young intolerance and begun to pity; and before too much +longing for freedom, and its insidious suggestions, had poisoned her +nature. Indeed, when she had seen her father buried with much pomp in +the cemetery behind Rosewater, and returned to the permanent peace of +her home, she missed her cares and responsibilities, so long and +systematically borne, and mourned, not as a child for its parent, but as +an adoptive mother suddenly bereft. Nevertheless, she was bent upon +enjoying her freedom to the utmost and rebelled against the obduracy of +her uncle's executors, who disapproved of her pilgrimage to Europe +unattended by a matron of Rosewater. Hiram Otis, who trusted no man, had +appointed four executors; and had not Judge Leslie been one of them the +other three might have delayed the settling of the estate beyond the +legal term. But at the end of a year Isabel was absolute mistress of her +property and herself. + +One of the happiest moments of her life was when she sat before her +lawyer's table in San Francisco and watched the pen strokes that +cancelled the mortgage of the house on Russian Hill. The house and its +acre, encumbered by the inevitable mortgage, had been all that remained +of Mrs. Otis's personal inheritance when she left San Francisco for +ever. James Otis had promised his dying wife that he would never sell +the place, which she bequeathed to Isabel; and when his last client left +him and he could no longer pay the interest, Hiram, who was morosely +devoted to his niece, met the yearly obligation: he would not redeem the +mortgage unless he were permitted to buy the property. But to this James +Otis, clinging to his solitary virtue, would not consent; and Hiram, +although he intended to leave all he possessed to Isabel, could not +bring himself to part with any sum in four figures. + +Before leaving for Europe Isabel had leased the house to a young +newspaper man whose wife had an income of her own, and not only an +artistic appreciation of the view, but a more practical esteem for a +site so far removed from the "all-night life" below. Immediately after +Isabel's return Mrs. Glait had asked permission to sublet the house, +remarking cynically that time had inured her to the desultory phenomena +of journalism, but never to the stable prospect of her husband's death +struggle with foot-pads, or her children falling down the cliff of this +wild bit of nature in the heart of a city. + +Isabel took back her old home with another spasm of delight, and vowed +that not until she was a pauper would she part with it again. Five or +six days of every week must be spent on the chicken-ranch, which had +grown to such proportions that she was now one of the persons that +counted in her flourishing community. But in time she would live more +and more in her lofty home, become a notable figure in San Francisco, +drawing with both hands from its varied best; and meanwhile, once a +week, she could sit for hours and look down upon the city, which, even +in rainy weather, was a wild and beautiful sight from her eyrie. + +Mrs. Otis had been a niece of the Mrs. Montgomery who had reigned on +Rincon Hill twenty years ago, and a cousin of the Helena Belmont who had +been the greatest belle the city had seen since that earlier time when +Nina Randolph, Guadalupe Hathaway, Mrs. Hunt McLane, and "The Three +Macs" had made history for themselves in spite of the momentous era of +which they were so unheeding a part. Mary Belmont would have been no +mean heiress herself had not her father been too adventurous a spirit +on the stock-market during the Belcher Bonanza excitement of 1872. For a +time it looked as if Gordon Belmont would be a far richer man than his +famous brother, Colonel Jack, always contented with a modest million; +but in ten mad days there was a decline of sixty million dollars in the +aggregate value of stocks on the San Francisco market; and six months +later, when he died of sheer exhaustion, he had nothing to leave his +only child but the house on Russian Hill, and a small income generously +supplemented by her uncle and guardian until her marriage. She was +thirteen at her father's death, and as her mother had preceded him, she +spent the following five years in a New York boarding-school. Then she +returned home, and, after a year's gayety, married James Otis. Colonel +Belmont surrendered her small property. Skilfully "turned over" it would +have multiplied indefinitely. But James Otis and his wife knew far more +about spending money than making it, and to-day nothing was left to +commemorate the meteoric and eminently typical career of Gordon Belmont +but the ancient structure whose nucleus he had taken over just after his +marriage as a "bad debt." His wife, too, had insisted upon living in it, +for reasons subsequently understood by her daughter and Mrs. Glait, and +complacently enlarged it with all the hideous improvements of the day. + +That part of Russian Hill conspicuous from the city is little more than +a great cliff rising abruptly from the extreme north end of the graded +ledge on the summit of Nob Hill, which, in its turn, almost overhangs +the steep and populous ascent from the valley. In "early days" none but +the goat could cling to those rough hills that all but stood on end, and +the brush was so thick and the titles so uncertain that their future +distinction was undreamed of. Then came a determined period of grading +which embraced the heights in due course, titles were settled, and many +that foresaw the ultimate possession of that great valley now known as +"South of Market Street"--but which in its haughty youth embraced South +Park and Rincon Hill--by the tenacious sons of Erin and Germania, moved +to the uplands while lots could still be bought for a song. The Jack +Belmonts, the Yorbas, the Polks, and others of the first aristocracy to +follow the Spanish, made Nob Hill fashionable before a new class of +millionaires sprang up in a night, and indulged its fresh young fancy +with monstrous wooden structures holding a large portion of converted +capital. Mrs. Yorba, who led society in the Eighties, when it was as +exclusive as a small German principality, was disposed to snub all +parvenus. But the young people made their way. When Mary Belmont +returned from school, and, chaperoned by a widowed relative, gave at +least a dance a month until she married, and many a one after, the heirs +of all grades thought nothing of leaving their carriages at the foot of +the cliff to climb the precarious stair; groping blindly more often than +not through the rains of winter or the fogs of summer. To-day Isabel's +neighbors wisely made no such demands upon the pampered, but in that +incomparably older time the young people would have climbed to the stars +for the sake of the lavish hospitality of the gay indulgent young +hostess; and if some of the youths rolled down the hill when the lights +went out, that was hardly a matter to excite indignant comment in a city +where drink was so admittedly the curse that it was philosophically +accepted with such other standing evils as fogs, trade-winds, +small-pox, mud-holes, dust-storms, and unmentionable politics. + +When Mary Belmont became the wife of James Otis, one of the greatest +ranchers in California--in which State, unlike other fervent patriots of +that era, he had been born--and a brilliant figure in one of the most +notable legal groups of any time, she long held her position as a social +favorite. But children came and died too quickly for her health and +fragile beauty, and the storms of life beset her. She continued to live +in her inconvenient eyrie, not only in the waning hope of ultimately +separating her husband from the convivial beings on the lower plain, but +because she felt an intense pride in owning a home two generations old +in that young community. She was determined that it should remain in the +family and be occupied by at least one of her children. So the ugly +brown wooden structure with its bay-windows, its central tower, its +Mansard-roof--added for the servants--had, contrary to all tradition, +actually joined three generations of San Franciscans in one unbroken +chain. It owed its proud position, no doubt, to the fact that when the +Otis fortunes collapsed there was but one child left to inherit it and +to be supported meanwhile. + +Isabel intended in time to give the house a new facade, and had gloated +over such of the Burnham plans as had been reproduced by the city press. +These lovely plans were designed to make the city as classic and +imposing as Nature had dreamed of when she piled up that rugged +amphitheatre out of chaos; and Isabel had long since resolved that, if +she could not be the first to plant a bit of ancient Athens upon a brown +and ragged bluff, the high tide of her fortunes should coincide with the +awakening of the city to the sense of its architectural guilt. She +banished much of the tasteless furniture of the old time, and refitted +with a stately comfort that expressed one side of her nature. She too +clung to traditions--and to the long mirrors in their tarnished gilt +frames, with the little shelf below; the multitude of family portraits +engraved on wood, and surrounded by a wide white margin and tiny gilt +frame. That they might strike no discordant note, she made use of a +lesson learned in London, where she had spent a month with Lady +Victoria, and had the walls and wood of the living-room painted white, +covered the windows and furniture with a plain stuff of a dark but +neutral blue. In the dining-room were a few paintings of her New England +and Spanish ancestors, and she disturbed them only to replace the +wall-paper with leather; at the same time sending the black walnut +furniture to the auction-room. + +Being the one practical member of her family, and the product of an +earthquake country, she repaired the uncertain foundations of her house +before removing the walls that had cut up the lower floor into the +conventional number of rooms and hallways. The house, of no great depth, +was so close to the hill-side, still rising above it, that more than one +enterprising cook had made use of the natural ledges before the windows. +Besides the kitchen department and pantries, there were now but three +rooms on the lower floor: the dining-room, a small reception-room in the +tower, and an immense living-room, broken by the white pillars that +supported the storys above. + +Mrs. Belmont and Mrs. Otis, in the time-honored American fashion, had +made a day nest of their bedroom, but Isabel was far too modern for that +lingering provincialism, and lived luxuriously in the big room +down-stairs when she was not in the porch. She had reserved her mother's +old alcoved bedroom with its mahogany four-poster for her own use, but +the rest of the second-story rooms she had fitted for her English +cousins, that they too might have headquarters in town. + +Neither appeared to be in any haste to visit the city of their +ancestors. Gwynne had left England in October, now nearly a year ago, +but, having discovered from his solicitor that he could apply for +letters of citizenship as late as the end of the third year after +landing, had announced to Isabel his intention to travel slowly about +the country "before settling down in its remotest part, which, from all +accounts, was sufficiently unlike the rest to provincialize his point of +view unless he saw something first of the East, South, and Middle West." +He had written to her several times, but only on business. She had +returned in January, after a round of visits in England, and had put his +house in order at once. The lease had expired, and Mr. Colton had +engaged a temporary superintendent, but Gwynne sent Isabel his power of +attorney and she was temporarily in possession. She wrote to him from +time to time that all was well, or to send him an account of her +expenditures; but felt no promptings towards a friendly correspondence +with one who showed as little disposition to encourage it. + +From Victoria she had not heard directly since she bade her good-bye in +Curzon Street, but Flora Thangue had written that her ladyship's superb +health had (to her ill-concealed fury) given way, following an attack of +influenza, and she would not be able to leave her doctor for an +indefinite time. A few months later she wrote that "dear Vicky" was +outwardly herself again, but in reality very nervous, the result, no +doubt, of her illness, and of the prolonged stress of business. However, +she had finally succeeded in letting the Abbey and Capheaton to +advantage, and it was on the cards that she would reach California +before the end of the year. Isabel hoped that, unfed by her son's +exacting presence the maternal fires burned low; she had a clearly +defined intention to be a factor in the new career of Elton Gwynne, and +no desire for the capricious interference of his mother. + + + + +II + + +As Isabel stood in her little porch that brilliant September morning, +she dismissed her occasional regret that she had not remained in England +for a London season. Not only had she put the time to better use on her +ranch, but no doubt her agent would have relet this house, and delayed +the fulfilment of one of those dreams upon which she unconsciously fed +her soul. The shrieking trade-winds and the dense white fogs were +hibernating somewhere out in the Pacific. All the city, in the great +irregular amphitheatre below, was sharply outlined in the yellow light; +Isabel wondered if the sun renewed its stores from the golden veins to +north and south. On the wide broken ledge just beneath her pinnacle was +the concrete evidence of an architectural orgy to be seen nowhere else +on earth: wooden mansions with the pure outlines of the Renaissance; a +Gothic palace with bow-windows, also of wood; a big brown-stone house in +the style of New York; piles of shingles and stones; here and there a +touch of Romanesque, later French, and Italian; the majority of those +plutocratic and perishable masses, of no style in particular, unless it +were that of Mansard combined with the criminalities of him who invented +the bow-window and the irrelevant tower. On the slopes were a few old +houses in gardens, some with cottage roofs, others square, brown, dusty, +melancholy. But the majority were of the "house in a row" type, +radiating in all directions from the "boarding-house blocks" on the +lower slopes. Then, down on the plain, came the big compact masses of +stone and concrete, brick and steel, devoted to business and housing of +the itinerant. The lofty domes of the City Hall and a newspaper +building, a few church spires and the great white-stone hotel on a crest +not far from Isabel's, were the sole pretenders to architectural beauty +within her ken. + +Far away she could make out the Mission Church, once called after St. +Francis of Assisi, now named Dolores for the vanished lake. It was the +last reminder of the work of the Spanish fathers, and looked +indescribably ancient in the midst of that busy and densely populated +district. At night Isabel watched the lights of the electric cars +flashing about that old monument of an almost forgotten conquest--like +the angry haunted eyes of the padres that had labored in the wilderness +for naught. But although this old church and the Presidio, which still +retained its quadrangle and a few of the original adobe houses, appealed +deeply to Isabel on account of the romance of Rezanov and Concha +Argueello that distinguished her family, her more personal sympathies +were with the streets just below her hill-top, packed as they were with +memories, tragic, humorous, gay, pathetic, of a people that had made the +city great. + +Even the dilapidated houses, with their sixty steps or more toppling +above the cut that had widened and levelled the street, had been very +hospitable in their time, and Isabel knew that her mother and +grandmother had toiled up those perpendicular flights in satin slippers +and ballooning skirts on many a rainy night. Mrs. Otis had told her +little girls stories of all those old houses, fine and simple, more +particularly of the fortunate mansions on Nob Hill's brief level. Isabel +longed for the time when she should enter them and pick up the threads +dropped from her mother's nerveless fingers. The Belmont house was +closed, the still restless Helena occupying a palace in Rome at the +moment. The Polk house had been sold to the energetic son of one of the +plodding old money-makers that had fought shy of stock gambling and +railroads. Nicolas Hofer belonged to the latest type the prolific city +had bred: the son of a millionaire, but a keen man of business, whom the +wildness of the city had never tempted, highly educated, honorable, and +an ardent reformer. + +Magdalena Yorba--Mrs. Trennahan--like most of her old neighbors, still +dwelt in the ancestral mansion, although she had given it a stucco +facade and shaved off the bow-windows. In each, Isabel was sure of +welcome, and she longed particularly to wander through the old Polk +house, where one of her Spanish great-aunts had reigned for a time. Like +all San Franciscans of family, she took more pride in her young-old city +than a Roman in his Rome. Its forty-two square miles had seen so many +changes, its story was so romantic and unique, that its age was not to +be measured by the standards of Time. Her grandfather had stood on this +hill after his Sunday climb and looked over and down a ragged wilderness +to the city bursting out of its shell--a wretched huddle of shacks and +tents by the water's edge. The bay no doubt was crowded with ships from +every corner of the world, many of them deserted, unmanned, forced to +lie idle until the return of the hungry disappointed gold-seekers. That +was less than sixty years ago. In the first ten years of its rapid +growth the city had burned seven times, millions blazing out in an hour. + +To-day San Francisco was replete not only with life but with wealth, +talents, and every variety of enterprise; it was as full of fads and +cults and artistic groups as London itself; it had sent forth authors, +artists, mummers, singers--and millionaires by the score. Many of the +art treasures of the world had been brought here and hidden from the +vulgar in those awful impermanent "palatial mansions." Some of the +finest libraries of the world were here. It had its bibliomaniacs, its +collectors, its precieux. And yet what a lonely city it was, stranded on +the edge of the still half-vacant western section of the United States, +with all the Pacific before it. Save for the rim of towns across the +bay, which were little more than a part of itself, it watched the Orient +alone, and was far too gay and careless, too self-absorbed and insolent, +to keep its jaws on the alert. Tact it was much too high-handed to +cultivate. It welcomed the hungry Oriental for so long as he was useful, +and when he outstayed his welcome, incontinently kicked him out. San +Francisco's intensity of independence as well as of civic pride was due +in part no doubt to the isolation which compelled it to be self-centred, +and to its unconscious dislike of the elder breeds beyond the Rocky +Mountains; but largely to the old adventurous reckless gambling spirit +and the habit of sleeping on its pistol. These first causes had +developed individuality to such proportions that the hair of a +Californian bristled when he was alluded to as a "Westerner," or even as +a mere American. + +And with time the patriotism of the San Franciscan waxed rather than +waned. It was no longer the fashion to take one's money to New York, +merely because of the higher cost of living that made a millionaire +"feel his oats," and of the allure of the older and more difficult +society to his women. San Franciscans still fled from the winds and fogs +of summer to their beloved Europe, and country-house life gained ground +very slowly, but deserters were few; and of late the rich men had shown +their faith not only by investing the greater part of their capital in +the city--until "improved real estate" was become a current phrase--but +the best of them, including Hofer and the mayor who had preceded the +present figurehead and his omnivorous Boss, were engaged in a desperate +battle with the highly organized gang of political ruffians that owned +and pillaged and dishonored the city in a manner with which nothing in +the history of municipal corruption could compare save the old Tweed +Ring of New York. For at least ten years previous to 1901, San Francisco +had enjoyed a period of not only decent but honorable government. There +was no "graft" in high places, the city was out of debt, it held up its +head with the cleanest municipal governments in the land. But, as ever, +the disinterested grew somnolent with content, and gave no heed to the +burrowing of the hungry recuperated and wiser rats in that prolific +underworld whence never a high-minded citizen emerges. The few that saw +and warned were disregarded; and circumstances, proper in themselves, +swelled the ranks of the petty politicians with thousands of greedy and +insurgent laborers. San Francisco awoke one morning to find herself in +the drag-net of a machine to which old Boss Buckley and the illustrious +Tammany doffed their hats. But the majority still gave little heed, too +content in their various blessings, and the gay light spirit the +climate gave them, to foresee the time when their pleasant city would be +utterly debauched, and life among arrogant thieves, prostitutes, and +socialists have become as impracticable as it already was in Chinatown +or on Barbary Coast. + +A group of the more thoughtful and patriotic citizens, assisted by the +one militant editor the city boasted, were doing all that was humanly +possible to prevent the re-election of the mayor, who had already +represented the worst element twice, and to break the power of the Boss. +Isabel in her lonely ranch house, when her chickens were asleep, +followed the fight with a passionate interest, and was tempted to come +forth from her seclusion and meet at least the representative men of her +city. But she was not yet ready to take up her own share of the burden, +and was far too modest to imagine that she could be useful until she had +become a person of importance in San Francisco. Nevertheless, as she +looked down to-day on the sharp outlines of the city under the hard blue +sky, almost glittering in their golden bath, she was impatient to become +a part of its life, or at least to discuss its interests with some one. +Rosewater, which of late years had become virtuous to excess, and almost +blind and deaf with local pride, took no interest in San Francisco +whatever, except as a market for eggs. When driven to the wall it +confessed the superiority of the metropolis in the matter of shops and +theatres; but its politics it invariably dismissed with adjectives more +forcible than elegant. + +It was at this point in Isabel's meditations that her eye happened to +rove along the plank walk to the rickety old flight of steps that led +from Taylor Street up Russian Hill. There was something vaguely +familiar about a tall, thin, well-groomed, but by no means graceful, +figure rapidly ascending the steps. In a moment her mind lost its +tensity of projection and she was almost flying down her own long stair. + +Gwynne broke into a run as he saw her. She wondered if he intended to +kiss her, but he merely shook her hand for a full minute. + +"I never in my life was so glad to see anybody!" he exclaimed, with the +joyousness of a school-boy come home for his first holiday. "It was such +luck to hear that you were in San Francisco." + +"But why didn't you telegraph? In a way I am disappointed--glad as I am +to see you. I intended to meet you at Oakland and take you directly up +to Lumalitas, where everything was to have been in gala array. And how +did you know I was in town?" + +"While I was taking my lonely breakfast this morning--I arrived late +yesterday afternoon--and glancing over one of your newspapers, my eye +caught your name. I learned that 'the charming and beautiful young +mistress of the old Belmont House on Russian Hill, who had excited so +much interest of late, had come down as usual for Sunday." + +"No?" Isabel flushed for the first time within Gwynne's knowledge of +her. "That is the very only time I have been the subject of a newspaper +paragraph--outside of Rosewater, which doesn't count--and I am as +delighted--as I have no doubt you were the first time you saw your name +in print!" she added, defiantly. + +There was nothing cynical in Gwynne's smile. "I understand," he said; +and then, as he ceased to smile, the light died out of his face, and +Isabel noticed that it was older and thinner. It had lost more than a +little of its aloof serenity, and his crest was visibly lowered. But on +the whole he was improved, for he had cut his hair, his lilting locks +having been too conspicuous a feature in the cartoons of _Punch_ and +_Vanity Fair_. But there was something subtly forlorn about him, and +Isabel's maternal promptings, once too active, but long moribund, +suddenly awakened. + +They mounted the steep flight of steps to the house slowly, exchanging +ejaculatory remarks. When they reached the porch she motioned to a long +wicker chair. + +"It is only ten," she said. "Luncheon will not be ready until one, and +my California hospitality demands that your entertainment shall begin at +once. Make yourself comfortable while I brew you a cup of Spanish +chocolate. I have actually one of the molinillos of our ancestors." + +When she returned with the frothy and fragrant beverage he was standing +with his hands in his pockets staring down at the city. He turned +swiftly at the sound of her step on the wood, but something was rushing +to the back of his eyes, and once more Isabel had the singular +impression of hearing his spirit cry: "Oh God! Oh God!" But his lips +were hard pressed and his eyes became suddenly contemptuous, then +smiling. + +"This is jolly of you," he said. "I have a weakness for +chocolate--cultivated during the winter I was in Munich with my tutor. I +never cared for beer--don't like anything bitter. Do you remember the +Cafe Luitpoldt, and all those little tables in the garden of the +Residenz--" + +He paused and narrowed his eyes. Isabel had turned white. "I must hear +that story," he said, quietly. "You are my only friend out here. In a +way you have altered the whole course of my life. I shall always have a +sense of relationship with you quite different from anything I have ever +known. So there must be perfect confidence and openness between us. I +told you frankly the unpleasant finish of my episode with Mrs. Kaye. I +hate mystery. I saw you go white once before, when I tried to make you +talk about Munich; and the romantic Flora was full of surmises. +Confession is good for the soul, anyhow. I want the atmosphere +cleared--not out of curiosity--I don't care tuppence about other +people's affairs--but I don't know you! I must know you! I am always +conscious of a wall about you--and in this damned God-forsaken country I +must have one friend!" he burst out. + +Isabel had quite recovered herself. "I will tell you everything, but not +now. We must be in the mood. This moment I am interested in nothing but +yourself. Sit down. What has happened to you in all these months? +Something not altogether pleasant. Have you had any adventures? Have you +been recognized?" + +He had finished his chocolate, and he clasped his hands behind his head +and leaned back in his chair, giving the railing a slight kick. + +"No," he said, grimly, "I have not been recognized. At first I avoided +all the big hotels, lest I might be; then growing more secure, and +disliking the inferior ones, I became quite reckless. The second time I +visited New York I went to the Waldorf-Astoria, and the third time to +the St. Regis. In the smoking-rooms of all the hotels and trains I +talked with any one whom I found disposed to conversation. Not that I +was; but I was perambulating the country for an object and determined to +accomplish it. As you had told me to improve my manners I did my best, +and have reason to believe that, if not effusive, I am almost cynically +approachable. In New York I was at times repelled with a haughty stare +or a negative frigidity which no duke I know could compass. But in +Boston they were more friendly, and farther West so expansive that I was +frequently invited to houses before I had presented my modest card. Very +often I had long talks with newspaper men, and made no attempt to +conceal the fact that I was a Britisher. Once or twice that fact was +commented on, but taken as a matter of course. There are a good many +Britishers in the United States. My identity was never suspected. I +never saw a newspaper paragraph about myself." + +He laughed, but looked at her between lids so narrowed that she could +not see the expression of his eyes. She nodded, smiling; and she could +make her smile very sweet and encouraging. + +"The time came when I felt like a shipwrecked mariner. Stranded! +Abandoned! Forgotten! Finally--take all the circumstances into +consideration and make due allowance--I felt that I would risk +everything to see my name in print once more. I arrived in Chicago late +one night. There had been a break-down that doubled the time of the +beastly trip. I went to its first hotel and registered myself as Elton +Gwynne. The night clerk, with the haughty indifference of the stage +duke, or the New-Yorker who fancies himself, called a bell-boy and +turned his back on me. I remained in Chicago three days. Not a reporter +sent up his card. Not a line appeared in a newspaper. It was the most +chastening experience of my life. No doubt it did me good. My ego has +actually felt lighter." He smiled. But he added in a moment: "It left a +scar, nevertheless." + +"Never mind," said Isabel, consolingly. "All that will read delightfully +in your biography. What on this difficult globe is not difficult, first, +last, and always? The only thing for you to do is to snap your fingers +at everything, as we do out here, and see nothing in the future but +success. How do you like the land of your birth?" + +"I hate it!" he said intensely. "Washington is a crude unwieldy village. +New York is like one of those nightmares a certain class of writers +project and label 'Earth in the Year 2000.' Chicago is the entrails of +the universe. The small interior towns and villages of the Eastern +States are open mausoleums for people so old and so dried up that their +end will be not death but desiccation. There is nothing picturesque in +those old towns, for they were dead before they were civilized. Some of +the cities and villages of the South are certainly attractive to look at +and have a background of a sort, but they are as lifeless as their +negroes. The cities of the West are hives, and when you have seen one +you have seen all. Its smaller communities are horrors, pure and simple. +Much of the country is magnificent. The Adirondacks, the Hudson River, +Yellowstone, those great prairies and deserts, atone for a good deal. +The last three weeks I have spent in southern California. It seemed to +me--below Santa Barbara, at least--little more than a reclaimed +desert--and with nothing of the wonderful atmospheric effects of the +great interior deserts; nothing but dirt and a hideous low shrub caked +with prehistoric dust. Precious little of it reclaimed at that. I am +glad that ranch is in good hands. I never want to see the place again. +That eternally grinning sky! That dead atmosphere! It blunted my nerves +for the time, but the reaction is all the worse. However--" He stood up +and leaned over the railing. "I did not expect the earthly paradise. I +am not going to treat you to a continued diatribe--" + +"But you must like California--love it!" cried Isabel, in alarm. "Of +course you have hated everything--natural enough--but not California! It +is your State, your home, your future. You must begin by liking it, at +least." + +"Very well, mentor, I shall do my best. One might certainly indulge in +an illusion or two up here. I thought as I walked--climbed--through the +city, guided a part of the way by a messenger-boy, who ejaculated at +intervals, 'Say, mister!' and described Nob Hill as the 'millionaire +bunch,' that I had seldom seen so many ugly buildings together; but from +this perch of yours it looks quite beautiful. Still I long for the +country. Can we go to the ranch this afternoon?" + +"Why not?" Isabel stifled a sigh. She had intended to ride all round the +city on the electric cars; but she felt as if she had an adopted +homesick child on her hands, and he was a responsibility that she had +deliberately assumed. Moreover, she felt deeply sorry for him. + +"You can express all your luggage but a portmanteau, and we will go in +my launch. It is down on the bay side of the Hill. We must start at four +to catch the tide. You have no idea how cosey and pretty your +ranch-house looks, and I have sent out my uncle's law--and +farm--library. I have arranged everything with Judge Leslie, and you +enter his office at once. He is the first lawyer of northern +California. I wrote you that it would be impossible to conceal the truth +from him, as his firm has done all the legal business of the estate for +the last thirty years, and he knows your mother has only one son. But he +is the more interested. No one else knows but Mr. Colton and his son +Tom--your Rosewater bankers and agents. Your secret is safe with them. +Gwynne is not an uncommon name in California, although some of its +letters have been dropped. Lumalitas has been leased for so many years +that your name has ceased to be associated with it in the public mind, +and the deeds are so deeply buried in the archives of St. Peter--the +county-seat--that the most curious would hardly attempt to unearth them. +Of course most townspeople all through the State take in a San Francisco +paper, and your name has doubtless appeared now and again in the +telegrams. But they are not the sort that take the least interest in the +career of a young Englishman--those that do, at all events, are few and +far between. Judge Leslie is deeply interested; so is Tom Colton, the +only son of the bank, so to speak. He is a Democrat, by-the-way--but I +don't suppose you have made up your mind--" + +"I have quite made up my mind. In practice one party seems about as bad +as the other, but at least the Democratic ideals more nearly correspond +with my own. Besides, the Democratic party is the under dog, and that +always appeals to me, to say nothing of the fact that it is weak in +strong men, that all its salient leaders are what you so elegantly term +'blatherskites.' If I go in for American politics, I must fight so hard +that I cannot help becoming absorbed body and soul; with only the +present and the future--no past. Let us take a walk over these hills." + + + + +III + + +"Do you run this thing yourself?" asked Gwynne, as they boarded the +launch, which was at anchor by the end of the sea wall at the foot of +Russian Hill. + +"Rather. How do you expect me to make a fortune in this paradise of the +labor-union if I don't do things myself? I have a hard time being +economical, and I suspect that where I save once I spend twice, but I +try not to think about it. Theories make life so palatable! This old +launch belonged to Uncle Hiram. I had it repaired, and take my eggs to +the hatcheries and my produce to Rosewater three times a week. There I +deal direct with the San Francisco buyers--and in this launch; it serves +me very well as an office. Then I come down in it every week. The +railroad is exorbitant, and the boats are too slow. It may be that +gasolene and repairs cost more than a railroad fare once a week, but I +have abstained from making a comparison. The trip is so delightful!" + +The launch was about twenty feet long with a small cabin and a fresh +coat of brown paint. It shot lightly over the smooth water, and Gwynne +sat on top of the cabin above Isabel swinging his long legs, and looked +with some envy at the hundreds of yachts that skimmed the bay. They +appeared and vanished about the corners of the Islands and promontories +like birds swooping after prey. The Islands and all the mainland had +lost their greens long since, but the burnt grasses shone in the sun +like hammered gold; were tan and brown and fawn on the shadowed eastern +slopes. The chain of mountains beyond the towns across the bay and +facing San Francisco glittered like bronze, but the lofty volcanic peak +of Monte Diablo, farther still, was a pale and misty blue. North of the +Golden Gate and high above the mountains of Marin County, Mount +Tamalpais was so intense and hard a blue, and was cut against the +fleckless sky with so sharp an outline, that it produced in Gwynne a +vague sense of unreality and uneasiness. The Marconi poles on the summit +looked like the masts of a mammoth ship, and every window of The Tavern, +close by them, shone like a plate of brass. + +They steered for the southern point of Angel Island, and Gwynne looked +about him with much interest. The mainland of the great northern cove +and the eastern side of the Islands were thick with trees: oaks, +buckeye, willows, madrono. And almost as thickly set, although sometimes +half hidden, were the villas: light and airy of architecture, gayly +painted, with broad verandas and overhanging vines. At the foot of +Belvedere and the little town of Tiburon were house-boats, in which +people lived for eight months of the year. + +And everywhere, people, people, people. They swarmed in the yachts, on +the house-boats, on the driveways, the verandas. Gwynne twisted about +and looked at San Francisco. The palaces were on the heights and in the +Western Addition--out towards the Presidio and the Golden Gate; but +hundreds of tiny dwellings clung to the precipitous sides of Telegraph +Hill and Russian Hill as if their foundations were talons. And each had +its bit of garden, or its balcony full of flowers. Telegraph Hill, the +great bluff where the city turned almost at a right angle from north to +south, was given over largely to Mexicans and Italians, and was +uncommonly vivid. And the streets were full of people. The city had +turned itself inside out. Everywhere were bright gowns and parasols, +whizzing cars packed to the rails. + +And the wealthy class by no means monopolized the bay with their yachts +and luxurious launches. There were fishing-smacks filled with whole +families of Italians and Chinese; in fact every tongue floated over the +water in the course of a brilliant Sunday afternoon. And at the docks +there were steamers, sailing vessels, from all the ports of the world, a +forest of spars and funnels; odd little Italian craft and even a Chinese +junk. A man-of-war was coming down from Mare Island. Gwynne had seen a +big Australian liner flying the Union Jack enter the Golden Gate as the +launch rounded Angel Island. It made him homesick, and he was not sorry +to lose sight of it. + +They passed steamboats crowded with holiday seekers coming home from a +day's outing in Sausalito, San Rafael, Mill Valley, sporting parks; the +majority noisy and vulgar, but a mass of color. It was a scene of +surpassing variety, life, gayety, prosperity, importance. Gwynne, as the +light electrical breeze began to prick his veins, experienced a +sensation of pride in the country where his lines were cast, in those +ancestors of his that had memorably helped to develop its vast +resources: a tremendous concession, for he had barely acknowledged these +ancestors before. A slight meed of resignation descended upon him. He +smiled down upon Isabel, who was frowning at the sun and sighing for +her forgotten veil; she had a tender regard for her complexion. Gwynne +thought her very pretty in her smart crash suit and sailor hat, not +nearly so severe and fateful in appearance as when she had adjusted +herself to the formalities of Capheaton; although he remembered that he +had heard much discussion of her beauty and had not been unappreciative +himself. But he liked her far better here in California. Her eyes were +more alert, her voice was less monotonous; and those little black moles +looked particularly fascinating on the ivory white of her skin, fairly +luminous in the sunlight. He fancied they would drift into matrimony; +and that she appeared to be as indifferent and passionless as she was +handsome and clever but the better suited his present mood. His love for +Mrs. Kaye had died a sudden and violent death, but it had left him +callous, somewhat contemptuous of the charms of woman. He doubted if his +heart would ever beat high in his breast again, but in the course of +events he should need a partner, and Isabel seemed to him fashioned to +be the helpmate of a busy and ambitious statesman. + +But all he said was: "You have a little freckle on your nose. I saw it +come." + +Isabel shrugged her shoulders and sniffed. He lost interest in her for +the moment, for he distrusted a woman without vanity. He knew girls too +little to suspect that the most business-like were often smitten with a +desire to pose; and were as likely to forget the pose of to-day in the +naturalness of to-morrow. Secretly, Isabel was grievously afflicted at +the thought of the freckle, and did not speak for some time, recalling +the antidotes of her early girlhood, when she and Anabel Leslie +experimented in secret with various beauty recipes cut from the +newspapers. She smiled as she recalled that Anabel, who had pretty +golden hair, had washed it with lye to acquire a reddish tinge, and been +forced to retire for a month; and a semi-tragic experience of her +own--smothered from crown to toe in a blanket taking a hot-air bath for +the benefit of her complexion, the spirit lamp, in a wash-basin under +the chair, exploded, and there was one interminable moment of panic, and +several days of discomfort. She quite forgot her companion in these +lighter reminiscences of a period that seemed far more than ten years +agone. + +Gwynne had discovered at Capheaton that one of his cousin's charms was +her absence of effort in conversation and a corresponding indifference +to effort in others. They did not exchange a syllable as they sped up +the wider expanse of the bay east of the Islands, and he watched the +hills and mountains close on his left, with their bright little towns +and sombre depths of forest. Many of the rounded cones of the foothills +were bare, and so was the rocky crest of Tamalpais, but the old redwoods +still held triumphant possession of several of the slopes and all of the +canyons. Here and there factories and warehouses marred the almost +primeval beauty of the scene, but to-day at least there was no smoke to +cobweb the radiant sky. Even the Chinese shrimp-pickers were lounging on +the beach before their little shack village. + +They passed the last of the towns. Towers and sharp roofs rose above the +mass of cultivated trees in some private park; the trees a motley +collection of pines and palms, eucalyptus and oak, madrono, laurel, +locust, and acacia. The gardens were full of children and birds. On the +roads horses in old-fashioned buggies danced at automobiles whizzing by. +In the yachts even the men had laid aside their keen anxious look--as +peculiar to the young San Franciscan of business as to the New-Yorker or +Westerner--and were bent upon absolute relaxation for the day. One +millionaire was alone in his big luxurious launch, a broad grin on his +homely ingenuous countenance, and even his mouth open to inhale the +clean and sparkling air. His hands were clasped on his curves. + +"He inherited," said Isabel, in reply to Gwynne's comment that he did +not look as if he ever expended his energies in the piling of dollars. +"And he doesn't want any more. But they all look well enough. It is not +only the climate but the cooking." + +They left San Francisco Bay and Isabel steered more carefully: the +channel in the Bay of San Pablo is narrow and the current treacherous. +When they reached the drawbridge they were not only alone on the wide +silvery expanse of water, but there was scarcely a country-house to +break the wild loneliness of mountain and canyon. After they entered +Rosewater Creek the mountains with their broken and multiplying ridges +were more imposing still, and before long another range began to taper +northward on the opposite shore. They were in the great tidal marsh now, +green, where all the rest of the world was burnt and dry. At times the +creek was as wide as an ordinary river, at others so contracted that one +could gather grass on either side. Isabel told Gwynne to "watch out for +other boats," for the creek wound and twisted and doubled like a mammoth +brown snake into an infinite perspective, broken here and there by +sailing boats that had the effect of skimming the land. It was a scene +reminiscent of Holland, but far more beautiful, with the wild primeval +character of the landscape and the grandeur of the mountains. + +Isabel indicated an island well out in the marsh. It was crowned with a +white house shaded by many trees. Men in duck trousers, and coatless, +were lounging in the shade. + +"That is a country club," she said. "Tom Colton will put you up. But if +you are still disinclined to sociabilities you can shoot all the ducks +you want on my place." + +"Shoot what?" + +"Best duck-shooting in the world is out here--canvas-back, teal, English +widgeon--fancy your not knowing that. It begins on the fifteenth of +October. I have not rented my marsh-lands this year, and intend to shoot +ducks for the market. You can help me and we'll go halves." + +Gwynne's eyes were sparkling. He had expected to kill his bear and deer, +but any variety of sport new or old gave him joy. Isabel pointed to many +little shanties on the edge of the marsh. + +"The more enthusiastic sit in those and wait for the tide to come back. +I avoid being left high and dry, for if the ducks go elsewhere it is +rather a bore." + +The mountains on the left diminished in height, turned off abruptly to +the northwest, following the coast line. Those on the right took form in +the pink mist that enveloped them, for the sun had set. All the lower +sky was pink, melting imperceptibly into the still pale blue of day. Far +to the north other mountains seemed suddenly to heave from the level, +villages appeared, with great stretches of farming land between. Then +the glow faded into the gray of twilight and the vast landscape took on +a sudden aspect of desolation; as of a country stranded, forgotten, +with a heap of stones here and there to mark some ancient civilization. + +"There is Rosewater--over there where the lights are coming out; and +here we are," said Isabel. + +Gwynne turned with a start and found that Isabel had run her launch up +to a little pier. Behind it was a cluster of low hills set with narrow +fields and tiny white houses. In the foreground was a large house of two +stories and no architecture whatever, although the roof was mercifully +flat. It was painted white and surrounded by a broad veranda. The garden +was full of bare rosebushes and blooming chrysanthemums, but save for +two mournful eucalypti and a naked acacia, there was not a tree in +sight. Just behind were many out-buildings, stark and white. + +"Is this where you live?" asked Gwynne, wonderingly. He had vaguely +pictured her in a romantic setting, a bit of California epitomized. + +"It was like Uncle Hiram to sell off the prettiest parts, but I don't +bother about anything I can't help, and I have a lovely view opposite. +Where is that boy?" She raised her voice and called, "Chuma! Chuma!" and +in a moment a Japanese boy came running down to the pier. + +"The two men spend Sunday in Rosewater, but I have trained my Jap to do +a little of everything," said Isabel, as they walked up to the house. +"He is one of the willing sort; most are not. Chuma is my cook and +butler and chambermaid--" + +"Do you mean that you live here without any other woman?" + +"Why not? No girl would stay in this lonely place. I should have to send +her in to Rosewater every night and get a second girl to keep her +company. Mac--who was with Uncle Hiram before I was born--sleeps in the +house. It was a hotel forty years ago, by-the-way, and is still known as +Old Inn. That was in the days of picturesque ruffianism, and there are +terrible stories about the house, but no ghosts." + +It had been decided that Gwynne should dine with Isabel and spend the +night at the hotel in Rosewater. Isabel had telephoned to her patient +Jap, and there was a log fire in the "parlor"--now transformed into a +comfortable living-room. Gwynne looked about him with considerable +curiosity while Isabel was up-stairs dressing. The walls were "ceiled" +with redwood and hung with the photographs she had accumulated in her +travels, a motley collection of many climes, from the snows of the Alps +to the patios of Seville; all, she had informed him, with a personal +association: "she was no photograph fiend." Several artist's sketches +arrested her guest's attention and he wondered what her life in Paris +had been. He fancied that her three years abroad were full of curious +chapters, most of them untold; but although she mystified him he could +not associate her with license of any sort. There was even a hint of +austerity about her, as if she drew strength from her Puritan +forefathers. + +It was patent, however, that she felt herself entitled to physical +comforts after the labors of her day. There were half a dozen +easy-chairs and a big divan covered with cushions. The carpet and +cushions were red, but although the room was delightfully comfortable +and homelike it might have been a bachelor's, so entirely were lacking +all the little devices of femininity. The only ornaments in the room +were an odd assortment of Tyrolese pipes and Indian baskets. On a shelf +above the divan, however, were many books, and Gwynne ran his eye over +them. They included masterpieces of the modern Russian, German, French, +and Italian schools; only three or four volumes of English criticism. A +set of shelves opposite was filled with the standard English and +American histories, essays, and novels, many of them old and bound in +calf. The upper shelf was devoted entirely to the Russian novelists, and +the bindings were new. + +When Isabel came down, looking very pretty in a blue evening frock, +simple enough to make her guest feel at ease in his travelling-clothes, +but carefully selected with an eye to effect, she sent him up to her +room to make his own simple toilet. + +"I suppose I should furnish a spare room," she remarked. "But if I did I +should have Paula--my adopted sister--and her family here whenever they +happened to want to come, which would be always when I didn't want them. +But you won't mind." + +Gwynne made a wry face as he sat down before the dressing-table that he +might reflect his visage while he brushed his hair. Nevertheless, he +cast about a curious and apologetic eye, in the belief that a woman's +bedroom must reveal some secret of her personality. This bedroom was so +simple and girlish that it gave him a vague sense of pleasure. The +windows and dressing-table were covered with white muslin, and there was +a canopy of the same above the little brass bedstead. The flounces were +so full and fluffy that he held his knees back nervously lest he should +disturb a puff. There was no other furniture in the room but two +rocking-chairs, and the only color was in the blue Japanese rugs +scattered over the white matting, and in two immense bows above the +dressing-table and bed. He decided, as he ran down the stairs to the +warm room below, that she understood both taste and comfort, and looked +forward to his own lonely ranch-house with more equanimity than when he +had paid the bill. + + + + +IV + + +There were two miles between Rosewater and Old Inn, but although Isabel +rode briskly and was sensible as ever of the keen buoyant quality of the +morning air that so often filled her with a pagan indifference to the +human side of life, her thoughts were with the pleasant evening by her +fireside, the supper in the low raftered room which once had been the +office of the hotel--a supper of fried chicken, transparent asparagus, +and soda biscuit, which Gwynne had disposed of with a school-boy's +enthusiasm--the hundred and one impersonal topics they had discussed in +a cloud of smoke before the logs, until Abe, the second hired man--who +was to drive Gwynne in to Rosewater--had opened the kitchen door three +times and coughed. Not since Isabel's return to California had she sat +at a fireside and talked to anybody; nor, indeed, with the exception of +her father in his lucid intervals, and her uncle in his rare moments of +expansion, had she ever talked with any one that covered the large range +of her own interests. Gwynne had snapped the lock on his unquiet spirit, +but in that comfortable domestic environment, half lying in an +easy-chair, with his gaze travelling indolently between the fire and the +animated face of his cousin, he had talked of her favorite books and +told her much of lands she had never visited. He had transferred himself +to the buggy with a grumble of disgust, and begged her to come for him +early in the morning. He refused to pay his first visit to his ranch +without her; and she had promised that Abe should go early for his +saddle-horse and meet her at the hotel. + +Pleasurable as the evening had been, Isabel was not in a sentimental +frame of mind; she was stirred at the prospect of a companion, and +wondered that she had been content in her solitude so long. Solitude and +complete liberty might be indispensable elements in her ideal of mortal +existence, but desultory companionship might be as necessary to +intensify them. + +It was nearly a year since her return, and outside of the bank parlor +and Judge Leslie's office, she had held naught but business converse +with any man. Nor with any woman. Although Rosewater society offered her +nothing and she was glad to live out of town, still she liked her old +school friends and had expected them to call on her. But weeks had +passed and not one of them had paid her the mere civilities. She met +them sometimes on Saturday afternoons, when all the world of Rosewater +shopped on Main Street, and they invariably greeted her with effusion, +and assured her they were "going out soon." Finally, busy and absorbed +as she was, she fell a prey to curiosity. She knew that the young men +had always rather feared her, as she had a forbidding reputation in the +way of "bookishness"; and as most of them had either left Rosewater or +married, in the four years of her absence, she had expected nothing from +them. But the girls? The young married women, who had been her comrades +at the High School? Did they resent her three years abroad and the sense +of superiority implied? It was patent from their manner that they +resented nothing. Did they disapprove of her becoming so energetic a +business woman? It was true that the girls of California's country +towns, except when forced by poverty to work, were the laziest mortals +on earth. But nothing could exceed their good-nature and entire +indifference. Isabel might have started a race-track or opened a +livery-stable and they would have vaguely admired, and been thankful +that themselves were as God made them. Her friend Anabel Colton was in +the south with an ailing child, and Mrs. Leslie was with her, or the +problem would have been quickly solved. + +One morning she met the beauty of Rosewater on Main Street, Miss Dolly +Boutts, a girl who had been half grown when she left, but one of her own +rapturous admirers. Main Street was crowded, but Miss Boutts rushed up +and kissed her, protesting that she had been trying for two months to +get out to see her. Isabel guided her firmly to an ice-cream table in +the candy store, and while Miss Boutts, who was a superb specimen of +animal beauty with a corresponding appetite, disposed of two saucers of +the delectable and a plate of cakes, Isabel dived to the heart of the +mystery. + +She began by dilating upon her pleasure in being home again, and then +congratulated her handsome friend, with a touch of sarcasm, upon the +overwhelming gayeties of Rosewater. + +Miss Boutts stared. "Gayeties?" said she. + +"What else? I never knew people so absorbed, although I fail to see why +I should be wholly excluded. Or have the fashions changed, and was I +expected to call first--" + +Miss Boutts, who was not particularly quick of apprehension, here threw +back her head and gave a musical laugh, which was out of tune with her +drawling nasal voice and abundant slang. + +"You innocent!" she cried. "Where have you been? I suppose you have been +imagining us at dances and dinners and teas and things. Why, we have +only danced twice in two whole years. It's cards, my dear. We are card +mad, the whole bunch of us, old and young, women and girls. Mrs. Leslie +and Anabel Colton are about the only exceptions, at least in our set. +But I fancy the whole town has got it. We play morning, noon, and +night--literally. Those who have no servants--and that question gets +worse instead of better--don't make their beds for days, and their +husbands get dinner at any old hour. Those who have a servant or two +belong to six clubs at least. I belong to every one of them, and two +meet in the morning." + +It had been Isabel's turn to stare. The older people had always played +bezique or whist, but rather somnolently of an evening. She wondered if +the old gambling spirit had broken out again, and asked if they were +playing poker or monte. Miss Boutts looked at her with positive scorn. + +"You girls that go to Europe and stay there too long get fearfully +behind things. Poker! Monte! We play bridge and five hundred." Then her +genuine affection for Isabel overcame her contempt. "We have spoken +often of asking you to join the clubs," she added, sweetly. "But there +isn't a vacancy at present." + +"I couldn't think of it. Chickens and cards don't rhyme. What do you +play for--money?" + +"No!" The scorn returned to her voice. "We are still too provincial for +that. San Francisco is ahead of us there. We don't even have real big +prizes--just a dinky little spoon sitting up on the mantel-piece to +excite us as if it was a tiara. I've won a whole bunch of them. They're +better than nothing and mean a lot of fun. I'm as proud as punch of +them." + +"And the men?" asked Isabel. Did they play, too? Miss Boutts replied +that they were too busy in the daytime, but were asked once a week to a +"bang-up" affair. Their other evenings they spent at the lodges--"or any +old place," added Miss Boutts, who had no brothers, and a very busy +father. When Isabel asked her if she had not the natural yearning of her +age and sex for beaux, she shrugged her shoulders and replied: + +"Rather. But where are you going to find them here? Pa won't live in the +city, and all the young men run away. Once in a while I visit in San +Francisco, and we go down to all the new plays, so I suppose I'll meet +my fate in time. Meanwhile, as there's nothing doing in that line here, +cards are a mighty fine substitute for beaux, and no mistake." + +Isabel had been glad to be rid of her, and of her other old friends, who +did call in due course. Anabel had not returned and was the worst of +correspondents. So it had fallen out that she had held no real converse +with youth until Gwynne's advent, and she accepted it with delight, and +shook her head with young triumph in being able to interest him--or in +joy of the sparkling air; she hardly knew which. + + * * * * * + +As Gwynne left his room the Japanese "chambermaid," who had been about +to knock, informed him that Miss Otis awaited him below. He ran +down-stairs and found her still on her horse. Abe held another horse by +the bridle. + +"It is nine o'clock--" began Isabel, but Gwynne interrupted her, rarely +apologetic. + +"I hardly slept. There was such an infernal racket. A theatrical +troupe--" + +"There generally is. How do you like your horse?" + +Gwynne examined the horse, and was good enough to remark that it was a +credit to California. Then he added: "It did not occur to me last +night--my luggage is expressed to the ranch and I haven't my +riding-togs--" Then he reddened at Isabel's gay laugh and Abe's +suppressed smile. + +"Oh, well," said Isabel, as she sprang from her horse. "The bloods will +be too busy to notice as we ride down Main Street, and after that it +won't matter." + +She went with him into the dining-room of the hotel, a room scrupulously +clean, but with no attempt at decoration beyond the various +advertisements of beer on the white walls. There was a long table down +the middle of the room and a great many small ones. Most of the latter +were empty, although two beside the door were covered with steaks and +eggs and coffee and rolls. One man, who had evidently finished, had +swung his chair about, tipped it against the wall, and was addressing a +political monologue to his toothpick. + +Gwynne led Isabel to a table in a corner by a window, and indicated the +company occupying more than half of the long table. + +"'Busted,' was the word they used, and I cannot think of a better one to +describe them. I talked with the men in the bar, and later wandered into +the parlor where the women were, some tearful, others indignant. One +had an infant, and there were several small children running about, +although it was midnight. The soubrette was chewing gum and +anathematizing Rosewater as the 'jayest town on the slope,' and others +were calling for the blood of the manager, who had absconded with the +receipts of an unprofitable week. They interested me, as all your weird +specimens do, and I found them a surprisingly decent lot, considering +that it is the cheapest sort of a vaudeville troupe. That poor little +woman with the red eyes and the parti-colored hair is the mother of the +infant. I saw one of the children carrying it about the hall as I left +my room. She wears spangled tights--she told me with a lively regret at +the prospect of pawning them--and shoots balls from the head of that +young man that looks like a parson. And the soubrette--all my ideals are +shattered! Look at her." + +The soubrette had a lank young body neatly attired in a store suit and +shirt-waist. Her face was sallow and her black hair as lank as her body, +but her eyes were keen and bright, and she was indisputably respectable. +She was drinking her coffee with both elbows on the table and listening +with a sort of indifferent sympathy to an elderly untidy woman who was +sniffling. + +"Drop it," she shot out, finally. "'Tain't worth it. The landlord's +given us a free breakfast, anyhow, and it's more'n most of 'em does. +We'll get back to 'Frisco somehow, and will run into Jake first thing. +I'll give him a slice of my mind right in the thickest of the +Tenderloin. You just shut up and be thankful you ain't got no kids." + +"She is positively discouraging," said Gwynne, as he attacked his +excellent breakfast. "I thought that the frozen surface of the American +woman thawed on the stratum soubrette." + +"The class is not always remarkable for its asceticism," said Isabel, +dryly. "I often lunch here, and see many varieties. The leading lady is +generally a large voluptuous person with a head like a hay-stack seen +through the wrong end of an opera-glass, and some of the soubrettes are +all hats and eyes and wriggling grace. The men are what we call 'tough,' +which is not exactly what you mean by 'toff.' Occasionally, however, +there are the most respectable family parties, including the children +whom they won't be parted from. We have three places of amusement, +including quite a fine opera-house, so they do very well, as a rule. Was +it your sympathy that kept you awake?" + +"I am not an ass. But they were in and out of one another's rooms all +night, and of course the baby cried. Then my room was over the +bar--well, what will you? Such is life. I am sorry you cannot eat +another breakfast. This seems to be the land of good cooking. If I did +not scorn to be unoriginal I should dilate upon the pie and doughnuts I +had for breakfast on the other side of your continent." + +He seemed still light of heart at the sudden end to his wanderings and +isolation, and they forgot the troupe and chatted about his ranch. He +had much to ask and his sponsor more to tell. + +The theatrical party appeared to finish their breakfast simultaneously. +Three, including the soubrette, reached under the table, dislodged the +morsel of gum they had mechanically attached to the under side of the +board, closed on it with a snap, and filed out. Most of them looked +quite cheerful. Several bowed to Gwynne. The soubrette gave him a +haughty suspicious nod. + +"She looked at me like that last night," said Gwynne, complainingly. +"What designs does she attribute to me? I never treated any one with +more respect." + +"They are all like that when they are respectable. Their fierce +Americanism resents any hint of patronage. Later on they invite it. You +will find these waitresses--the class, as a rule, is thoroughly +decent--much the same in manner." + +Two girls, white clad, their extended arms loaded with dishes, were +stalking about the room, anaemic, disdainful. A portly woman, whom Isabel +knew to be the mother of a brood, was far more anxious to please. She +came up to the table in the corner and asked Gwynne affably if his +coffee was "all right" and if he was a stranger in "these parts." He was +under Isabel's amused eye, but he acquitted himself with credit; and +when he rose from the table she thanked him indifferently for his tip, +but her eyes glowed softly. It was rarely thought worth while to tip a +mere waitress. + + + + +V + + +As they rode slowly down the hill towards Main Street Gwynne examined +his cousin from head to foot, but, he prided himself, out of the corner +of his eye. She wore a dust-colored habit with divided skirt, and a soft +felt hat and gloves of the same shade. Her horse was a very light +chestnut, and he was obliged to confess that the effect was harmonious, +although this Western style of riding by no means pleased his fastidious +taste. + +Isabel shot him an amused glance. "You don't approve of women riding +astride," she said. "We invented it; although it is now the fashion in +many other parts of America. Necessity is the mother of most fashions. +Wait till you see our mountain roads. They are a disgrace to +civilization--so broken and narrow that even in summer it is dangerous +for a woman to ride a side-saddle, and in winter impossible. I have +forgotten how, and that is the reason I never rode in England.... Here +is the centre of your existence for several years to come. Main Street +is to this section of the country what Wall Street is to the United +States." + +They had entered a street that turned abruptly in from the country a +block below them, and rose gently for several hundred yards, when it +straggled unevenly along a higher level, to melt into the older +residence district and then out into the open country again. There was +nothing quite like this Main Street in California. At its southern end +was a long double hitching-rail--as old as the State--already flanked by +several dusty wagons and big strong horses. The long unbroken block had +as many and as various stores as are generally spread over the entire +area of a town. Jammed against one another like cabins opening out of a +steamer's gangway, and yet of no mean size, were banks and saloons; +stores for chicken feed, groceries, fruit, candy, jewelry, clothing, +hats, fancy goods, stationery; and five drug stores with tiled floors. +Many of the windows made a brave display that would not have disgraced +San Francisco. The entire west pavement was roofed, making a promenade +like a ship's deck against rain or the severities of summer; and from +this roof depended an extraordinary number of signs, often eccentric of +color and design. Above the buildings of the opposite side of the street +rose the spars of several fishing-boats; the creek finished at +Rosewater. Gwynne glanced about him with an interest that nothing else +Californian save the Mission and San Francisco had inspired. Here was a +bit of a civilization of a building era, that was almost old, everything +being relative. At all events it was old-fashioned. It was thoroughly +countrified and yet suggestive of the concentrated activities of a city. +Isabel, after leaving the hotel had made a detour, giving him a brief +glimpse of the town. On the higher streets--Rosewater lay on a cluster +of gentle hills--between Main Street and the "residence" district, he +had noticed several modern buildings of brick or stone: offices, +churches, school-houses, a solid little opera-house of colonial design, +a fine City Hall, and one of those forlorn "Carnegie Libraries" in a +state of arrested development for want of funds, but with an imposing +facade and the name of the "donor" conspicuously advertised. All this +had interested him little, although he had thought the town on its +slopes looked very pretty and quiet; but this----the word "pioneer" +suddenly came to him, and he looked up and down with a keenness of +interest that was almost like a reviving memory. This beyond question +was a remnant of the old thing, and here, no doubt, the +great-grandfather whose first name he had forgotten, had been a familiar +sight; his fortune and enterprise had helped to lay the very foundations +of this landmark of a wild and stirring time.----Then they rode past a +square park high on a terrace, walled up with stone most modernly, the +green shaded with pines and palms, acacia and oaks; and the dream +passed. At the same moment he became aware that his partner was talking. + +"Rosewater is the financial and trading centre of an immense farming +district. There are four banks, as solid as the best in the world. Three +are as old as American California. The farmers come in daily for feed +and supplies, the chicken-ranchers with their produce for the San +Francisco buyers, and eggs for the great hatcheries. Many, like myself, +find the last less trouble and expense than bothering with incubators. +Something like four thousand dollars change hands daily in Rosewater, +and it has less than five thousand inhabitants." + +Having parted with her information she relapsed into silence, and, the +town lying behind them, he transferred his attention to her. She looked +severe, remote again, and he wondered if she would grow quite hard and +business-like in time. In the hotel office as he paid his bill he had +overheard one man say to another that she was "as good as the best, and +no man could get ahead of her." In this sexless get-up and with her +features set she looked hardly a woman. She certainly had capacities for +good-fellowship, and yesterday she had been almost tender. He had just +decided that he would as soon marry a portrait of George Washington, +when, in response to a light call behind them, Isabel wheeled about with +the pink in her cheeks and eyes wide with pleasure. She galloped back to +an approaching buggy, in which there was an extremely pretty +golden-haired young woman, and as she and Isabel simultaneously alighted +and flew into each other's arms, Gwynne also descended, prepared to +raise his hat when his existence was recognized. For some moments the +girls talked a rapid duet, then Isabel turned suddenly and beckoned. + +"This is my oldest friend, Anabel--Mrs. Tom Colton," she said, +apologetically. "She only returned last night--just caught sight of us, +and followed." + +Gwynne's disapproval vanished as he shook hands with the blooming young +matron and met her bright laughing eyes. She was a small imposing +creature and received him in quite the grand manner. Her accent of +America was as slight as Isabel's, and she used no slang. There was +about her something of the primness that characterizes American women in +the smaller towns, but her simple linen frock had been cut by a master, +and she looked so warm, so womanly, so hospitable as she welcomed Gwynne +to Rosewater, that he liked her more spontaneously than he had liked +anybody since he crossed the Atlantic, and was almost enthusiastic as he +rode on with Isabel. + +"Anabel is a perfect dear," said his companion, whose eyes and cheeks +were still glowing, and who looked like a mere girl. "I am much fonder +of her than I am of Paula, although we haven't a thing in common. She +was domestic and wild about children before she was done with dolls. Of +course she married at once. When we were at the High School together she +regarded my ambition to be first as a standing joke, and has never read +anything heavier than a classic novel in her life. Why I am so fond of +her I can't say, unless it is that she is absolutely genuine, and that +counts more in the long-run than anything else. Besides, she was my +first friend when I came here as a little girl. Her mother--Mrs. +Leslie--belongs to one of the old San Francisco families, and had always +known my mother. I love her as much as ever, but I am bound to confess +that I have missed her little. I suppose complete happiness comes when +you miss nobody." + +They rode on in silence, for the heat was increasing and the dust lay +thick on the road and swirled about their heads. There had been no rain +since March, and the sea that sent its daily fogs and breezes to cool +San Francisco and the towns about the bay was forty miles from +Rosewater. + +"Never mind," said Isabel, as Gwynne mopped his brow for the third time +and ostentatiously rubbed his face. "The nights are cool and the hot +weather will soon moderate down into the mellowness of October. When the +rains come--well it is a toss up, which is worse--the dust or the mud." + +"Heavens knows what we have swallowed," muttered Gwynne, who had served +on sanitary boards and heard much talk of germs. But Isabel only laughed +and told him to go to Anabel, who had a nostrum for every ill. A moment +later the road led up a hill-side, and at the summit she caught his +bridle and reined in. + +"I brought you this roundabout way on purpose," she said. "Is it not +what the poet would call a fair domain?" + +Below them was a vast flat expanse bounded opposite by a mountain chain, +that rose abruptly from the level, breaking into much irregularity of +surface above, but all its hollows blurred with woods. Beyond a dip +rose, far in the distance, a huge crouching formidable mass--St. Helena, +named after a Russian princess, the wife of the last of the Russian +governors of northern California. On the plain were golden fields, +orchards, compact masses of the eucalyptus-tree planted as shelters for +the cattle in time of storm or unbearable heat. Many cattle were roaming +about; on the grazing land in the far distance towards the town of St. +Peter--a mere white cluster in the north at the base of the range--were +the horses. Over the mountains lay a shimmering haze, blue or pink; it +was difficult to define whether the colors flowed through each other or +subtly united. + +"It is all yours," added Isabel, emerging from the role of the mere +cicerone. "Are you not proud of it?" + +Gwynne did in truth dilate, but hastily assured himself that it was at +the beauty of his estate, not at its paltry nineteen thousand acres. Had +he not shot over many an estate as large? Had not his grandfather come +into four times that number? True, most of them had not been entailed, +and this at least was his, his own. He quite realized it for the first +time; even as a source of income he had barely given it a thought; even +after Isabel's descriptions he had never exerted himself to picture it. +As a resource in his crisis it was all very well, but not worth while +shaping into concrete form until he could avoid it no longer. + +But now, as he gazed down and over the great beautiful expanse--for even +the mountain-side and much beyond was his--he felt a sudden passionate +gratitude to that Otis whose first name he had forgotten, pride fairly +invaded his chest; then, as he realized that it was visibly swelling +under Isabel's intent gaze, he blushed, laughed confusedly, turned away +his head. But his annoyance was routed by a speechless amazement, for +Isabel suddenly flung both arms round his neck and gave him a hearty +kiss. + +"There!" she exclaimed. "I never really liked you before, though I never +denied you were interesting enough. Men are nothing but overgrown boys, +only some are nice and some are not. You are. I'll really adopt you now, +instead of merely doing my bounden duty. Now look at those mountains in +the south." + +More disturbed than he would have believed possible at the young warmth +and magnetism of her embrace--although it was disconcertingly evident +that she would have kissed a small boy in precisely the same manner--he +composed his features to indifference and followed the motion of her +whip. + +In the dim perspective of the south she indicated Tamalpais and Monte +Diablo opposite, vague dim blue masses behind San Francisco. "Monte +Diablo and St. Helena are both old volcanoes," she continued. "I never +say dead volcanoes after the history and performances of Vesuvius and +Pelee. I wish one of our volcanoes would liven up. We might have fewer +earthquakes--although, to be sure, ours are supposed to be caused by +faulting--in so far as they know anything about it." + +"Do you think of nothing but earthquakes out here? You have made at +least three casual allusions since we met twenty-four hours ago, and in +southern California they are a part of every tradition." + +"If you had been brought up on earthquakes they would never be far from +your own mind. There is a theory that the reason for Californians taking +everything as it comes with a happy-go-lucky philosophy, lies in the +electrical air and the eight months of sunshine; but I believe it is due +even more to the earthquakes. If we can stand those we can stand +anything. It is in tune with the old gambling spirit that still colors +the country; no doubt has kept it alive. We never know what is going to +happen next, and we don't care. _Vive la bagatelle._ We have more to be +thankful for than the rest of the world, anyhow. Well, let us go down to +the house." + +The house with its out-buildings stood below them on a high knoll, three +sides surrounded by a grove of white oaks, the other open to the +mountains, although the front veranda was shaded by several spreading +trees, far apart. The large soft leaves and the pendent moss of the oaks +were gray with dust, but the shade was cool and delicious. Down in the +valley an old comrade here and there helped to tell the story of the +time when all these miles of valley and mountain were unbroken forest, +known only to the red man. And that was not a century ago. + +The house was frankly ugly, like all the farm-houses of its era, +although vastly to be preferred to the "artistic" structures succeeding +them. As the couple gave up their horses to a stately Jap, who had been +engaged by Isabel as butler, chambermaid, valet, and footman, and +entered the large living-room, Gwynne generously gave voice to his +approval. There were books to the ceiling, easy-chairs, the photographs +of friends that had decorated his rooms in London and Capheaton. His +eyes contracted as he saw a pile of London newspapers on the table, and +he turned away hastily and remarked that he was glad the fittings were +red, as it would be more companionable in winter; the rest of the year +he should live out-of-doors. The veranda, which surrounded the house, +was quite wide enough to live on, and below it was a border of garden +full of old-fashioned flowers. The bedrooms, gayly furbished with chintz +and matting, were up-stairs. + +"I didn't think it worth while to furnish a dining-room," said Isabel as +they returned to the lower floor. "It has always been the custom to eat +at the end of the living-room--when they didn't eat in the kitchen. And +what more dreary than to take your meals in a big country dining-room by +yourself! All the rooms here are large." + +She took him into the kitchen and introduced him to his cook, a stout +Mexican woman, who received him with excessive dignity, and wore nothing +but a single calico garment open to the chest. Then they mounted their +horses again and Isabel escorted him down to the great hay-barns, the +dairy, and cattle-sheds, introducing him to his hired men, who looked +him over frankly, but, somewhat to his surprise, addressed him as "sir." +He commented upon the unexpected deference as they rode back to the +house. + +"Oh, these country folk are naturally polite," said Isabel, dryly. "They +are not yet entirely corrupted by the yellow press, although independent +enough, as you will discover. Tact will manage any one. I have been +managing people all my life, and have prepared this force to like you. +Now I must be off. I am to lunch with Anabel." + +"You are not going to leave me!" cried Gwynne, in dismay. + +"The tragic moment must come sooner or later," she said, gayly. "And you +have forgotten your mail. It is somewhere under all those newspapers. +I'll ride out in a day or two and see how you are getting on." + +She gave him a cavalier little nod, touched her horse with the whip, and +a moment later was lost in a cloud of dust. Gwynne, angry and +disappointed, looked after her a moment, then shrugged his shoulders and +went in to his mail. + + + + +VI + + +Mrs. Tom Colton lived on one of the higher slopes of Rosewater in a +charming little double house all brown shingles and big chimneys. +Opposite was the paternal mansion on a high terrace, a modern +Renaissance structure, painted white and shaded with gigantic palms and +acacias. There was a porte-cochere but no balcony. + +All the "residences" of this quarter were modern and "artistic," even +the cottages; it was only on the lower slopes, close to the nucleus of +the town, that the many old-fashioned structures were but occasionally +thrown out of tune by a pile of shingles and stone. But all had gardens, +and there were several squares whence the streets radiated with as +puzzling an irregularity as London's own, but set thick with shade trees +tropical and boreal. On the high rim of the hills enclosing the town +were many small farms, and all were white with the Leghorn that laid the +golden eggs. These looked like a light fall of snow on the sunburned +hills, and were as refreshing as the garden trees upon which the hose +played night and morning. + +As Isabel left her horse at a livery-stable and walked up the wide clean +boulevard towards her friend's house, she met no one on the glaring +pavements, although here and there a buggy was hitched, and a patient +horse stood with his fore feet on the line of grass beside the +concrete, his head under a tree, and his eyes fixed expectantly upon +the door of the house. Indeed one might walk here at almost any hour of +the day and rarely meet another; all the energies were concentrated in +Main Street, although it was the town's standing grievance that it was +not the county-seat with a court-house that should make the pretensions +of St. Peter ridiculous. No small part of those energies in the business +district were devoted to humbling the rival, in the matter of commerce. +St. Peter retaliated with the accent of a fierce contempt. +"Chickenville!" "The Eggopolis!" quoth the local wits, and who shall say +that the darts did not quiver and sting, although the more flourishing +community never lowered its self-satisfied front? Even the rich banker +families were not at the trouble to put on airs. They did not possess a +handsome turnout between them, and as for dress there were few that did +more than keep themselves cool in summer and warm in winter. It was true +that Mr. Boutts possessed a runabout automobile in which he bumped his +family to San Francisco occasionally, but he was of the newer gentry and +owed his social pre-eminence to his wife and pretty daughter, and to his +conversion from the Congregational to the Episcopal Church. + +Isabel, of course, was a conspicuous member of the ancient aristocracy, +by virtue of her forefathers having owned half the county when the smoke +still rose from the wigwam; and although Mrs. James Otis had maintained +a haughty aloofness on her husband's ranch in summer, and later in a +Rosewater cottage, her neighbors thought none the less of her for that, +and Isabel, after school hours, played with their children. Later, even +the transgressions of her father, and her unchaperoned trip to Europe, +left her position secure. An Otis was an Otis. _Noblesse oblige._ +Aristocracies are aristocracies the world over. + +Mrs. Tom saw Isabel coming and opened the door herself; then as lunch +would not be ready for an hour, led her up to her large sunny bedroom, +where her three children, pretty fragile creatures in spite of their +tan, sweet-fed and spoiled, were playing on the floor. Isabel tossed and +kissed them, presenting them with a box of toys she had bought in Main +Street. Then she sat down with Anabel in the window to have a long talk. +But she quickly discovered that Anabel talked with one wing of her +brain, so to speak, and her roving gaze beamed constantly at the noisy +brood on the floor. Complacency, maternity, happiness, radiated from all +her sweet womanly little person, but in half an hour Isabel was casting +about for an excuse to leave directly after luncheon, although she had +promised to spend the day. As Anabel babbled on, while embroidering a +little frock, relating anecdotes of her marvellous children, commenting +upon the increasing extortions of the labor class, the iniquities of +servants, the mounting of prices in California, and the shocking mania +for cards that possessed Rosewater in common with the rest of the world, +there stole over Isabel a feeling of intolerable ennui. She had felt it +often enough in her sister's uneven domestic atmosphere, and now and +again in more regulated interiors, but never had the wings of her spirit +beaten so furiously as in this happy home of the most beloved of her +friends. The wave ebbed when the nurse came and carried off the +protesting trio, and as she sat with Anabel in the beautiful little +dining-room panelled and furnished with redwood, highly polished, the +table set with silver and crystal, the dainty meal beyond criticism and +served by a noiseless Chinaman, she was able to feel grateful that +Anabel was as happy in her way as herself in her own, and praised +everything with such warmth that the placid little lady waxed radiant. +Mrs. Tom was very golden-haired and blue-eyed and pink and white, but +none was further removed from insipidity than she. Her features were +strong, particularly her mouth and chin, and she had a repose of manner, +a squareness of shoulder, and a serenity of expression that gave her an +almost solid appearance. It was patent that she was making a success of +her life, and Isabel kissed her at parting with a hearty good-will; but +only the excessive dignity inherited from her Spanish ancestors arrested +a war-whoop as she almost ran down the hill. She had been detained until +five o'clock in spite of ingenious excuses, and when she mounted her +horse she galloped for the country at such a rate of speed that the +drowsy town turned over. When she reached a long and lonely stretch of +road she indulged herself in snatches of Spanish songs, and when she was +at home she did not go to bed till near midnight, so happy was she in +the contemplation of her solitude. + + + + +VII + + +Gwynne found few letters awaiting him; he had not encouraged +correspondence, and only his mother, Flora Thangue, and his solicitors +knew his address. It had been announced and reiterated in London that he +was making a tour of the world. During the first month of his absence +Lady Victoria had sent him a large bundle of clippings from newspapers, +some acid in comment upon his obvious intention of neglecting his duties +as a peer of the realm, his fruitless exposure of a chagrin at an +elevation in which he would find more and more consolation as time went +on. A few were sympathetic. Others went so far as to indicate a program +in which he might serve his country with modesty, if not with the +scintillations of the free-lance; and reminded him that peers had risen +to the post of prime-minister ere this, of viceroy, lord-lieutenant, +governor-general, and ambassador. Then, apparently, they dismissed him. +The fiscal question was acute. Dissolution threatened. There were bright +particular stars still in both parties, and the press and public had +enough to do with sitting in judgment upon their respective rays. + +In the two letters from his mother, written at Homburg, there was no +news beyond the letting of the properties and a bulletin of her health, +which promised an imminent fitness for travel. His solicitors wrote that +the income from the two estates was ample to keep the numerous women of +the family in comfort, and leave a surplus which should be paid to his +mother, according to his directions. This, with the southern ranch and +the San Francisco property, should yield her an income of two thousand +five hundred pounds a year. The confidential member of the firm hinted +that if his lordship found means of increasing her ladyship's income in +that land of gold and plenty it would be wise to do so, as her ladyship +knew less than nothing of economy and was even more deeply in debt than +usual. + +He missed Flora's gay letter of gossip, and looked with narrowing lids +at the pile of newspapers. None had been sent him before, and he had +left not a subscription behind him; but it was evident that his mother +and Flora were under the mistaken impression that he would welcome this +greeting in his new home. They had accumulated for a month. He +recognized the type of the leading dailies, and could guess the names of +the numerous illustrated weeklies. Suddenly he took them in his arms and +walked quickly over to the stove, his eye roving in search of a +match-box. But even as he stooped he rose again, and, blushing for his +weakness, carried them back to the table, tore them open with nervous +haste. He skimmed the great pages of the dailies from start to finish, +telling himself that he must have a breath from home, news from +authoritative sources, stated in excellent English; sickened with the +knowledge that he was but searching eagerly for a word of himself; +sickening more when he found none. Then he fell upon the weeklies, his +eye glancing indifferently from the paragraphs and presentments of the +royal and the engaged, but scanning every personality. He had had one +rival and there was much of him. + +Before he had finished the third his struggling pride conquered. He +gathered the heap and flung it into a corner, then caught up his hat and +struck out for the loneliest part of the ranch. He writhed in the throes +of disappointment, jealousy, disgust of self. He attempted consolation +by picturing all the other ambitious men he knew exhibiting a similar +weakness and vanity when there was no eye to see. His imagination did +not rise to marvellous feats--and what if it did not? He had never +aspired to be in the same class with other men. + +The bitter tide receded only to give place to apprehension. His +temperament was mercurial, balanced by a certain languor in the earlier +stages of emotion, and there had been little to depress his spirit +during those thirty years when all the fairies had danced attendance on +him; even defeat had but intoxicated his fighting instinct and given +another excuse for flattery and encouragement. During the eleven months +since he had left England he had experienced neither encouragement nor +flattery. He could not recall having made a profound impression upon any +of his casual acquaintances; he certainly had created no sensation. It +was true that his role had been that of the listener, the student, but +he had so long accepted himself as a personality, as the most remarkable +of England's younger productions, that he had been deeply mortified more +than once at the cavalier treatment of middle-aged business men with no +time to waste upon a young Britisher of no possible use to them. + +To-day he boldly faced the haunting doubt if he were really a great man; +if his success in England, as well as his phenomenal self-confidence, +had not been merely the result of an inordinate ambition fed by +fortuitous circumstances. He recalled that from childhood his +grandfather and his mother had practically decreed that the bright, +lovable, mischievous boy was to be a great man; that as he grew older +the entire family connection joined the conspiracy. It is easy enough to +believe in yourself when the world believes in you, and easy enough to +make the world take you at your own valuation when you have a powerful +backing, a reasonable amount of cleverness, a sublime audacity, the +power of speech, and a happy series of accidents. Were all great men +two-thirds accidental or manufactured? He felt inclined to believe it, +but while it soothed his torn and throbbing pride, it by no means +lessened his apprehension. + +Was he not a great man, even so? He felt anything but a great man at the +moment. He recalled that he had indulged in few lapses into complacency +since his departure incognito from England, and that he had deliberately +held self-analysis at bay by incessant travel and a compulsory interest +in subjects that did not appeal to him in the least. It was this absence +of interest after close upon a year in the country that appalled him as +much as his inner visioning. He hated the country. He hated its +politics, both parties impartially. He hated all the questions that +absorbed the American mind, from graft to negroes. He had sat in the +Congressional galleries in Washington, attended political meetings +wherever he could obtain admittance, studied the press in even the +smaller towns, travelled through the South and relieved himself of +whatever abstract sympathy he may have cherished for the colored race, +visited the sweat-shops of New York, the meat-packing establishments of +Chicago, the factories of New England, every phase of the great +civilization he knew of; and while he found much to admire and condemn, +both left him evenly indifferent. With all his soul he longed for +England. She might have her selfishness and her snobberies, lingering +taints in her political system, but she stood at the apex of +civilization, and her very faults were interesting; far removed from the +brazen crudities of the New World's struggle for wealth and power. And +although the blood of reformers was in his veins, and in his secret soul +he was an idealist to the point of knight-errantry, the desire for +reform had ebbed out of him during his American exile. And he knew the +fate of a good many American reformers. There were several in high +places at present, cheerfully trimmed down from the statesman to the +political ideal. Julia Kaye--clever woman!--had put the matter into an +epigram. The American statesman was the superior politician. + +And how was he, out of tune with every phase of the country, to find the +ghost of an opportunity to lead it? He was no actor. If he had a merit +it was sincerity, a contempt for subterfuge as beneath both his powers +and the lofty position to which he had been born. Moreover, he was +honest; an equally aristocratic failing and drawback. + +He recalled a conversation he had held in the smoking-compartment of a +Pullman with a sharp young politician, who had become voluble after +Gwynne had "stood him" two high-balls. + +"It's graft or quit," he had announced. "All this cleaning up in +insurance and what not, all this talk of curbing the trusts and the rest +of it don't fool yours truly one little bit. It's just the ins trying to +get ahead of the outs. It's not the honestest or the best man that gets +there in God's own country, but the smartest--every time. Those that are +crying the loudest against the grafters are just waiting for a chance to +graft good and hard themselves. I am, and I don't care who knows it. +Only I don't waste any strength kicking. The labor party works itself up +over trusts and capitalists, and most of the capitalists come out of +that factory, and are the first to grind those left behind them, under +both heels. They know what I know, and what you'll know before you get +through, that the only fun in life is to be got out of power and money." + +The face as sharp as a razor but by no means dishonest rose before +Gwynne. He had been a very decent little chap, and in the two days they +had travelled together he had displayed a photograph of his wife and +"kids," to whom he seemed even sentimentally devoted. Although Gwynne +had parted from the man with satisfaction it was impossible to despise +him utterly. Since then he had met many of his kind, more or less +honest, able, pettily ambitious, fairly educated, unlearned on every +subject except politics and the general business of the country; and all +equally unsympathetic. He made no pretence to judge the country on its +social or intellectual side, for he had been forced to avoid all groups +that might have enlightened him--although he found no difficulty in +assuming that well-bred and intellectual people were much the same the +world over, and was willing to give the United States the benefit of +every doubt. But its obvious side was the one that concerned him and his +career. In order to succeed--and without success life would mean less +than nothing to him--must he in a measure conform to conditions that +were the result of a century of complexities? He recurred to the dry +biographical sketches he had received, from certain of his travelling +companions, of the most distinguished--and successful!--men in American +politics to-day. Their ideals and their zeal for reform had played +between horizon and zenith like a flaming sword, so compelling the +attention of all that would pause to look that the diminishing +effulgence had been even more conspicuous; and now, although the sword +was occasionally brandished for form's sake, and was even sharper than +before, having learned to cut both ways, it had the rust of tin not of +blood on it, and deceived no one. But it had served its purpose--if to +be sure it had been needed at all--and its owners were past-masters of +success. Had he in him the makings of the mere trimmer and politician, +in addition to the miserable vanity that had riven him to-day? And would +some measure of great success won on those lines stir the dormant +greatness in him?--if there were any greatness to stir. This was the +fearful doubt, after all, that beset him. He almost saw with his outer +vision his ideals lying in a tumbled heap, as he felt himself on the +point of crying aloud that to feel once more that sense of power which +had exalted him above mere mortals, and given him an ecstasy of spirit +that no other passion could ever excite, he would sacrifice everything, +everything! + +He paused abruptly and looked about him. He was half-way up the +mountain. The great valley, that looked as if it might embrace the State +itself, lay before him. North and south the scenery was magnificent, +ethereal in the distance, melting everywhere into one of those lovely +mists that seem to have extracted the spiritual essence of all the +colors. But the very beauty of his new domain added to the sense of +unreality, of uneasiness, that had so often possessed him since he had +crossed the borders of the State. And it was all on such a colossal +scale. There could never be anything friendly, anything possessing, in a +land destined for a race of primeval giants. He felt so passionate a +longing for the sweet embracing historied landscapes of England that the +very violence of the nostalgia drove him homeward with the half-formed +intention of taking the first train for New York and the first steamer +out of it. Moreover, he was suddenly obsessed with the belief that if he +had greatness in him England alone held its magnet. + +But it was a long walk to his house, and he reached it late in the +afternoon, very tired and very hungry. When he entered his comfortable +living-room, redolent of flowers, he received something like a shock of +peace, and after he had taken a cold bath, he cursed himself roundly for +permitting the mixed blood in his veins to contrive at times the +temperament of an artist or of some women. As he sat down to a more than +palatable supper, he felt thankful that he had had it out with himself +so early in the engagement, and thought it odd if the Anglo-Saxon in him +could not drive rough-shod over his weaker outcroppings. + + + + +VIII + + +He did not see Isabel again for three weeks. Several days after his +arrival he received a note from her, briefly stating that she was +starting for Los Angeles to exhibit her prize Favarolles and Leghorns at +a "Chicken show," and after that would pay a long deferred visit to her +sister. "But I shall not be long," she added, possibly with a flicker of +contrition, "only they have been planning things for me for ages and I +am always putting them off. I will spend a week--not with them, exactly, +but at their disposal, and it will be a relief to have it over." + +Gwynne felt himself ill-treated, but shrugged his shoulders with a new +philosophy not all doggedness, and easily stretched to embrace the +vagaries of woman. And, in truth, he found an abundance of occupation. +Ascertaining that Mr. Leslie was away, he spent his time on the ranch, +examining its various yields, divisions, possibilities; to say nothing +of its books and history. The dairy was now an insignificant affair, +experiments having proved disastrous, and his superintendent advised him +to let it remain so. The greatest yield was in hay, and cattle raised +for the market. The last lessee had come to grief over blood horses, and +Gwynne's agents had accepted what remained of the racers and breeders in +default of apocryphal cash. Although advised that they could be sold to +advantage if haste were not imperative, Gwynne, who had a large balance +in the bank, determined to continue the experiment. Many acres of the +ranch were profitably let, although by the month only, as pasture both +for cows and horses. The orchards always made a handsome yield, and the +vegetable garden and strawberry beds needed only proper care to become +remunerative. Moreover, several acres had recently been planted with +kale, a favorite food of the conquering Leghorn, and there were fine +runs on the hills that might be fenced off for sheep--or chickens; but +at this point the superintendent always detected something even defiant +in his employer's cold indifference, and told his friends that the +Englishman was "haughty in spots." + +It was all very satisfactory, but in order to bring him a really +considerable increase of income he must dismiss his superintendent--who +now drew a salary of a hundred and fifty dollars a month, and who did +not inspire him with unbounded trust--and become his own manager, an +office which would not only make heavy demands upon his time, turning +him virtually into a farmer, with little leisure for the reading and +practice of law, but no doubt involve the sacrifice of money as well; he +did not flatter himself that he could learn to "run" a ranch of nineteen +thousand varied acres in a season. His superintendent was a half-breed +Mexican, the son of his cook, quick, voluble, and experienced in the +ways of the ranch, upon which he had worked since boyhood. Gwynne had +called on Mr. Colton at the bank two days after his arrival, and the old +gentleman, who had an eye like a gimlet and a mouth like a steel trap, +had consigned all "greasers" to subterranean fires, and emphasized the +fact that he had hired Carlos Smith by the month only. A better man +would demand a year's contract. There were infinite possibilities for +"the greaser" to pocket a goodly share of the profits, and "cover up his +tracks." And it might be a year or two before a superintendent could be +found capable in every way of managing so complicated a ranch. + +While he was still revolving the problem he met Mr. Leslie and Tom +Colton, who advised him to sell at least half the ranch to small +farmers. Properties of four and five acres were in increasing demand in +this fertile county, and equally difficult to obtain. He had but the one +interview with them, as they were starting the same day to attend to +some business in the north, but after revolving the matter in all its +bearings for another ten days he made up his mind to accept their +advice, consoled his crestfallen superintendent with the promise of +constant work, and set forth one afternoon to place his advertisements. + +He had visited the town but twice since his arrival, and then in the +morning. To-day he saw it characteristically for the first time. The +hills that formed a cove of the great valley were bright with their +houses and gardens, but very quiet. The long sloping block of Main +Street was crowded with wagons, buggies, and horses, that from a +distance looked to be a solid mass; and even when he rode into their +midst he found some difficulty in forcing his way. Where the dusty +vehicles were not moving they were tied to every post, the horses with +their front feet on the sidewalk observing the familiar throng with +friendly patient eyes. The shops were doing a rushing business, and so, +Gwynne inferred, were the banks. As for the saloons, their doors swung +with mechanical precision. Most of the farmers wore linen dusters and +broad straw hats, but their women had put on all their finery. The girls +of the town could be readily distinguished by their crisp muslins and +white hats and absence of dust. There were groups of Rosewater girls +holding rendezvous with their country cousins everywhere, although for +the most part in the drug stores, which, with their tiled floors and +ample space, looked like public reception-rooms. There were many knots +of men under the broad roof over the pavement, but in spite of the +ubiquitous saloon no drunkenness. Nor was there a policeman in sight. +Nor a shop for fire-arms. Gone were the old days when a man drank till +his brain was fire and his pistol went off by itself. The sting had been +extracted from California and she had settled down to practical +consideration of her vast resources; and in the comfortable assurance +that there was enough for all. Gwynne had not seen a beggar nor a pauper +since his arrival. + +He placed his advertisements with both the local newspapers, to avoid +the ill-will of either, posted others to the San Francisco press, and +was riding down Main Street in order to have a closer look at the long +hitching-rail lined on either side with another solid mass of horses and +vehicles, when he caught sight of Isabel driving a buggy and evidently +searching for an empty post. He laid aside his grievance and made his +way to her side. She quite beamed with welcome, and they disentangled +themselves into a side street, where there were empty posts. + +"I only got home at half-past eleven last night," she informed him. "The +boat was three hours late in starting, and when I finally made up my +mind to come by train the last had gone. So I overslept this morning or +I should have gone out to see you. But I meant to telephone you from +here and ask you to come out for the first duck-shooting--" + +"Duck-shooting!" Gwynne forgot the grievance. + +"The season opens to-day--the fifteenth of October. I had meant really +to ask you for the first thing this morning. Never mind, we have plenty +of time, and you will not have to go home for anything. Just wait here +until I do my errands." + +He tied his horse next to hers and sat down in the shade on a chair +provided by a friendly store-keeper. In less than half an hour she +returned, and they started for Old Inn. Isabel had never seemed so +charming to him as they rode slowly out of the town and along the dusty +road. Smiling and sparkling, she asked him rapid eager questions about +his ranch, his plans, his comforts, whom he had met, how he had passed +his days and evenings. The truth was she had practically forgotten him, +and her conscience smote her. Her week in San Francisco had waxed to a +fortnight, for she had enjoyed herself far more than was usual in the +company of her relatives. Lyster Stone was one of the most agreeable of +men when debts were not more than usually pressing, and as he had just +painted a drop curtain and sold a picture for a considerable sum, he had +replenished his own elaborate wardrobe, given his wife a new frock, +silenced the loudest of his creditors, and thought it worth while to +"blow the rest in" on a sister-in-law who seemed to have no taste for +matrimony. Moreover, he really liked and admired her, and he liked still +more to spend money. When his pockets were full of actual coin he +abandoned himself to sheer happiness. Debt had bred philosophy; +moreover, his wife relieved him of too depressing a contact with duns, +and there were times when his respite was longer than he deserved. If +his Paula had a little way of cajoling the amount out of her sister's +pocket, why not? He had never refused a friend in need, and, in truth, +could see no use for money except to spend it. If all the world did not +wag his way, so much the worse for cold-blooded mercenary superfluous +beings. So, the two weeks had been a round of dinners at the gay +Bohemian restaurants, chafing-dish suppers at his own and other studios, +the theatre and opera, and long walks about the brilliant streets at +night. It was all the more interesting to Isabel from its odd wild +likeness to foreign life. She had heard much of this American +"continental" flavor of San Francisco life, only to be tasted by +artificial light, and she had given herself up to it with an abandon of +which she possessed a sufficient reserve. But one cloud had risen on the +blue, and as it emptied itself in a torrent, it was a matter for +congratulation that it had tarried the fortnight. + +A woman of growing wealth, who affected artists' society, had continued +to live in her pretty odd little house, but had recently done it up like +a stuffed and scented jeweller's box. The tiny salon was her pride. It +was all cherry satin and white lace, the furniture lilliputian, to match +the proportions of the room and the lady. She was large-eyed, +dark-haired, pretty, and the room set her off admirably. It was here +that she invariably received her artist friends, and felt herself at +last set in a definite niche, in the city of individualities. One day, +in a spasm of generosity, she bade Stone, calling in a mood of unusual +depression, to paint it, and sell for his own benefit what, at least, +should be a glowing bit of still life. Stone began his work next day, +meaning, when the seductive interior was finished, to induce his patron +to sit on the doll-like sofa for a portrait, irresistible alike to her +vanity and pocket. But she capriciously went off to New York for +clothes, and he exhibited the picture in the shop of a dealer where +buyers were not infrequent. Thence, indeed, in the course of a few days +went a wealthy broker whose sign was three balls. He liked the picture, +but bargained that himself should sit on the sofa. His offer was +generous. Stone, to do him justice, demurred, for all Bohemia, at least, +knew the room. But Mrs. Paula wept at the thought of the lost hundreds, +and he succumbed. The result, at the owner's insistence, was exhibited. +The lady returned as unexpectedly as she had flown, and was asked at +every step if she had "seen her room." Scenting mystery, she went +to the gallery; and stood petrified before the faithful presentment +of her cherry-colored satin boudoir, the very edge of the sofa +accommodating a large gentleman with an eminent nose, a bulging +shirt-front--diamond-studded--and knees long severed. He looked like a +Hebraic Gulliver in Lilliput, and the unities were in tatters. She +stared, stuttered, wept. And then she descended upon Stone. + +Gwynne laughed heartily as Isabel related the episode, but they fell +into silence after they crossed the bridge and were able to accelerate +their pace. He made no effort to break it, although Isabel had never +found him more polite. She also thought him vastly improved with his +thick coat of tan, and almost picturesque in his khaki riding-clothes +and high boots. There were more subtle changes in him which it was too +warm and dusty to speculate upon at the moment. + +Gwynne had restrained his spontaneous delight in seeing Isabel again. +Not only did he have a genuine grievance in her neglect of him, but he +had no intention that she should fancy he had need of anything she could +give him, beyond superficial companionship and advice. More than once +during the past weeks he had caught himself longing so miserably for her +sympathy and the support of her strong independent character that it had +alarmed him. He realized for the first time what a prop and resource the +deep maturity and scornful strength of his mother had been. He must +brace and reinforce his character at all points if he persisted in his +determination to achieve the colossal task he had set for himself. +Woman's sympathy was all very well for some men, or for him in more +toward circumstances, but he had looked deeply into himself and been +terrified at unsuspected weaknesses. He had set his teeth and determined +to fight his fight alone. If he failed, at least he would have the +consolation of never having cried out to a woman: "Give me your help! I +need you!" + +He did not betray the least of this, but his first remark as they rested +the horses on the slight hill leading to Isabel's ranch was less +irrelevant than it may have seemed to himself. + +"I suppose you met all sorts of interesting Johnnies in that beloved San +Francisco of yours," he said, abruptly. + +"Of course. It will be quite cool in an hour and we can go out. +Fortunately I never gave away Uncle Hiram's shooting-togs, and he was +quite your height and figure. We'll take tea and sandwiches with us so +that we need not hurry home for supper." + +She suddenly forgot the ducks and pointed with her whip at the low hills +behind her house. The runs were covered with several thousand +snow-white, red-combed chickens, and all their little white houses shone +in the sun. The effect was by no means inartistic, but Gwynne elevated +his nose. He hated the sight of chickens. + +"Did you ever see anything more beautiful than that?" asked Isabel, +proudly. "They all know me, and I love every one of them." + +"I don't doubt there is money in them," said Gwynne, dryly. "But as a +pet I should prefer even a cat." + +"Oh, I only pet them when they are ill. There is an old feather-bed in +the house, and I put them in that when they need nursing at night. That +is a device of my own, and much better than going out at twelve o'clock +on a cold dark night. By-the-way, I think your idea of selling half or +more of Lumalitas admirable. Great tracts of land in this part of the +State are out of date, and more bother than they are worth, anywhere. +You can invest the money to great advantage in San Francisco; but I +think you should devote the rest of the ranch to chickens--" + +"No, madam!" Gwynne turned upon her the glittering eye of an animal at +bay. Then he laughed. "I have heard that proposition from every man I +have met and daily from my superintendent until I managed to suppress +him. I won't have a chicken on the ranch. The sight of them not only +fills me with ennui, but I have no intention of presenting your comic +papers with material. I could write their jokes myself--'_Gwynne before +and after_': Westminster in the background and a hayseed figure in front +addressing a constituency of chickens. Stumping the country with eggs in +my pockets for the children. Dining the eminent members of my +constituency on horse-meat, under the delusion that what is good for +chickens is good for votes. 'Leghorn Gwynne.' 'The Member from +Chickenville.' No thanks. No weapons that I can withhold." + + + + +IX + + +"This is all on my ranch," said Isabel; "so there is no danger of being +peppered. The rest of the marsh is owned by clubs, and as there was no +shooting here last year the ducks should be thicker than anywhere else. +We should get our fifty apiece in no time." + +They were entering a narrow slough, hardly wider than the boat. It cut +its zigzag way through the marsh for many miles, and they could follow +its course with the eye but a few feet at a time. Gwynne shipped the +oars and began to scull, his gun across his knee. Isabel, in front and +with her back to him, sat with her own gun ready for a shot. On one side +of them was a large piece of marsh-land, on the left, smaller patches, +and little islands caught in the long grasping fingers of the tide. +Gwynne had attired himself with an ill grace in a pair of his cousin +Hiram's rubber boots that completely covered his body below the waist, +and an old shooting-coat with capacious pockets. Isabel wore a similar +costume, and but for her hair might have been mistaken for a lad. She +possessed no interest for Gwynne whatever at the moment. Nor did +anything else but the prospect of a new and exciting sport. The October +evening was mellow and full of color, the entire reach of the marsh +steeped in a golden haze shed from the glory in the west. Even the +forests and the lower ridges rising to Tamalpais had something aqueous +in their vague outlines, swayed gently in the golden tide. Only the tide +lands were green; the very water was yellow. Here and there, but far +away, a mast or sail rose above the level surface of the marsh. From the +distance came the sound of constant shooting. + +Gwynne sculled silently, but with some impatience. They had left the +open creek far behind and had not seen a duck. Suddenly Isabel's gun +leaped to her shoulder. They rounded a sharp point and the whole surface +of the narrow slough between them and the next bend was black with +sleeping ducks. Gwynne's knee moved automatically to the seat in front +of him, and as the startled birds rose he and Isabel fired to right and +left. The scattering shot played havoc, and the second charge brought +down at least half as many on the higher wing. Isabel reloaded the guns +while Gwynne went for the ducks that had fallen on the land. He fell +into several holes himself, and returned covered with mud, but waving +his birds in triumph; and once more they stole softly along their +winding way. The shot had roused neighboring flocks; several dark clouds +had risen simultaneously, but in a few moments they settled again. + +"You had better use both guns," whispered Isabel, "and I will do the +reloading. We can't do much with these old-fashioned things at best." + +Gwynne accepted this act of sacrifice with a matter-of-fact nod, and it +was but a moment later that they came upon another flock. He fired with +an accuracy of aim that won him an admiring mutter, although to miss +would have been almost as noteworthy. But after repeating this +experience several times, he shrugged his shoulders and announced +himself blase. + +"I'd like something a little more difficult," he said. "Ten minutes of +this and we can glut the market." + +"All men are children," said Isabel, indulgently. "Tie up the boat and +we'll go after widgeon." + +They landed and stole softly over the larger reach of marsh-land, Isabel +in the lead as she knew every hole. It was ten minutes before she raised +her hand and pointed to a wilted but still effective screen. Under cover +of this they crawled towards a large pond on which ducks were resting +but by no means asleep. Before the guns were shouldered they had taken +flight; so few were brought down on the wing that Gwynne's interest +revived, and he followed Isabel eagerly towards another pond with a +better blind. Here they were more wary and more fortunate, and Isabel +took a curious pleasure in watching the manifest bliss of her companion. +She had never seen him look really happy before. Upon his return to +Capheaton from his triumphant battle on the hustings he had been as +impassive as his traditions demanded. On the morning of his engagement +he had looked rather silly to her detached eye; and immediately after, +tragedy and trouble and infinite vexation had claimed him. But this +evening, with his cap pushed back, his nostrils distended, his eyes +sparkling, he looked like any other young fellow to whom the present was +all. Isabel reflected somewhat cynically that it was the opportunity to +kill something that had effected this momentary reconciliation with +life. But she was too good a sportswoman not to understand his mood, and +when he had waded into the lake and returned flushed and triumphant with +his bag, she complimented him so warmly that he laughed aloud in sheer +delight. + +"We have enough for once," she began, but he would not hear of returning +to the boat even for the refreshment of tea, and they went on and on +until their feet were as weary as their shoulders under the burden that +was Isabel's part to string while her partner enjoyed himself. + +"But we must really go," she announced, finally. "We have a long stretch +out in the open creek after we leave the slough, and it is not so easy +to keep the channel after dark. I have lost track of things and don't +remember what time the moon rises. You can come every day if you like; +and four in the morning is the best time if you are energetic enough--" + +"I would get up at midnight--stay up all night. But I am quite willing +to return now--and not for tea. I should like several of these ducks for +supper, if your Jap is less haughty than mine." + +Their way lay through the middle of the marsh-land. It was not until +they reached the slough that she uttered a loud sharp cry. The boat was +at least three feet below them and there was nothing at either end but +mud. + +Isabel stamped both feet in succession and flung her burden to the +ground. "Why, _why_ did I take Mac's word?" she exclaimed, furiously. +"He always makes mistakes about the tide--he hasn't an inch of memory +left. Why didn't I look at the calendar? Or think? This comes of going +off for three weeks instead of staying at home and attending to +business. I had a confused idea that this was the 'good week.' Great +heavens!" + +Gwynne had watched her with considerable interest and curiosity. But he +answered, soothingly: "Well, what of it? The tide turns, doesn't it." It +happened that he had had no experience of marsh-lands. + +"Yes--in six hours." + +"Six hours! Well, what of it? It is all in the day's work. Look at it as +a jolly adventure." It was his first opportunity to console and he +hastened to take advantage of it. "We have tea and sandwiches, warm +enough clothing, and the weather is perfection. If we get stiff and +chilly we can walk--" + +"Walk? In these rubber boots? I am nearly dead already." She had a wild +impulse to drop her head on his shoulder and weep; but her pride flew to +the front and she shrugged her shoulders and remarked, airily: "I don't +really mind anything much except being an idiot. However, I'll make it +up to you. I can cook ducks better than Chuma. You make the tea." + +Gwynne made a fire out of decayed tule weed and driftwood, then climbed +down into the boat and brought up the provisions and utensils intended +for an earlier interlude. The tea warmed and stimulated both, and they +knelt by the fire and toasted the ducks at the end of the boat-hook, +scowling with a preternatural earnestness both were too hungry to +observe. Then they fell to, and it is doubtful if either had ever eaten +with a keener relish. They were obliged to use their fingers, and, as +they had no salt, to shred the ham and wrap it about the morsels of +duck, but to such minor matters they gave not a thought, and consumed +four teals and every scrap they had brought from home, as well as +another pot of tea. Isabel, recalling the injured air of her father, +uncle, and brother-in-law when their comfort was rudely disturbed, +warmed to Gwynne, who was good-humored and amused. Even the reflection +that he had roughed it in far worse straits than this, or that had he +the legal right to grumble he might possibly use it, did not alter the +pleasant impression he made as he tramped out the fire, washed his hands +in the marsh grass, and then stretched himself full length with his +pipe. She lit a cigarette, but had not smoked half its length when she +sprang to her feet. + +"Look!" she said. "We must get into the boat. It is getting damper every +moment, and the fog will make us feel as if we were in our graves if we +don't sit on something dry." + +She had pointed northward, and Gwynne saw a phantom mountain moving +along the level surface of the marsh with the quiet plodding motion of a +ship under full sail in a light breeze. The curious combination of +images fascinated him, and he watched the stealthy silent progress of +this night visitor from the tule lands of the north, that looked as if +it might have obliterated the world. As he jumped down into the boat he +saw before him, on three sides of him, the sparkling night. Then as +Isabel laid her hands on his shoulders and he lifted her down, the fog +swept over them, and there was nothing to do but sit and watch the glow +of pipe and cigarette; even their own outlines were barely visible. + +"I fancy it will go home when the moon rises," said Isabel, with a +little shiver. "Are you cold?" she asked, solicitously. + +"No," replied a tart voice. "Why didn't you let me ask that? You are not +my mother. We can make tea at intervals. How long do you suppose the +tide has been out?" + +"About two hours." + +"I am quite comfortable and have never resented any adventure. And this +is the appropriate time and place for a certain story. As I remarked +before I shall not know you until I have heard it. Pasts are dead +walls." + +"It is not necessary that you should know me." + +"I think otherwise. You are my one friend among eighty millions of +aliens, or ought to be. I shall continue to feel a superior sort of +acquaintance until you have taken me into your confidence." + +There was a movement of the fog that he inferred was a shrug. "Very +well," she replied, without a break in her cool even voice. "I suppose I +shall enjoy talking about myself. It is not often I have had the +opportunity to indulge in a monologue in my family, and you certainly +are at my mercy. If you attempt to flee you will be mired like the boat, +and I could not pull you out." + +He had never felt the least curiosity about the past history or the +inner life of a mortal before, and in normal circumstances Isabel's +would not have appealed to him. But her instrumentality in changing the +whole current of his life had alarmed his masculinity into a resolve to +demonstrate his superiority if it came to a contest of wills; given +birth to a subtle assumption of proprietorship, indifferent in material +things, but pressing towards the guarded chambers of the spirit. Isabel, +vaguely uneasy earlier in the day, began to appreciate the advance of an +outer and powerful force upon her precious freedom, and resented it. And +while she made up her mind that if it came to a silent contest of wills, +hers at least should not be conquered, she reflected that the deeper +intimacy, certain to ensue if she gave him her confidence, would insure +her a firmer and subtler hold upon his destinies. + + + + +X + + +"Of course I lived two lives before my father's death. My days were +sufficiently filled with him, to say nothing of making both ends meet; +for even after my uncle's death, I had only a small income until the day +of my complete liberty came. I slept soundly enough when I was not +following my father about the house with a candle, or about the hills +with a lantern. But such a life preyed upon my spirits. I imagined +myself both melancholy and bitter and grew unhealthily romantic. But +from the conditions of my life I had two escapes--in books and in +dreams. My father hated company more and more and I rarely left him for +a dance or one of those church festivities where all the young people of +my set were sure to meet. I knew that I was regarded as rather a tragic +figure, and this enhanced my morbid egoism. I wonder if I shall ever be +as really happy again! + +"During the year following my father's death I lived out here alone, but +with my hands tied by the executors of my uncle's will. I felt myself +quite the enchanted princess and put in most of my time dreaming about +the prince. I suppose no girl ever had such wild and impossible notions +of love. That is to say most girls have, but I had peculiar +opportunities for indulgence and elaboration. At the same time I +despised or disliked every man I knew or ever had known--with the +possible exception of Judge Leslie. Not only had I found all the men of +my little personal world weak, or selfish, or tyrannical, but those I +knew almost as well were narrow, or commonplace, or uninterested in +anything but local politics or making money, or both combined. Not but +that Rosewater is the world in little. You never read of any old Italian +duchy where there was more jealousy and intrigue; more silent and tense, +or open and gnashing struggle for supremacy than is centered in these +three banks. They have prevented the town from increasing in size and +importance, in spite of its prosperity, through their machinations +against one another. If a stranger comes to the town intending to invest +his money in some one of the flourishing industries, or to introduce +another, the banker to whom he brings a letter, or whom he happens to +meet first, terrifies him with tales of the rapacity and dishonorable +methods of his rivals; and the other two, who fear that the first will +get the stranger's business, warn him that Mr. Colton, for instance, +never gave an hour's mercy. The three have made slow, sure, dogged +fortunes, but each has prevented the others from becoming millionaires, +and Rosewater from taking its proper place as county seat. And they are +all afraid of new-comers, new capital, of authority passing out of their +hands. They are careful not to charge exorbitant rates of interest, and +every farmer and merchant in the county borrows from them; partly from +habit, partly because the banks are uncommonly sound. They foreclose +without mercy, but that does not frighten their old patrons, who have +the perennial optimism of the country. The only capital they have not +succeeded in frightening off is that controlled by the great +corporations. One or two have wedged their way in and others will follow +in time. Doubtless when the younger men get the reins in their hands +they will trim with the times, but the older seem to be Biblical if not +Christian, and the consequence is that most of the younger have left for +a wider field. + +"Finally the day came when I could turn my back on California, and I +felt sure that I should remain away for ten years at least. I thought +that the liberty I had longed for all my life was mine at last. In a +conducted tour, I soon discovered, there was little liberty, to say +nothing of privacy. Before I had been two days in the train I was made +to feel that there was something wrong with a person that showed a +disposition to retire into herself. She was either aristocratic, or had +something to hide, unless she responded to the confidences natural to +people of that class. As there were just eighteen in the party, of +course I always had a room partner, and there was not a woman in the +entire company that I would have known from choice. However, it was +excellent discipline, not unenlightening, and the end came in six weeks. +They sailed from Naples and I wandered about by myself. In a way the +liberty was intoxicating, but of course the sum of it was lessened by +the daily irritations of travel in Europe: the rapacity of the Italians +and French, the wretched trains, the hordes of vulgar tourists, mostly +of my own nation, the absurd primness, quite foreign to my nature, I was +forced to assume when alone with a man who was neither English nor +American, the awful fatigues, the ennuis of long rainy days in the +second-rate hotels and pensions I had to frequent. Still, I was too +young for any unpleasant impression to take root and discourage me, and +there was much that was wholly delightful. I spent weeks in a city or +even village that took my fancy. But even so it was not long before I +realized that my liberty was as far off as ever, because my soul at +least was possessed by the image of the prince, the more tormenting and +insistent as his outlines were so remarkably vague. In the intervals +when novelty ceased to appeal, when my very eyes refused to look at +things, I pictured inexpressibly thrilling and romantic futures. Then I +would fall into a panic at the passing of youth, for a woman never feels +so old again as between eighteen and twenty-five--her first +quarter-century. + +"And I did not lack opportunities. I met many people, some of them quite +charming. But they left me cold. + +"Then I lived the student life in Paris, studying art just enough to +give me the raison d'etre. It was very gay, very irresponsible, very +educating to a provincial miss. The restaurants with their sanded +floors, and the cosmopolitan mixture of students, generally eccentric to +look at, brandishing temperament until the poor thing must have been +worn out before its harness of technique was ready--all was a perpetual +source of delight to me, and I used to let my mind dwell on Rosewater +for the sake of enjoying myself with the more wonder and gratitude. + +"But of course in such a life I had to have a companion, I could not +long go to students' restaurants alone. I had taken a tiny flat in the +Latin Quarter at the top of a house, and overlooking a convent where the +nuns were always walking in the garden. A _femme de menage_ cooked my +breakfast and kept my rooms in order; but although I was quite +comfortable and never lonely, I had not been established a fortnight +before certain experiences at the restaurants and on the street, which +you can imagine for yourself, convinced me that I could not live alone. +So I looked hurriedly over the field, and decided that an American girl +in my class suggested fewest complications. Moreover, she interested me. +She had a pale tense face, rarely spoke to anybody, and worked as if her +life depended upon every stroke, although her talent was not +conspicuous. It was not easy to approach her, but one day, after I had +dined alone in my flat five times in succession, I noticed that she was +paler than usual, and that her hands were trembling. Then I felt certain +she was in trouble, and it would have been my instinct to help her in +any case. I joined her as we left the atelier, and asked her to walk a +bit. It was not long before she admitted that her money was practically +gone, and that her family would not send her any more; they had never +approved of her coming to Paris to study art. They were not at all well +off, and as she had a facility in trimming hats they had thought it her +duty to contribute more immediately to the support of the family. She +had not advanced as rapidly as she had hoped to do, and it would be +insupportable humiliation to return. + +"Here was my opportunity. I exultingly invited her to share my +apartment, told her that my income was quite enough for two, that I was +merely studying life, and that her protection would more than compensate +me for the little extra outlay. She declined at first, hesitated for a +week; but in the end she came. I grew very fond of her, and she +interested me more and more. Her real bitterness taught me what a purely +youthful symptom mine had been, and she was rather a clever girl, often +entertaining. She was about twenty-six, I fancy, and had received a good +education at the academy of the Western town in which she had been born. +Her grandparents were Italian emigrants, and she had fine black eyes +and a beautiful mouth. + +"Well, before many months had passed I knew that she was in desperate +straits, and she offered to go away, reiterating that she had only +intended to take advantage of the temporary haven while she fed her +courage and painted something that might sell. I knew that if she left +me she would throw herself into the Seine, and I persuaded her to stay. +It is not difficult to persuade a stricken woman to remain under a +friendly roof. I was full of sympathy for the poor little thing, but I +don't deny that I was immensely interested, and fairly palpitated with +the thought that I was actually seeing life at first hand. Who the hero +of her romance was I never discovered, except that he was of her own +race, and married, a fact he had concealed until ready to leave Paris. +She told me enough to make me hate all men so violently that the prince +took himself off and left me in peace. But I had trouble enough in my +household. As time went on Veronica's alternate attacks of melancholy +and hysteria were terrible. I sat up night after night to keep her from +throwing herself out of the window; at times she seemed to be quite off +her head. And then she still loved the wretch, and would maunder by the +hour. But it ended, as everything does; and the poor girl died. I have +no desire to linger over the climax. If anything was needed to set the +final seal upon my disgust with life at first hand it was the mean and +sordid details that attend death and burial in Paris. The landlord +behaved like the mercenary fiends they all are; I was obliged to call in +the assistance of the American consul before I could get the body out of +the house, and between all the trouble and fuss poor Veronica's story +was published from the house-tops. + +"As soon as it was over I left Paris and started to travel slowly +through Germany, feeling now a real sense of liberty, inasmuch as I was +sure I could be all intellect henceforth, dependent upon nothing so +unsatisfactory as human happiness. I never wanted another real contact +with life. I would travel, and study, and develop my mind, possibly some +latent talent. Many talents are manufactured anyhow, and the world is +always hailing them as genius. + +"But, of course, in time, and with constant change of scene, to say +nothing of youth, the impression faded; the painful experience hovered +faintly in the background of the past; the romantic imp in my brain, a +little pale and emaciated from its long sojourn in the cellar, resumed +the throne. Once more I began to realize that I was human, and to cast +about for the mate that must surely be roaming in search of me. It was +then that I arrived in Munich. + +"I saw him first in the Englischergarten. You remember it, that +wonderful imitation of a great stretch of open country, with fields +where they make hay, and bits of wild woods, and crooked pathways, and +bridges over a branch of the Isar, greenest and loveliest of rivers. And +then the little beer-gardens, where the people are always sitting and +listening to the band--and beyond the tree-tops, the spires and domes of +the beautiful city. + +"I was standing by the lake watching the swans when he rode by, and I am +bound to say that he made no great impression. I hardly should have +noticed him had it not been for his excessively English appearance, and +a certain piercing quality in the glance with which he favored me. I +should never have given him another thought, but a week later I met him +formally. It came about oddly enough. + +"That evening in looking through my trunk for a business paper I came +upon a letter of introduction given me by a friend I had made in Italy. +It was to a Baroness L., of Munich. I had quite forgotten it, and the +sight of it inspired me with no desire for the social curiosities. I was +infatuated with Munich, and its exteriors satisfied me. It has a large +courteous grandly-hospitable air, as if it were the private property of +a king, to which, however, all strangers are royally welcome. It is the +ideal king's city: life but no bustle; neither business, as we +understand the word, nor poverty; a city of infinite leisure and +infinite interest, a superb living picture-book, where one is ever +amused, interested, both stimulated and soothed. I had been in it three +weeks and had almost made up my mind to live there, and dream away the +rest of my life. Knote and Morena, Feinhals and Bender were singing at +the Hof Theatre. Mottl was conducting. Lili Marberg's Salome was +something to be seen again and again. You forgot the play itself. And +Bardou-Mueller's Mrs. Alving! I did not sleep for two nights. + +"Well, I left the letter on my table, instead of returning it to the +portfolio of my trunk, and it exercised a certain insistence. What are +letters of introduction for? And should I not see the social life of +Europe when the opportunity offered? So I left a card on the baroness. +She returned it in the course of a day or two, then wrote, asking me to +drink tea with her. I went. There were perhaps fifty people there. I +have not the faintest idea who they were or what they looked like. +Prestage--that was only one of his names, but it will do--asked +immediately to be introduced to me, and we talked in a corner for an +hour. Before we had talked for ten minutes I knew that the great gates +were swinging open. It is not possible for a woman to define one man's +fascination to another, and I hardly know myself why this man so +completely turned my head. He was not exactly good-looking, but he had +remarkable eyes and a singular tensity of manner, which made me almost +breathless at times. He was, moreover, brilliantly educated and +accomplished, and the most finished specimen of the man of the world I +had met. He was an American of inherited fortune who had spent the +greater part of his life in Europe, alternating between Paris and +London, although he knew the society of other cities well enough. His +contempt for the vulgarity of the huge modern fortunes, and his +admiration for Munich, were the first subjects to discover to us the +similarity of our tastes. + +"We soon discovered others. I think he fell as deeply in love with me as +he was capable of doing. He was forty-one and had fairly exhausted his +capacity, for he had lived the life of pleasure only; but no doubt I was +something new in his experience, and penetrated the ashes like a strong +western breeze. I have seen him turn quite white when I suddenly +appeared at one of our trysts. + +"Of course I lived in a pension. I had no private sitting-room, and he +positively refused to sit in the salon a second time. So we used to take +interminable walks about Munich, lingering in all the quaint old Gothic +corners, along the magnificent stretches of Renaissance; lunching on the +terraces of the restaurants under the shade of the green trees, or in +quaint little back gardens set in the angle of buildings as mediaeval as +Rothenburg; the people looking down at us from the narrow windows or the +little balconies. We spent hours in the Englischergarten, sitting on the +banks of the Isar; often took the train to the beautiful Isarthal and +spent the day in the woods; or sailed on one of the lakes with the +tumbled glittering peaks of the Alps always in sight. We visited +Ludwig's castles together, attended peasants' festivals in the +mountains, lunching in some dilapidated old garden of a Gasthaus. And of +course we went constantly to the opera. It was positive heaven for a +time, and as romantic as the heart of any romantic idiot could wish. I +was so happy I could not even think, even when I was alone. I simply sat +like one in a trance and gazed into space, vague rose-colored dreams +turning the slow wheel of my brain. No one paid any attention to us. +Everybody in the pension was studying something; we avoided the American +church and consulate and even the Baroness L. We were determined to have +our blissful dream unvulgarized by gossip. + +"There is no doubt that for a time my young enthusiasm gave him back a +flicker of the romance of his own youth, but of course it couldn't last. +I hardly know when it was I began to realize that the whole base of his +nature was honeycombed with ennui, and that any structure reared upon it +might topple at a moment's notice. I had been steeped to the eyes in the +present. I had no wish to marry. Marriage was prosaic. Life was a fairy +tale, why materialize it? I soon discovered that man's capacity for +living on air is limited, and I had almost yielded to his entreaties to +cross to England where we could marry without tiresome formalities, when +one day--this was perhaps a month after we had met--he was late at a +tryst. I lived a lifetime in five minutes. When he arrived he was so +apologetic and so charming that if I had been an older woman I should +have known that something was wrong. The next day, as it happened, I had +to go to bed with influenza, and wrote him that I might not get out for +a week. He wrote twice a day and sent me flowers. On the fourth morning +I felt so much better that I sent him a note by a _dinstmann_ telling +him that I should lunch on the terrace of the Neue Buerse restaurant. He +was not awaiting me; nor did he come at all. Later I saw him driving +with an astonishingly handsome woman; who looked as if she had been born +without crudities or illusions. + +"There are no words to express the tortures of jealousy and disgust that +I endured that afternoon. But at five came a note stating that he had +been out of town on a lonely voyage of discovery, and begging me to come +for a cup of chocolate at the Cafe Luitpold--where we had gone so often +to watch the motley crowd. I went, wrath and horror struggling in my +heart with the sanguineness of woman. He had never been so charming and +so plausible. I let him go on, exulting in the discovery that he was a +liar, for I knew that it pushed me a step towards recovery. When he had +finished I told him that I had seen him in the Hofgarten. I never shall +forget how white he turned. But if he had been an adventurer his mind +could not have been more nimble. He recovered himself instantly, +admitted the impeachment, insisted that he had just returned when I saw +him, had accepted a seat in the lady's carriage as he was entering his +hotel--before he had time to go to his room and find my note. I knew +that he was lying, but when he changed the subject to impassioned +pleading that I would cross to England at once, I was forced to believe +that he loved me. + +"But I was miserably undecided. Moreover, I could not leave Munich. My +quarterly remittance was unaccountably delayed. I told him this. He knew +that I would not move without my own money, but he sent off several +cables. The reply came that the drafts had gone and must have been lost +in the mails. Duplicates would be sent. There was nothing to do but +wait. + +"I suppose that money enters into all things. It certainly ruled my +destiny. The fortnight that ensued I never think of if I can help it. He +was desperately bored with Munich, but too polite to leave me alone. I +saw him with the woman three or four times. She was an Austrian who did +not visit the Baroness L., and she was staying at his hotel. There was +no doubt that he still wished to marry me, but I was in even less doubt +that his ruined nature would yield more and more to this sort of +fascination when my novelty had worn thin. Before my money arrived my +mind was made up. I dared not trust myself to the seduction of his +manner and voice--he was a past-master in the art of making love. I +wrote him that I would not marry a man I could not trust, and fled to +Vienna, telling my Munich bankers to keep my letters until I sent for +them. For two weeks I travelled madly through Austria and Hungary. Never +for a moment was I free of torments. Never before had I actually +comprehended what love meant. I hardly ate or slept. I arrived at a +place only to leave it. The hotel-keepers thought I was the American +tourist overtaken by that final madness they had always anticipated. +When the fortnight finished I looked back upon an eternity in purgatory. +I surrendered; at least he loved me in his way. He had never ceased to +urge our marriage. Who could say that I might not be fascinating enough +to hold him? It was worth the trial, and I despised myself for laying +down my arms without a struggle. + +"I took the Oriental express from Budapest, but during the journey, +swift as it was, I underwent certain reactions. I knew that he must have +left Munich, that all I could do was to take a letter to his bank and +ask that it be forwarded. I wrote the letter as soon as I arrived, but +decided to post it; my pride revolted at facing the sharp eye of the +person that handled the letters of credit. I had gone to the bank with +Prestage more than once. + +"As soon as the letter was posted I experienced a certain measure of +peace, having done all I could. Nevertheless, to sit still was +impossible, and I set out for a walk. It was one of those brilliant +clear crisp days with which that high plateau can put even California to +the blush. I saw that all the tram-cars were crowded, and that carriage +loads of people had flower pieces. I asked if it were a Feiertag and was +reminded that it was the 1st of November, All Saints' Day; Munich was on +its way to the several cemeteries to decorate the graves. I had seen All +Saints' Day in Venice and felt a mild curiosity to compare the Bavarian +festival with the Italian. So I walked out to the great Alt Sud Friedhof +where so many celebrities are buried, and where I fancied the scene +would be most complete. When I arrived at the entrance the frames that +had been set up in the outer court were almost denuded of the flower +pieces the countrywomen had brought in to sell, but I bought a wreath at +the solicitation of a peasant in a picturesque head-dress, and followed +the crowd. The cemetery is on three sides of the entrance and enclosed +by a high brick wall. I stood a moment at the inner official entrance, +hardly knowing which way to turn; but seeing a number of staring people +in a corridor on my right that faced one great division of the cemetery, +I was turning into it mechanically when a policeman waved me back with +the information that the entrance was at the other end. But not until I +had seen, stared, and gasped. In an alcove was a figure, almost upright, +that, in the first dazed seconds I took to be a wax-work, but +immediately knew to be a dead woman. As I almost ran out I recalled that +in Bavaria the dead are taken from the house within six hours, and are +kept in a public mortuary for three days, or until all danger of +premature interment is over. + +"I do not think I should mind, particularly, seeing a ghost; I am sure +my mental curiosity would get the better of my unwilling flesh; but I +have a real horror of the corpse. I tried to forget the grotesque +exhibition I had stumbled upon, in the novel and interesting scene about +me. The long aisles of the cemetery were filled with well-dressed +people, some strolling, others decorating, all apparently enjoying +themselves. Almost all of the graves and monuments were bedecked, and +presented a most Elysian appearance with the masses of bright flowers, +the streamers of wide ribbon, the lighted lanterns, many of them antique +and beautiful, above all the tall flambeaux, whose flames looked white +and unearthly against the bright atmosphere. Above was a deep-blue sky +with those thick low masses of snow-white clouds one sees only in +Bavaria. + +"But that grotesque little figure with its shrunken yellow face under +the pitiless sun glare, its bony old hands, attached I knew, to the +string of a distant bell, did not leave my mind for an instant. I walked +down every path, I examined every interesting monument, I even went into +the other divisions where there are so many statues in the alcove tombs; +but all in vain. I felt that I should see that old woman to the end of +my days. I could recall the very pattern of the cheap black lace of her +cap. There was but one way to rid my mind of the obsession, and that +was to return to the corridor, stand in front of every earthen figure, +remain there until my mind was satiated, in consequence delivered. + +"I set my teeth and went back to the Leichenhalle. Of course there were +many to keep me company. I looked long and unflinchingly at two +gentlemen in evening clothes, an old maid dressed for once on earth as a +bride, a young woman and her infant. The coffins lay on an inclined +plane and the edges were so concealed by a mass of flowers and greenery +that the ghastly company looked as if half rising to hold a reception. + +"And then I stood for I do not know how long before the alcove next to +the old woman beside the exit, not knowing whether I were turned to +stone or sitting by the Rosewater marsh indulging in some wild morbid +flight of imagination. + +"For there he was. For a second I did not fully recognize him, he was so +yellow, his lower jaw had so hideously retreated, completely altering +the slightly cynical expression of the mouth. The bright gay sunlight +searched out every line carved by too much living, the little wrinkles +about the eyes, the weakness of the handsome polished hands. He looked +unspeakably aged and hideous. I had never dreamed that a brilliant mind +could leave so miserable a shell behind it, that the body was such a +mean poverty-stricken thing, a thing to be thrust out of sight as soon +as it had fulfilled its work of balking and ruining the soul. I had +never looked at Veronica after her death, and only once at my father, +who had not horrified me, for here the undertaker has arts unknown, +apparently, in Bavaria. + +"My love died without a gasp. I shrank and curdled with horror that I +had loved that hideous clay. What he had aroused in me was merely the +response of youth to the masculine magnet, a trifle more specialized +than I had heretofore encountered; the inevitable fever when infection +appears. All personal feeling vanished out of me so completely that even +while I stood there I felt the same pity for him that I had for the +others, the helpless dead so mercilessly exposed to the vulgar +indifferent crowd. If I could have hurried him into the privacy of the +grave I would have exerted every effort, but before the laws of the +country I was powerless. As I was leaving the cemetery I discovered that +I still carried the wreath. I went back and added it to the bank of +greenery which his valet no doubt had provided. + +"When I returned to my pension I sent for the man and learned that he +and the Consul-General of the United States had done all that the +authorities had left in their hands. The body was to be shipped to New +York within the month. He had died of Bright's disease. It had declared +itself a day or two after I left. After ten days of intermittent +suffering, during which the valet had felt no apprehension, he had died +suddenly. + +"I left Munich the same day. If I have failed to give you any adequate +impression of my agonies, it will be next to impossible to describe my +subsequent states of mind. Indeed I have little remembrance of my mental +condition during the weeks of travel in Switzerland and Italy that +followed. I was deliberately living up on the surface of my nature, +indifferent to what was awaiting recognition below, although I knew it +to be nothing unwelcome. Then, finally, I felt the time had come when I +could draw aside the black curtain which I had hung for decency's sake +between my consciousness and my depths, and tell the new guest to come +forth. The guest was the liberty I had waited for all my life. I felt +indescribably free, light, strong. The tyranny of love, even while it +was but the love idea, that had shackled me for so many years, narrowing +my interests, warping my imagination, clouding the future, was +dissipated at last. I had paid the tribute to my youth and sex. I felt +really alive for the first time, existing in the actual not in the dream +world. There are women and women; and quite enough of the fine old +domestic order to keep the world going; but there is a vast and +increasing number that are never really alive and worth anything to +themselves or life until they have worked through that necessary +madness, buried it, and settled down to those infinite interests upon +which matrimony, happy or otherwise, bolts a thousand doors. Some day I +will tell you my theory of what such women are really born for, but you +have had enough for one night and the story is finished." + + + + +XI + + +Gwynne, between the fog and the story, felt congealed to the marrow. He +leaned his elbows on his knees and stared at the bottom of the boat. It +was the second time that the dark and carefully guarded recesses of the +human soul had been opened to him, but Zeal's at least were a man's, and +he had listened to him with a certain passive acceptance cut with +lightning-like visions of his own ruined future. He had never been +invited into a woman's crypts before, and he hardly knew whether he were +gratified or repelled. She had been as brutally truthful as he would +have expected her to be if she spoke at all, but he doubted if he +understood her as well as he had expected. He had been assured that she +had once at least possessed the capacity for intense feeling, but what +was the result? And were the depths frozen solid? Or merely buried +alive? + +He remarked after a moment: "I cannot think of anything appropriate to +say, so perhaps it is as well to say nothing. I certainly do not feel +that you are in any need of my sympathies, for you are quite terribly +strong. When did all this happen?" + +"About eight months before I went to England." + +"What did you do with yourself in the interval?" + +"I climbed in the Alps a bit, then went to Rome and studied the +Campagna, then travelled somewhat in Spain. By that time the desire for +California had grown insistent. The novelty of Europe had worn thin. I +was tired of playing at doing things, and only at home could I really +accomplish anything. I suddenly made up my mind to pay the long-delayed +visit to England, stopping in Paris by the way for frocks. I doubt if I +ever enjoyed anything more than those three weeks in Paris, where I +completely forgot every unpleasant association. It was my first fine +wardrobe, my first opportunity to experience to the full the delight of +clothes. I have felt quite happy here. California is so far from every +other place that it is almost like living on a detached planet. You +forget the rest of the world for months at a time. For days after I +returned I wandered about out-of-doors in a gay irresponsible mood, and +carolled all over the house. Of course it was nothing but the +electricity of the climate and that I was in my own State once more and +took an insane pride in it. You do not even need to be born here for +that; it comes with the inevitable sense of isolation. You will feel it +in time. If I had not known that so certainly I should never have dared +to urge you to come." + +Gwynne smiled with a pardonable cynicism; but while he was not unwilling +the conversation should turn upon himself, his curiosity was not +satisfied. The fog had gone and the moon had risen. He could see Isabel +quite plainly. She had turned her head and was gazing out over the great +expanse desolated by the moonlight, and he studied her profile for the +first time, often as he had observed it. To-night with the moonlight on +it and against the dark hills it was almost repellently unmodern in its +sharply cut regularity, the classic modelling of the eye-socket and +chin, the nose with its slight arch. Her hair had fallen from its pins +and hung in a braid, its length concealed by her position, and making +the effect of a queue. She had long since taken off her hat and wrapped +its veil about her head. The veil had slipped and might easily have been +mistaken for a ribbon confining the queue at the base of the head. For +an instant Gwynne's senses swam. He recalled the portraits of their +Revolutionary ancestors in the house on Russian Hill. It might have been +a medallion suspended before him. He drew in his breath; then his eye +fell to the short thin sensitive upper lip, rarely quiet for all her +extraordinary repose; to the full enticing under lip, and the little +black moles. Then his gaze wandered down to the rough shooting-jacket, +to the rubber boots reaching to her waist, and he only restrained +himself from laughing aloud because he feared to rush down the curtain +before that secretive nature. + +"Then you have no faith in love as the best thing in the world?" he +asked. + +She turned upon him her clear dreaming eyes. "I have faith enough in +love, as I have faith in death, or any other of the uncontrovertible +facts, as well as in its mission. But not as the best thing in life; not +for my sort at least. Not for even the domestic, for that matter, unless +they are utterly brainless. I believe that from the beginning of time +the misery of the world has been caused by the superstition that love +was all. It must continue to be the fate of the child-bearing woman, I +suppose--for a while at least; but others have blundered upon the fact +that it is a mere incident, and are far happier in consequence. To women +like Anabel freedom means an indulgent husband and plenty of money. To +others it means something of which the Anabels know the bare +nomenclature: an absolute freedom of the soul, of which the outer +independence is but the symbol. As I said, we only find it when we have +finished with the bogie of love. It is a modern enough discovery. Think +of the poor old maids of the generations behind us, who, failing to +marry, collapsed into insignificance instead of revelling in their +deliverance. And what humiliation to know that in your youth you are +really wooed for the sake of the race alone, no matter what the +delusions. If any one doubts it let him compare the matrimonial +opportunities of the ugly maternal girl and the ugly clever girl. When +clever women realize that they are a sex apart and wait until their +first youth at least is over before selecting a companion of the sex +that I am quite willing to concede must always interest us more than our +own, and no doubt is necessary to our completion, then will the world +have taken its first step towards real happiness." + +Gwynne repressed his gorge and answered practically: "Not a bad idea if +two were really suited, for no doubt companionship is _one_ of the best +things in life, and a woman is more useful in many ways to a man than a +partner of his own sex. It is even apparent that she does equally well +in certain varieties of sport. I suppose the more experience a man has +had of life the more he hesitates to define what love really is. One has +attacks of such a severity and one recovers so completely! Doubtless +Schopenhauer was right: it is merely the furious determination of the +race to persist. Spencer tells us that it is 'absolutely antecedent to +all relative experience whatever.' Companionship--yes--perhaps----" + +"It is necessary to a man; but by no means to all women----" + +"Not for yourself, you mean. You are still blunted and somewhat +disgusted--" + +"I have dismissed the question. You cannot imagine how happy I feel +every morning when I wake up, and every night when I go, always rather +tired, into my comfortable little bed, knowing that I shall sleep like +an infant. I love work. I love out-door life. I love the long evenings +with my books and my thoughts, and my plans for the future--all my own. +I revel in the thought that I can never be unhappy again, because now I +love no one. I loved my poor father, and suffered with him in his fits +of repentance and shame. I loved, of course, that man. I have absolutely +nothing in common with Paula, and my mother is merely a pretty memory. I +am fond of Anabel and perhaps several other friends--Mr. and Mrs. +Leslie; but that sort of affection does not go very deep. Love is +synonymous with selfishness and slavery--slavery because you no longer +own yourself. My brother-in-law adores my sister, makes a great point of +his fidelity, because before his marriage he was always flaunting some +painted female, without which possession, a few years ago, a San +Franciscan felt that he would lose the respect of his fellow-citizens. +But Lyster's reform makes him as exacting as a Turk. If my poor silly +little sister smiles at some fugitive thought he demands to know what it +is, and if she cannot remember he sulks for a day. He would possess her +very thoughts. She dares not have a man friend, talk to a man for half +an hour at a time. He won't let her belong to a club--clubs are all very +well for other women, but his wife is not as other women. On the other +hand, he has long since let her persuade him that he is the most +marvellous of men, and, in consequence, permits her to make every sort +of mean little sacrifice while he spends his money on himself. Her eyes +are in a measure open now, but it is too late, and she rebels in the +usual futile feminine way. There are millions like them. You will meet +Anne Montgomery. She is thirty-five now, quite plain, and makes a living +as a sort of itinerant housekeeper and caterer. She was a most lovely +girl, with a wild-rose complexion and starlike eyes, and full of life +and buoyant hope. Her great talent was for the violin, and she dreamed +of conquering the world. Teachers told her that with the proper study +she could at least become a professional of the first rank, although she +lacked the genius of creation. Her parents and an older sister--one of +the plain, domestic, unselfish kind, whose pleasure is in living for +others--were horrified at the bare suggestion. Not only because they +were old-fashioned--some of the most old-fashioned people on earth are +in San Francisco--but because it would mean separation from their idol. +They surrounded her like a flaming belt, not even a man could get at +her. They worshipped her as if she was a being of another world, +devoured her; all the treasures of life were centred in her. That there +might be the less temptation, they never took her to Europe; and +gradually induced her to lay aside the instrument altogether. She was +very sweet and gentle, and she loved them and submitted (I would have +throttled them all). But she faded rapidly, lost her lovely coloring and +animation, and she had no other beauty. Then her father speculated and +failed. While they were undergoing real privations the influenza swooped +down upon them and carried off the three older members of the family in +a week. Anne Montgomery is the most conspicuous victim of what are +generally supposed to be the higher affections that I know. They were +just commonplace animals--those three--nothing more." + +"Real happiness may lie in forgetting that love is selfish, and in +overlooking the bitter in the sweet." + +Isabel shrugged her shoulders. "If one can be happy without love why run +the risks?" + +They felt that they had exhausted the subject for the present and there +was a long silence. Gwynne's eyes wandered over the inexpressibly +desolate and sinister landscape. The intense brilliancy of the moon +seemed to press darkness down upon the earth. It was true that every +object was as sharp of outline as if cut against crystal, but they were +a hard dark brown: the hills that jutted out into the windings of the +marsh, the marsh itself, the more distant mountains. It looked like a +landscape upon which the sun had set for ever, smitten with death--or +not yet born into the solar system; some terrible formless menacing +globe on the edge of the Universe. As he had approached San Francisco on +the afternoon of his arrival, standing on the forward deck of the boat +in a high wind, he had thought it the most stranded lonely city he had +ever seen. He recalled the impression now, and in a flash he appreciated +the Californian's attitude to the rest of the world, the effect of such +isolation upon the character of a people that had created a great and +important city out of the wilderness, and in half a century. In spite of +the obstinate aloofness of his ego he felt an involuntary thrill of +pride in his connection with such a people; and hoped it might be +premonitory. But again the eerie landscape claimed him and he became +aware of the weird night sounds that broke out with violent abruptness +after intervals of throbbing quiet: the loud honk-honk of geese, the +shriek of loons, the noisy capricious serenade of the frogs. He +experienced a feeling of such utter isolation that he almost started +when Isabel spoke. + +"These waste places in California are almost terrifying by moonlight," +said she. "They always look as if they were brooding, crouching, +concentrating their energies for a convulsion. No earthquake country can +be quite normal in any of its aspects, nor quite beautiful. Here comes +the tide. How Mac will grumble at us! But he is sure to have kept the +fire going, and you shall have a cup of hot coffee before you start for +home." + + + + +XII + + +Gwynne, on the following day, was making a late toilet, and in anything +but a good-humor, for he had grown accustomed to early rising, when he +received a note from Isabel. + +It ran: + + DEAR PARTNER,--Anabel has just told me over the telephone that Tom + and Mr. Leslie and two other representative citizens are going out + to see you this afternoon. I have the ghost of an idea that a + friendly call is not their only object. _Do_ be plastic--it is + better in the beginning--until you know your ground. Above all, + don't be too English. You are vastly improved, but you have lapses. + + I send you your share of the ducks. Mariana's roasting will explain + our pride in one of the two most native of our products--the next + time we go to San Francisco I'll take you to the market and we will + sit in a grimy little balcony restaurant and you will be introduced + to fried California oysters. + + Please consider the marsh your own; and whenever you come, remember + that you are to have breakfast or supper with me. Are you quite + comfortable? If anything is wrong I will go over and interview + Mariana and the Jap. Of course the latter will appropriate your + cigarettes and books; he is probably a prince, and far from + condescending to steal, he will take them as his right; and his + hauteur may match your own at times. Moreover, he may decamp any + morning without giving notice--Lafcadio Hearn dwells upon the + _impermanency_ of the Japanese, and we can all bear him out. But on + the other hand the Jap will keep your house cleaner than any other + sort of servant, and he can be both amiable and alert when he + chooses. I merely warn you, for I know nothing of your present + _homme de chambre_ beyond the recommendation of my Chuma, who is + amiable to the verge of imbecility. If he disappears, let me know + at once, for I really want to make you comfortable and contented in + what I know must seem to you little more than a beautiful + wilderness peopled by ambitious barbarians. But wait till you know + San Francisco! + + ISABEL. + +Gwynne smiled at the form of address and the expressions of concern in +his welfare; but he scowled twice over the admonition to be plastic and +American. + +"I'll be what I damn please," he announced, aloud, much to the surprise +of Imura Kisaburo Hinomoto who entered at the moment with his shaving +water. + +Nevertheless, when his visitors arrived, late in the afternoon, his +natural courtesy, and the reflection that he had not come to America to +fail, induced him to receive the four with something like warmth, and to +place his cigars and whiskey--he already knew better than to offer them +tea--at their immediate disposal. They sat on the porch facing the +mountain, and for a few moments the conversation was confined to the +weather and the scenery, giving Gwynne an opportunity to observe his +guests with some minuteness. Judge Leslie and young Colton he had +already met, and he liked the former, a pleasant shrewd tactful man, who +was one of the chief ornaments of the northern bar, and universally +admitted to be "dead straight." So "straight," indeed, was he that his +term of judgeship had been brief. He had been carried to the bench on an +independent ticket, but the reform movement subsiding, he could obtain +re-election only by bargaining with political bosses, and this he +refused to do; but after the fashion of the country he retained his +title. He had a loose hairy benignant face with a humorous but +penetrating eye and the usual domelike brow. His body had grown unwieldy +from years and lack of exercise, and his clothes were old-fashioned and, +generally, dusty. He voted the Republican ticket and was not too well +pleased with his son-in-law who was a red Democrat and rising daily in +the good graces of the party bosses. + +This young man who was sipping his plain soda and commenting on neither +the scenery nor the weather, had inspired Gwynne with a certain interest +and curiosity. He was thirty but looked little over twenty, and his +large limpid blue eyes were as guileless as a child's. He had a long +pale face with an indifferent complexion and the common American lantern +jaw. His hair and brows and lashes were paler than straw, and his long +lank figure was without either distinction or muscularity. Nevertheless, +there was a curious suggestion of cynical power in his impassive face +and lolling inches, and Gwynne had made up his mind that he would be +useful as a study in politics. + +Mr. Wheaton, one of the present "City Fathers," a position he had +occupied with brief intermittences for many years, had hard china-blue +eyes and a straight mouth, in a large square smoothly-shaven face. He +had crossed the plains in the Fifties from the inhospitable State of +Maine, sought fortune in the gold diggings with moderate success, +avoided San Francisco with a farmer's dread of "sharpers," and drifting +to the hamlet at the head of Rosewater Creek had opened a small store +for general merchandise. Frugality and a shrewd knowledge of what men +wanted and women thought they wanted had increased his capital so +rapidly that in five years he had converted a wing of the store into a +bank. To-day he was a power. His wife was the leader of Rosewater +society and attended first nights in San Francisco. + +Mr. Larkin T. Boutts was new to Gwynne, although his status was easily +to be inferred from the constant references in the local press. He was a +fat little man who sat habitually with a hand on either knee, which he +clawed absently both in conversation and thought. Otherwise his attitude +was one of extreme repose, even watchfulness. He was excessively neat, +almost fashionable in his dress, which--Gwynne was to observe in the +course of time--was invariably brown. He had a small pointed beard and a +sharp direct dishonest eye. He was the leading hardware merchant of +Rosewater and owned the hotel and the opera-house. His business methods +had never been above criticism, and his politics drove the San Francisco +correspondent, during legislative sittings, into a display of caustic +virtue which gave the newspaper he represented just the necessary smack +of reform and did not hurt its inspiration in the least. For Mr. Boutts +was too sharp for the law, and all his sins were forgiven him on account +of his genuine devotion to Rosewater. Far from battening on her, after +the fashion of the San Francisco cormorant, he had never taken a dollar +out of her that he had not returned a hundred-fold, and he was the +author of much of her wealth. + +This gentleman was the first to indicate that they had not driven out +to Lumalitas to discuss the weather and the scenery. + +"Best come to business," he said, abruptly. "Judge, will you do the +talking?" + +But Judge Leslie, who was a modest man, waved his hand deprecatingly. +"The idea is yours, sir, and yours is the right to state the case." + +The host hastily poured whiskey-and-soda lest he should look haughtily +expectant. + +"It's just this, Mr. Gwynne," began Boutts, in his suave even tones. "We +have seen your ads. We know that you contemplate selling off a good part +of your ranch--Well, there was a buzz round town when those ads were +read, and I was not long passing the word that there would be a +mass-meeting that night in Armory Hall. That's where we thresh things +out, and in this case there was no time to lose. We had a pretty full +meeting. Judge Leslie took the chair, and I opened with some of the most +pointed remarks I ever made. I was followed with more unanimity than +usually falls to my lot. The upshot was that resolutions were passed +before nine o'clock, and a committee of four was appointed to wait upon +you to-day--and endeavor to win you to our point of view," he continued, +suddenly lame, for by this time Gwynne, forgetting Isabel and his good +resolutions, was staring at the common little man with all the arrogance +of his nature in arms, and the color rising in his cheeks. Mr. Boutts's +hands gripped his knees as if for anchorage, and he proceeded, firmly: +"No offence, sir, I assure you. This is a free country. The man who +tells another man what he'd orter do should be called down good and +hard. Nothing could be further from our intention. The meeting was +called only in the cause of what you might call both self-defence and +patriotic local sentiment, although it's a sentiment that's local to +about two-thirds of California--only we do more acting and less talking +than most. It's now some weeks since we adopted resolutions in a still +bigger mass-meeting and got the best part of the county to subscribe to +them; on the ground that an ounce of prevention and so forth. So we just +hoped that as you have come to live among us you could be brought to see +things from our point of view." + +He scraped his chair forward and dropped his voice confidentially, at +the same time darting a sharp glance through the open window beside him. +"It's this Japanese business. The Chinese, back in the Seventies, was +not a patch on it, because the Chinee never aspired to be anything but +house servants, fruit pickers, vegetable raisers and vendors on a small +scale, and the like. The agitation against them which led to the +exclusion bill was wholly Irish; that is to say it was entirely a +working-class political agitation, because the Chinee was doing better +work for less money than the white man. The better class liked the +Chinee and have always regretted the loss of them; and to-day those who +are left, particularly cooks and workers on those big reclaimed islands +of the San Joaquin River, where they raise the best asparagus in the +world--yes, in the world, sir--get higher wages than any white man or +woman in the State. + +"But these Japs are a different proposition. They're slack servants, +unless they happen to be a better sort than the majority, and that +unreliable you never know where you are with them. And being servants is +about the last ambition they've come for to this great and glorious +country. They're buyin' farms all up and down the rivers, the most +fertile land in the State, to say nothing of some of the interior +valleys. You see, there were big grants like Lumalitas at first over a +good part of California. Then the ranches of thousands of acres were cut +up and sold into farms of three or four hundred acres that paid like the +mischief so long as the old man stuck to business himself. This he +generally did; but times have changed, and now all the young men want to +go to town; and most of the big farms have been cut up into little ones +and sold off to immigrants and the like. Well, that's the Japs' lay. +They like things on a small scale and know how to wring a dollar out of +every five-cent piece. No one's denying they're smart. They slid in and +got a good grip before we thought them worth looking at. Now we're +saddled with about thirty thousand of them, and more coming on every +steamer from Honolulu and Japan. Some years ago when they began to find +themselves as a nation, and to rebel at the foreigners that were ruling +things through the open ports, they let it be pretty well known that it +was going to be Japan for the Japanese. Well, now the sooner they know +that it's California for the Californians the better it will be for all +hands. We don't go round lookin' for trouble, but if it comes our way we +don't mind it one little bit. We'll tolerate the Japs just in so far as +we find them useful, and useful they are as servants; for if they don't +hold a candle to the old Chinee, they're a long sight better than our +lazy high-toned hired girls, who are good for just exactly nothing; and +we need a certain amount of them for hire in other fields; but as +citizens, not much. We've put a stop to that right here, in this county +at least; and so, Mr. Gwynne, that's the milk in the cocoanut, and we +hope that you'll see things our way, and not sell any of your land to +the Japs." + +"You see," interposed Judge Leslie, that Gwynne might not feel himself +rushed to a decision. "These little men, while possessing so many +admirable traits that I am quite willing to take off my hat to them, are +not desirable citizens in a white man's country. Not only is their whole +view of life and religion, every antecedent and tradition, exactly +opposed to the Occidental, so that we never could assimilate them, never +even contemplate their taking a part in our legislation nor marrying our +daughters, but--and for the majority of the people this is the crux of +the whole matter--commercially and industrially they are a menace. With +their excessive frugality they can undersell the most thrifty white man, +both as farmers and merchants; and the contempt they excite, +particularly in this state of extravagant traditions, is as detrimental +in its effects as their business methods; the more a man exercises his +faculty for contempt the more must his general standards sink toward +pessimism, and pessimism is neither more nor less than a confession of +failure in the struggle with life. I never was much of a fighter, so I +believe in eliminating the foe whenever it is possible. At all events we +have made up our minds to eliminate the Jap, what with one motive and +another, and I think we will. It may come to war in time--when the +United States are ready--but we Californians have a way of taking +matters into our own hands, and as war is a remote possibility, and we +have little prospects of legislation--what with the treaty and the +unpreparedness of the country for war--we just do what we can to freeze +the Japs out. If we must have small farmers and our own young men have +other ambitions, there are plenty of good European immigrants, and it +is our business to encourage them. We assimilate anything white so +quickly it is a wonder an immigrant remembers the native way of +pronouncing his own name. But the Oriental we can't assimilate, for all +our ostrich-like digestion, and what we can't assimilate we won't have. +It is also true that we don't like the Jap. He antagonizes us with his +ill-concealed impertinence under a thin veneer of servility; and +superior as he is, still he has a colored skin. Now, right or wrong, +Christian or merely natural, we despise and dislike colored blood, every +decent man of us in this United States of America. Your sentimentalists +can come over and wonder and write about us, reproach us and do their +honest ingenuous best to convert us, it never will make _one damned bit +of difference_. We are as we are and that is the end of it. The +antagonism, of course, only leaps to life when the colored man wants +equal rights and recognition, something he will never get in the United +States of America, as long as the stripes and the stars wave over it; +and the sooner the sentimentalists quit holding out false hopes the +better. As to the Chinese, it is quite true that there was no objection +to them outside of politics. And the reason was, they kept their place. +The antipathy to the Japanese extends throughout all classes. Every +thinking man in the State is concerned with the question. California +will be overrun with them before we know where we are; and we are hoping +that other counties will give an ear to the wisdom and farsightedness +Mr. Boutts has displayed, in proposing that no more land shall be +sold--or rented--to the Japanese. They can work for us if we have need +of them, for a while, but they cannot settle." + +Gwynne had been thinking rapidly as Judge Leslie drawled out his +homily. In his new apprehension of latent weaknesses in his character he +was indisposed to yield to pressure, but he was equally desirous not to +let the turmoil into which his inner life had been thrown lead him to +any ridiculous extremes; not only interfering with his prospects, but +converting himself into chaos. He was extremely anxious to make no +mistakes at the outset of his new career, beset with difficulties +enough. Their words had every appearance of being a just presentment of +a just cause. He didn't care a hang about the "Jap." For the matter of +that, he reflected with some bitterness, he didn't care a hang about +California. At this point in his reflections he became aware that Colton +was turning his head with a sort of slow significance. He looked up and +watched a pale eyelash drop over a deep gleam of intelligence. Mr. +Leslie finished speaking, and Gwynne replied with an elaborate +politeness, which might be his vehicle for spontaneous sympathy or utter +indifference. + +"Thank you all very much for your confidence in me, and also for +preventing me from making what no doubt would have been a serious +mistake. I have no desire whatever for the Japanese as a neighbor. I was +one of the few to recognize the menace of Japan to Occidental +civilization when all the world was sympathizing with it during its war +with Russia, and they will get no encouragement from me. So the matter +is settled as far as I am concerned." + +"Shake!" said Mr. Wheaton, in a deep rumbling voice. + +The four shook hands solemnly with their new neighbor, then, with even a +greater gusto, drank his health. Gwynne suddenly remembering the +California tradition, and the ducks, invited them to remain for supper; +but all declined except Colton, who sent his wife a message by his +father-in-law. The other three climbed into Judge Leslie's surrey and +departed, Colton remarking, apologetically, and somewhat wistfully: + +"She's dining at the judge's and won't miss me: I never leave her alone. +I'll get back in time to take her home." + + + + +XIII + + +Mariana cooked the ducks with the skill of the unsung _chef_ she was, +and enhanced them with other delicacies for which she alone had a name. +Gwynne, faithless to Isabel's crude though honest effort, rose to gayety +and wondered whether California was practising the insidious methods of +the wife. Colton, absent of eye, disposed of his share of the repast as +negatively as he did most things, and as soon as they had retired to the +veranda produced a bag of peanuts from his pocket, without which, he +remarked, no meal was complete. Gwynne declined the national delicacy, +feeling that diplomacy had its limits, and lit a pipe, wondering how he +should lead his new friend to give him some practical political +information. He detected the guile under that bland, almost vacant +exterior, and Colton's prattle about duck-shooting and deer-hunting, +although apparently endless, did not divert him for a moment. But he had +less trouble than he had anticipated. Colton's mind seldom roved far +from politics, and it required little tact to lead him to the trough. + +"As I am necessarily in your confidence I will take you voluntarily into +mine," he announced, in his clear high pipe. "I don't in my heart care a +hang more for the Democratic party than I do for the Republican. But the +Republicans own the State at present, and there's no chance to get your +name up and really do things in that party. They're out for graft, every +last one of them. The chance is on the other side. It's a big chance; +for the laboring class, what with unions, and being rotten spoilt with +easy living in this State, is becoming more and more dissatisfied every +day. If they were let alone it would never occur to them they weren't +the chosen of the Lord; but we--the Democratic party--can't afford to +let them alone, unless we want to go out of business altogether. They +are just about the only dough we've got to work on, and for the last few +years we've been systematically sowing the seeds of discontent by means +of the press, metropolitan and local, abusing the rich, the trusts, +harping on the segregation of capital by a favored few, to the unjust +and illegal impoverishment of the many, painting gaudy pictures of what +the working-man's lot will be when he gets his rights, emphasizing that +in this State, of all others, man was intended to be happy and share +equally in her abundance. We sail pretty close to anarchy; but they are +an ignorant foolish lot, and we keep a tight hand on the reins and will +drive them in a straight line when the time comes. I am qualifying for +the position of district leader hereabouts, although I'm not announcing +it from the house-tops. But the present one is getting old, and I'm on +the inside track. I dress in these battered old clothes, that make my +little wife weep--she'll never have any other cause from me--just to +impress the farmers what a good Democrat I am; not a bit like Hyliard +Wheaton, who is a dude. All he is waiting for is his father's death so +that he can move to San Francisco. But I drive round in a dusty old +buggy, with candy for the children in my pocket, and chin with the +farmers about the crops and any old thing. When this county turns +Democratic, as it shall in the next five years--likely as not sooner, we +have so much raw material to work on in these immigrants--I intend to go +to Congress, hold on in the House until there is a vacancy in the +Senate, and there I'll be for life, and the boss of this State to boot. +I can't say I care about the Presidency. It's only a chance that there +may be anything doing while you're in--it's largely luck--and then when +you're out, if you survive the White House--which most Presidents +don't--you're as good as dead. I don't care about going abroad as a +Consul-General, or even Ambassador, for I wouldn't hold any office under +the United States government that was dependent upon the favor of a +small group in Washington. You're no better than a servant, and you +never know where you are. Political enemies at home, liars abroad, +somebody with a little more influence, or any low political business, +and you're fired without being heard in your own defence. You've got no +redress, and may be disgraced for life without ever knowing where you +were hit. None of that for me, although I'd like a big position of that +sort for my wife. But she can cut all the dash she wants as a senator's +wife, and I'll wield the big stick. That's where the fun comes in. I +have a natural turn for politics, and then it's the only road out of +Rosewater. The old gentleman is dead set upon my succeeding him in the +bank, and he'd never give me a lift, although if I made a hit at +anything he'd be so proud it would be easy sailing after. He's not a bit +displeased that I've turned over a few thousands an aunt left me. But +I'm after bigger game than that. She also left me two thousand acres of +land, that look hopeless because there's not so much as a spring on +them, and they're in one of the droughtiest sections in the State--she +got them as a bad debt. Now, just over the border of that ranch is a big +lake, and the owner of it won't sell or rent me water rights, thinking +I'll sell out for a song. But he don't know Tom Colton. I'm a member of +the present legislature--and that isn't the least of the reasons why. A +few hundreds in a few hungry pockets, and we run a snake through the +legislature declaring that lake state property. Then I ditch from the +lake, and I am the proud owner of a large tract of valuable irrigated +land. I sell off in small farms, and clean up a hundred thousand +dollars. That I'll invest in a Class A building in San Francisco. I'm +also in this projected electric railway of Boutts's--would advise you to +buy a block of that stock--I can let you in on the ground floor. Money +and political power, boss of this State--that's what I'm after--and no +idle dream either. I know the ropes, and all I have to do is to hang on. +I'll build a house on Connecticut Avenue in Washington, and my wife +shall have dresses four times a year from Paris." He turned to Gwynne +with glowing eyes. "You've barely seen her--and you haven't had a sight +of the kids. She's Isabel's great friend. I wonder you haven't been +round. I've got the nicest little shanty you ever saw, and we'd always +be glad to see you." + +Gwynne thanked him absently; then, while his guest, dismissing politics, +indulged in domestic rhapsodies, relating several anecdotes the while he +consumed another bag of peanuts, Gwynne's brain worked rapidly. He +boiled with discouragement and disgust. The cynical frankness of this +young provincial, with his serene confidence in his star, and in his +power to handle the millions he despised, bore a primitive and +humiliating likeness to his younger self: Americanized by the lower +standards of his country perhaps, but painfully like in its elements. +All he could claim, it seemed to him at the moment, was a higher +personal sense of honesty and honor; and how long would he keep it in +this country? While he was hesitating between taking a possible rival +into his confidence, and an arrogant desire to announce his reason for +coming to California, without regard to consequences, Colton dropped the +subject of his family, scattered the mass of shells on the floor with a +sudden sweep of his foot, and tipping his chair back against the wall, +produced a large red apple and his pocket-knife. + +"I can't say that I like the seamy side of politics," he remarked, +absently, as he performed a delicate operation without breaking the +skin. "My wife always maintains that I'm the most honest man alive, and +I shouldn't wonder if that was the way I really was made. Anyhow, I know +I'd a heap sight rather do a man a good turn than an ill one; but when +he gets in your way what are you going to do in a country where politics +are machine-made and every cog has to be oiled with graft? I'm thankful +I'll never be forced to accept a bribe--there's a lot of difference +between giving and taking, and I guess I'll have to do a lot of the +first. But it's politics or nothing with me, aside from having a natural +genius for them. I'll never get out of Rosewater otherwise. My father is +likely to live for twenty years yet, and I hope to God he will; but I +want the big game while I'm young. If the country was better I'd be, +too, and like my job. But you've got to play the game in your +shirt-sleeves. Kid gloves, and you sit on the fence and watch somebody +else wallow in after the prizes." + +"It seems to me that the best chance for fame and power lies in that +superior strength which is allied with honesty. A man who is at the same +time a clever manipulator of men, and whose aim is statesmanship, should +be able to reach his goal by a clean road." + +Gwynne had been long enough in the United States to blush uneasily as he +delivered these sentiments, and his color deepened as Colton gave a +little snort. + +"Can't be done. Not in this State, anyhow. You've been talking to +Isabel. She looks like the Pilgrim Fathers and has inherited all their +antiquated notions. Honest, now--_are_ your politics so much better than +ours?" + +"A long sight. And they are by no means perfect. We have our machine and +our compromises, and all the rest of it; and even a few wholly rotten +boroughs. Fifty years ago we were blatantly worse than you are to-day. +As long as the game lasts, and there are two parties, there must be more +or less chicanery, but we are snow-white compared with the mire of this +country. And it is an anomaly I cannot understand. I have now been a +year in the United States, have talked with hundreds of Americans, +studied them and their institutions. Few have struck me as personally +dishonest--as we interpret the word in England. Human nature in this +country, indeed, has at times appeared to me almost elemental, utterly +without the subtlety that makes for crooked dealing. There is a thousand +times more petty trickery in Europe; and, with us, more hypocrisy, +certainly; but politics we have at least elevated. Here, the best man in +private life seems to become transformed the moment he enters the +political atmosphere, and if he is not a scoundrel, he sails pretty +close to the wind." + +"H--m! All you say may be true. I don't agitate my gray matter over +problems. I know what we are, and the work cut out for me if I want to +stay on top. I have known reformers. We have lots of spasmodic attempts +at reform right here in this district. When the reform is directed at +some glaring evil, something that makes us uncomfortable, then it goes +through. When it's directed against politics in general, then the +reformer falls so hard he never gets up--unless, to be sure, he +scrambles up p. d. q. and trims with the wind. And that, I'm bound to +say, he generally does. We've had our idealists--talk till your mouth +waters. One session in Sacramento generally cures them. When it doesn't, +we have no more idea what becomes of them than of an ant that butts in +on a procession of other ants. Ever watch ants?" + +It was Gwynne's turn to snort. + +"I take my boy up on the hills every Sunday afternoon when it is fine, +and we watch ants and grasshoppers and birds and all the rest of it. Why +don't you get married? There's nothing like it. I may have some hard +hoeing ahead of me, but I always have that cosy pretty home at the end +of the day, and the sweetest wife in the world--who doesn't know the +Republican party from the Democrat, and never opens a newspaper. Isabel +is too high and mighty. She's a wonderful girl all right, but the last +woman I'd want for a wife. I know a girl that would just suit you--Dolly +Boutts. She's as pretty as a peach, and as domestic as Anabel. I'll have +you both in to supper, as soon as we get a new cook. We've had four this +month, and my wife warned me I was not to ask you to anything until she +was perfectly satisfied. She's the best housekeeper you ever saw." + +Gwynne maintained an infuriated silence. It was some moments before he +could trust himself to articulate. Colton, munching his apple, and +twirling the long spiral of skin he had peeled off without a break, +detected nothing unusual in the atmosphere. It was characteristic of him +that he took no interest in his new friend's future. Isabel had told him +that Gwynne had not sufficient income to maintain his rank in England, +and had resolved not only to drop his titles, but the name by which he +had so long been known; being averse from notoriety. Colton, who had +barely recalled the name of Elton Gwynne--he usually skipped the +telegrams unless a war with picturesque details monopolized the foreign +columns--had been somewhat amused at the precaution, but respected it; +he would never have thought of betraying a confidence reposed in the +bank. He assumed that Gwynne intended to become a rancher, like so many +other Englishmen, and that he purposed reading law merely as a secondary +occupation. He could have thought of several more interesting methods of +putting in time; but every one to his taste. + +Gwynne spoke finally, and when he did, Colton, whose chair was still +tipped against the wall, sat forward with a square planting of his feet. + +"I came to California with one intention only," said Gwynne: "to have +the political career that my elevation to the peerage deprived me of in +England. I had intended to work with the Democratic party, but I am free +to state that your account of it has turned my stomach. My reasons for +selecting it were, partly, that in principle at least it more nearly +approached the Liberal party in England; partly because of its weakness +in strong men. But if it is as rotten as you say I am afraid it would be +a waste of time to qualify for it; I certainly could not work in +harmony with it. However, there is an abundance of time for close +observation. I cannot vote for four years, and if I finally decide in +favor of the Republican party, at least we shall not be rivals." + +"_Jiminy!_" exclaimed young Colton, ingenuously; but Gwynne could see +the glitter of his eye. "Well, I'm glad to hear it. Not much you don't +go over to the Republicans! There isn't five cents' worth of choice +between the two parties when it comes to a square deal on any measure +ever put up, and this slow wave of reform that's trying to crawl over +the country--against trusts, graft, and the like--is just strong enough +to swamp the Republicans and give us our chance. Rivals! Not a bit of +it. There's room for all, and you're just the man we want. Isabel told +me you were a wonderful speaker--I'd forgotten. That's _just_ what we +want. I can't speak for a cent. There's no one in the district that can +carry a crowd. The boss was wailing over it the other day. You can do a +lot in the next four years. You'll go to all the conventions and county +meetings with me and make my speeches. I'll introduce you to everybody +that can put you _on_. You've fallen into clover with the judge, because +his only son, who was practising with him, has had to go to southern +California to live--nerves all broken up. He'll push you all right, and +as soon as you have swallowed the California codes you can practise in +the courts by courtesy. Then I'll take you to Sacramento with me next +year--I'm a senator this term--as my private secretary, and you'll learn +a lot. Your hair will stand up straight, but never mind. All that will +pave the way for whatever office you want to begin with when your papers +are ripe. I'll see that it's a good conspicuous town or county office, +and the legislature will follow as a matter of course. That will fill in +while you are waiting a chance for Congress--you must be seven years in +the country for that--nine for the Senate. Only, you must swallow us +whole. You can't make us over. We Democrats are determined to get on top +again and have our chance at the pickings. We'll talk reform, of course. +That's where your eloquence will come in, and the more you believe in it +while you're holding forth about the Republican party robbing the widow +and orphan--more particularly the farmer and the laborer--the better. +We'll promise the working-man a sort of sugar-coated socialism, but we +won't inspire him with any higher ideals than pecuniary profits, _if you +please_. That would mean content, and the end of the Democratic party. +Well, think it over. I must go. My little old woman doesn't like to sit +up late. Mind you drop in and see her the next time you are in town." + +Gwynne rang for his guest's buggy, thanked him for his advice; then +ordered his horse and rode about the ranch half the night. + + + + +XIV + + +A fortnight later Isabel announced to Gwynne that she intended to give a +party and introduce him to the young people of Rosewater. + +"All the girls want to know you, Anabel tells me, and as it is a relief +to hear that they are interested in something besides cards, and as +nobody else seems disposed to take the initiative, I have concluded to +play the _grande dame_ for a night. In a way it is my duty to introduce +you formally, although it would be more so if they had done anything for +me since my return. However--I will ask them for next Saturday evening +if you have nothing better to do." + +"One day is quite the same as another to me," said Gwynne, dryly. "What +do you fancy are my evening engagements? I have not even begun to read +law with Mr. Leslie; he has gone off to southern California to see his +son. He says he is always restless in the autumn, as young people are in +the spring, but has promised me his attention before the middle of this +month." + +They were rowing down the channel of the wider portion of the creek +towards Isabel's landing, their boat filled with spoil. The little +steamboat was winding proudly through the marsh, there were a dozen +sails in sight; from the south came an incessant sound of firing. The +distant mountains looked as hard as metal and there was a new crispness +in the air. Little rain had fallen, but it was no longer summer. Gwynne +had exchanged his khaki riding-clothes for corduroy; and Isabel's habit, +although still dust-colored, was made of cloth instead of pongee. To-day +they wore light covert coats over their canvas and rubber. + +With the passing of the heat and the advent of the daily electric +breezes sweeping up the valleys from the sea, Gwynne felt a slow lifting +of the dead weight on his spirits, although he was only happy when he +had his gun in his hand. California seemed less like a voluptuous +leviathan blowing poppy-dust that blunted the memory of all things +beyond her borders. At first he had been vaguely uneasy at the insidious +suggestion that he had transferred himself to another planet, but he was +beginning to suspect that California, true to her sex, might have +surprises in store that would quicken his blood at least. He still +disliked her at night: the high unfriendly arch of her sky, the sinister +atmosphere that brooded over her spaces, suggesting illimitable reaches +where no man dwelt, or would long be tolerated. But her days seemed full +of promise, and they certainly were full of beauty. + +He still fought with a longing to confide in Isabel: his apprehensions +and doubts, his haunting interrogation of inherent greatness. But he +turned from the temptation in a panic of spirit, sure that he would fail +unless he fought his battle alone. He had pondered more and more upon +his possible debt to his mother; and the doubt that she might have been +the foundation of his courage and self-confidence was as bitter as that +he might have owed the extraordinary rapidity of his career to the +influence of his family and name. And Isabel's very strength alarmed +him, the more so as he felt her subtle fingers among the leaves of his +new destiny. So he merely smiled into her eyes and made a gallant +remark, a purely masculine method of emphasizing that woman is charming +in her proper place. + +"I shall be delighted to dance again; particularly--it seems odd--as I +have never danced with you. And it is a year since I have seen you in an +evening gown. I have a vivid remembrance of how you looked that night at +Arcot, when you turned so many heads." + +Isabel colored, and whether with pleasure or resentment, she had not the +least idea. But she answered, hastily: + +"I feel that I have been very selfish to do nothing before. But really, +it seemed hopeless until Anabel told me yesterday that there was a vast +amount of interest in the young English rancher. I am afraid the girls +here will not interest you; only you should have the opportunity of +deciding that question for yourself. But what will be really delightful +will be to show you San Francisco. I have not been able to leave the +ranch for a day since that three weeks' outing I had no business to +take. But I have had half a dozen resentful letters from Paula, who has +persuaded herself that you are her cousin too, and asserts her right to +know you. But neither she nor Lyster has the remotest suspicion of your +identity. Elton Gwynne might have a dozen brothers; nor is it likely +they ever heard the name. If you were an artist or actor or litterateur +or composer you might be as well known in San Francisco as in London. +There is no city in the United States one-half so artistic--nor so given +to fads. But in European politics, the young people, at least, take as +much interest as they do in the canals of the moon. So you are quite +safe, and Lyster is the man of all others to show you Bohemian San +Francisco and give you a thoroughly good time. We might go down a few +days after the party." + +"That will be very jolly. I will confess that although San Francisco did +not inspire me with enthusiasm, it has occurred to me that it might be +an improvement on Rosewater.... Oh, by-the-way, I had a letter from my +mother not long ago, in which she said she had met some San Franciscans +at Homburg--Hofer, I believe the name was--and had promised I should +call on them, mentioning me, of course, as John Gwynne. I have wondered +if the risk would be worth while. The amusement to be derived from +provincial society is very doubtful." + +"Provincial! What arrogance! Do please call on the Hofers. They have the +old Polk house, whose history I have told you, and entertain like +princes. Besides, Mr. Hofer is one of that small millionaire group that +is trying to clean up San Francisco municipally. He is quite worth +knowing. And I want you to know San Francisco. It is my ambition to be a +great figure in San Francisco--and I have seen other cities, and might +be enjoying myself in England this moment." + +"Yes, I know," said Gwynne, smiling, and admiring her pink cheeks and +flashing eyes. "And of course I don't forget that you have spurned a +great position for the sake of your beloved city. That is really at the +root of my desire to know the place. If it has a fascination I should +like to feel it. Fascination is a strong word and means a considerable +amount of enjoyment, up to a certain point. But I am glad to have heard +the declaration of your ambition. Is it the final one?" + +"It is the pedestal," said Isabel, enigmatically. "Sometime, when you +give me your confidence, I will give you mine." + +"I have no confidences to make--none, at least, that can compare with +the rich experiences of your past. I told you all about Mrs. Kaye before +I left England, and, so far, America has left me--well, unfascinated. +By-the-way, Colton informs me that he and his wife have picked out some +one to cheer my loneliness and--" + +"Who?" + +"I do not remember her name. Doubtless she will be at the party. I am +curious to see all your friends together. I have seen an astonishing +number of pretty girls in the street, and I am wondering how they will +stand the test of lighting up; the great test to my mind. I don't know +which I like least, the manufactured animation of the European woman of +the world, or the too natural animation which makes the American girl's +features dance all over her face. You, if you don't mind my saying so, +are one of the very few Americans I have met that has something of the +Englishwoman's faculty of looking, at the same time, statuesque and +glowingly alive." + +"You excite my suspicion: I see no indication that you are out of +practice. It is quite true that American women's faces, like their +voices, lack cultivation. Well, you will see a good many pretty girls on +Saturday night, and with no particular advantage of dress. Money has +nothing to do with social position in these country towns. Perhaps +twenty families besides the bankers and Mr. Boutts, and the Leslies, are +well off. But many girls who are in the best society earn their living: +typewriters, clerks, book-keepers, and the like. One has carried on her +father's drug-store since his death. Most of the young men that could +get away have gone, and there are not half a dozen left with any money +behind them. The majority of beaux are either clerks, or in some small +business, although there are always the doctors and clergymen--very few +young lawyers. Snobbery barely exists. There are lines, but purely +theological. All social groups centre about the churches. The first here +has always been the Episcopalian." + +"It had occurred to me that society of any sort had ceased. Of the +famous California hospitality I have seen nothing. A number of men have +driven out and called upon me, and I have returned their calls, and +found their houses very well appointed--although some member of the +family usually answered the bell; and one morning I saw Miss Wheaton +sweeping off the porch, her head tied up in a towel. All I meet appear +to be very cordial and friendly, but I have not been asked to take so +much as a cup of tea in a house in the county, and I have now been here +something like five weeks." + +"California hospitality is a mere legend except in San Francisco. In the +small communities it has never existed in my time, although they used to +dance a good deal before cards turned their heads. You will find just as +much haggling over a five-cent piece here as in any small New England +town. These rich men have made their money by hoarding and wary +investments, rarely speculating; and that tells immensely on the +character. I doubt if the State itself has ever known the meaning of +hospitality since the old ranch days, when, of course, it was prodigal. +It is the San Franciscans that have kept the tradition alive; they are +as reckless, as extravagant, as royally indifferent to mere money as in +the famous Fifties. If you happen to call too close to a meal-time in +one of these towns, the meal will be postponed until you leave. In San +Francisco they would give you two-thirds of their last crust. At the old +Rosewater dances we never had anything but cake and lemonade--ice-cream +in very hot weather. I think it would be a good idea to give them a +shock and have a supper from town." + +"I believe you are socially ambitious," said Gwynne, smiling. "No doubt +it is your intention to make a fortune and lead San Francisco society." + +"Perhaps, but not in the way you mean." + + + + +XV + + +The long-closed bar-room of Old Inn was aired for a week, denuded of +cobwebs, delivered of mice, canvassed by the invaluable Chuma. The +Rosewater Hotel promised to contribute its Sunday band of four pieces, +manipulated with no mean skill by worthy but unprosperous young +citizens. Not one of Isabel's invitations was refused. The girls +suddenly discovered that they were still young, and were as much excited +at the prospect of a night's dancing as at meeting the English rancher. +The men accepted as a matter of course, thankful to be asked to +anything. The older people, surprised at an invitation to a dance, +assured one another that Isabel Otis, being absurdly extravagant, and +living two miles out in the country, was almost certain to regale her +guests with fried oysters and ice-cream. One or two of her mother's old +friends wrote and offered to contribute a chocolate cake, but were +relieved when she refused to "trouble them." Gwynne and Isabel hung the +walls of the big room with palm leaves, and branches covered thick with +small yellow oranges, the first of the year. When they rested from their +labors Isabel declared that it looked like an exhibit at a county fair, +but Gwynne, never having attended a county fair, was proud of his +handiwork and thought the effect an improvement upon the average +ballroom. The day before the party Tom Colton and Hyliard Wheaton rode +out to Lumalitas and demanded of Gwynne if he intended to wear a +"claw-hammer." Colton was averse on principle from being too "swagger"; +and they finally compromised on what the Americans called their +"Tuxedos," and Gwynne his "smoker." Anabel Colton, Dolly Boutts, and +Serena Wheaton, after half a day's telephoning, decided to "wear their +necks," and their hostess agreed to keep them in countenance. Every team +in Rosewater was bespoken for the distinguished occasion, and the +reports of the weather bureau were consulted daily. But the rains held +off and the night of the party was brilliant with starlight, and not too +cold. + +Gwynne, who had no intention of receiving with Isabel, and learning from +Colton that everybody would have arrived before nine o'clock, did not +make his appearance until ten. He found the big room full of young and +elderly people, even the latter chattering with an extraordinary +animation, induced no doubt by the surprises that had greeted them; they +had forgotten the existence of the old bar-room. From the dancers Gwynne +received a general impression of pink cheeks, fluffy hair, delicate +features, gay simple gowns, the usual lack of background; a curious +transientness, as if they had been born for the night like summer moths. +The men for the most part made a good appearance, the more favored +looking college-bred and irreproachable. Hyliard Wheaton, who was really +handsome, with his broad shoulders and cool smooth well-cut face, wore +an orchid in his button-hole and was devoting himself to Isabel. + +The hostess wore a gown of black chiffon trimmed with pale blue that +looked simple and was not. Her neck and arms were bare, and Gwynne +noticed at once that she had another little black mole where the bodice +slipped from her shoulder. She reproached the guest of honor for being +late. + +"You will dance this waltz with me," she commanded, royally; "and then I +will introduce you to the prettiest of the girls." + +For the first time in his life Gwynne felt self-conscious in putting his +arm about a woman's waist for the waltz. He had seen Isabel in full +evening dress many a time in England, in rubber boots to her hips, in +divided skirt astride her horse, in overalls among her chickens, and in +pretty little house-gowns when he had remained for supper; nevertheless, +in surrendering her slim waist she seemed to descend, significantly, +from her pedestal and become warm flesh and blood. He held her +awkwardly, barely touching her, wondering there should be physical +shrinking from such a beautiful creature, one, moreover, that had shown +him more kindness and disinterested friendship than any he had ever +known. He reproached himself, but even while he admired the luminous +whiteness of her skin he found himself scowling at the tiny black moles +that gave her an oddly artificial provocative look, as black patches may +have deliberately enhanced the charms of their coquettish grandmothers. + +"Humph!" said Mrs. Wheaton, raising her lorgnette, as became a leader of +society. "He is not so fond of her, for all this friendship we have been +hearing so much about. Well, it is natural enough. Isabel is far too +independent to be really attractive to men, for all her good looks. +These advanced women will have to step aside into a class by themselves, +and as the men won't follow them, that will mean they will die off +naturally, and the world wag its own old way once more." + +She was a tall stout woman, with a pale heavy face, and a curious +elevation of nose, as if sniffing an unpleasant odor; but which was +really meant to express pride of carriage. She wore a somewhat +old-fashioned but handsome gown of lavender satin trimmed with point +lace about the bodice, and a pair of diamond ear-rings. On one side of +her sat the elder Mrs. Colton, in black silk with a point-lace collar; a +sweet-faced frankly elderly woman. The third member of the group was a +woman who might have been any age between thirty-five and fifty, very +thin and dark, with the curiously virginal look peculiar to childless +women tainted by a suggestion of morbid sensuality, very difficult to +locate. Sometimes it seemed to twist across her thin restless mouth, at +others to gleam from her deep-set black eyes with a fleeting wildness. +Ordinarily she was smiling with an affected cynicism, and it was plain +to be seen that she respected her intellect. She was abominably dressed +in a frock of purple merino trimmed with black velvet ribbon; but she +wore a gold comb in her hair and a diamond brooch. + +As the leader finished her remarks Mrs. Haight brought her teeth +together with a snap and shot through them a little hiss. Mrs. Wheaton +turned upon her with the gleam of the bird of prey in her little gray +cold eyes. All the gossip of Rosewater was very old, scandal rare. "What +is it, Minerva?" she asked, eagerly. "Are they engaged? And do you know +just why he has come out here?" + +"I only know what everybody says about his coming here--that his health +ain't good, and he wants to make the ranch pay by running it himself; +but that other--" She paused and lifted her thin shoulders +significantly. "Well, all I can say is, that if they ain't engaged they +ought to be." + +Mrs. Wheaton leaned forward eagerly, but Mrs. Colton said, severely: +"That is just your evil mind, Minerva. You are always imagining things; +comes of having nothing to think about but cards and novels--six +children were what you needed." + +"I guess I have as much as anybody to think about, what with having no +help half the time, and a husband who wants his meals on time whether or +no. And I guess I worked as hard in the City Improvement Club as anybody +until we got all those concrete sidewalks for the town, let alone the +parks. What if I do read novels and play cards for recreation? Too much +thinking ain't good for anybody." + +"Oh, never mind," interrupted Mrs. Wheaton, hastily. "But what did you +mean, anyhow?" + +"Well, as you know, I don't sleep very well, and I often get up and sit +at the window, watching for the boat 'bus, and just imagining where the +people who are out late, or up early, are going to and what they are +thinking about. Well, I've seen him"--jerking her shoulder at Gwynne, +who was now dancing with Miss Boutts--"I've seen him riding home from +here as late as ten or half-past, many a night. He may have been +duck-shooting and stayed to supper. That's all right, but he could go +home just after. I for one don't think it's decent--a girl living all +alone like she does. If he wants to shoot ducks, anyhow, why don't he +join a club? If he does all his shooting here it's to be with her, and +no mistake. I've said from the very first, it's downright indecent for a +girl to live alone on a farm--no chaperon, not even a woman servant. I, +for one, think that Isabel Otis has done just as she pleased long +enough, and ought to be called down." + +"It is only natural that she should do as she pleases now that she has +the chance, poor soul," said Mrs. Colton. "She never had anything but +trouble and sorrow in her life until James Otis died. I wish he could +have died when she was little and I could have brought her up. That +life, and then her sudden liberty, have made her independent and +advanced, but I can't say that I like it myself. I wish she were more +like Anabel. It's odd they're not more alike, being such friends." + +"I quite agree with Minerva!" announced the leader. "Isabel ought to +have a chaperon. I don't doubt she's all she should be or _I_ shouldn't +be here to-night, friend of her mother's or not; but I suggested to her +only yesterday--I had a little talk with her on Main Street--that she +get some respectable old maid or widow to live with her." + +"What did she say?" asked Mrs. Colton, with a smile. + +"Say? The insolent young minx! She just looked at me, through me--Me--as +if I had not spoken. Her mother always put on airs. That's where she +gets it from. I had half a mind not to come to-night. But I wanted to +see things for myself. If she does anything really imprudent, _I'll make +her suffer_." + +This last phrase was famous in Rosewater. Mrs. Wheaton employed it +seldom, but when she did her friends understood that she was not far +from the war-path. Her color had risen with the memory of yesterday's +grievance, pushed aside by curiosity for some twenty-eight hours. + +Mrs. Haight regarded the radiant young hostess with a malignant stare, +prudently veiled by drooping lids. She envied Isabel with her whole +small soul; she had never known the sensation of liberty in her life, +and she stopped short of the courage that might snatch it. Mr. Haight, +the leading druggist of Rosewater and an eminent and useful citizen, was +a large stolid elderly man--he was at present in the little dining-room +with other gentlemen of his standing and a punch-bowl--as regular as a +clock in his habits, and devoted conscientiously to his wife, whom he +took for a buggy ride every Sunday in fine weather. They had been +married for twenty-two years, and for at least fifteen she had yearned +to be the heroine of an illicit romance; nor ever yet had found the +courage to indulge in a mild flirtation. She really loved her husband, +and in many respects made him an excellent wife, but her depths were +choked with the slime of a morbid eroticism which her husband was the +last man to exorcise. The earlier fever in her blood had gradually +dropped to the greensickness of middle-age, so that she was vaguely +repellent to men, particularly the young. This she had the wit to +detect, as well as the incontrovertible fact that her youth and her +chances were gone. As a natural consequence her repressed but still +rebellious passions diffused their poison throughout her nature. There +were times when she was seized with a frantic desire to inflict injury +upon some other woman, and at all times she found relief in sharp +criticism, in flinging mud at mantles spotless to the casual eye. She +passed for being very piquante and clever in a town where so little +happened except the turning over of money, and where the conversation +alternated between chickens and cards. She was sure that she scented a +scandal here, and her very nostrils quivered with anticipation; the +while she hated Isabel more bitterly for taking a lover instead of an +eternal husband. + +"Looks as if she didn't mean to introduce him to us," she remarked, with +an attempt at frigid criticism. "He don't dance so well but what the +girls could get on without him. Isabel might give him a chance to +exhibit his conversational powers--My! if he ain't going to dance again +with Dolly Boutts! I'd like to know how Isabel fancies that!" + +Gwynne, who liked any sort of exercise, and had been reading the United +States Statutes the greater part of the day, danced with the girls to +whom Isabel introduced him, returning no less than three times to the +exuberant Miss Boutts, whose step suited his, and whom he thought one of +the prettiest girls he had seen in America. Mr. Boutts's mother had been +the daughter of an Italian restaurant keeper in San Francisco, and his +heiress inherited a fine flashing pair of black eyes, a mass of black +hair, and a voluptuous but buoyant figure. She had inherited nothing of +the languor and fire of the Italian race, but chattered as incessantly +as any American girl, and had the mind and character of sixteen, in +spite of her almost full-blown beauty. Having an instinct for dress in +addition to a liberal allowance from her father, she was always a +notable figure in Main Street; and when in San Francisco was pleasantly +aware that she was by no means unnoticed in the fashionable throngs of +the hotels and Kearny Street. To-night she wore a gown of black net +revealing her superb shoulders and arms, and bunches of red carnations +that emphasized the red of her full pouting lips. She danced with a +graceful energy and looked unutterable things out of her great black +eyes while talking of the weather. Gwynne thought her a creature of +infinite possibilities, beside whom Isabel was a statue in ivory. + +Just before supper he was introduced to the older women, and offered his +arm to Mrs. Wheaton when two waiters, unmistakably from a San Francisco +caterer, threw open the doors upon a hall that separated the ballroom +from the old hotel dining-room. The startled guests filed hastily across +to find a dainty but sumptuous repast served at little tables. Even the +ice-cream was frozen in graceful shapes instead of being ladled out of a +freezer in full view of the company, and there was such an abundance of +all things, served with despatch by the professional waiters, that Mrs. +Haight was permitted to consume three plates of oysters _a la poulette_. + +"This must have cost a pretty penny!" she muttered to Mrs. +Wheaton--Gwynne was dancing attendance on Miss Boutts once more. "Much +money she'll save! One would think this was San Francisco, and some +swell house on Nob Hill. I don't believe a thing was cooked in her own +kitchen." + +"I should think not! This supper is from the St. Francis, or The Palace, +or The Poodle Dog--" Mrs. Wheaton ran off the names of all the famous +San Francisco restaurants, to the ill-concealed spite of Mrs. Haight who +did not dine in San Francisco once a year. "But as you suggest, I cannot +imagine how she expects to make a fortune in chickens if she throws +about money like this. No wonder Mr. Gwynne isn't good enough for +her--but perhaps that's the reason he's selling off so much of his +ranch. Mr. Wheaton says he thinks of putting up an office building on +some land he has south of Market Street." + +"To my way of thinking, Isabel Otis and matrimony don't gee. She's +altogether too advanced. Just you wait." + +The young people, meanwhile, were very gay, and there was little doubt +in Isabel's mind that if she lived in Rosewater and chose to revive and +lead the old social life she could drive cards to the wall in the first +engagement. She had been much elated with her success, but, of a sudden, +as her eyes roved benignantly over her chattering delighted guests, +ennui descended upon her: those ancestral mutterings in the soul that +stir dim memories of great moments of a greater time, inviting a vague +contempt and distaste for the petty incidents and achievements that make +up the sum of life. Isabel had experienced this faint sensation of +futility and disgust many times before, and although she was wise enough +not to let it paralyze her will, and to turn it to account in holding +her to her higher ideals, still she often envied the Dolly Bouttses, +with good red plebeian blood in their veins, and no voices in the +subconscious brain but those that bade them eat and drink and feed the +race. No, she decided, Rosewater could work out of its present inertia +by itself, and she began to wish her guests would go home; she was tired +of their inanities. Her disappointment in Hyliard Wheaton, whom she had +admired from a distance ever since her return, but who had never +succumbed to her charm until to-night, had much to do with her sense of +futility. He had read nothing, seen nothing, experienced nothing. He had +no ambition beyond living in San Francisco and enjoying life there. His +fine well-bred face with its high brow and smiling, slightly superior, +gaze, had suggested--the more particularly, perhaps, as his figure was +superb--possibilities both intellectual and romantic. Isabel told him +politely never to ride out without using the telephone first, and had +her excuses already coined. At least ten men be sides Gwynne were +hovering about Dolly Boutts, like humming-birds about the nectar of a +full-blown rose. They were blind to the fact that her voluptuous +suggestion was but a caprice of nature. Although, no doubt, she would +make the best of wives and mothers, she was as incapable of any depth of +passion as the frail fluffy creatures about her, and quite indifferent +to anything in man beyond his admiration. Up to the present she had +found cards far more interesting, particularly as she had known all the +Rosewater men since childhood; more particularly, perhaps, as this was +her first large party. She chattered, partly by instinct, partly in +deference to the traditional animation of the American girl; and it was +quite likely that the ultimate man would lead her to the altar under the +delusion that she was a brilliant woman with a genuine temperament. +Isabel wondered somewhat contemptuously at Gwynne's evident enthusiasm; +she would have given him credit for more experience and perspicacity; +but concluded that at a party a man could only judge a girl by her +exterior charms; and certainly Dolly had all her goods in the front +window. + +After supper they danced the old Virginia reel with great zest, and even +a few stray waltzes, then all left together at two o'clock; the older +women assuring Isabel formally that they had had a very pleasant +evening; but the girls and young men exclaimed that they had had a keen +time, a dandy time, and that their new hostess was too fine and dandy +for words. + + + + +XVI + + +Judge Leslie returned on the following day, and, sending for Gwynne at +once, announced that he was ready to settle down for the winter. A +partner attended to the business of the office, and the judge shut +himself up with Gwynne in the large light room containing his fine law +library, and examined his promising pupil. Gwynne was well read in the +English Common Law, and in Comparative Jurisprudence, particularly in +the history of treaties and the comity of nations. So much he had +regarded as necessary to the education of a future cabinet minister. + +Judge Leslie sketched out a course of study which embraced Cooley and +Kent on Constitutional Law, compilations of Leading Cases, Story on +Contracts, the California Codes, Civil, Penal, and Political, and +Corporation Law. "The money is in the last," he remarked, dryly, "but +even if you never succumb to these monstrous corporations, more aptly +named cormorants, the more you know about their methods and needs the +better, should you ever be called upon to fight them; and I have an idea +that that is just where you will show your strength. All the great +statesmen of this country have been great lawyers, and the great +statesman of the future is going to be the lawyer that checks the power +of unscrupulous capital, without at the same time delivering the country +over to the mercies of that equally unscrupulous tyranny the +labor-union. There is a solution somewhere and some man is going to find +it. I don't see why you should not be the man. I have followed your +career very carefully--you have always interested me. You come here with +a magnificent political training, a mind uncorrupted by a lifetime of +contact with the contemptible methods of machine politics, and a really +great ambition. Your eyes are wide open. I don't see why you should make +any mistakes, particularly as you have four good years in which to +ponder the great question before committing yourself. Four years are a +long span. No man can tell what may happen in that time, what new party +may evolve. All you can do is to watch events and be ready for the +forelock when time shakes it at you. If it so happens that you can +insidiously mould a new party meanwhile, so much the better. The wisest +and most suggestive writer on our national life is a Briton. I see no +reason why England should not send us a statesman--in the old sense. God +knows, all that we have now are a bitter disappointment to those of us +with any of the old ideals left. Should the Presidency be your ambition, +the fact of your having actually been born on American soil may be the +cause of a legal battle in the Supreme Court of the United States that +will pass into history. Meanwhile, as all apprenticeships must be +humble, you will be a sort of unofficial junior of this firm, sharing +the office business for the first year with Cresswell, and the second +year helping me with court practice in St. Peter. You can read in the +intervals and at home, and once or twice a week I should advise you to +attend lectures at the State University. I can see that your memory and +powers of assimilation are very vigorous, and the more quickly you +imbibe, and the more varied the quality, the better. All the odd types +of human nature you meet in this office won't do you any harm, either. +Study the American character above all things. Get in sympathy with it. +It is as opposite from the English as pole from pole, but you won't find +it a bad sort--the country's politics are the worst part of it, because +circumstances have forced them into the hands of a class of men that +make their living out of them, and whose natural destiny was +pocket-picking and the Rogues' Gallery--and if the best of us combine +one day to do you honor, we can carry you to places as distinguished as +any in your own country. Great and disinterested men have succeeded +against tremendous odds in times as parlous as these, and others have +the same opportunity here and now." + +The judge wound up his homily with a little peroration on Abraham +Lincoln and then left Gwynne to the California codes. The large new +stone office building of which Judge Leslie was the chief tenant stood +at the corner of a street a block above Main; Gwynne glancing over the +top of his tome could see a procession of teams, men lounging in the +doorway of a grocery store, and the spars of fishing-boats waiting for +the tide. His mind played him a curious trick. Piccadilly was before him +with its great hotels, its splendid old stone houses upon which the fogs +and the grime of London had demonstrated their poetical mission, the +classic entrance to the Park, the crowds of smart men and women; +Piccadilly at eight on a summer's evening choked with broughams and +hansoms, in which the light mantles barely concealed the shoulders and +jewels of the women. He had loved the outside life of London, returning +to it from afar with an ever fresh and boyish pleasure, the keener +perhaps because he knew that all doors were open to him and that he was +one of the great lions, not of those for whom the stranger must search +"Who's Who" upon his return from a function where half the guests had +made their little mark. He saw the lofty towers with their delicate +tracery, cutting the smoke on the banks of the Thames, the little room +below where he had made men, old and bored and suspicious, listen to +him; the more confident in his power to command their attention because +he knew that they had read and discussed, agreed with and denounced, his +sound contributions to colonial literature. The scene dissolved into a +wave of homesickness that made him choke and spring to his feet. Then he +swore at himself and returned to his codes. + +When Judge Leslie learned that Hiram Otis's law library had been moved +out to Lumalitas he suggested that Gwynne should read at home until he +had mastered the laws governing the State of California, and the student +was far better satisfied out there in the quiet and the fresh air of his +veranda. When a point needed expounding, a horseback ride into Rosewater +was not an unwelcome diversion. His will had triumphed in its first bout +with memory, so subtly liberated by the written word, and before three +days of close study had passed he had the sensation of having found a +new and individual patch upon which squarely to plant his feet. The +future seemed more definite, more assured; moreover, his avid brain, its +energies too long in abeyance, settled upon the new and absorbing +study--it was eight years since he had opened a law-book, although he +had forgotten little he had read at that plastic time--like a swarm of +locusts. He recalled that a clever woman had once said in his hearing +that whenever she felt blasee she took up a new language, and at once +felt young and eager again. The remark had passed him by at the time, +but he recalled it as he devoured and stored away the statutes that in +many ways differentiated California from the other States of the Union. +The mere fact that his was not the order of brain that took kindly to +monotonous application, but inspired him with the more ardent desire to +conquer; the sense of being on any sort of a battle-field again gave a +color to life. He realized that in six months more of inaction he should +have fallen into a constant and morbid habit of self-analysis, and +although his soul-sickness could not be healed in a moment, the sense of +danger gave an added zest to the impersonal nature of his studies. He +subscribed for all the San Francisco newspapers and for those of his own +and the adjoining counties. He was not conscious of any mounting love +for California, but here his lines were cast, and California was as good +a stepping-stone as another. If her politics were hideous he had not +made them, and his reviving faith in his star suggested that he may have +been born to redeem them. With the polishing up of the rustier parts of +his mind even his eyes grew brighter, he moved more quickly, he began to +feel all intellect once more, propelled by a body that was daily gaining +in red and vigorous blood. Judge Leslie was so delighted with his rapid +progress and his exceptionally retentive and classifying memory that he +assured everybody he met in Rosewater and St. Peter that he was training +a second Alexander Hamilton for the bar of the United States. + + + + +XVII + + +It was four days after the party that Isabel, walking over the low hills +among her chickens, in deep converse with her Abraham, was informed by +Chuma that Mrs. Thomas Colton had driven out to call upon her. She found +Anabel not in the house but seated before the front door in a smart new +basket trap, and as smart herself in coat and hat and gloves uniformly +dust-colored. She made a wry face at Isabel's overalls, but kissed her +affectionately. + +"This is my birthday," she announced, "and this is a surprise from +Tom--horse, harness, and all. I only had to give him three broad hints. +I wanted to show it to you first, and besides there is something I must +talk to you about--very important!" + +She assumed a matronly and mysterious air and dropped her voice. "I +suppose Mr. Gwynne does not call so early?" + +"Rarely. Won't you get out and stay to lunch?" + +"Tom would never forgive me. He is sure to bring me another surprise at +noon--it will arrive on the 11.30--a long chain made of every variety of +tourmalines set in silver. But I couldn't wait any longer to have a talk +with you about Mr. Gwynne. Until I saw you two together the other night +I had all sorts of romantic plans in my head. It seemed just the right +thing--_you_ are so different from everybody else; and then having met +him in England among all those old castles, and everything! I was sure +he would have enough of California in a year and then I should visit you +in England, and after a while you would marry Frances to a duke. But I +see that was all nonsense. You don't care a bit about each other and are +not in the least suited. I couldn't get up any sentiment for him myself; +he is much too cold-blooded and, well--_English_. They never can be like +us, no matter how hard they try. But in a way I like him, and Tom says +he is worth any ten men he ever met. I feel awfully sorry for him, out +there all alone--and it's a magnificent ranch--to say nothing of the +fact that he must be worth a lot of money besides. It would be perfectly +shameful if some San Francisco girl snapped him up--_and you know what +they are_. He belongs by right to us, and I for one shall see to it that +none of those man-eaters in San Francisco gets him. Did you notice how +attentive he was to Dolly the other night? Well, he actually called the +next day--she was out--and sent her flowers. Mrs. Haight saw him. She +says he looked dreadfully disappointed as he rode off. I take that with +a grain of salt, knowing Mrs. Haight; besides, he wouldn't break his +heart if a girl was out for good. But the fact remains that he did call, +and he hasn't called on another girl in Rosewater, much less sent her +flowers. Serena Wheaton and one or two others were at my house +yesterday. We are immensely excited over it. I am sure that if we +managed them both properly there would be a wedding in the spring. It +would be too delightful, for there hasn't been a bang-up wedding in +Rosewater since mine. And think of Dolly's trousseau! Every stitch would +come from New York. The San Francisco papers would be full of that +wedding, and St. Peter would be green with envy. And she would make him +such a good wife; such a beauty she is and such a dear good girl--just +the kind that wouldn't mind a man being haughty and overbearing. You two +would murder each other--but Dolly! The more I think of it the more +enthusiastic I am. We formed a plot last night, but as in a way he +belongs to you, I maintained that you should be consulted. But tell me +first--what do you think of it?" + +"Of the match? I cannot imagine a better. What is your plan?" + +"Last night Mrs. Colton had a bridge party, and I went over just as they +were finishing hissing at one another over a spoon that cost +seventy-five cents. After some of them had gone, the rest began to talk +about Dolly and Mr. Gwynne--I don't think the town has talked about +anything else since your party--except those everlasting cards, of +course. Well, the upshot was that I suggested we should revive the old +weekly dancing club. Otherwise they might not meet again for months, now +that Mr. Gwynne has settled down to his studies and hasn't been near +Rosewater since Monday. They agreed, but of course no one would offer +her house; they are all too mean, and mine is too small. But we can hire +the old hall, and all the men will be glad to subscribe--a few of us can +make up the deficit. Dolly always looks her best at night--she has the +loveliest neck!--and she would be glad of an excuse to get more party +dresses. Well--you see! You can always sleep at my house." + +"What fun it will be to have a weekly dance! I am going out to Lumalitas +this afternoon, and I will demand Mr. Gwynne's subscription." + +"Isabel! You are a jewel! Mrs. Haight was nasty, but I told her she did +not know you the least little bit, that you were no dog in the manger. +But, dear Isabel, do you think you ought to go out there alone? I don't +mind; you know that I never bother my head about other people's affairs, +but Mrs. Haight is such a gossip, and she never did like you, and all +small places are so gossipy. She has been telling everybody that Mr. +Gwynne rides past her house quite late at night from duck-shooting, and +of course she assumes that you shoot with him." + +"I generally do. You may tell Mrs. Haight, with my compliments, to go to +the devil! Still, dear Anabel, if you think it improper for me to call +alone on a bachelor cousin, I will pick up somebody on my way out." + +"Do, that's a dear. And I shall tell Mrs. Haight that old Mac always +goes shooting with you. I am sure that he does. Good-bye. I'll see about +the hall this afternoon." + +She drove off with lifted reins and a little flourish of her whip, and +Isabel went into the house and telephoned first to Gwynne, who had +installed a private wire between his house and hers, and then to Miss +Boutts. At two o'clock she drew rein before a large brown shingle house +on the highest point of Rosewater. Mr. Boutts had begun life in one of +the little old peaked cottages down by the central square; later he had +built an "artistic" cottage, and then a "residence"; symbolizing his +increase not only by the more pretentious structures but by mounting the +hill; the second cottage had been half-way up, the residence was on its +apex, and could be seen by the envious traveller on boat and train. +There was nothing left before him now but San Francisco or a balloon; +heaven being out of the question. + +Miss Boutts awaited the buggy, in the tiny porch, and had obeyed +Isabel's behest to look her prettiest. She wore a large red hat covered +with feathers shading into pink, and a claret-colored frock that fitted +her superb figure in a fashion that caused Isabel to draw her brows +together and suggest a dust-coat. + +"It is too sweet of you," said Miss Boutts, as she sprang into the +buggy. "I feel so flattered when you take any notice of insignificant +little me. Do tell me where we are going and why you told me to look my +prettiest!" + +"I must go out to Lumalitas to consult certain farmer's books in my +cousin's library, and I thought it only fair to provide him with +entertainment while I am busy. It seems the gossips do not approve of my +going out there alone, and as I was obliged to go I did not think it +worth while to make a martyr of Mr. Gwynne." + +Miss Boutts blushed and tossed her head. "He called on me and sent me +flowers," she said, in innocent triumph. "I was so sorry to miss him. +All the girls are fearfully jealous." + +"Do you like him?" asked Isabel, absently. + +"Well--a little. He is new, and English, and different. There's not much +to choose from here, and I don't know any of the swells in San +Francisco. I can't say he is my ideal--that has always been an immensely +tall man with big blue eyes and a tawny moustache; and Mr. Gwynne is +just a sort of blond, no color in his hair at all, and I never did care +much for gray eyes. He's tall enough, and the girls think him +'distinguished,' but nobody could call him big. Besides, he doesn't know +how to say sweet things one little bit. I went out on the veranda with +him at your party, and it was a heavenly night, and all he asked me was +if I wasn't afraid of catching cold, and then he wandered on about +American girls exposing themselves foolishly and wearing too thin shoes +and eating too many sweets. Fancy a man talking like that to a girl at +night on a veranda! I never felt so flat." + +Isabel glanced curiously at the beautiful empty creature. Her black eyes +looked like wells of sentiment, and her body a mould for a new race of +men. + +"Tell me," she exclaimed, impulsively. "What do you expect a man to do +under such circumstances--to--a--kiss you?" She brought out the last +with some effort, her old-fashioned training suddenly suggesting that +she could better understand the downfall of the girl she had befriended +in Paris than the vulgarities of the shallow. + +Miss Boutts laughed amusedly. "Well, most men would have tried it. I +never was one to make myself common, but once in a while--well! I +haven't much opinion of a man who wouldn't snatch a kiss from a girl he +admired to death, when he got a chance." She turned upon Isabel, curious +in her turn. "Of course you are lots older than I am--twenty-five or +six, aren't you? And I am only just eighteen. But I always used to watch +and wonder about you before you went away. I knew you were not the least +bit like the other girls. I wonder what it is like to be different from +other people. I always feel just like everybody else." + +"So do I," said Isabel, encouragingly. "It was only circumstances that +made me appear different." + +"But you know so much!" sighed Miss Boutts. "You speak a lot of +languages, and you took all the honors at the High School--and then all +those years in Europe! I wonder Mr. Gwynne will even look at any of +us." + +"Men like your sort much better," said Isabel, dryly. "Do be nice to him +to-day, and entertain him in your own style while I dig through those +tiresome books. I sha'n't be long." + +Gwynne looked more than hospitable as he ran down the veranda steps to +assist his guests out of the high buggy. When they had taken off their +dust-cloaks and stood side by side he reflected that he had seldom seen +two such handsome girls together. Isabel was far more simply dressed +than Miss Boutts, but her little black jacket fitted perfectly, and +there was a touch of pale blue at the neck, and in the lining of her +large black hat, that deepened the blue of her eyes under their heavy +black brows and lashes. Gwynne had never seen her look so girlish and +ingenuous. She kept her profile from him and he saw only her smiling +eyes and red half-opened mouth. + +"I had to telephone to make sure you would be at home," she said. "They +say I mustn't come out here alone, and I didn't want Miss Boutts to be +bored while I was at work. I'll leave you two here on the porch. That +will be quite proper." + +As she nodded and went into the living-room she saw Gwynne turn to the +lovely glowing girl left on his hands, with more intensity than she had +seen him display since Mrs. Kaye took her black eyes and fine bust out +of his life. As she made herself comfortable in his deepest chair she +heard the girlish shallow voice launch out into a eulogy of the scenery. +Gwynne responded with some enthusiasm; for a time there was a broken +duet, and then the feminine voice settled down to a steady monologue. +Miss Boutts knew that it was an American girl's business to be animated, +entertaining, amusing, especially with Englishmen, who hated effort. +Occasionally there was a masculine rumble, with a growing accent of +desperation, and the indulgent little bursts of laughter diminished in +frequence and spontaneity. Isabel lifted down volume after volume of the +books on farming her uncle had collected, letting one fall, rattling +leaves when leaves would rattle. An hour passed. She appropriated +Gwynne's writing materials and took what appeared to be copious notes. +The host suddenly excused himself and came within. + +"Won't you have tea?" he demanded. "It is rather early, but after that +drive--" + +"Much too early," said Isabel, absently. Her chin was on her hand, her +eyes were on a spotted page. "Mariana is sure to be asleep. Do go back +to Dolly. She is one of those girls that can't bear to be left alone. I +didn't bring her out here to be bored." + +"Didn't you? What on earth do you want of all those notes? Are you going +to write a treatise?" + +"Of course not. Do go back." + +Gwynne returned to the veranda. For more than another hour that sweet +nasal monotonous voice trilled on. Then it began to flag. Then a silence +ensued, broken at first by sporadic and staccato remarks, then becoming +as dense as the silences of the night. Again Gwynne invaded his +living-room. + +"Isabel!" he said, in a low tense tone. + +Isabel looked up dreamily and encountered a haggard face and a pair of +blazing eyes. "I'll never forgive you!" he whispered. + +"For what?" + +"For what! Do you want to drive me mad? Take her home!" + +"Do you mean to say that you have not been enjoying yourself?" + +"Enjoying myself! I have been on the rack." + +"You are the rudest--most unsatisfactory--I thought I knew your taste." + +"Oh, _please_!" + +"What do you mean?" + +They confronted each other, Gwynne flushed and angry, Isabel coldly +interrogative. Gwynne, who had been on the verge of an explosion, felt +suddenly helpless. It was assuming a great deal to tell a woman that he +saw through her plot to disenchant him with a rival. He could hear the +descending whip of Isabel's scorn. Besides, it would mean a quarrel, and +much as he resented her interference in his destinies, especially this +last and most notable success, he had no desire to break up the even +surface of their relation. So he merely shrugged his shoulders and said, +with what calmness he could muster: + +"Be kind enough to take her home. I will return the entire library if +you need it." + +"Oh, I have finished. I am sorry you have been bored." And she carefully +gathered up her papers and went to the rescue of the weary Miss Boutts, +while Gwynne ordered the buggy. During the drive towards the paternal +roof Miss Boutts remarked casually that she didn't care about +Englishmen, but otherwise had little to say. + +So ended the social regeneration of Rosewater. + + + + +XVIII + + +Gwynne awoke one morning with an irresistible desire for The Town in +every fibre of his being. Barring London he would have liked three +crowded days in New York, but as nothing better was available he felt +that he was open to the attractions of San Francisco. He had not visited +it since his departure on that brilliant Sunday after his arrival; he +had promised to wait for Isabel, and his interest in it was +intermittent. This morning he found his indifference culpable, inasmuch +as he had had three letters from his mother imploring him to increase +her income, and Mr. Colton had not only strongly advised him to tear +down the block of old structures south of Market Street, and put up a +great office building, but had offered to raise the money--selling half +the land and mortgaging the rest. And if Gwynne had not revisited San +Francisco he had a very accurate idea of its present conditions. It was +uncommonly rich, and its citizens, always sanguine of its future, had +been seized with a very fever of faith; they were selling out their +interests everywhere else and buying and building, tearing down and +rebuilding, until San Francisco threatened to lose its oddly patched and +wholly individual appearance and become the Western city of +sky-scrapers. + +As Gwynne dressed he recalled his first impression of the city as he +crossed the bay: its singularly desolate appearance, in spite of what +at first looked to be a compact mass of buildings covering some thirty +thousand acres on hill and plain, and later as if a comet had rained +down pickings from every architectural quarter of the universe. He had +walked once to the back of the boat and looked at the line of little +towns and cities lying at the base of the eastern hills. They did +nothing to dispel the impression of loneliness. Whatever their +individual names they were mere annexes of the great-little city +opposite. When he returned to the forward deck the dust was blowing its +brown volumes through every street that converged to the water-front. +Those dust wracks, broken and narrowed by the buildings, lifted from the +outlying sand-dunes, and following a law that had driven them eastward +since California had risen from the deeps, had a curiously baffled, +stolidly persistent expression, as if the old sand-dunes knew their +rights and were determined to assert themselves so long as man left a +yard of them free. + +Gwynne, in his solitary moments, when even his law-books were closed, +had recalled the stories of San Francisco, past and present, told him by +Isabel, and they had given rise to many whimsies. California, he still +all but disliked, but he wondered at the haunting memory of the city he +had seen so briefly, and the odd almost pathetic appeal it had made to +his sympathies. He had concluded that it was the pioneer taint in his +English blood, and had blinked in sudden wonder before the fact of his +close kinship, not only to that old romantic Spanish element, but to the +brilliant adventurous lawless race of men that had made the city great +and famous, then passed on into the kingdom of darkness leaving their +moral rottenness in its foundations, and, pulsing above, all their old +brave indomitable and progressive spirit. Although he had found it no +rival to his studies and his ranch, still he had given it more thought +than he was aware, and not only to its picturesque psychology, but as +the seat of a possible business adventure. To raise a large sum of money +on the San Francisco real estate--the common property of his mother and +himself--and erect a great office building of steel and reinforced +concrete, would add enormously to his own and his mother's incomes, but +on the other hand it would stand in the midst of acres of wooden +buildings and shanties, and the risk of a great fire--whose momentum +would sweep through any fireproof building--was one forgotten neither by +the insurance agents nor the chief of the fire department, who was said +to keep thousands of tons of dynamite in the city with which to +segregate the always expected conflagration. It was possible that no +insurance company would take the risk on an expensive building in such a +quarter. On the other hand it was as certain as the present wealth of +the city, that such a building would have hundreds of companions in the +next ten years, and the undesirable, immoral, and generally drunken +element, so largely responsible for the continual fires of the district, +would be gradually pressed to the outskirts of the city. He felt +inclined to take the risk, even a sense of exhilaration in it, as if +indeed the dead and gone Otises had invaded his soul and demanded one +more bout on earth. + +There was another matter that claimed his thoughts when the law was at +rest. He was suspicious and resentful of Isabel's desire to manage him; +and that she had succeeded more than once, through her superior feminine +subtlety, made him aware that two strong natures were slowly bracing +themselves against each other, and that on some future battle-ground +there might be a heavy and final encounter. This morning, as he ordered +his portmanteau to be packed and placed in the buggy, his impulse was to +take the tram, and cavalierly announce, upon their next meeting, that he +had "been to town." After he had had his coffee, however, he decided not +to be an ass, and unpardonably rude as well. She had talked of this +visit every time they had met, although one thing and another had +detained her, and he could hardly explain to her an impetuous and +solitary flight. He colored as he invoked her assumption that he feared +and was running away from her, asserting his independence like any +school-boy. Besides there was the launch. The idea of three hours on the +water instead of one and a half on a slow and dirty train so exhilarated +him that he forgot his self-communings and ordered the buggy at once. It +was but half-past five. They would catch the tide; nor did the train +leave until half-past eight. He presented Imura Kisaburo Hinamoto with a +box of cigarettes, gave him the run of the library, and drove off +whistling. + +He found Isabel among the chickens. She had just opened the doors of all +the little colony houses, and the hills were white with excited +scratching Leghorns. She wore overalls and high boots, and the night +braid of her hair was twisted several times round her throat. Gwynne +smiled as he recalled the heroines of poesy that had fed so many doves +and garden birds. No heroine could look picturesque in bloomers, and +feeding chickens, but as Isabel came towards him waving her hand +hospitably, her white clear-cut face resting on its black _goita_ of +hair might have suggested Stuck's Suende, in the Neue Pinakothek of +Munich, had there been an evil glint in her light cool blue eyes. The +fleeting query crossed his mind as to what she might have been if born +in one of the generations before the pioneers of her sex had opened so +many gates for the irruption of overburdened femininity. But he merely +remarked: + +"I am suddenly inspired With a desire to see San Francisco. Are you too +busy? Are we too late for the tide?" + +"Just in time," said Isabel, promptly; "and I shall be ready as soon as +the launch is. Do you know that it is Saturday? You could not have +chosen a better day." + + * * * * * + +As they pushed off, all the marsh and its creek was covered with a low +white mist that gave it the appearance of a great lake, a ghost lake +through which the little steamer just leaving Rosewater two miles above +coiled its way like a monstrous white bird feeling uneasily for a +foothold. Overhead the sky was covered with the pink fleece of dawn. The +mass of mountains in Marin County looked black and formless, but above +them rose the granite crest of Tamalpais, like an angular lifted +shoulder. + +"That mountain has marched north five feet in the last forty years," +said Isabel, as she carefully steered through the mist. "Either that, or +the earthquake of 1868 moved her off her base." + +"For heaven's sake don't tell me any more weird tales about this +country; it gives me the horrors often enough as it is. This morning the +hills and mountain on the other side of the valley looked like +antediluvian monsters just ready to turn over." + +"Well, they have turned over a few times, and may again. One reason we +all love California is because we never know what she will do next, and +because she is still primeval under this thin coat of civilization that +is too tight for her. I admire England, but I could not live in it. It +is too peaceful, too done. It is impossible to imagine any further +change, for civilization can go no further. But out here--the whole +country may stand on its head any day; and we may yet have cities as +great as Babylon and Nineveh." + +"Well, we'll not be here to see. This fog is just high enough to filter +into one's very marrow--even your picturesque pioneer days are over; I +will confess they might have made me feel that life on the edge of the +world was worth while. I should have liked to lay the foundations of a +great isolated city like San Francisco; but I don't see any sign of +another big city. Los Angeles is a little Chicago and may live to be a +big one, but nothing would induce me to live in the south. However, no +man is ever conscious of the fact that he is in at the birth of a great +city; our pioneer forefathers were just a parcel of adventurers crazed +with the lust of gold, and with no sense of any future beyond the +present." + +Isabel leaned forward eagerly. "You have been thinking about San +Francisco!" she exclaimed, triumphantly. "The old Otis blood is +beginning to wake up! Hooray!" + +Gwynne laughed outright, and for the first time without resentment; he +was tired of having California "rammed down his throat." Isabel's eyes +were dancing with so purely youthful and feminine a triumph that he +could not but feel indulgent. + +"I am growing reconciled to my lot. Here I am and here I remain." + +"Yes, you are much happier," said Isabel, softly. She half closed her +eyes and looked a trifle older. "It worried me dreadfully at first to +know that you were unhappy, and that it was my fault." + +"Unhappy!" exclaimed Gwynne, reddening haughtily. "I have not been +mooning about like a homesick ass--" + +"Oh, your outside was as tranquil as your pride demanded--and it was +splendid! But I couldn't help knowing--feeling. A thousand little things +appeal so directly to a woman's intuitions." + +"Indeed! I am delighted to learn that you possess the common intuitions +of a woman." + +"Am I unwomanly? Masculine?" asked Isabel, anxiously. + +"Not in the ordinary sense; but you are much too strong. No woman should +be as strong--as, well--as psychically independent as you are. It is as +flagrant a usurpation of prerogative as a pretty complexion on a man." + +"I only say one prayer: 'Give me strength. Give me strength.'" + +"For what, in heaven's name? What use have you for so much strength? You +have forsworn matrimony. You disclaim the intention of going forth and +entering the great battle of the intellects--having, as you say, no +talents. You have isolated yourself from love, so you need no uncommon +supply of strength to meet suffering. You will always have money enough, +and you appear to have been born with the gift of making it. Even if you +elect to be the leader of fashion in San Francisco, your equipment need +not be of unadulterated steel. But I cannot fancy why you entertain any +such ambition." + +"That is the least of my ambition--although I intend to become the most +notable woman in San Francisco, not only because I must gratify a +healthy natural ambition in some way, and because I want my life to have +a sufficiency of incident in it, but because it is a part of my general +scheme." + +"What is this precious scheme?" + +"You would not understand if I should tell you. Men have no time for +subjectivities--except poets, psychological fictionists, and the like, +who do not seem to me men at all. Now, one reason I have liked you from +the first, in spite of many things that made my American blood boil, is +that you are a man, a real masculine arrogant dense man, with no +feminine morbid tendency to analyze your ego, in spite of your Celtic +blood. I met too many of that sort in Europe." + +Gwynne, with his elbows on his knees, regarded the bottom of the boat +and colored guiltily, while congratulating himself that for all her +insight and cleverness she had barely penetrated his outer envelope. She +had thought him merely homesick, when his ego had been tottering, his +soul racked with doubt and terror; when he had spent long hours in +self-analysis; until the law had come to his rescue and reinvigorated +his brain. At the same time a wave of sadness swept over him. How little +human beings knew one another, no matter how intimate. As he raised his +eyes he seemed to see Isabel across a chasm as vast as the Atlantic; and +he was reminded that he knew her as little as she him. She had confessed +to the throes of what she believed to have been a great passion, but +when he had rehearsed the story away from the influence of her curious +cold magnetism and the sinister setting of its recital, he had +recognized it for what it was, the first violent embrace of an ardent +unshackled imagination with positive experience, in which the ego had +played an insignificant part. Her immediate recovery upon beholding the +disintegrating clay, without one regret for the vanished soul, or even +for the magnetic warmth of the living shell, suggested to his groping +masculine intelligence, totally unaccustomed to analysis of woman, that +her attack had been little more personal than if the man had infected +her with the microbe of influenza. Surely a woman that had loved a man +well enough to kiss him must have been stabbed with pity for the ardent +vigorous life thrust out into the dark. Then he felt a quick resentment +that anything so stainlessly statuesque as this girl--for all her trim +tailoring and large black hat--should have been even superficially +possessed by any man. + +"Did that Johnny ever kiss you?" he asked, abruptly. + +"Of course," replied Isabel. "Did I not have to, being engaged to him? +Not that there was much chance, for I never saw him alone between four +walls. Perhaps that was one reason that side of love seemed to me much +overrated. I was happiest when sitting alone in a sort of trance and +thinking about him." + +"Humph!" said Gwynne. + +The mist was gone. The east was a vast alcove of gold in which the hills +were set like hard dark jewels. The creek was narrowing. On either side, +and far on all sides, stretched the marsh. The guileless duck disported +himself on the ponds, but Gwynne, for once, was insensible to its +subversive charms, felt no regret that he had forgotten his gun. He came +and sat closer to Isabel, wondering if she felt as young as he did in +the wonderful freshness and beauty of the dawn. She certainly looked +very young and fresh and girlish, not in the least fateful, as when she +turned her profile against a hard background and forgot his presence. + +"I think I could quite understand anything you cared to tell me," he +said, smiling into her eyes. "Please give me your reasons for +cultivating the character of a Toledo blade. Is it your intention +to marshal all the clans of all the advanced women and lead them +against the more occupied and disunited sex? I am told that it is +a standing grievance in Rosewater that you will not join that +Literary--Political--Improvement--and all the rest of it Club. I should +think with your ambitions and--well--masterful disposition, you would +assume its leadership as a sort of preliminary course." + +"I intend to be a whole club in myself." + +"Appalling! But what _do_ you mean by that cryptic assertion? I told you +that I could understand anything you chose to explain, but, as they say +out here, I am not good at guessing." + +"I am working out a theory of my own. It has been demonstrated that +labor, capital, all the known forces, are far stronger when concentrated +and organized. I believe in concentrating all the faculties about a will +strong enough not only to conquer life but all the inherited weaknesses +that beset one daily within. That is a minor matter, however. I believe +that our higher faculties were given to us for no purpose but to create +within ourselves an individual strength that will add to the sum of +strength in the world. It is not necessary to proclaim this strength +from the house-tops, nor to search for windmills--a positive enemy it +would leap at automatically--nor even to seek to improve the world by +all the tried and generally futile devices. It is enough to be. I alone +may not add greatly to this subjective strength of the world; but think +what life would be did each individual succeed in making himself but one +degree less strong than God himself! It may be my destiny to make +propaganda without noise; but if not, the achievement of absolute +strength in myself will move the world forward to its millennium +one-millionth part of a degree at least. For that will be the real +millennium--when there shall be no despicable weakness in the world, no +moral rottenness, when each individual shall rely upon himself alone, +independent of the environment from which the majority to-day draw +everything good and bad, their happiness or misery. Nothing will ever +purge human nature but the triumph of the higher faculties, a triumph +accomplished by an unswervingly cultivated and jealously maintained +strength." + +"I don't deny that your millennium has its points, but would that not be +rather a hard world? What of love, the interdependence of the sexes, and +all the other human relations?" + +"It is love and interdependence that cause all the misery of the world; +they would be the very first things I should relegate among the minor +influences, did I wield the sceptre for an hour. To women, at least, all +unhappiness comes from the superstition that love--any sort--is all. Of +course there would be marriage, but of deliberate choice, and after a +long and purely platonic friendship, in which all the horrid little +failings that do most to dissever could be recognized and weighed. Free +love and experimental matrimony are mere excuses for the sort of +sensuality that is shallow and inconstant." + +"Ah! Then you would permit love to your married pair after they had +probed each other's minds and mannerisms for a year or two? That is a +concession I hardly expected." + +Isabel shrugged her shoulders. "I am neither an idiot nor blind. Heaven +knows I have seen enough of reckless passion and its consequences. The +equipment of the mortal proves him to be the slave of the race, but at +least he need not remain the blind and ridiculous slave he is at +present. If I had married that man no doubt I should have loved him more +frantically than ever for a time. But that would have passed, left me +resentful of bondage, of the surrender of self. There, above all, is the +reason I shall never marry. Impersonally, I believe in marriage, or +rather accept it, but I purpose to stand apart as a complete individual, +and subtly to teach others to drag strength out of the great body of +force in which we move, until they realize that in time mankind may feed +those creative fires, becoming, who knows, stronger than the great first +cause itself." + +"And I have been called an egoist," murmured Gwynne. "I feel a +mere--well--Leghorn--beside this sublime determination to sit upon the +throne of God and administer to both kingdoms. All the same, my fair +cousin, I believe that it takes a man and a woman to complete the ego. I +incline to the picturesque belief that they were originally united, and +halved in some--well, say when Earth and its atmosphere became two +distinct parts. No doubt it was a judgment for having accomplished too +much evil in that formidable combination. Who knows but that may be the +secret of the fall of man; the uneven progress of human nature may be +towards the resumption of that state, only to be attained when we have +conquered the worst in ourselves and become pure spirit." + +"That fits my own theory, for I believe that the two parts of what +should have been a perfect whole were cut in two for their sins, and +that reunion will come only when each has absolutely mastered the human +evil in him and freed the spiritual, but this he can only accomplish +alone--" + +"Don't quote Tolstoi to me! He waited until he was old and cold to hurl +anathema against the human passions. Theories upon love by a man long +past his prime are as valueless as those of a girl." + +"It was a theory I had no intention of advancing. I think for myself and +pay no more attention to the excessive virtue bred by the years than to +that equally illogical repentance or awakening of a woman's moral nature +when the man has ceased to charm or has disappeared. That is a mere +process, and no augury of future behavior. But you are always at your +best when you go off at half-cock like that! What I meant was that woman +has degenerated, not through passion but through ages of the exercise of +her pettier and meaner qualities. In some, these qualities lead to +malignancy, in the majority, no doubt, to frivolity--still worse, to my +puritanical inheritance--and they are utterly commonplace of outlook. +Matrimony keeps these qualities in constant exercise, because the ego +loses its independent life, its habit of meditation, and is pin-pricked +twenty times a day. It is by these qualities that woman chains man to +the earth, not by her human passions. I am quite willing to concede that +passion is magnificent." + +Gwynne ground his teeth. He had never encountered anything so +incongruous as this beautiful vital superbly fashioned girl talking of +passion in precisely the same tone as she would have talked of chickens. +He felt the primitive man's impulse to beat her black and blue and then +make her his creature. As Isabel turned her eyes she was astonished at +what she saw in his. Gwynne's eyes were blazing. There was a dark color +in his face, and even his mouth, somewhat heavy, and generally set, was +half open. She fancied that so he looked when on a platform facing the +enemy, and thoroughly awake. + +"What are you angry about?" she asked, calmly. "That I devote myself to +my sex instead of to yours? They need me more than any leader they have +evolved so far. There are millions of women of your sort. I want nothing +that your sex has left to offer. I will find a happiness unimaginable to +you, in living absolutely within myself and independent of all that +life, so far, has to give." + +Then Gwynne exploded, and forgot himself. He flung himself forward, and +catching her upper arms in the grip of a vise shook her until her teeth +clacked together. "Damn you! Damn you!" he stammered. "What you want is +to be the squaw of one of your own Indians!" + +"Let me go!" gasped Isabel, furious, and in sharp physical pain. "Do you +want to turn the boat over? Have you gone mad? I'll _kick_ you!" + +"Good!" said Gwynne, releasing her, and sitting back. "That is the only +feminine speech you have made since I have known you. I make no apology. +You need never speak to me again. Set me ashore over there. I can take +the train when it comes along." + +"You pinched me! You hurt me!" cried, Isabel in wrath and dismay. "I +hate you!" + +"And your sentiments are cordially returned. Will you put me on shore?" + +"I don't care what you do. You hurt me! You hurt me!" And Isabel dropped +her head into her arms and burst into a wild tempest of tears, like a +child that has had its first whipping. + +Gwynne laughed aloud. "We are running into a mud bank," he said, "and +the tide is going out." + +Isabel made a wild clutch at the tiller ropes, and brought the boat back +into the channel. But she could scarcely see, and Gwynne with a +contrition he had no intention of displaying offered to control the +launch. She vouchsafed him no reply, and as she did not steer for the +land, he retired to the extreme end of the boat and studied the scenery. +He was determined not to go through even the form of an apology, but he +was equally determined upon a reconciliation. In his first attempt to +match his wits with a woman's his face became so stony and intense that +Isabel recovered in a bound the serenity she had been struggling for, +and laughed with a gayety that would have deceived any man. + +"We are a couple of naughty children," she said, sweetly. "Or maybe +people are not quite civilized so early in the morning. You may smoke, +if you like, and then I shouldn't mind if you came here and let me teach +you to run this launch--it is probably more old-fashioned than any you +have undertaken. But as we no doubt shall make many journeys it is only +fair that you should do half the work." + + + + +XIX + + +When they docked at the foot of Russian Hill, Isabel suggested that +Gwynne should leave his portmanteau with Mr. Clatt, the wharfinger that +lived at the edge of the sea-wall and looked after such launches and +yachts as came his way. + +"I want you to stay with me if Lyster and Paula will come too," she +said, hospitably. "They like that sort of thing when they happen to have +a nurse. If they cannot come you will have to go to one of the hotels. +In either case you can send here for your suit-case. You had better take +the Jones Street car--" + +"The track is bust," said Mr. Clatt, who was a laconic person. + +"Walk along the docks to Polk Street and then south until you find a +car--I think it turns in at Pacific Avenue. The conductor will tell you +where to transfer--" + +"Are there no cabs?" + +"There are hacks and coupes at the livery-stables, if you care to expend +ten or fifteen dollars for being less comfortable than in the cars. +Remember our hills are little off the perpendicular." + +She did not see fit to inform him that his business would not take him +into the hilly district, and watched him wend his way along the noisy, +dirty, evil-smelling docks with some satisfaction. Then she climbed the +steep hill to her house, over the crest. There were many cottages on +this side of Russian Hill and one or two fine residences, but beyond one +cable-car line little or nothing had been done to make life easy for the +inhabitants. It was a bit of pioneer San Francisco. One day, no doubt, +there would be a boulevard at its foot, the rough inhospitable cliff +would be terraced, and set with the country-like villas of people that +appreciated the beauties of the bay and Tamalpais, but at present a +carriage could not mount it, and it made no appeal to the luxurious. + +An elderly couple lived in the "Belmont House" and did all that was +necessary in the present stage of Isabel's fortunes. She found the woman +house-cleaning and the old man weeding among the abundant crysanthemums +and asters in the half acre which still surrounded the old mansion. She +gave her orders and started for the home of her sister. A belated +trade-wind was screaming through the city driving the dust before it. +Isabel looked down at the towers and the domes, the steeples and walls +of the great modern buildings, the low city built in the days when San +Franciscans still feared earthquakes, all looming through the torn brown +veil like the mirage of a city infinitely distant. But San Francisco was +rarely more beautiful than in a dust-storm, which recombined her +outlines and the patchwork of her crowded generations into something +like harmony. She looked dreaming, proud, detached, an houri veiled to +allure, to inspire a new race of poets. Gwynne holding his hat on his +head with both hands, in the valley, cursed the climate, but Isabel +picking her way down the crazy old staircase, although in anything but a +poetical mood, paused a moment with that sudden outrush and uplift that +was the only passion she had ever known. Such moments were not frequent +and brought with them a sense of impersonality, as if she were but the +vehicle of aspiring passionate souls long gone from their own clay, that +rushed back through familiar conduits like volcanic fires, eager for the +arch of the visible world. + +But ancestral rights had short shrift this morning. Isabel's spirit was +a very caldron. She not only still raged at the fact that for a few +seconds she had been as helpless in the grip of mere brute strength as +any peasant woman, but she was keenly disappointed that Gwynne had not +understood her. That he might have understood her too well, his whole +sex precipitating itself upon the new enemy, she would not admit for a +moment; women, with a sort of dishonest mental confusion, invariably +substituting the word misunderstood for failure to accept their own +point of view. Above all, was she furious with herself. Instead of +annihilating him with the dignity of which she possessed an uncommon +share, she had been surprised into behaving as if she were the crudest +of mere human creatures. + +Moreover, her arms still pained, and she knew that they were black and +blue. + +At the foot of the bluff she ran into a basement doorway to pin on her +veil more securely, and dismissed psychology as incompatible with +trade-winds and dust. A block or two farther on she took a cable car +which slipped rapidly down the western slope, across the narrow valley, +then up another and steeper hill, all blooming with flowers in the +narrow gardens. She alighted at a corner half-way to the summit, and +walked back to one of those curious San Francisco "Flat Houses" with +three doors in a row. It was perched high above the sidewalk, for the +street but a few years since was a gully, and the grading had deepened +it. It was reached by some sixty winding but solid steps, and the little +terrace, off at a right angle, was full of color. + +As she had expected, Mrs. Paula was sitting in the bow-window of her +bedroom, gazing at the passers-by with a sort of idle eagerness. But so +were a hundred others in sight, there being no idler creature than the +American woman of small means, who neither belongs to clubs nor does her +own work. The shallow philosophers harp upon the boredom of the idle +rich whose every wish is gratified; but as a matter of fact the rich are +seldom idle, and in highly organized societies are models of system and +energy; whether misdirected or not, is beyond the question. It is the +idle woman in a flat whose imagination riots along the highways of the +great world, who keeps an avid eye for change of any sort, and finds a +fictitious existence in the sentimental, the immoral, and the society +novel. + +Paula, who lived in the top flat, ran down the two flights of stairs and +opened the door for Isabel. + +"Well! you are a stranger!" she exclaimed. "I was wondering if your +chickens had tuberculosis. Lots have in California. I read it in a +Sunday newspaper." + +"My chickens are quite healthy. How are the children?" + +"As well as can be expected in this dusty windy city where they have to +stay in the house half the day." Mrs. Stone's children were notoriously +healthy, but she was of the stuff of which the modern martyr is made. + +Isabel followed her up the stairs and into the large sunny front +bedroom. The children being invisible and also inarticulate, were +doubtless in the back yard. The room was vaguely untidy without being +dirty. A basket of socks and stockings in various stages of repair stood +on a table by the window, but pushed aside to accommodate the Saturday +society papers and a novel from the circulating library. An opera-cloak +lay across a chair, flung there, no doubt, the night before, and on the +floor close by was a pair of pink worn slippers very narrow at the toes +but bulging backward like a toy boat. On the sofa was a freshly +laundried pile of shirts with detached collars and cuffs, which Mrs. +Stone immediately began ostentatiously to snip along the frayed edges. +The room itself was full of sunshine, which gave it a cheerful air in +spite of the faded Brussels carpet and the old-fashioned walnut +furniture, a contribution from the house on Russian Hill. Mrs. Paula +wore a vastly becoming wrapper of red nun's veiling trimmed with a +yellowish lace that by no means looked as cheap as it was. She was +pretty to excess, one of those little brown women that men admire and +often trust. Had she been thin she would have been bird-like with her +bright darting brown glance, but her cheeks, like her tightly laced +little figure, were very round, and so crimson that they excited less +suspicion than the more delicate and favorite pink. And the brilliant +color suited her peasant style of prettiness, her full red lips, her +bright crisp bronze hair. She had a fashion of absently sweeping the +loose sleeves of her wrapper and "artistic" house-gowns up to her +shoulder and revealing a plump and charming arm; and the pointed toe of +shoe or slipper was always visible. Her arts were lost on Isabel, who +understood and despised her, but who regarded her as a sacred legacy +from her mother; Mrs. Belmont had been devoted to the pretty child she +had adopted just after burying three of her own, and who had waited on +her hand and foot to the day of her death. Isabel was always conscious +of putting on a curb the moment she entered her sister's presence, but +thought it good discipline, and only spoke her mind when goaded beyond +endurance. + +"I tried to telephone," she began, but was interrupted by a deep sigh. + +"The telephone is cut off--we owe for three months. Hateful +things!--they know we always pay some time or other." + +"If you are so badly off would it not be more economical to make the +children's clothes--" + +"Isabel! Much you know about children! One can buy ready-made things for +just half." + +Isabel subsided, for she felt herself at a disadvantage before this +experienced young matron; although she vaguely recalled that whenever +she had presented the children with little frocks and sailor suits she +had expended a considerable sum. But doubtless she had gone to the wrong +shops. Mrs. Paula was one of those women that haunted the cheap shops +and bargain-counters, and was always in debt. + +"What a heavenly suit!" she exclaimed, her eyes roving covetously over +Isabel's smart black costume. "Paris, I suppose. Fancy being able to +walk into a store and order a new dress whenever you feel like it. I +have never done that in all my life--" + +"It was for that I settled an income upon you before I left for Europe, +but if it is not enough to buy a new frock occasionally--" + +"Oh, it would be enough if I could use it for that purpose, but you know +what my life is! If Lyster would only live economically--but it is +dining out at a restaurant five nights a week--champagne half the time, +especially if we have a guest, and we generally have--a Californian +thinks himself disgraced if he doesn't give invited company champagne. +It's all very well to brag about the magnificence and generosity of this +town--when you can afford to. But most everybody _I_ know, at least, +can't, and when the first of the month comes, I guess the women all wish +that San Francisco was more like New York, where they say every +Californian in time avoids every other Californian for fear he'll want +to borrow five dollars, and all the men let themselves go wild over Emma +Eames because she's proper and doesn't cost anything. It's time we +reformed instead of flinging money about like European princes--spending +four times as much as you've got for fear of being called stingy. A San +Franciscan would rather be called a murderer than mean. I talk and talk, +and it's no use. A terrible thing has happened to us," she ended, +abruptly. + +"What?" asked Isabel, startled; she had lent an indifferent ear to the +familiar harangue. + +"Lyster has gone on a newspaper--the _Ventilator_. Fancy--Lyster a +newspaper artist--making pictures of prize-fights, actresses, murderers, +and society women at the opera. It was that or the street, and Lyster +was frightened for once in his life. We owe for every mortal thing as +well as the telephone." + +"That is the best thing I have ever heard of Lyster," said Isabel, +imperturbably. "But when he gets a respectable sum of money for a +picture, as he did a little while ago, why on earth doesn't he pay his +bills, and make a fresh start? I thought he had when I was down." + +"Those two weeks cost a good deal," said Paula, softly. + +Isabel colored but controlled her anger as she had many times before. "I +was under the impression that the check I gave you when I left--" + +"Oh yes, but then you really don't know much about the cost of things, +in spite of the fact that you run a farm. We always had an extra man for +you--" + +"I could well have dispensed with the dissipated fad-ridden specimens +you produced for my entertainment. I did not meet a sober man during the +entire fortnight. What is the amount of your indebtedness? I will pay +half, but no more." + +She knew that it would be wiser to demand the bills and herself pay +something on account to the desperate creditors, but she revolted from +playing the mentor to that extent. When Paula, after a frowning bout +with a pencil and a sheet of paper, announced the sum that would tide +them over, Isabel was quite aware that she was facing the entire amount. +However, she wrote a check, merely extracting a facile promise that it +should be devoted to its legitimate purpose, and not to champagne or +frills. + +"I will also send you down one or two tailor suits I have little use +for," she added. "Things are so cheap in Europe that I was often +betrayed into buying more than I wanted. They can easily be altered." + +"Thanks!" said Paula. "I am not the style for tailor-made things, but +goodness knows I am glad enough to get anything." + +Isabel glanced doubtfully at the slippers. "I have so many boots. They +are rather an extravagance with me--but I am afraid my foot is longer +than yours." + +"Yes," said Paula, complacently, as she threaded a darning-needle. "My +foot is quite _fearfully_ small." + +Isabel, who knew her foot to be far more slender and elegant than the +plebeian member that never dared expose itself beyond the instep, nearly +overflowed with feminine wrath; but she swallowed it, and remarked in a +moment: + +"I had quite forgotten why I tried to telephone. Mr. Gwynne came down +with me and I should like to show him about a bit. Of course I cannot do +it alone; what is more, I want him to stay in my house. Nothing could +exceed his hospitality to me in England, and I should hate the idea of +sending him to a hotel when I have a house with eight bedrooms. Couldn't +you and Lyster come up and stay for a couple of days? And if Lyster will +show Mr. Gwynne the town, as indeed he has suggested more than once, it +must be understood that the expense is mine." + +"Lyster would never permit it," said Paula, grandly. "You know what he +is--he even lends more than he borrows; that is one reason why we are +always so hard up. He is simply dying to show Mr. Gwynne about. And that +means that he'll spend a month's salary before he gets it." + +"Then I will pay the month's bills. You must manage it as I wish or I +return to-day." + +Isabel knew that Stone, if not generous in the higher sense, was +delighted to play the extravagant host, and never failed to assume the +role when he had money or credit. And if he was the freest and most +debonair of borrowers at least he repaid when unusually prosperous; and +he prided himself upon never having borrowed from a woman. Once when +Isabel, who could not help liking him, had offered to pay his debts, he +had promptly ascended from the depths of depression in which she had +discovered him before his easel, and replied, gayly: + +"Not yet! The sort of man that borrows money from a woman is the sort of +man that has no intention of paying it back. I am not that sort." + +With a wife who was or had been an adoring slave, it was little wonder +that Stone's original selfishness had become abnormally enhanced, and +Isabel took into account the feminine silliness of which he had been a +victim since birth. His mother, well-born, southern, indolent, had +indulged him in every whim during his boyhood; then when the familiar +San Francisco crash came, he had turned to actual work with an exceeding +ill grace. The easy ladies of the lower slopes, with whom he had tastes +more than Bohemian in common, had admired him extravagantly, and when he +finally met a girl that suited his tastes as exactly, and was +respectable to boot, he became a devoted if somewhat erratic husband. He +was now thirty-eight and all hope of graduation from perpetual +irresponsible boyhood had been destroyed long since by a woman abjectly +in love with him and too shrewd to antagonize him. With a strong brain +and character a wife might have kept him on the upward artistic path and +converted him to a measure of domesticity. But Paula had neither, was, +moreover, quite satisfied with her mental equipment and blooming little +person; so much so indeed that of late she was beginning to think +herself thrown away, a matrimonial offering; to weary of being the mere +annex of her brilliant husband. She was very clever in her fashion, +however, and Stone still thought her his willing slave, although curtain +lectures were less infrequent than of yore. And she had learned to +manage him in many ways he would have thought it a waste of time to +suspect. + +"It will be all right," she said to Isabel. "He always thinks I have +more money than I have, for he never could do arithmetic at school and +still believes that two and two make five. I shall be delighted to get +out of this skyscraper for a few days." And then she asked, +insinuatingly, if she could not take the children. + +But upon this point Isabel was obdurate, knowing that if Paula once +planted her entire family in the Belmont House the police could not +uproot them. Moreover, although she liked children, she detested +Paula's. They were pert and spoiled, untidy and noisy, although handsome +and highly bred of feature. She never saw them that she did not fall +into a sort of panic at the thought that similar little creatures full +of present and potential nuisance might have been her own, and then felt +extraordinarily light of spirit in the reflection that she had escaped a +lot she had as yet seen no reason to envy. + +"Have you no nurse?" she asked. + +"Oh yes. She has been threatening to leave--has been _fearfully_ +disagreeable--but I suppose she will stay, now that I can pay her." Mrs. +Paula wisely gave up the point and invited her visitor to remain for +luncheon. But Isabel rose hastily. + +"I must go home and see that everything is in order--the beds aired, and +lunch prepared for Mr. Gwynne in case he should turn up. Then you will +come about four? And we will dine out somewhere?" + +"I'll pack all the decent things I possess and send them up right away. +Fortunately the dress Lyster gave me last month is quite fresh, so I +shall not feel too small beside your magnificence, and I am sure that +Mr. Gwynne, even if he is an Englishman, does not dress any better than +Lyster." + +"Not a bit. We shall have some jolly times together. Mr. Gwynne is very +anxious to meet you." + +"Well, he has not been in any particular hurry. Still, it will be +fearfully nice, and I am so glad you have come down at last." + + + + +XX + + +It was characteristic of Mrs. Paula that she was not in the least +jealous of Isabel's beauty. She was quite positive that no man would +hesitate between her own exuberant prettiness and a face and form that +looked as if it had stepped down from a dingy old canvas. It was true +that Stone admired Isabel--with reservations to his wife--and had openly +avowed his intention to paint her when he emerged from the tyranny of +the pot-boiler. He had hoped that Isabel would take the graceful hint +and order a portrait, but Isabel had succumbed to the pleadings of too +many students of indifferent talent, and had no intention of undergoing +the ordeal of sittings again to any but a master. To-night, as the party +of four entered The Poodle Dog--the socially successful offspring of the +still enterprising and disreputable parent on the dark slope +above--Paula deliberately outstripped her companions and appropriated +the seat, at the corner table reserved for them, that faced the room. +Isabel was only too delighted to turn her back upon the staring people, +for it had occurred to her to-night, for the first time, to be uneasily +ashamed of her adopted relative. She had gone about with her several +times since her return from Europe, and absently disapproved of a +somewhat eccentric tendency in dress, but to all sorts of odd costuming +she had grown accustomed during her experience of art circles abroad. +This evening, as she stood in her living-room with Gwynne and watched +Paula sail down the broad staircase, she had a sudden vision of the +shanty at the northern base of Russian Hill where Mrs. Belmont had found +her little Mexican seamstress, deserted by her American husband, wailing +over the child she was about to leave. This story had always inspired +Isabel with the profoundest pity, tempering her frequent impatience and +disgust towards the family alien, but to-night she wished for a few +moments that her mother had sent Paula to a foundling asylum. She +glanced uneasily at Gwynne and fancied she could hear him slam the lid +of his breeding upon a supercilious sputter. Mrs. Paula's skirt and the +jacket on her arm were a respectable brown, but there was something in +the screaming red blouse, the immense cheap red hat, the blazing cheeks, +the pinched waist between swelling bust and hips, the already lifted +skirt--Paula always wore a train that she might at the same time achieve +longer lines and more subtle opportunities--exhibiting the pointed +bronze slipper with a large red bow and much open work above, that +suggested, if not the French cocotte, at least that San Francisco +variety known in local parlance as "South of Market Street Chippy." She +did not bear the remotest likeness to a lady. She looked common, fast. +Isabel wondered that she had never faced the truth before. It was as if +a wave of final criticism heaved from the brain of the man whose life +had been passed in the best societies of the world across to hers. But +Gwynne was imperturbable and polite, and as they rode down-town in the +bright cars Paula thought him "fearfully nice" and was quite sure that +he admired her. + +"We are fearfully late," she remarked, complacently, as she seated +herself and looked slowly around the big room with its ornate frescoes +and heavy chandeliers, its crowded tables and strange assortment of +types. "But it is much nicer--to see them all at once, I mean," she +added, untruthfully. + +Gwynne, whose seat also commanded a view of the room, looked about him +with much interest. He had a vague association of impropriety with the +name of the restaurant, but he saw only a few painted females and +queer-looking men. The majority looked as if they belonged to the higher +walks of Bohemia, and quite a fourth were indubitably fashionable. But +his more vivid impression was that they all looked gay and care-free, +and that their personalities were not wholly obscured by clothes. After +lunching or dining at one of the great New York restaurants he had +carried away the impression of a tremendously fashionable school in +uniform--the women distinguished in appearance beyond those of any other +American city, but utterly unindividual. The social bodies of the United +States had interested him little, but to-night he glanced about with +something of the curiosity of a Columbus discovering the land of his +fathers. No doubt his Otis great-grandfather had been intimate with the +great-grandfathers of more than one man present; in this remote bit of +civilization he almost felt as if he were sitting down with a company of +relatives, at the least to a gathering of the clans. And he had rarely +seen so many handsome women together, nor such a variety of types. + +Paula, who knew every one by sight and assiduously read the society +papers, volunteered much information while Isabel ordered the dinner; +Stone had been detained half-way down the room by a party of friends. + +"That is Mrs. Masten," she whispered, with a respectful accent on the +name and in the significant tone she always employed when addressing a +person of social importance. "The youngish tall woman with white hair +and distinguished profile. She is one of the old set--the one Mrs. +Belmont belonged to--and fearfully haughty. Some people call her a +beauty, but how can a woman be a beauty with white hair? Lots get it +here and lose their complexions before they are twenty-five. It is the +wind and nerves and too many good times. I wonder I have not gone off +too, but I take a nap every day no matter what happens. Just beyond is +Mrs. Trennahan. She never did have any beauty with that sallow skin and +no feature except her eyes; but her husband, who was a great swell in +New York, and often takes her there, is quite devoted to her, and they +have a house on Nob Hill and another in Menlo Park. She is so exclusive +that it is a wonder she ever condescends to dine in a restaurant; but +Mr. Trennahan is a fearfully high liver, and this kitchen is famous. +Mrs. Trennahan's mother, Mrs. Yorba, who led society in the Eighties, +had only ninety people on her visiting list, and they say that her +parties were the dullest ever given in San Francisco. Of course that was +before I was born. The glory of that prehistoric crowd has departed, in +spite of the fact that a few of them--not many--have kept their +fortunes--and they are nothing to the new ones. The Irish and Germans +are on top now and are just ruling things--people whose very names our +mothers never heard, although they were making their piles without +saying much about it. They have come forward in the last five or six +years with a rush. All the old leaders are dead, and their children +don't seem to care much--just stand aside and put on airs. One of the +new leaders has a brogue. And as for Mrs. Hofer--take a good look at +her." + +Paula indicated a tall superbly proportioned young woman in a simple +Parisian black gown and an immense black hat with a cascade of white +feathers rolling over the brim; she had a round laughing face and an air +of indescribable buoyancy. "She was born and brought up south of Market +Street, in the respectable part, but a dead give away in her generation: +she's only twenty-six. I forget what her old peasant grandfather started +life as, a peddler, probably, but afterwards he had a dry-goods store, +or shoes or something, and he bought real estate, and his son improved +it, so now they are rich. She was educated at the public schools, went +to the University for a year, had two more in Europe, and came back with +what they call presence and style, but is just cheek dressed up. She +hadn't much show socially, but she didn't lose any time capturing +Nicolas Hofer, the son of a German emigrant, who made money in the +commission business which his sons have turned into millions. All the +men like him, and as he was a great catch, of course he went everywhere; +and when he married they had to accept his wife. She did the rest, and +no one can deny that she is smart--in our sense and yours! She is a +leader already, and has a perfectly wonderful house, that all the old +aristocrats fall over themselves to get invited to. I'd like to go there +myself, but of course I'm nobody. Hofer poses as a reformer, but I guess +this old town's too much for him--" + +"Nicolas Hofer?" asked Gwynne, with interest. "I fancy that is the man +my mother met at Homburg and asked me to call on." + +"Oh!" exclaimed Mrs. Paula, with a toss of her head. "If you are going +in for fine society you will soon have no use for us." + +Gwynne, being unaccustomed to crudities of this sort, applied himself to +his oysters, while Isabel made a fierce resolution that she would find +another chaperon or remain in the country. She was disagreeably +conscious of craning necks, and although she knew that she was beginning +to excite interest in San Francisco, and was looking her best in a white +cloth frock and large white hat, she made no doubt that her +juxtaposition to the exotic Paula was the theme of more than one +unpleasant comment. While she liked Bohemia and was entirely indifferent +to shabbiness, she had never grown accustomed to vulgarities, and that +they should be embodied in her adopted sister filled her with a futile +wrath. + +Stone hurried to his neglected party, waving his hand genially. He was a +very tall loosely built man, with a sensuous laughing mouth and an eye +that was seldom sober. He carried wine in his spirit as well as in his +skin, and if the latter had bagged a trifle under its burden, the spirit +was only depressed by the morning headache, and few men were more +popular. + +"Know what kept me?" he demanded, as he doubled a huge Eastern +oyster--for the others Isabel had ordered the more delicate Californian, +but Stone's interior demanded a sterner nourishment. "Isabel, you are +famous. At first it was the men. Now it is the women too. It was like +you, dearie, to put Isabel opposite that mirror where everybody can see +her, but in which she looks just one decree further removed from common +mortals. Takes an artist's wife! No use, my sister. The Eggopolis must +take care of itself, the chickens be left to roost alone. San Francisco +wants you, and what she wants she gets--what is the matter, darling?" +The corners of his little wife's mouth were down and her chin was +trembling. + +"You might have paid _me one_ compliment!" she enunciated, between anger +and tears. + +"Good heavens, sweetheart, you are as familiar to them as Lotta's +fountain. You are an old story--and always beautiful," he added, +gallantly. "But Isabel! We raise the voluptuous by the score, Gwynne, +houris to beat the band. Climate's a regular Venus factory; but somehow +we don't get the classic very often. Too mixed, probably. Will have to +wait another generation or two. Eyes, complexions, figures--ye gods! But +noses--somehow they run to snub. Still! Look over there. Ever see +anything more fetching than those great Irish eyes in a regular little +Dago mug? She's worth three cold millions and I pine to paint her. The +price would be a mere detail. But to return to Isabel. She has only to +raise her finger to become the rage, and I want her to raise it." + +"I wonder how much they would care for her if she hadn't been born into +one of the sacred old families, and hadn't money to boot!" cried Mrs. +Stone, exasperated beyond endurance by this triumph of marital +tactlessness. "I'd like to know what chance a poor girl has to turn +people's heads--" + +"Tut! tut! Brownie, you're jealous. You know there never was a town +where people cared less about money--" + +"It's just like any other old town, only you have silly legends about it +that you stick to in the face of facts. That day Isabel took me to the +St. Francis for lunch I never saw so many stuck-up-looking girls in my +life, and they all looked as if they had just sailed out of New York +fashion-plates. There are only about six really fashionable women here +to-night, and they only come because they think it's spicy to get so +close to real vice without actually touching it. For my part I'm sick of +the whole Bohemian game, and I'd like to dine at The St. Francis or The +Palace every night." She turned to Gwynne, her eyes flashing +dramatically; she was tired of being chorus to her popular husband's +leading roles, and was determined to hold the centre of the stage for +Gwynne's edification at least. "They pretend to come here because the +dinner is so good!" she exclaimed. "Good and cheap! But it isn't that a +bit with the swells--the women, that is. They just love the idea of +doing something almost naughty, once in a while in their virtuous +lives--when a San Francisco woman _is_ proper she'd make you really +tired with her superior airs and censorious tongue; but there isn't much +she doesn't know, all the same, and she just revels in venturing this +far." + +"I don't understand," said the bewildered Englishman. "Are we dining in +a dive?" + +"Not quite, but almost!" cried Stone, refilling his glass from the large +bottle in ice. "There is only one San Francisco! We have about six of +these French restaurants--ever taste anything like these frogs in Paris? +You scarcely ever see anybody in them at this hour with an 'all-night' +reputation. There are plenty of other resorts, a good many of them under +the sidewalks, where the dinner is almost as good but where a man +doesn't take his wife. And up-stairs--here--and in a few others--well, +if a woman is seen entering by the side door she is done for. But then +she isn't usually seen. Lord! if these walls could speak! The +divorce-mills would explode. The waiters all invest in real estate. +Policemen send their daughters to Europe, and the boss politicians get +rich so fast they spend money almost like a gentleman. In the hotels you +are all but asked for your marriage license, but in what is +euphemistically known as the French restaurants--well, high-toned vice +comes high, but the town is fairly bursting with accommodations for +every purse. No town like this!" he exclaimed, gazing into his lifted +glass and with the accent of deep feeling. "No town on God's footstool. +Nothing like it. Wouldn't live anywhere else if you gave me the planet. +Of course I've reformed, but then it's the _atmosphere_--not a taint of +American Puritanism--European and something more--the wild flavor of a +new and unique civilization. Precious few California men that go to New +York to live but are too glad to come back; and Eastern men, like +Trennahan, who have had a long taste of it, couldn't be paid to live +anywhere else." + +"So all the legends of San Francisco are true?" said Gwynne, who +preferred Stone to his wife. + +"Couldn't exaggerate if you tried. Wait till I show it to you. No blazed +trail nor special policeman detailed to protect our precious skulls. I +know the ropes and am not afraid to go anywhere." + +"How do you like your new work?" asked Isabel, hastily, not knowing what +he might say next. "I should fancy that newspaper life would suit you." + +"Does! Never hit a job I liked as well. Jolly set of fellows. Up all +night. What more could a fellow ask? No more aristocracy of art for me. +I'm neither a Peters nor a Keith, and I wish I'd found it out ten years +ago. If a man can make a good living, what in--ah, what on earth more +can he want in a town that gives him the best things in the world to +eat, the jolliest all-night life, the finest fellows in the world, the +prettiest women to look at, a climate that puts new life into old +horses--life's a dead easy game out here--when you don't develop too +much ambition. Ambition? Nothing in that. Fellows are ingrates and +idiots that go off to a cold-blooded place like New York, with a beastly +climate, the moment they have made a little mark here. No philosophy in +ambition. Only one life. Why not enjoy it--when your creditors will let +you? And the money always comes somehow--comes easy, goes easy, and if +we can't all be great, we can be happier here than anywhere else on +earth. Here's to San Francisco--and perdition to him that calls it +'Frisco!" + +"So you have said good-bye to ambition?" asked Isabel, curiously. "I +used to think you had a good deal." + +"So I had. Once I was younger and knew less. Perhaps if I had ever done +anything cleverer than a few dashing skits for the Bohemian Club, and +somebody had patted me hard enough on the back, I might have made an ass +of myself and crossed the continent in the wake of so many that have +never been heard of since." + +"I don't think you ever gave your creativeness a real chance. If you had +shut yourself up in the country for a year--" + +"I should have stayed a week. Scenery on a drop curtain is all I want of +nature. No, Isabel." He relapsed into sadness for a moment. "I have +travelled the logical road and simmered down into my place. It's just +this: San Francisco breeds all sorts. A few are born with a drop of +iron in their souls. They resist the climate, and the enchantment of the +easy luxurious semi-idle life you can command out here on next to +nothing, and clear out, and work hard, and make little old California +famous. Where they get the iron from God knows. It's all electricity +with the rest of us. There are hundreds of my sort. You've seen them at +the real Bohemian restaurants; young men mad with life and the sense of +their own powers; all of them writing, painting, composing, +editing--mostly talking. Then at other tables the old-young men who +have shrugged their shoulders and simmered down like myself; lucky if +they haven't taken to drink or drugs to drown regrets. Still other +tables--the young-old men, quite happy, and generally drunk. Business +men and some professional are the only ones that forge steadily ahead; +with precious few exceptions. But you don't see them often in the cheap +Bohemian restaurants, which have a glamour for the young, and are a +financial necessity for the failures. Never was such a high percentage +of brains in any one city. But they must get out. And if they don't go +young they don't go at all. San Francisco is a disease. You can't shake +it off. And you don't want to. To Hades with ambition anyhow," he cried, +gayly. "We can admire one another--and we've learned to, instead of +knocking the life out of everybody else as we did a few years ago. Now +we present the unique spectacle of a city packed to the brim with +cleverness and always ready for more. We know how to appreciate. _Vive +la bagatelle._ New York? Why, the spirit and brains would be drained out +of nine-tenths of us trying to keep a roof over our heads, and nobody +knowing we were there. No, _sir_. No, _madam_! The men in this town +realize more and more when they are well off, and here is one of them." +And he refilled his glass. + +Isabel, not knowing that she had been listening to the litany of wasted +lives, turned in disgust and cast about for an excuse to leave before +Stone ordered another bottle of champagne. She encountered a gleam of +amusement in Gwynne's eyes, and it seemed to transfer her to an empty +auditorium, while mankind performed its little tricks on the stage for +her sole benefit. It was a subtle tribute, and she blushed under it. She +was also gratified to observe that Paula was boring him. But she glanced +away, lest he should think she had forgiven him. At the same moment she +saw a young man that had sat with his back to them, and opposite the +famous Mrs. Hofer, suddenly push back his chair, rise to his feet, and +look sharply at Gwynne. Then he came rapidly down the room, and Gwynne +rose and met him as if lifted to his feet by the hospitality beaming +from the large bright shrewd capable face of the Californian. + +"This is Mr. Gwynne! Is it really?" he exclaimed, taking the stranger's +hand in a large warm grasp. "I am Nicolas Hofer. Your mother wrote you? +We have only been back a short time--I had intended running up to see +you. I knew you for a Britisher the minute you entered the room, but the +word was only just passed about who you were. Do--please--waive +formality and lunch with me at my house to-morrow. Then we'll motor +about a bit and I'll show you something of the city. Glad the fine +weather holds out. No denial. I expect you." And he skilfully took +himself off, before Gwynne should feel obliged to introduce him to his +party. + +"Now, what do you think of that for California manners, and the +arrogance of the rich?" demanded Paula, triumphantly. + +"Not a bit of it," replied Stone, amiably. "Man was in a hurry. Can't +you see his wife waiting for him? Never knew a Californian to put on +airs in my life." By this time his optimism was complete. "Only women +imagine such things. There are as many poor as rich in San Francisco +society. Only some of us are too poor, and Bohemia is better anyway. +Well, let's hit the pike. This room is too hot for my head." + + + + +XXI + + +The Poodle Dog, a high new ugly building, stood on the corner of Eddy +and Mason Streets in the very centre of the Tenderloin, or "all night +district." For two or three blocks on every side there was a blaze of +light, electric signs, illuminated windows, sudden flashes from swinging +doors. There was much movement, life, laughter, carriages in the street +driving from restaurant to theatre. And all beyond, east and west, south +and north, was a city as dark and quiet as the grave. The hill tops were +picked out with a few lights, but one could barely see them from this +region that never slept. Nor could one see Chinatown and Barbary coast, +nor other sections more picturesque than creditable, where the cheaper +gas blazed late, and not even a policeman was sure of his morrow if he +ventured too far. But here was the sound of music and decorous laughter, +the clang of street-cars and the constant rattle of carriages: the +restaurants were beginning to empty; there would be an hour or two of +comparative quiet, and then another crowd would fill the streets, the +restaurants, even the saloons; a crowd that rarely saw daylight mixing +amiably with respectable but undomestic citizens that could afford to +sleep late. + +At present the scene was brilliant. "The San Franciscan loves the +outside life as much as the Londoner," said Isabel to Gwynne, as they +stood a moment almost blinded by the lower signs. "In many ways you +will find them not unlike--especially as regards fads. Wait until you +have been really initiated into intellectual Bohemia--the clever young +newspaper men and budding authors. I already hate the names of Ibsen, +Shaw, Wilde, Symons, Maeterlinck, and Gorky. I am only waiting for them +to discover Max Klinger and Manet--" + +"Klinger?" asked Stone. "Where have I heard that name?" + +"He is the great unconscious humorist of modern art, also a great +etcher," said Isabel, dryly. "Have you ever heard of the +_Secessionists_?" + +"Of course," replied Stone, huffily. "You imagine that because you have +been to Europe--" + +"Well, _have_ you ever heard of the _Scholles_?" + +Gwynne laughed aloud. "If he has not, I should champion the octopus +proclivities of California." + +"They are the very best draughtsmen in the world--" + +But Paula had no intention that the conversation should be general. It +had been agreed that they should visit Chinatown, and she took Gwynne's +arm and led him up the hill; she found his cool impersonal manner almost +fascinating after a lifetime in a nest of horned egos. They walked up +through the semi-darkness to Clay Street and down to Portsmouth Square, +passing through an entirely disreputable region, but quiet at this hour. +As they crossed the Old Plaza--now Portsmouth Square--Isabel explained +that it had been the nucleus of the San Francisco of the Fifties, and +that people had crowded nightly against the great plate-glass windows on +one of the corners to watch the gamblers and the hillocks of gold on +every table; and that no doubt their common ancestor, who was a +convivial adventurous soul, had brawled here many a night. Mrs. Paula, +who knew absolutely nothing of the history of either California or San +Francisco, hastened her steps, and in consequence excited the always +smouldering jealousy of her husband. Stone had an exaggerated idea of +her beauty and youth, and felt his own power waning, moreover had all +the average American's Oriental instinct for exclusive possession. +Consequently, as they entered the flaming bit of Hong-Kong on the +opposite side of the square, Gwynne, infinitely to his satisfaction, +found that there had been a deft exchange of partners. + +He had been in China, and the sudden entrance into an illusion more +complete than even the stage could achieve almost took his breath away. +There were the same crowds of stolid faces and dark-blue blouses, +relieved here and there with the rich garments of the merchants and the +women; the hundreds of tiny high balconies; the gorgeous windows filled +with embroideries and porcelain, Satsuma and bronzes. He was glad to +stroll with Isabel through a scene so like a picture-book, and to +exclaim with her over the novel sensation of passing from the +quintessence of the Western world into a bit of ancient civilization. +She realized the psychology of every violent contrast as no companion he +had ever known, and when she told him of the adjacent Spanish Town, +Little Italy, Nigger Town, Sailor Town, where representatives of the +scum of every clime were no doubt qualifying for purgatory at the +moment, he experienced a lively regret that there were places he must +explore without her comment. + +It was a gala night in Chinatown. Even the provision shops were +festooned with sausages ornamented with bits of colored paper, and +decorated paper or silken lanterns hung before every house. Painted +women with stolid faces, often deeply imprinted with misery, rolled +along, and there were many pretty children in the street, painted too, +and dressed in the gayest and richest of garments. On the balconies of +the upper and greater restaurants were valuable jars and vases full of +plants and flowers. They ascended to the finest of these restaurants and +found a merchant's party eating at round tables from dolls' plates. In a +room opening upon a veranda, their creatures chanted what sounded to +Occidental ears like the dirge of the lost souls of all the Flowery +Empire, and the expression of the relaxed haunted faces confirmed the +impression. In large alcoves well-dressed Chinamen reclined on tables of +marble and teakwood, filling and refilling the opium pipe with an +infinity of patience that if otherwise applied might have led to +greatness instead of dreams. + +"These men are just on exhibition," said Stone, contemptuously. "Wait +till I show you the real thing down in the slime. Lots of tall stories +about Chinatown, but the reality is bad enough." + +They took a Jackson Street car and rode up through humbler Chinatown, +then through quarters of varying respectability until they reached the +sacred precinct of Nob Hill. Here there was an aristocratic calm, but +much light, and faint strains of music. The season was in full swing, +and society was either dining, or dressing for the dance. + +As they climbed the hill-stair Stone artfully trimmed the ragged edges +of his wife's discontent. Subservient as she was to him, there were +times when her temper flew straight and sharp like a blade too long +hooped, and he had his reasons for conciliating her. + +Said Gwynne in a low tone as they felt their way up the dark and +precarious flight: "Shall you think me rude if I accept Hofer's +invitation for to-morrow? And Stone wants me to do the town a bit +to-night. I am most curious--but I am your guest--and I can come down +another time--" + +"I feel almost cross with you. This house is your hotel. If you ever go +to another--whether I am in town or not--there will be trouble." + +So it was that as they reached the steps leading up to the door of the +house, Stone dropped his wife's arm, which had lain somewhat rigidly in +his, and catching Gwynne firmly by the elbow, beat a rapid retreat. + +"Good-night, darling!" he cried. "We're off to do the town." Throwing up +first one leg then the other in black silhouette against the stars, he +sang: "And we won't be home till morning, till morning--" + +The voice drifted up from the corner of Taylor and Broadway, where the +two men waited for a car. "Till daylight doth appear." + +Mrs. Paula was gasping. "Well, I never--never--" she exclaimed, as +Isabel hastily marshalled her up the stair and into the house. "I hope +they'll be garroted! That's all! But it's just like the selfish beasts +of men--" + +"What difference does it make? Didn't Lyster agree to be host? It would +be too dismal for Gwynne to roam through the purlieus with a +policeman--and he cannot come down often. It's bedtime, anyhow." + +"Bedtime?" cried Mrs. Paula. "Why, it's only ten o'clock. But I forgot +that you go to bed and get up with chickens." + +"I should think you would be grateful to go to bed early, once in a +while." + +"Oh, I often retire early enough, if it comes to that. It's listening +half the night--all, is more like it--for the last car, and then for a +hack galloping from side to side up that hill, as if the driver and the +very horses were drunk themselves. I tell you it's a life!" + +"And don't you get used to it?" asked Isabel with curiosity. "You've +been married thirteen years, and I suppose Lyster has always been what +he calls an all-nighter." + +"There are some things a wife never gets used to," replied Paula with +injured dignity, as she held out a doubting hand for the candle Isabel +had lighted. "Haven't you gas or electricity?" + +"There is gas, but why take the trouble to light it? And the candle +recalls so many delightful evenings in England. I know no prettier +picture than a procession of long-trained women, with bare shoulders, +and jewels in their hair, each carrying a candle up a long stair beside +the central hall." + +"Ah! I have no such charming reminiscences of the English aristocracy, +and I am only afraid of spilling candle grease on my one decent dress." + + + + +XXII + + +At four o'clock Isabel was awakened by suspicious sounds at the key-hole +of the front door. She reached out for her pistol, but withdrew her hand +as she heard the careless laugh of her brother-in-law. A few moments +later the two explorers, after an instant's hesitation at the head of +the stair--which they had climbed like cats--walked past her door with a +brisk swaggering preternaturally steady gait that invoked the memory of +former occupants of the mansion. Then Gwynne's door opened and shut as +if by sleight of hand. Stone's was at the end of the hall. Isabel +inferred that he went through it, and a sound between a hiss and a +smothered roar shot down the hall as he would seem to pick up the door +and bang it into place. + +Mr. Hofer had mentioned his luncheon hour as half-past one. Isabel had +Gwynne called an hour before. She was sitting on the veranda, as he +emerged. He was as well groomed as usual, but he was unmistakably pale +beneath his new coat of tan. She laughed wickedly. + +"Oh yes," he said, imperturbably, "I was drunk. If I had not been I +never could have got through it, not being a seasoned San Franciscan. I +thought I knew vice. I have seen a good many variations, and in places +where protection was necessary. But I had not guessed at the +combination of ancient civilization and the crudities of the mining-camp +in the heart of a modern city. Stone is not a tank, but a camel. I +befuddled myself successfully in those dives under the pavements--and we +had by no means begun there: I should say we had patronized at least +half the saloons in San Francisco before we started for the underworld. +As we finally supported each other up the hill--we hadn't the price of a +cab left between us--it seemed to me that I was ascending from a jungle +of antediluvian men and women and beasts for ever and ever on the +rampage. San Francisco is the most wonderful city in the world inasmuch +as she not only exists but thrives on the top of such outrageous +rottenness. And no wonder that the men like Hofer are desperate. We were +escorted by a policeman after all, and he seemed to enjoy himself. The +flash of knives--I saw two men stuck--made as little impression upon him +as the awful abandonment of--well, of the females. Good God!--Well, I +hope another variety is in store to-day. Hofer, at least, does not +appear to be dissipated." + +"Oh no, it is the fashion in that set to be domestic and good citizens. +All you'll hear of the underworld to-day will be its relation to +politics. They have been making a desperate fight to defeat the present +mayor's reelection and have been overwhelmingly defeated. The mayor is +popularly supposed to be a criminal at large, and the party that +supports him call themselves socialists, and are labor unions more +greedy and tyrannical than any Trust in the country. Nice town. But we +are optimists. No doubt Mr. Hofer and his party are already planning for +the next campaign. If I were a man, I'd go back to the tactics of the +Fifties and lynch. The city had good government for twenty years after +the operations of that Vigilance Committee. You might suggest it." + +"I cannot say that I am in a suggesting mood. Shall you be here to +dinner?" + +"Probably. But you are to accept whatever offers. No doubt Mr. Hofer +will motor you out to the Country Club or down to Burlingame, where he +has a house." + +Gwynne nodded gratefully and left her. As he reached the top of the +steps leading down the hill, Isabel saw him pause and speak to a very +tall very smart young woman, whom she recognized in a moment as Mrs. +Hofer. Then the young matron advanced along the board walk with a sort +of trembling stride. It was evident from her charming blushing face that +she was as embarrassed as any one so young and buoyant, so successful +and so Irish, could be. Isabel ran down the steps to meet her. + +"Oh!" cried Mrs. Hofer, in a light, high, cultivated, but nasal voice, +with a slightly English accent. "You _are_ sweet! I had intended to call +in state the first time I could think of a decent excuse, for I have +simply been mad--_mad_--to know you. But last night I told Mr. Hofer +that my slender stock of patience had gone--flown--evaporated. I could +hardly wait till this afternoon! Do you think I'm unconventional? I'm +not really, except when I'm abroad--never here. Nobody is so +conventional as the San Franciscan at home." + +Isabel was smiling and trying to guide her up the steps. "I am more glad +than I can say to know you, at last," she said. "Do come into my house." + +"Let me rest a bit. The breath is out of me with the climb and the +fright. Yes, fright, and it takes a good deal to phaze me. But you're +the sensation of the town, my dear. There have been all sorts of plans +to get hold of you. People are simply mad--_mad_! I was just bound I'd +be the first. Not petty social ambition, not a bit of it. I wanted to +know you. And I stayed in a country-house in England just after you, +last year. To think that you could have married Lord Hexam. Oh, what a +jewel of a house! I went simply mad over those white rooms in London." + +Isabel had firmly piloted her up the steps and into the house, and Mrs. +Hofer sat on the edge of a chair like a bird on a bough, her merry +shrewd sweet eyes devouring Isabel's face. + +"Oh, but I've wanted to know you! You don't know what this means to me!" + +"But why?" asked Isabel, much amused. "I am nobody." + +"Oh, just aren't you, though? Why, you're almost the last of the old San +Francisco Knickerbockers, so to speak. That is, the last that has +inherited any of the beauty one is always hearing about from the old +beaux. And most of them have gone under anyhow--in the cheerful +California fashion: three generations from shirt sleeves to shirt +sleeves. Of course there are some left, but the most interesting thing +about them is that they have been forced to open their houses to the +likes of us--or sit down and talk to empty chairs. But the old Spanish +blood is what interests us most. It was quite forgotten--all that old +life--for about two generations; but now it's the fashion to remember +it, and everything else early Californian. To think that you are a +niece, so to speak, of the first nun in California, who had that +romantic love affair with that Russian--I never could pronounce his +name. That's not what interests _me_ most, though. It's _you_. To think +what you've done! Those chickens! My man in the market has orders to +send me Old Inn chickens and eggs, on penalty of losing my custom. All +the _blasee_ girls--the San Francisco girls _do_ get so _blasee_, poor +things--are threatening to go in for chickens. It would be a lot better +for them than bridge. It is quite shocking the way they do gamble. Talk +about early times!" + +"Fancy chickens becoming a fad!" Mrs. Hofer had paused for breath. "Poor +chickens! Tell your friends that they will have to get up at all hours +of the night, and at six o'clock in winter, and five in summer, and +spend a large part of their time in overalls and rubber boots. I fancy +that will cure them." + +"It would! No more flirtations! No more Paris gowns! No more paint! I'll +tell them. But they admire you, all the same. And we are all dying to +see you _en grande tenue_. I am giving a ball the night before +Christmas. Say you will come--right here, on the spot." + +"I shall love to come. I had intended to reopen this house as soon as I +could afford it, and had hardly expected to pick up my mother's old +threads until then. But a ball! I haven't danced for a year." + +"It is simply fine to hear you say things just like other girls, when +you look the concentrated essence of all our bewigged and bepowdered +ancestors. To think that you've got that old colonial blood in you too, +and are related to a lot of those old duffers one sees in the public +parks. The next time I go East I'll look at them with more interest." + +Then she sat still farther forward, and her bright face took on an +expression of coaxing eagerness. + +"If it hadn't been a man's luncheon to-day I should have asked you to +join us. But won't you come down to The St. Francis with me? My +automobile is at the foot of the bluff. We can motor afterward through +the park a bit, and out on the boulevard. It is a simply heavenly day." + +Isabel hesitated, and lifted an ear to the floor above. There was not a +sound, nor was it likely that Lyster would make his appearance before +dinner. Paula had announced her intention of visiting her children in +the course of the afternoon; she would hardly awaken for luncheon. While +she hesitated Mrs. Hofer began to coax in her eager commanding fashion. + +"Oh, do come! Please come! I'm mad, _mad_ to have you all to myself for +one day. Chloroform them--" + +"You wouldn't lunch with me?" + +"I _will_ entertain you first. Please, please, come!" + +"Very well," said Isabel, laughing. "I doubt if they ever know the +difference. I won't be a minute getting ready." + +She ran up-stairs, and during the half-hour of her toilette Mrs. Hofer +examined everything in the down-stairs rooms and nodded an emphatic +approval. + + + + +XXIII + + +It was nearly midnight. Isabel, her head still buzzing after a +kaleidoscopic day, which included much motoring and many words, felt no +inclination for bed, moreover was not only curious to hear Gwynne's +impressions, but felt a pleasant sense of anticipation in talking the +day over with him. He had telephoned that he was going down to +Burlingame for dinner, but should manage to return to the house in the +neighborhood of midnight. She wondered if he had met as many people and +received as many bewildering impressions as she had done. + +If she had cherished a lingering delusion that aught remained of the old +proud reserved character of the society of her mother's time, it had +vanished before the chatter of her hostess and the experiences of the +day. They had not lunched at The St. Francis, after all. As they reached +the entrance Mrs. Hofer capriciously changed her mind, and decided to +make a dramatic descent with Isabel upon the house of a friend whom she +knew to be entertaining informally, and where she was always sure of a +welcome. The house was out at The Mission, a generic term in these days +for the valley under the shadow of Twin Peaks, so sparsely populated by +the _padres_. There were still a few large wooden houses, surrounded by +grounds, that looked like country seats in the midst of that wilderness +of cheap and hideous streets; built perhaps thirty or forty years +before, when "The Mission" was a suburb, and for old affection's sake +still inhabited in spite of a thousand drawbacks. Isabel approached this +place in a fever of anticipation, for it was none other than the old +estate of Juan Moraga, and through a grille in its vanished adobe wall +Concha Argueello had held tryst with her Russian lover, Rezanov. + +Into this sheltered valley the trade winds and the fog came so seldom +that, although it was a November day, the host had no hesitation in +entertaining his guests on the lawn, with rugs under foot and a canopy +to protect the complexions of the women. Here, Isabel found members of +nearly every set the city had ever possessed: Mrs. Trennahan, like +herself of the old Spanish stock, and her New York husband; Anne +Montgomery and two or three others of the second regime; Catalina Shore, +with her beautiful half Indian face and English husband; these few with +a repose of manner that looked old-fashioned against the lightly poised +figures and incessant chatter of the younger girls. And there was an +even greater variety of garb. Several were dressed for the season in +velvet and furs: one wore an organdie blouse and hat; another had +hastily donned a checked travelling suit; there was no doubt that Miss +Montgomery had bought her simple brown frock already made, and perhaps +at a sale; her neighbor wore a black lace dress with a fur boa. The +majority were excessively smart, whatever their vagaries, and Mrs. +Hofer, most of all, in several shades of gray; not only becoming to her +dark hair and bright color, but suggesting the natural plumage of a +bird; she was one of those women that look so well in whatever they wear +that it is difficult to imagine them in anything else. Isabel, perhaps, +although the sharp eye of a woman would have detected the absence of the +hand of a maid in her toilette, more nearly solved the problem of a +spring day in mid-winter, with her frock of white serge and large black +hat covered with feathers. + +She sat between the "Reform Mayor," whose guest she was, and the +"Militant Editor," neither in the highest spirits after their recent and +unexpected defeat; and heard much of that intimate political talk for +which she had longed, although her mind wandered occasionally to that +romantic past of caballero and dona not yet a century old, very +difficult to conjure in this swarming heterogeneous valley. + +After luncheon Mrs. Hofer had invited Miss Montgomery into the +automobile, and taken her and Isabel for a long ride, chattering of +everything under the sun, but with breathing spells that enabled Isabel +to exchange a few remarks with her old friend; and between remorse for +her own neglect and pity for that desolated life, she was almost +effusive, and begged Miss Montgomery to visit her in the valley where +Anne's father too had owned a ranch in palmier days. She offered to +furnish a room immediately, and Miss Montgomery smilingly promised to +obtain surcease from dinner-parties, where her portion was to enter by +the back door--in nine cases out of ten with the ancestral silver--and +take the rest she needed. She made a good living, she assured Isabel, +but was educating a young relative for the navy, and lived in a flat +that was largely kitchen. All her fragile wild-rose beauty was gone long +since, but she still remembered how to put on her clothes, and her +position was unaffected in that devil-may-care city; she went into +society when she chose. + +Mrs. Hofer, on their return from the environs, left them for a few +moments in front of a house on Van Ness Avenue where a friend lay ill, +and Isabel made an enthusiastic allusion to the gay out-door appearance +of the city. The broad avenue was crowded with men, women, and children, +promenading in the sunshine. Every street-car was filled with people on +their way to or from the Park, Presidio, or Cliff House. They had passed +hundreds of automobiles and fine turnouts of every description, and out +at the three great resorts thousands of pleasure-seekers. + +Miss Montgomery set her well-cut mouth in a pale line. "I get somewhat +weary of all this pagan delight in mere externals," she remarked. "It is +all so superficial and deceptive, although sincere enough in its +ebullitions. I can tell you, my dear idealist--you have not changed a +particle, by the way--that there is another side you have never seen. I +doubt if you ever would see it, even if you came to live in the town." +The automobile stood on a corner. Miss Montgomery indicated the rise and +fall of the hill-side, east and west of the avenue. "Look at all those +shabby-genteel rows of houses, each exactly like the next, each with its +awful bow window, and all needing a new coat of paint. So are the lives +inside. And there are miles of them. There are just four sorts of people +in this town--ignoring its underworld--that get any real enjoyment out +of life: those that are wealthy enough to command constant variety; the +careless clever Bohemians with their wits always on the alert and plenty +of congenial work; the club women; the laboring class, that get the +highest wages on earth and are as happy as beasts of the field on a +bright warm winter's day like this. But oh, the thousands and thousands +of mere mortals that are mired in their ruts and no longer even plan to +climb out! There is no more chance for those people--who are in some +little business, or are clerks, or small professional men, or fractions +in the great corporations--to mention but a few examples--no more chance +for them than in any of the older cities; for San Francisco has gone at +such a pace that she has as many ruts as if centuries had plowed her, +and those in the ruts might as well be on Lone Mountain. They--the women +particularly--have the tedium vitae in an acuter form than you have seen +anywhere in Europe, for over there the centuries have mellowed and +enriched life; there is something besides this eternal climate which can +never take the place of art. Of course there was a day when every man +had an equal chance, but that day has passed long since. And then in +Europe," she went on, the minor note in her voice becoming more +plaintive, although she was too well bred to whine, "you are always near +some other place. You can save your money for a few months and command a +change of scene. Here you have to travel three thousand miles to find a +change of accent. I often have the delusion that California is on Mars. +And the climate! Day after day, when I walk down that shabby hill with +menus revolving in my head, or take the boat across that sparkling +bay--I have customers all about--I long for the extremes of seasons they +have in the East--fogs and four months of intermittent rain are only an +irritant to one's natural love of variety. I long for the excitement of +wading through snow drifts. I wish we would have a war. I should love +to hear the shells hissing overhead, to see great buildings collapse, +people rushing about in a mad state of excitement--anything, +anything, to relieve the monotony of this isolated bit of +semi-civilization--where, I can tell you, more women meditate suicide +from pure ennui than in any city on earth!" + +Isabel was appalled by this outburst. The brilliant day seemed faded, +the bright faces were grinning masks. Then she experienced a powerful +rush of loyalty towards this stranded member of her own class, and +before she realized what she was saying, she had offered to send her to +Europe to finish the musical education begun in her promising youth. + +"Don't be angry," she stammered, knowing the intense pride of the +impoverished American. "Why not? We are really related. I am quite +alone. My little fortune has almost doubled. I make much more than I can +spend. It would be quite shocking if I did not do something for some +one--there is Paula of course, but it is against my principle to do too +much for any woman with a husband. Do--please--" + +Miss Montgomery, who had flushed deeply and averted her head, turned +suddenly with a smile and a light in her eyes that, with the color in +her cheeks, made her look young for a moment. + +"That was just like you!" she exclaimed. "I remember in Rosewater, when +you were a little thing, you used to give away the clothes on your back, +and your toys never lasted a week; although you beat the children and +pulled them about by the hair when they didn't play to suit you. I saw +you on the street just after your return from Europe--you looked as if +you had wrapped yourself up in the pride of your nature--had found a +plane apart from common mortals. For that reason I did not remind you of +my existence. But I should have remembered that you had had trouble and +care enough to freeze any woman of your inheritances into a sort of +animated Revolutionary statue. But you are just the same old Isabel. It +makes me feel young again." + +"And you will go?" asked Isabel, eagerly. + +Miss Montgomery shook her head. "No," she said, sadly. "It is too late. +I am thirty-five. If you have made no place for yourself by that time in +America you belong by a sort of divine decree to the treadmill. And the +limberness has gone out of my fingers as out of my mind. Sometimes I +deluge my pillow; but I will confess to you that down deep there is a +consciousness of bluntness, and it makes me inconsistently satisfied to +be here in this land of climate and plenty, instead of in Boston or New +York, where both climatic and social conditions are so terribly stern +for the poor. After all, the word 'struggle' is a mere euphemism out +here, and I am still asked to nearly all of the big parties; not one of +the older set has dropped me, and I could go out constantly if I chose. +But I have neither the energy nor the money. I could have presents of +ball gowns, but of course I won't accept them." She laid her hand on +Isabel's. "Don't imagine that I do not appreciate your generosity. I +shall never forget it--nor the dear childish awkward spontaneity of its +expression. But here I stay and rot." + +"I heard this same lament from Lyster the other night; only he was more +cheerful about it--possibly because he has other surcease--" + +"Don't waste any sympathy on us," said Miss Montgomery, contemptuously. +"There never was such a sieve as California--San Francisco--for +separating the wheat from the chaff--for determining the survival of the +fittest. If I had been worth my salt I should have conquered every +obstacle, overcome the family will, when I was young and full of hope +and vigor. So would Lyster Stone. San Francisco is stronger than we are. +That is the truth in a nutshell. Those that are stronger than she have +gone. The rest don't matter. And as so many of those that are really +gifted enjoy themselves with only an occasional spasm of self-disgust, +they are not greatly to be pitied. By and by they will outgrow even +that, and congratulate themselves that they were not of those that fled +from the good things of life." + +Mrs. Hofer ran down the steps and into her automobile. "I +simply--couldn't--get--away," she cried between the agonized thumpings +of the engine. "But perhaps you were glad to be rid of me a bit. Please +don't say so, though. It would make me simply miserable." + +As the car glided off, she sat on the edge of the seat facing her +guests, lightly, and with the same backward sweep of her body as when +walking. She always seemed to be fairly bursting with youthful energy, +and no bird could rival her buoyancy. She immediately assumed the burden +of the conversation. + +"Dear Miss Otis! I have been meaning all day to ask you about Lady +Victoria Gwynne, but so many things have put it out of my head. What do +you think of her? I am simply mad to know. I never met any one who +interested me half so much; I couldn't make her out the least little +bit. The only time when she seemed quite alive was when she spoke of +her Jack. In the famous Elton she didn't seem to take any interest at +all. I fancy they've fallen out, for whenever his name was +mentioned--and Mr. Hofer admires him immensely--she always became as +mute as a mummy. It put me out a bit. I'm not used to that sort of +treatment. When I want to talk about a subject, I am in the habit of +doing so. Lady Victoria is not a bit simple like so many English great +ladies. Perhaps it's the Spanish blood, or perhaps it's because she's so +_blasee_. They _do_ tell stories! I never heard any received woman +accused of having had quite so many--well, at least in this town, when a +woman is openly larky she soon finds herself on the north side of the +fence. There was my Lady Victoria hobnobbing with all the royalties at +Homburg. But what interested me most was her attitude to Sir Cadge +Vanneck--" + +"What?" Isabel sat erect. "Has Sir Cadge Vanneck returned from Africa? I +thought something besides ill health was detaining her. Do you think +they will marry? I don't know whether Mr. Gwynne would like it or not. +He looks forward to her arrival--" + +"I can see Lady Victoria on a California ranch! She would yawn her head +off. London is 'the world' in quotation marks. She couldn't, that +seasoned lady, stay out of it six months. But about Sir Cadge--that was +the final mystery. It actually kept me awake one night. You know the +story, how devoted he was for about two years, and then how he ran away +when her husband was killed, for fear he would have to marry her. Nobody +knew exactly how she felt about it, for one thing must be said for the +people of those effete old civilizations: their breeding carries them +through any crisis without the turn of a hair. But the report was that +she showed an inner convulsion in subtle outer vibrations, or people +imagined she did, probably because she'd got to that age where she +couldn't have many illusions left. Then, suddenly, this summer, he +returns, and follows her to Homburg. He is all devotion. She is an +iceberg. And she's gone off dreadfully. I saw her seven years ago at +Covent Garden, and she was the handsomest thing I ever looked at. She's +handsome yet, but her muscles are getting that loose look and her eyes +are bottomless pits of ennui. Save me from being a fashionable +demimondaine. Better go to the deuce and die in a garret. Something +honest in that, anyhow--and more picturesque. There may be something +behind, that we don't know anything about, but in my opinion she is not +the happiest of women; and with such a handsome and agreeable man as Sir +Cadge Vanneck at her feet, she is just an ingrate. We are not here, +already? I wish I were not invited this evening, I'd simply _make_ you +come home to dinner. And it seems so rude to leave you at the foot of +this bluff; but there is just one thing the automobile can't do--" + +Isabel, her head spinning with many words, had been glad to express her +pleasure in the day's entertainment and run up the steps to her refuge +on the heights. She had found that Mr. Stone was still in bed and likely +to remain there, and a haughty note from Paula announcing that she had +returned to her children and should remain where she was wanted. + +She was vaguely planning to "do something" for Anne Montgomery, and +congratulating herself that she could fly at will from people that +talked too much, when she heard Gwynne's long stride on the plank walk, +and called gayly to him out of the darkness "to stand and deliver." + +"I hope you carry a pistol," she added, anxiously, as he ran up the +steps. "I scarcely ever pick up a newspaper without reading of a +hold-up, and there were four on this hill last week. We change, out +here, but we don't seem to improve much." + + + + +XXIV + + +"I have had what is called a full day," said Gwynne, as he sank into a +chair beside Isabel. "Lunch with half a dozen of the cleverest and most +strenuous men I ever met--and not at Hofer's house, by the way, but out +at the Cliff House, up in a tower, where we had a superb view of the +ocean and Golden Gate; then motored about the city for three hours, then +down to Burlingame for dinner, then back to supper at one of the +restaurants. After over a year of social suspension I hardly knew how to +behave, especially to all the pretty women I met at the Club House at +Burlingame,--who seemed to expect me to pay them compliments and flirt +desperately. I feel worn out, and on the verge of sighing for my lonely +ranch." + +"But you have enjoyed yourself," said Isabel, smiling. "It has done you +a lot of good. You must grow straight downward to your roots. Then, when +you shoot up again you will be a real American." + +Gwynne made a wry face. "Not yet. Mrs. Hofer's father, Mr. Toole (who is +now retired and spends most of his time in about the most luxurious +library I ever saw--we alighted in it for a few moments before swooping +down to Burlingame) quoted Byron to me and is well up in English +politics. There were several London newspapers and reviews on the table. +Moreover, at the luncheon, Elton Gwynne was actually discussed for a +few moments. All of which gave me pangs of homesickness. But although +they are all sufficiently versed in British politics, their interest is +very casual. Even national matters don't concern them particularly. What +absorbs them is the redemption of San Francisco; and after my +experiences last night I can't say I am surprised. The sort of municipal +government that permits and battens upon an unlimited variety of open +vice must devour the entire city in time. Mr. Toole informed me, in the +holy calm of his library, that reform is impossible; and certainly the +professional grafters seem to be one of the few productions of this +State whose energy is not demoralized by the climate. But that must make +the fight more interesting. And hardly a degree less menacing is this +gigantic octapus of labor unionism--of inexcusable socialism. Well, we +shall see! It makes one tingle." + +"And do you never, in your inmost, contemplate returning to England?" +asked Isabel, curiously. + +Gwynne swung about and planted his elbows on the railing, clasping his +hands about his head. For some moments he seemed absorbed in the mass of +lights at the foot of the black hill-side. "I don't know," he said, +finally. "It is possible that only my will keeps me from thinking about +it. It may be that, having made up my mind before leaving England, I +accomplished a final wrench and adjustment. I abstain from too much +self-analysis; but it is certain that down deep I often feel a tug at +familiar strings. I don't pretend to know myself, for after all what is +each one of us but the composite of the race, always at war with a spark +of individuality. Some fine morning I may wake up, order my trunk to be +packed, and take the first train out of California." + +"Oh, might you?" + +"Well, of course, I should stop and say good-bye to you. That is if I +did not fall into a panic at the thought of a final encounter with that +terrible will of yours." He turned and met a pair of eyes that were +shining like a cat's in the dark. "You know that you have been +manipulating the strings of my destiny!" he said, abruptly, and +surprised at himself. "I grew fearful of self-analysis and buried myself +in the law--jolly good antidote--but I am always conscious of a subtle +pressure on my will--was. I have thrown it off. It was either that or +leave." + +"Perhaps you have felt freer since Saturday morning," said Isabel, +cruelly. + +His own eyes glittered, but if he blushed the darkness screened him. +"Quite true," he said, dryly, "The man-brute turned. And in the final +battle, when the feminine principle is pitted against the masculine, I +fancy we shall know how to win the day. If we resort to primitive +methods it will be your own fault." + +"I was invited for dinner to-morrow night, and had to decline because my +arms are black-and-blue." + +"I don't repent," said Gwynne, doggedly. + +There was another silence, and then he asked: "Haven't you been trying +to manage me?" + +"I have only been trying to steer you in a new country--to make things a +little easier--" + +"You are not always frank. And that is not altogether what I mean. I +hardly know myself what I do mean. Before I arrived I thought it likely +I should ma--want to marry you. In many respects you were designed to be +the wife of an ambitious public man. With your beauty, and brains, your +grand manner, and your subtlety--but it is the last that has put me +off. I have seen too many men managed by their wives. I never could +stand it. Doubtless my Celtic blood gives me the tiniest feminine drop. +It is only the big uncomplicated oafs that don't mind being managed by +their women. I should want the freest and most open companionship, but +with my will always in the ascendant--although no man would be more +indulgent to his wife." + +"You will find thousands to answer all your requirements and +limitations." + +"Much you know about it. True, this place is full of handsome and +attractive women--topping! And they have a free wild grace, a stride, a +swing--it is wonderful to watch them go up these hills. And I was vastly +entertained at luncheon, and at one or two of the houses where I was +afterward taken to call. But I doubt if I shall ever find anyone again +that possesses so many remarkable qualities in combination as your own +puzzling unsatisfactory self." + +"I am not in the least like Mrs. Kaye, and you thought she combined +every quality under the sun." + +"I expended the last of my calf love on Mrs. Kaye. I was blinded by +passion; but that my emotional depths were not even stirred was +manifested by the rapidity of my convalescence. We were utterly +unsuited. In many respects I should have been ashamed of her. Blood must +always tell in England--although in America--if Mrs. Hofer is a +type--well, this is the land of reversed theories. Mrs. Kaye and I would +have been at swords' points in less than a year. The next time I choose +a wife it will be with my judgment." + +"And are you no longer capable of love?" + +"Oh, love!" Once more Gwynne gazed down upon the sleepless city, where +the lights seemed to powder the upper air with gold dust. "Perhaps. It +seemed to me that day in Park Lane that all the heat died out of my +veins. I am only just beginning to feel alive once more. But I have no +wish as yet to experience the passion of love again--not even with you; +although if you would cry off in some respects I don't know but that I +should still like to marry you." + +"At least you could beat me if I did not behave." + +He laughed. "I don't doubt I should want to. No, I'll never let myself +go like that again; but I should be sure first that my will was the +stronger of the two." + +"You carefully abstain from proposing so that I cannot make the retort I +should like to." + +"You may. I know you won't have me. But that does not alter the fact +that the same ancestral lines have given us an inconceivable number of +molecules that are subtly responsive. The great cleavage has +accomplished as many points of divergence and contrast. Therefore is +there, in me, at least, an insistent whisper for ancestral and long +denied rights. You will feel it in time--" + +"How much you have thought about it!" + +"My mind is pretty well oiled: it does not take me years to work out any +proposition. To tell you the truth, I have never put that undercurrent +of consciousness into words until to-night. All the same, even if I +loved you, if I finally believed you to be the stronger of the two, I +should take the next boat for England. California wouldn't hold me. And +I should not say good-bye." + +"That would be a confession of weakness." + +"It is one I'd be the better for making." + +"Well, anyhow, as I am hostess I can order you to bed. It must be one +o'clock. I don't doubt you will find more than one affinity if you are +awakening; that is merely the mating instinct. Good-night." + +Far too hospitable and high-handed to incommode a guest, she did not +tell him that Paula had gone, and that Stone had sauntered out in search +of a "bracer," and had not returned. Gwynne slept the sleep of the +unburdened conscience, and returned to Rosewater by the first +train--Isabel was remaining in town for another day--ignorant not only +of having violated the proprieties, but of the fact that a former +inhabitant of Rosewater lived not far from the foot of the bluff. + + + + +XXV + + +Two weeks later Lady Victoria was established in the house on Russian +Hill. She had given no intimation of her coming until the day her train +was due in Oakland, when she telegraphed, suddenly reflecting, no doubt, +that she was descending into the wilderness and that precautions were +wise. Gwynne barely had time to catch the train from Rosewater, and when +the connecting boat arrived at the ferry building in San Francisco, he +was obliged to run like a thief pursued by a policeman down to the +Oakland ferry building, in order to catch the boat just starting to meet +the Overland train. All this was by no means to his taste. Nor was his +mother's cavalier arrival. It savored too much of royalty. And he had a +masculine disapproval of being taken by surprise; moreover was far less +ardent at the prospect of seeing his mother again than he would have +expected. In England he had needed her; she seemed superfluous in this +country, which she never would understand; and he wanted all his time +for his studies--and as little reminder of England as possible. His +mother, for all her individualities, was the concentrated essence of the +England he knew best. Besides, she was accustomed to a great deal of +attention. He had no taste for dancing attendance upon any one, and from +whom else could she expect it--unless, to be sure--he recalled that his +mother was a beautiful woman, always surrounded by a court of admirers. +Why should Americans be impervious to the accomplished fascination and +the beauty of a woman that had reigned in London for thirty years? He +determined to press Isabel into service. She could try her hand on his +mother's American destinies, and provide her with amusement and a host +of friends. + +He felt all the promptings of natural affection when he was actually +face to face with his mother once more, and forgot all his doubts in his +intense amusement at her naive surprise before the comfortable immensity +of the San Francisco hotels, and the crowds and automobiles in the +streets. + +The next day he took her up to the ranch. For a week she stalked about +the country, eight hours out of the twenty-four, expressing interest in +nothing, although her eyes always softened at her son's approach; and if +she manifested no enthusiasm for his adopted country, at least she +barely mentioned the one of his heart. At the end of a week she promptly +accepted Isabel's suggestion to transfer herself and her grim disgusted +maid to the house on Russian Hill. Isabel lost no time in piloting her +thither. Anne Montgomery undertook to provide her with a small staff of +servants, and to call daily and order the household until all wheels +were on their tracks. Mrs. Hofer delightedly agreed to be the social +sponsor of Lady Victoria Gwynne, and issued invitations at once for a +tea and a dinner; and Gwynne, who had been half indifferent to +rebuilding on the San Francisco property, immediately began holding long +interviews with bankers, lawyers, architects, and contractors. The law +required him to give but thirty days' notice to his tenants, well-to-do +workmen; and if all went well the building might be finished in seven +months. Lady Victoria evinced something like a renewed interest in life +when told that by the following winter her income would be increased; +and trebled as soon as the large revenue from the building had paid off +the mortgage. Her son offered to place his own share at her disposal +until her debts were paid, but to this she would not listen. He found +her maternal affection undimmed, but other changes in her which he was +far too masculine to understand, and after she was fairly settled and +apparently content, he dismissed feminine idiosyncrasies from his +overburdened mind. He had neglected his studies long enough, and it was +time to begin his amateur practice in Judge Leslie's office, to say +nothing of the bi-weekly lecture at the State University at Berkeley, +which, with the journeys, consumed the day. + +Isabel's feminine soul took a far more abiding interest in the subtle +changes of that complicated modern evolution whose special arrangement +of particles was labelled Victoria Gwynne. She bore little external +traces of her illness, and when Isabel congratulated her upon so +complete a recovery, she looked as blank as if memory had failed her. +Isabel had encountered this truly British attitude before, and +experienced none of the irritation of several of the Englishwoman's new +acquaintances when insisting upon the beneficence of the San Francisco +climate. But it was not long before Isabel discerned that under that +sphinx-like exterior the older woman was intensely nervous, that once or +twice even her splendid breeding could not control an outburst of +irritability. Her eyes, too, had a curious hard opaque look, as if the +old voluptuous fires had burned out; and she seemed ever on her guard. +What her future plans were no man could guess. She might have settled +down for life on Russian Hill, so completely did she make the new +environment fit her imperious person. She even remarked casually to +Isabel that "of course" she should entertain in the course of the +winter, but at one of the hotels; she would never ask people to climb +those stairs on a possibly rainy night. But it was evident that her +entertaining would be merely on the principle of noblesse oblige; her +lack of interest in the doings of a civilization so different from her +own was patent, and it was doubtful if she would have even accepted the +attentions showered upon her had she not feared the alternative of an +unbroken ennui. Isabel felt vaguely sorry for her, and puzzled deeply, +but she could do no more than provide her with entertainment and the +abundant comforts and luxuries of the city; to express any deeper and +more womanly sympathy to that proud nature would have been a liberty +Isabel would have been the last to take. But she retained her own rooms +and went down with Gwynne once a week, when they both devoted themselves +to Lady Victoria's amusement. It was at least gratifying that the French +restaurants and many of the unique Bohemian resorts entertained her more +than society; and she found the Stones amusing, and frankly made use of +Paula, who did all her shopping, receiving many a careless present. + +Meanwhile Gwynne, when not reading, or practising, or attending +lectures, or endeavoring to hurry forward his new enterprise in the +city, took long buggy rides with Tom Colton about the country, and made +acquaintance with many farmers, as well as with the guileful depths of +the ambitious young politician. Colton, although for the present +dependent upon only the voters of his district, by no means confined +his attentions even to those of his county. The time would come when he +would need a wide popularity, and with his cool far-sighted tactics he +was already sowing its seeds. There was an immense and varied material +to work on. Not only were his own county and the two adjoining as large +as a State more modest than California, but, with the exception of the +Asti vineyards, and one or two ranches like Lumalitas, were cut up into +an infinite number of farms owned by Irish, Scotch, Danes, Norwegians, +Swedes, Hungarians, Swiss, Germans, Italians, and a few native +Americans. Asti alone, a great district devoted to the vine, and +boasting the largest tank in the world, was entirely in the hands of +Italians. The Swiss, for the most part, were cheese makers. The rest +devoted themselves to chickens, grain, hay, wheat, and fruit. There were +several orange orchards and one violet farm. Many of these foreigners +were so numerous that churches had been built for their separate use, +and service was held in their native tongue. All were willing to drop +work for a few moments and talk politics with Colton, particularly if it +was to abuse lawmakers and monopolists--above all, the railroads, whose +prices were exorbitant, and whose service was inadequate. In this +department of monopoly at least they had a real grievance, and Colton +never let them forget it. He made no secret of the fact that the United +States Senate was his goal, and reiterated that there alone could he +accomplish the legislation that would free the farmer from the costly +tyranny of the corporations and give the laboring man his rightful share +of profit. Some were skeptical that any mortal could accomplish all he +promised, but the foreigners for the most part were gullible, and they +all liked the rich man's son, with his simple ways and his blatant +democracy. + +Of Gwynne they took little notice, but he studied them, one and all, and +it was not long before he understood the materials with which he must +deal in the future. The State was Republican, although San Francisco +presented the remarkable spectacle of a Democratic mayor with a +Republican boss controlling the labor element, which was presumably +democratic in essence, and devoted to the figurehead. But country +politics were far less complicated, and it was possible that a strong +Democrat with a sufficiency of inherent power could weld together the +conflicting and half indifferent elements, and change the political +current. Californians had gone thunderously Republican at the last +Presidential election, because for the moment they were dazzled by the +Roosevelt star and all it seemed to portend. There could be no better +augury for a really great and sincere leader; for whether or not +Roosevelt was all they imagined, the point to consider was that they had +been carried away by their higher enthusiasms, not by those a mere +trickster like Colton was trying to stimulate. They had rushed to the +polls with all that was best in their natures in the ascendant, eager +not only for a great servant that would reform many abuses, but for one +that stood at the moment before the country as the embodiment of all +that was high-minded, uncompromisingly honest, and nobly patriotic in +American life. It was one of the greatest personal triumphs ever +accomplished--for the leaders wished nothing more ardently than his +downfall--and whether or not it was to be justified by history, it must +ever remain to his credit that he had hypnotized his countrymen through +the higher channels of their nature. The reaction might be bitter, but +memory is short, and at least he had served to demonstrate that the +American mind was not materialized by the lust of gain, was quite as +susceptible to the loftier patriotic promptings as in the days of its +revolutionary and simpler ancestors. A man like Colton might delude for +a time, for the Democratic party was deplorably weak in leaders, and the +Republican bosses, in California, as elsewhere, had made the State a +byword for shameless corruption; and their iron heel ground hard even in +that land of climate and plenty. Colton might be useful to rouse +Californians to a sense of their wrongs and opportunities, but Gwynne +doubted if he could hold them. He promised too much. The time would come +when they would turn to a strong man who talked less and did more, who +gradually imbued them with the conviction of absolute honesty, +distinguished ability, and as much disinterestedness as it is reasonable +to expect of any mortal striving for the great prizes of life. + +One day there was a mass-meeting suddenly called to express sympathy +with the orange growers of the South, who had dumped twelve carloads of +early oranges into the San Francisco Bay rather than submit to the +increased rates of the transcontinental railroads. Gwynne saw his +opportunity and summoned his powers. There was a moment of doubt, of +hesitancy, of reflection that he was rusty, and that the subject was of +no special interest to him; then, at the eager insistence of Colton, he +walked rapidly to the front of the platform with all the actor's exalted +nervous delight in a new role. In a few moments there was no subject on +earth so interesting to him as the iniquities of the railroads and the +wrongs of the orange growers; he awoke from his torpor so triumphantly +that his amazed audience, as of old, felt the deep flattery of its +power over him, and he made a speech which was like the rushing of risen +waters through a broken dam. Not that he permitted himself to be carried +away wholly; he deliberately refrained from indiscriminate phillipics, +from rousing their ire too far, grasped the opportunity to see what +could be done by appealing to their reason through their higher +emotions, and begged them to meet constantly and consider the question +of electing men that were not mere politicians, that would deliver the +State from the medieval tyranny that oppressed it; advised his hearers +to employ the best legal counsel they could get, and to give their +leisure moments to the study of practical politics, instead of +indolently submitting all great questions to the hands of men as +unscrupulous as the State bosses and corporations. With his peculiar +gift he made each breathless man in the auditorium feel not only that he +was being personally addressed, but that his mental equipment had +mysteriously been raised to the plane of the speaker's. When Gwynne +finished amid applause as great as any he had evoked in England after +the expounding of great issues dear to his heart, he turned to find +Colton regarding him with sharp eyes and lowering brow. He immediately +took his arm and led him without. + +"I am glad a climax has come so soon," he said. "Otherwise I should have +begun to feel like a hypocrite. Not only are your principles and mine +utterly antagonistic, but you must consider me as your rival. I can do +nothing definite, of course, for nearly four years, and meanwhile you +may reach the United States Senate. If you do I shall do my utmost to +oust you. Nevertheless, if I can be of any service in sending you there +I am perfectly willing to place myself at your disposal, for the +experience and insight I shall acquire in exchange. And as you are no +worse than the others, and some one must go, it might as well be you as +another. But, I repeat, I shall use all my powers to oust you and take +your place." + +Colton stood for a few moments, his hands in his pockets, regarding the +ground. Then he lifted his eyes and smiled ingenuously. + +"You are dead straight, for a fact. And I think I have got just as good +an opinion of myself as you have of yourself. You put me in the United +States Senate with that tongue of yours--God, you can talk!--and I'll +take the chances of even you getting me out. It will take more than +eloquence to upset a great State machine, and before I get through I'll +have the Democratic machine stronger than the Republican is to-day. You +can't get anywhere in this country without the machine, and the man in +control stays in control unless he falls down, and this I don't propose +to do. I'll swap frankness and tell you right here that when I'm boss I +may let you come to Congress as my colleague, but that you've got to do +as I say when you get there. What do you say to that?" + +"I'll take all the chances. At least we understand each other. I work +for you now, and I break the power of both you and your infernal machine +when I am a citizen of the United States." + +"Shake," said Colton. + +And they shook. + + + + +XXVI + + +Isabel sat idly on the veranda of her old hotel as was her habit in the +evening hour. There had been no heavy rains as yet to freshen the hills +and swell the tides until the salt waters scalded the juices from the +marsh grass, turning it from green to bronze and red; and the barometer +was stationary. A cool wind came in from the sea with the flood, and +Isabel enjoyed the beauty that was hers all the more luxuriously in her +thick shawl of white wool. A great part of the valley north and south +was within the range of her vision, and it was suffused with gold under +a sky that looked like an inverted crucible pouring down its treasures +in the prodigal fashion of the land. Facing her house and on the +opposite side of the marsh, at its widest here, was a high wall of rock, +from which the valley curved backward on either side, tapering to the +great level in the north, but on the south halting abruptly before the +mass of mountains following the coast line and topped by the angular +shoulder of Tamalpais; coal black to-night against the intense gold of +the West. + +She had not seen Gwynne for several days, and half expected that he +would come to-night. These were busy days, and she saw less of him than +formerly, although he snatched an hour for shooting whenever he could, +and occasionally rode over for supper; and they saw much of each other +during the weekly visit to the city. Their relations were easy and +sexless. He refused to talk of chickens, but they had many other +interests in common. She had by no means forgotten his outbreak in the +launch, and had scowled at her arms for quite a week as she brushed her +hair for bed, but that episode was now several weeks old, and she had +ceased to harbor resentment. But she was subtly out of conceit with +herself and life, resentful that she missed any one, after her long +triumph in freedom from human ties; also resentful of the respect and +interest with which Gwynne had inspired her, particularly since his +summary expulsion of her will from the battle ground where it was +becoming accustomed to easy triumphs. She had no love for him, and she +was as satisfied with the life she had chosen as ever, but she was +beginning to feel a sense of approaching confusion, where readjustment +would once more be necessary. The future looked longer, and she was +losing her pleasant sense of finality. She had guessed long ago that the +only chance of escaping the terrible restlessness that pursues so many +women, like enemies in the unseen world converted into furies, was to +caress and hug the present, fool the ego into the belief that it wanted +nothing beyond an imminent future, certain of realization, which should +be as all-possessing as the present. But she had been wise enough to do +little analysis, either of her depths or of life, and her time was full +enough. + +"Are you asleep?" asked a polite voice. Gwynne swung himself over the +low railing of the veranda. + +"I did not hear your horse." It would be long before he could surprise +her into any sort of emotion again. + +"Good reason. I walked. I read Cooley until I had an alarming vision of +the Constitution of the United States writ black upon the sunset, so I +thought it was high time to walk it off. Naturally my footsteps led me +here." + +"That was nice of them. Mac will drive you home, or you can have my +horse." + +"It is like you to plan my departure before I have fairly arrived. May I +sit down?" + +Isabel shivered. The glow had gone, there was only the intense dark +fiery blue behind the stars--silver and crystal and green; one rarely +sees a golden star in California. There were scattered lights in +Rosewater and on the hillsides; and the night boat winding through the +marsh was a mere chain of colored lights; here and there a lamp on a +head mast looked like a fallen star. + +"That is the way I generally feel after the glow has disappeared," said +Gwynne, abruptly. "Let us go in." + +There were blazing logs on the hearth, and a comfortable chair on either +side. The room looked very red and warm and seductive. As they passed +the table Isabel half lifted one of the English Reviews for which she +subscribed. "There is an allusion to you here," she said. "I meant to +send it to you. I fancy they want you back. It is very complimentary." + +But Gwynne concealed the promptings of vanity and took one of the chairs +at the fireside, asking permission to light his pipe. She noted, as she +settled herself opposite, that there was less of repose in his long +figure than formerly, something of repressed activity, and his rather +heavy eyes were colder and more alert. + +"It all seems a thousand years ago," he said. "I am John Gwynne. I doubt +if I shall ever love your California, but I am interested--this mass of +typical Europeans not yet Americanized--no common brain to work on, no +one set of racial peculiarities. And the law has me fast. I have become +frightfully ambitious. Talk about your Hamilton. I too walk the floor +till the small hours, repeating pages aloud. My Jap thinks me mad, and +no doubt is only induced to remain at his post by the excellence of my +tobacco, and the fact that his education is unhindered by much service. +While I am packing my own brain cells I infer that he is attending a +night school in St. Peter, for I hear him returning at all hours; and he +certainly shows no trace of other dissipation. We have never exchanged +ten sentences, but perhaps we act as a mutual stimulus." + +"Don't you love California the least little bit?" asked Isabel, +wistfully. "Or San Francisco?" + +"I have liked San Francisco too well upon several occasions--when I have +run down to spend the night at the Hofers--or have fallen in with Stone +on my way back from Berkeley, and been induced to stay over. Hofer and +that set seem to be content with living well; they are too serious for +dissipation. But Stone! Of course such men die young, but they are +useful in exciting the mind to wonder and awe. I don't think I am in any +danger of becoming San Franciscan to the point of feeding her insatiable +furnaces with all the fires of my being, but there is no denying her +fascination, and it has given me a very considerable pleasure to yield +to it. Whether I shall practise law there--change my base--I have not +yet had time to think it out." + +"A country lawyer's is certainly no career." + +"This is a good place to begin politically. San Francisco is too hard a +nut to crack at present. If I could become powerful in the State, the +Independent leader they need, then I might transfer my attentions to +that unhappy town. Even Hofer and all the rest of the devoted band seem +to be practically helpless since the re-election of the mayor. What +could I do--at present?" + +"With a big legal reputation made in San Francisco you could travel very +fast and far. And you would be learning every thread of every rope, +become what is technically known as 'on'; and then when the time came--" + +"I hate so much waiting! The shortest cut is here in the country. I +shall manage these men far better than Colton, who is the crudest type +of American politician. Nothing could be simpler than his program: +abuse, promise. Nothing simpler than his ambition: all for himself, and +the devil take the hindmost. I have yet to hear him utter a sentiment +that betrays any love of his country or desire to serve her, any real +public spirit. Those are the sentiments I am trying to cultivate for +this accidental land of my birth, for without them ambition is +inexcusable and endeavor a hollow sham." + +"And can't you?" Isabel left her chair and stood by the mantel-piece. It +was the first time he had spoken of himself with any approach to +confidence since the day of his arrival. "Sometimes I repent the share I +had in your coming to America--not that I flatter myself I had much to +do with it--" she added, hastily. "But my being there may have turned +the scale. You might have gone off to rule a South American Republic--" + +"I should have done nothing so asinine, and you had everything to do +with my coming here. Not that I hold you responsible. You gave a hint, +and I took it." + +"And you don't regret it?" + +"Why waste time in regret? I can go back any moment. Not that I have the +least intention of doing anything of the sort." + +He was pleasantly tired in mind and body, and the warm homelike room +caressed his senses. He settled himself more deeply in Hiram Otis's old +chair and looked up at Isabel. She had laid aside the white shawl, but +wore a red Indian scarf over her black gown. The gown was cut out in a +square at the neck; she always dressed for her lonely supper, and she +had put a red rose in her hair, in the fashion of her California +grandmothers. With her face turned from the light, her eyes with their +large pupils looked black. + +"I shall stay in California, like or no like," continued Gwynne. "But I +did not walk five miles to talk politics with a woman after a day of law +and the citizens of Rosewater. Where did you get that curious +old-fashioned scarf?" + +"I found it in a trunk of my mother's. Doubtless it belonged to her +mother. I also found this." She indicated a fine gold chain and heart of +garnets that lay on her white neck. The humor in his eyes had quickened +into admiration; he reflected that the various streams in her +composition might not be so completely blended as would appear upon that +normally placid surface. The feeling of uneasiness which he had +peremptorily dismissed stole over him once more. She looked wholly +Spanish, and put out the light of every brunette he knew. Dolly Boutts, +whom he still admired at a distance, although he fled at her approach, +was a bouncing peasant by contrast; and several well-bred and +entertaining young women of the same warm hues that he had met during +the past few weeks in San Francisco suddenly seemed to be the merest +climatic accidents beside this girl who unrolled the pages of +California's older past and afforded him a fleeting vision of those +lovely donas and fiery caballeros for whom life was an eternal +playground. That they were his progenitors as well as hers he found it +difficult to realize, he seemed to have inherited so little of them; but +they had flown generously to Isabel's making, and to-night she gave him +that same impression of historic background as when she turned the +severity of her profile up on him and suggested a doughtier race. + +"It was about the same time," he said, abruptly. + +"What?" + +"While our Spanish ancestors were playing at this end of the continent, +our 'American' forefathers were bracing themselves against England. It +was in 1776 that the Presidio and Mission of San Francisco were founded, +was it not? Curious coincidence. Perhaps that is what gives you your +sense of destiny." + +"I have no sense of destiny." + +"Oh, but you have. Now I know that you are quite Spanish to-night. It is +your more ordinary mood of calm unvarnished--not to say +brutal--directness that gives you your greatest charm as a comrade--even +while you repel as a woman." + +"Do I repel as a woman?" Isabel had placed one foot on the fender, one +hand on the mantel-piece, and as she leaned slightly towards him, the +red glow of the lamps and the mellow old scarf softening her features, +the small square of neck dazzlingly white, and the position revealing +the lines of her figure against the high flames of the logs, she looked +more lovely than he had ever seen her. Like all racial beauties, bred by +selection, she needed the arts of dress and furnishings to frame her. +It is only your accidental or peasant beauty that can defy "clothes"; +and Isabel's looks in ordinary ranch and riding costumes made no +impression on Gwynne whatever. But to-night her appeal was very direct, +although he had not the least idea whether she was posing or was +entirely natural in an unusual mood. He had no intention of being made a +fool of, however, and answered with the responsive glow in his eyes due +a pretty and charming woman: + +"Sometimes. Not to-night. If you would remain Spanish with no +Revolutionary lapses, I make no doubt I should fall in love with you, +and then perhaps you would fall in love with me merely because of my own +lack of picturesqueness, and we should live happily ever after." + +"What a bore." Isabel sniffed, and moved her gaze to the fire. But she +did not alter her attitude. + +"Are you really happy?" asked Gwynne, curiously. + +"Of course. So much so that it begins to worry me a little. My +puritanical instincts dictate that I have no right to be quite happy. +What slaves we are to the old poisons in our blood! I live by the light +of my reason, and all is well until one of those mouldy instincts, like +a buried disease germ, raps all round its tomb. Then I feel nothing but +a graveyard of all my ancestors. I don't let them out, and my reason +continues its rule, but they keep me from being--well--entirely happy, +and I resent that." + +"I should say it was not the Puritans but your common womanly instincts +that were thumping round their cells. You have no right to be happy +except as Nature intended when she deliberately equipped you, and that +is in making some man happy." + +"That is one of those superstitions I am trying to live down while I am +still young. Your mother is unhappy, under all her pride, because she +has outlived youth and beauty and all they meant to her--she made them +her gods, and now they have gone, and she doesn't know which way to +turn. Ennui devours her, and she is too old to turn her brains to +account, too cynical for the average resource of religion, and too +steeped, dyed, solidified, in one kind of womanism to turn at this late +date to any other. But there are so many resources for the woman of +to-day. The poor despised pioneers have done that for us. Of course it +has not killed our natural instincts, and if I had not fallen in love +when I did, no doubt I should still be looking about for an opportunity. +It is my good-fortune that I was delivered so soon. I wish all women +born to enjoy life in its variety could be freed of that terrible burden +of sex as early as I was." + +"I suppose you would like to rid men of it too." + +"I do not waste any thought on men; so far as I have observed they are +able to take care of themselves." + +"A woman incapable of passion is neither more nor less than a failure." + +"I have seen so many commonplace women capable of it! Look at Mrs. +Haight and Paula." + +"I never look at Mrs. Haight, but as for Mrs. Stone I can quite conceive +that if she had better taste she would be almost charming. She embodies +youth properly equipped." + +"For reproduction, you mean. That is the reason that the silliest, the +meanest, the most poisonous girl can always find a husband if she is +healthy. It is no wonder that some of us want a new standard." + +Gwynne laughed. "Schopenhauer suits you better when you are out on the +marsh in rubber boots and a shooting-jacket. Do you realize that if you +persist in this determination to camp permanently in the outer--and +frigid--zone, you will never be the centre of a life drama? That, I take +it, is what every woman desires most. You had a sort of +curtain-raiser--to my mind, hardly that. First love is merely the more +picturesque successor of measles and whooping-cough. In marriage it may +develop into something worth while, but in itself amounts to +nothing--except as material for poets. But the real drama--that is in +the permanent relation. This relation is the motive power of the great +known dramas of the world. Life is packed with little unheard of dramas +of precisely the same sort--the eternal duet of sex; nothing else keeps +it going. Now, it is positive that a woman cannot have a drama all by +herself--" + +"Not a drama in the old style. But that is what we are trying to avoid. +Are there not other faculties? What has civilization done for the world +if it is to be everlastingly sex-ridden? What is the meaning of this +multitude of faculties that progress has developed? What is the meaning +of life itself--" + +"Oh, are you aiming to read the riddle of life?" + +"I mean to pass my own life in the effort. Men have failed. It is our +turn. But if I say any more I suppose you will pinch me again." + +"No," said Gwynne, smiling. "I feel much more like kissing you--ah!" + +He had the satisfaction of seeing her eyes blaze. His pipe was finished; +he clasped his hands behind his head and almost lay down in his deep +chair. "I am just tired enough to be completely happy, and if I can +look at you I am willing to listen like a lamb all night." + +"And be convinced of nothing." Isabel tossed her head and returned to +her chair. It faced him and he could still look at her. They watched +each other from opposite sides of the hearth with something of the +unblinking wariness of a dog and a cat, and no doubt had they possessed +caudal appendages they would have lashed them slowly. + +"I don't say that," he replied, in a moment. "I believe I intimated that +I came here to-night with a purpose. It was to tell you that I have +thought more or less about what you said in the boat that morning, and +that I can understand, if I cannot agree with you. No doubt the times +have bred a certain class of women too good for mere matrimony. I have +seen many that were miserably thrown away; although I will confess that +the only remedy that occurred to me was a better man. But if you and +your like--are there really any others?--if you, let us say, are groping +towards some new solution of life, some happiness recipe that will +benefit the few that deserve it, far be it from a mere man +to--well--pinch you. You--you individually--have so many highly +developed faculties that I can conceive your finding sufficient +occupation through them, a filling up of time;--and no doubt idleness +and the vain groping after sex happiness are the principal reasons for +the failure of so many women. But work does not give happiness; it +merely diminishes the capacity and opportunities for unhappiness. I take +it that you, with all your gifts and the immense amount of thought you +have bestowed on the subject, are striving for something higher than +that. Besides, I had your lucid exposition of your mission. I now have +an additional reason for remaining in California--to watch the new +century plant flower. Like other commonplace mortals, however, my +instincts fight for the only solution of happiness I know anything +about. I still think that as the wife of some ambitious public man you +would find a far better market for your gifts than to stand as a sort of +statue of Independence on the top of Russian Hill with only San +Francisco to admire. And if you passionately loved the man--" + +"Now you are spoiling everything. But it is handsome of you to admit +that I am not a fool; and that you have thought my theories worth +turning over in your busy mind is a compliment I duly appreciate." + +"Even a sneer cannot spoil your loveliness to-night, so I don't mind the +sarcasm in the least. But it is true that in my few unoccupied +intervals--as, for instance, when Imura Kisaburo Hinamoto is shaving me, +and I have, by an excess of politeness, made sure that he will not cut +my throat--I have had visions of you on that ungainly pedestal with all +San Francisco kneeling at the base. It is quite conceivable. I am a born +leader myself. I recognize certain attributes in you. The town is on the +qui vive to know you. Mrs. Hofer is determined that you shall be the +sensation of her ball, and no doubt that will be the commencement of +your illustrious career. When you are really grown into your pedestal +like one of Rodin's statues, you are certain to have a most illustrious +and distinctive career--and accomplish much good. But you will be +terribly lonely." + +"I should not have time. And if I am a born leader, how, pray, could I +yoke comfortably with any man? I should despise a slave, and the same +roof will not shelter two leaders." + +"I am not so sure of that, if both were working to the same end. It +takes two halves to make a whole. If women have so far been the +subordinate sex, no doubt it is merely the result of those physical +disabilities which enabled man to gain the ascendency during the long +centuries of struggle with nature. But your sex is rapidly altering all +that. We shall see woman's suffrage in our time--and be better for it. I +have never been opposed to it--and that is proof enough of the progress +the idea has made, for I am arbitrary and masculine enough. Then--now, +no doubt--women will be as much partners as wives, and I grant the +relationship might be vastly more interesting than marriage in the old +style. And I will even concede that it may be the only sort of marriage +for a man of my type--with a pretty woman, of course; hanged if I could +marry the finest woman in the world if she were ugly; and if this be +true--if men really need women enough to make such a concession as I am +making this moment, then I fancy that women will retain enough of their +original generosity to meet our demands." + +"You do not need any woman. In England I fancied that your mother meant +a great deal to you, but I don't believe you have missed her at all--or +that you will mourn when she returns to England. I was more than ready +to take her place; you actually stirred my maternal instincts when you +arrived, you looked so forlorn. But you spurned me, and now you have +grown too independent even to illustrate your own theories." + +"I did not spurn you. Some day I may tell you why I did not come to you +in my dark hours, but not now." + +"Why not now?" + +"Because I do not choose to. And seductive as you look I am not to be +made a fool of to gratify one of your whims--of which you are quite as +full as the least emancipated woman I ever saw." + +To this Isabel deigned no reply, and a silence ensued. She transferred +her gaze to the fire, and her mind revolved in search of new arguments, +but it was tired and worked slowly. She concluded to change the subject +and offer to read him the article in the Review, so complimentary to +himself; but she turned her head to discover that he was sound asleep. + +She laughed, half vexed, half amused. Then she laid a rug lightly over +his knees, and softly replenished the fire. The room was deliciously +warm, her own chair very comfortable. She too fell asleep. + +She was rudely awakened. Gwynne was shaking her by the shoulder, and his +face was white with consternation. + +"Good God!" he exclaimed. "Do you know what time it is? It is two +o'clock! Why did you let me sleep? Those old tabbies--" + +"They must be asleep too," said Isabel, indifferently. "Come out, and I +will hold the lantern while you saddle Kaiser." + + + + +XXVII + + +Mrs. Haight was hastily putting her parlor in order for the "Ten o'Clock +Five Hundred Club." She was without a servant, having had four hired +girls and three Japs in the past month; during the last three days she +had cooked for herself and Mr. Haight, "done all the work," and attended +seven card parties. Mr. Haight, who had not had his dinner the night +before until nine o'clock, and whose steak this morning had been burned +and his coffee muddy, had gone down-town in a huff, threatening to move +to the hotel unless his wife found a servant or her sanity. + +Mrs. Haight, who wore a red flannel wrapper trimmed with black lace, +which she believed became her style, shook up the sofa-cushions on the +divan, where she longed to receive her guests reclining in Oriental +voluptuousness, but had never dared, and dusted the table as if she were +slapping an enemy's face. The bed was not made, nor likely to be before +night, and she too knew the penalties of burned steak and bad coffee, +enhanced by the irritability of the insomniac. She had her redeeming +virtues, no doubt; all have, even burglars and murderers, until they +slip into the region of pathology; but this morning she looked and felt +like a she-wolf; and few mammals are so dangerous, particularly a +she-wolf that has never suckled young. + +Her expected guests arrived promptly, glowing with the light dry cold, +some wearing furs because they became the season, others thin cloth +jackets over their shirt-waists. One had bundled herself into a broche +shawl and "run over" hatless. Each, as she entered the parlor, cast a +critical eye upon the silver spoon standing in lonely glory on the +mantel-piece, and nodded or scowled, according to her bent. Mrs. Haight +was far too cunning to detain them from the tables they fairly rushed at +as the last member arrived, and it was not until they had "scrapped" and +wrestled and stormed at and abused each other for at least two hours, +not until their ugly passions were in full possession, and they threw +down their cards with loud indignation that a substitute should be +allowed "to compete for a prize, anyhow"--the substitute having won the +spoon--that the hostess, with the peculiar slow fire in her eyes that +marks the beast of prey in sight of its quarry, suddenly let it be +understood that the high tension was to be relieved with a choice bit of +scandal. It was some time since they had had one; propriety, like +business honesty, being almost inevitable in a community little larger +than a throne. + +Mrs. Wheaton exclaimed: "Your eyes look like two burnt holes in a +blanket, Minerva. What is it? Hurry up. I must run home and supervise a +new Swede that speaks ten words of English. She asked me if I wanted +young children for dinner. I suppose she meant chickens, but one never +knows, and Anabel's babies are just over the fence." + +"It's this, and it's no joking matter, Sarah Wheaton. I saw Mr. Gwynne +pass this house at three o'clock this morning, and on Isabel Otis's +horse. Now, I saw him going out to Old Inn, _walking_ before sundown. +He had plenty of time to say what he had to say and get home at a decent +hour--which is long before half-past ten, and that's what it's been many +a night. This thing has become a scandal to the community, and I for one +won't stand it any longer. Its downright immoral, and I'm not using too +strong language purposely." + +"Oh my!" exclaimed Dolly Boutts. "You could never make me believe +anything against Isabel. He's studying terribly hard--the judge told +pa--and likely as not has insomnia. Englishmen are so terribly dull to +talk to I shouldn't wonder if it was hard work for them to learn +anything." + +"Insomnia!" cried Mrs. Haight. "I guess I have insomnia and I guess I +know what I am talking about. What does a kid like you know of the +wickedness of the world, or insomnia either? But this has gone just as +far as _I_ intend to permit it." + +"It certainly looks very bad, very bad," muttered Mrs. Wheaton, whose +own light eyes were glowing. "What steps shall you take, Minerva? Or +what should you advise me to do? I am sorry I had forgotten the girl. I +should have kept the eye on her that I intended." + +"It's a matter for all, not for any one of us. I intend to bring it up +at the Club Meeting this afternoon, and I expect you all to back me, for +the thing's a disgrace to the community, and all our girls will be +talked about. In my opinion the best thing to do is to tell her to leave +and go and live in that hot-bed of wickedness, San Francisco." + +"Why Minerva, you're a regular old Puritan witch-hunter!" exclaimed Mrs. +Colton. "You never could make me believe that child had any harm in +her--" + +"It isn't what one believes. It's what is. I know. I've studied human +nature. If I don't know anything else I know that. She'll get out of +Rosewater, or I'll hit her in her weak spot. I'll write her up for the +San Francisco _Illuminator_. They'd give hundreds, and they can have it +for nothing--" + +"Why, Minerva Haight, I'm ashamed of you!" cried Mrs. Colton. "It's like +persecution, and you have no proof. Why should you know more of the +world than we do, I'd like to know?" + +"I do, that's all. And I don't see her doing every mortal thing she +wants, while others have to walk a chalked line through life. It's all +or none. That's my creed. She'll soon wilt when she sees we mean +business--either go, or take a chaperon, or marry the man, whichever she +prefers. I don't care, so long as she ain't allowed to do as she pleases +and no questions asked and no penalty paid. But she'll knuckle, for it's +my opinion she's just making money to spend it in San Francisco--cut a +dash there like her mother did before her. Probably wants to become a +society leader and have a string of lovers. Nice product to hail from +Rosewater. I think she ought to be sent back to Europe where they don't +mind such goings on. The things you do read about the English +aristocracy! It's my opinion _that_ Lady Victoria ain't any better than +she should be. She looks it--and through us, just as if we were +window-panes." + +"You are real crude, Minerva," said Mrs. Colton, crushingly, as she rose +to go. "I thought Rosewater was near enough to the metropolis for us not +to be as provincial as some folks farther up the line, who haven't the +same advantages." + +"I guess we're all crude enough, if it comes to that," retorted Mrs. +Haight. "I'd like to know what's cruder than a man's staying at a girl's +house till two o'clock in the morning--and for all the high and mighty +way he carries himself--and him the born image of Hi Otis. It's too +ridiculous. I'd like to bring him down several pegs, too." + +"He bears only the most distant resemblance to Hi Otis," said Mrs. +Colton, indignantly. "I never could endure Hi; he didn't have the +manners of a car-conductor, and this young man's real polite and kind, +besides having a _much_ more high-toned face. I don't believe you can +run him out, either. He looks the kind to stay or go, just as suits him. +And I'd advise you to think this matter over before you give it +publicity. I might go out and speak to Isabel quietly--" + +"Not much she don't get off as easy as that!" + +Mrs. Wheaton nodded approvingly. "It's a case for the Club," said she. +"We'll talk it out this afternoon and decide what's best to do." + +And all the others, save Mrs. Colton and the loyal Dolly, cordially +agreed with her. + + + + +XXVIII + + +The Rosewater Literary, Political, and Improvement Club met on the first +and fourth Thursdays of the month, in a large room on the top floor of +the Town Hall, and across the corridor from the Public Library. Saving +only the business section of Rosewater, rejuvenated by the fruitful +Leghorn, there was no such centre of activity within forty miles. +Rosewater, once as disreputable as San Francisco in the Fifties, now +contributed but an occasional drunkard or burglar to the languid powers +on the first floor of the Town Hall. The reading public was largely +confined to young girls with the taste for romance fresh on the palate. +The new books wandered in a year after the rest of the world had +forgotten them, and rarely in couples. One copy was quite able to quench +the thirst for "keeping up," and was often read aloud in the intervals +between cards. The standard works were well represented, however, and a +reasonable amount of history. "All Rosewater's good for," quoth one of +the biting wits of St. Peter, "is to die in. If you're born there people +never forget it; it sticks to you like a strawberry mark on the end of +your nose. And if you live there you might as well be dead, anyhow." +Rosewater retorted that if St. Peter had a better library it was because +she had nothing else to do than read, and, for all its court-house, was +nothing but a suburb of Rosewater, anyway; or at the best a mere +headquarters for drummers. + +On the afternoon following Mrs. Haight's card-party the large sunny room +with its outlook upon marsh and hill was filled promptly at two o'clock; +for the word had flown about town that Minerva Haight was on the +war-path and that the scalp she pursued was Isabel Otis's. The +President, as she rapped for order, betrayed no ruffling of the humorous +imperturbability that had made her a power in Rosewater. Mrs. Leslie, +although of "the old Southern set" of San Francisco, had none of the +external elegances of Mrs. Wheaton, Mrs. Boutts and Dolly, or even of +her own daughter. She was generally to be seen in a rusty black frock +and bonnet, a pair of eye-glasses in black frames bestriding the bridge +of her nose. But her eyes were very black and bright, her mouth was as +firm as it was kind and humorous. Beside her sat the Treasurer, Mrs. +Wheaton, whom Mrs. Leslie understood as thoroughly as she did every +member of the flock that was really hers, although in matters of mere +society she disdained to lead it. Mrs. Wheaton, for all her petty airs +and evil-scenting profile, was really a woman of high ideals. Her +severity to others was due to the secret knowledge that these ideals +were beyond her personal accomplishment, and the satisfaction to be +derived from audibly rating the failings of her neighbors. Her highest +ideal was self-control, particularly in relation to the weaknesses of +the flesh; but after a period of stern abstinence, she indulged +inordinately in oysters, fried chicken with cream gravy, and ice-cream +with cocoanut cake; and sipped a night-cap upon retiring. Her passion +for cards had long since routed her will; but she intended to reform +wholly in time, for she walked in fear of the Lord. If she judged the +young harshly, she persuaded herself that she had only their well-being +at heart. She was one of the pillars of the church and gave liberally to +its support. + +Mrs. Haight, who, as we have seen, enjoyed one of those purely +fortuitous reputations for cleverness, was Secretary of the combined +wings of the Club, and sat on Mrs. Leslie's left. Mrs. Wheaton's portly +person was sheathed in purple velvet, and there were handsome strings +between two of her chins, but Mrs. Haight wore a battered hat of +Neapolitan straw bedecked with a ragged bunch of carnations. It sat on +one side of her ill-kept head, giving her a singularly rakish and +definite appearance. She was furthermore attired in an old Paisley shawl +belonging to her grandmother--what better way to advertise a +grandmother?--over a blue alpaca frock made by her own unskilful +fingers. Mr. Haight was the most prosperous druggist in Rosewater, but +his wife had sounding virtues. + +The other members of the Club, some sixty in number, were as variously +dressed as became their pockets or proclivities, decently for the most +part, for there was no poverty in Rosewater. Mrs. Leslie took no notice +of the charged atmosphere, but proceeded to business as methodically as +if engaged in her morning housekeeping. The minutes of the last meeting +were read by Mrs. Haight, in the cultivated tones of one who had recited +upon the stage of her youth, "Curfew shall not ring to-night," and "The +Wreck of the Hesperus." The huskily strident voice trembled slightly, +but she read several pages of foolscap without a break, and finished +with a flourish. Then Mrs. Leslie, in spite of scraping chairs, asked +Mrs. Colton, Chairman of the Improvement Inspection Committee to read +her report on the condition of the new concrete pavements, of several +homesick palm-trees in the public squares, and on the prospect of +removing tin cans and soda-water bottles from the picnic grounds. This +resort was near the marsh, and it was the pet project of the ladies of +Rosewater to extend it into a boulevard as far as Point Santiago, so +that "public picnickers" should find an additional reason for spending +their money in Rosewater, and extend the fame of the town. They had +endeavored to extract the funds from their stingy lords by private +subscription, failing an appeal to the City Fathers, who found other +uses for the public funds; but even the civic Mr. Boutts was not ready +for such an outlay. The women--who had accomplished so much, having +literally transformed Rosewater from a broken-down pioneer country town +into one of the prettiest spots in California--had by no means +despaired; and when Mrs. Colton finished her report, Mrs. Leslie +remarked: + +"Our boulevard may be nearer than you think. Mr. Gwynne has conceived a +project for reclaiming the marsh-lands, and converting them, by means of +levees and those tremendous dredges and pumps, into arable land--like +the reclaimed islands of the San Joaquin River; and has persuaded Tom +Colton to present a bill to that effect at the next meeting of the +legislature--asking for an appropriation for the levees, at least. He +has himself promised a handsome contribution for the boulevard, +convinced that it will add materially to the wealth and importance of +the town. He has even talked over Mr. Boutts--an important +conversion"--nodding smilingly at Mrs. Boutts--"and Isabel Otis, who has +forty-five acres of marsh, has promised that if the bill goes through +she will also contribute a thousand dollars. She not only realized at +once that the boulevard would bring more capital to Rosewater, but she +means to sow the reclaimed land with asparagus--and we all know the +profit in that. Her attitude and comprehension of the matter have +gratified me extremely, almost as much as her continued residence in +Rosewater after all her fine experiences abroad; to say nothing of +engaging personally in a lucrative business instead of playing with it +and leaving the actual work to dishonest help. She is an example I wish +more of our young women would follow. But as regards Mr. Gwynne: I think +he deserves a vote of thanks. He comes here a total stranger with an +immense estate, from which he could derive a sufficient income for his +pleasures, and he has already devoted a considerable amount of his time +and splendid mental abilities to the welfare of this little town. A few +of our older men have some public spirit, an idea or two beyond lining +their pockets, but we do not boast a single young man who cares whether +we have camellias or cabbages in the public squares. I feel sure that +Mr. Gwynne will supply this deficiency and be a host in himself. I have +talked with him several times, and he has said, in so many words, that +as he intends to make this county his home he purposes to accomplish +something in the way of general improvement. This means that he will, +for my husband says that he not only has remarkable mind and will, but +that he is a young man of incorruptible honor--and I know of no +combination that we need more. So, ladies, I propose that we pass a vote +of thanks to Mr. Gwynne, thus not only showing our appreciation of his +interest, but securing his friendship for the Club." + +Mrs. Haight rose, sallow and trembling. She felt her sails flapping +about her, but none the less was she determined to reach her goal if she +had to get out and swim. She knew the President well enough to control +the hissing of her venom, but as she turned to address the chair she +found it impossible to imbue her tones with the suavity proper in a +baleful counsel for the prosecution. + +"Mrs. President, Ladies!" she began, clearing her throat. "Before +passing a vote of thanks to Mr. Gwynne I think it my duty to ask you +dispassionately if you really think he is a person from whom we can +afford to receive favors. And above all, if Isabel Otis should be +permitted any sort of contact with the Club she has scornfully refused +to join. That is not the point, however. The point is that I maintain +that neither of them is fit for respectable people to associate with." +She felt that her summary was precipitate, and drawing herself up +defiantly looked hard at Mrs. Leslie. The President was regarding her +impassively. + +"Why not?" she asked. + +"Because! As you force me to say it, Mr. Gwynne is out at Old Inn until +all hours of the night. I have seen him riding home as late as half-past +ten again and again. And I happen to know that before _that_ Lady +Victoria came, they were practically alone in the house on Russian Hill +one whole night. Mrs. Filkins, as you know, lives on Taylor Street, and +she saw Paula Stone pass her house in the afternoon looking as mad as a +hornet--she was sure she wasn't going back, and found out afterwards +that she hadn't; and she saw Mr. Gwynne come down those steps at seven +o'clock the next morning--going to catch the seven-thirty boat--looking +as pleased with himself as Punch. But I might have stood all that for a +while yet; I might have given Isabel the benefit of the doubt, since she +had _asked_ Paula to chaperon her, and might have found out too late +that she had gone--for she was gallivanting herself all day; I might +have overlooked his staying so often till ten-thirty--although I +maintain that an unmarried girl living alone on a ranch without even +female help is a disgrace to any community--yes, I might have swallowed +that for a while longer; but this morning--at three o'clock--I +saw--_with my own eyes, ladles_--Mr. Gwynne riding home from Old Inn on +Isabel Otis's sorrel horse Kaiser. Now I, for one, don't stand for such +goings on. I propose that instead of passing a vote of thanks to Mr. +Gwynne we pass a resolution to _cut_ both of them, and show them what a +decent community is." + +She sat down in her flounces, and Mrs. Wheaton rose and seconded the +motion. The others looked rather frightened, although alert and +interested, and Mrs. Colton rose hastily and proposed that before +putting such a momentous question to the vote, the whole matter should +be thoroughly investigated. + +"We must also have the advice of our President," she added. "For my +part, although I do not approve of young unmarried women living alone, +still I cannot believe such dreadful things of anybody, let alone Isabel +Otis. I am glad Anabel is not here. She would never listen to any +insinuation against Isabel, and might be tempted to disrespect of her +elders." + +"And you, Mrs. Boutts?" asked the President. + +"As a woman of the world I have not that implicit faith in human nature +that some people are still so happy as to cherish. My daughter--who +refused to come to-day, knowing the subject to be discussed--is +indignant at these reports; but of course she is a mere child, and very +much fascinated by Miss Otis. I do not by any means approve of the +drastic methods proposed by Mrs. Haight--I should hope that California +had taken _some_ of the old puritanical spirit out of us--but I do think +that Miss Otis should be given to understand that she cannot import +European fashions into Rosewater, and that she must have a chaperon. Let +her feel that she has acted unwisely, at the very least, by not inviting +her to any of the young people's gatherings in the future." + +"As there are no more except for card-playing, and as she has recently +been the only hostess at an evening party the town has boasted for two +years, your virtuous wrath bids fair to blow past her unheeded. Mrs. +Plews, will you address us?" + +Mrs. Plews was the wife of the pastor of the aristocratic Episcopalian +church, a pretty fluffy young woman, who visited the sick and made +excellent ice-cream for the church festivals. "Oh, I don't know!" she +exclaimed, deprecatingly. "It is all too dreadful! I no longer regret +that Miss Otis does not come to church. I had thought of remonstrating +with her once more--but when I recalled the last time! Now, it is indeed +well that she has not been associating with our young folks. I am sorry +this was not known before her party; I must really talk to Mr. Plews +before I can say anything further." + +"Mrs. Toffitt, I am sure that you have something to say--and an opinion +of your own." + +Mrs. Toffitt, a buxom highly colored woman of forty, who, since her +husband's death, the year before, had continued his business--a general +feed store--with striking success, and who was one of the most popular +women in Rosewater, with her abounding good-nature, her high spirits, +and her utter independence of speech, sprang to her feet. + +"I have this to say," she cried. "For a lot of puritanical, prying, +spying, detestable old hens, we take the cake. Isabel Otis minds her own +business. Why, in heaven's name, can't we mind ours? Does she owe +anybody anything? Has she taken anybody's beau away? Anybody's husband? +Does she walk the streets doing nothing but show herself, or go buggy +riding with one fellow after another? Does she ever refuse money for +charity, or for our improvements when it's asked of her? Was she a +credit to the town with her record at the High School, or wasn't she? +Are we proud of her travels in Europe, her high-toned connections, her +business sense, the way she acted to that old reprobate of a father, or +ain't we? That's what I want to know. And she's got real intellect +instead of just the average American brightness; that's the secret of +the whole trouble. What if she does sit up all night talking to a man +who's got something besides chickens and dollars in his head? I'd do the +same if I had the chance. Just make a note of that. If Mr. Gwynne likes +to transfer his attentions to me I'll sit up all night right on Minerva +Haight's doorstep, and talk about any old thing he wants. If I was as +young and handsome as Isabel Otis I'd keep the best man going to myself, +bet your life on it! And I repeat, it's nobody's business." She whirled +upon the pallid Minerva with a flaming face. "Nice business you're +in--sitting at your window all night watching for other people's slips. +You'd make one fast enough if the Lord would let you, and that's what's +the matter with you. Now, put that in your pipe and smoke it." + +She sat down amid much laughter and applause. Mrs. Leslie rapped +vigorously for order, although her mouth was twitching. + +"Now, ladies," she said, suavely, "if you have all relieved your minds I +will say a few words. First of all, I wish to state that I shall refuse +to put the matter to a vote. It is a question that does not come within +the jurisdiction of the Club, which was not organized to supervise +morals as well as streets and sewers. You can all act towards Isabel and +Mr. Gwynne exactly as your consciences dictate, but for my own part, I +have this to say: I am astonished to find that the Club life, a life +which women the world over have prided themselves upon as the greatest +factor in broadening and elevating that their sex has ever known, seems +to have done, in our case at least, so little to eradicate certain +Oriental instincts and traditions. The cities are full of young women +living alone, and self-supporting. Why should not a girl have the same +privilege in the country? Because she is handsome and distinguished? I +fancy that a good many girls in analogous circumstances are passing +unnoticed. I have not the least doubt that a very respectable percentage +of very respectable young women, living alone in their city flats, sit +up late and talk to men that are interesting enough to keep them awake. +I am quite sure that were I young in these emancipated times I should +take full advantage of them. And emancipated is what we pretend to +be--although the word itself is somewhat outmoded; a healthy sign, +proving that we are no longer labelled. And if that does not mean +personal liberty, freedom from the old ridiculous restrictions that +were an insult to womanhood itself, what does it mean? It is a part of +our mission to make woman as free and independent and happy as men, and +without the slightest danger to the old high moral standards; for no +woman that has had it in her to go wrong ever waited for the permission +of her own sex. We are, in fact, we Club Women, the great sieve that +separates the wheat from the chaff; the chaff has no more use for us +than we have for it, and we are too wise in our own sex to waste any +time on it. The women that were born to be the playthings of men are in +a class apart--to be dealt with, to be sure, by Societies organized for +and experienced in that purpose; and we have not even considered them in +the stupendous effort we have made to secure the freedom of the higher +order of women from the old miserable social thralldoms. And what we +have accomplished is historic. + +"I have seen extraordinary changes in my time. When I was young a woman +was an old maid at twenty-five. There was no appeal. To-day there are no +old maids. Twenty years ago, in that old exclusive set of San Francisco +led by Mrs. Yorba, Mrs. Montgomery, and for a little while by poor Mary +Belmont, it was almost unheard of for a girl of the better class to walk +alone on the street. If a man joined her the city fermented. Now, what +with the influx of all these new people, the social laws have been +modified to such an extent that my old friends must turn in their +graves; although, of course, and very properly, a certain amount of +chaperonage for young society girls is still demanded. But it is a mere +harness of flowers, worn as a sort of a joke for most of the people in +society to-day have flown upward on happy golden wings from strata +where as much was known of chaperons as the American newspapers know +about handling British titles. But, for my part, I find the whole change +a vast improvement. Nothing could be duller than a girl's life in my +time. And if society--the world of mere fashion--has broadened, how much +more should be expected of us, who are the vanguard of our sex? who have +set out to free women from every sort of senseless bondage they had +endured for centuries, and no more from the tyranny of the physically +stronger sex than through their own silliness and cowardice. + +"We are struggling to enfranchise our sex. We would like to try our hand +at regulating the affairs of the nation. Here, in these smaller towns, +all over the country, we have proved a far greater power for +improvements of all sorts than men. Rosewater owes to us, and to us +alone, its beautifully paved and shaded streets--we have no difficulty +in remembering what a barren mud-hole it was--the trees that shade the +poor horses at the hitching-rails; the beautiful squares, the tropical +plants and trees, the improved sewerage system, the cleanliness of the +marsh border, everything in fact that has transformed Rosewater from a +mere set of roofs and walls into a delightfully habitable town. +Moreover, we have raised both the moral and the intellectual tone, for +although I at least have always discouraged too much interest in +people's private affairs, the higher interests, and the increased +intimacy among women, have done much to keep them out of mischief. Until +this card fever descended upon the town, it was generally regarded as +occupying a high place among communities of its size. Cards, however, I +regard as a passing madness; it merely means that even yet we have not +enough to do. + +"And--so it seems!--in spite of all that we have accomplished, in spite +of our long and ofttimes disheartening struggle to lift ourselves above +the average female woman, we are as ready to tear reputations to pieces +as ever, to judge by mere appearances, to discount general character and +behavior, to forget our ideals and give unlicensed rein to the mean and +detestable qualities we still cherish in common with the mass of +unenlightened women. I do not assert that I have never heard gossip from +men; but it has always been from the men that spend their lives in Club +windows, never from men that had some better way of filling their time. +From my husband I have never heard a scurrilous word of any one, and he +has a temper of his own, too. Now, so far as I can make out, we have not +only been trying to usurp the time-honored prerogatives of men, but to +attain their highest standards. While I deprecate violence of statement, +I am inclined to agree with Mrs. Toffitt that a woman belonging to this +Club, a Club which stands high in the Club life of the State, should +have something better to do than to spend the night at her window spying +on her neighbors. If she cannot sleep she can improve her mind or sew +for the poor. If a man engaged in such nefarious night work and brazenly +admitted it, I will venture to say that his Club, or his Lodge, at all +events, would ask for his resignation. It would be quite in order with +our avowed principles that we reprimanded Mrs. Haight instead of Miss +Otis, but we will let the matter pass this time with a mere hint. One +point is, by-the-way, that the latter not being a member of the Club it +would be the height of impertinence to take her to task. But in any case +I personally refuse even to consider the question of anything being +otherwise with her than it should be. There is, no doubt, some wholly +commonplace explanation of Mr. Gwynne's passing through Rosewater on her +horse this morning. As for their constant companionship, what more +natural? They are closely related, and she has been a very necessary +sister to him. Nevertheless, I shall make it my unpleasant business to +tell her that we are still the same old females, still incapable of +conceiving of aught but one relationship between unmarried members of +opposite sexes, that our imaginations and our positive knowledge of life +are alike undeveloped. Then she can take a chaperon or not as she +pleases. She will always be welcome in my house; and as for my daughter, +she will only laugh at this tempest of her elders in a tea-pot. That is +all I have to say." + +She finished amid much applause, some shamefaced, some hearty, but there +were a number of lowering brows. When adjournment was declared a few +moments later, she left at once, but the others remained to talk the +matter over. The ingrained love of finding our sister worse than +ourselves is not to be eradicated by a few years of Club life, and +although the majority decided that Mrs. Leslie was quite in the right, +several announced their intention to cut Isabel Otis. There was no +informal resolution taken to ignore the matter, and, on the whole, Mrs. +Haight went home with her crest up, and Mrs. Wheaton fasted for three +days. + + + + +XXIX + + +Mrs. Leslie was a brave woman, but when the judge suggested that it +would be better for him to talk the matter over with Gwynne, obtain his +explanation, and delicately hint the attitude of the town, she was +nothing loath to renounce her mission. "The dear child," the friends of +her mother all remembered, had once possessed a temper that only the +peculiar circumstances of her life had chastened, and they had an uneasy +suspicion that it still smouldered beneath the well-bred insolence with +which she had so far received much friendly advice. + +By this time--mid-December was nigh--the judge and Gwynne had discussed +many subjects besides the law. Mrs. Leslie, whose hospitable instincts +were too deep to be blighted even by the servant question, had placed a +room at Gwynne's disposal to be used when it rained, or he talked so +late with the judge that the long ride home was not worth while. He +dined with them several times a week, and found both these simple +old-fashioned people delightful. And with Judge Leslie, alone of all his +neighbors, could he discuss the affairs of the great world, get away +from the politics and the small local interests that absorbed every +other man in Rosewater. Moreover, Judge Leslie was well acquainted with +his past career and often manifested a keen desire for details. Gwynne +was not sure that these lapses were good for him, but certainly it was +pleasant, stretched out there by the big fireplace in an old room full +of books, English for the most part, to talk of himself and his +achievements. Isabel rarely referred to his past, never encouraged him +to talk about it. His mother had become as silent as a mummy; old man +Colton might have lost his memory, and for Tom Colton British politics +had no existence. + +But Judge Leslie understood and had much sympathy for his +pupil--possibly believed in the virtue of the safety-valve. Certainly +Gwynne invariably went to bed after these long talks content in mind and +body; and the next day he was far too busy to trot out his ego and sit +down with it. And his mind at least was happy in its new sense of +expansion and acquisition, its increasing and developing powers. His +studies had the further effect of moderating the purely personal +viewpoint of the United States that had tormented him, and of enabling +him to withdraw far enough to command glimpses of the New World as a +great abstraction. And his contacts with the strange medley of small +farmers and mechanics, with local politicians in back offices and +saloons, even his acquaintance with the San Franciscans that were +attempting to reclaim that bawdy borough, did not affect the universal +idea he had at last succeeded in focussing. He had cast out disgust and +disapproval as youthful and unphilosophical, resolved anew to play his +part in the history of the country, letting the unborn events of his +term of enforced quiescence determine what the part must be. He had not +yet reached the stage of enthusiasm, but he had at least mounted to that +of interest; and he had even caught himself wondering if, should a law +pass in Great Britain, reducing the House of Peers to an elective body, +or permitting peers of his grade to sit in the House of Commons, he +would return? There was little doubt that there was more good to be +accomplished in the new country. + +His English great-great-grandfather had been historically active in the +reforms of 1832; a great-uncle had devoted his services to the passing +of the Reform Act of 1867; and a cousin to the Corrupt Practices Act of +1883. Reform was in his blood, and as, after all, the United States was +as much his own as Great Britain, he hoped in time to feel for it the +same passion of affection he had cherished for the country that had +given him fame and honors with both hands. And he knew that his other +hope of being of practical service to the United States in accordance +with his own ideal was no idle dream, for it was quite apparent from the +newspapers and reviews that the best men all over the country were awake +at last to the perils besetting the Republic, and that a bloodless +revolution was slowly making its way over the country. He had +unmitigated contempt for the revolutionist of the red shirt, insatiable +for the notoriety so easily obtained by appealing to the passions of men +a shade more ignorant than himself; no blood revolution was possible in +the United States during its present condition of prosperity. No country +can be universally roused to revolt with any weapons more deadly than +words until it has long felt the pinch of hunger in its vitals, and +watched millions starve while hundreds consumed the fat of the land. No +doubt there was grinding poverty in the crowded tenement districts of +the Eastern States, but those men were not the stuff of which +revolutionists were made, if only because they deliberately elected the +rigors of the town rather than supply the crying demand for labor and +servants throughout the country. It was only the idle that foregathered +and talked anarchism or even socialism; not those that cared to work. + +Here in California there was practically no such thing as poverty, or if +there was, the pauper, if fairly able of body, should be set up in a +public pillory. With a scale of wages the highest in the world, a +corresponding cheapness of every necessity of life, with the bare +exception of coal, needed in excess during one short season of the +twelve-month, sun for eight unbroken months, and a soil so fertile that +in many places it yielded two crops a year, there would have been no +discontent had it not been for the rapacity of labor unions, and the +systematic agitations of men like Tom Colton. In every human heart there +is the germ of discontent, no matter what the conditions, but Gwynne +recognized the possibility of diverting this uneasy parasite from +imaginary personal grievances to the public good, to measures which +would benefit the mass, subtly elevating man's opinion of himself in the +process, and so taking the first long stride in the direction of general +political reform. It was only by making the masses see their own part in +the abominable political corruption that made "graft" universal, and +permitted the rapid concentration of the country's wealth into a few +insolent hands, that the decapitation of the swarms of professional +politicians could be accomplished. In no part of the United States could +such reforms be attempted with anything like the same prospect of +success, as in this State with its traditions of contempt of money for +its own sake, and its almost primeval sense of independence. It was true +that there was no superb indifference to money in the small towns, but +much of the old spirit lingered among those that lived close to the +soil; and Gwynne had never seen such uncalculating lavishness, such a +humorous contempt for economy as in San Francisco. He was himself +generous by instinct and habit, but this gay reckless openhandedness, +whether a man had anything to spend or not, had already stirred some +deeper instinct still, possibly his pioneer, perhaps his Spanish, and he +had never enjoyed anything more in his life than certain nights in San +Francisco, when he had sallied forth with his pockets full of gold and +returned to Russian Hill on foot for want of a five-cent piece to pay +his car-fare. He had himself too well in hand ever to give permanent +rein to any such latent propensities, and he had no intention of +impoverishing himself, but the fact that the genius of the city was in +his blood warmed it to the strange, fascinating, wicked, friendly, +young-old city on the rim of the Pacific. + +As it happened, he was not in the humor for reading on the morning after +the meeting of the female clans, nor were there any clients in the outer +office, and he uttered some of his impressions aloud to the judge who +was sitting restlessly by the window, ostensibly watching Main Street. +Gwynne had wondered at the old gentleman's sudden idleness, but fell +easily into conversation this languid morning that was more like spring +than belated winter. + +"I can understand the fascination of San Francisco for anybody," said +the uneasy judge. "I wonder--" with a sudden inspiration, "if it +wouldn't be better for you to go into the law-office of a friend of mine +down there for a while. I mean--" in response to Gwynne's look of +astonishment, "of course I should hate to lose you--quite as much as I +hated to lose my own son, and yours is the only society in which I have +found any positive refreshment for years. But--well! in fact it would +be as well for you to leave Rosewater for a while--until all this talk +has died out." + +"What talk?" + +The judge felt what courage was left in him oozing under Gwynne's icy +stare. + +"Oh Lord! It's just this, Gwynne--just fancy I am really your father. +There are a lot of infernal old hens in this town--where don't they +roost, anyway?--and they have been exercising themselves over your going +out to Isabel's so much, especially at night. They've got the idea into +their empty heads that Isabel has come back from Europe, where she lived +by herself, with all sorts of free-and-easy notions. Perhaps the real +truth is that they distrust any girl as handsome as that who won't +marry. The talk didn't amount to much until yesterday morning--" + +"Ah!" Gwynne stood up and took his hat from the little private rack. +"Suppose you ask Mrs. Leslie to tell the hens that I have spent a great +many futile evening hours, the only ones I have at my private disposal, +trying to induce Miss Otis to marry me, and that yesterday evening, +after the fourth or fifth refusal, I borrowed her horse, having walked +out, and rode half-way to San Francisco to steady my nerves. Love and +the law combined are somewhat of a load to carry. I will go out now and +try my luck again. Perhaps this talk will influence her a bit. In fact I +promise that it shall." + + + + +XXX + + +Gwynne found Isabel just stepping out of her launch, after a business +morning in Rosewater, and was hospitably invited to dismount and remain +for luncheon. + +"Would you mind asking your Jap to make us some sandwiches and come with +me up to my mountain shanty?" he asked. "I have rather a headache and +want a long ride. Besides, it is high time I went. I should look over +the roads, which they tell me are very bad after the heavy rains. I want +to go into camp there in the early spring--have invited Hofer and one or +two others for salmon-fishing. I have now sent three letters to the +tenant, one Clink, by teamsters, and he has never replied. For all I +know he may have burned the house down and decamped. So, altogether, +this seems to me the time to go, and it would be very jolly to have you +with me." + +"I'd like nothing better," said Isabel, delightedly, "after talking eggs +and chickens all morning. And I haven't been up to Mountain House for +years. It used to belong to Uncle Hiram, you know. He always fished +there in the spring, and took me with him. Then Mr. Colton bought it +in--I won't be ten minutes." + +"Now I know why you wear that hideous divided habit and ride astride," +said Gwynne as they started. "I have been half-way up the mountain once +or twice, to say nothing of the Marin hills, and I have never seen such +roads. They are a disgrace to the State. Why on earth doesn't the +legislature take them in hand?" + +"Now _I_ know _you_ are in a bad humor," said Isabel, laughing. "You +grumbled at everything when you first came to California, and now that +you have become philosophical like the rest of us, you only anathematize +when you are put out. I saw something was wrong the moment you arrived. +What is it?" + +"I'll tell you later. This is our only chance for a sharp trot." + +It was quite two miles to the ascending road at the foot of the mountain +range that divided the great valley. It rose gently for a time then +suddenly became steep. Lumpy and slanting, already dangerously narrow in +many places, for there had been a few days of hard rain, it led along +the edge of cannons and chasms, creeks and little valleys as round as +a bowl. Here and there was a farmhouse or a country home on a slope, set +in the midst of fields just turning green. The first stretch of +road--cut roughly in the mountain-side and then left to take care of +itself--was on county property, but after an hour's climb along the +flank of the mountain they reached the part of the great mass included +in Lumalitas, where the road, although still public, had been mended now +and again by tenants that had used the camp in the fishing season. + +"It is even worse than I thought," grumbled Gwynne. "I wonder if Tom +Colton could be induced to put in a bill at the next legislature. It +would be a good opportunity for him to make a promise with some hope of +fulfilment." + +"The trouble is the farmers don't care," said Isabel, shrugging her +shoulders. "There are only a few of them in the mountains and they have +jogged up and down these bad roads so many years that they accept them +as a matter of course. I don't know that I mind this, myself. It +certainly is more picturesque than if it had become popular with +automobilists of much influence in legislative councils." + +"At present you have to ride with your eyes on the road to make sure it +is there." + +"We can take turns, and it certainly is beautiful." + +"Oh, beautiful!" + +But when the road improved for quite half a mile, he too gave himself up +to the sensation of being lost in the heart of a mountain. The valley +was far behind them and out of sight. There were groves of ancient oaks +in the hollows, turbulent streams foaming over masses of rocks that had +fallen from the cliffs above. Sometimes they looked down a thousand +sheer feet into a bit of wilderness as unbroken as if on each side of +the range man had not snatched the fertile lands from the savage a +century before. + +The air grew colder and Isabel put on her covert coat. But it was a +clear sparkling day, and when they reached the summit they could see San +Francisco, a smoky mirage forty miles to the south, the ferry-boats +crawling like beetles across the bay, the surf of the ocean on the rocks +beyond the Golden Gate, a vast sweep of gray ocean; and the bulk of +Tamalpais, that from this high point looked as if it had heaved itself +free of the mass of mountains and forests about it. Two thousand feet +below, their own valley, with its marsh and fertile ranches, looked like +a dark ribbon between the hills, Rosewater like a toy village. + +They trotted their horses for a few moments on the level and then rode +down into the little valley where an unsuccessful farmer of solitary +habit had some time since rented the few acres of land surrounding +Mountain House, with the understanding that the best rooms were to be at +the disposal of the lord of Lumalitas during the fishing and hunting +seasons. The log-house, or "camp," was very solid and had been built by +the first James Otis, who was a mighty hunter; and the salmon-fishing in +the creek, at present containing but a few feet of water, was so fine +that hardly a spring had passed without a visit from the tenants of +Lumalitas, who were constrained by the terms of the lease to keep the +house in repair. Of late this had been the duty of the sub-lessee, and +as no teams passed his isolated dwelling, and as he had not seen fit to +answer his landlord's communications, even verbally, by the boy from one +of the lower ranches who had carried up the missives, all Gwynne knew +was that Mr. Clink was alive, and that the ranch was free of winter +debris. + +They found the gentleman sitting on a stump. He had a hand on either +knee, and his small watery unblinking eyes were fixed on space. A beard, +narrow and grizzled and stained, rested on his lean front, or stirred +gently in the breeze. He neither rose, nor otherwise noticed the +approach of his visitors. + +Gwynne called, shouted, approached the verge of profanity, but he might +as well have addressed the silent forest. + +Isabel elevated her nose. "To use the vernacular, he is on a long, slow, +melancholy jag. I will go in and see how he keeps the house. It needs an +airing at least. Every window is closed and probably has been all +winter." + +She remained in-doors half an hour, putting things to rights with many +mysterious touches known only to her sex. When she returned to Gwynne +she found him sunning himself on the porch with his back to Mr. Clink, +who stolidly regarded an old stump of geranium. + +"It is clean enough," she said. "But when you come, bring new +blankets--or send them, and your provisions--the day before you bring +your guests. I will come up with them and see that everything is in +order. I might also turn the hose on Clink, if he has chosen that +occasion to drench himself inside. At all events bring a cook--you can +have Chuma; these people never can cook anything but fried meat and +potatoes." + +Drifted leaves lay on the porch a foot deep. Isabel found a broom and +swept vigorously, snubbing Gwynne's offer to do it himself. He watched +her, crossly reflecting that she was never so unattractive as in that +dust-colored divided habit, and wishing that he had waited for the +evening hour; even if infrequently seductive, she was always lovely in a +becoming gown. + +Finally, her labors over, she dusted an aged rocking-chair and sat down, +fanning herself with her hat. Her cheeks were flushed and her eyes +sparkling, but she turned to look at the beautiful creek that had torn +its way through the forest, and Gwynne suddenly felt that he hated her +profile. During the last few weeks he had lost that sense of a constant +and secret contest of wills, perhaps because his own had proved the +stronger in the final engagement; perhaps, who knew? because she +possessed all the infernal subtlety of the Spaniard. But her profile +suggested relentless power, and he still had a secret hankering for the +old-fashioned submissive female, liberal and indulgent to the sex as he +was. He had reflected that he had met so many handsome finely developed +girls, with a sufficiency of animated brightness, but well within the +type, during the past few weeks, that it was rather odd he had not been +captured; particularly as several of the most ripping would add +materially to his fortunes. But he had come to the conclusion sometime +since, when he hardly knew, that he would prefer to remain unmarried, +and enjoy the intimate companionship of a congenial and interesting +creature like Isabel, whom he never quite understood. He cursed the +stale old conventions that interfered with his desires. + +Isabel turned suddenly and smiled. "How fierce you look!" she said. +"What is the matter?" + +"Everything. Some one, Mrs. Haight, I suppose, saw me riding home on +your horse at three o'clock yesterday morning, and the whole town is by +the ears. Judge Leslie undertook to break the news to me, and I told him +I had gone out to propose, and then ridden about the country to calm my +raging fires. I feel that I owe it to you to propose in good earnest, +and such as I am you are welcome to me." + +"I never heard such a graceful proposal. I wouldn't marry you if +Rosewater stood on its head." + +"I was rather brutal about it, and I must honestly confess that I'm not +particularly keen on marrying you, but I think we'll have to marry, or +be deuced uncomfortable--" + +"Oh, nothing to what we should be if married. And Rosewater to me is a +mere market for chickens and eggs. The only punishment they could +inflict on me would be to burn down the hatcheries. I hate to bother +with incubators." + +Gwynne stood up and knocked the ashes out of his pipe. "We must be +serious," he said. "They are really malignant about it. I have felt it +in the air for some time. Every time I pass that she-devil, Mrs. Haight, +on Main Street, her eyes contract with a sort of malicious warning. +'Just you wait!' is the way she would phrase it. And I always _feel_ her +at her window when I ride home late. No woman of your age and beauty can +defy public opinion alone. The world--and scandal spreads like a plague; +San Francisco is only forty miles from Rosewater--the world can hurt you +in a thousand ways, ruin your life. I really am only too willing to +protect you, and I hope that you will marry me. I am sure we should get +along--after a bit." + +"That was better. But I will not be driven into matrimony by gossip, or +even scandal. That is no part of my scheme of life. And I know Rosewater +better than you do. Mrs. Leslie, Anabel, Mrs. Colton, many of the most +powerful, would never believe a word against me." + +"Not at first. But malicious tongues will wear the gloss from the +best-befriended reputation in time. The kindest natures are +conventional; and susceptible to all that take, or seem to take, a place +in the ranks of established facts." + +"I won't do it," said Isabel, stubbornly; and as she turned her profile +to him he almost swore aloud. "I shall conquer, or prove the whole +modern game of woman a sham, a fool's paradise. I told you that I had +set myself to drag strength out of the unknown forces. Well, I propose +to use it now. And in your behalf as much as mine." + +"I can take care of myself.... I even think I could face the prospect of +becoming your husband with a reasonable amount of equanimity." She was +looking straight at him again, her face deeply flushed, her eyes +shining. "It never occurred to me before, but I believe that if you +would permit yourself to develop, you might become the most fascinating +woman in the world. And if you did, I swear that you should be happy." + +"I am happy, and in my own way. I get something out of every moment. Do +you think I am going to run the risk of losing all that for anything so +dubious as this old game of sex?" + +"Very good game if it is played properly. I have a mind to teach you." + +"Well, you will not!" + +"I think I shall. It is either marry you or leave California." + +"That is a threat unworthy of you." + +"No threat at all. If you will not permit me to protect you in one way I +must in another. I leave and throw everything over with great eclat. You +have discarded me and I cannot stand the proximity." + +"They might merely think that you were running away from me." + +"I shall take good care they think what I choose. Women are more +romantic and sentimental than malignant, the bulk. All they want is a +starter." + +"But you need not leave California. You can move to San Francisco." + +"Now you are talking like a child. I shall return to England. As to my +American career, my only chance lies here. I hate the rest of the +country, and the best material is in California, anyhow. Yesterday I +received a letter from my solicitor, enclosing one from Jimmy, who +informed me that I was on every tongue, that the public curiosity was +piqued, that the newspapers were demanding that I should return and +accept my responsibilities, and that without doubt a place would be made +for me in the new Liberal Cabinet. It is a propitious moment for +return. If there is a time when a Liberal peer can make any running it +is when his party is in power." + +There was a pause for several moments. Gwynne filled and lit another +pipe. Isabel stared at a ring she twisted about her finger, Mr. Clink at +the geranium stump. The low dull roar in the forest tops was unceasing, +but for other sound of life they might have swung off into space. + +Finally Isabel spoke. "I won't marry you," she said. "But all ends will +be served if we announce an engagement. We can state that we think it +best not to marry until your law studies are concluded. It can be +postponed once or twice on other pretexts, then fall through. By that +time gossip will be forgotten, people will have lost interest in us. In +San Francisco they are not likely to hear of this at all, or if they do +it will not matter, and if you fall in love with any of the _cotillon_ +beauties I will release you in due form and give you my blessing." + +"I have not the least intention of undertaking life with a _cotillon_ +beauty. Your compromise will do for the present, but you will understand +that my proposal is a bona fide one, should you arrive at a more +rational frame of mind." + +"I sha'n't fall a victim to any irrational state of mind. I won't marry. +Why, even people that like me too much interfere with my sense of +liberty." + +Gwynne laughed. "We had better be starting," he said. + + + + +XXXI + + +They parted at the foot of the mountain, and as Isabel approached her +own house she saw Anabel Colton's trap tied to the garden gate. She set +her teeth and slackened the pace of her horse, but Anabel and Miss +Boutts had seen her, and leaned over the edge of the veranda, calling to +her impatiently. She gave her horse a cut with the whip and rode rapidly +to the stable. When she finally reached the veranda she greeted her +friends courteously enough, and then, as she noted their expression of +defiant loyalty, remarked, sweetly: + +"Of course you have been expecting to hear that I am engaged to Mr. +Gwynne, but I only really made up my mind to-day." + +"Isabel!" Both fell on her neck, Dolly with tears, and she responded +with what enthusiasm was in her, and gently deposited them into two of +the veranda chairs. With a very fair simulation of the engaged girl she +answered their rapid fire of questions, and even informed Anabel that +she would prefer silver to china when the day for presents arrived, and +promised that she should come to the rehearsal of the ceremony, since, +unfortunately, the young matron's own happy state debarred her from +officiating at the altar. But she was averse from lying, even by +implication, and was glad to see them go. After they had turned for the +last time to blow her a kiss, she went within, slammed all the doors on +the lower floor, stamped her feet, and hurled a book across the room. +Finally she swore. After that she felt better and sat down to read a +letter from Mrs. Hofer that awaited her. + + * * * * * + +"... I can't do anything with your Lady Victoria" [the lively young +matron ran on after a few preliminary enthusiasms]. "She went everywhere +at first, but just sat round looking like a battered statue out of the +Vatican with some concession in the way of clothes--not so much. +Literally she made no effort whatever, and, you know, _American men +won't stand that_. Perhaps that's the reason she suddenly called off and +refused to go anywhere. But what can she expect? American women may talk +too much, but at any rate they are the sort American men know like a +book, and our knights have no use for inanimate beauties a good many +years younger than my Lady Victoria. + +"Now she appears to do nothing but walk--stalk rather. She goes over +these hills as if she had on seven-league boots. One would think she was +possessed by the furies; or perhaps she is afraid of getting fat. + +"I am simply dying to see you again. If you don't mind--I like you +better than any one I ever met. You combine everything, and although you +make me feel as fresh as paint and as Irish as Paddy Murphy's pig, still +you always put me in a better humor with myself than ever. How do you do +it? You suggest all sorts of things that I can't define at all. Comes of +living alone and making a success of it, I suppose, getting ahead of +mere femininity and all the pettinesses of life. That's flying rather +high for me, so I'd better come down. Please _make_ Mr. Gwynne come to +my party. I intend that party to be the greatest thing ever given in +California--since the old Monte Cristo Ralston days, anyhow: and have +all sorts of surprises that I won't tell even you. The ballroom is quite +finished and is a perfect success. It is _too_ fine to think that you +will make your formal debut in it. Everybody is coming. Mr. Gwynne +simply must. I know of about a dozen girls who would have given him the +_cotillon_ if he had asked them, and even now, when they are all +engaged, I know of at least two who would not hesitate to throw their +men over. We all like him tremendously, the men as well as the women. +Mr. Hofer and I--do you know, we have just a dark suspicion--where _is_ +Elton Gwynne, anyway? That would be too good to be true. He could own +the town. We know an _individual_ when we see one, and wouldn't we +appreciate the compliment! We'd like him all the better for having +accepted him when he was plain John Gwynne, and we'd like ourselves +better still. You know how we make up our own minds out here. Look at +the famous actors and singers we've rejected, and the reputations we've +made. Not like New York, that never expresses an opinion until a sort of +consensus has sweated up to the surface. I hate New York. Can't you come +down and pay me a visit of a week? I should love it. Call me up on the +telephone." + + * * * * * + +Isabel pondered over this missive for a few moments and then reread +parts of a long letter she had received the day before from Flora +Thangue. + + * * * * * + +"... I almost wish Jack would return, although at first I approved of +his going. His case seemed so desperate. But since the elections there +has been so much talk of him, so many prophecies as to what he will do +when he returns--they believe him to be travelling in South America--so +much seems to be expected of him, especially now that the Liberals are +in, and there is so much dissatisfaction with the Cabinet--I really +believe he would be the one to keep the party in power and that his +becoming prime-minister would be a question of only a few years. Not +such a bad outlook! But I don't care to say all this to Jack--or even to +Vicky. You are responsible for the present state of affairs, and I am +sure you realize what a tremendous responsibility it is. Besides, you +know every side of the question over there as I do not. Think it over, +dear Isabel.... Julia Kaye, I happen to know, has been trying to get his +address. So far, she has not landed another big fish, and no doubt +thinks that Jack's disgust and enthusiasm have both worn themselves out +by this time. Don't send him back, but bring him. Of course he has +fallen in love with you. Besides, you could accomplish any mortal thing +you put your will to. Do, please, think it all over. A few years' delay, +and he might return and find it too late. The public memory is short. +There are rivals. The one he had most to fear from has an +Under-secretaryship, and lets no one forget him. There will be deep +resentment at too long an absence, especially if he should become an +American citizen meanwhile. They would never forgive that. + +"... About Vicky. I wish I could have gone with her, but she did not +feel that she could afford to take me, and Vicky's spasms of economy are +not to be discouraged. But, thank heaven, she has you and Jack. Perhaps +all she really needed was a change: she was always an individual, but +she got to be distinctly peculiar after you left--nerves, I suppose: +only instead of being merely irritable like other women she sealed +herself up like a Mahatma preparing for astral flight. I only wish she +was one. Women of her class no longer take to religion, when the fires +are dead, but they certainly need a substitute, and I should think +theosophy would be as good as any. It is such a delightful mixture of +vagueness and cock-sureness, and even more picturesque than Romanism. It +is time for me to follow the fashion and write a book, and I think I'll +paint the mysterious delights of India as a late autumn resort. I am so +sick of all these public mausoleums for youth! It would be a positive +relief to think of all our erstwhile beauties stretched out in some +frescoed cave with their ears and eyes and noses sealed up with wax, +while their ever-youthful spirits sallied forth for new conquests on the +astral plane. But Vicky never 'made up': one must say that much for her. +Only this terrible fetish of youth! Heavens! the tragedies my +sympathetic soul has endeavored to see as tragedies only. Not that +growing old seems to be the worst of it. The underlying tragedy is that +they can't care enough, and this they take to be the real end of youth, +and patter up and down the old worn-out track of device, trying to fool +themselves as well as others. But Vicky, as I said, is an individual: a +touch or two more and she might have been a genius. She is like the mass +of women in many things, heaven knows, but her divergences are the more +startling; and the point of divergence lies down in the roots of her +pride. She suddenly felt the complete loss, the final departure of +youth, and she accepted it like a fallen goddess, and refused even the +sudden and startling renewal of Sir Cadge Vanneck's devotions. She had +nothing left to give him, and although her pride may have urged her to +show the world that she still could capture a man like that, I think he +really bored her to death, and she was satisfied to parade him for a +time and then publicly throw him over. And she once loved him, I am +certain of it. That is tragedy, if you like. I fancy she has desperate +moments, but she will pull through in her own way. Don't delude yourself +with the notion that she is sitting down in sackcloth and ashes with her +past! Those women don't repent, for they never admit that the laws of +common mortals apply to them. What is their royal pleasure to do they +do, and when it is over a square inch of their memory might have gone +with it. To mull themselves, commit some flagrant error that lands them +in the divorce court, or high and dry in the outskirts--that is another +matter. They repent then, _sans doute_; and get no mercy. We overlook +everything at this apex of civilization but stupidity. We respect the +high-handed but not the light-headed. That is one reason those +long-winded novels of sin and repentance--generally over one slip and +when the man has wearied--leave us cold. We know too much. It seems such +a lot of fuss about so little. If some of these good, painstaking, +and--let us whisper it--bourgeoise novelists had seen one-tenth of the +pagan disregard for all they cherish most highly, that I have seen, and +if they could only be made to comprehend--which they never could--how +absolutely admirable these same women are in many other respects--such +capacity for deep undying friendship, such uncalculating loyalty, such +racial possibilities of heroism--well, they would do a good deal harder +thinking than they have had to do yet, if they attempted to readjust +their traditions to the actual facts of life. But the old traditions get +back at our women all the same, although they don't suspect it. They pay +the penalty in that late--sometimes not so late--intolerable maddening +ennui. Heavens! how many women I have heard wish they were dead. Thank +God I am a virgin! + +"Of course, dear Isabel, I would not write like this about Vicky to any +one on earth but yourself. But she is on your hands, so to speak, and I +feel you should have some sort of comprehension of her. To understand +her fully is impossible. She is unhappy, that is the main thing--what +with all I have intimated, and the great change in her fortunes--I can +hardly imagine Vicky without Capheaton and the reflected glory of +'Elton Gwynne'; and, no doubt, she finds California an exile and has +realized by this time that she can be of little use to Jack. Better make +a fortune for her in your wonderful American way and bring them both +home." + + + + +XXXII + + +Isabel called up Mrs. Hofer on the telephone, and after being switched +off and on half a dozen times, and crossed wires and all the other +mishaps peculiar to the California telephone service had reduced both to +a state of furious indifference, Mrs. Hofer accepted Miss Otis's +inability to go down to San Francisco until the day of the party, and +her promise to pay the visit during Christmas week, with equal +philosophy. + +The party was to be on the night of the 24th, and Isabel did not see +Gwynne again until the evening of the same day. Judge Leslie went to +Santa Barbara to spend the holidays with his son, and his pupil to +Burlingame and Menlo Park for a week. After the polo and various other +sports at the former resort, with a set that bore an outline resemblance +to the leisure class of his own country, the gay life at the Club and +the multitude of pretty girls always flitting amid compact masses of +flowers, he found the now unfashionable borough of Menlo Park somewhat +dull; although he had good snipe-shooting on the marsh with his host, +Mr. Trennahan. The whole valley, however, had a peculiar charm for him; +when riding alone past the fields of ancient oaks with the great +mountains on either side, almost a sense of possession. For all this +magnificent and richly varied sweep of land, now cut up into a few large +estates and an infinite number of small ones, into towns, and villages, +hamlets, and even cities, had once been the Rancho El Pilar, and the +property of his Mexican ancestor, Don Jose Argueello. He knew that in +those old days it must have looked like a vast English park, and he felt +some resentment that his ancestors had not had the wit to hold fast to +it until his time came to inherit. + +Mrs. Trennahan's father, Don Roberto Yorba, had bought a square mile +from one of the Argueello heirs, and a few rich men of his time had +followed his example; and slept in their country-houses during six +months of the year while their women yawned the days away, deriving +their principal solace in contemplation of their unchallenged +exclusiveness. Stray members of those old families were left, and were, +if anything, more exclusive than their parents, disdaining the +light-hearted people of Burlingame, unburdened with traditions. +This was still the set that never even powdered, faithful to the +ancient code that it was not respectable, and who spent the greater +part of the year in the country, finding their pleasures in the +climate--soporific--excellent old Chinese or Spanish cooks, and in +reminiscences of the time when the fine estates had not been cut up into +little suburban homesteads for heaven only knew whom. + +Mrs. Trennahan had sold her father's place, and bought a superb estate +in the foothills, where she entertained in the simple fashion of the +Eighties. Trennahan still took the haughty spirit of his chosen borough +with all his old humor, but he liked no place so well, even in +California. A New-Yorker is always a New-Yorker, however long he may +live in California, but he becomes more and more attached to the +independent life, the even climate, above all to the cooking; and +Trennahan was no exception. He had found Magdalena the most comfortable +of companions, she had presented him with two fine boys--who were +preparing for college, at present--and a lovely daughter; and he was, in +a leisurely way, collecting earthquake data, for future publication, and +amused himself with a seismograph; which worried Magdalena, who thought +the instrument much too intimate with earthquakes to be a safe piece of +household furniture. Gwynne liked them both as well as any people he had +met in California, and engaged the beautiful Inez--who would seem to +have embodied all her mother's old passionate longing for physical +loveliness--to dance several times with him at the great ball which was +to be the medium of her introduction to society. + +"I am still old-fashioned," Mrs. Trennahan confided to Gwynne, with a +sigh. "I never have liked new people and I never shall; Mr. Trennahan +has not laughed it out of me. But what will you? They are seven-eighths +strong in San Francisco, I have a daughter who naturally demands the +rights of her youth--so I make the best of a bad bargain. But I +protest." + +When Gwynne arrived at the house on Russian Hill late in the evening it +occurred to him to tap on Isabel's door and tell her that he had obeyed +her orders, recalled all the traditions down in their common ancestor's +old domain, and "got the feel" of the place. He had never crossed the +threshold of this room although he had brushed his hair many times in +the spotless bower by the marsh, and he was surprised, after a moment's +colloquy through the panels, by an invitation to enter. He was still +more surprised to find Isabel sitting before her dressing-table in full +regalia, although they were not to start for the party until eleven +o'clock. She wore the white tulle gown with the dark-blue lilies in +which she had created a sensation at Arcot, and looked more radiant than +he had ever seen her. Her eyes were like stars, her cheeks were pink; +her red lips were parted, the upper trembling with excitement. + +"Come! Look!" she cried. "See what your mother has given me. I had to +dress at once to see the whole effect." + +She lifted and fingered rapturously a row of splendid pearls that lay on +her neck. + +"Did you ever see anything so beautiful? All my life I have wanted a +string of pearls--real pearls that you read about, although I thought +myself fortunate to have that old string of Baha California pearls, and +never expected anything better. At first I wouldn't take them, but +Cousin Victoria said they were her mother's, a gift from _her_ father +when she married, so that I ought to inherit them, anyhow; and might as +well have them while I was young. She vowed she should never wear them +again, as her skin was no longer white enough for pearls. I can't +believe it!" + +Gwynne looked at her curiously. "I had no idea you cared for those +things. I could have given you pearls. Your pose has always been to +scorn the common weaknesses of your sex." + +"You are just a dense man! I have all my sex's love of personal +adornment, if you like to call that a weakness. Do you suppose I admire +myself in that riding-habit or those overalls? Don't I always dress for +supper even when alone? Have I not a lot of lovely gowns? Look at this +one! I am so glad I never wore it again until to-night. As for jewels, I +adore them, and when I am a millionaire I shall have little shovels full +like those you see in jewellers' windows, just to handle; and the most +lovely combinations to wear. But I don't ruin my complexion pining for +what I can't have--or have lost. Of course poor mamma had beautiful +jewels, but they went the way of all things." + +Gwynne looked at his watch. "I shall get a bite in town," he said. "The +shops will be open till midnight. Hofer will endorse a check for me; I +have sold three farms in the past week and have a pot of money in the +bank. There is something else I want you to wear to-night--" + +"I won't take jewels from you--" + +"You are not only my fiancee but my cousin--" + +"Nonsense!" + +"I shall be back in about two hours. Mind you are sitting just there +when I arrive." + +As he went swiftly out and closed the door, she shrugged her shoulders, +and her eyes danced with anticipation. After all, she could return his +present when the farce was over, and she was in a mood to have the world +poured into her lap. + +She dined alone with her Puritan and Spanish ancestors, and when the +brief meal was over, went up and exhibited herself to Lady Victoria, who +was in a state of silent fury at being the victim of a headache. She +complimented Isabel upon her appearance, however, and added: + +"I hope this pretended engagement will end in reality. You are of our +blood. I recognize it more and more. I am thankful he escaped Julia +Kaye. You are--could be--all I am afraid I compelled myself to believe +she was." + +"Do you want him to go back to England?" asked Isabel. "I had a letter +from Flora the other day, and she thinks it is my mission to restore him +to his country." + +"I don't care. What difference does it make? I want him to be happy, and +he can have a career anywhere. In your case beauty is not a curse, and I +should be glad to see you concentrate your gifts where you can find and +give real happiness. Now, enjoy yourself like a girl to-night and don't +bother about Jack or any one else--certainly not about me," as Isabel +stood looking down upon her with a puckered brow. + +Lady Victoria, in a negligee of salmon pink under a red light, and +reclining on her divan with a box of cigarettes beside her, and a French +novel in her hand, looked little less handsome than when she had +captivated Isabel's girlish fancy a year ago. It was only the utter +weariness of the eyes, and a subtle hardening of the whole mask of the +always immobile face, that betrayed the sudden rupture with a long +complacent youth. But she looked at Isabel's glorious youth without a +pang of envy in her cynical, if not yet philosophical, soul, and said +again, with emphasis: + +"Marry him. You can do it. Any woman can marry any man she wants. That +is the reason we are never really happy. We never love men, as we +imagine that we could love. We have fevers for them that last a few +weeks, and then we become maternal and endure them. We might love a +demi-god, never man as we know him. Perhaps in some other world--who +knows?" + +Isabel pricked up her ears. Was Lady Victoria meditating the +consolations of the Church--or of Flora's more modern substitute? What a +solution! But she dared not ask. She was still a little afraid of her +complicated relative. She begged her not to read too late, and went out, +promising to conciliate the offended Mrs. Hofer. + +As she walked down the hall she stooped absently and picked up a scrap +of paper, hardly aware that she held it in her hand until she sat down +once more before her mirror. Then she glanced at it. To her surprise it +was an advertisement of a prize-fight, cut from a newspaper; and on the +margin an illiterate hand had scrawled, "_Nine o'clock sharp._" She +wondered which of the servants was indulging in the distractions of the +ring. All except Lady Victoria's maid were Japs. Could the Frenchwoman +have found a lover who had introduced her to the forbidden pleasures of +the town? Obviously it was not Gwynne's for the date was two days old, +and he had been in Menlo Park at the time. But she had more interesting +things to ponder over. Being a good housekeeper, she folded the scrap +and hid it under one of the little silver trays, intending to give it in +the morning to Lady Victoria, who was the temporary mistress of the +mansion. Then she fell to counting her pearls, wound them twice about +her throat, decided that she preferred the single long ellipse falling +among the blue flowers on her bosom, marvelled, in an abandon of +femininity, at the dazzling whiteness of her skin. She was beautiful, no +doubt of that; it might be as Lady Victoria and Flora Thangue asserted, +that any future she chose was hers to command; and, as the latter had +intimated, to be an English peeress, with her husband at the head of the +state, was no mean destiny. To-night, her almost fanatical love of +California was dormant. She felt wholly personal. Whatever the future, +she wanted to be the most admired girl at this party to-night, to +dominate its long-heralded splendors as a great soprano rises high and +triumphant above the orchestral thunders of a Wagner opera. Old +instincts were stirring subtly. She had the rest of her life for great +ideals. To-night she would be an old-time belle: as Concha Argueello had +been just a century ago, as Guadalupe Hathaway, Mrs. Hunt McLane, Nina +Randolph, and "The Three Macs," had been in the city's youth; as Helena +Belmont had been but twenty years before. She recalled the oft-told +story of the night of Mrs. Yorba's great ball, in the house next to the +one which was to be the theatre of her own debut, when Magdalena Yorba, +Tiny Montgomery, Ila Brannan, and the wonderful Helena had been +introduced to San Francisco, and the most distracting belle the town had +ever known had turned the heads of fifty men. It was far easier to be a +belle in that simpler time than to-day, when the San Franciscan vied +with the New-Yorker in the magnificence of furnishing and attire, and a +mere million was no longer a fortune. And the city more than maintained +its old standard of beauty, for its population had nearly doubled; the +handsome girls of the upper class had learned the art of dress, and even +among the shop-girls there was a surfeit of pretty faces and fine busts. +As to the demi-monde it was the pick of America, for obvious reason. + +But Isabel was an ardent dreamer, and as she sat in her silent old home, +high above the city's unresting life, she imagined herself into a +blissful picture where she should realize to the full all the desires +dear to the heart of a girl. It was true that she had created a _furore_ +that night at Arcot, but her triumph had been extinguished by fright and +the tragedies that came in its train. And no triumph abroad ever quite +equals the conquest of your own territory. Isabel concluded that if it +were a matter of a single season, she would rather reign in San +Francisco than in London--but her dreams were cut short by Gwynne's +rapid step on the plank walk, and a moment later he was tapping on her +door. + +She looked up at him with undisguised expectancy. + +"I am going to enjoy it," she said. "I shall accept it. I don't care!" + +"I should hope so, after all the trouble I have had." He sat down in a +low chair beside the dressing-table and facing her. "Hofer had been +turned out of the house and had taken refuge at the Mission. I took an +automobile and rushed out there, only to find that he and his friends +had concluded to come in and dine at one of the restaurants. Definite, +but I know their tastes pretty well, and finally tracked them down. By +that time I was starved, but when the dinner was over Hofer went with me +himself to the jeweller's--" + +"What is it?" asked Isabel, impatiently, her eyes on a long box Gwynne +had taken from his pocket. + +But Gwynne seldom had an opportunity to tease her. He drew his finger +along the heavy coil of hair that rose from the very nape of her neck +and pushed forward a soft little mass on to the brow. "I have always +wanted to see something here," he said. "I remember once seeing a lovely +print of the Empress Elizabeth of Austria, who wore her hair somewhat as +you do--" + +"Not a bit of it. Her hair was generally half-way down her back--" + +"Well the effect was the same--and in this print she had a row of +daisies or stars; I never could remember which--" + +"You haven't brought me daisies?" said Isabel, in disgust. + +Gwynne pressed the little gilt nob, and as the lid flew up Isabel cried +out, with delight. + +"You shouldn't! But I don't care! I said I wouldn't. I never expected +anything so gorgeous, though--" + +She caught the box from his hand and fastened the diamond stars in the +line he had indicated. There were five, graduated in size, and they gave +her beauty its final touch of poetry and light. Isabel gazed at her +dazzling reflection with parted lips and dancing eyes, then turned +impulsively, flung her arms about Gwynne's neck, and kissed him. He +pushed her away roughly. + +"Don't do that again!" he said. "I am not your brother, nor one of your +girl friends. Can I look about? I have always had a curiosity to see +this room. I had an idea that it was different from the one at the +ranch." + +"You can look at what you like," said Isabel, indifferently. "I shall +look at my stars. _Madre de Dios!_ as our Spanish ancestors would have +said. _Ay yi! Valgame Dios! Dios de mi alma! Dios de mi vida!_ I never +was so happy in my life." + +Gwynne walked about the large old-fashioned room with its bow-window, +and alcove for the bed. He had half expected that the room he had so +often passed with reluctant steps would be furnished in blue or pink, +but it was as red as that of the traditional queen. Isabel had brought +up all the old crimson damask curtains that had been fashionable in her +grandmother's time, and covered the windows and walls of her bedroom, +even the head of the mahogany four-poster in which her mother and +herself had been born. The carpet was new, but a dull crimson, like the +faded hangings, and the dressing-table with its quantity of chased +silver--one of the few inheritances she had managed to retain--was the +only spot of light in the rather sombre room: it was all white muslin +and bright crimson silk. There was an old-fashioned settle against the +wall and three stiff chairs. Gwynne liked the room, and had a vague +feeling that he knew Isabel a little better. Certainly it expressed a +side of her of which he had caught but an occasional glimpse. + +He pulled the curtains apart and shading his eyes from the light of the +room looked down towards the city. It had vanished under a sea of white +fog that broke against the ledge of Nob Hill. A cable-car might have +been a comet flashing along the edge of a void. + +"I wonder," he said, "I wonder--should San Francisco disappear--be +burned by that fire you are always expecting--or if the bay should +shoal, or the Golden Gate rush together, so that she would have no +reason for existence, and gradually be devoured by time--I suppose the +fog and the winds would still be faithful. I can imagine the fogs +rolling in and embracing her, and the winds raging about every forgotten +corner, centuries after there was anybody left to curse either." + +"Was it Mrs. Kaye or Lady Cecilia Spence that said you just missed being +a poet? I hope some slumbering ancestor is not struggling for +resurrection out here. I much prefer that you should be a statesman." + +"I intend to be, nor have I any desire to turn poet. I have seen too +many in London. But this city, ugly as it is, appeals in its own way to +the imagination--more, for some unknown reason, than the most poetic I +ever saw in the old worlds. There is something almost uncanny about it. +While it is raw, and crude, and practically in its infancy, it at the +same time suggests an unthinkable antiquity. Perhaps--who knows?--it had +a civilization contemporary with the Montezumas--or with Atlantis; and +it is the ghosts of old unrecorded peoples that linger and give one a +fairly haunted feeling when one climbs these hills alone at night." + +"Much better you keep your hand on your pistol and your eye out for +foot-pads--and one dreamer in the family is enough. I hope I have not +infected you." + +She forsook her glowing image and looked at him inquisitively. He +wandered about the room again and paused to look at a row of +daguerreotypes on a shelf, dead and forgotten Belmonts. + +"You do dream a good deal," he said. "Judging by your varying styles of +beauty as well as other things, you must be possessed by a dozen +different sorts of old Johnnies trying to mutter something up out of the +dark." + +"I'm going to be nothing but a dreamer for a whole week." + +"If that means that you will forget chickens, and dress yourself +decently, I shall do what I can to heighten the illusion. Should you +like me to make love to you?" he asked, turning to her with a quickening +interest. + +"That might wake me up," said Isabel, politely. "This week is crowded +with parties and things. I am to visit Mrs. Hofer and go to all of them. +You won't see much of me until New Year's eve, when I come home and we +dine at a Bohemian restaurant with Lyster and Paula, and watch the +street crowds after. But I do not look so far ahead. If I am a success +to-night I am going to make believe that I am an old-time belle like +Helena Belmont, or my poor little mother, for that matter. And I shall +feel just like her when I start, for Angelique will pin up my skirts +under a long cloak, and pull carriage boots over my slippers so that +nothing will be spoiled going down those steps. I suppose I can't hope +to be quite such a belle as if I had lived in those less-sophisticated +days, but who knows? And I can forget Rosewater--and Bohemia; I sha'n't +even think of the Stones until New Year's eve; I sent them their +Christmas presents this morning, on purpose. I am going to be frivolous, +coquette, and imagine myself a girl of the old Southern Set, when there +were no new people. And I'm going to make them _think_ I am a great +beauty, whether I am or not. I remember mamma used to say to me: +'Cultivate the beauty air. That often is more effective than beauty +itself. Tiny Montgomery was a beauty according to every known standard, +but she had no dash, and was never looked at when Helena Belmont was in +the room.' So to-night, you'll see me sail into that ballroom as if I +already had the town at my feet. By-the-way--the last time I began to +feel like a real girl again was that night at Arcot--and I did feel +eighteen--triumphant--happy--until I got back and saw Lord Zeal in the +library. I have never forgotten his face." + +"Nor have I," said Gwynne, dryly; but he turned pale. "I suppose you +haven't had the least suspicion what he came to tell me that night?" + +"I thought to say good-bye without letting you know--it isn't possible +that he told you he intended to kill himself?" + +"He told me a good deal more. He had shot Brathland. Murdered him, in +plain English. You may fancy the night I had with him." + +Isabel stared up at him, the radiance gone from her face. + +"And you have been carrying that about in addition to everything else?" + +"It was brutal to tell you this to-night! I can't imagine why I did, +particularly as I have never told even my mother--who, like everybody +else not necessarily in the secret, thinks that Zeal killed himself in +despair over his failing health. But--yes, I remember that dress now--I +rarely notice the details of women's clothes--but I remember admiring +those blue lilies on that airy white stuff--I suppose you suddenly +brought the whole thing back as vividly as if we were at Capheaton +instead of out here on the edge of creation. You must forgive me and +forget it." + +"Yes I will! I'll forget everything for a week." She wheeled about and +rubbed her cheeks. Gwynne stooped suddenly and kissed the little black +mole on her shoulder. + +"This is all I ask in return for the baubles," he murmured; and then as +he met a blazing eye: "Could I do less than restore your lovely color? +But I must fly and get into my togs." + + + + +XXXIII + + +The old-fashioned interior of the Polk House, with, on the lower floor, +its double parlors connected by sliding doors, its narrow central hall, +and its many shapeless rooms of varying size, had been entirely +remodelled by the essentially modern Mrs. Hofer. Her husband had wished +to build an imposing mass of shingles and stones, but Mrs. Hofer was far +too impatient to wait a year--perhaps two, if there were strikes--to +take up her abode on Nob Hill, and the Polk House was in the market. +Perhaps something in the stolid uncompromising exterior of the old +barrack appealed to her irresistibly, mausoleum that it was of an +aristocratic past. But upon the interior she wasted no sentiment, and +some half a million of her husband's dollars. There were now three great +rooms on the lower floor and four small ones, besides a circular hall +with a spiral marble stair. The drawing-room, which ran from east to +west, was one of the most notable rooms in the country, had been the +subject of violent controversy, newspaper and verbal, and was a +perpetual delight to the dramatic soul of its mistress. The most +original artist the State had produced had painted a deep frieze which +was a series of the strange moonlight scenes that had made his fame: the +deep sulphurous blue of the California night sky, the long black +shadows, the wind-driven trees, the low desolate adobe houses abandoned +in the towns settled by Spain. Now and again a cluster of lights +indicated a window-pane and a belated tenant, but the garden walls were +in ruins, the tiled roofs sagging, the ancient whitewash was peeling; +all blended and lifted into a harmony of color and pathos by the genius +of the artist. The expanse of dull green-blue walls of rough plaster +below the frieze was unbroken; on the marble floor there were blue +velvet rugs. The furniture was of ebony and dull-blue brocade. There was +not even a picture on an easel, but there were several Rodins and +Meuniers. At the lower or west end of the room the wall had been removed +and replaced by a single immense pane of plate glass. From this window, +always curtainless, there was a startling view of the steep drop of the +hill, beetling with houses and steeples, Telegraph Hill beyond and a +little to the north; then the bay, and the towns on its opposite rim. At +night the scene, with its blue above and black below, picked out with a +thousand lights--massed into a diadem beyond the bay--looked like a +sublimation of the painter's work. Within, the cunningly arranged lights +saved the room at all times from being too sombre, and were set to +reveal every detail of paintings far too precious to have been +recklessly lavished upon a wooden house in the most recklessly built of +all great cities. + +The dining-room--which had the proportions of a banqueting-hall, with an +alcove for family use--was hung with tapestries and furnished with +chairs lifted bodily from a castle in Spain; and it was a room in which +no one would remember to look for ancestors. The library also commanded +a view of the bay and had been decorated by native artists with +imitations of the Giorgione frescoes, charmingly pink and smudgy. The +hangings and furniture were of royal crimson brocade, and the walls were +covered with books. Mr. Toole, who was a scholar of the old-fashioned +sort, of which California still holds so many, had selected the books; +and the contents were as noteworthy as the bindings. In a special alcove +was a large number of priceless Fourteenth and Sixteenth Century +editions. From this sumptuous room curved an iron balcony, where the old +gentleman might be seen sunning himself any fine day, his steel +spectacles half-way down his nose, and a volume propped on the shelf of +an easy-chair furnished with all the modern improvements. + +On the white satin panels of the large round hall were a few of the most +valuable old masters as yet brought to the country, but Mrs. Hofer, who +was a patriot or nothing, did not hesitate to mix them with the best +efforts of her fellow-citizens, nor to proclaim her preference for the +native product. It was all very well to have old masters, and modern +Europeans, if it was the thing, but she never felt quite at home with +them, and liked her California inside as well as out. + +The four little reception-rooms, or boudoirs, were so many cabinets for +treasures, and on the night of the ball, like the rest of the rooms on +this floor, were entirely without further adornment; only the white +marble of the spiral stair was festooned with crimson roses; and the +narrow hall that led from the rotunda to the new ballroom was dressed in +imitation of a long arbor of grape-vines, and hung with clusters of +hot-house grapes and Chinese lanterns. The ballroom had been built out +from the back of the house upon the steep drop of the hill, and as even +its graduated foundation did not lift it to the level of the first +floor, it was reached by a short flight of steps. For three months Mrs. +Hofer's judicious hints had excited the curiosity of the town, and all +that were not bedridden had presented themselves at as early an hour as +self-respect would permit. Mrs. Hofer, to use her own phrase, had +"turned herself loose," on this room, and even her husband, who had +gasped at the sum total, indulgent as he was, admitted to-night that +"she knew what she was about." The immense room was built to simulate a +patio in Spain. The domed roof, in the blaze of light below, looked to +be the dim blue vault of the night sky. The gallery that encircled the +room was divided into balconies, and from them depended Gobelin +tapestries, Eastern rugs, silken shawls--yellow embroidered with red, +blue embroidered with white--after the manner of Spain on festa days. +The background of the gallery was a mass of tropical plants alternating +with latticed windows and long glass doors. Sitting with an arm or elbow +on the railing, was every California woman of Mrs. Hofer's acquaintance +that had the inherited right to wear a mantilla, a rose over her ear, +and wield a large black fan; that is to say, those that were too old or +too indifferent to dance. How Ada Hofer induced them to form a part of +her decorations nobody ever knew, themselves least of all; but there, to +the amazement and delight of the hundreds below, they were, and it was +many years since the majority of them had looked so handsome. Beneath +the balcony was an arcade where many seats were disposed among palms and +pampas grass. The inevitable fountain was at the end of the room; it was +of white stone, and colored lights played upon its foaming column. The +musicians were in the gallery above it. + +When Gwynne and Isabel descended the steps and stood looking down upon +the scene for a moment, the younger people were dancing. Every woman +seemed to have been fired with the ambition to contribute her own part +to the brilliancy of the night. There were tiaras by the score in these +days, and the gowns had journeyed half-way round the world. There had +been imported gowns in the immortal Eighties, when Mrs. Yorba reigned, +but never a tiara; and Isabel for the first time fully realized the +significant changes worked by the vast modern fortunes and their +ambitious owners. Blood might have been enough for their predecessors, +but the outward and visible sign for them. + +And all sets were represented to-night. It is doubtful if any woman had +done as much to entice them to a common focus as the surmounting Mrs. +Hofer. She was not the leader of San Francisco society, for that office +was practically an elective one, and meant an infinite amount of trouble +with corresponding perquisites; it must be held by a woman of supreme +tact, experience, executive ability, and practically nothing else to do. +The present incumbent, to the infinite credit of San Francisco, was a +member of one of the oldest and most distinguished families in +California; or in America, for that matter; and although still young, +and with less to spend in a year than the Hofers wasted in a week, she +had been chosen, after the death of the old leader, and some acrimonious +discussion, to rule; and rule she did with a rod of iron. But she took +her good where she found it, and was grateful for what Mrs. Hofer, with +her beautiful house and irresistible energy had already accomplished. +For Mrs. Hofer was by no means too democratic. If she had drawn all +factions to her house she had taken care that only the best of her own +kind came too, and this best was very good indeed; for it was educated +and accomplished, more often than not had mingled in society abroad; an +honor to which many of the ancient aristocracy had never aspired. No one +recognized this fact, and the irresistible law of progress, better than +the Leader, in spite of her Spanish blood; and to-night she sat in the +very centre of the north gallery, her charming dark face draped in a +mantilla some two centuries old. Beside her sat Anne Montgomery who had +not a drop of Spanish in her, but whom Mrs. Hofer had done up with a +brand-new mantilla of white lace and an immense black fan. Miss +Montgomery had a lingering sense of humor, but it suited her to look +young and pretty once more, if only for a night. Mrs. Trennahan, who was +really fond of Mrs. Hofer, particularly as she had been adroitly +persuaded that this party was to be a mere setting for her lovely young +daughter, also decorated the gallery in one of the old Yorba +mantillas--it had belonged to the beautiful aunt for whom this house had +been built by the husband she scorned--and wore it for the first time in +her life. Trennahan had shaken with a fit of inward laughter, but had +compelled his eyes to express only admiration and approval. + +Other dowagers sat below, some bediamonded and others not: the "old +Southern Set" lived on diminishing incomes; new industries were +decreasing the values of the old. They had lost none of their pride, but +philosophy had mellowed them, and they were honestly grateful for such +splendid diversion; and Mrs. Hofer's suppers cost a small fortune, even +in San Francisco. Their offspring cared as little for traditions as for +supper, and had married or were marrying into the newer sets, rapidly +obliterating what lines were left. As for the new, they were legion, and +not to be distinguished by the casual eye from those that traced their +descent to the crumbling mansions of South Park and Rincon Hill; and +they had the earnest co-operation of the best of the world's milliners. +The pick of Bohemia was also present, those that were distinguishing +themselves in art and letters, or even on the stage, for Mrs. Hofer had +learned some of her lessons in London. All that were now looked upon as +county families, spending as they did but one or two months of the year +in the city, had come to town for this ball, but the country towns were +represented only by Gwynne and Isabel and the Tom Coltons. The group of +men so desperately interested in the municipal affairs of the city +disliked and distrusted Colton; but Mrs. Leslie had been born on Rincon +Hill, and all doors, old and new, were open to her daughter. Isabel +caught a glimpse of Anabel among the dancers, in a gown of primrose +satin almost the color of her hair, and a little diamond tiara made from +some old stones of her mother's. + +"Well!" exclaimed Isabel. "What do you think of us? Is it not a +wonderful scene?" + +Gwynne nodded. "All that is wanting is a background of caballeros in the +gallery, silk and ruffles, and hair tied with ribbons. But I suppose the +old gentlemen objected. There must be some limit to Mrs. Hofer's powers +of persuasion. But--yes--it is a wonderful scene, and you are a +wonderful people to take so much trouble." + +The waltz finished and Mrs. Hofer bore down upon them. She wore white +brocade, the flowers outlined with jewels, shimmering under a cloud of +tulle, and her neck and her fashionably dressed head were hardly to be +seen for the rubies and diamonds that bound them. She was fairly +palpitating with youth and triumph, and delight in the dance, and +although without beauty or a patrician outline, there was no more +radiant vision in the room. She reproached Isabel for being late, +informed her that she had ordered all the best men to keep dances for +her, summoned several, and then bore off Gwynne to introduce him to the +prettiest of the girls. In a few moments Isabel was engaged for every +dance before supper; she had given the _cotillon_ to Gwynne. + +She had realized immediately, that upon such a scene, with such a +background, she could hope to make no such overwhelming impression as +had fallen to the lot of Helena Belmont; surrounded by buff-colored +walls and a small exclusive society--for the most part disdainful of +dress. Nevertheless, she was soon pleasurably aware that she was the +subject of much comment, not only in the gallery, but among the hundreds +of smart young girls and women on the floor, the men that danced, and +those that supported the walls. The old beaux, left over from the days +when Nina Randolph and Guadalupe Hathaway had reigned, who had put the +stamp of an almost incoherent approval upon the dazzling Helena, that +famous night of her debut, were dead and dust; but another group, +including the quartet that had as promptly declared themselves the +suitors and slaves of the exacting beauty, were present to-night, +critically regarding the debutantes. Their comparisons were less +impassioned than those of their old mentors, for they were tired; they +had disposed of much of their superfluous enthusiasm in the increased +difficulties of making an income, since the brief reign of a heartless +witch, whom they still remembered with an occasional pang of sentiment, +but more gratitude that they had not had her as well as fortune to +subdue. None had prospered exceedingly, but all had done well. They were +still in their forties, but as gray as their fathers had been at sixty; +indeed, looked older than Trennahan, who had disdained to add to his own +and his wife's fortunes, and lived merely to enjoy life; and they would +far rather have been in bed. But three of them were indulgent family +men. Eugene Fort had clung to the single state, but the others were +contributing one or more daughters to the evening's entertainment; and +they had all drifted naturally together to discuss the new beauties +before retreating to the haven at the top of the house where there was a +billiard-table and much good whiskey and tobacco. They were disputing +over the respective claims of Inez Trennahan, who was a replica of the +California _Favoritas_ of a century ago, and Catalina Over with the +Indian blood on her high cheek-bones, and her mouth like an Indian's +bow, when Isabel descended the stairs. They promptly gave her the palm, +although they did not turn pale, nor lose their breath. + +"The grand style," said Trennahan. "I wonder will the home-bred youth +appreciate it? In your day she would have had a better chance, but most +of these worthy young men, when they have been to college at all, have +patronized Stanford or Berkeley; in other words, never been out of the +State, and, no doubt, prefer the more vivid, frivolous, and essentially +modern product." + +"If it lay with us," said Alan Rush, sadly. "But it is as you say. She +will frighten most of the young fellows. By Jove, she looks as if she +had danced at Washington's first ball. But that's it. Nothing free and +easy, there. It's no longer the fashion to be too aristocratic." + +But Isabel, if she did not create a _furore_ among the young men, who +would have thought such a performance beneath their dignity, was, at +least, generally admitted to be "Pretty well as stunning a girl as you +might see in a long day's journey," "a regular ripper," "the handsomest +of the bunch," and as far as "mere looks went" the "pick of the lot." +The girls viewed her with no great favor, but the majority of the women, +especially those in the galleries, sustained the verdict of the men; and +the Leader, in the course of the evening, descended and introduced +herself, claimed relationship, and graciously intimated that if Isabel +cared to join the _cotillon_ clubs and the skating-rink--_The_ +skating-rink--an exclusive yet hospitable wing would be lifted. A +younger brother of Mr. Hofer, who had also multiplied his paternal +million, devoted himself to her seriously, and Gwynne, who soon had +enough of dancing, gracefully renounced his claims to the german. They +had one waltz together and then he did not see her again until the hour +of departure, when he stood in the hall and watched her descend the +winding white stair between the roses. He thought her a charming picture +in her long white coat, with a lace scarf over her head, and her arms +full of costly toys. When she reached his side she ordered him to put +her favors into the pockets of his overcoat, and keep his hand on his +pistol, as she would not risk losing one of them, much less her jewels. +Her eyes were very bright, and her cheeks deeply flushed, but were the +cause a fully satisfied ambition, he could only guess. + + + + +XXXIV + + +The hour was four, and after they had said their last good-night to the +guests whose homes lay between the Hofer mansion and their own, they met +but one foot passenger as belated as themselves. This was a big man that +loomed suddenly out of the fog. Isabel screamed and ran into the middle +of the street, and Gwynne, who had obediently taken out his pistol, half +raised it. But the man laughed. + +"I'm on the lookout for thim meself," he said, in a rich brogue. "Good +luck to yees." + +As they let themselves into the house, Gwynne threw his hat and coat on +the settle in the vestibule, and then ran his hand through his hair and +rubbed the back of his head, a habit of his when he had a suggestion to +make. + +"I remember we were going to sit up the rest of that night--or +morning--after Arcot," he said. "Are you very tired?" + +"Tired? I shall not sleep a wink for hours. The fire is sure to be laid +in the tower-room." + +They went into the small circular room, furnished in several shades of +green, that Isabel had retained for her own use, and while she shook +down her skirts Gwynne applied a match to the coals. The raw morning air +had penetrated the house, too old-fashioned to have a furnace, but +wooden walls are quickly heated. When Gwynne had removed the blower +several times and satisfied himself that the hard coals would burn, he +resumed the perpendicular. + +He looked doubtfully at Isabel, who was still wrapped in her cloak, and +had elevated her feet, covered with the long carriage-boots, to the +fender. "Sha'n't you take off those things?" he asked. "You don't look +as if you meant to stay." + +"You can take off the boots, but I'll keep on my coat for a few +moments." + +He laughed as he knelt again. "I certainly am getting broken in. I have +known Englishwomen to pull off their husband's hunting-boots after a +hard day's work--" + +"The idea!" + +"Very good idea. Do you mean that you would not?" + +"Well, I might, as a return favor. You need not take all night to pull +off mine." + +"You might, at least, let virtue be its own reward. It's not often it +has the chance." + +"Well, get up and don't be an idiot. I suppose you have been flirting in +the conservatory all the evening and haven't had time to readjust your +mood." + +"Mrs. Hofer has no conservatory. Great oversight. But I did sit out a +dance or two in that room with the immense window--" + +"With whom?" + +"I have forgotten her name. Will you have a cigarette?" + +"No, but you may smoke if you like." + +He had settled himself in a deep chair on the opposite side of the +hearth. There was a silence of nearly ten minutes, until Isabel, +suddenly removing her coat, brought Gwynne out of his reverie. + +"I cannot say that to-night was in any sense a repetition of my own +experience at Arcot," he said, abruptly. "That night--I have tried to +forget it--I had enough adulation to turn any man's head. I fancy it +_was_ pretty well turned, and that made the wrench during the small +hours the more severe. Still, it has been an interesting evening, and +one or two things happened." + +"What?" Isabel was full of her own experiences, but too much of a woman +to betray the fact when a man wanted to talk about himself. + +"I danced for a while, but I had had exercise enough during the day, and +didn't care particularly about it. Besides, all the girls I danced with, +and that one I sat up-stairs with for a few minutes, not only talked my +head off, but quizzed me, and I did not understand it. To my amazement, +I learned not long after that they know who I am. Can you imagine how it +got out?" + +"They know everything. It is an old saying that the San Francisco girls +scent a stranger the moment he leaves the tram at the Oakland mole, and +know all about him before he has registered. The obscurest knight could +not hide himself in this town. Rosewater alone saved you so long. How +did they quiz you?" + +"Each began at once to talk about my 'distinguished relative, Elton +Gwynne.' I may be more dense than most, or perhaps I was merely bored, +but I assumed that they thought I was his brother and knew his +whereabouts. When supper was half over, and I was congratulating myself +that I had got out of the _cotillon_, even with you, for it meant +dancing with a lot of others, my host took me firmly by the arm and +marched me up-stairs. He informed me that he was 'bored stiff,' could +see that I was, and had 'coralled' a few more choice spirits. We went, +not to the smoking or billiard-room, but to his own bedroom, and here I +found four or five more of your strenuous millionaires, the reform +editor, and the lawyer that looks like a bull-dog waiting for the word +to spring at the throat of the Boss and his whole vile crew. + +"Here we sat and smoked until the air inside was as thick as the fog +that blotted out the lights of the city and towns opposite. Of course +the talk was of the rotten state of San Francisco. I never heard the +whole story before, and it made my hair stand on end. I knew that vice +flaunted itself more openly here than elsewhere, but I did not guess +that the thousand and one establishments of every sort, from the lowest +negro dive under the sidewalk, and the snares for the very young of both +sexes, straight up to the most gaudy 'French restaurants,' as well as +Chinatown, Barbary coast, and all the rest, paid tribute to the gang of +political ruffians that have got control of the city. No wonder the last +have developed a preternatural sharpness that makes it next to +impossible to bring the charges home, for they will all be rich enough +in time to move to Europe and buy up such salable scions of +improverished houses as happen to be on the market. The thing is as well +known as I know that you are my third cousin, but, although the +second-rate grafters are brazen enough, it is not worth while to attack +them until the Boss is done for, and so far he has proved much too +clever to be caught. A college man, although of low origin, and an +accomplished lawyer of a sort, he pockets huge sums from these +disreputable establishments, for himself and his minion, the mayor, and +calls them attorney's fees. Naturally the panderers to vice won't admit +they are blackmailed: they are between the devil and the deep sea; if +the fight came on in earnest, and they gave evidence against the Boss, +and the Boss won, he would clean them all out and put others in. The +Reformers, if they won, would clean them out too; so, naturally, they +hold their tongues and hope this reform movement will peter out as so +many others have done. So do the Board of Supervisors whom the Boss also +owns and through whom he blackmails the great corporations. But--and +when they had got to this point in the talk there was an abrupt pause, +and then Hofer turned to me and said: 'Even if you don't come in and +join us, which I always hope you will do, I know a man that can keep his +mouth shut when I see him. So fire away.' + +"And then they discussed the fact that one of their number had recently +gone to Washington to ask the President to send out an able man of the +Government Secret Service; they have every reason to believe that this +request will be complied with. With sufficient evidence they would then +make a quiet crusade in the hope of rousing public spirit to the extent +of forcing in a grand jury that could not be bought by the Boss. +Needless to say he has controlled every grand jury that has met during +his reign, and one might as well hope to convict a wind for unroofing a +house, even were he not master of every legal trick himself, and had he +taken less pains to cover up his tracks. In this detective lies their +chief hope at present; but what a slender hope it is, when you consider +the devil-may-care character of these San Franciscans, who would dance +on the edge of hell, with equal nonchalance, if only there were a screen +between. There is not an outstanding excuse for forming a vigilance +committee, as there was during the Dennis Kearney-Anti-Chinese riots of +1879, and there is no such aroused public spirit and indignation as +sustained the Vigilantes of the Fifties. These rascals take good care to +be non-sensational in their methods, and what the San Franciscan doesn't +see doesn't worry him. The city is rich, prosperous, famous, tourists +are pouring in, the best in drama and opera comes yearly--to be +presented in fire-traps whose owners pay toll to the Boss; they already +have the handsomest hotels in the world, the finest cooking, climate; +even earthquakes--severe ones--have moved elsewhere. What can you do +with a people like that? They are fairly insolent in their sense of +security. Let the political gang make their share. There is enough for +all. But don't bother us. Let us be happy. _Vive la bagatelle._ There +you have the motto of San Francisco. + +"By the time they had threshed the subject out, explaining details and +plans to me, as if I were already one of them, I was feeling pretty +uncomfortable. Naturally, I blurted out that I could no longer accept +their hospitality and confidence on false pretences, and told them who I +was. Each got up in turn, solemnly held out his hand, and said, 'Shake.' +Then Hofer informed me that they had all been practically certain for +some time that I was myself; being good enough to add: 'We knew there +couldn't be more than one of you; and we are also able to put two and +two together, occasionally. Before we thought of it, however, you struck +us all as being a man accustomed to homage. Later we discovered that you +were choke full of seven different kinds of ability, and it was then +that the twos began to move towards each other on the board; and we +decided that we must have you here, right here in San Francisco. What +can a man like you find in a God-forsaken place like Rosewater, anyhow? +The Eggopolis! You can't afford to hail from there; it would stick to +you for the rest of your life. And we have just got to have you. We may +have some of the ablest lawyers in the country in San Francisco, and a +few honest ones, but we can accommodate one more; and a man that will +throw over a great title and an already won name for the sake of +standing on his own legs--that's the sort of stuff the old pioneers were +made of. So, here you must come, and stand shoulder to shoulder with +us.' + +"I replied that I must finish my law studies with Judge Leslie first, +and have some little practice under his direction; that I intended to go +in for politics, but that for some years all the power over men I could +acquire would be through the law--and I had remarkable chances for +contact in and about Rosewater; where, moreover, if they learned who I +was it would not matter much. It might be quite otherwise in the city. +To this they agreed: that is to say, that I should remain in Rosewater +for six months or a year longer; but they asked me to promise that if +any great emergency arose, in which they believed I could be of use, I +would come at their call. And I promised." + +He rose and moved restlessly about the room. "Upon my word!" he +exclaimed; and Isabel, who had not taken her eyes off him, although he +had addressed the greater part of his talk to the fire, noted that he +was paler than usual--and that his eyes were very bright; "upon my word, +I really do feel more elated than on that night at Arcot. That small +devoted band of men!--most of them with millions they might take to the +most civilized capitals of the world and spend in splendid enjoyment--I +never have met such patriotism! It is magnificent! And to find it out +here in this stranded city--that fascinates the very heart out of you, +by-the-way--I don't know that I wonder so much--I believe I shall +succumb myself in time--it is like being on another planet. At any rate +I hated myself to-night for any sickness of spirit I may have permitted +to linger--for a while my very personality seemed to melt into what may +prove an even greater cause than all that appears on the surface. The +present California may be merely the nucleus of a great future Western +civilization, so unlike the Eastern that no doubt it will dissever +itself in time and breed still wider divergences; until the old +generic term American will no longer apply to both. Moreover, it +already feels that it owns the Pacific, and faces the Orient alone. +And to rebuild this city--you have seen the Burnham plans--transform +it into the most beautiful city of the modern world--to give it a +great, instead of a merely brilliant and erratic civilization--a perfect +administration--what dreamers! What imagination! It is an inspiration to +come into contact with an idealism that money, and power, and daily +contact with the mean and base in human nature--" + +"I could love you!" cried Isabel. "If you say any more, I believe I +shall kiss you again." + +"If you do," said Gwynne, deliberately, "I shall neither pinch you nor +push you away. But you may regret it, nevertheless." + +He threw himself once more into his chair and clasped his hands behind +his head. "It is an astonishing fact," he said--"This--I was reading the +history of the Kearney riots, only the other day. The commentator was +very severe on the Irish and German element that imperilled the city for +purely personal reasons; that was responsible for the most remarkable +and reprehensible of all the State Constitutions. That was not quite +thirty years ago. Whether any of these men, who are mainly of Irish or +German descent, are the sons or grandsons of any of those old Sand-lot +agitators I have no means of knowing; probably not, their fortunes were +no doubt already in the making, and the founders had graduated from the +class that went to sand-lot meetings and shouted, 'The Chinese must go.' +But it is certainly one of the oddest evolutions in history that it +should be the descendants of that foreign element alone that take any +real interest in this city; that are ardent to reform it, beautify it; +that are willing to devote their time and a good part of their fortunes +to that end. So far, although I have met in the clubs many old gentlemen +of charming manners and prehistoric descent--that is from '49, or even +the more pretentious East and South; and, at all sorts of places, their +sons--who are either building up new fortunes or spending old +ones--there is not one, so far as my observation serves me, that has +lifted a finger to fling off this octopus. Hofer says they have even +ceased to grumble. Their incomes are assured. Some are merely well off, +others immensely wealthy--with a sufficiency invested elsewhere. All can +command about the same amount of luxury, however their establishments +may vary in splendor. And nothing can exceed the luxury of their Clubs. +The older men at least--and they are not so old--have subsided into a +slothful content that makes them a cross between a higher sort of +carnivorous animal and the tacit supporters of the criminals in power. +These friends of mine, whose fathers may or may not have listened to +Kearney in the Sand-lots, are worth the whole lot of your ancient +aristocracy--hybrid, anyhow--and if I do 'hang out my shingle' here in +San Francisco, they are the only ones I care anything about knowing. +They are the only real Americans I have met, for that matter--according +to your own standards--" He broke off abruptly and leaned forward, +smiling at his companion. "I meant to ask you as soon as we got home to +tell me all about your first great party in your beloved city, but I +have been led away by my natural egotism. You were, by general acclaim, +I fancy, the beauty of the evening. Did you enjoy it all as much as you +expected?" + +"I fancy I should have enjoyed it more if I had been up-stairs with you. +I found it more of an effort than I had imagined to make conversation +with those young men. Of course I enjoyed being openly admired and +besought for dances. Who wouldn't? But I never deluded myself for a +moment that I was anything approaching those old-time belles. As the +conditions have passed away, however, my vanity doesn't suffer. At all +events I am going to carry out my program and rush about to everything +that is given this week, to forget Rosewater, every aspiration, all that +ever happened to me. Every girl should have one girl's good time, and +although mine is belated, it would be silly to let it pass. Besides, I +am curious to see if I really can--well, delude myself." + +"So am I! I have an idea you won't. You are quite different from all +those girls, who are at the same time the brightest and the most +frivolous, the most feminine and the most modern, the most daring and +the most indifferent, I have ever met. Those that have been as carefully +brought up as our ninetieth cousin, Inez Trennahan, are simply moulds +for the future to run into. There were several young persons that looked +as if they might go pretty far in a conservatory--perhaps that is the +reason Mrs. Hofer has none. She appears to have Irish virtue in excess, +and I expect the larky would get short shrift from her. But you--you are +quite unlike them all." + +"I am a Californian," said Isabel, defiantly. + +"Yes, but of a very exclusive sort--to say nothing of the peculiar +circumstances that were bound to breed seriousness of mind. And you have +quite a distinguished collection of real ancestors, and intellect +instead of mere cleverness. It is only once in a while that your--let me +whisper it--Western frankness and ingenuousness leap out--the +impulsiveness, the electric passion. When a certain amount of +readjustment has gone on inside of you and your more natural elements +work their way up and take possession, I really believe I shall fall in +love with you, and marry you out of hand--if you remain as beautiful as +you are to-night." + +"All right," said Isabel, pretending to stifle a yawn. "That would be +interesting. All the clocks are booming something. Let us go out and see +if the sun is rising." + +She wrapped herself in her cloak once more, and they climbed to the +crest of the hill and watched the sun rise behind the Berkeley mountains +and bathe San Francisco in trembling fire. It routed what was left of +the fog, although for a time the walls and waters of the Golden Gate +looked darker than before, and Tamalpais was a mountain of onyx. In a +few moments the smoke that wrapped the San Francisco day in a brown +perpetual haze began to ascend first from the little chimneys and then +from the great stacks. But until then every steeple, every tower, the +great piles of stone and brick in the valley, the old gardens full of +eucalyptus-trees and weeping willows, the strange assortment of +architectures on Nob Hill, even the rows of houses on the tapering +half-circle of hills beyond the valley, miles away, stood out as bright +and sharp and shadowless as if caught and imprisoned in a crystal ball. +It was the drifting smoke that seemed to bind all together and make the +city fit for humanity. + +Gwynne pointed to a spot far to the southeast, in the valley between +Market Street--the wide diagonal highway that cut the city in two, and +ran from the ferries almost to the foot of Twin Peaks--and the high +mound known as Rincon Hill. "There," he said, "are the hovels and shops +that cover the block belonging to my mother and myself, and that is to +make us rich. Half is practically sold, and the proceeds, and the money +raised on the other half, will erect a building that is to cost some two +hundred thousand dollars. The insurance rates will be enormous, but even +so the income should be really a great one. If all goes well, the +foundations--of reinforced concrete, although they still laugh at +earthquakes--but Mr. Colton is a monster of caution--will be laid in +about six weeks, and then I shall watch the steel framework rise with a +very considerable interest." + +"That means the beginnings of a millionaire. Do you really care so much +to be rich?" + +"I know the value of money," said Gwynne, dryly. "I have no intention of +buying men after the fashion of your friend Tom Colton, but it is a +mighty good background for personality. Now you had better go in and get +some beauty sleep." + + + + +XXXV + + +Miss Montgomery called as Isabel and Gwynne were sitting down to +luncheon at two o'clock. She was not in the best of tempers, for she had +renewed her youth briefly the night before, her old admirers had shown +her much gallant attention, and if she had gone home with a song in her +heart and a flame in her eyes, she had been but the more conscious of +the wooden spoon upon awakening. She had risen with no very keen regret +for her vanished claims upon men long since married and consoled, for +she had never been what is called a marrying girl, but with her mind +inclined to gloomy meditation upon lost opportunities far more dear. She +had never ceased to believe that, the fates conspiring, she might have +become one of the great musicians of the world; for although she was +willing to admit the defect of will that had reduced her to the ranks, +she had not grasped the historic fact that the born artist accomplishes +his fulfilment in spite of all obstacles, imagined or real. Her +obstacles had been purely sentimental, for her family were commonplace +selfish people not worth considering, and, her endowment being just +short of distinguished, a misplaced sense of duty and the stultifying +influences of her home were responsible for her profession as caterer at +the age of thirty-six. Her people had belonged to the type that held in +aristocratic disgust the "woman who did things," "showed herself to the +public"; moreover, as Isabel had told Gwynne, they worshipped the +flower-like artistic young creature, and would let neither the world nor +man have aught of her. She was twenty-eight when her family died, and +knowing that as a music-teacher she could not hope to compete with +finished instructors, she had looked ever her other talents and found +that the only one which promised immediate returns was a certain knack +for sauces and sweets. All her friends rushed to her assistance, and +while broiling over a hot stove, stirring jam, wished that dear Anne +were not so proud and would accept a check without any fuss. But Miss +Montgomery quickly graduated from this amateur stage. She set herself +deliberately to work to become a _chef_, and, from offerings to the +Womans' Exchange, she was soon supplying choice dishes for luncheons, +and finally entire dinners. She had a warm friend in the then Leader of +San Francisco Society, and her own cleverness and indomitable +perseverance did the rest. She sometimes reflected that if she had found +the iron in her nature sooner she might have been fiddling in Vienna; +but perhaps her highest gift had really been culinary, perhaps she +needed the enthusiastic encouragement which she found on all sides when +she embraced that appealing art; at all events she succeeded, was +educating a promising orphan relative, and laying by for her old age. +Another friend, no doubt, was the massive family silver which had +escaped the wreck. Many of the new people, Mrs. Hofer among others, did +not care for the responsibility of a luxury so tempting to thieves, and +for which they had no innate predilection; they were more than willing +to pay a reasonable sum for ancestral decorations upon state occasions, +and to dine from artistic plated ware meanwhiles. Not but that there +was a sufficiency of solid bullion to be seen on many a San Francisco +table, and there were several golden services in the city; but rich +people have all sorts of economical kinks, and Miss Montgomery found +this one profitable. Another thing, no doubt, that had contributed to +her success, was the business-like attitude she had assumed as soon as +she felt herself a professional. She accompanied her refections to the +kitchen door, although the front was always open to her, and +philosophically pocketed the customary tip. + +And she had struggled valiantly against becoming an embittered old maid; +in the main, had succeeded. To the world, at least, she rarely turned a +scowl, and she had never lost a friend. But there were times when she +hated her parents. Since Isabel's return she had had more than one +rebellious hour, for Isabel had taken her life in both hands, snapped +her fingers at restraints and small conventions, and, so far, at least, +had made good. And the younger girl's development, to one that had known +her always, was extraordinary. On the other hand, she exulted in the +prospect of a member of the old set coming prominently to the front once +more. She had spent a week with Isabel at Old Inn, and received a +certain measure of confidence. She hoped that Isabel would really make a +fortune, and urged her to follow Gwynne's example and put up a modern +building on her San Francisco property. Money was easy to raise, for +change and improvement possessed San Franciscans like an epidemic, and +few but were not anxious to convert "South of Market Street" into a +great business district. Although she was grateful to the new people, +particularly Ada Hofer, who, to use the lady's own expression "made +things hum," in her heart she disliked the breed, and deeply resented +the fact that the old set, even those by no means impoverished, to-day +formed little more than a background. They were to be seen everywhere, +they were still a power in a way, but they were by no means prosilient. +Therefore, as she sat in the old dark dining-room on Russian Hill and +listened to Isabel's praise of the interest that Hofer and his set took +in the political and artistic regeneration of the city, she was moved to +break out tartly: + +"Are you giving them credit for altruism? They have their millions +invested here, naturally they crave a reasonable prospect of retaining +them--also of increasing them by filling Fairmont, and other projected +caravansaries for the rich, with winter tourists from the East; possibly +Europe. They not only fear the corporation cormorants--whom they can +never reach so long as the Board of Supervisors is controlled by the +Boss--the Boss himself and all his devouring horde, but the greatest +menace of all: that San Francisco will in time, and before very long, be +owned body and soul by the labor-unions. Then, even if they managed to +save their wealth, the city would be intolerable for the socially +ambitious or even the merely refined." + +"You are unfair," said Gwynne; "for these men all have enough to pull +out and invest elsewhere. They could go to New York and buy a big +position, as so many of their predecessors have done. Or to London. Of +course no man ever lived that was wholly disinterested, unless he was a +fanatic, but it is vastly to the credit of these men that they love +their own city, stand by it--determined to make it livable, not only for +themselves, but for future generations; instead of moving away and +becoming millionaires of leisure." + +"Oh yes, I don't deny that they have enthusiasm--the remnant, no doubt, +of what in their European ancestors was temperament. Americans don't +have temperament. Or if we have we are far too self-conscious to show +it. In the East it has been quite eradicated. Out here where gambling is +still in the blood--and that blood is mixed--where the air is full of +electricity, and the very ground under your feet none too certain, we +are a little more primitive; we have an excitability that makes +strangers find us more like the Latin races of Europe than our relatives +beyond the Rockies. And although the set you admire does not drink, nor +live the all-night life, it has its own demands for spice and variety, +and its own ways of gratifying them. Love of change, love of any sort of +a fight, is in the blood of your true Californian--particularly here in +San Francisco, where all the great gambling fevers, from the days of '49 +to the wild speculations in Virginia City stocks in '76, have raged up +and out. Your friends are merely playing a big game. Successive defeats, +and the formidable front of the enemy, make it the more stimulating. +They have that fanatical love of San Francisco that every one out here +has who doesn't hate it, and they find it more exciting to stay here and +gamble for big stakes than to watch their wives spend money in New York, +and console them for snubs. Another point--they are far more +enterprising than the rich men's sons that preceded this generation--or +set, rather. They keep on making money, you may have observed. And +fashions change. New York Society is no longer the Mecca of the worldly +San Franciscan, and it has also become the fashion to invest huge +amounts here; in many cases, entire fortunes. These men really could not +pull out without great loss of income, and they all know how safe it is +to leave one's interests in other people's hands. In this town, at +least, no one has ever done that without regretting it." + +"If the fashion has changed I dare say it is these men that have changed +it. I always bow to feminine logic, but nothing you have said so far has +changed my attitude. Besides, I admire their taste. This is the only +part of America that has made any appeal to me, and there is no question +that if they force through the Burnham plans, this city, with its +wonderful natural advantages, will be as beautiful as ancient Athens. +Surely you must admit ideality in men that can conceive such an ideal +and cling to it, no matter how forlorn the hope." + +"That's just what I object to. The least imaginative of us realizes that +nature gave San Francisco a beautiful face and that man has done all he +could to scar it. But even did these men obtain control--which they +can't short of lynch law--it would take half a century to remove the old +city piecemeal. Do you imagine property-owners are going to change their +natures and sacrifice profitable office buildings and shops for the sake +of widening streets and making boulevards and parks? Do you realize what +it would mean in the way of individual sacrifice to build winding roads +about these hills instead of the improved and perpendicular gullies we +have to-day? Not even your own would do it. They merely dream and talk, +although, no doubt, they would make all the changes that promised large +personal profits. I suspect that the secret of their zeal is the desire +to deflect the tourist tide from south to north." + +Gwynne laughed. He was a stubborn idealist, and having found something +at last to admire he purposed to hug it. "You belong to the pessimistic +camp. I discovered that when you honored Old Inn. And I have lived here +long enough to learn that it is full enough. But you are all different +from other Americans, and for that reason I find the most discontented +of you interesting." + +But Miss Montgomery suspected that he was quizzing her and would not be +drawn further. Instead, she proposed a walk, and Gwynne in his turn +suggested that they go over and look at his property, which he had +visited once only. Miss Montgomery knew the history of every house old +and new, and told them many anecdotes as they walked down the steep +hills or along the cross streets to Kearney, at the base. The new houses +had fine gardens, the old ones were gloomy with eucalypti, or ragged +with palms, but everywhere were flowers, even at this season, giving an +immediate relief to the eye from the long dull perspective. On six days +out of the seven the streets were torn with wind when they were not +drenched with rain, and in the dry season the dust was intolerable; +although San Franciscans vowed it was a part of the picture and missed +it when abroad. But gay as certain sections of San Francisco was at +night, its residence districts always had a deserted air, and on Sunday +nothing could exceed the brown desolation of the shopping streets. From +a variety of causes San Franciscans were averse from too much +pedestrianism, and one could walk for blocks and pass nothing but an +occasional carriage, or the trolley-cars shrieking up and down the +hills, or emptying themselves into Kearney and Montgomery streets with +the racket of a besieging army. + +But this Christmas Day it was clear and warm, and the wind drifted about +as if its wings were tired. All the world was on the cable and trolley +cars, but bound for park and sea, and in the opposite direction from the +three on their way to the valley south of Market Street. Kearney Street +would have looked like a necropolis had it not been for several patient +horses standing with their feet on the pavement, their ears cocked +towards a saloon, or establishment for "rifle practice"; and even Market +Street, on week-days barely passable with its trucks, four lines of +cars, and a mass of humanity, was almost deserted. They walked past the +Palace Hotel, down Second Street, and by many dingy peeling low-browed +and entirely hideous shops and flats, with glimpses into unsavory cross +streets, until they came to the block owned by the Otises since the +early Fifties. Even in its present condition the rents were +considerable, and as it was but a stone's-throw from several other new +office buildings, there was no question that in the course of a few +years the land value would be doubled, and Gwynne regretted being forced +to sell a portion of his share in order to be able to erect a building +large enough to pay. What was left of Hiram Otis's portion, inherited by +Isabel, stood on the opposite corner, and now yielded only ground rent, +the old buildings having crumbled on the stock-market. But the land +could be sold conditionally, and once more Miss Montgomery suggested +building. Gwynne turned to Isabel with interest. + +"Do!" he exclaimed. "Come in with us, and we'll put up a larger +building. Sell your land and I'll borrow money on one of the ranches, +and sell out my Consols. Then I can hold on to all this, and we'll none +of us have so long to wait for large returns." + +"I am afraid of fires," said Isabel, dubiously. "The most vivid memories +of my childhood are standing at my window on the Hill in my night-gown +and watching whole blocks down here in flames. The wonder is that yours +have never gone. Now I get my ground rent, no matter what happens." But +before she had finished speaking she had made a sudden movement towards +Gwynne. "I will do it," she said. "It will be better--all round." + +"Good! And I intend to put on outside shutters of asbestos, so, with +walls of concrete and steel, and as little wood inside as possible, we +should weather anything short of subterranean fires." + +Then Miss Montgomery took them through South Park, the oval enclosure, +surrounded by high brown sad-looking houses looking down upon a bit of +dusty green, and pointed out the long-deserted mansions of the +Randolphs, the Hathaways, the Hunt McLanes, and of others who had +dispensed the simple lavish hospitality of the Fifties and Sixties. She +was intensely proud of the fact that her mother had been born in South +Park, and pointed with a sigh, not all unconscious affectation, to the +stiff three-storied house that had come, with so many others, "round the +Horn" in the Fifties. Beside it, looking like an old man with his arms +hanging and his jaw fallen, its windows vacant and broken, its paint +long unrenewed, and cobwebs on the very doorstep, stood the Randolph +House, the theatre of the most poignant of all an Francisco's initial +tragedies. Isabel had told Gwynne the story of Nina Randolph, and as +Anne repeated it he recalled the name of Dudley Thorpe, and remembered +that he had left the reputation of a good parliamentarian and M. F. H. + +They went up to Rincon Hill, once the haughty elder sister of South +Park, now looking like a lonely island in a dirty sea covered with +wreckage. There still remained several handsome old ivy-covered +mansions, and many beautiful as well as picturesquely dilapidated +gardens. Rincon Hill had contributed two peeresses to England, Lee +Tarlton and Tiny Montgomery, and Gwynne not only knew them both, but was +the more interested, as Cecil Maundrell's sudden elevation to the +earldom of Barnstaple during his active youth had served as an +object-lesson to himself. Mrs. Montgomery's old home was in good repair, +but she was in Europe as usual, and Randolph Montgomery, now in the +diplomatic service--too independent for the machine, he had been driven +out of politics some years since--preferred the more central comforts of +a hotel when he visited San Francisco. Two old family servants were +sunning themselves in the garden. The window-curtains were presumably +packed in camphor, and the dim panes suggested a cobwebbed and desolate +interior. Gwynne glanced across the ugly shabby but teeming valley to +the symbols of stupendous energies concentrated on its edge, and the +variegated magnificence of the hills, piling like roughly terraced +cliffs above it; then west to the mountains by the sea, green, unclaimed +by man as yet, although the dead were thick on the hills just below. It +was a city struggling out of chaos, but perhaps more interesting than it +would be a century hence, when it had fulfilled its destiny and become a +great metropolis of white marble and stone. A century? Nowhere had era +succeeded era with such startling rapidity, nowhere in one short +half-century had the genus American passed through so many phases. The +evidences were all before him. Once again he had the impression of +standing in the presence of hoary age--ugly premature age--was that the +secret of the vague suggestion of an unthinkable antiquity that so often +rose like a ghost in his mind? + +The girls announced that they should ride back, and they walked over and +took a Third Street car. It was almost empty when they entered, but was +invaded at the next corner by a belated pleasure party bound for the +Park, a noisy disreputable crowd of flashy men, and girls with bold +tired eyes, a thick coat of the white paint which has made the fortune +of the San Francisco chemist, and gaudy cheap attire. Known in the +vernacular as "chippies," they bore a crude Western resemblance to the +Parisian grisette, and what they lacked in style they made up in sound. +They were the class that monopolized boats and trains on Sundays, +screaming steadily through the tunnels, and returned late, no longer +happy because no longer able to make a noise. One of the young women +pointed a finger at Gwynne, screaming, "I choose you!" and plumped +herself on his lap, to the suppressed delight of Isabel and Miss +Montgomery. But Gwynne looked blankly at her ill-buttoned back and the +immense buckle of her belt, while the rest of the party, those that sat +and those that swung to and fro at the straps, mocked her for choosing +so unresponsive a knight. The car stopped to accommodate another relay, +and Gwynne by a deft movement transferred the lady to his own seat, and +engineered the girls out of the car, before two hoodlums, who were +working their way up from the lower door, could reach them. + +They found a garage and a good automobile, and spent an hour or two out +on the ocean boulevard. When they returned to town, Miss Montgomery +alighted at one of the hotels where she was to dine; and, the chauffeur +announcing that he could not "make another hill," Gwynne and Isabel +started for home on foot. + +The city rose in a succession of hills from the level, and they climbed +slowly, talking little. Suddenly Gwynne laid his hand on Isabel's arm +and stopped, directing her gaze upward. They were at the foot of one of +the narrow almost perpendicular blocks that rose between Pine and +California streets. On either side were brown old-fashioned houses, +several of them set back from the street, and surrounded by trees and +high close fences. It was almost dark, but a moon was due, so the street +lamps were not lit. Crawling down from the street above, on one side +only, and clinging to the upper houses, was the advance guard of the +fog. It had come in stealthily and halted for a moment, taking strange +shapes. It looked like the ghost of an ancient fog, and the very houses, +in which not a light had appeared, might have been deserted for a +century. In a moment it began to crawl down the side of the street, +seeming to fill the whole city with silence. It was a scene +indescribably gloomy, haunting, forbidding, and to Gwynne, who had +studied the city in many lonely rambles, to whisper of the unrelieved +gloom of lives behind that stage where the most famous of American +Follies danced for ever in her cap and bells. The spirit of sympathy was +in the fog and the brief darkness for the thousands of broken dogged men +and women that rarely caught sight of the cap and bells. For them the +ashes, the embittered memories, the blasted hopes, a quiet sullen hatred +for the city that had devoured their hearts and left them automatons. +This was a phase of the city's life of which the enthusiastic shallow +tourist had never a hint. It took a man of genius like Gwynne to feel +the genius of the city in all its sinister variety. He had hardly pieced +his impressions together as yet, but he told Isabel a little of what his +subconscious ego had formulated, and she had never liked him so well as +when she took his arm and they ascended into the sudden downrush of the +fog. + + + + +XXXVI + + +Gwynne returned to Lumalitas on the following day and Isabel moved down +to Mrs. Hofer's. This had seemed a rather superfluous proceeding to Miss +Otis, but Mrs. Hofer would take no denial, and lodged her guest in a +suite the luxury of which at first delighted and then stifled her. She +liked splendor and luxury in the abstract, but some lingering shade of +Puritanism in her resented the enthralment of the higher faculties. Her +rooms were upholstered with satin from floor to ceiling, the +toilet-table was bedecked with gold, and the furniture had been made for +some favorite of Napoleon during the First Empire. Isabel was haunted by +a vague sense of impropriety, which she ridiculed but could not stifle. + +And for the first time in her life she became weary of flowers. When she +arrived there was an abundance of the more costly in her boudoir--those +that were raised in hot-houses that the rich might not be balked in +their laudable desire to spend--and before the week was over, her rooms, +as she wrote to Gwynne--chuckling on his veranda--looked like a +florist's shop and smelt like a funeral. Everybody she met, and several +that she did not, sent her the floral tribute. The bell rang every hour. +When the imperturbable footman finally appeared with a box that looked +like a child's coffin, Isabel told him pettishly to throw it into the +back yard. All Americans send flowers to a pretty girl as a matter of +course, but the San Franciscan indulges in an avalanche where his more +economical Eastern brother is content with good measure, pressed down, +but not running over. + +But the offerings were by no means confined to the young men that Isabel +met at the functions of the week. "Old friends of the family" were +interested to welcome to their midst the beautiful daughter (albeit +somewhat eccentric) of Jim Otis and Mary Belmont. Enthusiastic maidens, +and others--anxious to proclaim their delight in this sudden invasion of +their preserves--sent roses with stems four feet long and chrysanthemums +that looked like painted cauliflowers. After a tea at the Presidio, +given in the open square, and in honor of the descendant of its most +historic Commandante, Don Jose Argueello, that reclaimed precinct being +singularly prolific in flowers, the offerings arrived on the following +day in an ambulance. + +It was an energetic week. When Mrs. Hofer was not herself entertaining, +she and her guest lunched and dined out daily, attended several teas +every afternoon, a _cotillon_, a skating masque, and five balls. Two of +the luncheons were at Burlingame and Menlo Park, whence they motored as +valiantly as if the roads were European. How so much was crowded into +one short week Isabel never understood, but finally came to the +conclusion that the rush at its worst was better than remaining for two +consecutive waking hours in the Hofer mansion. Mrs. Hofer was always +amiable and charming, but she was overwhelming. Her energies demanded +the safety-valve of constant speech, and she was one of those American +hostesses that hold that to neglect a guest is an unpardonable breach of +hospitality. She even gave up bridge for the week. Moreover, Isabel was +not long discovering that she contributed her part towards the +sustenance of that wondrous buoyancy, those eternal high spirits, that +glorious _joie de vivre_. The woman was an unconscious vampire. Men did +not feel it, and saw only her irresistible youth, but she squeezed women +as she did her morning sponge, and had no real intimates; although few, +herself least of all, understood the secret. If she had liked Isabel +less, it would have been more endurable, but she had never liked any one +more, to say nothing of the fact that she was determined to give her +"the time of her life." She descended upon her helpless guest with a +rush of silken skirts--that sounded like wings--and a torrent of bright +chatter, during every unoccupied hour or moment. Isabel's only +experience of hospitality heretofore had been in England, where a guest +might die and be resurrected between the formal hours of reunion and the +hostess be none the wiser. It had never occurred to her that visiting +might become hard labor, and as she had met few people whom she had +liked as spontaneously as Ada Hofer, she had come to her without a +misgiving. But she was soon hiding behind the curtains of the big rooms +down-stairs, and, upon one memorable occasion, took refuge under the +library table, while the sweet rapid voice of the hostess clarioned +throughout the house. She was drawn guiltily forth by a deep chuckle +from the arm-chair in the window. Mr. Toole regarded her with a twinkle +in his bright old eyes, and no resentment. + +"I won't tell on ye," he said. "I feel like it meself, at times. Ada's a +good child, as good as a born egoist can be, but--well--we are not all +made on the same plan. And this life don't suit you. You're a dreamer. I +know one when I see one, for I've that side to meself, and now that +life is easy it's most the only side I've got left. Sit down in that +corner behind the bookcase and I'll read to you from one of the old +poets, Byron, belike. If Ada finds us, I'll send her kiting. She didn't +bring me up." + +When Isabel, in the solitude of her bed, found time to think, she +concluded that if she could eliminate all men from her week except Mr. +Hofer and those of his particular set, she might still enjoy herself. +The San Francisco society youth has always been a failure. Except in +rare instances he has not been outside his native State, has read +nothing, and is casual of manner. Although more young men of the favored +class attend the home universities than formerly, the students that +derive the full benefit of these institutions are rarely those that +intend to make a business of dancing, and calling on Sunday afternoons. +It is yet too soon to weld cultivation with leisure, and, for the matter +of that, most of the society youth have their living to make, combining +business and fashion with a moderate success. Like Wellington's puppies, +they have proved themselves of sound metal when put to the crucial test, +but as an intellectual diversion they might as well be mechanical toys. +The leader has not yet arisen that can permanently combine the older and +younger sets. They mingle at great functions, but the dancing set +monopolizes the season's stage. + +Of this set Mrs. Hofer was an enthusiastic member, and even at dinner +rarely entertained any other. Occasionally, and once during Isabel's +visit, she invited some friends of her husband, who never went to +parties, and often entertained when his wife was elsewhere; but these +men did as much talking as listening, and that was no part of Mrs. +Hofer's system. Isabel had flashing vistas of small groups of men and +women, distinguished socially as well as mentally, that entertained each +other, or met at a new club through which Mrs. Hofer whisked her one +night,--a club where the best of Bohemia met the more intellectual +members of society; and she knew that in these groups she might find +also the higher class business and professional men, and a few of +leisure that enjoyed life without either dancing or drinking. But Mrs. +Hofer, although far too well satisfied with life and herself to be a +snob, loved brilliancy, splendor, constant excitement, dancing, chatter; +and only her chosen set could provide the banquet. She could dance every +night from ten until two, and awaken in mid-morning as fresh as a rose. +She had the wardrobe of the storied princess, and her guests and friends +must contribute their share to the brilliancy of all gatherings. She +detested shabbiness; it was the only thing that depressed her spirits. +Proud as she was of her husband, his aims, and his position in the +community, his friends and their themes frankly bored her. She liked +talk, not conversation. She really loved him, however, and was far too +clever to let him feel neglected. He was inordinately proud of her, and +grateful that she permitted him to give his time to his own interests, +instead of dragging him about to groan against the wall. She had her +little crosses and disappointments, for she had many servants and +dressmakers; but, on the whole, Isabel had never seen any one so +persistently happy, nor with more reason. Even her three children were +as sturdy as young calves, and although they yelled like demons for an +hour every morning--reawaking to the sense of a vague something life +still denied them, and infuriated at the thought--Mrs. Hofer merely +turned over on her pillow with an indulgent smile. It never occurred to +her that the rest of the household might be less indulgent; and the +nursery above Isabel's room was not the least of the causes that +contributed to a frantic longing for the thirty-first of December. + + + + +XXXVII + + +But it was not until four o'clock on the day of release that she found +herself actually alone in her chilly and chaste boudoir on the higher +hill; Mrs. Hofer escorted her home and remained for many last words. +Then Isabel fell into a chair before the mounting fire and shut her +eyes. Lady Victoria was out. Gwynne was not expected until the evening +train. She wished that she had not promised to dine with the Stones at +seven. The house was as silent as a tomb; but while she was still +rejoicing in the sudden cessation of sound and motion, the door opened +and Gwynne entered. She gave him a surly nod, and he explained that he +had come down in the morning, in order to be at hand to welcome her; had +even meditated going to her rescue. Isabel deigned no reply, and he took +possession of a deep chair, settled himself on his backbone, and +regarded her attentively. + +"I am sorry you have not enjoyed your week as much as I have done," he +observed. "The weather has been magnificent, and I have spent all the +days out-of-doors, riding, walking, duck-shooting--taking liberties with +your boat, and even your launch. I never enjoyed myself more--after such +close study, and all the rest of it, I suppose. I must say you don't +look very fit. You are pale instead of white, and--well--cross. Judging +from those models of literary elegance and Christian charity, the San +Francisco weekly society sheets--with which I whiled away that infernal +train journey--you have been feted like visiting royalty, photographed +by the foremost in his art--which would appear to be the equivalent of +painted for the Academy--and your family history seems to have been +written up from old files, with even more picturesqueness than +accuracy--" + +"I wish you would keep still. You didn't talk half so much in England. I +shall hate you if you become wholly American." + +"I am a born egotist. Ask my mother. Or my long-suffering friends and +constituents. You did all the talking at Capheaton--or gave me a wide +berth. But here my mother neither talks nor listens--" He paused +suddenly and lowered his voice. "Is anything the matter with my mother, +do you think? I never saw any one so changed. Do you suppose she hates +California and is staying here only on my account?--I have offered more +than once to pay her bills; and she is used to them, anyway. For +heaven's sake persuade her to go back and enjoy herself in her own +fashion. I really don't need her--haven't time. And in spite of your +liberal thorns and maddening incomprehensibilities, you can always put +homesickness to flight. Sometimes I think she is ill, and then again she +looks as fit as ever." + +"She has developed nerves. All women get them sometime or other. And +there is a certain order of women with whom beauty and fascination are a +vocation. When those pass they hate life." + +"What rot. No doubt she's a bit off her feed and restless. Probably the +climate doesn't suit her. Heaven knows it is nervous enough. But I don't +pretend to understand women. What's up with you? Didn't you enjoy being +a belle, after all?" + +"I was not a belle. I was a distinct failure." + +"What?" Gwynne sat up and forward. "If you want to psychologize, fire +away. It always interests me." + +"I have no intention of psychologizing. I haven't had time to think. But +I do know that a life lived all on the surface--and at lightning +speed--doesn't suit me a bit." She gave him a rapid sketch of her week. +"I was with them, but not of them; no doubt of that. Old Mr. Toole told +me one day that I was a dreamer, and I am afraid that is the solution. I +like to imagine myself doing things, but I don't like actually doing +them. I found that out over and over again in Europe. I can't tell you +how I have longed for a girl's good time here in San Francisco--denied +all these years, and my birthright. I was bored everywhere. I cannot +make talk; I can only talk spontaneously when I am interested. I +couldn't even enjoy the dancing--for the prospect of entertaining those +brats between times. And they were all afraid of me. I never could be a +belle like either the old ones or the new ones; the fault lies wholly in +myself, not in circumstances or materials. _I don't really want it._ No +girl can be a social success unless she cares tremendously for it. +Merely pretty girls are often popular, simply because popularity is the +breath of life to them. I wouldn't try it again for anything on earth. I +long to be at home watching the marsh, and not a soul to talk to. That +was all I was made for. A dreamer! I am terribly disappointed." + +"But Society is a mere phase. So is Stone's Bohemia. The town is full of +clever people. You can select and form your own set--when you are +ready." + +"I am afraid I don't care about it. I dislike the actual effort. So long +as Mr. Hofer and those men are talking I am interested, but even so I +have enjoyed--far more--thinking about and planning to know them. I am +nothing but a dreamer." + +"And you have just discovered that?" asked Gwynne, curiously. "I may not +have made an exhaustive study of woman, but up to a certain point I know +you; and I have not waited for Father O'Toole to enlighten me. I could +have told you that you would hate all this sort of thing. You had a mere +taste of it in English country-houses, where entertaining has reached +such a point of perfection that a man never feels so much at home as +when in some one's else house. If you had waited for a London season you +would have been as quickly disillusioned. You have the most impossible +ideals--" + +"I can realize them when I am alone," said Isabel, defiantly. "I shall +be as happy as ever on the ranch, the day after to-morrow." + +"That sort of happiness will do very well for a while--living in your +imagination and all that. But what is it going to lead to?" + +"Lead to? It is enough in itself." + +"You can't live on moonshine for ever. I told you before that I +understood your particular form of idealism; but although I believe that +man will certainly be happier when he lives more within that structure +of infinite variety, himself, less and less dependent upon the +aggregations Life has devised for amusing and tormenting him, still we +must reach that condition by very slow degrees; if we take it with a +leap the result will be an ugly and disastrous selfishness. If you can +prove to the world that you have found happiness in the cultivation of +the higher faculties, you will serve a purpose in life, for you will +encourage a certain class of women born with such serious lacks, in the +health or the affections, or even in the power to endure the mere +monotonies of married life, that they are better off alone; but who +often feel themselves a failure and drop into morbidity and decay. That +means contact for your highness, however. If you sit down by your marsh +for the rest of your life and dream, you miss the whole point. And when +time forced you to realize the uncompromising selfishness of such a +life--where would your happiness be then?" + +"Now you are talking by the book. Why are we so sure that it is a part +of our duty to make others happy? That may be but one more superstition +to rout. If we manage to be happy ourselves, and through the exercise of +the higher faculties alone, we may be serving an end decreed from the +beginning; by some subtle process, as incomprehensible as even the +commonplaces of life, add to the sum of happiness, and so serve life far +better than by scattering ourselves all over the surface. But I told you +something of this before and have not forgotten the result." + +"Neither have I, but one can get accustomed to any idea. What I want to +know is--do you leave youth entirely out of your calculations?" + +"Oh--youth! Well--it is possible I might not if I had not lived through +its tragedy already--for which I am thankful." + +"You have had romance and tragedy, and you are a very experienced young +woman, but you have not had happiness," said Gwynne, shrewdly. "That, +too, is a birthright, and sooner or later you will demand it. Social +conquests have palled in seven days. In time chickens also will cease to +satisfy, and books, and dreams, and sunsets, and liberty. The peculiar +conditions and events of your first quarter-century demanded an interval +before beginning again; and filled with all you have deliberately +chosen--all, that is, but chickens, which are a work not of God but of +supererogation. But intervals come to an end like other things. When +this finishes you will suddenly demand happiness--the real thing." + +"You mean that I will fall in love again, I suppose." + +"I mean that you will love." + +"Now you are hair-splitting. Are you qualifying to contribute +fictionized essays to the American magazines?" + +"I am stating facts and don't care a hang about sarcasm. Just now you +have spasms when some aspect of nature exalts you. I have watched you +with considerable amusement. But it is natural enough--merely a sort of +forerunner of what will happen when nature establishes her currents with +your own interior landscapes. Then there will be earthquakes and +hurricanes--your cultivated realism and inherent romanticism will become +hopelessly mixed, and you will be really happy." + +"More likely, such moments are the forerunners of a state which shall be +an eternal exaltation. Personal immortality is only to be desired if it +insures the lifting of our faculties to their highest power of +expression. Anything else would mean a boundless ennui. As for my +present inertia, is it not the duty of some few to pass their lives in +appreciation of the past? Heaven knows there are enough looking out for +the present. And I am sick of the superstition that love is all. I told +you before that the happiness of women, at least, depended upon +relegating it to its proper place. Once I regretted that Prestage did +not die while I still believed in him, so that I could have lived my +life with his memory, as Concha Argueello did with Rezanov's. But even +that would have been a species of slavery, and I should have chafed at +the bond; never had this divine sense of freedom." + +"I pass over the majority of your arguments--I must sleep on them. But +when have I maintained that love was all? If that were my doctrine +should I be reading my head off, investing in Class A buildings, talking +politics to farmers, and revolving plans for the conquest of California? +I should be making love to you. That is what I should like to do, +however, and what I propose to do when I am ready." + +"Are you in love with me?" + +"I hardly know, but I suspect that I shall be. If I deliberately choose +you now as my life partner, you cannot complain that I am the mere slave +of passion. I don't fancy I look it at this moment. I have had those +fevers, and am willing to admit their brevity. No doubt if I had not +been so occupied of late I should have had another. As it is, I am +blessedly permitted to foresee it; and to keep my brain clear enough +meanwhile to think for both of us." + +"Very cousinly, but I can think for myself." + +She had risen, but he stood with his back against the door for a moment. + +"Another thing--" he said. "You need a buffer. You have remarkable +powers, and you might realize some of your dreams if the prospect of +initiatives did not alarm your secretly feminine soul. The two of us +together could conquer the world. Now go ahead and dream until dreams +pall and I have more time." + + + + +XXXVIII + + +"Ibsen will live, not as a dramaturgist, but as the greatest professor +of dramaturgy the world has ever known." "Only one way left to be +original--never write about Italy." "When we say that a man is a high +type what we really mean is that he is the great exception to the type." +"That progressive type of bore--the man with a grievance." "San +Francisco is the cradle and the grave of more genius than ever was +packed into any city, ancient or modern. It is like our money, 'easy +come, easy go.'" "And more Hell." "An epigram is only to be forgiven +when a memorable thought is packed into a phrase that sticks." + +As Isabel and Gwynne escaped from the little Italian restaurant into the +blare and glare of the street, their heads were ringing with much +brilliant if somewhat affected talk. They had sat with their hosts at +the "newspaper table." It was the fashion at the moment to express life +in paradoxes, and with a nice adjustment of commas and colons. There had +been no talk of politics in this Bohemia, nor of society; nor yet of +other subjects that commanded its attention when the long day gave place +to the shorter night: the women present were respectable, many of them +wives, and not a few went into society when they chose. There was much +talk of the fads with which the world was ridden, never a reference to +the literature or art of the past; and there was something almost +pathetic in the prostration of these brilliant young men, who had never +crossed the boundaries of their State, to European groups, some of whose +members were already passe, but still loomed gigantic from the far edge +of the Pacific. Few American writers are popular in California, however +they may be read; and the reason, no doubt, lies in the mixed blood to +which all Europe has contributed, and which is full of affinities little +experienced by the rest of the country. Even the famous cooking is +un-American. The French, Italian, and Spanish restaurants are exactly +what they claim to be; their very atmosphere might have been imported. +The many that prefer restaurant life even to the excellent cooking to be +found in the average home, give their highest preference to the legacy +of the Spaniard; they eat hot sauces and Chile peppers with every dish; +and _tamales_ are sold on the street corners. This is enough to make the +San Franciscan an exotic, and it contributes in a great measure to his +fatal content. These young men had no real knowledge of the world, but +they had their own world, and were by no means provincial in the +accepted sense. But the majority were satisfied to coruscate to an ever +applauding audience--for a few years; with money easily got and +delightfully spent; to regard Life as a game, not as a business. +Afterwards the rut, the friendly pocket--nowhere so open as in San +Francisco--a job now and then, more than one way of forgetting that in +times gone by a fellow was one of those "coming men" the wanton heedless +city turns out with the same profusion that gorges her markets and +flaunts her sun for eight months of the year. + +To Gwynne they seemed like some primitive race flourishing before its +time. He no longer argued with them, for he had the disadvantage of +being a scholar, and it interfered with his tolerance of fads on the +rampage; but they saddened him, made him feel almost elderly--and +abominably healthy. To-night, although some of the complexions of these +young men were green, and others red, they had been brilliant without +undue hilarity. They intended to get very drunk later on--if only as a +compliment to the New Year--but they were far too accomplished for +precipitancy. Stone, alone, refilled his glass so often that Gwynne +announced abruptly that they were missing the fun in the street, and +Paula promptly took possession of his arm. Stone followed, rumbling +disapproval, with Isabel. This arrangement was not to Gwynne's taste, +but he had developed subtlety in such matters and bided his time. + +Kearney Street from Telegraph Hill to Market Street, a mile or more, was +a blaze of light, and crowded with people. It was a very orderly throng, +for it was composed of the respectable element of the city, and if they +had laid dignity aside for the moment, they were not distractingly +noisy. All were throwing confetti, and many had tin horns. Isabel saw +the Hofers, arm in arm, tooting vigorously. Half of society was there; +and many staid and strenuous business men were promenading with their +wives and daughters, more than one with his neck encircled by paper +ribbons of many hues. The street-cars had stopped, but there were a +number of automobiles filled with masques, singling out their friends on +the pavement and hurling confetti. + +But it was not until Stone and his party reached the great central +highway, Market Street, that the scene was characteristic. Here the +windows of the Palace Hotel, and all the other buildings, great and +small, were illuminated and filled with people. And the entire city +would seem to have emptied itself not only into Market Street, but into +those streets on the north side that completed the "all-night district." +The people in the windows wore their gayest attire, and there was often +music as well as light behind them. They threw down confetti by the +bushel on the masses below. And the masses! There was no polite +restraint here. Largely recruited from the immense South of Market +Street district, they were out for a good time, and its inevitable +expression was noise. They were in the best of tempers, but the din was +terrific. They hooted and yelled, and every one of the several thousand +had a tin horn and blew it with all his might. Every undefended ear was +victimized. Isabel pressed one of her own against Stone's shoulder and +covered the other with her hand. But she stared at the crowd with all +the interest of the secluded for the mass. There were painted ladies of +all grades, and hundreds of shop-girls, covered with white paint or +lavender powder, their figures exaggerated with the corset of the +moment, and violent plumage on head and waist, although they had +prudently left their best skirts at home. Many of them were +astonishingly pretty, and no doubt more respectable than they looked. +Mrs. Paula was in her element. She wore her red hat and blouse, waved +her hands to the windows, exulted in the showers of confetti that +descended in response, and shouted into Gwynne's ear that she was +singled out for special attentions. In truth she received more than her +escort relished. Her natural affinity with the class above which she had +risen so high had never been more patent, and kindred spirits looked +from many approving eyes. Suddenly both cheeks were painted black by a +too fraternal hand, and then a man tried to kiss her. This was more than +even Paula could stand, and she flung herself into her husband's arms, +daubing his shirt with black and red. He dropped Isabel and struck out +furiously. There was an immediate scuffle, during which Gwynne basely +drew Isabel's arm through his and pressed forward into the thick of the +crowd. + +"We have had enough of them, and no doubt they have had of us," he said, +comfortably. "Now we will enjoy ourselves." + +"Well, if they blacken my face don't notice them. One would think Lyster +would know how to play the game by this time." + +"He is always ready to fight after the fifth glass of champagne. I have +had lively experiences with him." + +Conversation was impossible in the din. Isabel's face was smudged more +than once, but no other liberty was attempted. Gwynne also looked like a +chimney-sweep, and was addressed as "darling" several times, but the +crowd was inoffensive until a chain-gang of hoodlums dashed irresistibly +through it, pushing many off the sidewalk, and rousing a lurid +accompaniment. One man, solid and stolid, stood his ground on the edge +of the chain and administered a hearty kick upon each ankle as it +passed. There were angry howls in response, but none could retaliate +without breaking the chain, nor indeed could they control its momentum. + +"That is one of those things one would like to have thought of one's +self," said Gwynne, admiringly, rubbing his ribs, for he had hastily +swung Isabel outward, and received much of the impact. "We might as +well get out of this." + +They slowly made their way into one of the cross streets that seemed to +leap like a blazing meteor down from the darkness of the heights. But +the crowd was still as dense, and the street but a third the width of +Market Street. Not even an automobile attempted to force its way. Saloon +doors were swinging. Policemen stood in front of them, but there was no +further disorder. Gwynne and Isabel pressed back against the wall of a +shop and watched and waited. They were to celebrate the birth of the New +Year with the Hofers at a restaurant on the block above, but there was +no prospect of reaching it at present. + +The sky was cloudless. If the evening chill had come in from the +Pacific, it was routed by the mass of humanity and the downpour of heat +from the electric lights. All the great signs were blazing, many in +colors. And there was music in all the saloons and restaurants; it rose +and fell with the noise of the tin horn and the hoot of the happy. The +people in the windows here threw down not only confetti but flowers, and +stacks at each elbow added to the mass of color. Even the men had tied +bright silk handkerchiefs about their necks, and they were bestrewed +with bits of gold and silver paper, and festooned with colored ribbon. +Gwynne and Isabel were quickly singled out and pelted with balls that +opened with the impact and tangled them together with the endless paper +streamers. + +It was eleven o'clock before the crowd began its retreat to their +restaurants, and Gwynne and Isabel were able to make their way up to the +celebrated resort where the Hofers awaited them. They were shown to a +dressing-room where they could wash their faces, and then to the gallery +above the body of the restaurant which was divided into boxes, and +occupied by all sorts and kinds of people, including many of their +friends. In Hofer's box was a large bottle on ice and a table set for +supper. Mrs. Hofer, looking less approving than earlier in the evening, +sat half-hidden by a curtain, but her husband, in common with most of +the other people in the gallery, was throwing confetti upon his friends +below. He seized Gwynne and dragged him to the front of the box, and the +new arrival was greeted by shouts from every man, it seemed to him, that +he had met in San Francisco. The large hall with its tables of all sizes +was as densely packed as the streets had been. + +"Ever see anything like this before?" demanded Hofer. He paused with a +gasp and dislodged a ball of confetti from his throat. "Look with all +your eyes, old man. There are the best and the worst--all who can pay +the price: the reformers cheek by jowl with the mayor and the Boss, by +Jove! The matron and the other kind of matron, the fair young girl who +hopes to buy a rich husband, and the sort that has to give more and take +less; the family man and his family, not a bit afraid of contamination, +enjoying himself to the limit; financiers, millionaires, corporation +bosses and curb-stone brokers, newspaper men, artists, politicians big +and little, society youths and girls severely chaperoned. See that crowd +with the queens of the Tenderloin? Ever hear what one of our local wits +said about them: 'Pity the worst of men should be named for the best of +fish!'" + +Hofer, who felt it his duty as a good citizen to empty his bottle with +the rest of the world on New Year's eve, rattled on. Mrs. Hofer gave an +occasional warning cough. Like most San Francisco women of her class +there was a good deal of prudery under her gayety, and no instinct +whatever for Bohemia. She had come to the restaurant because her husband +had urged it, but she took no part, and threw only an occasional glance +at the floor. But as Isabel was manifestly interested, she presented her +arm and hat to the gaze of the crowd, that her guest might partake in +the doubtful fun if she wished. + +Isabel and Gwynne, still tangled in the paper streamers and vigorously +pelted from below, leaned eagerly over the railing and flung handsful of +gold and silver bits upon the already glittering throng. It certainly +was an astonishing sight. There was little seeking after +inconspicuousness, even in the boxes. All were there to celebrate the +birth of the New Year, and to "play the game," however chastened they +might feel on the morrow. All were drinking champagne and growing more +hilarious every moment. One girl modestly dressed, and known to Mrs. +Hofer as an entirely respectable young person, although not of her own +class, was sitting on the knee of the man she was to marry, and drinking +from his glass. The ladies of the lower ten thousand were nicely graded. +Some were dressed with a severe and simple elegance, and painted as +delicately as a miniature. These were very quiet, the carven smile on +their crimson lips not disturbing the careful arrangement of their +features; and their eyes never lost their jewel-like immobility. They +were attended by what is vaguely known as "men about town," men with +money to spend and no position to lose. It was no longer the fashion +among conspicuous men to flaunt their mistresses, but these indefinite +persons kept the old traditions alive. Still other women blazed with +paint and jewels and excessive richness of attire. In attendance were +the big sleek brutes, whom all other men held in contempt. But all were +happy to-night and asking no man for his respect. + +At a table in the very middle of the room was a young, buxom, and very +naughty-looking damsel, who evidently was a belle: the circle of black +coats about her round table was unbroken save by herself. What dress she +wore was black, and on her golden head was an immense black hat covered +with feathers. Her abundant diamonds were almost overwhelmed. Every time +one of her escort raised his glass to his lips he toasted her, and she +rose to respond, presumably to give the company the benefit of the tiny +waist that tapered off the white acre above. She was irreverently +hooted, but imperturbably rose and fell like a jack-in-the-box. + +Hofer finally sat down to supper with his guests, but they had barely +finished when every clock in town began to boom the midnight hour and +there was a wild ringing of bells all over the city. Down-stairs one of +the young men ran to the orchestra, whirled the leader from his seat, +flung off his own coat, and led the crashing music with a tin horn. +Hofer and Gwynne went to the front of the box, glasses in hand. All +below had sprung to their feet and were waving and clicking their +champagne-glasses, singing, catcalling, tooting, cheering. Even Isabel +and Mrs. Hofer leaned forward. In the turmoil they did not notice that +the young woman in the centre of the room was standing on her table, her +befeathered head flung back, draining her glass; but they turned just in +time to see one of her admirers rifle her bodice and wag his trove at +the company. + +"This is too much!" cried Mrs. Hofer, furiously, and running to the +back of the box. "Nicolas, I insist!" But Nicolas was enjoying himself +immensely and paid no attention. + +Isabel had been about to follow Mrs. Hofer when she lost her breath and +nearly fell over the edge of the box. Lady Victoria, accompanied by a +man who was unmistakably a pugilist, had entered by a side door. + +Isabel's brain seemed to eliminate every thought it had ever possessed +and hurriedly to remodel down to one agonizing point. The pair were +endeavoring to force their way forward to a table that evidently had +been reserved for them. Gwynne was leaning over the railing drinking to +Mr. and Mrs. Trennahan. In a moment his interested eyes would rove over +the crowd again. Isabel suddenly fell on him, bearing him backward. + +"Take me out--quick!" she gasped. "I am horribly ill!" + +Gwynne, grasping his hat, was fairly borne out of the box. As Isabel was +ghastly and trembling he assumed that she was really ill, and made no +protest, but half-carried her down the stair. They attracted no +attention and reached the sidewalk in a moment. + +"If we can only find a carriage!" he said, solicitously. "You never can +walk up those hills. What an atmosphere that was! I don't wonder you +came a cropper. I hope the Hofers won't mind--" + +"Nobody minds anything." + +She took his arm and they walked up the street. The bells were still +ringing, horns tooting, but the street was comparatively empty. At the +corner a Salvation Army corps was singing hymns to a flabby and penitent +congregation. Just beyond was a row of hacks awaiting the weary +reveller, and in a moment Gwynne and Isabel were driving rapidly along a +dark and deserted street. + +"Do you feel better?" he asked. + +She did not answer for a moment, afraid of breaking down. Gwynne was +sure to offer prompt consolation, and even if he assumed the brotherly +attitude, she had no wish to be taken in his arms. In spite of herself +his calm reiteration that he intended to marry her had forced its seed +into her brain, for ideas projected from bold determined minds are +insistent things. But never had love and all connected with it been so +hateful to her as at this moment. He peered into her face. + +"You are not going to cry!" he exclaimed. "You!" + +"No, I am not! But I never was so nearly overcome. Such noise! Such +sights! Such heat! It was too bad to take you away, though. Shall you go +back?" + +"Not I! May I smoke? We shall be an hour reaching the base of our cliff +at this rate. He is apparently going out to the cemeteries under +pretence of avoiding the hills." + +He elevated his feet to the opposite seat and lit a cigarette. + +"I wish my mother had come home before we left. It was a pity for her to +miss this. Even if she would not dine with us, I could have returned for +her." + +"I saw her in the crowd with a party of people. I might have told you, +but my mind has been in as many pieces to-night as a bag full of +confetti. I am sure she has seen it all." + +"Good. It was what you might call a trifle variegated, but not to be +missed. Great old town, this! No wonder they think California is the +world, out here. It is what they say of the London flats: +'self-contained.' I like Hofer better than ever. The man whom champagne +transforms into a big silly boy is the right sort. Is there really a +workaday world, a city to reform, and two ranches up the valley?" + + + + +XXXIX + + +They reached home sooner than might have been expected, but there were +many fares below, and the hackman galloped down the hill as recklessly +as if a slip would not have been the death of himself and his valiant +beasts. + +Isabel went directly to her room and persuaded Gwynne to go to his, +arguing that some one of his mother's party would be sure to bring her +home. As he was to take the 7:30 train he made no protest. Even were he +still awake when Lady Victoria returned, the fog was rolling in; nor was +he likely to be leaning from his window. + +Isabel heard her come in two hours later, and it was another hour before +she slept. She had determined to ask her wayward but still awesome +relative to leave San Francisco before her son found her out or she had +time more fully to disgrace him. But how to approach the most +unapproachable woman she had ever known with so delicate a proposition +was a question that made her toss about her ancestral bed and kept the +blood in her brain. She recalled the slip of paper announcing a +prize-fight, and wondered at her stupidity; for she had heard something +of the resources of blasee women ere this. + +Finally she fell asleep. She was awakened by a sharp earthquake--grim +herald of the coming year! She was too well seasoned to have felt +anything more than a passing annoyance, had she not heard Lady Victoria +give a piercing scream and run from her room. Whereupon she rejoiced +wickedly, flung a wrapper across her shoulders, and went into the hall. +Gwynne was standing in his doorway, looking more asleep than awake, and +intensely disapproving. Lady Victoria was leaning against the wall, her +eyes wide with terror. Isabel took her firmly by the arm, marched her +into her room, helped her into a dressing-gown, and, pushing her into a +chair, took one opposite. + +"How dreadful!" exclaimed Lady Victoria. "I had forgotten about +earthquakes--" + +"Earthquake!" said Isabel, contemptuously. "That was a mere vibration. +We had sixty-two of those last winter. If you only stay long enough we +will show you what California really can do. Every ten years or so we +have a good hard shake--enough to bring the plaster down; and every +half-century or so she gets up and turns over. I have made a specialty +of earthquakes, and could tell you extraordinary tales of some of the +great ones of the south--" + +"Please do not. I prefer to forget. But don't leave me. Fancy Angelique +sleeping through such a thing!" + +"Doubtless she is not in the house. All the world was out last night." + +"Was it?" + +"I think this as good a time as any other to tell you, Cousin Victoria, +that I saw you last night--just as the clocks were striking twelve." + +"Did you?" + +Her trained features did not betray her, but Isabel saw the figure under +the loose gown grow rigid and brace itself against the back of the +chair. And as Isabel stared at her, with the desperate courage born of +the sudden plunge, it seemed to her that she felt a vibration from the +nausea, the disgust, the hatred of life, the death-rattle of great +passions dying hard. She wondered again, if, given the same conditions, +she would have differed much from the woman she had brought to bay. Her +early trials and provincial upbringing had developed her Puritan +inheritance, but she had had flashing and startling glimpses of her +depths now and again. For a moment she felt the waters of an immemorial +ennui rise high in her own soul, then drop to the grinning skulls and +sparkless ashes of old pleasures. She shuddered back, and raised her +eyes once more to the haughty mask opposite. + +"I think I understand," she said, gently. "But you must go. I kept him +from seeing you to-night. But he would find out in time. As you know how +he believes in you, you can imagine the consequences. I suppose you have +not done anything so public before, or I should have heard of it. I +vaguely recall that women can look on at prize-fights from private +boxes. Last night, it isn't likely that any one noticed. Or if they did +they would question the evidence of their senses in the morning, the +best of them. So please go." + +She paused. Lady Victoria stared at her without the slightest change of +expression. Isabel continued imperturbably. "London is so vast--if you +must have that sort of liberty, for heaven's sake go where it is most +likely to be overlooked--and where libel laws are operative. For all its +license, San Francisco is one of the most censorious and unrelenting +societies in the world, and has more old-fashioned people than New York. +If you become the talk of the town, and those awful weekly papers find +you out, Elton will be a long while living it down. It will make +ridiculous all his efforts at reform. Perhaps he would no longer care. I +fancy it would affect him that way." + +She rose, and Lady Victoria rose also and walked to the door. As she +opened it she smiled grimly. "You have courage," she said. "I am more +than ever convinced that you are the wife for Jack. I will go." + + + + +PART III + +1906 + + + + +I + + +On the same afternoon Lady Victoria developed appendicitis and went to +bed for two months. She was only in danger for a short time, but the +doctor announced his intention of giving her a rest cure, and his +patient, who was profoundly indifferent, made no protest. And if +invalidism is a career, an illness is an adventure; moreover, no doubt, +it was a relief to Victoria Gwynne to have her thinking done by some one +else for a time. Isabel had thoughtfully rung up the handsomest doctor +in San Francisco the moment the disease declared itself, and it was to +be expected that he would find his patient interesting enough to spend +an hour by her bedside daily. It was manifestly impossible to transfer a +woman of Lady Victoria's heroic proportions down that rickety and almost +perpendicular flight of steps to an ambulance, but the best of nurses +were engaged, Anne Montgomery agreed to come every morning and attend to +the housekeeping, Gwynne established a long-distance telephone beside +the bed, and Mrs. Trennahan, whom Lady Victoria liked--she could not +stand Mrs. Hofer--promised a daily visit; and an automobile trip to the +south as soon as the doctor would permit. + +It was nearly a week before Isabel, who had sat up with Gwynne during +the first two nights, and been on the rush ever since, was able to +return to her ranch. She had offered to remain in town altogether, but +Lady Victoria replied with some show of irritation that if either she or +her son sacrificed their time and interests on her account it would +oppress her mind with a sense of guilt, and hinder her recovery. She +would telephone to them at a certain hour every day, and if they came +down once a week as usual she should enjoy seeing them, instead of being +worried by a sense of obligation. In truth she was glad to be rid of +them for more reasons than one. + +It was late in the afternoon when Isabel arrived in Rosewater, and +business detained her there for several hours. She dined with the Tom +Coltons, and the conversation was a quaint mixture of babies, politics, +servants, and the Hofer ball. Colton drove her home, and talked the +steady monotonous stream with which he tricked the world into believing +that his own ideas were still in the germ. Upon this occasion he might +as well have betrayed his secrets or quoted the poets, for Isabel paid +no attention whatever to his monologue. She was consumed with her desire +to be alone once more. She was tired of the very sound of the human +voice, and remembered with satisfaction the silence of her Chuma and the +taciturnity of her men. + +When she finally reached her home she illuminated it from top to bottom +and wandered about in a passion of delight. Her sensation of gratitude +and novelty in her solitude and freedom could not have been keener if +she had been absent for six months. Although it was too cold to sit +out-of-doors, she walked up and down the piazza for an hour, watching +the crawling tide and the brown tumbled hills. The boat was late, and +every other light was out when it appeared, a mere string of magic +lanterns with a red globe suspended aloft. Isabel struck a match and +answered the captain's familiar greeting from his high perch in the +pilot-house; then went within, for the fog was rolling over Tamalpais, +dropping down the mountains in great sea waves. But even then she would +not go to bed, and lose her knowledge of recovered treasure. After a +time, however, she fell asleep in her chair before the fire. She awoke +suddenly, but drowsily surprised and disappointed not to find Gwynne in +the chair opposite. Then she became aware of the cause of her +interrupted slumbers. There was the sound of fire-arms and of barking +dogs on the hills sacred to the Leghorn. In three minutes she had her +skirts off, her high boots on, and was running, pistol in hand, to the +colony, announcing her coming by a preliminary discharge. Then for the +next hour she and her men fought one of those hordes of migratory rats +that suddenly steal upon chicken-ranches and leave ruin behind them. +Isabel had a genuine horror of rats. She would far rather have faced an +army of snakes; but with her rubber boots, the well-trained dogs, and +her accuracy of aim, she had nothing to fear. Those that were not +slaughtered were finally driven off, and Isabel, content even in this +phase of her strictly personal life, went to bed and slept the sleep of +youth and health and an easy conscience. + +The next day began the torrential rains that lasted for three weeks, +almost without an hour's intermission; that wiped out the marsh, and +threatened floods for all the valleys of the north. The boats no longer +looked as if cutting their way through the lands, but adrift on a great +lake. Tamalpais and the mountains below it had disappeared, as if +hibernating, and the winds raged up and down the long valley, shaking +old houses like Isabel's to their foundations, and leaving not a leaf +on the trees. Nothing could be wilder or more desolate than the scene +from Isabel's piazza, where, encased in rubber, she took her exercise, +often battling every inch of one way against a driving wall of rain. +Rosewater, or any sort of house except her own, she did not see for days +at a time, nothing but that gray foaming muttering expanse of water, its +flood and fall no longer distinguishable. At first she was more than +content to be so isolated. Her practical life occupied little of her +time; only a daily, and always unexpected, dash up the slopes to see +that her men were not shirking their duties, and a weekly trip to +Rosewater with her produce: she used her own incubators in bad weather. +A visit to San Francisco she did not attempt, and she was quite sure +that the daily conversation over the telephone--when it had not blown +down--was as sufficing for Lady Victoria as for herself. She read and +studied and dreamed, became indifferent to what she chose to call her +failure as a society ornament, and planned a larger future; to be +realized when she had come to care less for dreams and more for +realities. No doubt that state of mind would develop before long, and +meanwhile she might as well enjoy herself according to her present mood. +Nothing could alter her belief that all unhappiness came from contacts, +and certainly she had proved her theories so far, and took a pagan joy +in mere living. She loved the wild battle of the elements, the waste +below her garden, with as keen a sensuousness as the spring and the +flowers, and often sat late in her red room by the fire to enjoy its +contrast with the desolation without. + +But Gwynne was not a man to be dismissed from the thoughts of any one +that knew him as well as his cousin, He had taken his part in her life +as a matter of course, and of late they had been very intimate. During +the first days and nights of his mother's illness, they had talked, or +sat in companionable silence, by the hour. She had been assailed by +regrets more than once that she was to have no part in his life, that he +had already won some of his hardest battles with no help of hers, and +deliberately had matched their spirits and driven her off the field +where she had subtly sought to manage him. She liked him the better for +this, but while her vanity retired with philosophy, she regretted her +inability to help him. That she had it in her to assist and encourage +him in many ways, she needed to be told neither by himself nor his +mother, but she was unwilling to pay the price. That she felt his charm, +took an even deeper interest in him since he had announced his intention +to marry her, she did not pretend to deny, and sometimes caught herself +looking out upon a future in which he had as inevitable a part as if it +had been decreed from the beginning of time. She also dreamed of the +satisfaction and pleasure it would give her to make him really love her, +become quite mad about her. But again she was unwilling to pay the +price. She argued that this was merely due to the persistence of the +solitary ideal; and refused to face the cowardice that lurked in the +bottom of her soul. Heroic in every other development of her highly bred +character, she had all the secret fear and antagonism of her sex for the +other, a profound resentment of the male instinct for possession, and +the deeper terror that what Gwynne might find would eventually make her +wholly his. Life had given her a deep surface; the depths below it sent +up rare vibrations; and her mind was seldom unoccupied. She could add +layer upon layer of evasions and subtleties with no prospect of a rude +disturbance; and when the wind ceased for a time she tramped over the +hills. But she missed Gwynne increasingly, wondered that he did not +brave the elements and come out to her; finally felt herself shamefully +neglected, and would not answer his occasional telephone queries as to +her well-being. + + + + +II + + +Three days of floundering through the mud between Lumalitas and +Rosewater exhausted Gwynne's patience, and he engaged a furnished suite +of rooms on Main Street, moved in his law library, Imura Kisaburo +Hinomoto, and several easy-chairs, invested in a red wall-paper for his +sitting-room, and was immediately so comfortable, and so relieved to be +rid of his dripping sighing trees and flooded valley, that he was almost +happy. As he looked down from his window upon the slope of the street +crowded with muddy wagons and men in oil-skins and high rubber boots, he +recalled the ironical picture Isabel had drawn, that memorable night at +Capheaton, of his own future appearance; and as he could not ride out to +Old Inn in any other garb, an excess of vanity deterred him from going +at all. To be sure he could drive out in a closed surrey, but he would +have felt equally ridiculous, and Isabel, beyond doubt, would scorn him. +Better let her think him indifferent for a while; it might do her good. +He could save himself from discourtesy by telephoning occasionally, and, +for the matter of that, the less he thought of her at present the +better. + +For the first time he came intimately in contact with the men of +Rosewater: "leading citizens" too busy to call upon him at Lumalitas, or +to sit down in their places of business for a chat during the day, and +too well trained to ask strangers home for dinner, were any hospitable +instincts left in them. But they soon discovered that his rooms were +very comfortable and inviting, his whiskey and tobacco "above par." The +homeless citizens of Rosewater, while their wives wrangled at bridge or +five-hundred, fell into the habit of "dropping in at Gwynne's," instead +of going to the Lodge or the dingy back room of some saloon or lawyer's +office. They were at liberty to take off their coats and put their feet +on the railing surrounding the large iron stove that sat well out into +the room. There were even spittoons for such as clung to the old +tradition; and in a short time the large newly built, almost luxurious +room took on somewhat of the character of that forum of an older time, +the corner grocery. Judge Leslie seldom honored these assemblies, as he +was tired at night and rejoiced in a comfortable home; nor did Tom +Colton, whose domestic virtues were pronounced; but Mr. Wheaton came, +and Mr. Haight, Mr. Boutts, and other solid business men old enough to +be Gwynne's father; and they were all deeply interested in Rosewater +first, State politics second, and national affairs once in four years; +or oftener if there was any pyrotechnical departure from routine. +European politics interested them not at all, and if they had any +suspicion of Gwynne's real status, they were too accustomed to minding +their own business to take any liberties with his reserve. + +But they were fully alive to the importance of his addition to the +community. He was a large landholder, selling many small farms to +acceptable persons; he spent money freely, buying everything he needed +for his household and farm in Rosewater, instead of sending to the city; +he was studying law with a view to practising in their midst; and now +that Judge Leslie--who proclaimed him a marvel--was threatening to +retire, his keen and cautious fellow-citizens needed nothing more than a +man of first-class legal ability to take care of their great and varied +interests and defend them against the corporation bogie. They found +themselves hinting that he should engage in politics as well, when his +probationary years were over. + +When Gwynne shrugged his shoulders one night and remarked bluntly that +he had no desire to work with either of the California machines, and +would unquestionably come a howling cropper if he worked against either, +Mr. Wheaton answered with the nimbleness of a mind already made up, that +he could be sent to Sacramento on an independent ticket--manipulated by +the honest men of Rosewater--to fight such of the frauds and tyrannies +as the State was suffering acutely from at the moment. During reform +spasms the machines were practically powerless, and with the brilliant +abilities he would be able to display as soon as he entered public life, +and backed by a powerful influence, he could win his way to higher +things before the wave subsided. They wanted a senator in Washington who +was for his State first and himself next, even more than they wanted a +lawyer; and for that matter he could serve their anti-corporation +interests better there than here. Meanwhile he would have many +opportunities to speak and show the stuff that was in him, draw converts +to himself with his fiery eloquence and hard practicality, inculcate the +desire for better things, and the necessity for reducing the influence +of the army of petty professional politicians to a minimum, make of +himself so central and inspiriting a figure that when his time came the +best element of both parties throughout the State would form an +independent body under his leadership. + +This was an alluring picture, but if Mr. Wheaton, who had had as little +to do with politics as possible, was a bit of a dreamer, there was no +question that his dreams were shared by more practical men at the +present moment than for many years past; and that his theories were +sound, however formidable the alert, resourceful, enormously capitalized +army which stood between them and execution. His idol was Abraham +Lincoln, and in consequence he "banked" on the good in human nature as a +factor, which, in sudden recrudescences of indignant energy, +accomplished revolutions of far greater moment than the overthrowing of +political machines. + +Mr. Wheaton had launched forth upon one particularly stormy night when +he happened to be Gwynne's only guest. The host, not to be outdone, was +sitting with his feet on the railing of the stove, but as far from the +spittoon as possible. He had listened to the long monologue, which +involved a sketch of Lincoln's varied career, with more attention than +might have been inferred from his half-closed eyes, and his pipe had +gone out. It was only recently that any of his neighbors, barring Judge +Leslie and Tom Colton, who shared his secret, had definitely proposed a +political career to him, in other words divined his abilities and +ambitions. But Mr. Wheaton had once been young and adventurous himself, +and much if not all of his success in life was due to his shrewd +divination of human nature. No man could drive a harder bargain than +"Wash" Wheaton (he was named for the father of his country), but he had +never been wanting in a vein of humorous sympathy, nor in a fair +capacity for friendship as well as enmity. + +He raised his eyes from the coals and looked directly at Gwynne, who was +relighting his pipe. + +"I don't like Tom Colton," he said, abruptly. "And it's not so much +because he is the son of that old skinflint, neither. He is a little too +much the product of the times--a sort of polished up descendant of that +hoodlum element that terrorized San Francisco in the Seventies. He +started out as a mere or'nary politician, but the Democratic Boss took +him up and his ambitions are growing. What with the money he has and +will inherit, and the devilish gall of him, he can play a deep game, and +his chances of winning look a little too fair to suit a good many of us. +He's nothing better than an anarchist, and without the excuse of the +common anarchist--who, at the worst--or his own best--risks his life. +Tom Colton and men of his stamp wouldn't risk the skin of their little +fingers. All they do is to build a red-hot fire under the political +caldron, stir it up with a big stick until it doesn't know where it is +at or what it is made of, and then float into power on the steam. This +has been one of the rottenest States in the Union for a good many years, +and no wonder such men as Tom think they can about do as they please; +but a good many are getting pretty damned tired of it, and there's a +sort of reform mutter going on here and there that will gather and swell +if skilfully manipulated. We've been talking you over, and have +concluded to back you up for all we are worth as soon as you are +ready--that is to say we would but for one drawback--your friendship +with Colton." + +"If you choose to call it that. I have told him in as plain English as +he will ever hear what I think of his politics, and that if I ever enter +public life myself I shall devote my energies to running him and his +like out of it. He is too good-natured and too sure of himself--and his +State!--to mind. Moreover, he has four years the start of me. It is +possible that I shall go to Sacramento with, and even speak for, him; +but he understands perfectly that I am only after experience, will +advocate nothing I disapprove of--he actually has certain reforms in his +political basket, and whatever may be his intention to compromise when +he reaches Sacramento, I, at least, can advocate them in all sincerity; +and further open the eyes of all these people to what they ought to want +and to have. All this is perfectly understood between us. I, and the +honest public clamoring for its rights, do not weigh a feather in the +scale, in his opinion, against the might of organization." + +"Very good. I suspicioned something of the sort. He can't corrupt you, +and you couldn't get a better insight into corruption than through him; +so fire away. What's your program, anyhow?" + +"It's too soon to make one--be sure that I am willing to return your +confidence with my own"--as the sharp china-blue eyes opposite +contracted; "but I can do little now except win the confidence of the +farmers in this district and of men like yourself. But if a reform party +does achieve power, if only for a term, the first thing for it to do is +to overhaul the ballot system. Before we reformed ours we were as deep +in the mire as yourselves. When the American voter is under the +supervision of an honest judiciary, a general system of local reforms +will follow as a matter of course." + +Mr. Wheaton sighed. "You would have to begin with the judiciary. If you +reformed them, and had any strength left, and then reformed the ballot +in the manner of your own country, I guess you'd get about anything you +wanted. But you'll need a tidal reform wave, I'm afraid. However, you +never can tell what one year will bring forth in this country. On the +other hand, the results of certain reforms, fought and died for, have +done as much to make us pessimists as any of the immovable abuses. Take +the question of Civil Service Reform, for instance. In the old days when +you wanted to induce a man to give you the benefit of his abilities and +influence during an election, you held out hopes of preferment, and he +took your word if he knew your word was good, and worked with a decent +sort of ambition--all things being relative. What happens now? Few find +anything promising or attractive in the competitive examination. You ask +a man--the professional politician he is now, sure enough--to help you +get your candidate, or yourself, in, and what happens? The gentleman +coolly demands, 'How much?' and holds out his hand. You fill it or he +turns his back and walks off. There is just that much less of good left +to appeal to in this particular brand of human nature. Ours is a much +more complicated civilization than yours, Mr. Gwynne. You were dealing +with Britishers only, in 1832. We are trying to digest the riffraff of +the world, and can't do it, in spite of such incorrigible optimists as +Judge Leslie. Immigrants in the first generation have just about as much +feeling for the American flag as a chicken has for Rosewater. They look +upon vote-selling as a legitimate way of improving their fortunes, and +they are the easy prey of such agitators as Colton, because they had +nothing in their own countries, and want the earth in this. Of course +their children go to the public schools, and become Americans, but we +always have the problem of fresh hordes to deal with. And new and +old--it is easy to plant the weevil in their brains that the rich have +corralled all the money, and the laborer--even in California, where he +gets the highest wages paid on this earth--is a miserable victim, and +entitled to all he doesn't make. They never remember that nearly every +capitalist in the country has risen from their own ranks, and that their +dreams are mainly occupied with doing the same. But you might as well +talk to the trade-winds, especially with such men as Tom Colton stirring +the caldron. 'Get rich quick; and selling votes is as good a starter as +any.' There you have the moral sickness of the country in a nutshell. +And few professions pay better than that of the politician. The pettiest +division leader, who does the Boss's dirtiest work, and has fewer +redeeming virtues than the midnight burglar, makes such a good thing out +of it that the prettiest Salvation Army lass couldn't convince him of +the error of his ways. And he enjoys himself. To hang around saloons, +prize-fights, help out shyster lawyers with their tricks, and play the +game hard during election times--that satisfies him until he sees a +chance of stepping into a bigger pair of boots of the same make. But, +thank God, there are more honest men out of politics than in. That is +the trouble, but there they are, and it will be a part of your business +to round them up. Well, I guess I've held forth long enough. I'll send +you round a few volumes from my Lincoln library to-morrow. I always go +to it when I lose my faith in human nature. Good-night." + +And he gathered up his long legs and went out. + + * * * * * + +In his many talks with his friends in San Francisco, Gwynne had received +practically the same suggestions. The lawyer who advised this group in +its necessarily intermittent campaign against the San Francisco +politicians was one of the ablest in the United States. He had offered +Gwynne a place in his office, a 'courtesy partnership,' when he was +ready to move to the city. But Gwynne deliberately remained undecided +for the present, although half inclined to practise in the country for +some years. If he could not have the inestimable education of the old +days, when lawyers jogged about the country with the circuit judges for +months at a time, he could at least get into close contact with the +plain people in a manner that in a city would be practically impossible. +Until the rains began, and after his definite understanding with Colton, +he had, during his hours of exercise, formed the habit of "dropping in" +upon the small farmers of his political district, under pretence of +asking their advice; gauging and sowing. Upon the men that had bought +land of him he was able to bestow many small favors, and his old +experience with the tenantry of Capheaton gave him an instinctive +knowledge of their wants that added to the sum of his popularity. To his +inferiors he had never shown the arrogance of his nature, and he +welcomed these small toilers as a substitute for his old tenants; for he +had missed the poor that kept the sympathies quick--and, perhaps, gave +richer shadows to life. + +His long lank American figure and slight resemblance to Hiram Otis, who +had been an institution if not a favorite, his readiness to stand drinks +to his farmer acquaintances, and others, whom he happened to meet in +Main Street, the approachableness he had cultivated with some effort, +combined with the subtle suggestion that he would not permit a liberty; +a characteristic that every true man respects; his reputation for being +"dead straight," and his insistence upon receiving his just dues--"all +that was coming to him"--in spite of the easy terms he made with several +to whom he sold land; all this, in addition to the dignity of being the +largest rancher in the county, and a law partner of Judge Leslie, had +quickly made him a marked as well as a popular figure. Even his accent +was unnoted in that State of many accents. + +He had thought out for himself all that Mr. Wheaton had suggested, and +if he still had his moments of depression and disgust, and even of +revolt, much of his old confidence was returning; although he sometimes +reflected, with a sort of whimsical bitterness, upon the difficulty of +sustaining an impression of innate greatness unaided by an occasional +demonstration. But he had, at least, learned to see people merely as +human beings without taking their shells into account; and he also +realized that in those storms of spirit, which, at the time, he had +deprecated as ebullitions from a too mercurial nature, he had developed +more rapidly and precisely than many a man does by the exterior +catastrophe. And impersonally his admiration for the land of one set of +forefathers grew, although personally he remained cold. But he +cultivated all sorts and conditions of men, and hopefully trained +himself for the enthusiastic moment. + +There were even times when, surrounded by his Rosewater friends, with +their lapses into quaint American speech and their intense localism, the +old Otis blood stirred in him very strongly; he caught himself using +phrases and figures that no doubt were an inheritance with his brain +cells. When the walls and furnishings of his room were obscured by +smoke, and there were half a dozen pairs of boots against his stove, it +was not difficult to fancy himself back in the old corner grocery on a +winter's night: his companions drinking apple cider, instead of rye +whiskey, and the orator of the moment sitting, by preference, on a +barrel, and munching crackers. + +In San Francisco, which he visited twice a week on his return from +Berkeley, when alone in the long sloping streets swept with the +wind-driven rain, when the gutters roared and the houses looked as +deserted as their huddled beaten gardens, stories Isabel had told him of +the days of the Argonauts rose like ghosts in his brain, and he would +suddenly experience an overwhelming sensation of being at home. His +mother promptly dispelled these visions. + +On the whole his time was too fully occupied to leave him more than +stray moments for the subtler mood; but as day after day, finally week +after week passed, with no prospect of fair weather, the monotony and +confinement affected his nerves, he tired of the unrelieved +companionship of men, and wished that Isabel would move in to Rosewater +for the winter months. He rang her up, when this brilliant idea occurred +to him, but was informed by Chuma that she was not in the house. On the +following day he telephoned again, and learned that she slept, on the +third that she was engaged in the delicate operation of extracting some +deleterious substance from the crop of a valuable hen. Whereupon he +swore vigorously, and vowed that he would forget her until the skies +cleared. But "the skies they were ashen and sober," and he caught +himself dreaming over his "Torts," or during one of Mr. Boutts's +ecstatic visions of Rosewater with a great hotel in the style of the old +Missions, and an electric railway. (Mr. Boutts, by-the-way, never +elevated his feet to the railing of the stove, but always sat on the +edge of his chair, a hand on either knee.) He took the train impulsively +to San Francisco, one afternoon, and talked of reinforced concrete with +his contractor, and San Francisco politics with Hofer. He even called +upon several young ladies, who interested him less than ever, and +returned to Rosewater at the end of four days with a sense of duties +neglected and a slip in his self-mastery. This put him in such a bad +humor that he directed his Asiatic to refuse him to the members of his +informal Club, and wished he were back in San Francisco doing the town +with Stone. + + + + +III + + +He was glowering into the open door of the stove and wondering why on +earth he had not remained in town over Sunday at least, when he became +aware that his noiseless Jap was standing at his elbow. + +"What is it?" he demanded, testily. "I wish you would get a pair of +creaky boots." + +"A gentleman," replied the impervious Oriental. + +"I told you I would not see anybody." + +"But he has a card." It was not often that the cool even tones of Imura +Kisabura Hinomoto fluctuated, but Gwynne detected a faint accent of +respect. Somewhat surprised himself, he glanced at the card. It bore the +name of one of the judges of one of the benches provided for by the +constitutions of both nation and State. He had a summer home on the +mountain opposite and relatives in Rosewater, so there was nothing +remarkable in his being in the little town on a rainy winter Sunday. +Nevertheless, Gwynne's instinct of caution, more active than usual +during the past year, stirred sharply. + +"Show him in," he said. "And bring the whiskey--both Rye and Scotch." + +This was the most perfect specimen of the bluff, hearty, breezy, almost +ingenuous Westerner that Gwynne had encountered. The judge, who had been +relieved of his hat and overcoat by the admirable Imura, advanced with +both hands outstretched, and Gwynne could do no less than surrender +his, although he had never fancied any one less. The judge was a big man +with a round jolly face, set with a sensual mouth, a pendulous nose, and +merry twinkling eyes. Although possibly no more than fifty-five years of +age, the baldness of his head had amplified the common noble domelike +American brow: behind which Gwynne had so often groped and found +nothing. This man was indubitably clever, and to a less educated eye +than Gwynne's his face would appeal and fascinate. His magnetism was +superlative. + +"My dear Mr. Gwynne!" he exclaimed. "Believe me when I say that this is +one of the most satisfactory moments of my life. I was forced to come to +this God-forsaken hole last night, and had it not been for you I should +have taken the morning train back to the city. But when I heard that you +were in town--you were pointed out to me as we both left the train--I +knew that my opportunity had come. And--my dear young gentleman--I throw +away no opportunities; I throw away no opportunities." + +By this time Gwynne had steered him into the largest of the chairs, and +offered him his choice of the whiskies. The judge, after an instant's +hesitation, accepted the Scotch; and Gwynne felt that he had a tactful +and dangerous man to deal with. + +"Excellent!" exclaimed the judge, and he smacked his lips. He inhaled +the aroma of the cigar voluptuously. "But my dear old friend, Judge +Leslie, whom I ran in to see for a few moments this morning, told +me--with his customary humor--that you were as remarkable for the +superior quality of your whiskey and tobacco as for the many personal +qualities that have so rapidly endeared you to the citizens of +Rosewater." + +"Thanks," said Gwynne. + +The judge changed his tactics instantly. "I cannot beat about in the +dark and merely turn myself loose in pleasant generalities, Mr. Gwynne," +he said, gravely. "I am going to tell you at once that I am positive you +are Elton Gwynne. Judge Leslie would give me no satisfaction this +morning, but I needed none. I happened to be employed in old Colton's +bank in my younger days--as secretary--and although that was a long time +ago--a long time ago!--it came back to me, when I began to hear so much +about our new rancher, that his full name was John Elton Cecil Gwynne, +and that he was the only son of his mother. Or--if impressions are +confused after so long an interval--I may have gathered the last fact +from James Otis, whom I knew very well. He and Hi, indeed, I may +honestly say, were among my few intimate friends, despite some disparity +in years. So, I have a double interest and, I modestly hope, claim upon +you. The former at least has been accentuated since yesterday, when your +likeness to Hi struck me very painfully. You are a vast improvement, I +grant, for Hi was as ugly as mud and as cross as two sticks, but the +resemblance is acute, odd as it may appear. Those things are very +subtle, very subtle." + +Gwynne had heard the keys of his secret weakness tinkle for a full bar, +but while it improved his humor it did not cloud his judgment, and he +applied himself to finding out the purpose of the man's visit. + +"I regret very much that I have come too late to know any of my male +relatives," he said, affably. "Hiram Otis, from all I hear, was an able +man, if somewhat soured, and his unfortunate brother one of the most +brilliant lawyers of his day. Terrible thing, this reckless drinking in +San Francisco. I was told yesterday that when--a few years ago--an +editor was sent out from New York to assume charge of one of your most +flourishing dailies, he made the entire staff go down to Los Gatos and +take the Keeley cure. Then, for a time, he had _relays_ of sober men, at +least, but until then he had felt himself a lonely Philistine--besides +taking a hand in every department of the 'shop,' even setting type at +times. But it's a fascinating old town, all the same. Too fascinating, I +fear." And he managed to fetch a remorseful sigh. + +The judge, who had laughed heartily at the anecdote, dismissed his +twinkle for a moment, and looked at the young man with concern. + +"For God's sake," he said, softly, "don't tell me that you have +inherited that microbe." + +"Oh no, indeed!" said Gwynne, cheerfully. "I never could take to drink +now--a man's character is pretty well formed at thirty-two, I fancy, and +I scarcely ever touch spirits when alone--prefer the lighter wines. +Only, as San Francisco is so convivial, one naturally imbibes a good +deal, especially with friends addicted to the 'cocktail route'--and I am +afraid I shall have to give up the city for the present and stick to +work." + +"The judge tells me that your legal powers are really amazing--that you +have accumulated more law in four months--" + +"Tut! Tut!" cried Gwynne, springing to his feet and reaching the table +in a stride. "Have some more whiskey, judge. And don't flatter me any +more. I am afraid that vanity is my besetting weakness--" + +"Thank God it is not the other!" said the older man, fervently. "And +vanity keeps the heart younger than anything I know of. Lose the power +of being tickled by a compliment and inflated by success, and you lose +the salt of life. But I am delighted that you have taken to the law. I +know your English career like a book, and although I do not pretend even +to guess at the motives which induced you to fling aside not only the +most promising career in England, but one of the noblest of her titles, +I may say, sir--and I may speak for my fellow-citizens, the whole +million of them--I am deeply flattered, and gratified, that, whatever +your motive, which could only be an honorable one, you have chosen this +fair State as the theatre of your future triumphs. I hope I shall see +you beside me on the bench--unless, to be sure, you have higher +ambitions than the mere practice of law." + +"The first men in the country have been lawyers," said Gwynne, politely. +"Why aspire higher?" + +"Why, indeed? But I think you will. The law frequently leads either to +one of the benches or into the more active field of politics. And +you--with your enormous energies--you will never be content with the +law, pure and simple, no matter how brilliant a reputation you might +achieve." + +"But honest lawyers are so rare!" exclaimed Gwynne, boyishly. "I do +believe I should be an honest one. That, at least, is the intention I +have set beside my ambition. I am ambitious, judge, as no doubt you have +divined, and the prospect of being shelved among the lords sickened me. +I wanted to make a career for myself, so cut the whole business and came +here where my American properties were. Besides, as it happened, I +inherited practically nothing with which to keep up my English estates. +There! You have my reasons, judge, and you are welcome to them. Titles +without money are mere embarrassments. Still, I really should have left, +had it been otherwise--I am certain I should. I never could stand the +inaction of the Upper House. Nor do I care for those compensatory honors +that my position and family influence might have secured for me. And now +I feel more the American every day. I have even grown keen on making +money--which I rather disdained at home; for the matter of that, thought +little about it. You may not know that I am--in partnership, as it were, +with my mother and cousin--putting up a large Class A building in San +Francisco?" + +He inferred that there was little about him the judge did not know, but +accepted the interested "Ah!" and rhapsodized over his new interests. +The Judge listened with a benignant smile and a twinkling eye, every +once in a while giving the tip of his long fleshy nose an abrupt shove, +as if it impeded his breathing. + +"Just so!" he exclaimed. "Just so! It is the Otis blood. No better +pioneer blood in the State. Jim was the wild one. The others were as +steady as rocks. Their father and grandfather--your ancestors, +sir--helped to make this great State what it is. Their names will always +be honored in the annals of California. Terrible pity Jim and Hi got +away with so much. If they'd hung on as your mother and her mother did, +Miss Isabel would be one of the heiresses. But she seems able to take +care of herself, and with that face and form, I guess she can redeem her +fortunes any way she chooses. I hear that young Harry Hofer can't talk +of anything else." + +Gwynne wondered if this were what the judge had come for, but +exonerated him, concluding that he was merely rambling on in the hope of +an opening. + +"No doubt!" he said, heartily. "Miss Otis could marry any one she +pleased. One of the best titles in England was hers for the asking, +by-the-way. But like myself she is too good an American--shall I say +Californian?--to live anywhere but here. She is immensely successful +with her chickens, and we shall all make money on this new deal--I am +certain of that." + +"No doubt, no doubt. Things are booming in San Francisco. You'll get a +huge rent from a building of that size--in time. Pity it has to be +divided among three of you. And there will be a big mortgage to pay off +first, I suppose; and it is in a very precarious district, a very +precarious district." And once more the twinkle retired and he gazed +dreamily at the fire. + +"Oh, even golden apples have to ripen. And I have taken every precaution +against fires. Have some more whiskey, Judge." + +"Don't care if I do." Gwynne knew that the Scotch scalded a throat +caressed these many years with the oily rye, and put as little seltzer +in it as he dared. But the judge sipped it heroically. Suddenly the +twinkle danced back to his eye as he turned it upon Gwynne. + +"You can't delude me!" he cried. "You can't, sir. I know you intend to +go in for politics. Nothing else would ever satisfy your genius. Own up, +now." + +"Well," said Gwynne, modestly. "I have thought of it. After my five +years are up, of course--makes one feel rather like a convict. Meanwhile +I can make some headway with the law: or, shall I say, build up a +reputation that may be useful to me when I am able to run for office." + +"Ah! Just so! Great pity you were ever discharged from your American +indigenate. Then one year in California would settle the matter. Which +of our parties makes the strongest appeal to you?" + +Gwynne's eyes had contracted and he was staring at the stove. But his +abstraction was too brief to be noticed, and he answered in a +confidential tone, "Well, Judge, to tell you the truth--" And then he +stopped and laughed. + +"I see. You think one is about as bad as the other." + +"Well, I am afraid that is it." + +"Oh, my boy, they're not nearly as bad as they are made out to be--our +American politics. Judge Leslie is dotty on that subject, and so are a +good many of the other old fossils of Rosewater. I don't say but that +San Francisco would be the better for a good spring cleaning, but the +State's not nearly so bad as it's painted, not nearly so bad as it's +painted." + +He delivered his repeated phrases with an unctuous indulgent roll that +made Gwynne long to grind his teeth. But the prospective American merely +raised an interrogative eyebrow. "I don't hear much good in any +direction," he murmured. + +"Of course, I can understand that you have seen through Tom Colton, and +that he has appalled you as much as the fossils. He's in a hurry, and if +he isn't mighty careful the machine will throw him down. For all his +affected simplicity he's too fond of the limelight: loves to see his +name in print; and when he makes a donation to a charity or an +improvement scheme he uses up all the fireworks in the State." + +"I was under the impression that he was in high favor with the district +Boss--" + +"The district Boss is getting old, and Tom, one way or another, has +acquired a great influence over him; but I happen to know that he +doesn't stand any too well with the State Democratic Boss." + +"If Tom were really earnest in his reforms, really had the interest of +the common people at heart--although I never saw common people so well +off in my life--but the point is that if Tom were really sincere he +might form an independent party." + +"Well, he can. It won't do him any good. It wouldn't do even you any +good to work up a reform party, and your abilities are to his as a +thousand to one. In fact a man like yourself would have far less chance. +They would let Tom amuse himself, but they would find you really +dangerous, and the upshot would be that the two parties would unite and +crush you. Crush you flat. You might be a George Washington, Alexander +Hamilton, and Abraham Lincoln rolled into one, and you would emerge from +the swift and simultaneous impact of those two cast-iron walls flatter +than the sole of your boot. Even if you made a good running on a reform +wave, so much the worse. Reform waves merely serve the purpose of making +some poor devil conspicuous and recklessly optimistic, then subside and +leave him high and dry--at the mercy of the ever-recuperating machine. +It's enough to make a man wish he'd never been born. I've seen it more +than once. There's only one of two results. They are either so disgusted +with politics that they stay out of them for the rest of their lives, or +they pick themselves up and make a bolt for the machine they think most +likely to give them a career. Look at some of our most illustrious +incumbents. Great bluff on the outside--which the machine don't mind +one little bit--and the best sort of a party man inside; walking a +chalked line with no rebellious wings on his feet. Wings don't grow on +clay. But they are right, Mr. Gwynne, and not because they are wrong, +either. In this great country organization is absolutely essential, and +in all vast complicated organizations some chicanery will creep in. But +take them all in all, American politics are not half as bad as they are +painted, not half as bad as they are painted." + +"Well, that is a relief. You certainly should know. But what of the +great corporations that rule this State--as well as the country? The +State Democratic or Republican Boss is president or treasurer of one of +them, is he not? I haven't taken the trouble to be very specific as yet. +My time is so far off. Of course I do not need to be told that +organizations, trusts, or whatever you like to call them, are +inevitable--because they are in the line of progress; and unabused, they +would be as much to the advancement of the individual as of the country. +But they have been abused, from all I can make out--quite shockingly. I +am taking the course on 'The Law of Corporations' at the University, +partly because I want to understand so vital a question as thoroughly as +possible--and partly--well--at least, I fancied I should--for a +time--for what money there might be in it--But really!" + +"Oh, I don't say that some trusts are not reprehensible, and the sooner +they are exposed the better. But they are sensational cases. The +majority of the great complex aggregations of capital are monuments to +American genius and progress; I am sure that if you waste any time on +the yellow press you know how to discount it. Some of even the best of +the trusts may have swollen to a size that renders them practically +unmanageable, as well as injudiciously provocative of much jealousy and +unrest. But the principle is sound, as you have admitted, and the great +law of adjustment will correct all that is undesirable, and in a very +few years. Meanwhile, get rich yourself, Mr. Gwynne. I'm delighted to +learn that corporation law has appealed to you so strongly, for the +money is there. I'm glad I came. I'd like to do one of your blood a good +turn, to say nothing of yourself. Perfect yourself in corporation law +and Leslie says you accumulate more rapidly than any hundred ordinarily +well-equipped men one might name--and I can put you in the way of +clearing a hundred thousand a year." + +"_Could_ you?" + +"Yes, sir. What the great corporations want, and want badly, even with +all the good legal talent they've got, is an attorney of extraordinary +abilities, and this you have. I understand that the legal luminary of +that reform set in San Francisco has offered to take you into his +office. That's about as great a compliment as even you could have, but +there's nothing in it. They're playing a losing game. They ought to win, +but they won't. The San Francisco Boss may be what we elegantly term a +shyster lawyer, but there never was as clever a one; and there's no +trick he doesn't know. He'll beat them at every turn. You'd only make +one more of that estimable Don Quixote band. Don't waste your youth. +Study corporation law with all your might and main, and _I'll_ place you +where you'll make a big income from the start--and it'll grow bigger +every year. Then when your turn comes to vote and run for office--why, +the whole field will be open to you to pick and choose from. +Corporations are not ungrateful, and with a mighty one behind you, I +guess you wouldn't whistle for anything, long." + +Gwynne regarded the thin sole of his house shoe with so rueful a +countenance that the judge laughed outright. "Have you really had +thoughts of working up a reform party?" he cried, the dancing imps in +his eyes almost escaping. + +"Well, I may have dreamed a bit that way. You see, I come of a family of +reformers." And he gave the judge a rapid sketch of the part his English +forefathers had played in the great reform acts of their country. The +judge nodded sympathetically. + +"Just so. I understand your point of view perfectly. Perfectly. But +those great movements in England are matched here by spasms only. This +country is too big and too heterogeneous. Don't set yourself between two +cast-iron walls, Mr. Gwynne, because when they do get a concerted move +on, they fly like hell. Join either of the parties, and you will find +not only that it is not half as bad as it is painted, but that it +accomplishes far more good than harm, many real reforms, that are +systematically ignored by the press." + +"I thought you said that reforms were impossible in this country." + +"Oh, bless my soul, no. That would mean that we were going straight to +the dogs. Reforms are going on every minute. The country is more +tolerable and civilized every decade. What I mean is that no reform can +be accomplished until the time is ripe for it. That is the reason why +our spasms amount to nothing. They are always premature. But if you +really want to do this country a service throw in your lot with the +regulars. You would always be an influence for good, and when you saw +the first opening for the correction of some crying abuse, you would +have powerful machinery at hand to work with. What you want to do, Mr. +Gwynne, is to become a powerful factor in the machine, not waste your +time on windmills." + +"Which machine?" asked Gwynne, ingenuously. "I don't fancy I could ever +make up my mind. They seem precisely alike to me." + +"Well," said the judge, slowly, although he brushed the tip of his nose +aside with more violence than usual. "I don't like advising, +particularly a young man of your distinguished abilities and +achievements. But I really think I am better able to advise you than +Leslie, and certainly every man of us should feel a sense of +responsibility to the old Otis--and Adams!--blood. I will say frankly +that in your place I should join the party that owns this State--and +shows no signs of letting go; in other words, the Republican. I can well +understand, that having been a Liberal--and to the extent of renouncing +your titles!--the Democratic would appeal to you. But don't waste your +time, Mr. Gwynne. You are thirty-two. You don't want to throw away the +next ten years on a losing game, and then, tired out, arrive nowhere. +You would fight so hard that all your energies would be second-rate by +that time. You want to begin right now and swim with the tide. Nurse +your great energies for the exactions of the victorious career. You'll +need them. And need them fresh." + +"That sounds like good advice, but the whole political game appals me +when I consider that it will be six years before I can even run for the +House of Representatives--" + +"True! True! Pity your parents didn't lose you. But everything turns +out for the best. Meanwhile, you can make name and fortune as a +corporation lawyer. And you can't have too much money in this world, +sir. You can't have too much money in this world." + +It was on the tip of Gwynne's tongue to ask him bluntly what corporation +he had in mind, but not only did his already boiling humor recoil from +the indignity of a deliberately worded bribe, but he doubted if it would +be proffered so early in the game. He had a very clever man to deal +with; it was not likely he would make the mistake of a direct approach. +Gwynne flattered himself that he looked as ingenuous as Tom Colton, but +as he had seen through the complacent judge, it was possible that the +judge might entertain suspicions of a man with his reputation. He was +glad he had not spoken when his visitor rose abruptly to his feet. + +"Bless my soul!" he exclaimed. "I shall miss my train if I don't hurry. +And heaven forbid that I spend another night in this mud-hole. My +address is on my card--when do you come down again?" + +"There is a lecture at Berkeley on Wednesday--" + +"Good! Now, you will dine with me next Wednesday night--and I hope on +many other nights. We must have several long talks--and all about your +future, young man. I am too old to talk about my own, but I remember +what I was at your age. Tactful, hey? But no," dropping his voice +gravely. "I want to help you. And I can. Whatever branch of the law you +specialize upon, you must leave Rosewater and come to San Francisco. I +can place you in an office--even should you decide upon general +practice--that will carry you swifter and further than our reform friend +can, because he is playing a losing game--a losing game, sir. But we'll +talk of all that later. I must hasten." + +Gwynne escorted him to the head of the staircase, where he resisted an +impulse to kick him down, then, after a hasty glance into the +dictionary, encased himself in rubber and went up the hill to the home +of Judge Leslie. He was to dine there, and it was but a quarter-past +four, but what he had to say and ask would not keep for an hour and +three-quarters. + + + + +IV + + +On his way to the house he decided that he could not confide even to +Judge Leslie that he had been singled out as likely spoil by the +"grafters." No doubt that in a way it was a compliment to his abilities, +this early-conceived determination to whisk him out of the reform field +and engross his abilities, killing two birds with one stone. Probably he +would be approached in a similar manner very often, until he became a +definite quantity, and in time would grow accustomed to it; and callous. +But at present he was hot and sickened, the more so as he felt that he +had received a new impulse to believe in himself. These vast +corporations--the railroad, street railways, lighting, and telephone +companies, were the ones that dictated to San Francisco, and were +supposed to have debauched the Board of Supervisors, all of them small +laborers, elevated by the Boss to serve his ends--counted their capital +by the millions; in one case, at least, by the hundred million. They had +already bought much of the best talent in the country, and they wasted +no time on the second-rate. Gwynne could easily guess in whose teeming +and orderly brain the scheme to seduce and attach himself had been +shaped, and, with the American contempt for the perspicacity of any +foreigner, had selected this judge, with his breezy direct tactful +manner, as certain to edge the newcomer into the fold. To Gwynne the +only saving grace in the whole interview was that he had not been +tempted. Had he been he should have felt utterly demoralized, disposed +to take himself at the valuation of the business-like unsentimental +brains in power. + +He found his judge awakening from a nap before his library fire and +dusting the crumbs from his beard. + +"This is an unexpected pleasure," the old gentleman began, then stopped +short. "What is the matter?" he asked, anxiously. "Sit down." + +"What does indigenate mean?" + +"Why--a purely technical term for citizenship." + +"A friend of yours called upon me to-day, on the strength of having +known the Otises, and remarked that it was a pity I was ever discharged +from my American indigenate." + +"That you renounced American citizenship upon coming of age. It is a +pity." + +"But I remember doing no such thing. I did no such thing. I certainly +should remember it." + +"You mean that you made no formal act of renunciation of your American +birthright, obtained no certificate of British nationality?" + +"I did nothing of the sort. It is possible that my father did it for +me--" + +"Your father could do nothing." Judge Leslie was staring at him. +Suddenly he laughed. "You _are_ British! I am almost inclined to believe +you hopeless. How did I get the impression that you had formally +expatriated yourself? From Isabel, who, no doubt, woman-like, jumped at +the conclusion--having known you when you were more British still. And +you never brought up the subject--" + +"Don't regard me as wholly an idiot. I read the Constitution of the +United States half a dozen times while making up my mind to come here, +and it is not likely that Article XIV.--'All persons born in the United +States, etc., are citizens of the United States, etc.'--escaped me. I +consulted my solicitor, and he read me from some chapter on +Expatriation, as plainly as may be, that the forfeiture of native +citizenship was accomplished not only by a formal act of renunciation, +but followed a long severance with the relations of the government under +which the person was born, or--acceptance of service under a foreign +government. Considering that I had left the United States when I was +five weeks old, and had fought and bled for Great Britain, besides +serving in her Parliament--where, of course I took my oath of +allegiance--and that I had been an Englishman to every possible intent +and purpose, even wearing my titles for some weeks, it seemed to me--and +to my solicitor--that I would have rather a hard time obtaining an +American passport." + +The judge nodded. "Quite right. All the same, I can't understand why +your father did not bring the question up when you attained your +majority, or why you, an ardent Britisher, did not think of it +yourself." + +"You would understand if you lived among us for a few years. In the +first place my being born in the United States was such a mere incident +that it was rarely mentioned, and then in the most casual manner. I +don't suppose my mother ever volunteered a piece of information in her +life, and my father rarely gave a thought to any matter but sport. My +grandfather probably disliked the idea--he detested America--at all +events he never alluded to the subject, and was far too British to dream +that the child of British parents could be other than British were he +born in heaven itself. I don't think the matter had entered my mind for +ten years, when the subject came up the first night of Isabel's visit to +Capheaton--and I stupefied every one by announcing that I had been born +in America; but otherwise it made no impression upon them. It is quite +possible that had there been any prospect of my becoming the heir, when +I reached my majority, some member of the family would have recalled the +fact of my birthplace; but Zeal was well then, his wife was bearing +children rapidly, there was every reason to suppose she would have half +a dozen boys. Do you mean to say that I have never been an Englishman?" + +"Oh, you are all right as far as the British law goes. And you were a +good and bona fide British subject for thirty years. Don't feel any +discouragement on that score." + +"Then am I an American citizen? Is there to be no long period of waiting +and of comparative inaction?" + +"I am not so sure. There is no provision of the Constitution so open to +various construction. And none has been so variously construed. I could +cite a hundred instances--that is, I could read them to you to-morrow. +But I recall two, and they are fair samples. One child, born in the +United States, of French parents, returned to France, and after serving +his term in the French army wished to become an American citizen, and +obtained his passport without difficulty. A full-grown American citizen +went to Mexico and fought for Maximilian, and lost not only his own +citizenship, but that of his children, who had been born in the United +States. There you are, and there you are again, as dear old Dickens +would say. But I must think a minute." He transferred his gaze to the +coals, and was silent for a few moments. + +"There is a pretty strong case on both sides," he resumed, in a musing +tone. "You left this country when an infant, you practically forgot it, +you entered the service of Great Britain heart and soul, and achieved +high distinction. You inherited a title and wore it as a matter of +course. For thirty years you never set foot on American soil, nor at any +time demanded the protection of the United States, as you might easily +have done in your foreign wanderings. There is hardly a doubt that if +England had gone to war with us at any time during the last ten years +and needed your services you would have given them. However, that +contingency did not arise, so let it pass. But with an unsympathetic +State Department and an active enemy or two, all the other points cited +would make up as clear a case of voluntary expatriation as any on +record. But there is a pretty good balance on the other side. You _were_ +born in the United States, you _did not_ renounce at any time your +allegiance, you have the blood of two Presidents in your veins, +and--here is the important point: you have been one of the heaviest +tax-payers in California for thirty-two years. Now, as I have intimated, +these expatriation cases have all been decided on their individual +merits. I should advise you to go at once to Washington, and enlist the +influence of the British Ambassador to get you personal and private +interviews with the powers that be. Then plead your own case. One of two +things will happen. Either there will be much hemming and hawing, and +much virtuous and judicial weighing of your peculiar case, article by +article, or the President himself will decide one way or another +off-hand--he being what he is. For that reason I think it would be well +to approach him by degrees, let him digest it a bit. He may be delighted +that you have thrown over your titles and your brilliant and promising +career to become an American citizen, invite you to take the oath of +allegiance forthwith, and order the State Department to issue a +passport. On the other hand he may fly off at a tangent and be +righteously indignant that a man with the blood of the Otises and +Adamses in him, who had the good-fortune to be born on American soil, +hesitated a moment after reaching man's estate--more particularly that +he never gave the matter a thought. Nothing could be more problematical. +I wouldn't bet a twenty-dollar gold piece either way. But, I repeat, you +must go yourself. Otherwise the affair would hang on interminably. +Moreover, you must tell no one the object of your journey. Tom Colton +would pull every wire within his reach, and he is no mean rival, to +postpone your admission to citizenship, and so, I fancy, would others." + +He shot a keen glance at Gwynne. "I think I know who your visitor was, +to-day, and what he came to Rosewater for. That speech of yours, and its +effect on the crowd, never escaped the attention of the party bosses, +and of course you are a marked man in this small community--to say +nothing of your intimacy with the reform set in town. The judge, who +started somewhere in this neighborhood as a poor boy, rose from various +minor situations to be the secretary of Colton's bank, saved his dimes +and studied law. So far so good; the average self-made American. The law +leads a good many of us into politics and it wasn't long leading him. He +was an invaluable party man, with that bluff honest exterior, that +superabundant magnetism, and that twinkling eye. The world always +associates a fine upright nature with a twinkling eye. I have one myself +and I believe that is the main reason why I have always been afraid to +do wrong. Well, our friend got the bench when he wanted it, and he has +been a mighty good friend to the corporation that put him there. And it +has done well by him. He owns a fine house in San Francisco, entertains, +goes into the best society, has visited Europe several times, and, +although he is now rising sixty, continues to fool all but a few. He +might climb higher and become a United States Senator, but the +corporation finds him too useful here. He rather resents that, but they +make the sacrifice worth his while. I can well conceive they have +spotted you, and you may be sure there is little about you they don't +know. Of course they have made up their minds you are erratic, and have +not the least doubt that they can manipulate that loose screw. They have +bought thousands, these ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- +---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- (it was not often the judge swore, but +when he did he took some time). Grafters, that are debauching the +country and will soon make it impossible for an honest man to live; and +although they will no doubt have the grace to approach you with less +brutal directness than commonly, I knew that was what they were after +the moment that old rascal began to talk to me this morning. He never +fooled me. Well, we'll fool him. You go to Washington and get your +passport, and if you can't hasten matters don't let an outsider know +what you are after. Plunge into society and let them think you need a +change from California. Of course you will give your real name. Cat's +out, anyhow. Perhaps they will think you are on your way home to +England. Flirt with the girls and be a frivolous young blood. The judge +asked you to dinner, I suppose? I thought so. You would meet more than +the judge; if not the first time, then the second and third. Write him a +note, telling him you are obliged to go south to take a look at your +mother's ranch. Then obey a sudden impulse and go East by the southern +route. In Washington be seen as much with your ambassador as possible. I +don't think these rascals will suspect, for they take for granted that +you were duly 'discharged from your American indigenate'--I can hear +him! If they did there would be the devil to pay, but I don't think they +will. However, don't waste any time." + +Gwynne was staring at the fire, his inner being chaos, but he replied in +a moment that he would start for Washington on the following day. + + + + +V + + +There had been no stormier night during the winter. Isabel's old house +creaked and rattled and groaned like a ship in a whole gale, and the +wind sent great waves of rain along the veranda. A northern window had +been blown in and hastily patched. Although but nine o'clock the sky was +as black as midnight. For several days there had been merely a quiet +steady fall, but during the afternoon the northern rain belt had sent +down another great storm and it had been rising ever since. + +Isabel, unable to go out, had washed her hair, and was still sitting on +the hearth-rug, drying it, when she heard a shout outside, then the slam +of a door at the back of the house, and voices in the kitchen. She was +too warm and comfortable to be interested. If it were a tramp he was +welcome to the shelter of the house; if a burglar there were two men to +dispose of him, and her jewels were in a safe-deposit box in San +Francisco. She loved a storm and had given herself up to one of those +moods of pure delight in the present moment, although she had been in +anything but a good-humor of late, and solitude had palled. But a raging +storm, the sense of the absolute dominance of nature and the littleness +of man, always exalted her. She knew that the old house was secure on +its foundations, and, but that she loved comfort and warmth, she would +have liked to be out on the marsh in a boat; tense with the +difficulties of keeping the channel and avoiding the shoals and +mud-banks obliterated by the risen waters. It amused her to imagine +herself out there, while dwelling pleasurably, in a doubled +consciousness, upon the warm red tints of her room. Her dreams were +barely disturbed by the unknown interloper, but they were shattered a +moment later by Gwynne's voice and rapid step in the hall. + +She had intended to greet him with a cool hauteur after his neglect of +nearly a month, but she could not rise in time; and, enveloped in a mass +of hair, spread over a yard of the floor, it was impossible to be +dignified. So she resolved to be charming. + +"I had to come in the back way like a tramp and leave my oil-skins in +the kitchen," he announced, abruptly, as he entered. "Don't get up. I +have always wanted to see your hair down. So did Jimmy, I remember. Did +he?" + +"Certainly not. Neither would you if you had not chosen such an +extraordinary time to call. I am delighted to see you once more after +all these years, but--what on earth possessed you?" His eyes were +glittering, although he had dropped his lids, and he did not sit down, +but moved restlessly about the room. + +"Your mother is much better," said Isabel, tentatively. + +"Oh yes, and she is looking forward to her motor trip, and telephoned +this morning that her room was a mass of flowers. I fancy she is a bit +touched by so much kindness, for she has not been half decent to any one +but the Trennahans." + +"Does she say anything about returning to England? She had it in +mind--just after the earthquake." + +"She has made one or two casual allusions to her return, but she never +plans far ahead--does what takes her fancy at the moment. But this life +will never suit her. I imagine she will go before long. London is in her +blood. Now that she can live properly--will have all she can, or ought +to want, when the building is paying, there is no object in her +remaining here." + +"How goes the building?" + +"How can anything go in this infernal weather? The old shanties are +down, and the contractor had a sort of tent erected and has done some +work on the foundations. I should have come directly to California if I +had had any idea of the money to be made by selling off my superfluous +land and putting up that building. It might be finished, by this time. +Why didn't you tell me?" + +"I am only remodelling my own brain on business lines by slow degrees, +and no echo of this building fever reached me in Europe. You will +remember that I did write, while you were wandering about America, that +Mr. Colton suggested it for both of us. If I did not dwell on the +subject it was because I had a feminine horror of the mortgage--and no +idea that you were so keen on making money." + +"I am thinking principally of my mother. When a woman has always had the +world I doubt if she can live long out of it. San Francisco is all very +well for the young and adventurous, and for those with a strong sense of +the picturesque, but I can imagine that to a woman of her age and +experience----Do you know--" he burst out. "I don't know where I am. +What an extraordinary thing heredity is! I doubt if most people, +although they would call that a platitude, realize that heredity is +anything more than a telling word. There are times when I am sitting at +my stove, surrounded by all those typical American men, who seldom +mention a subject but politics and farming--for I tabu chickens--or the +intensely local interests, more or less affected by politics,--there are +times when I actually feel the nameless ambitious young fellow--not born +in a log-cabin, perhaps, but next door to it--and endowed with that keen +compact pioneer determination to stride straight to my goal, whether it +is the White House or--well--the Presidency of a Trust Company. I +forget--good God!--_Are_ those years behind me in England? I have caught +myself wishing that I had kept a scrap-book like other idiots. It +escapes my memory altogether at times, that I have but to take a steamer +out of New York to reach the top of civilization again in less than a +week." + +"Perhaps it suggests itself when you remember that with the income you +can command before long, life in England will be more worth while." + +"That was as nasty a one as you ever gave me! No one knows better than +yourself what brought me to America, and that those conditions cannot be +altered by money. Could I not have had Julia Kaye's fortune? You need +not be nasty again! You forget that not only was I in love with her--or +thought I was--but could have given her the equivalent. She would be the +last to claim that she was to pay too high a price, even with me thrown +in. If you don't beg my pardon I'll leave the house." + +"I beg your pardon," said Isabel, hastily. She was thrilled with +curiosity; she had never seen him so nearly excited, with the exception +of one memorable and painful moment. She fancied that she could see one +of the barriers between them sway. + +"It may be that this sudden prospect of wealth, or rather of a goodish +income that would enable me to keep up a decent establishment in town, +and a bit of a place somewhere in the hunting country, has upset my +equilibrium, but it occurred to me this morning as I was splashing +through the mud--I had to go out to the ranch--in fact it came over me +with such a rush that I felt like Don Quixote, and every landmark looked +like a windmill--what is England to-day but the very apex of +civilization? The Mecca, the reward, of every man and woman with the +breeding and the intelligence to appreciate it? The best of everything +goes there, you have but to turn round to help yourself to an infinite +variety--to be found piecemeal everywhere else on earth. And the very +best is mine, by inheritance and personal effort. Why in thunder am I +out here on this ragged edge of civilization struggling with almost +primitive conditions?--elemental badness, sure enough! What is my +object? Merely to bring about a set of conditions that exists in England +to-day. I have them there. Why am I wading into filth up to my knees, +for the sake of an alien race, when they are mine already?" + +"But you had too full a measure. That was the reason you emptied the cup +and turned your back. You wanted hard work--to use your gifts." + +"What does it all amount to? Suppose I insidiously work up a reform +movement in this State, and am shot into Congress over the head of the +machine? Suppose my gifts are as extraordinary as I have been led to +suppose--ordinarily a man feels damned commonplace--and by force of +those gifts I hold my own against the formidable organizations I shall +encounter there at every turn? Suppose this reform spirit in the United +States grows and strengthens, and I come along in time to benefit by it, +and am landed in Washington--even in the White House? What of it? I had +a thousand times rather be prime-minister in England--in other words the +real head of eleven million square miles of the earth's surface, +dictator to a good part of the world, for that matter. Your public men +are servants--or ought to be, according to your Constitution. In England +we render service by courtesy, and rule the roost. In this country every +man in public life is not only at the mercy of his constituents, but in +daily terror of having his head cut off by the man above him. Even the +President has to be a politician above all things." + +"You used to talk in England--as if you were not wholly swayed by +personal ambition." + +"It is not so difficult over there to conceive high and mighty +ideals--fool yourself, if you like. But I'll be hanged if I can see +myself baring my breast for poisoned arrows, with a seraphic smile on my +lips, over here! It is all so crude! I want to be a main instrument in +reform as much as ever--Oh yes! But I am not sure that one motive is +not to make the life and the game more tolerable. And the everlasting +machine! There won't be a day, inside or out of it, that I won't run up +against every damnable meanness that human nature is capable of. I must +handle these men, placate them--or get out. History has not yet failed +to repeat itself. If I succeed, in favoring conditions, in forming a new +party, I may end as a boss myself! Exalted ideal! Inspiring thought! +Better go home and live like a gentleman. I could have some sort of a +career, and I have seen enough in this country to drive me towards the +conclusion that there are worse things in life than curbing one's +youthful ambitions a bit." + +He was still striding up and down the room, his expressive hands as +restless as his feet. The color was in his face and his eyes were +blazing. There was a curious magnetism about him that Isabel had never +been sensible of before, although she had heard much of it in England. +It was as if his spirit were fully awake; at other times he appeared to +live with his cool critical brain only, while his inner self, with its +intense slow passions, slept. She wisely made no comment, and after +shoving the books violently about the table he went on: + +"You may argue that if public men were elected directly by the people +and the President held office for one term of ten or fifteen years only, +that a long stride would be made towards the millennium. But it is +doubtful if even then, forty or fifty different tribes--for that is what +your State and territory lines effect--could be managed without +machinery, and machinery develops the lowest attributes in human nature. +I saw enough of that in the few rotten boroughs we have left in England, +but my imagination never worked towards the full and original +development in this country. We have other faults; the serenest optimist +would never deny them; but, faults or no faults, we crown civilization +to-day. The richest man in America has not the least idea what it means +to live like a gentleman in our sense. And there is no flaw in my +appreciation of your country. In many respects it is the most +marvellous the world has known--but--I sometimes wonder if the pioneer +blood in my veins is red enough to stand it. No matter what the most +successful reformers accomplish, there will be no high civilization here +in our time--no background. Unconsciously, or otherwise, I shall always +have the goal of England in my mind--and if that is the case, why am I +here? Isn't civilization the highest that man is capable of +accomplishing, the best that Earth has to offer any of us? What sense is +there in going back to the beginnings and plodding or fighting towards a +goal you were born to? It's more than once I've felt like Don Quixote. +The whole infernal country is a windmill--and a large percentage of its +inhabitants are windbags." + +"Of course you have a streak of Don Quixote in you. All men of genius +have, I suppose. You felt that you had a mission--to pack a great deal +into a convenient phrase. You could do nothing in England but sit down +and sup with the elect. You would have choked very quickly. And if you +went back you would not stay. You would not only be bored, but you know +now how badly this country needs one disinterested man of genius." + +"I am not disinterested. I never felt more selfish in my life." + +"You have an immense capacity for disinterested statesmanship. Of course +all motives, especially with the highly gifted, are complex. You have +said yourself they would be fanatics otherwise. And you are far more +American than you know, although you have just confessed that you do +know it well enough at times. All your American ancestors may be living +again in you. It was your own instinct, no influence of mine, that sent +you out here, filled with mixed but high ambitions. No full-blooded +Englishman would ever do what you have done. Insanity and inebriety skip +a generation. Why not Americanism? Heaven knows there is nothing +American about your mother. And when the political cleanup comes, as it +is bound to--" + +"Oh, I am sick of this everlasting optimism: 'Everything is bound to +come out all right,' 'God's own country,' and all the rest of it. I can +understand it well enough out here, though. It is a wonder to me that +any Californian has energy enough to care. Life is easy at the worst. +The scoundrels batten unnoticed--although they are sending up the price +of everything; and the most ungrateful and rapacious labor class on +earth never get their deserts. The labor class hasn't a leg to stand on, +so far as bare justice goes. Pity they can't have a taste of Eastern +factories and wages and climate for a while. If it were not for its bay +and the tremendous significance of its position opposite the Orient, +California would be what it ought to be, the pleasure gardens of the +world. No politics, no labor-unions, merely a succession of estates, big +and little, where a man could live a happy animal existence for +one-third of the year, after working the other two-thirds--that is a +sane division. But if I stay here I work. And for what ultimate object? +England, as sure as fate." + +"You cannot possibly tell how you will feel twenty years hence--" + +"Twenty years! That is a fair estimate, no doubt! I believe that the +real secret of discontent has been the prospect of this cursed period of +inaction. Nice substitute--coruscating as a blooming barrister; and it's +mighty difficult to travel along for four years without showing your +hand. It requires a tact that I may or may not have. If I have it, there +may be other depths of hideous guile, as yet undiscovered. I have had +glimpses of them already. All these farmers that I am nursing? What if +my beneficent virus works too quickly--before I can represent them? Some +other fellow reaps the benefit; and when my turn comes, likely as not +there will be a reaction. I've to keep and increase my hold on these men +of every nationality under the sun, as well as upon the seasoned old +Americans, lest they should break away from me. Nice job I've cut out." +He hesitated a moment, but added: "Beastly idea to subject all to the +same law. It should be ten years for immigrants, and one for the +man-of-the-world anxious to take the oath of allegiance--not that I am +frantic to take it." + +"I never knew any one so keen for obstacles; and now that you have found +more than you bargained for--" + +"It's not the obstacles that daunt me. If I were only sure of +accomplishing any result worth while, if I had the materials to work +on--if I were sure I cared! The American is an unhatched Englishman, but +he won't be hatched out in my time----I even long for the close compact +drama of English life. Everything is spread over such a vast loose +surface here. These four years through which I may--must stumble along +with my hands tied, are a fair example. And it seems to me that I never +go to bed without seeing a face on the dark trying to enunciate: 'What +for?' 'Why?'" + +He sat down suddenly on a chair in front of her and took his head in his +hands. "Do you ever ask yourself those questions?" he demanded, +abruptly. + +Isabel nodded. He noted absently that she looked like an elf with her +face half-hidden by her hair, and that he could see but one little black +mole, but a narrow ring of blue about the dilated pupils of her eyes, +the tiny dimple at the corner of her mouth. She wore a loose blue +wrapper, and the wood fire leaped in high flames behind her. The storm +was terrific. He suddenly realized that this was the only homelike room +he knew outside of England. He felt as if nothing would ever give him +peace again, but he was suddenly and overwhelmingly glad to be +there--and comfortably alone with Isabel on this raging night. He stared +at her until his own pupils dilated, but she replied more tranquilly +than she felt. + +"_Cui bono_ is the motto on Earth's coat of arms. The only thing that +saves us is that we don't see it all the time. There are long intervals +in which we eat and sleep and dance and love and play at politics and +enjoy the storm--and our best companions." + +"We certainly are not here to spend our lives preparing for another +world. Otherwise there would be no sense in the complexities of +civilizations. A man could do that much in a cave. It is merely the +diabolism of instinct that prompts the young to believe that the race is +all. Certainly love is not the only source of happiness. I have been +ecstatically happy when writing--thinking, in the fever of composition +that I was dashing out the finest thing in literature. I have been happy +under fire, or excited enough to think so. And I have felt enough +exultation with exaltation to make happiness when I have been on a +platform and carried a hostile crowd off its head and to my feet. If two +people were indescribably mated--I don't know--" + +"Why not deliberately accept the doctrine that there is a purpose, even +if you are not permitted to read the riddle of life--" + +"All very well, but what have politics to do with it? You may answer +that a man should lay up all the credits he can, and that he can +possibly get more by cleaning out the political trough than in any other +way. If those are my lines I suppose I shall work along them, but my +higher faculties whisper that to live this life on the intellectual +plane, fighting for your country when necessary, is the rational +existence for those that have the luck to be born to the good things of +the old civilizations. Here they don't know any better, or if they do +they can't help themselves. If that plane isn't meant to live on, why is +it there? Has a man the right deliberately to step off the high plane +upon which a long succession of circumstances have planted him--pull up +his roots and plant them in a virgin soil?" + +"Perhaps it is his duty to go where he is most needed--where his riper +instincts and experience--" + +"Your arguments are always good, otherwise I should not be here arguing +with you. What do you really think of love?" + +She jumped with the suddeness of the attack, and then drew backward a +little, for he was leaning towards her and she felt his masculine +magnetism as she had never done before. It pulled and repelled her, +fascinated and filled her with resentment. And she was fully alive to +the romantic conditions, the wild night, the isolation, the vibrating +atmosphere. But she replied, soberly: + +"I don't think about it. I buried all that--" + +"Chuck it on the dust-heap! It served its purpose: women should have +some such experience in their first youth as men have others. You are +the better for it, because you worked off on the poor devil all the +morbid and ultra-romantic tendencies that were spoiling your life. But +let it go at that. It was no more love than my first Byronic madness for +one of my mother's friends when I was sixteen--" + +"You were thirty when you were in love with Mrs. Kaye. And she was not +even your second--nor your tenth, no doubt." + +"Quite right. I do not understand and shall waste no time on the effort. +All men run pretty much the same gamut. That attack was the most +commonplace sort of passion, no madness in it, no idealization, no sense +of mating--" + +"And how, may I ask, do you expect to know when you really do fall in +love--" + +"I'll know, all right. I wish you would put up your hair. You look +uncanny, not like a woman at all. You have too many sides. I like you +when you are human and normal." + +"If you think my hair in its proper place will accomplish that +result--my hair-pins are up-stairs on my dressing-table--" + +He disappeared instantly. When he returned she was standing and coiling +her hair about her head. Her sleeves were loose and the attitude bared +her arms. As Gwynne handed her the pins, one by one, he stared, +fascinated; but when she had finished and shaken down her sleeves, +returning his stare with two polar stars, he turned his back suddenly +and resumed his tramp of the room. + +"I have changed my mind," he said, abruptly. "I had intended to marry +you on any terms, merely because you suited my critical taste. But I +believe that if I married you in that way I should beat you or kill +you--or you would kill me. You are capable of anything. Love would +square matters with us--nothing else." + +"Then is the engagement broken?" asked Isabel, placidly. She did not sit +down, but stood with a foot on the fender. + +He relieved his feelings by kicking a stool across the room, then came +and stood in front of her. + +"Could you love me?" he demanded. + +"I am not the village prophet." + +"Have you made up your mind you will not marry me?" + +"Oh yes--that." + +"Because you couldn't love me, or because you are determined not to +marry?" + +"I won't feel and suffer and have my life torn to tatters when I can +keep it whole! I had rather marry you without love, if I believed myself +indispensable to your success in life." + +"Much you know about it. I won't have you on any such terms." + +"You are in no imminent danger. Heavens, what a wind! You must stay here +to-night. If the spare room is too cold you can sleep on this divan." + +"If that is a polite hint, I am ready to take it. I have been here long +enough." + +"Oh, but I mean it. I will not hear of you riding back in this pitch +darkness. You would be more likely to go into the marsh than not. You +can return to Rosewater so late to-morrow that Sister Ann will infer you +have made a morning call." + +"I shall return to-night. It was as dark when I came, and I am not +altogether a fool. Neither is my horse." + +"But you are not so familiar with the road," murmured Isabel, +irrepressibly. + +"That is the one decent thing you have said to me to-night. It is these +sudden lapses into the wholly feminine that save me from despair. What a +night for romance, and you and I sparring like two prize-fighters! That +is as far as we have ever got. If you would ever let me know +you--sometimes I have an odd fancy that I can see a lamp burning in your +breast, and that if ever I got at it, and searched all the nooks and +crannies of your strange nature by its light, I should love you as +profoundly as it is possible for a man to love a woman." + +"I am afraid it is only a taper in a cup of oil. At all events it is not +a search-light, even to myself. I fancy people only seem complicated to +others when they do not wholly understand themselves." + +"Do you understand yourself?" + +She shrugged her shoulders. + +"Are you perfectly satisfied that you never could love me?" + +She reddened and her sensitive mouth moved, but she brought her teeth +together. "That has nothing to do with it." + +"Everything!" + +"Nothing!" + +"Do you mean to tell me that you are literally contented with your life +as it is?--living out here alone with nothing to do but read and look +after those confounded chickens? You have the most romantic temperament +I have ever met, and the way you gratify it would make an elephant +laugh." + +"I dream and think of the future." + +"Future? You saw what that amounted to when you were in town--" + +"I have shaken off the impression. It must have been that I had too much +at once--and the purely frivolous, which offended my puritanical +streak--" + +"You don't like the Bohemian crowd any better." + +"There are plenty of others. When I am ready I shall make the plunge and +forbid myself to shrink from realities--" + +"And the only people that will interest you will be those deep in public +affairs. A woman to be a political power must be married. Otherwise she +becomes the worst sort of feminine intriguer." + +"I am interested in the women that are interested in the improvement of +all things." + +"And what is their ultimate aim, for heaven's sake? The franchise. Do +you mean to tell me that you intend to become a Club woman? I had sooner +you wrote a book." + +"I have no intention of doing either--" + +"In other words you are a plain dreamer, and a selfish one at that--" + +"I try not to be selfish. I visit no ill-humor on any one--but you!--and +I do good where I can. I should be more selfish if I ran the risk of +making--some man unhappy in matrimony." + +"Well, I'm sick of the subject. I came to say good-bye for a time. I'm +off to the south to-morrow, and then east on business. I don't know when +I shall be back--Oh, you can turn white--I can make you turn white!" + +"What do you expect when you fire such a piece of news at me? What is +behind this?" + +"I have told you enough." + +"Don't you trust me?" + +"Oh, you can keep a secret. I don't know that I want to tell you." + +"Very well." + +"Oh, well, it would be beastly ungrateful in me not to. I have had a +hint that, not having de-Americanized myself formally when I came of +age, I may still be an American citizen. Judge Leslie has advised me to +go to Washington and find out, and I am going. Are you really so +interested?" + +"Oh yes," said Isabel, softly. "I am interested! I have been afraid you +might become discouraged and disgusted. Four more years would be a long +time. Are you glad?" + +"I don't know whether I am or not. When it comes to taking the oath of +allegiance to the United States--if that is sprung on me in +Washington--I shall feel more like taking the next steamer for England +and making my oaths there. It is a little too sudden." + +"All this hesitation and doubt are natural enough until you are settled +down, and become too accustomed to the country to think of anything +else--" + +"I accept the balm. But I have less hesitation than you +imagine--whatever the doubt and disgust. And I really believe the secret +of my unrest is you! Good heavens! _Do_ I love you--_already_--that +would be the last straw!" + +He was staring at her, and something in his face blinded her. She turned +cold from head to foot; but she moved her glance to the baskets on the +mantel-shelf, and replied, quietly: + +"It will take some time for you to know whether you are in love again +or not. You have seen me too constantly--barring the last month. I have +become in many ways necessary to you. When you move to San Francisco, as +I am convinced you will, and have many other resources----propinquity +is all there is to ninth-tenths of what we call love----and then a +little more kills it! Even if I were under the same delusion as you are +I should not yield to it." + +"I do love you," he said, as slowly and clearly as he was capable of +enunciating. But his voice was hoarse, and she was sensible, without +turning her head, that he was rigid. "It is different--quite different. +I am willing to wait, however. I understand your hesitation. When I +return--" + +"Doubt of the reality of your--well--" + +"Love," said Gwynne, grimly. + +But Isabel could not bring herself to utter the word. "One way or the +other, it does not alter my determination not to marry." + +"Let that rest for a while. What I want to know is, could you--do you +love me?" + +"Oh, I don't know! I only know I don't want to. You have a tremendous +influence--you have made every one else seem commonplace and +uninteresting--I have resented very much your neglect this last month. I +am willing to tell you all this--also, that I have dreamed, imagined +myself in love with you. But I am convinced that if you let me alone I +shall get over it." + +"I have no intention of letting you alone." + +She moved backward suddenly, and he laughed. "I wouldn't touch you with +a forty-foot pole," he said, roughly, "unless you wanted me. That, +perhaps, shows how far gone I am. But precious little you know about +men. Or yourself. If I kissed you this minute you would succumb--" + +He turned suddenly and was down the hall and had slammed the kitchen +door behind him before she realized that she was actually alone, that he +meant to leave the house. For a moment she clutched the edge of the +mantel-piece in a passion of relief and regret. Then her femininity was +swept aside by her hospitable instinct and vehement fear. She ran down +the hall and into the kitchen. But even his rain garments and boots were +gone. She opened the back door and peered out into the inky darkness. A +light was moving in the stable. The rain was falling in a flood and the +wind almost drove her backward. But she gathered up her gown and ran as +fast as she could make headway to the stable. He was alone, and +tightening his horse's saddle-girths by the light of a dark lantern. He +gave her a bare glance and went on with his work. + +"You must not go!" She was forced to scream. "You shall not. Why, you +are mad. The marsh--such conventionality is ridiculous. I refuse to +recognize it." + +He rose to his feet and led his horse outside. But before he could vault +to the saddle she caught his arm and dragged him backward. "You shall +not go! You shall not!" She could hardly hear the sound of her voice. +But she heard his, and there was nothing in either storm or darkness to +blunt the sense of touch. For a moment she felt as if the whole had +never been halved, as if they two were youth incarnate; and his arm was +like vibrating iron along her back. She thought he was going to kiss her +and dazedly moved her head towards him. But he cried into her ear +instead: + +"I stay if you marry me to-morrow." + +"No, no, no!" Her will sprang through her lips, and before it was beaten +down again she saw a spark of light engulfed in the dark, and stood +alone in the storm, wondering if the world had turned over. + + + + +VI + + + "_Monday Morning._ + + "This is merely to announce that I survived the marsh, and that + upon my return we will resume where we left off last night. E. G." + +Isabel received this note early in the morning. That night she had +accepted an invitation of some weeks' standing, and was established in +the old Yorba mansion on Nob Hill. She anathematized her cowardice, but +solitude was beyond her endurance for the moment. She had made up her +mind that she would not think of Gwynne at all, much less give herself +opportunities to miss and desire him; and her will, reinforced by +conditions, was strong enough at times to persuade her that she hated +him. + +And there was nothing in the Trennahan household to try her nerves, +everything to soothe them. Although the old buff walls and terrible +carpets of Mrs. Yorba's day had gone long since and the house had been +completely refurnished, it looked like a home, not a museum. Trennahan +had taken his family to Europe many times, and they had brought back +much that was rare and beautiful; but nothing stood out obtrusively, not +even a color. They entertained constantly in a quiet way, and if +Magdalena was far too Spanish to seek out the clever of all sets, and +Trennahan too indifferent, at least Isabel met daily such of the _haute +noblesse_ as were not completely fossilized, and many men that +interested her well enough. Moreover, as Mrs. Trennahan now had a +grown-up daughter, she was obliged to take her to the cotillons and +other routs given under the merciless supervision of the Leader. Isabel +accompanied her as a matter of course, and when she declined an +invitation her guest was at liberty to go with the ever faithful Mrs. +Hofer. + +For three weeks Isabel did little thinking. She went to the ranch once a +week for the day only, spent an occasional hour with Lady Victoria. Even +then she was barely reminded of Gwynne. She was busy during every moment +while in the country, and her relative was no more communicative than of +yore. Only once did Victoria remark casually, that, by a sort of poetic +justice, Gwynne was detained in the south with a sprained ankle, and was +hurling maledictions at fate from the classic shades of Santa Barbara. +Isabel grudgingly admired the restraint with which he denied himself the +possible solace of correspondence with herself, and it crossed her mind +once or twice that the young man might have the understanding of women +that proceeded from instinct, if not from study. But she deliberately +dismissed him, and although his name was frequently mentioned in her +presence, she soon ceased to turn cold, and forced him to flit with a +hundred others across the surface of her mind. + +For the first time in her life she flirted desperately, and with others +besides young Hofer. She was quite wickedly indifferent to consequences, +and was inspired to woo the fickle goddess of popularity. The peace and +charm and intellectual relief of the Trennahan home did much to modify +her shrinking from realities, and the effort to please, and the +abandonment to the purely frivolous instincts of youth, were the only +aides her beauty needed to achieve that popularity she had abstractly +desired the night Gwynne brought her the stars. She no longer desired it +at all, but she disguised this fact, and reaped the reward. + +Moreover, although her analytical faculty slept in the darkest wing of +her brain, the mere fact that she was stormily loved and desired by a +man to whom she was powerfully attracted, that for a moment she had been +awake and eager in his embrace, had warmed her blood and given her an +insolent magnetism that she had never possessed before. + +Through Mr. Colton she received a formal request from Gwynne to dedicate +the Otis Building--named in honor of the creator of the family +fortunes--on the day the last of the foundation-stones was laid. In +company with half a hundred other young people in automobiles, she +astonished South of Market Street, one beautiful spring day--the spring +was making desperate assaults upon the lingering winter--and amidst much +mock solemnity and many cheers, deposited into the chiselled crypt of +one of the great concrete blocks upon which the building would rest, a +strong-box containing three of Concha Argueello's Baja California pearls, +several family daguerreotypes, and the original deed of sale which had +transferred the property from the city to the first James Otis. When the +ceremony was over the contractor shook hands with her approvingly. + +"That's as good a place as any for a deed of sale in this here town," he +remarked. "For no shake will ever budge them concrete pillars. They're +down to bed-rock. And no fire'll ever crack them, neither. We'll begin +on the steel frame to-morrow, and you must come down occasionally and +cheer us up. It'll be worth it. The Otis's goin' to be the cock o' the +walk. Better make up your mind to have them terra-cotta facings." + +"Oh, they would not raise the rents, and would hardly be appreciated by +their present neighbors," said Isabel, lightly. "I am going to send you +a bottle of champagne to-night, and you must drink to the health of The +Otis." + +The man promised fervently that he would, and then after ordering beer +from a neighboring saloon for the workmen, Isabel and her party motored +out to the beach beyond the Cliff House, where a number of old +street-cars had been converted into bath-houses, and disported +themselves in the waves until it was time to rush home and make ready +for the Mardi Gras ball. + +This yearly function was given in the Institute of Art on Nob Hill, the +wooden Gothic mansion with bow-windows, erected in the Eighties by a +railroad millionaire who had barely survived his nimble victorious +assault upon Fortune. His widow had presented his "monument" to Art, and +now its graceful flimsy walls housed much that was valuable in canvas +and marble, and more that was worthless. Once a year, on the eve of +Lent, Society gave a Mardi Gras ball, and such of the artists as were +known to the elect decorated the rooms, and contributed certain +surprises. This year, partly out of compliment to the Leader and Miss +Otis, partly because the old Spanish spirit had been roaming through its +ancient haunts of late, the interior of the mansion was hung with red +and yellow. Isabel, in full Spanish costume, led the grand march with +young Hofer, who was dressed as a toreador, and supported the jeers of +his friends in the gallery with what fortitude he could summon: he was +plump and pink and golden. The great room, surrounded with boxes draped +with the colors of Spain and filled with women splendidly dressed and +jewelled, was very gay and inspiring, and the masques flung confetti and +had a squib for everybody with a salient characteristic. When the march +finished, Isabel, who wore a half-mask of black satin, and her hair in +two long braids plaited with gold tinsel, danced a Spanish dance by +herself, alternating tambourine and castanets. She had practised it +during the past week with a professional, and she gave it with all the +graceful sexless abandon of those California girls, who, a hundred years +before that night, were dancing out at the Presidio and Mission. She was +the success of the evening as she had purposed to be, and went home with +two proposals to her credit, and as gratified a vanity as ever +titillated the nerves of an ambitious and heartless young flirt. It was +not the first time that Isabel had deliberately elected to play a role +and achieved so signal a triumph that she was beset with the doubt if +she had not but just discovered herself. As she fell asleep in the dawn +of Lent it was with the somewhat cynical reflection that perhaps she +could make quite as great a success of the role of the statesman's wife +were she to essay it. + +The roads were still in too muddy and broken a condition for the +long-projected automobile trip, and the Trennahans had decided to hire a +special car and journey to Mexico, spending some time in Southern +California. They urged Isabel to go with them, but she was sure that she +had had all the respite she needed, nor would she neglect her chickens +any longer. In truth she said good-bye to the party, which included not +only Lady Victoria, but several other congenial spirits, with a +considerable equanimity. She was suddenly tired of them all and glad to +go back to her solitudes. + +Although she did not return with that exuberance of joy, which, upon +former occasions had made her feel like a long-prisoned nymph restored +to her native woodland, still she was more than content to be at home +again, and sat on her veranda until darkness closed the long evening. +Every trace of the winter's madness had vanished. The marsh was high and +red above the fallen waters, the hills were green, the trees budding, +wild flowers were beginning to show their heads. The scene, until the +last ray of twilight had gone, leaving that dark formlessness of a +California night with its horrid suggestion, was almost as peaceful as +England. + +For several days Isabel, from reaction after weeks of incessant gayety, +and the heaviness of early spring, was too languid to find even her +Leghorns interesting. She slept late, yawned through the day; and never +had her hammock--swung on the porch at the beginning of +spring--possessed so recurrent an attraction. At the same time she was +conscious, under the physical inertia which had brought her mind to a +standstill, that she avoided Rosewater lest she should be forced to talk +of Gwynne. He was still in Santa Barbara, and it was likely that he +would be persuaded to go with the Trennahans to Mexico. There was time +enough to seek his passport, and Isabel could well imagine that his +impatience was not uncontrollable. No doubt he understood by this time +that he could expect no change in her, if indeed he had not dismissed +the matter from his mind. + +She was rudely shaken out of her apathy by a long telegram from him, +dated at El Paso: + + "I have come this far with the Trennahans. Go on to Washington + to-day. Expect me any time now. But should I be detained will you + go over to the ranch occasionally? Use old power of attorney should + occasion arise. Glad you made the running you wanted at last. + Better order terra-cotta facings for The Otis. Am told that two + other buildings will go up shortly in neighborhood. Quite fit + again. E. G." + +The delight and relief this telegram induced, the subtle sensation of +hope and flattery, not only routed torpidity, but lashed her into such a +state of fury that she ran up to her bedroom and indulged in an attack +of nerves. When it was over she faced the truth with the unshrinking +clarity of vision she could summon at will. But if she was not as +astonished as she thought she ought to be, she was no less angry, not +only with herself, but with life for playing her such a trick. Less than +ever did she want to marry, and cease to be wholly herself, to run the +risk of disillusionment and weariness, and that ultimate philosophy +which was no compensation for the atrophy and death of imagination. But +no less did she turn appalled from the thought of a future without +Gwynne. All her old vague plans were suddenly formless, and she felt +that if she even faced the prospect of regarding the shifting beauties +of the Rosewater marsh for the rest of her life, she would hate nature +as much as she now hated her treacherous self. And none could divine +better than she, that, present or dismissed, when a man has conquered a +woman's invisible and indefensible part she might as well give him the +rest. He is in control. She has lost her freedom for ever. So strong was +the feeling of mental possession that Isabel glanced uneasily about the +room, half-expecting to see the soul of Gwynne; wondering inconsequently +if it would descend to notice that her eyes were red. But she vowed +passionately that she would not marry him. If she had to be unhappy, far +better unhappy alone and free, with some of her illusions undispelled. +She had seen no married happiness that she envied, even where there was +a fine measure of love and philosophy. Even Anabel had come to her one +day in town, looking rather strained and worn, and, in the seclusion of +Isabel's bedroom, had confessed that the constant exactions of a +husband, three children, and migratory servants "got on her nerves," and +made her long for a change of any sort. "And there are so many little +odd jobs, in a house full of children," she had added, with a sigh. "And +they recur every day. You can no more get away from them than from your +three meals; I never really have a moment I can call my own. Of course I +am perfectly happy, but I do wish Tom were not in politics and would +take me to Europe for a few years." + +And if Anabel was not happy--wholly happy--with her supreme capacity for +the domestic life, how could she hope to endure the yoke? She with her +impossible ideals and theories? Not that they were impossible; but to +anticipate, in this world, the plane upon which the more highly endowed +natures dared to hope they were to dwell in the next, absolute freedom +was necessary. Isabel's theory of life--for women of her make--had not +altered a whit, but the beckoning finger had lost its vigor. That left +her with no material out of which to model a future for this +plane--which, of course, was another triumph to the credit of the race. + +She knew that Gwynne had conquered, that she had really loved him, as +soon as he had ceased to play upon her maternal instincts. She had +casually assumed at the time that her interest in him was decreasing, +but in this day of retrospect, she realized keenly that it had marked +the opening of a new chapter. This was, perhaps, the most signal of +Gwynne's victories, for the maternal tenderness for man means maternal +dominance, a cool sense of superiority. Isabel was so conscious of +Gwynne's mastery that she longed to kick him as she blushed to recall +she had done once before. She rubbed her arms instinctively, as if she +still felt the furious pressure of his fingers, and when the memory of +another sort of pressure abruptly presented itself she hurriedly bathed +her eyes and went out on her horse. + + + + +VII + + +For a week she was so moody and irascible that Abraham twice gave +warning, Old Mac artfully took to his bed with rheumatism, and only the +inexcitable Chuma was unconcerned. She rode her horse nearly to death, +snubbed Anabel--whose children were down with the measles--over the +telephone, and even boxed the ears of a dilatory hen. At the end of the +week a sudden appreciation of her likeness to a cross old maid +frightened her, and time and the weather completed the cure. Her +ill-humor, which had scourged through every avenue of her being, took +itself off so completely that it seemed to announce it had had enough of +her and would return no more. + +And the spring came with a rush. The hills burst into buttercups, "blue +eyes," yellow and purple lupins, the heavy pungent gold-red poppy. The +young green of weeping willows and pepper-trees looked indescribably +delicate against the hard blue sky. Rosewater was a great park, all her +little squares and gardens, and long rambling streets, set thick with +camellias, roses, orange-trees heavy with fruit, immense acacia-trees +loaded with fragrant yellow powdery blossoms. Main Street was clean +again, and so were the farmers and their teams at the hitching-rails; +the girls were beginning to wear white at church on Sunday, and to walk +about without their hats. The great valley was as green as the hills, +save where the earth had been turned, and one or two almond orchards +were so pink they could be seen a mile away. It was spring in all its +glory, without a taint of summer's heat, or a lingering chill of winter. + +In Isabel's garden were many old Castilian rose bushes, that for fifty +years had covered themselves pink with the uninterrupted lustiness of +youth; and their penetrating, yet chaste and elusive fragrance, combined +with the rich heavy perfume of the acacia-tree beside the house, would +have inspired a distiller and blender of scents. The birds sang as if +possessed of a new message; and several of Isabel's prize roosters, +tired of their old harems, flew over the wire-fences and strutted off in +search of adventure, proclaiming their route by loud and boastful +clamor. When they were captured by the unsympathetic Abe and restored to +their excited ladies, they flew at and smacked them soundly, then tossed +back their red combs and crowed with all their might: a paean to the ever +conquering male. + +There were other flowers besides Castilian roses in Isabel's garden, +haphazardly set out and cared for, but the more riotous and luxuriant +for that. And all around her, save on the Leghorns' hills, was the gay +delicate tapestry of the wild flowers. The marsh glittered like bronze +in the sunlight. In the late afternoon it was as violet as the hills. In +the evening afterglows it swam in as many colors as the Roman Campagna. +At this hour the sky was often as pink as the almond orchards, melting +above into a blue light but intense; while everything in its glow, the +tall trees on the distant mountains, and the picturesque irregularities +of the marsh-lands, seemed to lift up their heads and drink in the +beauty until Isabel expected to see them reel. + +And the pagan intoxication of spring took as complete a possession of +her. She sat under the long drooping yellow sprays of her acacia-tree, +her lap full of the pink Castilian roses, and dreamed. No one could help +being in love in the spring, she concluded, given a concrete +inspiration; and far be it from any creature so close to nature as +herself to attempt to stem that insidious musical scented tide. It was +possible that Gwynne would not return, or returning, would flout her; +she hardly cared. In fact so steeped was she in the pleasures of merely +loving, in a sweet if somewhat halcyon passion, that she had no wish +that the mood should be dispelled; and felt that she could ask nothing +more than to spend the rest of her mortal life with a beautiful +memory--like the aunt whose dust lay over the mountain in the convent +yard. She knew that if Gwynne returned and demanded her, she should be +tempted to marry him--she never went so far as to promise either him or +herself the rounded chapter; but one of the strongest instincts of her +nature was to squeeze the passing moment dry, jealously drink every drop +of its juice. She had no intention of tormenting herself with +problematical futures. Futures took care of themselves, anyhow. + +She was subconciously aware that she could conceive and portray a more +extreme phase of emotion than this present evolution, but she +deliberately avoided the phantasm. She was utterly, ideally, absurdly +happy. Not for a moment did she desire the raw material, the concrete +substance, to which all dreams owe their being. The wild pagan gladness +of the wood-nymph, rejoicing in her freedom from the worries of common +mortals, and in the vision of an undefined but absolute happiness, was +enough for her. Sometimes, when walking in the early morning, far into +the hills, and away from human eyes, she let the light electric breezes +intoxicate her, and danced as she walked, or sang; nor, indeed, was she +above whistling. She often spent the evening hours on the marsh, those +long twilights that are so like England's; remaining, sometimes, as late +into the night as the tide would permit, enjoying the contrast of the +lonely desolate menacing landscape with the utter beauty of the day. She +avoided San Francisco and Rosewater, but the extraordinary effervescence +within her demanded an outlet of a sort, and she was so radiant to her +small staff that they looked upon her with awe. She had actually a +fortnight of bliss, and hoped that nothing might happen to disturb it +for ever and ever. But no one's world has ever yet stood still. + +One day Tom Colton's hoarse voice over the telephone begged her to "come +at once." She was on her horse in ten minutes, in Rosewater in half an +hour. There were groups of people in the street near the younger +Coltons' house, the front door was open, several members of the family +were passing in and out. As she entered the garden she saw one of them +tie a knot of white ribbon to the bell knob. + +Her first impulse was to run. She felt that rather would she hear of +Gwynne's death than face Anabel in her maternal agony. But she set her +teeth and went on, far more frightened than sympathetic. The people that +overflowed the hall and parlor were all crying, but nodded to her, and +Tom Colton, haggard and white, appeared at the head of the stair and +beckoned. He pointed to the door of his wife's bedroom, as she ascended, +and she went forward hastily and entered without knocking. Anabel was +standing on the threshold of the door that led into the nursery. Her +face was white and wild, but she had not been crying. + +"Isabel!" she exclaimed, in loud astonished voice, "my baby is dead! My +baby is dead!" + +Then Isabel, greatly to her own surprise, dropped into a chair and burst +into vehement tears. For the moment the child was hers, she suffered +pangs of maternal bereavement that seemed to tear her breast and twist +her heart. But there was a terrible silence in those two rooms, and in a +few moments it chilled and calmed her. She looked up to see Anabel +staring at her with blank expanded eyes. + +"What are you crying for? You?" demanded the young mother. "I never saw +you cry before. And it's not your baby." + +"I know it," said Isabel, humbly. "I suppose it is because I am so sorry +for you. I am--terribly." + +"I never thought you had that much feeling," said Anabel, dully. "You +were always the strong one. Come and see my baby." + +Isabel rose, trembling and unnerved, but no longer shrinking, and +followed Anabel into the nursery, where the child, looking like a little +wax-work, lay in its crib. + +"She is dead!" said Anabel, in the same astonished indignant voice. "My +baby!" She caught Isabel's arm and shook it violently. "It isn't true," +she commanded. "Say it is not. How can it be? She spoke and laughed only +two hours ago. The relapse was nothing. The doctor said so. That is not +my baby." And then her brain stopped for a moment, and Isabel carried +her into the other room. + +She remained with her until after the funeral. Anabel, when she +recovered her senses, cried hopelessly for hours, but gradually +controlled herself and rose and went about her affairs with a stern +calm. It was her first trouble, but not for nothing had she been given a +square jaw and a sturdy little figure. She was filled with dumb protest, +and laid away her bright careless youth in the child's coffin, but she +accepted the inevitable. + +Mr. and Mrs. Leslie were in the south when the baby died, but arrived +for the funeral. Until then Anabel clung to her friend, and so did young +Colton, who was far more demoralized than his wife. He did not brush his +hair, nor go to bed, but wandered about the house like a bewildered +spirit, occasionally smiting his hands together, or embracing the other +two children convulsively. He had no support to offer his wife, and +Isabel was glad to stay with the brave stricken little creature; but +when Mrs. Leslie arrived she felt herself superfluous and returned home. + +She had had little time to think of Gwynne, but it had crossed her mind +that she would accept this heartrending episode, in which she had been +called upon to play an intimate part, as but another warning; one, +moreover, that would stand its ground did she attempt to force it aside. +But Gwynne entered and filled her dispossessed mind the moment she sat +down under her acacia-tree, which was perhaps an hour after her return +home. But this time her dreams did not flow upon a smooth golden scented +tide. She searched the accumulated newspapers for mention of him in the +despatches, wept stormily at his neglect, tormented herself with the +belief that Julia Kaye was in Washington; at all events that he had +discovered that his love for herself was but one more passing fancy, +born of propinquity. + +She saw mention of him. Twice he had dined at the White House, and his +name was frequently in the list of guests at other dinners and +functions. He was not visiting at the British Embassy, and Isabel drew +her only comfort from the fact: he might be enjoying himself too much to +think of her, but his purpose was unaltered, or he certainly would be +the guest of a man whom she knew to be his friend: Gwynne was the last +man to embarrass anybody, and if the ambassador had enemies they would +find his connivance at the Americanization of a useful British peer +vastly to his own discredit. + +Isabel enjoyed no further peace of mind. The flames of uncertainty +devoured her. The worst she could endure, but suspense spurred her +always ardent imagination to such appalling feats that she barely ate or +slept. But she was far too high-handed to suffer actively for long. She +buried her pride in one of her many crypts, summoned her feminine craft, +and wrote Gwynne a letter. It began in the brief and business-like +manner the iniquities of their builders demanded--they were on +strike--and her facile pen flowed on with various other items of +information, more or less unpleasant. Mr. Clink, the lessee of Mountain +House, had absconded with all the furniture, including the doors and +windows, and she hesitated to refurnish, not knowing if Gwynne would +return in time for the salmon-fishing. Nor had she been able to find +another tenant, although she had spent two days in the mountains. She +thought it might be a good place for a sanitarium, if he were inclined +to form a company. Some sulphur springs had recently bubbled out of the +ground near the house, which would add to the value of the property; but +she must confess that they ruined the place for her. She distrusted the +sudden advent of mineral waters; one never knew what was coming next. +Then, after more cheering, but equally practical information, she +rambled off into gossip, told the sad story of the Coltons' bereavement, +and asked him a few friendly questions about himself. Of course he had +not succeeded in getting his passport or he would be home--unless, to be +sure, the Britisher was too strong in him after all, and he would not +return. This alternative she contemplated with a lively regret, for she +had had no one to talk to since he left, and so much business sat +heavily on her shoulders. Then she announced herself his affectionate +cousin; and it was not until the letter was gone, and quite a day of +self-gratulation at her own adroitness, that it suddenly occurred to her +that Gwynne had made up his mind that the first letter should come from +her. For a few moments she was furious, then concluded that she did not +care; she wanted to hear from him on any terms. She counted the days, +intending finally to count the hours and minutes; but this agreeably +breathless task came to an abrupt end at the close of the sixth day. +Gwynne answered by telegraph. He thanked her for her interesting and +more than welcome letter. He was well, and bored, and hoping daily to +settle his affairs and start for home. In any case he should have +returned to California: he was surprised at her doubts. She was not to +bother further about his affairs out there. He had telegraphed to the +contractor that he could wait as long as the strikers. He added that he +longed for California. + +Isabel wondered if he had not dared to trust himself in a letter, +finally concluded that this was the secret of the long telegram, +dismissed her apprehensions, and, with a soothed but by no means +tranquil imagination, yielded herself up again to dreams and the +spring. + + + + +VIII + + +It was close upon the middle of April when Gwynne left the train a mile +from Lumalitas, and, being unheralded, walked across the fields to his +house. He had intended to get off at Rosewater, hire the fastest horse +in town, and ride out to Old Inn; but he had been seized with doubt and +diffidence, and while he was still turning hot and cold the train moved +out of the station. It was now nearly ten weeks since he had seen +Isabel, and during that time he had received one letter from her. This +letter he had read and reread until its contents were meaningless; and +he was still in doubt as to what might lurk between the lines. He was +reasonably sure that he had forced her to write, but whether mere pique +and curiosity had been his aides, he was far from being able to +determine. She had been right in assuming that he dared not trust +himself to the tempting privacy of the letter. He had no idea how he +stood, and would not run the risk of making a fool of himself; not until +he was face to face with her could he pretend to decide upon any course +of action. But he had been tormented for ten weeks as he had never +expected to be tormented by any woman. Although he still assured himself +that he intended to marry her, the riot in his mind and blood bred +distrust of himself and evoked terrible images of Isabel at the altar +with another. He should hate to the day of his death the beautiful old +town of Santa Barbara, where he had been without any sort of refuge +from his thoughts; and in Washington, although he had managed to occupy +his mind and time profitably, there were still hours which he must spend +alone, and he had dreaded them. + +And he was beset by other doubts than those of the mere lover. He was +conscious that in these weeks of absence and longing, he had idealized +Isabel, until the being he dwelt with in fancy was more goddess than +woman. He knew many sides of her, but much had eluded him, even after he +began to study her. That she was gifted in large measure with what the +Americans so aptly termed cussedness he had good reason to know; and +whether this very definite characteristic so far controlled her nature +as to hold her nobler qualities in durance----or were there nobler +qualities? She had brain and common-sense; both attributes had compelled +his respect long since. And she had character and pride--loyalty and +independence. He had had glimpses of what he would unhesitatingly have +accepted as heart and passion had he not known himself to be dazzled by +her beauty and wilful powers of fascination. That she was wholly +feminine, at least, he was convinced; she was too often absurdly so to +keep up, with any one that saw her constantly, the fiction of the +sexless philosopher. The very devil in her was of the unmistakable +feminine kidney. All this gave him hope, and he knew, that when caprice +permitted, she would be unrivalled as a companion. Intellectually, at +least, there was no thought of his she could not share and appreciate; +and her sense of humor and her feminine perversities would always +delight him. If only there were depths beneath. The longings of the +spirit are always formless, vaguely worded, a little shamefaced. Gwynne +hardly knew what was the great extreme he wanted in his wife, but he +knew that if he did not find it he should be miserable. He was by no +means the young man that had fallen blindly in love with Julia Kaye. He +had had little time for introspection, for intimate knowledge of +himself, in those days. + +The spring was invented to remind men what mere mortals they are. Gwynne +would have felt restless and disinclined for law and politics this +morning had he never seen Isabel Otis. Every lark in the great valley +was singing madly. Blue birds, yellow birds, sat on the fences and +carolled at each other as if the world were always May. The very earth +seemed to have sprouted into color. He had never imagined wild flowers +by the billion, nor such a harmonious variety of color. The fields were +green, the cherries, black and red and white, glistening and luscious, +were ready for picking in his orchards. As he approached his house, he +saw that all the white oaks, bare in winter, were in leaf; large soft +young green leaves, that almost hid the pendent sad green moss. The air +was warm and light, the sky so blue it seemed to laugh with a promise of +eternal good things. The whole land breathed hope, and youth, and +allurement to every delight, of which she alone possessed the store. He +was soon to learn what a liar she was, but although it was many a long +day before he took note of any phase of nature again, save her weather, +he had an elusive presentiment that he should never cease to be grateful +for that moment of quick unreasoning exultation in his youth and +manhood, and in the mere joy of life. + +He was not surprised, as he turned the corner of the veranda, to find +Imura Kisaburo Hinamoto sitting with his feet on the railing, a +cigarette in his mouth, and a volume, issued by the United States Coast +and Geodetic Survey, on his knee. But as the servant saw the master he +rose promptly to his feet, extinguished the cigarette with his fingers, +and stood in an attitude of extreme respect. He even smiled, but not +propitiatingly; it was almost patent that the return of his chance +superior was welcome. + +Gwynne nodded. "Glad to see that you still improve your mind," he +observed. "Tell Carlos to hitch up and go for my luggage: I left it at +the station." He looked at his watch. It was half-past eleven. He +hesitated a moment, then decided to postpone his visit to Isabel again. +He did not feel in the mood to sit down and eat with her. "My horse at +two o'clock," he added. And the Jap disappeared. + +Gwynne went into the kitchen, and Mariana, who was peeling onions for an +_olla podrida_, screamed and embraced him. + +"No could help," she said, philosophically. "Very glad, senor, very +glad." + +Gwynne was not in the humor to repulse anybody, and assured her that she +really made him feel that he had returned to his home. Several of her +tribe were in the kitchen and looked expectant. He informed them that he +had a box of New York sweets in his trunk, and retreated. + +On the veranda he sat down facing his mountain, which like the rest of +the world was a mass of delicate color, where it was not merely green, +and seemed to move gently under the pink shimmering haze. Beyond was the +blue crouching mass of the old volcano. "The eternal hills" was a phrase +that never occurred to him when he watched these mountains, always +veiled under a colored and moving haze. They looked far more likely to +pull up their feet and walk off. But Gwynne, although the border +beneath his veranda was full of sweet scents, and the roses on the +pillars hung about him, and the air was a soft caressing tide, was no +longer concerned with nature. He was nervous and full of doubt, of +uneasy anticipation that he would not appear to advantage at three +o'clock that afternoon. He knew that if he were really panic-stricken +and attempted to carry it off in the masterful manner, she would laugh +in his face. If he could work himself up to the attitude, well and good. +At the same time he was vaguely conscious that this period of alternate +hope and fear, of cold fits and hot, would one day be sweet in the +retrospect, and regretted with some sadness; an episode in the lover's +progress gone beyond recall. + +There was a sound of wheels on the county road, then on his own +property. He wondered at the unusual dispatch of his Carlos, but +realized in a moment that a buggy was approaching, not a wagon. Then +there was a light slouching step on the veranda, and he rose to greet +Tom Colton. + +"By Jove, old chap, I'm glad to see you," he began, and thankful that he +had written his condolences; but he paused abruptly. Colton ignored the +outstretched hand. + +"So you've got your passport?" he said. And his ingenuous blue eyes were +full of a hard antagonism. + +"Yes," said Gwynne. "I should have told you in a day or two. How did you +find out?" he added, curiously. "I took my oath before the passport +clerk in the innermost recess of the State Department." + +"There's not much I don't find out. Only, I got wind of this a little +too late. So did some others, or you might have hung round Washington +for the next four years. Do you call it square not to have told me of +this before you left?" + +"I saw no obligation to take you into my confidence. In the first place +the result of my pilgrimage was very doubtful, and in the second you +would have done all you could to balk me. When have I given you reason +to write me down an ass?" + +"You are too damned clever," muttered Colton. "Too clever by half. Much +better for you if you had stayed where you were. You had no enemies when +you left, but now, let me tell you, you've got a bunch that it will take +more than your cleverness to handle." + +"They can do their worst. I thought that all I needed was hard work, but +I fancy that what I missed most was the stimulus of enemies." + +"Well, you've got it all right." + +Somewhat to the host's surprise he suddenly seated himself and tipped +back his chair. Gwynne remained standing, leaning against a pillar, his +hands in his pockets. Colton surveyed him frankly. His eyes were still +hard and he was very angry, but he saw no reason why he should be +uncomfortable, and although he could disguise his feelings when he +chose, he knew that here it was safe to allow himself the luxury of +frankness. He was the more annoyed, as what friendship he was capable of +he had given to Gwynne. That would not have stayed hand or foot a +moment, were his path in the least obstructed, but he regretted that +they had come to an issue so early in the game. Indeed, he had hoped to +manipulate Gwynne's destinies so subtly that they would be politically +bound for life, with himself always a length ahead. It was true that +once or twice he had felt a misgiving that the Englishman, with all his +aristocratic disdain for devious ways, might match him and win, but the +shock of this early outwitting had been none the less severe. + +"Did you have a hard time getting it?" he demanded. + +"Rather. Never heard so much palaver in my life." + +"Well, I wish there had been more. I think I have at least the right to +ask what you intend to do next." + +"Return to Judge Leslie's office to-morrow--for the matter of that, I +have read a good deal since I left. In September I shall have been a +year in the State, and of course I can vote. I am not so sure that I +shall." + +"Yes! That is all, I suppose?" + +"For the present. You are too good a politician to fancy that American +citizenship has invested me with a halo. Except to a hundred odd +farmers, Rosewater, a small group in San Francisco, and a party boss or +two, I am unknown. No doubt I shall be several years achieving +sufficient prominence either to run for office, or to accomplish +anything whatever--outside of Rosewater. So far as I can see, this +immediate citizenship has effected two results only: I am now in a +position to take advantage of any political change that may develop, +instead of sowing for another to reap--and--" + +He hesitated, and Colton shot him a keen glance. "It has made a change +in you, I guess. I noticed that the minute I laid eyes on you. If +anything was needed to make me madder, it was that." + +"Yes--I am changed. That is to say, I am poised. In spite of the +determination to absorb Americanism with every pore, there was always +the lurking doubt that it wouldn't do; that some day I should make a +bolt for England. Now the matter is settled forever. I not only am an +American but always have been. The highest legal opinion in the country +was called in, and that was what finally decided the question. I +accepted it as literally as the others did, and in so doing I relegated +my English life to the episodical backwaters: among my adventures in +India and Africa. I fancy that if England came to a death struggle in my +time, and every man counted, I should fight for her. I certainly never +should fight against her. But it is a profound relief to me that I am +not throwing her over, that we have no legitimate right to each other. I +fancy that that, too, demoralized me a bit." + +"How did you feel when you took that oath?" asked Colton, more and more +curious, almost forgetting his grievance. "It's a kind of solemn oath. +I've had a sort of chill when I've heard it taken once or twice." + +"There could hardly be a more solemn oath. I don't know that it gave me +a chill, but I certainly read it over several times before I took it. +And I took it without any reservations." + +"Did you feel an American the moment you took it?" + +"Yes--I did. That is to say I felt a certain buoyancy. The die was cast. +There could be no more hesitation and doubt. My new life had actually +begun." + +"It's begun, all right. Jiminy, but you'll have a tough time. They're +onto you now. You haven't the ghost of a chance to make a move they +won't see before your hand is off the board." + +Gwynne replied with even more than his usual fluency. + +"Yes," replied Colton, with a sigh. "I guess that's where we'll all +bring up. But meanwhile? Are you going to throw me over?" + +"It will depend upon yourself. I have no objection to confide to you +such plans as I have been able to formulate. Judge Leslie advised me to +play about in society, in Washington, but I was in no humor for anything +of the sort. I had uncommon opportunities to study men and conditions, +and I took full advantage of them. I doubt if I shall vote until the +next Presidential election. Then, if an independent party of consequence +has not been formed, and I see no prospect of working up one in this +State, I shall vote the Democratic ticket. As things stand at present, +it is the less of two evils, and would at least accomplish a reduction +of the tariff, and something towards a redistribution of wealth. I +haven't the least doubt that the Democrats, if they get in--unless they +have a really good man up their sleeve--will abuse their power quite as +much as the Republicans have done; but that will take some time; and +meanwhile a new party is sure to grow up, for the best men in the +country are thoroughly roused. There's no doubt on that point--and it is +a point you would do well to remember. There have been chapters before +in the world's history when right has paid." + +"For a while," said Colton, dubiously. "The point is now that you are +likely to join the Democrats." + +"To vote with them. Theirs are the soundest principles. I stick to that +point." + +"I don't question it. I only wish elections weren't two years off; I'd +like to get to work." He took a bag of peanuts from his pocket and began +to munch thoughtfully. "But you are turning me off. What do you mean +exactly?" + +"I shall have nothing to do with the machine. I shall speak and make +propaganda, that is all. My object is not so much to get the Democrats +in as the Republicans out. I shall do nothing to split the Democratic +party--and play a losing game--unless a really great movement should +rise, gather strength, and sweep the country. It is on the cards that +there will be such a movement, and I throw myself into it the moment I +am persuaded the split will not work to the advantage of the +Republicans." + +"How much enthusiasm have you pumped up?" + +"Enthusiasm!" Gwynne's eyes roved over his "fair domain." Isabel, at +least, was not far from its borders! "I cannot say that I am at +boiling-point, but I don't fancy that matters much. I have my work cut +out and I shall do it. Perhaps I shall work more disinterestedly without +enthusiasm. Certainly I shall be more clear-sighted. If ever there was a +time in the history of a country to sink individual ambition, it is +now." + +"Gwynne!" said Colton, abruptly. "What in thunder does it all amount to, +anyhow? What difference does it make--will it make a thousand years +hence--that you and I are sitting here on the very edge of creation, +solemnly discussing the rottenest subject of our little time--American +politics? What's the use of the socialists frothing, and nations trying +to overturn one another? I had rather die on the spot than that the +United States should be conquered for five minutes by Japan or any other +Asiatic power, although I could endure the victory of a people that I +recognized as our equals. Why are instincts planted so strongly? There +may be a reason for a few years; but that's just it, a few mean little +years and it is all over. What difference does anything really make, so +long as we are comfortable? Everything else, every other instinct, is +artificial. My wife is a religious little body and believes in reward +and punishment hereafter, that we must spend at least a certain part of +our time in this life preparing for the next. I'd like to believe the +same, not only to please her, but because I could look forward to +meeting my child again; but, somehow, I can't. The present has always +been about as much as I could tackle. And I fancy that when I'm through +with it, I won't want any more. But although the present whirls so fast +that I don't have time for the sort of thinking intellectual people like +you and Isabel do, still it does sometimes dash across my mind--that +question: 'What is it all for? And why do we sweat through life for what +amounts to exactly nothing in the end?'" + +"You cannot be sure it amounts to nothing. Sometimes I have the fancy +that the entire round globe has just one inhabitant, of which we merely +appear to be individual manifestations: that we are, in fact, a part of +the earth herself, and she absorbs and casts us forth again, as she +rushes along to her own destiny as sentient as ourselves. All the +planets are alive in the same way, and they are all racing to see which +will make the greatest showing on what we call down here the Judgment +Day--that is to say, which shall have produced the most balanced and +perfected being; which shall have whirled away the most original sin and +sifted out a man, great and good without self-righteousness--to my mind +the worst of mortal failings because its correlative, injustice, is the +source of most of the unhappiness. That will be the millennium, and +having no windmills and evils left to fight, we minute visibilities will +welcome deindividualization. Then, no doubt, there will be a grand final +battle between the great body of good thus formed, and the evil cast +out, but roaming space and joining forces. If we do our best here we +shall win, and be happy ever after. There is no question, that if you +follow your higher instincts you are happier in the long run than if you +fall a slave to your base and mean; and that, to my mind, is the proof +that the highest instincts are meant to be followed to some greater +end." + +"Hm. I have heard a good many theories, first and last, and that sounds +as plausible as any." + +"All this is very casually related to American politics, except that we +had better clean up when the opportunity is vouchsafed us; for nothing +degrades human nature nor retards civilization so much as politics gone +altogether wrong. As far as you are concerned, although it was +understood that the compact was to end with my citizenship, I have no +thought of ending it unless the conditions I hope for shall crystallize +meanwhile. If it seems best to keep the Democratic party unsplit I shall +do your canvassing and speaking, for it will make me known, and give me +the opportunity to inculcate the principles I purpose to advocate. If +you ignore them when you are in office, so much the worse for you, and +better for me; for, as I have told you more than once, the moment I am +in power I shall devote my energies to pulling you and your like down +and out. But I should advise you to join the third party if it arises." + +"No doubt I might, if it were strong enough," said Colton, frankly. "I +don't propose to play any losing game, and if the Democratic party goes +by the board, T. R. Colton doesn't follow. And if a third party came in +to stay it would have to have a boss--" + +"Not your sort." + +"Oh, well, time enough." Colton's ill-humor was now somnolent under some +two pounds of peanuts. He rose and shook hands with Gwynne. "Glad to see +you looking so well--you're some heavier than when you came to +California, by-the-way, and it suits you first rate. Be sure you call on +my wife the first time you come to town." + +He declined Gwynne's invitation to dinner, and drove off, looking +slothful and amiable once more. But what went on behind that mask, +within that long ill-built cranium, Gwynne had never pretended to guess. +Nor, to-day, did he care. + + * * * * * + +At three o'clock he gave his horse to Abe, was told that the lady of the +manor was out walking, and went into the house. He had a fancy to meet +her again in the room that harbored the sweetest of his California +memories. It was dark and cool. Only one window, looking upon the +garden, was open. Beside it was a comfortable chair which he took +possession of and looked out into the wild old garden so different from +the excessively cultivated plots of Rosewater and his own meagre strips. +There was no veranda on this side of the house, and the great +acacia-tree, with its weight of fragrant gold, was but a few feet from +the window. The entire garden was enclosed by a hedge of the Castilian +roses of which he had heard so much, rare as they now were in +California. The dull green leaves and tight little buds could hardly be +seen for the mass of wide fluted roses of a deep old-fashioned pink. And +there were large irregular borders covered with the luxuriant green and +the blue stars of the periwinkle, beds of marguerites and violets, +bushes of lilac and honeysuckles, roses and jasmine. The blended +perfumes were overpowering, however delicious; Gwynne had sat up half +the night before talking to his mother after a long hot journey; he fell +asleep. + +Perhaps it was his late conversation, perhaps something more subtle, but +he felt himself transported to a void. In a moment he realized that the +void was not space as he knew it, but rigid invisible substance. He +slipped along through rocky strata, hearing strange echoes and inhaling +the disagreeable odors of healing waters. Suddenly he found himself in a +vast hollowed space, empty but for many pillars. His vision grew keener. +In the very centre of the hall he saw two pillars of a colossal size, +and standing between them a being almost as large. This unthinkable +giant had an arm about each pillar and strained as Samson had strained +at the pillars of the temple. Then a new and powerful force drew him +upward once more, and he awoke. + +He turned his head towards the dim interior of the room and for a dazed +moment thought that he beheld Spring herself. She wore white and had +dropped a mass of wild flowers at her feet; she looked as if rising out +of them. Her hat was covered with poppies and wild azalea, and she had a +sheaf of buttercups and "blue eyes" in her belt. + +"I haven't changed my ideas one bit," she said, with a shrug, as Gwynne +rose and came towards her. "But I can't help it!" + + + + +IX + + +Isabel rose as usual at five, but, instead of dressing at once, stood at +her window idly and looked out over the marsh. Thirteen hours before she +had made a decision on the instant, or so it seemed to her, and in that +instant changed her life so completely that she was still a little +dizzy, and the future as yet had taken on no coherent form. She had even +told Gwynne she was positive she could _stand_ him for ever, and this, +with her varied if incomplete knowledge of his sex, she took to be even +more significant and hopeful than the uncompromising sense of loving +him. No doubt there would be many interesting battles before two such +developed personalities became more or less one, but at least he had +none of the petty and selfish and altogether detestable qualities of her +father, her uncle, and Lyster Stone; and he was entirely human. And he +was young and she was young. It all seemed very wonderful; wonderful to +be so happy, and yet to feel that she had relinquished nothing, or at +least not the tenth of what she would have lost if she had married +Prestage--or any other man. If she had not met Gwynne she knew that she +never should have married at all, and, not having had the best within +her ken, been happy enough. + +And yet she was a little sad, and it was by no means the gentle +melancholy of reaction. She had reason, and felt a disposition to box +her own ears. She knew that Gwynne, triumphant and happy as he was, had +ridden away vaguely dissatisfied. He had turned and given her a keen +questioning glance as he mounted, and had not turned again. She had +laughed, and waved her hand, and felt a new desire to tantalize him. + +She had abandoned herself to sheer happiness the day before, to the mere +pagan delight in an ardent lover come in her own ardent youth, to the +sense of an unbroken circle of companionship, and to so wild a triumph +in having brought Gwynne to her feet, made him quite mad about her, that +she had fairly danced about the room, and tormented him as far as she +dared. + +This was Wednesday. They were to be married on Saturday, that Lady +Victoria, who was leaving for England in the evening, might nod them a +blessing. Then, no doubt, Gwynne would have his way in most things, and +she already felt the stirrings of mere female ductility. But meanwhile +she should exercise and enjoy her own power to the full. And she had +good reason to believe that no woman had ever been more charming, +distracting, provocative. If Gwynne had been in love when he came, he +had kissed her very feet when he left, and had been as bewitched as +anyone so clear-brained could be. Moreover, she had promised him +everything he wished, agreed without demur to the hasty marriage, and +even, when he asked her whether she would prefer to live in her house or +his, had sweetly left it to him to decide. They were to spend the +honeymoon in the house on Russian Hill. She was incapable of looking +beyond that. There had been at least twenty bewildering hints that when +his time came one rein, at least, should be his--in all matters of great +moment, two--and although no doubt she would break away very often, +what more delightful than to recapture and subdue? What more could a man +want than the most fascinating woman in the world, whom only his own +passion could shock from mere existence into the fulness of life? But +Gwynne, in the depths of his swimming brain, had wanted something more, +and Isabel knew that if he had slept as ill as herself, the doubt had +more than once assailed him if she were anything more than a charming +beautiful and clever creature, save perverse and egotistical; who would +keep him distractedly in love with her, but leave the best part of him +unsatisfied. + +Her perversity had gone with him, and during a more or less wakeful +night she had repented, and even wept at the thought that something +might occur to exterminate him before ten o'clock on the following +morning--when they were to meet again--and he would depart unconsoled by +the knowledge that it was the greater needs in his own nature that had +called to hers. At least she hoped this was so, and, in an excess of +humility, wondered if she really had enough to give--the power to insure +their complete happiness. She had lived in a sort of fool's paradise, +and no doubt imagined herself a far more rounded being than she was. +Well, she could grow, and finally she had curled down into her pillow +and fallen asleep. + +This morning she was rather tired, and although still repentant, +suspicious that when he returned her femininity would fly up with her +spirits, and she would be more than content to fascinate and bewilder +him. Like all women in love and fumbling blindly through the outer +mysteries, she was eagerly psychological, discovering once for all her +sex and herself. + +Her eyes had been fixed dreamily upon Tamalpais, but suddenly they were +drawn irresistibly upward by the pricking consciousness of something +strange. It was a moment before she realized that she had never seen a +sky just like that before. Her back was to the east, and although the +sun was rising it was still low; at this stage of the dawn the sky was +generally gray. This morning it was a ghastly electric blue. And then, +while her eyes were still staring, and something in her brain moving +towards expression, she heard a noise that sounded like the roar of +artillery charging across the world. She fancied it rushing through the +Golden Gate and up the bays and marsh, before it hurled itself with a +vicious and personal violence against the wall beneath her window. She +braced herself against the sash as the house shook in the strongest +earthquake she had ever felt. It appeared to be brief, however, and she +was turning away to dress herself, when it commenced again with a fury +and violence of which she had never dreamed the modern earth to be +capable. She threw herself on her knees the better to grip the +window-ledge, but her only sensations were surprise and an intense +expectation. Electric flames, as blue and ghastly as the reeling sky, +were playing all over the marsh, she saw the long bare line of Tamalpais +charge down and up like a colossal seesaw; and in that terrific plunging +and dancing, that abrupt leaping from one point of the compass to the +opposite, or towards all at once, that hysterical shaking and struggling +as if two planets had rushed from their orbits and were fighting for +life in midspace, Isabel expected the entire globe to stand on end, and +was convinced that the finish of California, at least, had come. She had +read of earthquakes that lasted for hours, and even days, and no doubt +this one was merely getting up steam, for it increased in violence and +momentum every second. The house rattled like a big dice-box. She +expected it to leap down the slope into the shivering marsh. Pieces of +rock fell down the face of the cliff opposite, but so great was the roar +of the earthquake, so close the sound of creaking and straining timbers, +of falling chimneys, and china, and even plaster, that she could not +hear the impact as they struck the ground and bounded high in air. + +Then, there was a bulge of the earth upward, a twist that seemed to +wrench the house from its foundations, and the earthquake ceased as +suddenly as it had come. Isabel waited a few moments for it to return, +incredulous that the mighty forces beneath could compose themselves so +abruptly; then rose and began to dress herself. + +Human blades of a fine temper meet a sudden and terrific onslaught of +Nature in one of two spirits: utter cowardice, or an attitude of +impersonal curiosity. It is not a matter of heroism but of nerves. The +bravest may become abject, if their will has been weakened by some drain +on the nervous system; others, that would run from a mouse or prove +unequal to the long-heralded danger, rise, in the intense concentrated +excitement and surprise of the moment, to a state of absolute and even +cynical indifference. One of the unwritten laws that has descended from +father to son in California is that an earthquake, no matter how severe, +is a mere joke, and should incite prompt and facetious comment. Isabel +being both heroic and hardy, paid the California tradition the tribute +of a smile and a shrug, and regretted that she had not been in San +Francisco; she "liked being in the midst of things." Sentiment, +psychology, egoism, had literally been bounced out of her. She knew that +Gwynne might easily have been killed, but although she intended to find +out in the least possible time, to feel merely human in the face of such +a stupendous exhibition of what nature could do when she chose, was a +descent of which she, at least, felt herself incapable. + +She hurried on her riding-clothes, dropped her braid under her jacket, +and ran down the stairs. Chuma, trim and spotless, was sweeping the +hall, white with fallen plaster. He gave her his usual good-morning grin +and went on with his work. She paused and regarded him curiously. + +"What do you think of our earthquakes?" she demanded. + +"Oh, very big shake," he said, cheerfully. "Very big shake." + +Vaguely nettled she took her hat from the rack and went out by the back +way. Mac had knocked on her door immediately after the earthquake, and +was now with Abe in the colony on the hills. He came running down when +he saw her, and it was patent that his rheumatism, for once, was +forgotten. His old red face with its prominent bones set in thick sandy +gray hair was more animated than Isabel had ever seen it. + +"Glory be!" he exclaimed, as he reached her. "That was about the worst! +I was just tellin' Abe that I felt the great earthquake of '68 in this +very house, in that very room, by gum, although I was up and dressed, +for it was eight o'clock, and I'd gone back for my pipe. So, I know what +I'm talkin' about, Miss Isabel, when I say that this was about four +times as bad--" + +"Please saddle my horse." + +"Yes, marm. Wisht I could have got out of bed. I'd like to have seen if +the earth rose and fell in a long wave like the shake of '68. Land's +sakes, but those chickens did squawk." And although he saddled Kaiser +rapidly, he never paused in his reminiscence of the last Northern +California earthquake to pass into history. "But this one! By Jiminy! +Well, I guess we take the cake in everything out here, earthquakes +included." + +Isabel patted the still shaking horse. "Get the launch ready," she said, +as she mounted; and Mac nodded. It was characteristic that neither +thought of the danger of sudden shoals, of the always possible tidal +wave, or of some new and diabolical trick of nature. The nerves were +still keyed too high for anything so shabby as prudence. + +Kaiser, no doubt glad to put himself into motion, bounded forward as his +mistress lifted the bridle, and although Isabel did give an occasional +glance ahead, to make sure the earth was not yawning, she never drew +rein, and the horse galloped with all his might towards Rosewater. As +the marsh narrowed she saw that the town was still there, and that there +were no fires. As she approached the great iron bridge that connected +Rosewater with the continuation of the county road, a horseman entered +at its other end and galloped across, regardless of the law or a graver +danger still. The next moment Isabel and Gwynne had shaken hands +casually, and were riding towards Old Inn. + +His eyes were shining and almost black. "I saw the mountains rock!" he +exclaimed. "Rock? Dance. Then I thought they would plunge down into the +earth and disappear. And St. Peter is flat. All the business district, +including the four hotels, are down, and everybody in them buried in the +ruins. A man dashed up as I was mounting, and I told all the men on the +place to go to the rescue. The news came just in time to prevent the +murder of Imura by Carlos, for not admitting that we had had the +greatest earthquake in the history of the world. It was the first +symptom of patriotic fire I ever saw in Imura, but he stoutly maintained +that in the matter of earthquakes Japan could do as well as California." + +"That is all very well, but I have read a lot about Japanese +earthquakes, and never of such an _extraordinary_ one as this. Has +anything terrible happened in Rosewater?" + +"I saw a few chimneys down, but no buildings except the old brick +school-house. Mrs. Haight was sitting on the curb-stone in her +night-gown, wailing like a banshee, but although all the rest of the +town appeared to be in the streets, and similarly attired, they were +quiet enough. As I passed the cemetery I gave it a hasty side glance, +half-afraid of what I might see. All the monuments are down and pointing +in every direction. What gyrations! Do you suppose they've had it in San +Francisco?" + +"Do I suppose--much you know about our earthquakes! San Francisco always +gets the worst of it, or seems to, there is so much more to shake. Your +mother is probably in hysterics, although up on the hills one is safe +enough. It is the sandy valley and the made ground down by the +ferries--up to Montgomery Street, in fact--that get the worst of it. I +have ordered the launch." + +"Good. I wish my mother had gone east from El Paso, as she had half a +mind to do. But she wanted to see her doctor again. I am afraid she +won't look at this as we do. I never was so interested in my life. Was +sure we were going to smash, but that it was worth while in anything so +stupendous. I suppose it is too early to telephone." + +Isabel pointed to the wires. They were sagging, and two of the telegraph +poles were down. "Doubtless the tracks are twisted, too. We are +fortunate to have the launch." + + + + +X + + +Mac, so swollen with the prideful experience which enabled him to +compare two great earthquakes, and his accumulations of practical data +bearing thereon, appeared ten years younger, and, as Gwynne and Isabel +rode up, was lording it over his fellow-hirelings. He had forbidden +Chuma to make a fire in the kitchen stove until the chimney, what was +left of it, had been repaired, directed him to bring down-stairs the +oil-stove Isabel had bought for the old rheumatic's comfort, and cook +breakfast upon it. As even the stovepipe in the out-building, used for +preparing the elaborate repasts of the Leghorn, was twisted, Abe had +been ordered to drag the great stove into the open, build a screen about +it, and "do the best he could, and be thankful he was alive." Poor Abe, +who had not been extant in 1868, and had even missed the considerable +earthquakes of the Nineties, was in a somewhat demoralized state, and +wondering audibly what people supposed he cared about chickens, anyhow. + +Isabel and Gwynne sat down in the dining-room and ate their +breakfast--on fragments--calmly and methodically, talking constantly of +the earthquake, it is true, but instinct with that curious casuistry +that a certain safety lay in following the ordinary routine of life; +perhaps--who knows?--so great is the egoism of the human spirit--that +the unswerving march of man in his groove might restore the balance of +nature. + +After breakfast Isabel went up to her room and dressed hastily and +mechanically in a short walking-suit, as mechanically expecting the same +earthquake to return to the spot associated with it. Gwynne wore his +khaki riding-clothes, but it was doubtful if any one would be critical +in San Francisco that morning. Nothing, as it happened, could have +suited his purpose better, and it was long before he took them off. + +When the launch was under way Isabel told Gwynne of the blue flames that +had danced over the marsh during the convulsion. "If electricity is not +a cause of earthquakes, it certainly is let loose by them," she added. +"I expected every moment that we would blow up and fly off into space." + +"I saw something of the same sort on the hills, and expected to see St. +Helena spout flames." + +In a few moments they were sensible that the constant artificial +vibration of the boat was the most grateful sensation they had ever +known, and of the wish that they could leave it only for a train, to be +transferred at the end of a long journey to another train, and still +another. But these sentiments were not exchanged, and their conversation +was purely extrinsic. Here and there along the shore an old shanty lay +on its side, or had tumbled forward to its knees; but for the most part +dilapidated chimneys and fallen poles were the only visible symbols of +the tumult beneath the smiling beautiful earth. Never had Earth looked +so green, so velvety, its flowers so gay and voluptuous. Even the sky, +now its normal deep blue, had this same velvety quality, the very +atmosphere seemed to breathe the same rich satisfaction. But no birds +were singing, and there was nothing normal in the groups of people, +gathered wherever there were habitations: they wore bath-robes, +blankets, overcoats, anything, apparently, they had found at hand, and +had not re-entered their treacherous habitations. No trains were +running, but the drawbridge that separated the marsh from San Pablo Bay +opened as usual. + +Gwynne steered the launch, and his conversation and Isabel's drifted to +speculations as to what had happened in the city. + +"Thank heaven I had the foundations of that old house replaced," she +said, "or I am afraid your mother would have shot right down to the +Hofers' doorstep. I am fairly at ease about The Otis, for in spite of +the old drifting sand-lots that district is built on, its foundations go +down to bed-rock, and thanks to the strikers there is nothing to fall +off the steel frame. But I am rather worried about the islands. San +Francisco Bay is supposed to have been a valley some two hundred years +ago, and if it dropped once it might again. Those islands are only +hilltops." + +The islands, however, looked as serene as the rest of nature, although +most of the chimneys were fallen or twisted, and there were the same +groups of people in the open, awaiting another throe. These, however, +had had time to recover their balance and clothe themselves. The launch, +which had a new engine, had been driven at top speed, and it was not yet +seven o'clock, barely the beginning of day to these luxurious people, +but a day that would doubtless be remembered as the longest of their +lives. On the military islands, routine, apparently, had received no +dislocation, and on the steep romantic slopes of Belvedere the villas +might have sunken their talons to the very vitals of the rock. The most +precariously perched had paid no toll but the chimney. + +As the launch bounded past the long eastern side of Angel Island, Gwynne +contracted his eyelids. "Have you noticed that black cloud over the +city?" he asked. "At first it did not strike me particularly--but--it +looks as if there might be a big fire." + +Isabel, who faced him, turned her head. "There are always fires in San +Francisco after an earthquake," she said, indifferently. "And about +seven a day at any time. There are none on the hills, so your mother is +not having a second fright. Poor thing! I am afraid she is terribly +upset. I wish she had gone." + +She sat about, to observe the city more critically. Already its sky-line +was changed, for every chimney, smokestack, and steeple, commonly +visible, was shattered or down. The smoke cloud, which looked like a +great ostrich plume bent at the tip, was as stationary as the hills, and +had a confident permanent air that they would lack for some time. And +fixed as it was it seemed to grow larger. + +"Steer to the east of Alcatraz," said Isabel, suddenly; "and towards +Yerba Buena. I should like to see where the fires are." + +When the launch was well off the point of Telegraph Hill, they saw +several large fires on the western side of East Street, the wide roadway +that divided the city from the water-front and Ferry Building. Far down, +in the South of Market Street district there appeared to be other large +fires. + +"Warehouses, probably," said Isabel. "What a sight!" She indicated the +collapsed sheds about the moles, and the twisted and toppling +appearance of the tower on the Ferry Building, which stood on the edge +of the made ground. It was an immense structure of great weight, and +only an uncommon honesty--and vigilance--in building had saved it from +destruction. Had the piles been hollow, or too short to reach bed-rock, +it would either have sunken or tumbled. + +And then they noticed that the bay was silent and deserted. It was a +moment before they realized that of the several lines of ferry-boats +none appeared to be running. "That means that the tracks are out of +working order," said Isabel, grimly. "We may have had the best of it, +bad as it was. Ah!" One of the Oakland ferry-boats pushed out of its San +Francisco mole. It was black with people. Isabel stared with wonder. "It +looks as if people were running away from the city. Or perhaps a good +many that live across the bay came over on the same mission as +ourselves, and have been turned back. That would mean that all East +Street was on fire and they could not get into the city. Well, let us +hurry. Even although the fires are so far off they may terrify your +mother. I remember she told me once in England that she had never seen a +fire. I have a queer sensation in my knees." + +Gwynne laughed. "I should think you might be used to fires by this time. +And you have a celebrated fire department. I fancy you are just feeling +the reaction." + +"I was not a bit frightened during the earthquake!" said +Isabel, indignantly. "But there is nothing _phenomenal_ in fire to brace +one up--and those had a sinister determined look--and that boat-load of +people! I only hope your mother has not run away--under the impression +that San Francisco alone was shaken. We wouldn't find her for a week." + +"My mother's nerves are not what they were, but I am positive she will +not run. She is certain to wait for us at the house." + +A few moments later they ran the launch up to the landing at the foot of +Russian Hill. There were a few tumbled shanties on the slope, but none +of the well-built houses had been dislodged, and the great buildings on +this water-front were in good condition. Mr. Clatt was not visible, but +left his cottage at Isabel's call, and gave them something more than his +usual surly greeting. + +"Glad to see you are all right," he said. "Been expectin' you. Jest +stepped in to git my pipe." + +"Much damage done?" asked Gwynne. + +"Considerable, but I guess the shake'll take a back seat. City's on +fire." + +"There are always fires after earthquakes," said Isabel, angrily. + +"City's on fire. Thirty broke out s'multaneous. Water main's bust. Chief +of Fire Department killed in his bed, or as good as killed. There's +plenty left to fight the fire but nothin' to fight it with. Guess the +old town'll go up in smoke this time." + +"My knees feel rather weak, too," said Gwynne. He turned to the +wharfinger, who was pulling leisurely at his pipe. "We--my mother and +Miss Otis, at least, may need this launch to leave the city with," he +said. "Can I rely on you? You shall have a hundred dollars if you let no +one steal it; and if the fire should reach this side, you are welcome to +a refuge on my ranch." + +"I'll see daylight through any one that looks at it," said Mr. Clatt. +"This ain't no time to stand on ceremony. The army's called out already +to help the police keep order--the lootin' was disgraceful for about an +hour. Every rat tumbled out of his hole, and of course they went for the +saloons. I'm well enough known along here to be let alone when I show my +teeth. Your house is all right, miss." + +This side of the hill was almost deserted; nearly every one seemed to be +watching the fires from the crest; but occasionally Gwynne and Isabel +passed a solitary person clinging to his possessions, or a small group; +and invariably were greeted with the same remark: "City's on fire. Water +mains were broken by the earthquake." + +As they passed through the crowd on the hill-top, they received similar +information, although many added confidently that "something would be +done. The wind was sure to change to the west." + +And so far, at least, the picture from the heights was by no means +appalling. There were a number of fires in the south, and a wall of +flame and smoke along the water-front near the Ferry Building. Had the +earthquake spared the mains they would merely have been spectacular. + +Gwynne and Isabel, as they made the slight descent to the Belmont House, +saw two of their Japs sitting on the roof throwing down the bricks of +the fallen chimneys. Then they turned the corner and found Lady +Victoria, an opera-cloak thrown over her night-clothes, pacing up and +down the veranda. + +"Oh, my God!" she exclaimed. "I did not dare to wonder if you were dead +or alive. Why did we ever come to this God-forsaken country?" She did +not offer to embrace them, but her eyes were brilliant, and there was a +color in her cheeks. And no one had ever heard her talk so fast. "Was +it as dreadful with you? Did you get out of the house? I was awake when +I heard that awful roar. Somehow, I knew what it meant, and before the +earthquake was well begun I was out here. I never ran so fast in my +life, although I was flung against the walls. And I almost wished I had +stayed in the house. Such a sight! That awful reeling city! Just imagine +thousands of buildings plunging, and leaping, and dancing, and toppling. +Towers bowing to you so solemnly that I almost disgraced myself and had +hysterics. And steeples pitching off, or huddling down like corpses. And +that awful loud deep steady roar and crash of a thousand walls and +chimneys falling. And the dust that seemed to swallow the city. For a +moment I thought it had gone, and expected the hills to follow. Then it +rose and everybody on earth seemed to be in those streets--and in white. +They looked like Isabel's Leghorns. Such pigmies from up here. Pigmies! +That is what we all are. And Angelique, the wretch, has run away." + +"Well, she cannot go far, as all the railroads but one seem to be +injured," said Gwynne, soothingly. "Better go in and dress and we'll +walk down and take a look at things. That will divert your mind." + +But it was not until Isabel had assured her that the worst force of an +earth movement in California spent itself in the first great shock, and +offered to help her dress, that Victoria could be persuaded to enter the +house. Gwynne fetched Isabel's field-glass and studied the scene below, +picking out the more disastrous work of the earthquake. All the new +solid buildings, and most of the old, appeared to be unharmed, and the +residence district, built of wood on stone foundations, for the most +part, was much as usual, save for its altered sky-line: every chimney +and skylight had disappeared. But tall slender factory chimneys had +broken raggedly in half, and the great tower of the City Hall, standing +high against the blue sky and advancing smoke, seemed to shriek like a +man whose flesh had been torn off with hot pincers until only the shamed +skeleton was left. Nothing but the steel cage that had supported the +bricks remained: eloquent of the millions that a dishonest city +government and its confederates had stolen. + +Gwynne, as his eyes travelled more precisely, picked out more and more +evidences of the power of the earthquake. Steeples were gone, walls +fallen outward, roofs caved in, or yawning where a heavy chimney had +gone through, old houses were on their knees, or had fallen into their +cellars. Great cracks and rifts in walls and asphalt, fallen cornices +and shattered windows detached themselves from the general picture of +the half-ruined but oddly indifferent city. Almost immediately, through +the smoke in the southeast, he had caught a glimpse of The Otis, an +immense skeleton of steel, that had defied the earth, and offered +nothing to the fire. But although he experienced a passing gratitude +that he should lose nothing by the disaster, he forgot the incident in a +moment: he felt wholly impersonal. + +Everybody in the city, apparently, was out-of-doors. The squares were +black with people, quiet crowds, it would seem, moving slowly where they +moved at all. He saw mounted officers and parading soldiers, and groups +of firemen standing impotently by their hose and engines. In the burning +South of Market Street district rivers of people were pouring towards +the great central highway, their arms and shoulders burdened; fleeing no +doubt with their household goods. Then Gwynne began to study the fires, +and it dawned upon him that he was looking down not upon a mere +conflagration but a burning city. It was more than likely that the fires +would not cross Market Street, and that those near the water-front would +be extinguished by water pumped from the bay; but "South of Market +Street" was a city in itself, and not only did he feel a certain pity +for all those terrified black pigmies down there, but a pang for the +extinction of a region so identified with the early history of San +Francisco. Rincon Hill was obliterated by the smoke, but no doubt she +would go; with all her pretty old-fashioned houses, so unlike the +horrors on the plateau below him--and South Park with its tragic +memories. Moreover, if all the factories and warehouses, and the blocks +devoted to the wholesale business, were destroyed, the city would be +poorer by many millions. + +He shifted his glass away from the fires. More and more details arrested +his eye. Inert forms were being carried out of houses where chimneys or +skylights had gone through the roof. Automobiles were flying about, +hundreds of them. Mounted orderlies were dashing at breakneck speed +between the Presidio and the city. For a moment he wondered, then +remembered that General Funston lived on Nob Hill. He inferred that the +Mechanics' Fair Building, down in the western section of the valley, had +been turned into a hospital, for automobiles were constantly dashing up +and delivering limp and helpless burdens. The old Mission Church, +Dolores, was unharmed, but not far away, and in that crowded district +built upon the filled-in lake, or lagoon, of the Spanish era, he saw +that a large building, doubtless a cheap and flimsy hotel, had sunken +to its upper story, and that people were digging frantically about it. +Every house in the immediate neighborhood had dropped into its cellar or +lurched off its foundations. But it was all like some horrid picture by +Dore: the smoky darkening atmosphere, the jets, the bouquets, the square +masses of flame, each seeming to embrace a block if not more, the dark +slowly rolling clouds not far overhead, the tides of humanity dwarfed by +the distance, the broken dislocated houses, the great haughty defiant +buildings, with the superb conflagration behind them. + +One of the neighbors, who lived on the crest, returning from a +reconnoitring expedition, paused and informed him that the mayor had +been persuaded to call a meeting of the more prominent citizens, to +decide, if possible, what might be done to save the city, and to keep +the people from falling into a panic. Mr. Phelan, the "Reform Mayor"--of +the city's last period of municipal decency--had suggested sending to +the military islands for dynamite enough to blow up a wide zone beyond +the fire; but property-owners were already protesting. Many felt sure +the fire would not cross Market Street, others were as certain that the +whole city would go. A corps of marines had been despatched from Mare +Island immediately after the earthquake and would undoubtedly save the +Ferry Building and the docks, but if the fire ran over from Market +Street a few blocks higher up, nothing could save all that great +business, shopping, and hotel district; to say nothing of Chinatown, and +possibly these hills. All South of Market Street was in motion, making +for the ferries or the bare western hills, the Presidio and Park; they +must answer for many of the fires, as they had not given a thought to +cracked chimneys when they wanted their breakfast; but of course crossed +wires and the overhead trolley system were responsible for as many more. +Then he advised Gwynne to order that all the bath-tubs in the house +should be filled with what water was left in the pipes, and that a stock +of provisions from the neighboring grocer and butcher should be laid in. +"Personally I don't believe the fire will ever come as far as this," he +said. "But there'll be a famine, no doubt of that. The wires are all +down, scarcely a train is running, the country may be as hard hit as +ourselves--and all that crowd down there to feed!" + +Gwynne thanked him and replied that the launch was in waiting; but when +the man had gone he called the Japs, gave them money, and ordered them +to follow his neighbor's suggestion. He realized that he had no desire +to leave this city where life was suddenly keyed to its highest pitch, +and retire to the security and inaction of the country. Moreover, he +recalled the promise he had given Hofer and his other friends on the +night of the ball: this might be the emergency, and what services he +could render should be given freely enough. + +Lady Victoria and Isabel came forth, and they all made their way rapidly +down to Nob Hill. The stair was more rickety than ever, and many of the +older houses they passed looked badly shaken within, if not +without--every door was open. The floors were covered with plaster; more +often than not the furniture and ornaments, and even mantels, were +massed in an indistinguishable heap. The Hofers' door, like the rest, +was open, and they saw that the spiral marble stair was a pile of +glittering splinters and that the pictures had been turned completely +round or flung across the hall. Mrs. Hofer had been too eager to reign +on Nob Hill to wait for a new foundation. Several of the servants were +sitting on the steps, and informed Gwynne that all the family, including +the children, had gone out in two automobiles an hour before, to see the +city. + +They walked down the hill, stopped many times by returning citizens +anxious to impart information. The Italians on Telegraph Hill were mad +with terror: "they were no Californians," in accents of bitter contempt. +Portsmouth Square was full of Chinamen laughing at the women that had +run there from the hotels without shoes on their feet, and only an opera +or automobile cloak over their night-clothes. Even more amused were +those Oriental philosophers at the white scared faces of the prisoners +clinging to the bars of the jail. Nobody could tell how many people had +been killed by falling roofs and walls, although the wildest stories +were current, but so far there were more doctors and nurses attending to +business than patients to care for. Down in the Mechanics' Fair +Building, which had been converted into an emergency hospital, they were +working as methodically, with book and pencil, as well as with bandage +and instrument, as if earthquake and fire were a part of the daily +routine. "Almost everybody was quiet, but there were sights down there, +Oh, Lord, there were sights!" One man button-holed Gwynne, as he had +button-holed others on his ascent, and informed him that he had "got +down there" just in time to see two hundred and fifty thousand dollars +go up in smoke. "Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and it has +taken me twenty years to make it!" he reiterated, with an excited +bitterness that was almost hilarious. He did not ask Gwynne if he had +lost anything, but passed on to button-hole the next man and pour out +his tale of individual protest; upon him the earthquake and fire had +made a personal attack. + +"How strange it seems to be in the midst of so much _life_--mere +physical life," said Lady Victoria. "A whole city tense and helpless! I +wonder that man could think of himself. We are all mere fragments of one +great whole." + +Her eyes were still restless and bright, her mask had fallen, and with +it, curiously, many of her years. For a time, at least, the heavy burden +of self had slipped from her tired spirit. + +Few stood in the doorways, or even gardens; nearly every one not +exploring the city was in the middle of the street. In the +boarding-house district, half-way down the hill, the corners were +crowded with people watching the fires, although as many more had gone +to the heights to command a better view. Some were still dazed and white +with terror, a few looked distraught; more than one man was as nervous +as his wife. But the majority were calm, although they wore an +expression of being ready for anything. A few, mindful of the California +tradition, were joking and relating the absurdities of their experience. +There was no question that the shock had been far greater in the city +than in and about Rosewater, and both Isabel and Gwynne, to Lady +Victoria's disgust, expressed a regret that they "had missed anything." +But it was possible that the convulsion had been even worse elsewhere. +St. Peter was built over a known fault, and San Francisco was not; and +indeed news was already coming into the city of coast hamlets that had +literally been torn to pieces. Other wild rumors were flying about. New +York had disappeared. Chicago had been swept by a tidal wave. As the +telegraph wires were all down no one attempted to account for these +items of news, but so much had already happened that if the eastern +hemisphere had dropped to the level of Atlantis, no one would have +stared. + +When they reached Union Square they found it so crowded that they hardly +could make their way. Not only the guests of the St. Francis Hotel, that +flanked it, had taken refuge in the open, but those of many other +hotels. A few of the men were still in pyjamas, and of the women in +dressing-gown or opera-cloak, caught up as they fled. But the majority +had ventured back and dressed themselves, so that the "sights" were not +what they may have been an hour earlier. But no one seemed to care for +shelter; at all events they liked companionship in misery, although few +besides the foreign members of the Grand Opera Company were voluble. +Gwynne and Victoria and Isabel saw many of their acquaintance, not all +recognizable at first, for even those that had returned to their rooms +to dress themselves had taken little pains with their hair. One woman of +great beauty, however, whose husband's hat surmounted her flowing locks, +was just informing Isabel that she had reached that frame of mind where +vanity was pressing apprehension to the wall, when there was an +explosive sound, another as of rushing wings, the crowd stumbled against +one another, and the large buildings about the square rocked. Again +there was an exodus, and some clutching and gasping; but only a few of +the refugees from the burning district, sitting on the furniture they +had dragged with them, screamed. It was over in a few seconds, and then +Gwynne pressed his women gently out of the crowd and down, through the +tide of refugees, to Market Street. They walked in the middle of the +street, for the sidewalks in this business district, where many of the +buildings were of brick or stone, were littered with the debris of +fallen cornice and shattered windows and chimneys. Market Street was +kept open for automobiles, and the crossing refugees; the spectators +stood on the edge of the northern pavement only, and in some cases on +the top of bricks that represented an outer wall. A number of the +refugees were marching towards the ferries, although a curtain of smoke +bounded the lower end of Market Street. Others were moving stolidly +towards the western hills. All were burdened with pillow-cases packed +with clothing, or dragged trunks, cribs, baby-carriages, in which was a +strange assortment of utensils, children, and household pets. The +scrape, scrape of these unwieldy objects could be heard in a monotonous +reiteration above the distant roar and crackling of the flames. Behind +the tide of humanity rolling in from the burning district, at the end of +every street, was a vista of flame and smoke. And the dark clouds were +mounting higher and higher, lit with a million golden sparks. The +temperature was tropical. + +People were already beginning to talk in phrases: The doomed city. The +fire zone. Razed to the ground. Brains were not active, and any one +energetic enough to put a few expressive words together was sure of +disciples. Here, more than elsewhere, it was apparent that the army was +in possession of the city. Mounted officers rode slowly up and down, and +at the mouth of each of those dusky and menacing avenues was a guard +with drawn bayonets. They permitted the unfortunate to emerge, but few +to enter. In spite of the audible energy of the fire, the slow tramp of +the refugees, the scraping of their furniture on the ill-paved streets, +the city was extraordinarily silent. People scarcely spoke above a +mutter. There was no shouting of orders. Even the children were not +whimpering, the tawdry women were not hysterical, not a parrot raised +his voice nor a dog whined. Faces were dazed, blank, imprinted with a +stolid determination to get to a place of safety and keep families and +belongings together. The present moment was as much as they could grasp, +and truth to tell there was a good deal in it. + +Some of the sightseers speculated mildly--those that owned no property +in this district--as to what would happen if the wind drove the fire +much farther north. The opposite side of the street was lined with some +of the greatest business houses in the city. The Palace Hotel looked +like the rock of Gibraltar. Not a vase in its court had been overturned, +some one said. The other buildings were of stone, brick, concrete. They +had stood the earthquake; even the great square tower of the Call +Building, unsupported by other buildings, had barely lost a cornice. Was +it possible that the fire would take them? But the fire was rolling +nearer every moment, for it met little to resist it but wood. Down by +East Street several of the Market Street buildings were blazing. But no +doubt the marines would extinguish those, and surely that sea of flame +would break and retreat before the wall of rock opposite; and behind it +were other structures of stone and brick and concrete. Now and then a +refugee, permitting his attention to be drawn from his own little +affairs, told that the back windows of these buildings were already hung +with wet blankets, and that people stood by the cisterns on the roofs, +hose in hand. But the South of Market Street fraternity shook a united +head, and when the new phrase, The doomed city, was wafted into its dull +ears, it adopted it promptly, and marched on muttering it over and +over. + + + + +XI + + +Already a number of automobiles had flown by, some filled with people +anxious to leave town before it might be too late, but most of them +containing surgeons and their assistants, or relays of firemen, alone +permitted to enter the burning district; or prominent men bound for the +citizens' meeting to be held in the cellar of the old jail in Portsmouth +Square, a site upon which their ancestors had gambled and Jenny Lind had +sung. Gwynne, who was already beginning to chafe at inaction, to feel +the excited blood shake his pulses, was revolving excuses to send his +mother and Isabel home, when an automobile came charging down Market +Street at a terrific rate of speed. From some distance he recognized +Hofer sitting beside the chauffeur. Not in the least considering his +act, he stepped in front of the crowd and made a signal. Hofer responded +with a shout, the automobile slowed slightly, two men stood up and +clutched Gwynne, dragging him into the machine. Gwynne's long legs flew +backward as if he were plunging head first over an embankment, and he +had only time to right himself, turn and shout "Go home," before the +automobile had regained its speed and was out of sight. + +Victoria turned to Isabel with wide eyes. "It looked like kidnapping!" +she exclaimed. + +"I fancy they merely want him at the citizens' meeting. No doubt they +want every steady clear brain they can muster. I think I had better go +out and see what has become of Paula and the children. Will you come?" + +Victoria shook her head. "This is all too interesting," she said. "I +must see more of it, and I am no longer afraid. When I am tired I will +go home. Shall we agree to meet there for luncheon?" + +Isabel nodded and started up Stockton Street alone, intending to take +the first car that led in her sister's direction. Some of the trolley +wires were down, but no doubt others were uninjured, and the cable-cars +had always seemed to her as fixed as fate. She could no more conceive of +their system being dislocated for more than an hour at a time than of +the city burning. So far she was merely interested, and although sorry +for the unfortunate poor, felt that the fates had conspired to do the +city a service in cleaning out so objectionable a quarter. Of the +millions invested in that district she did not think, but sighed as she +thought of South Park and Rincon Hill. Still, they would have been +obliterated in the course of events and before long; and as for the fire +itself it would be stopped by the great walls of masonry on and near +Market Street. She looked eastward down the deserted streets towards the +bay, and although the vista there also was closed with flame and smoke, +the fires were far away, and the marines were fighting it. + +She passed many people ascending and descending, some with pressed lips, +others arguing with a certain fettered excitement against the +pessimistic attitude. After she left the business blocks the sidewalks +again were free of debris, although she could see the ruin within. The +disreputable section of this street, known as the "Red light district," +was crowded with women, to whose rescue or comfort no man would seem to +have come. Isabel looked at them with an irresistible curiosity, but no +sense of repulsion; she even stopped and answered their eager questions +as best she could. She was possessed with the idea that there was but +one person in San Francisco that day, no matter what the optical +delusion. She was not at all dazed, but utterly impersonal. + +Even in the blazing sunshine most of these women were handsome, and +young. But all assurance was gone; when not strained and haggard from +the recent and the menacing terror, they looked indescribably forlorn. +But they were very quiet. Isabel heard but one excited cry, and +something of its thrill ran along her own nerves. "My God! The wind is +blowing from the southeast and it's blowing strong!" + +Isabel glanced back. It seemed to her that the great suspended waves of +smoke, red-lined, were rolling with more energy, and they certainly were +inclining west as well as north. She wondered, with some irritation, why +the wind blew from the southeast when the first of the trades should be +roaring in from the Pacific. A strong steady west wind and the fire +would be blown towards the bay, where it could be extinguished from the +marine boats. Every time a gust ruffled her hair she shook her head +irritably, wondering that she had ever loved the wind. + +She reached California Street. The cars were not running. Far down where +they should have started she saw nothing but smoke. Nor was there the +usual rumble indicating that the cable was at work, a sound which was +among the first of her memories. She turned west and climbed the almost +perpendicular blocks to the summit of Nob Hill. The beautiful massive +pile of white stone, to be known when finished as Fairmont Hotel, and +which had already done so much to redeem the city from its architectural +madness, looked as serene and unravaged as if it crowned a hill of +ancient Athens; but so, for that matter, did its neighbors, two as +faultless in their way; the others appearing even more outrageous than +usual, inasmuch as they had had their opportunity to disappear and +failed to take advantage of it. + +From the summit of the hill Isabel gave a hasty glance southward, then +walked rapidly west; the fires seemed to cover far more ground than when +she had first looked at them from Russian Hill, an hour ago. + +After she had tripped over two large paving-stones that had met in an +upward bulge, she took more note of detail. Some of the houses had +private cisterns, and their roofs and walls were still quite wet. +Pretentious garden walls, and stone pillars supporting facades, had +fallen, while next door an apparently more delicate structure was +intact. It seemed to be a matter of foundation. And everywhere there +were groups of silent people watching the fire. Even when the Red Cross +men and women carried out the injured, Isabel did not hear a groan. And +all were losing their dazed and frightened expressions. The careless +philosophy of the city was reasserting itself, although in a more +dignified phase. + +At Van Ness Avenue, the wide street that runs through the residence part +of the city from north to south, Isabel shuddered for the first time, +and, as she was ashamed to run across, stood and stared with a new sense +of fascination at the inexplicable old earth. The street lay in a narrow +valley, what would have been a mere canyon in the mountains, and the soil +was loose and sandy, although the great houses sat upon most of the +brief level and held it firm. But the stone blocks in low garden walls +were bulging and broken, and the street itself was horribly torn. Here +and there it had sunken, and looked as if a wave had passed over it and +left an impress. A large stone church had fallen, one tower into the +street and another upon the neighboring house. The stone walls of houses +were cracked; one of the "mansions" had a zigzag crevice from top to +bottom. + +And the proudest had brought forth chairs and were sitting in their +gardens or on the pavement. Isabel recognized a girl who had been one of +the belles of Mrs. Hofer's ball, clad in a bath-gown and a pair of +socks, and another, noted for her gowns, passed in a wagon, a +handkerchief tied about her head and a half-filled pillow-case on her +lap. Isabel knew that both had lived in one of the beautiful private +hotels on the avenue, and she had already heard that it was so badly +wrecked that the guests had been thankful to get out alive and had not +ventured to return for their clothes. The stately building had been run +up in a night, its feet set in sand, and the wonder was it was not lying +across the avenue. + +Many of the refugees had already reached this third and last wide street +of refuge, and although the greater number were still down at the +southern end, others had pushed on, intending to walk to the Presidio, +where they were likely to be fed. They were resting on their cumbrous +belongings, strange groups, unkempt and half dressed. Many of the +householders had sent within for food, and one wealthy dame, whose maid +had had time to build her coiffure and groom her properly, sat with a +dirty frowsy baby on her lap and was coaxing it to take milk from a +spoon, its bottle having been overlooked in the flight. The mother was +sitting on the bureau her husband had rescued, by no means abashed, nor +even surprised. + +Isabel crossed the street and ascended and descended again, traversed +several blocks to the north, and finally approached the house in which +the Stones had their apartment. Although high-perched, it was uninjured, +and as Isabel climbed the hill she saw Paula and her children seated, +with many others, on the long flight of steps. Paula waved her hand and +walked down composedly to meet her sister. She was dressed, laced, and +painted. A sufficient time had elapsed since the earthquake to permit +her ruling passion to regain its throne. + +"Well, I am glad to see you!" She greeted Isabel with something of the +grand air. She felt almost pompous with the sense of playing her part in +a great event, fancied herself, perhaps, its central figure. "Of course, +I knew you were all right up there, especially as we came off fairly +well. But you should have been here. You've missed it!" + +"I know," said Isabel, humbly. "But I am glad you were not hurt. And not +frightened?" + +"Oh, fearfully. And being up so many flights of stairs made it seem so +much worse. But Lyster and I managed to get out of bed and into the +nursery before it was half over, and hold the children in the doorways. +I didn't make a fool of myself like so many others, and run out in the +street before I was dressed; my hair was up on pins. Lys was more +frightened than I was--it's a wonder he has any nerves at all--and now +that there are so many fires he is fearfully excited at the idea that +all his favorite haunts may go. He has gone down-town to see what is +happening--also," in a happy afterthought, "to try and borrow some +money. He literally had not ten cents in his pocket. We have some in the +bank for a wonder, but everybody says the banks will go, and also that +there will be hard times." + +Isabel handed over her purse mechanically. "Victoria and Elton have +plenty, I shall not need it," she said. But the desire to save Mrs. +Stone's feelings was superfluous. The purse disappeared with a polite +"Thanks, dear," and Paula hastily changed the subject, lest the luxury +of a carriage for the return to Russian Hill should appeal to Isabel. +"Of course you'll go back to the ranch where you can be comfortable," +she remarked. + +"I have no plan. The launch is ready for us, but it will depend upon the +others. Should you care to go to the ranch? I don't suppose you are in +any danger from fire, out here, but things may be very uncomfortable for +a time." + +"Oh, I'll take the risk," said Paula, easily. "I should be bored to +death up there, and here there are so many people to talk to. I have +heard about fifty experiences this morning, and all fearfully +interesting. I guess we'll make out. It will only be for a day or two +anyhow, and everybody that has food in the house is offering to share +with the rest. I never have much on hand, but Mrs. Brooks, who lives +under me, always keeps her store-room filled, and has invited me to +lunch. You had better stop, too." + +"I have promised Victoria to return. Just suppose the fire should come +out here, what should you do?" + +"Oh, take a mattress or two out to the Presidio. It's not far, and would +be a regular picnic. But it won't." + +"Well, I'll go, then. If you change your mind you can have the launch. +Only come to me first. Mr. Clatt is standing over it with a +six-shooter." + +"Thanks. Sorry you won't come in. Lys won't sit down for about a week, +he's _that_ nervous, so you'll probably see him up on the Hill." + +Isabel started for home, and when she reached Fillmore Street discovered +that she was tired. It was then that she regretted not having reserved a +dollar or two; but no doubt Victoria was at home by this time. She found +a livery-stable, and asked the proprietor, lounging in the entrance, if +he could send her to the foot of her bluff. + +"Yes, for fifty dollars," he said, coolly. Fillmore Street was a +prosperous slum, another brief level between two steep acclivities. It +was not yet aware of the proud destiny that awaited it, that for the +next year or more it was to be the teeming centre of the abbreviated +city's life, but there never was a time when it was burdened with +manners, or the grand point of view. When Isabel stared, the man +continued: "Yes, ma'am! Fifty's the ticket. And two hours later it may +be five hundred. Some people are getting mighty nervous, and I've let +five hacks and buggies already, at my own figure, to them as wants to +get out of town quick." + +Isabel turned her back on him, and climbed and descended again. Lower +Van Ness Avenue was even more torn and lumpy than where she had crossed +it at California Street, and hundreds of the South of Market Street +refugees were sitting or lying in the middle of the street, worn out but +stolid. Just beyond, she caught up with a teamster, who, noticing the +fatigue in her eyes, stopped his horses and offered her a "lift," +provided she was "going his way." + +Isabel gratefully climbed to his high perch, after stating that she had +no money, and being royally silenced. + +"Oh, shucks!" said the man. "I guess this is the time to do other folks +a good turn. You'd do the same for me, I'll bet. What do you think of +this business, anyhow?" + +Isabel replied hopefully, but he shook his head. + +"City's doomed. Far as Van Ness, anyhow. Nothin' ain't goin' to stop +that fire but water, and water's just what they haven't got. Lord! to +think of that bay on three sides of the city. Talk about the Ancient +Mariner. I don't live in the city, but I'll be sorry to see it go. Lord! +warn't that a shake? I was flung plumb out of bed and against the wall, +and the house next to mine, or the one I war in, went plumb out into the +middle of the street. Lord! what a yellin' there was inside! Nobody +hurt, but one woman went plumb out'r her mind. They've got her tied to +the bed-post now. And what a lootin' of saloons there was until the +soldiers marched in! Now, I hear, that there mayor has issued an order, +which is to be pasted up all over, that any man caught lootin' anything, +saloons or otherwise, is to be shot dead and no questions asked. Good +job, that. I guess we're in for high old times, miss. I'm makin' for +Oakland, where I live. I brought in a load last evenin' and stopped +over. Some of my friends live down by the ferry, and I'll pick them up, +if they want to get out. Don't you want to come along? My wife and me'll +be glad to put you up if you can't do any better." + +Isabel thanked him warmly, and assured him that she would be safe in any +case, then discovered a loose half-dollar in the pocket of her jacket. +The man accepted it philosophically. + +"You were welcome to the ride, but I'm not the one to say nay to a bit +of silver so long as you say you're not hard up yourself. Guess it'll +come in handy. Well, s'long. Good luck to you. I've enjoyed your society +very much." + + + + +XII + + +The teamster had deposited her at Taylor and Jackson streets, and as she +passed the Trennahans' door it occurred to her to ask how they fared. +The house appeared to be uninjured, but the electric bell was useless, +and it was not until she had knocked several times that an old Mexican +servant answered the summons. Then she learned that the family had left +for Menlo Park in their touring car immediately after the earthquake, as +the boys were at the country-house with their tutor. The woman had been +maid for many years to Mrs. Polk and had lived with Magdalena since her +aunt's death. She was a privileged character, and during Isabel's visit +had accepted her relationship to the house of Yorba and waited on her +personally. + +"So tired you look," she said. "Come in, no?" Then, as the invitation +was declined, she leaned her stout shapeless figure against the +door-frame and begged Isabel for an account of her experience. Isabel +gave it briefly, and the old woman shook her head. "So terreeblay +thing!" she sighed. "Seventy years I live in California and this the +more bad earthquake I never feel. My mother she feel the great +earthquake of 1812 in the south, when the padres plant a long straight +branch in the middle of the square of San Gabriel, and it never stop +shake for four months. Ay yi, California! I theenk we all go into the +bay this morning, and I fall down twice when I run to see how little +Senorita Inez she feeling. Ay yi!" + +"Why did you not go to the country?" + +"And who take care the house? The car come back bime-by for the other +servants, but I no go. Si, I can go in the train--then--perhaps. But no +in automobilia. Is devil, no less." + +"Well, if you should be frightened come up to me," and Isabel went on +hurriedly to her own home, suddenly reminded of the uncertainty of her +relative's nerves. But Victoria was standing on the porch staring +outward with such an intensity of gaze that she took no notice of +Isabel's approach. And when Isabel reached her side, she too stood +silent for a time. _The Call_ Building was on fire. This square tower of +seventeen stories and a dome, with some seventy windows on each side, +had caught fire at the top, and as the flames devoured the contents of +one floor as quickly as possible that they might dart down another +flight and gorge themselves anew, in an incredibly short time the two +hundred windows in sight, and no doubt those in the rear, were spouting +flames like the mouths of so many cannon: each sharply defined, owing to +the indestructible nature of the walls. Volumes of white smoke poured +upward to be lost in the black clouds above. At times the fire and +smoke, on either side, torn by the wind, seemed to dance and gyrate in a +Bacchanalian revel, taking monstrous forms, that exploded in showers of +sparks, glittering like the fabled California sands. Above the burning +district the smoke clouds changed form constantly. Sometimes they reeled +along like colossal water-spouts. The roar of the fire waxed louder as +one listened to it: a deep persistent energetic roar, as of a sea +climbing over a land its time had come to devour. + +Suddenly a curtain of smoke swept down and obliterated the scene, +conveying a sense of respite, challenging the memory, although a moment +later it was shot with a million sparks. + +Victoria announced briefly that they were to have lunch of a sort, but +for her part she would prefer a bath. + +A bath, however, was out of the question, and, without washing the +cinders from their faces and hands, they sat down to beefsteak fried on +one of the oil-stoves used for heating the Mansard story, and canned +vegetables. That much indulgence they might have permitted themselves, +but human nature is prone to extremes, and they were tuned to a severe +economy that might embrace more than water for some weeks to come. + +Isabel sent a plate of sandwiches and a bottle of beer down to Mr. +Clatt, and the servant returned with the information that the faithful +wharfinger was sitting on a chair in front of the launch, a pistol on +his lap; and that already a small crowd was crouched like buzzards in +front of him. Isabel asked Victoria if she cared to retreat, but the +older woman shook her head. + +"Do you?" she asked. + +"Oh no. I shall remain until the last minute, certainly until I know +what Elton's plans are. If the launch is seized we can go down to Fort +Mason or out to the Presidio. Every one is in the same boat. I should +hate being too comfortable. But I don't think you should sleep +out-of-doors. It is always damp at night." + +"I can stand as much as you can. I am quite fit again. And this is the +first time, for heaven knows how many years, that anything has +interested me. I shall stay till the last minute; and surely no fire +could climb this hill. Did I tell you that Mr. Trennahan came up at once +and asked me to go to Menlo Park with them? Ungrateful--but I have not +thought of it since." + +Isabel announced her intention to take a nap. "No one knows what may +happen to-night," she said. "And I feel as if I had not slept for a +week." + +She fell asleep at once. Lady Victoria awakened her by bursting +unceremoniously into her room. + +"You must get up and look!" she cried. "The Palace Hotel and the other +big newspaper buildings are on fire. The sight is something awful--and +wonderful." + +Isabel ran to the window. All the valley was a rolling sea of flame, and +all space seemed to be filled with enormous surging billows of smoke. +From every window of the Palace Hotel, an immense square building of +some seven stories, from the great newspaper buildings, and from other +brick and stone structures near by, tongues of flame were leaping; the +wooden buildings were mere shapeless furnaces. Again a volume of smoke +descended, and for the moment nothing was to be seen but a red blur +somewhere in the midst of rolling black. + +Victoria communicated to Isabel the information she had received from +the neighbors, always coming and going. People were pouring out of the +city, not only by the Southern Pacific boats to Oakland, and indirectly +to Berkeley and Alameda, but by freight-boats and launches to the Marin +towns. They were obliged to make a long detour round the base of the +northern hills, as the water-front and the streets behind were a roaring +furnace, although the fires had not crossed East Street. All houses in +the towns across the bay had opened to the refugees, tents had been +erected in the public squares, and emergency hospitals had been started +before nine o'clock. The militia had been called out to assist the +regulars, and also the Cadet Battalion of the State University. A +Citizens' Patrol had been formed to protect the still unburned +districts, each man provided with arms at the Presidio. People on the +lower slopes were now in full flight towards the western parks and +hills, as well as the Presidio, many being under the impression that the +ferry-boats were not running. It was doubtful if a hotel or a +boarding-house would harbor a soul that night; not east of Van Ness +Avenue, at least, and many in that region were preparing to sleep in the +Park and squares, lest the fire attack them from the south. Refugees, +exhausted, were lying on the doorsteps and in the streets of the Western +Addition. + +Victoria relapsed into silence and Isabel gazed down upon the beautiful +terrible scene--the curtain had rolled upward again--at the enormous +tongues of flame leaping from every window, the showers of golden +sparks, the swooping and soaring clouds, many of them white, with +convoluted edges, and faintly tinted like the day smoke of Vesuvius. +These curled white masses rolled among the black waves towards the west, +and the low deep roar waxed louder as one listened to it. + +All the wooden bow-windows of the Palace Hotel had been eaten off, but +it would be hours before the stoutly built old hotel ceased to feed the +flames. Sometimes sheets of fire seemed to drive from the apertures +across the great width of Market Street, to be beaten back by a solid +wall of flame. In the intense clear yellow light that bathed the street +Isabel could see the twisted car tracks. More than once she fancied she +saw a prostrate body, but it may have been an achievement of the +shifting flames, and certainly nothing living moved down there. The +mounted officers and their men were patrolling the blocks along all the +northern front of the fire. + +"Are you not in the least worried about Elton?" asked Isabel, abruptly. + +"Not a bit. I never worried about him when he was a child. He was always +the most agile and ready youngster I ever saw." + +"But he is very venturesome. He might be caught in one of those furnaces +as well as another, or killed by falling bricks." + +"He is a man of destiny," said Victoria indifferently. "He will live to +accomplish what he was born for." + +Isabel, in truth, found worry as impossible as any other common emotion, +nevertheless thought it odd that he did not come to them for a moment or +send a message. She could appreciate his wholly masculine mood, his +temporary indifference to the charms of her sex, but he had an ingrained +sense of responsibility, and was more considerate than the average man. + +Lady Victoria returned to her vantage-point on the veranda, and Isabel +went down to the garden fence where the three Japs were standing, and +asked them if they intended to remain--half the servants had already +fled from the city. Two replied that later in the day they should go to +Oakland where they had friends. Isabel told them that she should not +part with what little money there was in the house, and they answered +politely that they expected to wait for their wages. The oldest of the +three, a respectable man of thirty, who looked like, and no doubt was, +a student, announced his intention to remain. + +"I can cook," he added. "Not well, but perhaps well enough for a few +days. And perhaps if we are driven out I may go to the country with you. +I should be willing to work for anything you could pay me until things +were restored to their normal condition--if you would be good enough to +give me my evenings for study." + +Isabel promised him the protection of her ranch-house, and stood talking +to him for some time. His English was unusually correct and his remarks +were more intelligent than those of the average man of her acquaintance. +He told her something of Japanese earthquakes, and was good enough to +add that he had never felt quite so violent or so peculiar a series of +earth movements as California had achieved that morning. He was curious +to see the result as recorded on the seismograph, and to know at what +hour it registered in Japan. + +"I think Professor Omori will come over," he said, modestly. "This +earthquake will interest him very much. He will wish to study the +ground." + +"Were you not frightened?" asked Isabel, curiously. + +"I appreciated the danger, but frightened--no, miss, I think I have +never felt frightened. But I do not like fire. I have seen Tokio burn. I +shall walk about constantly and see that it does not steal upon us from +the north or west. Some silly person might make a fire, and all the +chimneys must be cracked." + +"I feel much relieved to know that you will patrol," said Isabel, +wondering if she were being gracious to a prince. "Would you mind going +up to the top of the hill and asking some one if he knows whether all +the injured were taken from the Mechanics' Pavilion? It is blazing like +a wood pile." + +He went up the hill and returned with the information that all the +patients, as well as the doctors and nurses, had been taken out, the +last of them while the roof was blazing, and conveyed in automobiles to +other emergency hospitals far away; and that the prisoners in the City +Hall had been transported, manacled, to the army prisons in the same +manner. + +"One of the gentlemen said he saw Mr. Gwynne running an automobile full +of nurses and patients--one of Mr. Hofer's machines," he added. "And +that he returned twice at least. All the young men that own machines are +acting very well, they say, transporting the injured, and making +themselves generally useful. Many are on the roofs of the greater +buildings with the firemen fighting the fire with blankets, and hose +attached to the cisterns. A few buildings have been saved in that way, +but not many, and more or less of the water has to be turned on the men, +who catch fire repeatedly from the sparks." + +Isabel went into the house and put on her hat. "I cannot keep still any +longer," she said to Victoria, a moment later. "And now I am quite +rested. I shall go down and see Mrs. Hofer, and reconnoitre for myself. +If Elton should come, ask him to wait for me here--he must need a +rest--or walk down Taylor Street." + + + + +XIII + + +She found her lower neighbors still sitting on their doorsteps or +standing in groups, but was told that many more had already gone out to +the Western Addition with their valuables, fearing that the fire might +come up the southern or eastern slopes before night. A large touring car +was standing in front of the Hofers' door. The children and their nurses +were in it, and Mr. Toole came out and took his place as Isabel reached +the house. He greeted her for the first time since she had known him +without a smile; and he looked very old and sad. Isabel heard Mrs. +Hofer's light high rapid voice within. She was standing in the large +drawing-room, giving orders to a group of servants. When she saw Isabel +she cried out as if confronted with a ghost. + +"Oh!" she exclaimed, but not kissing her as usual; her mind apparently +was divided into many parts. "I am relieved to see that _you_ are all +right. I didn't know what might have happened up State. Did you _ever_? +Well!--Great old country this. Talk about living on the side of +Vesuvius. And now everything is going, everything!" + +"I keep hoping for a change of wind." + +"Perhaps, but I've pretty well given it up. We are in disgrace to-day, +sure enough. And anyhow Mr. Hofer has lost millions, millions! +However--" She recovered herself with a bound. "He made them, so I +guess he can make more. And do you know what he's thinking about +already? He burst in here half an hour ago--as black as your hat--with +orders that I should take the family down to Burlingame at once, and +then began talking about the Burnham plans, and the opportunity to clean +up the city politically. There's a raging idealist for you. And do you +know what he and Mr. Gwynne are up to now? Carrying dynamite, no less, +between Fort Mason and the fire line. The two of them are running an +automobile apiece and have put themselves at the disposal of the +authorities. Nice thing for me to be thinking of all night. Don't you +want to come along?" + +Isabel shook her head. + +"Well, I'll move on then--before they change their minds and impress my +car. So far I have a gracious permit to keep it. The servants have +buried the silver and the pictures, but--" She glanced at the beautiful +frieze, which, without its electric lights, looked a mere blur of blue +and black, then shrugged her shoulders. "I just won't believe my house +will go," she said, defiantly; "not till the last minute, anyhow. When +the fire's over, or Mr. Hofer lets me, I'll come back and do something +for those poor wretches that have been burned out. Gather up what food +there is to be had in the country, and start an eating station or +something. Mr. Hofer says food will come pouring in from every direction +presently, and then they will need organizers. I'm good at that. Can I +rely on you? It will be an experience, anyhow; and of course it's my +place to do that sort of thing. Besides, I do feel terribly sorry for +those poor things, and I won't be able to sit still for a month." + +"You can count on me. When this is over I shall find you somehow." + +"Oh, don't worry. The newspapers won't miss anything. They're burned +out, but I hear that the editors are already over in Oakland scurrying +round after a plant. Well, _adios_. If you say the word I'll send the +car back for you--although I doubt if it would pass a squad without +those children in it. I suppose it would hold several tons of dynamite! +Heigh-ho, I suppose it is all in the day's work. What can you expect if +you live in an earthquake country?" They had reached the pavement and +she put her lips close to Isabel's ear. "I'd like to get out of the +damned place and never see it again," she whispered. "I'll keep a stiff +upper lip, but those are my sentiments and I guess I have company." + +She stepped lightly into the car, nodded with a grim gayety, and in +another moment had disappeared round the corner of Taylor and California +streets. + +Isabel started down the hill, and almost immediately met Anne +Montgomery. She had not recognized her as they approached each other, +for the glare was in her eyes; but Miss Montgomery ran forward and +kissed her. + +"What on earth did you come to this God-forsaken place for, when you had +the country to stay in?" she demanded. "Oh, Lady Victoria? I did not +know she was here. Just come with me and look at a sight." + +She put her arm through Isabel's and led her rapidly for several blocks +along California Street, then down Hyde towards moving columns of +people. The fire was far south of these refugees as yet, but they looked +down every cross street and saw it; and more than once during their slow +flight they had seen the soldiers at the visible end of each long vista +move a block farther north. "I tramped a long way with them," said Miss +Montgomery, "carrying things for a woman I never saw before. Then a man +took the burden over and I started up the hill to see how some friends +were faring." + +From this point they could hear the roar and crackle of the fire and the +crashing of walls; but even more formidable was that tramping of +thousands of feet, the scraping of trunks and furniture on the tracks +and stones. Isabel, still feeling like a palimpsest, lingered for an +hour looking at these refugees. They were vastly different, in all but +their impotence, from those of the early morning. Hundreds were from the +"boarding-house district"; others were householders; a large number, no +doubt, owned their carriages or automobiles, but those had been +impressed long since. It was a well and a carefully dressed crowd, for +by this time nearly every one had recovered from the shock of the +earthquake; many forgotten it, no doubt, in the new horror. They had not +the blank expression of the poor, dazed by the second calamity following +so close upon the heels of the first, but their lips were pressed, eyes +were straining towards the distant goal, and all would have been pale +but for the glare of the fire. Fortunately for most of them, men as well +as women, they had either children, pets, or even more cumbersome +belongings to claim their immediate attention; no time for either +thought or despair. They pushed trunks to which skates had been +attached, or pulled them by ropes; they trundled sewing-machines and +pieces of small furniture, laden with bundles. Many carried +pillow-cases, into which they had stuffed a favorite dress and hat, an +extra pair of boots and a change of underclothing, some valuable +bibelot or bundle of documents; to say nothing of their jewels and what +food they could lay hands on. Several women wore their furs, as an +easier way of saving them, and children carried their dolls. Their state +of mind was elemental. They lived acutely in the present moment and +looked neither behind nor before--save to a goal of safety. Misfortune +had descended upon them, and ruin no doubt would follow, but for the +present they asked no more than to save what they could carry or propel, +and to get far beyond that awful fire. The refinements of sentiment and +all complexity were forgotten; they indulged in nothing so futile as +complaint, nor even conversation. And the sense of the common calamity +sustained them, no doubt, deindividualized them for the hour. Soon after +they became their normal selves once more, and accepted the hard +conditions of the following weeks with the philosophy that was to be +expected of them. But underneath all the recovered gayety and defiant +pride of the later time more than one spirit was sprained, haunted with +a sense of dislocation, permanently saddened by the loss not of fortune +but of personal treasures, of old homes full of life-long associations, +never to be replaced nor regained. Many no doubt were better off for +losing those old anchors that held them to the past and emphasized their +years, besides keeping their sorrows green, but others had one reason +less for living. Nevertheless the philosophy born of a lifetime in an +earthquake country, of the electric climate, of their isolation, as well +as the good Anglo-Saxon strain in so many of them, brought a genuine +rebound to all physically capable of it, both old and young. But to-day +they were primitive--and entirely human. They helped one another, the +stronger carrying the weaker's burdens as a matter of course. The men +were bent almost double with increasing properties. + +Isabel felt neither pity nor admiration for them; they were a mere unit, +these thousands reduced to their primal component, the third fact in the +great day of facts. + +Suddenly, however, she caught sight of Lyster Stone. He carried a baby +on one arm and several rolls of painted canvas under the other. Beside +him walked the mother pushing a loaded crib; and behind him the artist +friend, to whose aid he had evidently gone, dragged a large canvas trunk +bound with an ingenious system of ropes. Stone nodded gayly when he saw +Isabel. + +"Hallo!" he cried. "I was going for you later on. We'll all sleep out +to-night. Better come along." Then as Isabel only shook her head he +said, hurriedly: "Awfully sorry I forgot--promised Gwynne I'd go up and +tell you he was in for a long day's work--transporting hospital patients +and hauling dynamite. He sent peremptory orders that you and his mother +were to go to the country with the afternoon tide." + +The crowd bore him on and Isabel and Anne walked up the hill again, +meeting other streams of refugees, but thinner, as most of them +preferred the easier slopes. Isabel looked at Anne curiously. There was +an unusual restlessness about her, nothing of the rudimentary expression +of the crowd. Isabel was wondering if her apparent and unusual spirits +might be due to the fact that her flat was in the Western Addition, and +that she had hired a wagon at the first alarm of fire and carried her +silver to the Presidio, when Anne suddenly began to explain herself. + +"Do you know," she broke out, "I have a wonderful sense of +freedom!--of--of--hope. Something has happened at last. All the ruts +have been ploughed over. Life will never be the same here, in my time at +least. It will be like beginning all over again, with a hundred barely +imagined possibilities and an equal chance for every one. It may be a +reprehensible thing--to feel as if the destruction of your city had set +your individual soul free--but I do, and that's the end of it. And I can +tell you I've seen that _expression_ in the eyes of many a man in the +last few hours. Not in those of the older men, perhaps, for they wear +out early enough in this climate, anyhow, and those that are close upon +sixty don't look as if they had much left to live for--although I've +seen a few flying about as if they had dropped thirty years; its all a +matter of temperament and physique. But for the rest of us! The still +energetic men, and the women that have been cankered with the tedium +vitae, and have the brains and brawn to work. It will be the Fifties all +over again--not only something more than a bare living in prospect, but +a constant, exciting, interest in life. I saw a good many men, just +after the earthquake, looking as if they had believed the end of the +world had come, but they braced up directly the city was threatened by +something they could pit themselves against. Every man worth his salt is +fighting fire, rescuing the helpless, dragging mattresses out to the +hills and Park, and helping the women down here save their belongings. +All with automobiles and carriages are helping the authorities and +hospitals. Political factions and personal enemies are working side by +side, particularly down on the fire line. Even the mayor has won a day's +respect from his fellow-citizens, although I'm told he's terribly torn +between the Committee of Fifty and the military authorities on the one +hand, who want to blow up a wide zone, and the property-holders who +won't have their precious possessions sacrificed when the wind may +change any minute. Meanwhile the fire has a headway that will give it +the best part of the city. I never felt so alive in my life; so vividly +in the present. Can you remember the name of a book you have read, that +there is any world outside these seven square miles?" + +"Yesterday is a mere dream and to-morrow is only a bare possibility! The +Fifties! I feel as if we were at the beginning of things on another +planet. I shall never trouble my head with problems or psychology again. +We are mere dancing midgets on the scalp of stupendous forces that we do +not even dimly apprehend. Earth lets us play until her patience is +exhausted with our pretentions as mere human beings, at our insane +delusion that the intellectual are not only the equal but the superior +of the physical forces; and then she merely shakes herself, and the +wisest is as helpless as the idiot, the prince even worse off than the +pauper because he has a bigger house to run out of. They all dance to +her tune like so many wooden marionettes. Hofer is no better off than +his blacksmith--whose savings are probably in the fireproof vault of +some bank, while I happen to know that more than one millionaire has not +insured his Class A buildings, thinking the expense unnecessary. No +wonder you have a sense of freedom. So have I. We are dancing to the +tune of the unseen forces. They will do the thinking. I wonder, +by-the-way, if deep down in the brain of that fleeing ruined tide of +elemental beings there is not a prick of gratified vanity that they are +in the midst of a great and horrible experience? We have been reading so +much lately of the horrors in Russia, we have read, all our lives, of +horrors and atrocities somewhere, and this State has grinned at us so +unintermittently. Now we, too, are actors in a great life-and-death +drama. I don't fancy any one is doing even that much analysis, but I +can't help thinking that the vague appreciation of the fact sustains +them in a way--possibly gives them a calm sense of superiority to the +rest of the world----Look at this." + +They had reached Jackson Street on the flat of Nob Hill. It was now +evening and the exodus from Chinatown had begun. The Mongolians were +streaming up from their threatened quarter, and, like the others, +tramping silently out to the Presidio. The merchants had put on their +fine clothes, and their families--exposed to the Occidental eye for the +first time--wore gorgeous garments of bright silks covered with +embroideries. The poor little respectable wives tottered along on their +foolish feet, held up by their lords or their "big-footed" +serving-women, while their children trudged along uncomplainingly and +stared at the fire with big expressionless eyes. Mingling freely with +the wealthy autocrats of Chinatown were the coolies, and the +disreputable women with which the quarter swarmed. The Chinese rarely +import their wives. The coolies wore their blue blouses and soft felt +hats, and the women had painted their faces and built up their hair as +usual, shining tower-like coiffures stuck with large-lobed pins, cheap +or costly, according to their grade. All were as stolid as their own +wooden gods. They would have looked like a solemn procession on a festa +day had it not been for the bundles and strong-chests they carried. + +"Come up to dinner, such as it is," said Isabel, to Anne. "What are you +going to do to-night?" + +"Camp down in the sand-lots by Fort Mason and see what I can do for +those poor refugees. There will be great suffering, I am afraid. Many +women should be in hospital with every attention; and with all this +excitement who knows what may happen? I fancy either a tent-hospital +will be erected, or the worst cases will be taken into the fort. I am a +good nurse, and I told the Leader I should be there. There will be many +children to look after, too. The parents, the best of them, won't be up +to much." + +"Perhaps I will go down later. But I shall wait at the house until I +have seen Mr. Gwynne--he may need food, or be hurt in any of a dozen +ways. If you see him--and no doubt you will, if you are to be at the +fort--tell him that I have not gone to the country and have no intention +of going." + + + + +XIV + + +They had passed members of the Citizens' Patrol on every block, and they +found one pacing the plank walk on Russian Hill. He told them that the +edict had gone forth that not so much as a candle should be lit in a +house that night and that all cooking must be done out-of-doors. The +spectacled Jap was boiling soup on one of the oil stoves, which he had +carried into the garden and half surrounded by a screen. Beside him was +what looked like an open newly-dug grave, and the girls, startled, +demanded what it meant. + +Sugihara, apparently, never smiled, but his eyes flickered. "Before +Cusha and Kuranaga went I made them dig a hole for the silver," he said. +"It is too heavy for the launch. If we are driven away, I will cut your +ancestors from their frames and take them with us." + +"Well, you are a treasure," said Isabel, with a sigh. "You shall do +nothing but read when you get to the ranch." + +Lady Victoria was pacing slowly up and down the porch, her eyes seldom +wandering from the fire. When dinner was ready, she merely shook her +head impatiently, and Isabel and her guest sat down in the little +tower-room, which was brilliantly illuminated from below. Sugihara +had made a very good soup of canned corn and tomatoes and had fried +bits of meat and potato. There was little conversation. The dynamiting +was now something more than sporadic. The detonations were so terrific +that it was not difficult for the San Franciscans to imagine +themselves--supposing they had a grain of imagination left--in a +besieged city. Isabel suggested, and Anne agreed with her, that they +might have been far worse off than they were; nature at her extremest is +never so pitiless as the human brute when the lust to kill is on him. + +Isabel prepared the remains of the feast for Mr. Clatt, and asked +Sugihara if he would object to relieving the watch, that the wharfinger +might snatch a few hours' sleep. There was no longer any danger of fire +except from the conflagration itself, and now that the dynamiting had +begun in earnest it was possible that the flames would be isolated +before midnight. + +The Jap went off with the dish in one hand and a book in the other, +hoping that he would be allowed to light a candle on the launch. He +returned in a few moments, and for the first time he was smiling. + +"Mr. Clatt will not give up his watch," he said. "He says he might miss +the chance to put a hole in some--dago (his language was very bad, +Miss). He says there's not a wink of sleep in him." + +"No doubt but that he will hold on to it, unless the military step in," +said Anne. "Then, I fancy, he would surrender very meekly. They have +impressed a good many launches for prisoners and dynamite. But I hope +not, for whether the fire comes up the hills or not, there is going to +be terrible privation. Heaven knows how many days it will be before we +have enough water even to drink, and I heard a little while ago that as +soon as food comes in the authorities will establish relief stations, +where everybody, from the millionaire to John Chinaman, will have to +stand in line and wait for his loaf of bread. Wouldn't it be better for +you to go at once?" + +"I fancy I can endure as much as any one, and if I am driven from here I +will go down to you. I shall go down anyhow when I have seen Mr. Gwynne. +I do not propose to lie in a hammock while several hundred thousand +people are sleeping on the ground. What do you take me for?" + +"Somehow I don't see you as a nurse, or amusing children, or doling out +bread and raiment. You would be much more in the picture encouraging Mr. +Gwynne. However--I am going to impress your linen and a clothes-basket +to carry it in. No doubt the philosophical Sugihara will help me carry +it to the fort." + +"Take what you like." Isabel directed her to the linen-closet, and went +down to the veranda. She paused abruptly in the doorway. Victoria's face +could be seen only in profile, but its expression, as she gazed down +upon that tossing twisting furious flame ocean, needed no analytical +faculty to interpret. It was voluptuous, ecstatic. + +Isabel crossed the porch in a stride. + +"What are you thinking of?" she demanded, imperiously. + +Victoria did not turn with a start. She did not turn at all. "I am +thinking," she replied, automatically, as if in obedience to the +stronger will--"I am thinking that at last I understand what it is we +are so blindly striving for from the hour when we can think at all; what +it is--that unsatisfied desire that urges us on and on to so many fatal +experiments in the pursuit of happiness. The great goal, the real +meaning of our miserable balked mortal existence is not that dancing +will-o'-the-wisp we call happiness, for want of a better name. It is +Death." + +"Well?" Isabel's voice rose, but she kept the anxiety out of it. + +"I cannot imagine anything more delicious," went on Victoria, in the +same low rich tones, "than to walk straight down those hills and into +that sea of flame. I have always admired Empedocles, who cast himself +into Etna. Once I saw a friend cremated, and the brief vision of that +white incandescence, before the coffin shot down, seemed to me the +apotheosis, the voluptuous poetry of death. I could walk down into that +colossal furnace without flinching, and I believe that my last moment, +as the world disappeared behind me, and those superb flames took me into +their embrace, would be one of sublimest ecstasy." + +Isabel caught her by the shoulders and whirled her about. "Well, you +will do nothing of the sort," she cried, roughly. "In the first place you +couldn't get through the lines, and in the second you are wanted at Fort +Mason. Anne is going down with a basket of linen for the poor women who +will be confined to-night. You are an uncommonly strong woman, and you +can make use of every bit of your strength. Anne and the Leader are +frail creatures, and no one else that I know of is going. They need you, +and you will soon have your hands so full that your head will be purged +of this nonsense. It is the fire lust--the same lust that incited a boy +to-day to attempt to set fire to a house in this district that he might +watch the whole city burn. I hope your egoism exploded in that climax. +Here comes Anne. You must go." + +"Very well," said Victoria, suddenly dazed, and with a will relaxed +after the long tension of the day. "I will go." + +"Where are your jewels?" + +"Down in the bank." + +"Well, gather up any other small things you treasure, and either conceal +them about you or give them to me." + +"I shall not take anything. My laces are in the chiffonniere. I do not +care to enter the house again." + +Isabel fetched her hat and jacket, for in spite of the fire it would be +cold near the water; and a few moments later she stood on the edge of +Green and Jones streets, on the other side of the hill, and watched +Victoria and Anne, carrying a large clothes-basket between them, +carefully making their way down to the level. They had a walk of some +thirteen blocks before them, but the streets were full of people and of +ruddy light. + +She returned to the house and sat down on the porch, her eyes diverted +from the fire for a moment by the picture of Sugihara, a pair of +eye-glasses in front of his spectacles, comfortably established on a +chair in the garden and reading by the lamp of the burning city. It was +apparent that he had forgotten the 18th of April. + +Isabel was alone but a moment. Stone burst in upon her. He had +approached from behind, and came running down the hill. + +"Isabel," he cried. "Get a bottle of champagne." + +"Champagne?" + +"Yes. It may be six months before I see another--but that is a mere +detail. I want to drink to the old city." + +Isabel, who liked him best in his dramatic moments, found a bottle of +champagne. He knocked the head off, and filling the glass, went down to +the first landing of the long narrow flight of steps. He held the glass +high, pointing it first towards the middle of what had been Market +Street, and was now a river of fire, then slowly shifting it along +towards Kearney and Montgomery, as he named the restaurants that had +given San Francisco no mean part of her fame. + +"Here's to Zinkand's, Tait's, The Palace Grill! The Poodle Dog! +Marchand's! The Pup! Delmonico's! Coppa's! The Fashion! The Hotel de +France! And here's to the Cocktail Route, the Tenderloin, and the +Bohemian Club! And here's--" By this time his voice was dissolving, and +the glass was describing eccentric curves. "Here's to the old city, +whose like will never be seen this side of hell again. Pretty good +imitation of heaven in spots, and everything you chose to look for, +anyway. And the prettiest women, the best fellows, the greatest +all-night life, the finest cooking, the wickedest climate. Here's to San +Francisco--and damn the bounder that calls her 'Frisco!" + +Then he drank what was left of the contents of his glass and hastily +refilled it. After he had finished the bottle luxuriously, he held out +his hand to Isabel. "Come along?" he asked. Then, as she shook her head: +"I must go back to Paula and the kids. The mattresses are out in the +Park already. You are in no danger, what with the neighbors above and +the patrol. Good luck to you," and he vanished. + +Isabel was alone at last, a state she had unconsciously wished for all +day--it seemed a month since the morning. She sat down and leaned her +elbows on the railing. Now that the sun was gone, the heavens, or the +smoke obscuring them, were as red as that sea beneath which seemed to +devour a house a minute as it rolled out towards the Mission and worked +with all its might among the great business blocks between Market Street +and Telegraph Hill. Some one had estimated that the columns of fire +were seven miles high, and they certainly looked as if they had melted +the very stars. Here and there was a play of blue flames, doubtless from +some explosive substance, and when the dynamite shot the entrails from a +house there was a gorgeous display of fireworks--the golden showers of +sparks symbolizing the treasure that blackened and crumbled in dropping +back to earth. + +Before sitting down she had swept the distant hills with her field-glass +and seen thousands of people lying not ten feet apart, like an exhausted +army after battle. In that intense glare she could even study the +eccentric positions of the fallen headstones and monuments in the old +deserted cemeteries--Lone Mountain and Calvary. The cross on the lofty +point of the bare hill behind the Catholic cemetery was red against the +blackness of the west; and hundreds of weary mortals were huddled about +its base. She tried to pity all those terrified uncomfortable creatures +out there, but again the part they played in the greatest natural drama +of modern times occurred to her, and she thought that should console +them. + +She wondered at her lack of sentimental regret at the destruction of her +beloved city. But sentiment seemed a mere drop of insult to be cast into +that ocean of calamity. Moreover, she was pricked by a sense that it was +a living sentient thing, that city, and was getting its just dues for +the hearts it had devoured, the lives it had ruined, the merciless +clutch it had kept upon so many that were made for better things. To its +vice she gave little thought; she fancied it was not worse than other +cities, if the truth were known; it was the picturesqueness of its +methods that had held it in the limelight. But that it was one of the +world's juggernauts, and the more cruel for its ever laughing beguiling +face--of that there was no manner of doubt. + +She wondered also that she was not in a fever of anxiety about Gwynne. +She had interrogated the sentry and been informed that the automobiles +carrying dynamite dashed straight down to the fire line, often within; +that a number of the soldiers, whose duty it was to lay the explosive, +had been wounded and carried to the hospitals; that there was always the +risk of a laden machine being suddenly surrounded by fire, for many +houses were ignited by the sparks, and, in that wooden district down +there, burned like tinder. Perhaps, like Victoria, she was too sure of +his destiny; perhaps the picture of the future with him that she had +conceived refused to alter its lines; or it may be that there was no +place in the impersonal arrangement of her faculties the double +catastrophe had effected, for fear; or for anything beyond the +impressions of the moment. Her mind worked on mechanically. She was +determined to remain as long as there was a possibility of Gwynne's +returning for food or care. But the soul beneath was possessed by an +absolute calm. She had the sense of having been taken into partnership +with nature that morning; so sudden and personal had been that assault, +from which she yet had issued unscathed. She felt that everything that +would follow in life, excepting only her love for Gwynne, would be too +petty to regard more seriously than the daily meals. Not that she had +more than a bare mental appreciation of the phases of love at the +moment; but it possessed her and it was infinite. + +She sat motionless until nearly two o'clock and then went up to her room +and lay down. It was not possible to sleep for more than a few moments +at a time, for the detonations were almost incessant, but she forced +herself to rest, not knowing what work the morrow might have in store. +When she finally rose and looked out of her window she saw that the fire +was coming up the hills. + + + + +XV + + +She barely touched the breakfast prepared by the methodical Sugihara, +who had already buried the silver, and cut the pictures from their +frames, rolled, and tied them securely. + +"It is only a question of a few hours," he said. "The dynamiting so far +has done more harm than good. They take a house at a time instead of a +block, and as it falls apart it ignites another on the opposite side of +the street. The army doesn't like to interfere, and the mayor has too +long been obsequious to capital. Mr. Clatt is still there with the +launch behind him. I took him down his breakfast some time ago. He told +me to tell you that he'd 'got his job cut out for him now, as the Dagos +were beginning to leave Telegraph Hill.'" + +Isabel had one or two moments of panic as she watched those waves of +flame beat up the hill, and pictured them raging up the eastern slopes +as well; but the panic passed, for she knew that there were two exits +still open. The heavens were black. A disk like a sealing-wax wafer +indicated the position of the sun. The heat was terrific. The dynamiting +was incessant, but it did not drown the roar and the eager furious +crackle of the flames, the reverberating crash of falling walls. And the +flames were the redder for the blackness above. Cinders were falling all +over the heights, and the smoke burned the eyes. + +"I shall feel like Casabianca presently, and rather ridiculous," she +reflected, "but I shall stay till the last possible moment." She went +within and packed a pillow-case with Lady Victoria's laces and other +portable objects of value and adornment, then gathered up similar +belongings of her own, tied the case firmly about the neck, stood it +where it could be snatched in flight, and returned to the porch. + +The boarding-house district, several blocks of large wooden houses, +seemed literally to be swept from its foundations by those rushing +pillars of fire. The whole quarter was wiped out in an hour, and then +the fire turned its attention to the higher slopes. + +It played with them for a while, darting west and returning for a morsel +at which it leaped with the agility of a living monster, went west +again; then, its appetite whetted and its greed insatiable, it started +straight for Nob Hill. The soldiers drove the faithful servants out of +the houses at the point of the bayonet. Then--in a moment--the familiar +curtains were blowing out of the windows--shrivelled to a crisp and +pursued by the red rage behind. + +Sugihara did not go through the form of cooking luncheon. He knew that +his mistress would not eat, and he had as little appetite himself. He +folded his arms on the top of the fence and waited for the signal to +retreat. + +Isabel went into the house repeatedly and dipped her burning face into a +basin of water, but returned quickly to her post. The fire was running +from the east along California Street hill; she saw the men who had been +cutting pictures from their frames in the Institute of Art flee to the +west, then watched the Gothic structure flare up and burn like an old +hay-stack: that monument to a millionaire whose name would be already +forgotten had it not been tacked to the gift. The fire reached +California Street, on the edge of the plateau, from the south, coming up +the west side of Taylor Street. Other great houses of the rich were so +many roaring furnaces--several were curiously neglected and isolated by +the fire, that seemed to have gone mad with its own lust. The eastern +slopes were a mass of smouldering ruins, not black, but the most +exquisite tints of violet, rose, chrome, gray, sepia, yellow. They +looked, with their arches and columns, towers and broken walls, like the +Roman Forum and the Palatine Hill on a colossal scale. About and through +them floated clouds of fine white ashes, ghostly restless dust of +unthinkable treasure. + +Suddenly, hardly crediting her eyes, Isabel saw an automobile labor up +the steep acclivity, through that swirling furnace, and dart across +California Street and in the direction of Russian Hill. She knew that +Gwynne was in it, and a moment later Hofer discharged him at the foot of +the steps, then ran the car out Jackson Street at the top of its speed. + +Gwynne walked up the steps and along the plank walk. Isabel recognized +him by his carriage, for he was as black as a coal-heaver and most of +his hair was burned off. + +"I should like to wash first," he said, as he came up the house flight. +"The water will go with the rest." + +"Of course. Do you want anything to eat." + +"No, I had some sandwiches a while ago." + +He went up to his room and Isabel awaited him in the farthest corner of +the living-room, where it may have been a trifle less hot and less noisy +than elsewhere. + +He came down in a moment. "That was a close shave," he said. "We didn't +know what we were in for, and it was either go on and hope for better +luck at the top, or dive down into a very good imitation of a live +volcano." + +He was recognizable, although his khaki clothes were black and burned, +and one side of his head made him look as if he had just been discharged +from a military hospital. + +"I shall rest for a few moments and then go back," he said, throwing +himself into a chair opposite Isabel. "I never forgot you, but I made +sure Stone had delivered my message and that you were on the ranch. I +saw my mother and Miss Montgomery an hour ago. You must get out of this +at once." + +"Tell me what you have been doing," said Isabel evasively. + +"I have been alive," he said, intensely. "Never in all my days have I +found life so wonderful. Battle is nothing to it. For the best part of +two days I have been dodging the open jaws of death every minute; and +the sensation of pitting one's puny human strength and the accumulated +wit of several thousand years of varied civilization against an element +in its might has inspired me with the only consummate approval of life +that I have ever known--although I might have known it the day before +yesterday if you had looked as you do now." He sat steadily regarding +her for a few moments without speaking, but he was sensible of no +immediate wish to touch her. That, too, belonged to a possibly greater +but far different to-morrow. He was keyed very high. He did not feel +himself so much a human being as a component part of one force disputing +every inch of the progress of a mightier. + +"Great God, what men!" he burst out. "I have been with some member of +the Committee of Fifty, on and off, these two days, to say nothing of +last night--Mr. Phelan invited me to serve on it yesterday morning. They +are superb, not daunted for a moment, talking already of the new city, +of the opportunity this conflagration has given them to make it over in +every way. Architects were engaged before three o'clock yesterday +afternoon. And the young business men that have been cleaned out! They +talk only of the enormous possibilities of the future. I remember +reading once of much the same spirit exhibited by Londoners after the +Great Fire. It is the most wonderful thing in the world that for a few +days at least you are permitted to cherish an unleavened respect for +human nature. Every mean cowardly and selfish trait that chains man to +earth is moribund to-day, in the normal at least; and the rats have run +to other holes. The higher qualities, those that have inspired the world +since it began, are in full possession. And, by Jove, it is going to be +the pioneer life over again! Do you remember that I regretted once I +could not be in at the foundation and growth of a great city, also that +the drawback to such an opportunity was that one was never conscious of +his part? Well, now we are back to the conditions of the Fifties, and we +know it. We shall work for tremendous stakes, and in no doubt of the +result." + +"The enthusiastic moment has come," said Isabel. + +"Rather. Here is my part cut out for me. Here I stay and become a chief +factor in making this city greater even than before. That is enough for +any man. And there will be plenty of fight. Politics will crawl back to +new strongholds, as soon as men become egos again, but I shall fight +them here, not in the country." + +He stood up, and Isabel asked, hastily: "Have you had no sleep?" + +"Hofer and I broke into an empty house in the Western Addition towards +morning and slept on the floor for three hours. I have known harder +beds. I must go. I felt that I must look at you and order you to leave +at once." + +"I don't want to leave the city." + +"You must go. The fire will have taken this house before midnight. You +will be ordered out before that. They may save the city west of Van Ness +Avenue, for the mayor at last has consented that several blocks shall be +blown up at once. I am carrying dynamite. If I saw Russian Hill on fire +and was not sure that you were out of harm's way, it would unnerve me, +and I need all the nerve I've got." + +"I can go down to Fort Mason." + +"I want to know that you are out of the city. I think my mother is +better off where she is. She is working with a will down there and +absolutely refused to leave. I did not insist--no fire could cross those +sand-lots, and I fancy she needs occupation. But you must go." + +"I should be as safe." + +"Perhaps. But I should be beset by fears that you had ventured too far. +I can be quite impersonal, keen, steady of hand and brain, if you are +out of the city." + +"Very well, I will go." + +"The day the fire is over I will go for you and we will marry and live +in any shanty we can find--begin life together like any Forty-niners. +You can help others as much as you choose then. There will be work for +all--but now there is not, cannot be until organization begins. And I +must be free to take care of you. Will you go at once? The launch is +still there." + +"Yes, I will go at once." + +He left her, and a few moments later she was walking down the other side +of the hill, the voluminous pillow-case slung over her shoulder. Beside +her trudged Sugihara, the ancestors under one arm, and his library under +the other. The street along the water-front was a moving mass of +refugees from Telegraph Hill, and Mr. Clatt was standing in the launch, +on the alert. He gave a shout of delight as he saw Isabel, and she waved +her hand. As she reached the wharf and forced her way through the +Italians and Mexicans, who regarded her with no great favor, she noticed +a small party of Chinese evidently in distress. The woman, magnificently +arrayed, and hardly larger than a child, was huddled against the +sea-wall, dumbly protesting that she could go no farther. Her face was +twisted and her eyes were staring with pain and fright. A pretty child +in three shirts of different colors, all silken and embroidered, was +wailing in the common language of his years, and the young husband +argued with his wife in vain: she made no response, but her passive +resistance was as effective as if her feet had been six. She would not +let her maid touch her, and her husband dared not relinquish his hold on +his strong-box while surrounded by his formidable neighbors of Telegraph +Hill. + +Isabel, glad to be able to do something for some one, told him to hand +the box to Mr. Clatt, then carry his wife on board the launch. The nurse +followed with the child, while Isabel and Sugihara, having cast their +own burdens on board, and drawn their pistols, brought up in the rear. + +As the launch entered the current that would carry it east of Angel +Island, Isabel looked at her guests--the Chinese wife and her child +lying on the cushions of the cabin, stolid once more; the big-footed +maid and the husband, his strong-box between his knees, seated opposite; +the Japanese, sitting cross-legged on the roof, his back to the land--no +doubt to emphasize his contempt for the rabble; Mr. Clatt, shaking his +fist at a group of vociferating Italians--and smiled grimly as she +recalled the romantic boat party that escaped from Pompeii. She did not +feel in the least romantic, but she felt something greater and deeper. + +She turned her head many times to look at the wonderful spectacle of the +burning city, the red curtain in the background, along whose front +rushed the pillars of fire driven by the rolling masses of smoke. Where +the fires on Nob Hill had burned low the flames looked like red +sprouting corn. Fairmont had caught at last. It stood, a great square +pile of white stone against the red background, and from its top alone +poured a steady square volume of curling white smoke. The windows, and +there were many hundreds of them, looked like plates of brass. The last +thing she saw, as the launch shot up the bay towards San Pablo, was a +wave of fire roll down Telegraph Hill, and hundreds of black pigmies +fleeing before it. + +It was a beautiful evening of perfect peace when the launch entered +Rosewater creek. The marsh was bathed in all the faint colors of the +afterglow. The birds were singing. People were sitting under the trees +in their parks or gardens. A fisherman was sailing up to Rosewater with +his catch. But for the red light in the south and the faint sound as of +a besieging army, there was nothing to recall that a civilization had +been arrested and a great city was burning down to its bones. + +THE END + + + + +BY THE SAME AUTHOR + + THE CONQUEROR + A FEW OF HAMILTON'S LETTERS + THE ARISTOCRATS + SENATOR NORTH + HIS FORTUNATE GRACE + PATIENCE SPARHAWK AND HER TIMES + RULERS OF KINGS + THE TRAVELLING THIRDS + THE BELL IN THE FOG + +(_CALIFORNIA SERIES_) + + REZANOV + THE DOOMSWOMAN + THE SPLENDID IDLE FORTIES + A DAUGHTER OF THE VINE + THE CALIFORNIANS + AMERICAN WIVES AND ENGLISH HUSBANDS + A WHIRL ASUNDER + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Ancestors, by Gertrude Atherton + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ANCESTORS *** + +***** This file should be named 31858.txt or 31858.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/1/8/5/31858/ + +Produced by Mark C. 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