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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/39724-0.txt b/39724-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..2f66d5b --- /dev/null +++ b/39724-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,4836 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 39724 *** + +THE IMITATOR + +A NOVEL + +By + +PERCIVAL POLLARD + +SAINT LOUIS + +WILLIAM MARION REEDY + +1901 + + + + +CHAPTER I. + + +"The thing is already on the wane," said young Orson Vane, making a wry +face over the entree, and sniffing at his glass, "and, if you ask me, I +think the general digestion of society will be the better for it." + +"Yes, there is nothing, after all, so tedious as the sham variety of a +table d'hote. Though it certainly wasn't the fare one came to this hole +for." + +Luke Moncreith turned his eyes, as he said that, over the place they sat +in, smiling at it with somewhat melancholy contempt. Its sanded floor, +its boisterously exposed wine-barrels, the meaningless vivacity of its +Hungarian orchestra, evidently stirred him no more. + +"No; that was the last detail. It was the notion of dining below stairs, +as the servants do. It had, for a time, the charm of an imitation. +Nothing is so delightful as to imitate others; yet to be mistaken for +them is always dreadful. Of course, nobody would mistake us here for +servants." + +The company, motley as it was, could not logically have come under any +such suspicion. Though it was dining in a cellar, on a sanded floor, +amid externals that were illegitimate offsprings of a _Studenten Kneipe_ +and a crew of Christy minstrels, it still had, in the main, the air of +being recruited from the smart world. At every other table there were +people whom not to know was to argue oneself unknown. These persons +obviously treated the place, and their being there, as an elaborate +effort at gaiety; the others, the people who were plainly there for the +first time, took it with the bewildered manner of those whom each new +experience leaves mentally exhausted. The touch of rusticity, here and +there, did not suffice to spoil the sartorial sparkle of the smart +majority. The champagne that the sophisticated were wise enough to +oppose to the Magyar vintages sparkled into veins that ran beautifully +blue under skin that held curves the most aristocratic, tints the most +shell-like. Tinkling laughter, vocative of insincerity, rang between the +restless passion of the violins. + +"When it is not below stairs," continued Vane, "it is up on the roof. +One might think we were a society without houses of our own. It is, I +suppose, the human craving for opposites. When we have stored our +sideboards with the finest glass you can get in Vienna or Carlsbad, we +turn our backs on it and go to drinking from pewter in a cellar. We pay +abominable wages to have servants who shall be noiseless, and then go to +places where the service is as guttural as a wilderness of monkeys. +Fortunately, these fancies do not last. Presently, I dare say, it will +be the fashion to dine at home. That will make us feel quite like the +original Puritans." He laughed, and took his glass of wine at a gulp. +"The fact of the matter is that variety has become the vice of life. We +have not, as a society, any inner steadfastness of soul; we depend upon +externals, and the externals pall with fearful speed. Think of seeing in +the mirror the face of the same butler for more than thirty days!" He +shuddered and shook his head. + +"We are a restless lot," sighed the other, "but why discompose yourself +about it? Thank your stars you have nothing more important to worry +over!" + +"My dear Luke, there is nothing more important than the attitude of +society at large. It is the only thing one should allow oneself to +discuss. To consider one's individual life is to be guilty of as bad +form as to wear anything that is conspicuous. Society admires us chiefly +only as we sink ourselves in it. If we let the note of personality rise, +our social position is sure to suffer. Imitation is the keynote of +smartness. The rank and file imitate the leaders consciously, and the +leaders unconsciously imitate the average. We frequent cellars, and +roofs, and such places, because in doing so we imagine we are imitating +the days of the Hanging Gardens and the Catacombs. We abhor the bohemian +taint, but we are willing to give a champagne and chicken imitation of +it. We do not really care for music and musicians, but we give excellent +imitations of doing so. At present we are giving the most lifelike +imitation of being passionately fond of outdoor life; I suppose England +feels flattered. I am afraid I have forgotten whose the first +fashionable divorce in our world was; it is far easier to remember the +names of the people who have never been divorced; at any rate those +pioneers ought to feel proud of the hugeness of their following. We have +adopted a vulgarity from Chicago and made it a fashionable institution; +divorce used to be a shuttlecock for the comic papers, and now it makes +the bulk of the social register." + +Moncreith tapped his friend on the arm. "Drop it, Orson, drop it!" he +said. "I know this is a beastly bad dinner, but you shouldn't let it +make you maudlin. You know you don't really believe half you're saying. +Drop it, I say. These infernal poses make me ill." He attacked the +morsel of game on his plate with a zest that was beautiful to behold. +"If you go on in that biliously philosophic strain of yours, I shall +crunch this bird until I hear nothing but the grinding of bones. It is +really not a bad bit of quail. It is so small, and the casserole so +large, that you need an English setter to mark it, but once you've got +it,"--he wiped his lips with a flip of his napkin, "it's really worth +the search. Try it, and cheer up. The woman in rose, over there, under +the pseudo-palm, looks at you every time she sips her champagne; I have +no doubt she is calculating how untrue you could be to her. I suppose +your gloom strikes her as poetic; it strikes me as very absurd. You +really haven't a care in the world, and you sit here spouting +insincerity at a wasteful rate. If there's anything really and truly the +matter--tell me!" + +Orson Vane dropped, as if it had been a mask, the ironical smile his +lips had worn. "You want sincerity," he said, "well, then I shall be +sincere. Sincerity makes wrinkles, but it is the privilege of our +friends to make us old before our time. Sincerely, then, Luke, I am +very, very tired." + +"A fashionable imitation," mocked Moncreith. + +"No; a personal aversion, to myself, to the world I live in. I wish the +dear old governor hadn't been such a fine fellow; if he had been of the +newer generation of fathers I suppose I wouldn't have had an ideal to +bless myself with." + +Moncreith interrupted. + +"Good Lord, Luke, did you say ideals? I swear I never knew it was as bad +as that." He beckoned to the waiter and ordered a Dominican. "It is so +ideal a liquor that when you have tasted it you crave only for +brutalities. Poor Orson! Ideals!" He sighed elaborately. + +"If you imitate my manner of a while ago, I shall not say what I was +going to say. If I am to be sincere, so must you." He took the scarlet +drink the man set before him, and let it gurgle gently down his throat. +"It smacks of sin and I scent lies in it. I wish I had not taken it. It +is hard to be sincere after a drink that stirs the imagination. But I +shall try. And you are not to interrupt any more than you can help. If +we both shed the outer skin we wear for society, I believe we are +neither of us such bad sorts. That is just what I am getting at: I am +not quite bad enough to be blind to my own futility. Here I am, Luke, +young, decently looking, with money, position, and bodily health, and +yet I am cursed with thought of my own futility. When people have said +who I am, they have said it all; I have done nothing: I merely am. I +know others would sell their souls to be what I am; but it does not +content me. I have spent years considering my way. The arts have called +to me, but they have not held me. All arts are imitative, except music, +and music is not human enough for me; no people are so unhuman as +musical people, and no art is so entirely a creation of a self-centred +inventor. There can be no such thing as realism in music; the voices of +Nature can never be equalled on any humanly devised instruments or +notes. Painting and sculpture are mere imitations of what nature does +far better. When you see a beautiful woman as God made her you do not +care whether the Greeks colored their statues or not. Any average sunset +stamps the painted imitation as absurd. These arts, in fact, can never +be really great, since they are man's feeble efforts to copy God's +finest creations; between them and the ideal there must always be the +same distance as between man and his Creator. Then there is the art of +literature. It has the widest scope of them all. Whether it is imitative +or creative depends on the temperament of the individual; some men set +down what they see and hear, others invent a world of their own and busy +themselves with it. I believe it is the most human of the arts. Its +devotees not infrequently set themselves the task of discovering just +how their fellows think and live; they try to attune their souls to +other souls; they strive for an understanding of the larger humanity. +They--" + +Moncreith interrupted with a gesture. + +"Orson, you're not going to turn novelist? Don't tell me that! Your +enthusiasms fill me with melancholy forebodings." + +"Not at all. But, as you know, I've seen much of this sort of thing +lately. In the first place I had my own temperamental leanings; in the +next place, you'll remember, we've had a season or two lately when +clever people have been the rage. To invite painters and singers and +writers to one's house has been the smart thing to do. We have had the +spectacle of a society, that goes through a flippant imitation of +living, engaged in being polite to people who imitate at second hand, in +song, and color, and story. Some smart people have even taken to those +arts, thus imitating the professional imitators. As far as the smart +point of view goes, I couldn't do anything better than go in for the +studio, or novelistic business. The dull people whom smartness has +rubbed to a thin polish would conspire in calling me clever. Is there +anything more dreadful than being called clever?" + +"Nothing. It is the most damning adjective in the language. Whenever I +hear that a person is clever I am sure he will never amount to much. +There is only one word that approaches it in deadly significance. That +is 'rising.' I have known men whom the puffs have referred to as 'a +rising man' for twenty years. Can you imagine anything more dismal than +being called constantly by the same epithet? The very amiability in the +general opinion, permitting 'clever' and 'rising' to remain unalterable, +shows that the wearer of these terms is hopeless; a strong man would +have made enemies. I am glad you are wise enough to resist the +temptation of the Muses. Society's blessing would never console you for +anything short of a triumph. The triumphs are fearfully few; the clever +people--well, this cellar's full of them. There's Abbott Moore, for +instance." + +"You're right; there he is. He's a case in point. One of the best cases; +a man who has really, in the worldly sense, succeeded tremendously. His +system of give and take is one of the most lovely schemes imaginable; we +all know that. When a mining millionaire with marriageable daughters +comes to town his first hostage to the smart set is to order a palace +near Central Park and to give Abbott Moore the contract for the +decorations. In return Abbott Moore asks the millionaire's womenfolk to +one of his studio carnivals. That section of the smart set which keeps +itself constantly poised on the border between smart and tart is awfully +keen on Abbott Moore's studio affairs. It has never forgotten the famous +episode when he served a tart within a tart, and it is still expecting +him to outdo that feat. To be seen at one of these affairs, especially +if you have millions, is to have got in the point of the wedge. I call +it a fair exchange; the millionaire gets his foot just inside the magic +portal; Moore gets a slice of the millions. All the world counts Moore a +success from every point of view, the smart, the professional, the +financial. Yet that isn't my notion of a full life. It's only a replica +of the very thing I'm tired of, my own life." + +"Your life, my dear fellow, is generally considered a most enviable +article." + +"Of course. I suppose it does have a glamour for the unobserving. Yet, +at the best, what am I?" + +Moncreith laughed. "Another Dominican!" he said to the waiter. "The +liqueur," he said, "may enable me to rise to my subject." He smiled at +Vane over the glass, when it was brought to him, drained it under closed +eyes, and then settled himself well back into his chair. + + + + +CHAPTER II. + + +"I will tell you what you are," began Moncreith, "to I the eye of the +average beholder. Here, in the most splendid town of the western world, +at the turning of two centuries, you are possessed of youth, health and +wealth. That really tells the tale. Never in the history of the world +have youth and health and wealth meant so much as they do now. These +three open the gates to all the earthly paradise. Your forbears did +their duty by you so admirably that you wear a distinguished name +without any sacrifice to poverty. You are good to look at. You are a +young man of fashion. If you chose you could lead the mode; you have the +instincts of a beau, though neither the severe suppression of Brummell +nor the obtrusive splendor of D'Aurevilly would suit you. Our age seems +to have come to too high an average in man's apparel to permit of any +single dictator; to be singled out is to be lowered. Yet there can be no +denying that you have often, unwittingly, set the fashion in waistcoats +and cravats. That aping has not hurt you, because the others never gave +their raiment the fine note of personal distinction that you wear. You +are a favorite in the clubs; people never go out when you come in; you +listen to the most stupid talk with the most graceful air imaginable; +that is one of the sure roads to popularity in clubdom. When it is the +fashion to be artistic, you can be so as easily as the others; when +sport is the watchword your fine physique forbids you no achievement. +You play tennis and golf and polo quite well enough to make women split +their gloves in applause, and not too well to make men sneer at you for +a 'pro.' When you are riding to hounds in Virginia you are never far +from the kill, and there is no automobilist whom the Newport villagers +are happier to fine for fast driving. You are equally at home in a +cotillon and on the deck of a racing yacht. You could marry whenever you +liked. Your character is unspotted either by the excessive vice that +shocks the mob, or the excessive virtue that tires the smart. You have +means, manners and manner. Finally, you have the two cardinal qualities +of smartness, levity and tolerance." He paused, and gave a smile of +satisfaction. "There, do you like the portrait?" + +"It is abominable," said Vane, "it is what I see in my most awful +dreams. And the horror of it is that it is so frightfully true. I am +merely one of the figures in the elaborate masquerade we call society. I +make no progress in life; I learn nothing except new fashions and +foibles. I am weary of the masquerade and the masks. Life in the smart +world is a game with masks; one shuffles them as one does cards. As for +me, I want to throw the whole pack into the fire. Everyone wears these +masks; nobody ever penetrates to the real soul behind the make-up." + +"It is a game you play perfectly. One should hesitate long about giving +up anything that one has brought to perfection. These others dabble and +squabble in what you call the secondary imitations of life; you, at any +rate, are giving your imitation at first hand." + +"Yes, but it no longer satisfies me. Listen, Luke. You must promise not +to laugh and not to frown. It will seem absurd to you; yet I am terribly +in earnest about it. When first I came out of college I went in for +science. When I gave it up, it was because I found it was leading me +away from the human interest. There is the butterfly I want to chase; +the human interest. I attempted all the arts; not one of them took me +far on my way. My failure, Luke, is an ironic sentence upon the vaunted +knowledge of the world." + +"Your failure? My dear Orson; come to the point. What do you mean by the +human interest?" + +"I mean that neither scientist nor scholar has yet shown the way to one +man's understanding of another's soul. The surgeon can take a body and +dissect its every fraction, arguing and proving each function of it. The +painter tries, with feeble success, to reach what he calls the spirit of +his subject. So does the author. He tries to put himself into the place +of each of his characters; he aims, always, for the nearest possible +approach to the lifelike. And, above all the others, there is the actor. +In this, as in its other qualities, the art of acting is the crudest, +the most obvious of them all; yet, in certain moments, it comes nearest +to the ideal. The actor in his mere self is--well, we all know the story +of the famous player being met by this greeting: 'And what art thou +to-night?' But he goes behind a door and he can come forth in a series +of selves. A trick or so with paint; a change of wig; a twist of the +face-muscles, and we have the same man appearing as _Napoleon_, as +_Richelieu_, as _Falstaff_. The thing is external, of course. Whether +there shall be anything more than the mere bodily mask depends upon the +actor's intelligence and his imagination. The supreme artist so +succeeds, by virtue of much study, much skill in imitating what he has +conceived to be the soul of his subject, in almost giving us a lifelike +portrait. And yet, and yet--it is not the real thing; the real soul of +his subject is as much a mystery to that actor as it is to you or me. +That is what I mean when I say that science fails us at the most +important point of all; the soul of my neighbor is as profound a mystery +to me as the soul of a man that lived a thousand years ago. I can know +your face, Luke, your clothes, your voice, the outward mask you wear; +but--can I reach the secrets of your soul? No. And if we cannot know how +others feel and think, how can we say we know the world? Bah! The world +is a realm of shadows in which all walk blindly. We touch hands every +day, but our souls are hidden in a veil that has not been passed since +God made the universe." + +"You cry for the moon," said Moncreith. "You long for the unspeakable. +Is it not terrible enough to know your neighbor's face, his voice, his +coat, without burdening yourself with knowledge of his inner self? It is +merely an egoistic curiosity, my dear Orson; you cannot prove that the +human interest, as you term it, would benefit by the extension in wisdom +you want." + +"Oh, you are wrong, you are wrong. The whole world of science undergoes +revolution, once you gain the point I speak of. Doctors will have the +mind as well as the body to diagnose; lovers will read each others +hearts as well as their voices; lies will become impossible, or, at +least, futile; oh--it would be a better world altogether. At any rate, +until this avenue of knowledge is opened to me, I shall call all the +rest a failure. I imitate; you imitate; we imitate; that is the +conjugation of life. When I think of the hopelessness of the thing,--do +you wonder I grow bitter? I want communion with real beings, and I meet +only masks. I tell you, Luke, it is abominable, this wall that stands +between each individual and the rest of the world. How can I love my +neighbor if I do not understand him? How can I understand him if I +cannot think his thoughts, dream his dreams, spell out his soul's +secrets?" + +Moncreith smiled at his friend, and let his eyes wander a trifle +ironically about his figure. "One would not think, to look at you, that +you were possessed of a mania, an itch! If you take my advice you will +content yourself with living life as you find it. It is really a very +decent world. It has good meat and drink in it, and some sweet women, +and a strong man or two. Most of us are quite ignorant of the fact that +we are merely engaged in incomplete imitations of life, or that there is +a Chinese wall between us and the others; the chances are we are all the +happier for our innocence. Consider, for instance, that rosy little face +behind us--you can see it perfectly in that mirror--can you deny that it +looks all happiness and innocence?" + +Vane looked, and presently sighed a little. The face of the girl, as he +found it in the glass, was the color of roses lying on a pool of clear +water. It was one of those faces that one scarce knows whether to think +finer in profile or in full view; the features were small, the hair +glistened with a tint of that burnish the moon sometimes wears on summer +nights, and the figure was a mere fillip to the imagination. A cluster +of lilies of the valley lay upon her hair; they seemed like countless +little cups pouring frost upon a copper glow. All about her radiated an +ineffable gentleness, a tenderness; she made all the other folk about +her seem garish and ugly and cruel. One wondered what she did in that +gallery. + +"To the outer eye," said Vane, as he sighed, "she is certainly a flower, +a thing of daintiness and delight. But--do you suppose I believe it, for +a moment? I have no doubt she is merely one of those creatures whom God +has made for the destruction of our dreams; her mind is probably as +corrupt as her body seems fair. She is perhaps--" + +He stopped, for the face in the mirror had its eyes thrown suddenly in +his direction. The eyes, in that reflex fashion, met, and something akin +to a smile, oh, an ever so wistful, wonderful a smile, crept upon the +lips and the eyes of the girl, while to the man there came only a sudden +silence. + +"She is," continued Vane, in another voice altogether, and as if he were +thinking of distant affairs, "very beautiful." + +The girl's eyes, meanwhile, had shifted towards Moncreith. He felt the +radiance of them and looked, too, and the girl's beauty came upon him +with a quick, personal force that was like pain. Vane's spoken +approbation of her angered him; he hardly knew why; for the first time +in his life he thought he could hate the man beside him. + +The girl turned her head a little, put up her hand and so hid her face +from both young men, or there is no telling what sudden excuse the two +might not have seized for open enmity. It sounds fantastic, perhaps, but +there are more enmities sown in a single glance from a woman's eyes +than a Machiavelli could build up by ever so devilish devices. Neither +of the two, in this case, could have said just what they felt, or why. +Moncreith thought, vaguely enough perhaps, that it was a sin for so fair +a flower to waste even a look upon a fellow so shorn of faith as was +Orson Vane. As for Vane-- + +Vane brought his hand upon the table so that the glasses rocked. + +"Oh," he exclaimed, "if one could only be sure! If one could see past +the mask! What would I not give to believe in beauty when I see it, to +trust to appearances! Oh, for the ability to put myself in the place of +another, to know life from another plane than my own, to--" + +But here he was interrupted. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + + +"The secret you are seeking," said the man who had put his hand on Orson +Vane's shoulder, "is mine." + +Vane's eyes widened slightly, roving the stranger up and down. He was a +man of six feet in height, of striking, white-haired beauty, of the type +made familiar to us by pictures of the Old Guard under Napoleon. Here +was still the Imperial under the strong chin, the white mustache over +the shapely lips; the high, clear forehead; the long, thin hands, where +veins showed blue, and the nails were rosy. The head was bowed forward +of the shoulders; the man, now old, had once been inches taller. You +looked, on the spur of first noting him, for the sword and the epaulets, +or, at least, for the ribbon of an order. But his clothes were quite +plain, nor had his voice any touch of the military. + +"I overheard a part of your conversation," the stranger went on, "not +intentionally, yet unavoidably. I had either to move or to listen. And +you see the place is so full that moving was out of the question. Did +you mean what you were saying?" + +"About the--" + +"The Chinese wall," said the stranger. + +"Every word of it," said Vane. + +"If the chance to penetrate another's soul came to you, would you take +it?" + +"At once." + +Moncreith laughed aloud. "Where are we?" he said, "in Aladdin's cave? +What rubbish!" And he shook himself, as if to disturb a bad dream. He +was on the point of reaching for his hat, when he saw the face of the +girl in the mirror once more; the sight of it stayed him. He smiled to +himself, and waited for the curious conversation between Vane and the +stranger to continue. + +"My name," the stranger was observing, taking a card from an _etui_, +"may possibly be known to you?" + +Vane bent his head to the table, read, and looked at the white-haired +man with a quick access of interest. + +"I am honored," he said. "My name is Orson Vane." + +"Oh," said the other, "I knew that. I do not study the human interest in +mere theory; I delight in the tangible. That is why I presume upon +you"--he waved his hand gracefully--"thus." + +"You must join us," said Vane; "there is plenty of room at this table." + +"No; I must--if your friend will pardon me--see you alone. Will you come +to my place?" + +He spoke as youthfully as if he were of Vane's own age. + +Vane considered a second or so, and then sprang to his feet. + +"Yes," he said, "I will come. Good-night, Luke. Stay on; enjoy yourself. +Shall I see you to-morrow? Good-night!" + +They went out together, the young man and the one with the white hair. +One glance into the mirror flashed from Orson's eyes as he turned to go; +it brought him a memory of a burnished halo on a fragile, rosy, beauty. +He sighed to himself, wishing he could reach the truth behind the robe +of beauty, and, with that sigh, turned with a sort of fierceness upon +his companion. + +"Well," said Vane, "well?" + +They were passing through a most motley thoroughfare. Barrel-organs +dotted the asphalt; Italian and Sicilian poverty elbowed the poverty of +Russian and Polish Jews. The shops bore signs in Italian, Hebrew, +French--in anything but English. The Elevated roared above the music and +the chatter; the cool gloom of lower Broadway seemed far away. + +"Patience," said the old man, "patience, Mr. Vane. Look about you! How +much of the heart of this humanity that reeks all about us do we know? +Think,--think of your Chinese wall! Oh--how strange, how very strange +that I should have come upon you to-night, when, in despair of ever +finding my man, I had gone for distraction to a place where, I thought, +philosophy nor science were but little welcome." + +"My dear Professor," urged Vane finally, when they were come to a +stiller region, where many churches, some parks and ivy-sheltered houses +gave an air of age and sobriety and history, "I have no more patience +left. Did I not know your name for what it is I would not have followed +you. Even now I hardly know whether your name and your title suffice. If +it is an adventure, very well. But I have no more patience for +mysteries." + +"Not even when you are about to penetrate the greatest mystery of all? +Oh, youth, youth! Well, we have still a little distance to go. I shall +employ it to impress upon you that I, Professor Vanlief, am not +over-fond of the title of Professor. It has, here in America, a taint of +the charlatan. But it came to me, this title, in a place where only +honors were implied. I was, indeed, a fellow student with many of whom +the world has since heard; Bismarck was one of them. I have eaten smoked +goose with him in Pommern. You see, I am very old, very old. I have +spent my life solving a riddle. It is the same riddle that has balked +you, my young friend. But I have striven for the solution; you have +merely wailed against the riddle's existence." + +Vane felt a flush of shame. + +"True," he murmured, "true. I never went further into any art, any +science, than to find its shortcomings." + +"Yet even that," resumed the Professor, "is something. You are, at any +rate, the only man for my purpose." + +"Your purpose?" + +"Yes. It is the same as yours. You are to be the instrument; I furnish +the power. You are to be able to feel, to think, as others do." + +"Oh!" muttered Vane, "impossible." Now that his wish was called possible +of fulfilment, he shrank a little from it. He followed the Professor up +a long flight of curving steps, through dim halls, to where a bluish +light flickered. As they passed this feeble glow it flared suddenly into +a brilliant jet of flame; a door swung open, revealing a somewhat bare +chamber fitted up partly as a study, partly as a laboratory. The door +closed behind them silently. + +"Mere trickery," said the Professor, "the sort of thing that the knaves +of science fool the world with. Will you sit down? Here is where I have +worked for--for more years than you have lived, Mr. Vane. Here is where +I have succeeded. In pursuit of this success I have spent my life and +nearly all the fortune that my family made in generations gone. I have +this house, and my daughter, and my science. The world spins madly all +about me, in this splendid town; here, in this stillness, I have worked +to make that world richer than I found it. Will you help me?" + +Vane had flung himself upon a wicker couch. He watched his host +striding up and down the room with a fervor that had nothing of senility +in it. The look of earnestness upon that fine old face was magnetic. +Vane's mistrust vanished at sight of it. + +"If you will trust me," he answered. He saw himself as the beneficiary, +his host as the giver of a great gift. + +"I trust you. I heard enough, to-night, to believe you sincere in +wishing to see life from another soul than your own. But you must +promise to obey my instructions to the letter." + +"I promise." + +A sense of farce caught Vane. "And now," he said, "what is it? A powder +I must swallow, or a trance you pass me into, or what?" + +The professor shook his head gravely. "It is none of those things. It is +much simpler. I should not wonder but that the ancients knew it. But +human life is so much more complex now; the experiences you will gain +will be larger than they could ever have been in other ages. Do you +realize what I am about to give you? The power to take upon you the soul +of another, just as an actor puts on the outer mask of another! And I +ask for no reward. Simply the joy of seeing my process active; and +afterwards, perhaps, to give my secret to the world. But you are to +enjoy it alone, first. Of course--there may be risks. Do you take +them?" + +"I do," said Vane. + +He could hear the whistling of steamers out in the harbor, and the noise +of the great town came to him faintly. All that seemed strangely remote. +His whole intelligence was centered upon his host, upon the sparsely +furnished room, and the secret whose solution he thought himself +approaching. He was, for almost the first time in his life, intense in +the mere act of existence; he was conscious of no imitation of others; +his analysis of self was sunk in an eagerness, a tenseness of +purposeness hitherto unfelt. + +The professor went to a far, dark corner of the room, and rolled thence +a tall, sheeted thing that might have been a painting, or an easel. He +held it tenderly; his least motion with it revealed solicitude. When it +was immediately in front of where Vane reclined, Vanlief loosed his hold +of the thing, and began pacing up and down the room. + +"The question of mirrors," he began, after what seemed to Vane an age, +"has never, I suppose, interested you." + +"On the contrary," said Vane, "I have had Italy searched for the finest +of its cheval-glasses. In my dressing-room are several that would give +even a man of your fine height, sir, a complete reflection of every +detail, from a shoe-lace to an eyebrow. It is not altogether vanity; but +I never could do justice to my toilette before a mirror that showed me +only a shoulder, or a waist, or a foot, at a time; I want the +full-length portrait or nothing. I like to see myself as others will +see me; not in piece-meal. The Florentines made lovely mirrors." + +"They did." Vanlief smiled sweetly. "Yet I have made a better." He paced +the floor again, and then resumed speech. "I am glad you like tall +mirrors. You will have learned how careful one must be of them. One more +or less in your dressing-room will not matter, eh?" + +"I have an excellent man," said Vane. "There has not been a broken +mirror in my house for years. He looks after them as if they were his +own." + +"Ah, better and better." + +Vane interrupted the Professor's silence with, "It is a mirror, then?" + +"Yes," said Vanlief, nodding at the sheeted mirror, "it is a mirror. +Have you ever thought of the wonderfulness of mirrors? What wonder, and +yet what simplicity! To think that I--I, a simple, plodding old man of +science--should be the only one to have come upon the magic of a +mirror!" His talk took the note of monologue. He was pacing, pacing, +pacing; smiling at Vane now and then, and fingering the covered mirror +with loving touch as he passed near it. "Have you ever, as a child, +looked into a mirror in the twilight, and seen there another face beside +your own? Have you never thought that to the mirror were revealed more +things than the human eye can note? Have you heard of the old, old +folk-superstitions; of the bride that may not see herself in a mirror +without tragedy touching her; of the Warwickshire mirror that must be +covered in a house of death, lest the corpse be seen in it; of the +future that some magic mirrors could reveal? Fanciful tales, all of +them; yet they have their germ of truth, and for my present discovery I +owe them something." He drew the sheet from the mirror, and revealed +another veil of gauze resting upon the glass, as, in some houses, the +most prized pictures are sometimes doubly covered. "You see; it is just +a mirror, a full-length mirror. But, oh, my dear Vane, the wonderfulness +of this mirror! I have only to look into this mirror; to veil it; and +then, when next you glance into it, if it be within the hour, my soul, +my spirit, my very self, passes from the face of the mirror to you! That +is the whole secret, or at least, the manifestation of it! Do you wish +to be the President, to think his thoughts, feel as he feels, dream as +he dreams? He has only to look into this mirror, and you have only to +take from it, as one plucks a lily from the pool, the spiritual image he +has left there! Think of it, Vane, think of it! Is this not seeing life? +Is this not riddling the secret of existence? To reach the innermost +depths of another's spirit; to put on his soul, as others can put on +your clothes, if you left them on a chair,--is this not a stupendous +thing?" In his fever and fervor the professor had exhausted his +strength; he flung himself into a chair. Vane saw the old man's eyes +glowing and his chest throbbing with passion; he hardly knew whether +the whole scene was real or a something imposed upon his senses by a +species of hypnotism. He passed his hand before his forehead; he shook +his head. Yet nothing changed. Vanlief, in the chair, still quaking with +excitement; the mirror, veiled and immobile. + +For a time the room stood silent, save for Vanlief's heavy breathing. + +"Of course," he resumed presently, in a quieter tone, "you cannot be +expected to believe, until you have tried. But trial is the easiest +thing in the world. I can teach you the mere externals to be observed in +five minutes. One trial will convince you. After that,--my dear Vane, +you have the gamut of humanity to go. You can be another man every day. +No secret of any human heart will be a secret to you. All wisdom can be +gained by you; all knowledge, all thought, can be yours. Oh, Orson Vane, +I wonder if you realize your fortune! Or--is it possible that you +withdraw?" + +Vane got up resolutely. + +"No," he said, "I have faith--at last. I am with you, heart and soul. +Life seems splendid to me, for the first time. When can I have the +mirror taken to my house?" + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + + +Vane's dressing-room was a tasteful chamber, cool and light. Its walls, +its furniture, and its hangings told of a wide range of interest. There +was nowhere any obvious bias; the æsthetic was no more insistent than +the sporting. Orson Vane loved red-haired women as Henner painted them, +and he played the aristocratic waltzes of Chopin; but he also valued the +cruel breaking-bit that he had brought home from Texas, and read the +racing-column in the newspaper quite as carefully as he did the doings +of his society. Some hint of this diversity of tastes showed in this, +the most intimate room of his early mornings. There were some of those +ruddy British prints that are now almost depressingly conventional with +men of sporting habits; signed photographs of more or less prominent and +personable personages were scattered pell-mell. All the chairs and +lounges were of wicker; so much so that some of the men who hobnobbed +with Vane declared that a visit to his dressing-room was as good as a +yachting cruise. + +The morning was no longer young. On the avenue the advance guard of the +fashionable assault upon the shopping district was already astir. The +languorous heat that reflects from the town's asphalt was gaining in +power momentarily. + +Orson Vane, fresh from a chilling, invigorating bath, a Japanese robe of +exquisite coolness his only covering, sat regarding an addition to his +furniture. It had come while he slept. It was proof that the adventure +of the night had not been a mere figment of his dreams. + +He touched a bell. To the man who answered the call, he said: + +"Nevins, I have bought a new mirror. You are to observe a few simple +rules in regard to this mirror. In the first place, to avoid confusion, +it is always to be called the New Mirror. Is that plain? + +"Quite so, sir." + +"I may have orders to give about it, or notes to send, or things of that +sort, and I want no mistakes made. In the next place, the cord that +uncovers the mirror is never to be pulled, never to be touched, save at +my express order. Not--under any circumstances. I do not wish the mirror +used. Have you any curiosity left, Nevins? + +"None, sir." + +"So much the better. In Lord Keswick's time, I think, you still had a +touch of that vice, curiosity. Your meddling got you into something of a +scrape. Do you remember?" + +"Oh, sir," said the man, with a little gesture of shame and pain, "you +didn't need reminding me. Have I ever forgotten your saving me from that +foolishness?" + +"You're right, Nevins; I think I can trust you. But this is a greater +trust than any of the others. A great deal depends; mark that; a very +great deal. It is not an ordinary mirror, this one; not one of the +others compares with it; it is the gem of my collection. Not a breath is +to touch it, save as I command." + +"I'll see to it, sir." + +"Any callers, Nevins?" + +"Mr. Moncreith, sir, looked in, but left no word. And the postman." + +"No duns, Nevins?" + +"Not in person, sir." + +"Dear me! Is my position on the wane? When a man is no longer dunned his +credit is either too good or too bad; or else his social position is +declining." He picked up the tray with the letters, ran his eye over +them quickly, and said, "Thank the stars; they still dun me by post. +There should be a law against it; yet it is as sweet to one's vanity as +an angry letter from a woman. Nevins, is the day dull or garish?" + +"It's what I should call bright, sir." + +"Then you may lay out some gloomy clothes for me. I would not add to the +heat wittingly. And, Nevins!" + +"Yes sir." + +"If anyone calls before I breakfast, unless it happens to be Professor +Vanlief,--Vanlief, Nevins, of the Vanliefs of New Amsterdam--say I am +indisposed." + +He dressed himself leisurely, thinking of the wonderful adventures into +living that lay before him. He rehearsed the simple instructions that +Vanlief had given him the night before. It was all utterly simple. As +one looked into the mirror, the spirit of that one lay on the surface, +waiting for the next person that glanced that way. There followed a +complete exodus of the spirit from the one body into the other. The +recipient was himself plus the soul of the other. The exodus left that +other in a state something like physical collapse. There would be, for +the recipient of the new personality, a sense of double consciousness; +the mind would be like a palimpsest, the one will and the one habit +imposed upon the other. The fact that the person whose spirit passed +from him upon the magic mirror was left more or less a wreck was cause +for using the experiment charily, as the Professor took pains to warn +Orson. There was a certain risk. The mirror might be broken; one could +never tell. It would be better to pick one's subjects wisely, always +with a definite purpose. This man might be used to teach that side of +life; that man another. It was not a thing to toy with. It was to be +played with as little as human life itself. Vivisection was a pastime to +this; this implicated the spirit, the other only the body. + +Consideration of the new avenues opening for his intelligence had +already begun to alter Vane's outlook on life. Persons who remarked him, +a little later, strolling the avenue, wondered at the brilliance of his +look. He seemed suddenly sprayed with a new youth, a new enthusiasm. It +was not, as some of his conversations of that morning proved, an utter +lapse into optimism on his part; but it was an exchange of the mere +passive side of pessimism for its healthier, more buoyant side. He was +able to smile to himself as he met the various human marionettes of the +avenue; the persons whose names you would be sure to read every Sunday +in the society columns, and who seemed, consequently, out of place in +any more aristocratic air. He bowed to the newest beauty, he waved a +hand to the most perennial of the faded beaux. The vociferous attire of +the actors, who idled conspicuously before the shop-windows, caused him +inward shouts of laughter; a day or so ago the same sight would have +embittered his hour for him. + +At Twenty-third street something possessed him to patronize one of the +Sicilian flower-sellers. The man had, happily, not importuned him; he +merely held his wares, and waited, mutely. Orson put a sprig of +lily-of-the-valley into his coat. + +Before he left his rooms he had spent an hour or so writing curt notes +to the smartest addresses in town. All his invitations were declined by +him; a trip to Cairo, he had written, would keep him from town for some +time. He took this ruse because he felt that the complications of his +coming experiment might be awkward; it was as well to pave the way. +Certainly he could not hope to fulfil his social obligations in the time +to come. An impression that he was abroad was the best way out of the +dilemma. The riddance from fashionable duties added to his gaiety; he +felt like a school-boy on holiday. + +It was in this mood that he saw, on the other side of the avenue, a +figure that sent a flush to his skin. There was no mistaking that +wonderful hair; in the bright morning it shone with a glow a trifle less +garish than under the electric light, but it was the same, the same. To +make assurance surer, there, just under the hat--a hat that no mere male +could have expressed in phrases, a thing of gauze and shimmer--lay a +spray of lilies-of-the-valley. The gown--Vane knew at a glance that it +was a beautiful gown and a happy one, though as different as possible +from the filmy thing she had worn when first he saw her, in the mirror, +at night. + +At first unconsciously, and then with quite brazen intent, he found +himself keeping pace, on his side of the street, with the girl opposite. +He knew not what emotion possessed him; no hint of anything despicable +came to him; he had forgotten himself utterly, and he was merely +following some sweet, blind impulse. Orson Vane was a man who had +tasted the froth and dregs of his town no less thoroughly than other +men; there were few sensations, few emotions, he had not tried. Almost +the only sort of woman he did not know was The woman. In the year of his +majority he had made a summer of it on the Sound in his steam yacht, and +his enemies declared that all the harbors he had anchored in were left +empty of both champagne and virtue. Yet not even his bitterest enemy had +ever accused him of anything vulgar, brazen, coarse, conspicuous. + +Luke Moncreith was a friend of Vane's, there was no reason for doubting +that. But even he experienced a little shock when he met Vane, was +unseen of him, and was then conscious, in a quick turn of the head, that +Vane's eyes, his entire vitality, were upon a woman's figure across the +avenue. + +"The population of the Bowery, of Forty-second street, and of the +Tenderloin," said Moncreith to himself, "have a name for that sort of +thing." He clicked his tongue upon his teeth once or twice. "Poor Orson! +Is it the beginning of the end? Last night he seemed a little mad. Poor +Orson!" Then, with furtive shame at his bad manners, he turned about and +watched the two. Even at that distance the sunlight glowed like a caress +upon the hair of her whom Orson followed. "The girl," exclaimed +Moncreith, "the girl of the mirror." He came to a halt before a +photographer's window, the angle of which gave him a view of several +blocks behind. + +Orson Vane, in the meanwhile, was as if there was but one thing in life +for him: a meeting with this radiant creature with the lilies. Once he +thought he caught a sidelong glance of hers; a little smile even hovered +an instant upon her lips; yet, at that distance, he could not be sure. +None of the horrible things occurred to him as possibilities; that she +might be an adventuress, or a mere masquerading shop-girl, or an adroit +soubrette. No tangible intention came to the young man; he had not made +it clear to himself whether he would keep on, and on, and on, until she +came to her own door; whether he would accost her; whether he would +leave all to chance; or whether he would fashion circumstances to his +end. + +The girl turned into a little bookshop that, as it happened, was one of +Vane's familiar haunts. It was a place where one could always find the +new French and German things, and where the shopman was not a mere +instrument for selling whatever rubbish publishers chose to shoot at the +public. When Vane entered he found this shopman, who nodded smilingly at +him, busy with a bearded German. The girl stood at a little table, +passing her slim fingers lovingly over the titles of the books that lay +there. It was evident that she had no wish for advice from the assistant +who hovered in the background. She did not so much as glance at him. +Her eyes were all for her friends in print. She did look up, the veriest +trifle, it is true, when Orson came in; it was so swift, so shy a look +that he, in a mist of emotions, could not have sworn to it. As for him, +a boyish boldness took him to the other side of the table at which she +stood; he bent over the books, and his hands almost touched her fingers. +In that little, quiet nook, he became, all of a moment, once more a +youth of twenty; he felt the first shy stirrings of tenderness, of +worship. The names of the volumes swam for him in a mere haze. He saw +nothing save only the little figure before him, the shimmer of rose upon +her face passing into the ruddier shimmer of her hair; the perfume of +her lilies and some yet subtler scent, redolent of fairest linen, most +fragile laces and the utterest purity, came over him like a glow. + +And then the marvel, the miracle of her voice! + +"Oh, Mr. Vane," he heard her saying, "do help me!" Their eyes met and he +was conscious of a bewildering beauty in hers; it was with quite an +effort that he did not, then and there, do something absurd and stupid. +His hesitation, his astonishment, cost him a second or so; before he +caught his composure again, she was explaining, sweetly, plaintively, +"Help me to make up my mind. About a book." + +"Why did you add that?" he asked, his wits sharp now, and his voice +still a little unsteady. "There are so many other things I would like to +help you in. A book? What sort of a book? One of those stories where +the men are all eight feet high, and wear medals, and the women are all +models for Gibson? Or one of those aristocratic things where nobody is +less than a prince, except the inevitable American, who is a newspaper +man and an abomination? Or is it, by any chance," he paused, and dropped +his voice, as if he were approaching a dreadful disclosure, "poetry?" + +She shook her head. The lilies in her hair nodded, and her smile came up +like a radiance in that dark little corner. And, oh, the music in her +laugh! It blew ennui away as effectually as a storm whirls away a leaf. + +"No," she said, "it is none of those things. I told you I had not made +up my mind." + +"It is a thing you should never attempt. Making up the mind is a +temptation only the bravest of us can resist. One should always delegate +the task to someone else." + +The girl frowned gently. "If it is the fashion to talk like that," she +said, "I do not want to be in the fashion." + +He took the rebuke with a laugh. "It is hard," he pleaded, "to keep out +of the fashion. Everything we do is a fashion of one sort or another." +He glanced at her wonderful hat, at the gown that held her so closely, +so tenderly. "I am sure you are in the fashion," he said. + +"If Mr. Orson Vane tells me so, I must believe it," she answered. "But I +wear only what suits me; if the fashion does not suit me, I avoid the +fashion." + +"But you cannot avoid beauty," he urged, "and to be fair is always the +fashion." + +She turned her eyes to him full of reproach. They said, as plainly as +anything, "How crude! How stupidly obvious!" As if she had really +spoken, he went on, in plain embarassment: + +"I beg your pardon. I--I am very silly this morning. Something has gone +to my head. I really don't think I'd better advise you about anything to +read. I--" + +"Oh," she interrupted, already full of forgiveness, since it was not in +her nature to be cruel for more than a moment at a time, "but you must. +I am really desperate. All I ask is that you do not urge a fashionable +book, a book of the day, or a book that should be in the library of +every lady. I am afraid of those books. They are like the bores one +turns a corner to avoid." + +"You make advice harder and harder. Is it possible you really want a +book to read, rather than to talk about?" + +"I really do," she admitted, "I told you I had no thought about the +fashion." + +"You are like a figure from the Middle Ages," he said, "with your notion +about books." + +"Am I so very wrinkled?" she asked. She put her hand to her veil, with a +gesture of solicitous inquiry. "To be young," she sighed, with a pout, +"and yet to seem old. I am quite a tragedy." + +"A goddess," he murmured, "but not of tragedy." He laughed sharply, and +took a book from the table, using it to keep his eyes from the witchery +of her as he continued: "Don't you see why I'm talking such nonsense? If +it meant prolonging the glimpse of you, there's no end, simply no end, +to the rubbish I could talk!" + +"And no beginning," she put in, "to your sincerity." + +"Oh, I don't know. One still has fits and starts of it! There's no +telling what might not be done; it might come back to one, like +childishness in old age." He put down the book, and looked at her in +something like appeal. "There is such a thing as a sincerity one is +ashamed of, that one hides, and disguises, and that the world refuses to +see. The world? The world always means an individual. In this case the +world is--" + +"The world is yours, like _Monte Cristo_," she interposed, "how +embarassed you must feel. The responsibility must be enervating! I have +always thought the clever thing for _Monte Cristo_ to have done was to +lose the world; to hide it where nobody could find it again." She tapped +her boot with her parasol, charmingly impatient. "I suppose," she +sighed, "I shall have to ask that stupid clerk for a book, after all. He +looks as if he would far rather sell them by weight." + +"No, no, I couldn't allow that. Consider me all eagerness to aid you. Is +it to be love, or ghosts, or laughter?" + +"Love and laughter go well together," she said. "I want a book I can +love and laugh with, not at." + +"I know," he nodded. "The tear that makes the smile come after. You want +something charming, something sweet, something that will taste +pleasantly no matter how often you read it. A trifle, and yet--a +treasure. Such a book as, I dare say, every writer dreams of doing once +in his life; the sort of book that should be bound in rose-leaves. And +you expect me to betray a treasure like that to you? And my reward? But +no, I beg your pardon; I have my reward now, and here, and the debt is +still mine. I can merely put you in the way of a printed page; while +you--" He stopped, roving for the right word. His eyes spoke what his +voice could not find. He finished, lamely, and yet aptly enough, +"You--are you." + +"I don't believe," she declared, with the most arch elevation of the +darkest eyebrows, "that you know one book from another. You are an +impostor. You are sparring for time. I have given you too much time as +it is. I am going." She picked up her skirts with one slim hand, turned +on a tiny heel, and looked over her shoulder with an air, a +mischievousness, that made Orson ache, yes, simply ache with curiosity +about her. He put out a hand in expostulation. + +"Please," he pleaded, "please don't go. I have found the book. I really +have. But you must take my word for it. You mustn't open it till you are +at home." He handed it to the clerk to be wrapped up. "And now," he went +on, "won't you tell me something? I--upon my honor, I can't think where +we met?" + +"One hardly expects Mr. Orson Vane to remember all the young women in +society," she smiled. "Besides, if I must confess: I am only just what +society calls 'out.' I have seen Mr. Orson Vane: but he has not seen me. +Mr. Vane is a leader; I am--" She shrugged her shoulder, raised her +eyebrows, pursed up her mouth, oh, to a complete gesture that was the +prettiest, most bewildering finish to any sentence ever uttered. + +"Oh," said Orson, "but you are mistaken. I have seen you. No longer ago +than last night. In--" + +"In a mirror," she laughed. Then she grew suddenly quite solemn. "Oh, +you mustn't think I didn't know who you were. It was all very rash of +me, and very improper, my speaking to you, just now, but--" + +"It was very sweet," he interposed. + +"But," she went on, not heeding his remark at all, "I knew you so well +by sight, and I had really been introduced to you once,--one of a bevy +of debutantes, merely an item in a chorus--and, besides, my father--" + +"Your father?" repeated Orson, jogging his memory, "you don't mean to +say--" + +"My father is Augustus Vanlief," she said. + +He took a little time to digest the news. The clerk handed him the book +and the change. He saw, now, whence that charm, that grace, that beauty +came; he recalled that the late Mrs. Vanlief had been one of the +Waddells; there was no better blood in the country. With the name, too, +there came the thought of the wonderful revelations that were presently +to come to him, thanks to this girl's father. A sort of dizziness +touched him: he felt a quick conflict between the wish to worship this +girl, and the wish to probe deeper into life. It was with a very real +effort that he brushed the charm of her from him, and relapsed, again, +into the man who meant to know more of human life than had ever been +known before. + +He took out a silver pencil and held it poised above the book. + +"This book," he said, "is for you, you know, not for your father. Your +father and I are to be great friends but--I want to be friends, also, +with--" he looked a smiling appeal, "with--whom?" + +"With Miss Vanlief," she replied, mockingly. "My other name? I hate it; +really I do. Perhaps my father will tell you." + +She had given him the tip of her fingers, her gown had swung perfume as +it followed her, and she was out and away before he could do more than +give her the book, bow her good-bye, and stand in amaze at her +impetuousness, her verve. The thought smote him that, on the night +before, he had seen her, in the mirror, and spurned the notion of her +being other than a sham, a mockery. How did he know, even now, that she +was other than that? Yet, what had happened to him that he had been able +so long to stay under her charm, to believe in her, to wish for her, to +feel that she was hardly mortal, but some strange, sweet, splendid +dream? Was he the same man who, only a few hours ago, had held himself +shorn of all the primal emotions? He beat these questionings back and +forth in his mind; now doubting himself, now doubting this girl. Surely +she had not, in that dining-room, been sitting with her father? Would he +not have seen them together? Perhaps she was with some of her family's +womenfolk? Yes; now he remembered; she had been at a table with several +other ladies, all elderly. He wished he knew the name one might call +her, if ... if.... + +Luke Moncreith came into the shop. Orson caught a shadow of a frown on +the other's face. Moncreith's voice was sharp and bitter when he spoke. + +"Been buying the shop?" he asked. + +"No," said Orson, in some wonder. "Only one book." + +"Hope you'll like it," said the other, with a manner that meant the very +opposite. + +"I? Oh, I read it ages ago. It was for somebody else. You seem very +curious about it?" + +"I am. You aren't usually the man to dawdle in bookshops." + +"Dawdle?" Orson turned on the other sharply. "What the deuce do you +mean? Are you my keeper, or what? If I choose to, I can _live_ in this +shop, can't I?" + +"Oh, Lord, yes! Looks odd, just the same, you trailing in here after a +petticoat, and hanging around for--" he pulled out his watch,--"for a +good half hour." + +Orson burst out in a sort of clenched breath of rage. He kept the +phrases down with difficulty. "Better choose your words," he said. "I +don't like your words, and your watch be damned. Since when have my--my +friends taken to timing my actions? It's a blessing I'm going abroad." + +He turned and walked out of the shop, fiercely, swiftly. As the fresh +air struck his face, he put his hand to it, and shook his head, +wonderingly. "What's the matter with Moncreith? With me?" He thought of +the title of the book he had just given away. "Are we all as mad as +that?" he asked himself. + +The title was "March Hares." + + + + +CHAPTER V. + + +A young man so prominent in the town as Orson Vane had naturally a very +large list of acquaintances. He knew, in the fashionable phrase, +"everybody," and "everybody" knew him. His acquaintances ranged beyond +the world of fashion; the theatre, the turf, and many other regions had +denizens who knew Orson Vane and held him in esteem. He had always lived +a careful, well-mannered life; his name had never been in the newspapers +save in the inescapable columns touching society. + +When he was ready to proceed with the experiment of the mirror, the +largeness of his social register was at once a pleasure and a pain. +There were so many, so many! It was evident that he must use the types +most promising in eccentricity; he must adventure forth in company with +the strangest souls, not the mere ordinary ones. + +Sitting in the twilight of his rooms one day, it occurred to him that he +was now ripe for his first decision. Whose soul should he seize? That +was the question. He had spent a week or so perfecting plans, stalling +off awkward episodes, schooling his servants. There was no telling what +might not happen. + +He picked up a newspaper. A name caught his eye; he gave a little laugh. + +"The very man!" he told himself, "the very man. Society's court fool; it +will be worth something to know what lies under his cap and bells." + +He scrawled a note, enclosed it, and rang for Nevins. + +"Have that taken, at once, to Mr. Reginald Hart. And then, presently, +have a hansom called and let it wait nearby." + +"Reggie will be sure to come," he said, when alone. "I've told him there +was a pretty woman here." + +He felt a nervous restlessness. He paced his room, fingering the frames +of his prints, trying the cord of his new mirror, adjusting the blinds +of the windows. He tingled with mental and physical expectation. He +wondered whether nothing, after all, would be the result. How insane it +was to expect any such thing to happen as Vanlief had vapored of! This +was the twentieth century rather than the tenth; miracles never +happened. Yet how fervently he wished for one! To feel the soul of +another superimposing itself upon his own; to know that he had committed +the grandest larceny under heaven, the theft of a soul, and to gain, +thereby, complete insight into the spiritual machinery of another +mortal! + +Nevins returned, within a little time, bringing word that Mr. Hart had +been found at home, and would call directly. + +Vane pushed the new mirror to a position where it would face the door. +He told Nevins not to enter the room after Mr. Hart; to let him enter, +and let the curtain fall behind him. + +He took up a position by a window and waited. The minutes seemed heavy +as lead. The air was unnaturally still. + +At last he heard Nevins, in gentle monosyllables. Another voice, high +almost to falsetto, clashed against the stillness. + +Then the curtain swung back. + +Reginald Hart, whom all the smart world never called other than Reggie +Hart, stood for a moment in the curtain-way, the mirror barring his +path. He caught his image there to the full, the effeminate, full face, +the narrow-waisted coat, the unpleasantly womanish hips. He put out his +right hand, as if groping in the dark. Then he said, shrilly, +stammeringly. + +"Vane! Oh, Vane, where the de--" + +He sank almost to his knees. Vane stepping forward, caught him by the +shoulder and put him into an arm-chair. Hart sat there, his head hunched +between his shoulders. + +"Silly thing to do, Vane, old chappy. Beastly sorry for this--stunt of +mine. Too many tea-parties lately, Vane, too much dancing, too much--" +his voice went off into a sigh. "Better get a cab," he said, limply. + +He had quite forgotten why he had come: he was simply in collapse, +mentally and physically. Vane, trembling with excitement and delight, +walked up to the mirror from behind and sent the veil upon its face +again. Then he had Nevins summon the cab. He watched Hart tottering out, +upon Nevins' shoulder, with a dry, forced smile. + +So it was real! He could hardly believe it. In seconds, in the merest +flash, his visitor had faded like a flower whose root is plucked. The +man had come in, full of vitality, quite, in fact, himself; he had gone +out a mere husk, a shell. + +But there was still the climax ahead. Had he courage for it, now that it +loomed imminent? Should he send for Hart and have him pick up his soul +where he had dropped it? Or should he, stern in his first purpose, fit +that soul upon his own, as one fits a glove upon the hand? There was yet +time. It depended only upon whether Hart or himself faced the mirror +when the veil was off. + +He cut his knot of indecision sharply, with a stride to the mirror, a +jerk at the cord and a steady gaze into the clear pool of light, +darkened only by his own reflection. + + * * * * * + +Strain his eyes as he would, he could feel no change, not the faintest +stir of added emotion. He let the curtain drop upon the mirror +listlessly. + +Walking to his window-seat again, he was suddenly struck by his image in +one of the other glasses. He was really very well shaped; he felt a wish +to strip to the buff; it was rather a shame to clothe limbs as fine as +those. He was quite sure there were friends of his who would appreciate +photographs of himself, in some picturesque costume that would hide as +little as possible. It was an age since he had any pictures taken. He +called for Nevins. His voice struck Nevins as having a taint of tenor in +it. + +"Nevins," he said, "have the photographer call to-morrow, like a good +man, won't you? You know, the chap, I forget his name, who does all the +smart young women. I'll be glad to do the fellow a service; do him no +end of good to have his name on pictures of me. I'm thinking of +something a bit startling for the Cutter's costume ball, Nevins, so have +the man from Madame Boyer's come for instructions. And see if you can +find me some perfume at the chemist's; something heavy, Nevins. The +perfumes at once, that's a dear man. I want them in my pillows tonight." + +When the man was gone, his master went to the sideboard, opened it, and +gave a gentle sigh of disappointment. + +"Careless of me," he murmured, "to have no Red Ribbon in the place. How +can any gentleman afford to be without it? Dear, dear, if any of the +girls and boys had caught me without it. Another thing I must tell +Nevins. Nothing but whisky! Abominably vulgar stuff! Can't think, +really, 'pon honor I can't, how I ever came to lay any of it in. And no +cigarettes in the place. Goodness me! What sweet cigarettes those are +Mrs. Barrett Weston always has! Wonder if that woman will ask me to her +cottage this summer." + +He strolled to the window, yawned, stretched out his arms, drawing his +hands towards him at the end of his gesture. He inspected the fingers +minutely. They needed manicuring. He began to put down a little list of +things to be done. He strolled over to the tabouret where invitations +lay scattered all about. That dear Mrs. Sclatersby was giving a +studio-dance; she was depending on him for a novel feature. Perhaps if +he did a little skirt-dance. Yes; the notion pleased him. He would sit +down, at once, and write a hint to a newspaper man who would be sure to +make a sensation of this skirt-dance. + +That done, he heard Nevins knocking. + +"Oh," he murmured, "the perfumes. So sweet!" He buried his nose in a +handful of the sachet-bags. He sprayed some Maria Farina on his +forehead. Perfumes, he considered, were worth worship just as much as +jewels or music. The more sinful a perfume seemed, the more stimulating +it was to the imagination. Some perfumes were like drawings by +Beardsley. + +He looked at the walls. He really must get some Beardsleys put up. There +was nothing like a Beardsley for jogging a sluggish fancy; if you wanted +to see everything that milliners and dressmakers existed by hiding, all +you had to do was to sup sufficiently on Beardsley. He thought of +inventing a Beardsley cocktail; if he could find a mixture that would +make the brain quite pagan, he would certainly give it that name. + +His mind roved to the feud between the Montagues and Capulets of the +town. It was one of those modern feuds, made up of little social +frictions, infinitesimal jealousies, magnified by a malicious press into +a national calamity. It was a feud, he told himself, that he would have +to mend. It would mean, for him, the lustre from both houses. And there +was nothing, in the smart world, like plenty of lustre. There were +several sorts of lustre: that of money, of birth, and of public honors. +Personally, he cared little for the origin of his lustre; so it put him +in the very forefront of smartness he asked for nothing more. Of course, +his own position was quite impeccable. The smart world might narrow year +by year; the Newport set, and the Millionaire set, and the Knickerbocker +set--they might all dwindle to one small world of smartness; yet nothing +that could happen could keep out an Orson Vane. The name struck him, as +it shaped itself in his mind, a trifle odd. An Orson Vane? Yes, of +course, of course. For that matter, who had presumed to doubt the +position of a Vane? He asked himself that, with a sort of defiance. An +Orson Vane, an Orson Vane? He repeated the syllables over and over, in a +whisper at first, and then aloud, until the shrillness of his tone gave +him a positive start. + +He rang the bell for Nevins. + +"Nevins," he said, and something in him fought against his speech, "tell +me, that's a good man,--is there anything, anything wrong with--me?" + +"Nothing sir," said Nevins stolidly. + +Orson Vane gave a sort of gasp as the man withdrew. It had come to him +suddenly; the under-self was struggling beneath the borrowed self. He +was Orson Vane, but he was also another. + +Who? What other? + +He gave a little shrill laugh as he remembered. Reggie Hart,--that was +it,--Reggie Hart. + +He sat down to undress for sleep. He slipped into bed as daintily as a +woman, nestling to the perfumed pillows. + +Nevins, in his part of the house, sat shaking his head. "If he hadn't +given me warning," he told himself, "I'd have sent for a doctor." + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + + +The smart world received the change in Orson Vane with no immediate +wonder. Wonder is, at the outset, a vulgarity; to let nothing astonish +you is part of a smart education. A good many of the smartest hostesses +in town were glad that Vane had emerged from his erstwhile air of +aristocratic aloofness; he took, with them, the place that Reggie Hart's +continuing illness left vacant. + +In the regions where Vane had been actually intimate whispers began to +go about, it is true, and it was with no little difficulty that an +occasional story about him was kept out of the gossipy pages of the +papers. Vane was constantly busy seeking notoriety. His attentions to +several of the younger matrons were conspicuous. Yet he was so much of a +stimulating force, in a society where passivity was the rule, that he +was welcome everywhere. + +He had become the court fool of the smart set. + +To him, the position held nothing degrading. It was, he argued, a +reflection on smart society, rather on himself, that, to be prominent in +it, one must needs wear cap and bells. Moreover his position allowed +him, now and then, the utterance of grim truths that would not have +been listened to from anyone not wearing the jester's license. + +At the now famous dinner given by Mrs. Sclatersby, Orson Vane seized a +lull in the conversation, by remarking, in his ladylike lisp: + +"My dear Mrs. Sclatersby, I have such a charming idea. I am thinking of +syndicating myself." + +Mrs. Sclatersby put up her lorgnettes and smiled encouragement at Orson. +"It sounds Wall Streety," she said, "you're not going to desert us, are +you?" + +"Oh, nothing so dreadful. It would be an entirely smart syndicate, you +know; a syndicate of which you would be a member. I sometimes think, you +know, that I do not distribute myself to the best advantage. There have +been little jealousies, now and then, have there not?" He looked, in a +bird-like, perky way, at Mrs. Barrett Weston, and the only Mrs. Carlos. +"I have been unable to be in two places at once. Now a syndicate--a +syndicate could arrange things so that there would be no +disappointments, no clashings of engagements, no waste of opportunity. + +"How clever you always are," said a lady at Orson's right. She had +chameleon hair, and her poise was that of a soubrette. The theatre was +tremendously popular as a society model that season. Orson blew a kiss +at her, and went on with his speech. + +"Actors do it, you know. Painters have done it. Inventors do it. Why +not I?" He paused to nibble an olive. "To contribute to the gaiety of +our little world is, after all, the one thing worth while. Think how few +picturesque people we have! Eccentricity is terribly lacking in the +town. We have no Whistler; Mansfield is rather a dull imitation. Of +course there is George Francis Train; but he is a trifle, a trifle too +much of the larger world, don't you think?" + +"I never saw the man in my life," asserted the hostess. + +"Exactly," said Orson, "he makes himself too cheap. It keeps us from +seeing him. But Whistler; think of Whistler, in New York! He would wear +a French hat, fight duels every day, lampoon a critic every hour, and +paint nocturnes on the Fifth avenue pavement! He would make Diana fall +from the Tower in sheer envy. He would go through the Astoria with +monocle and mockery, and smile blue peacock smiles at Mr. Blashfield and +Mr. Simmons. He would etch himself upon the town. We would never let him +go again. We need that sort of thing. Our ambitions and our patience are +cosmopolitan; but we lack the public characters to properly give fire +and color to our streets. Now I--" + +He let his eyes wander about the room, a delicate smile of invitation on +his lips. + +"Don't you think," said one of the ladies, "that you are quite--quite +bohemian enough?" + +Orson shuddered obviously. "My dear lady," he urged, "it is a dreadful +thing to be bohemian. It is no longer smart. If I am considered the one, +I cannot possibly be the other. There is, to be sure, a polite +imitation; but it is quite an art to imitate the thing with just +sufficient indolence. But I really wish you would think the thing over, +Mrs. Sclatersby. I know nobody who would do the thing better than I. Our +men are mostly too fond of fashion, and too afraid of fancy. One must +not be ashamed of being called foolish. Whistler uses butterflies; +somebody else used sunflowers and green carnations; I should +use--lilies, I think, lilies-of-the-valley. Emblematic of the pure folly +of my pose, you know. One must do something like that, you see, to gain +smart applause; impossible hats and improbable hair, except in the case +of actresses, are quite extinct." + +A Polish orchestra that had been hitherto unsuccessful against the +shrill monologue of Orson, and the occasional laughter of the ladies, +now sent out a sudden, fierce stream of melody. It was evident that they +did not mean to take the insult of a large wage without offering some +stormy moments in exchange. The diners assumed a patient air, eating in +an abstracted manner, as if their stomachs were the only members of +their bodies left unstunned by the music. The assemblage wore, in its +furtive gluttony, an air of being in a plot of the most delicious +danger. Some rather dowdy anecdotes went about in whispers, and several +of the ladies made passionate efforts to blush. Orson Vane took a sip of +some apricotine, explaining to his neighbor that he took it for the +color; it was the color of verses by Verlaine. She had never heard of +the man. Ah; then of course Mallarmé, and Symons and Francis Saltus were +her gods? No; she said she liked Madame Louise; hers were by far the +most fragile hats purchasable; what was the use of a hat if it was not +fragile; to wear one twice was a crime, and to give one away unless it +was decently crushed was an indiscretion. Orson quite agreed with her. +To his other neighbor he confided that he was thinking of writing a +book. It would be something entirely in the key of blue. He was busy +explaining its future virtues, when an indiscreet lull came in the +orchestral tornado. + +"I mean to bring the pink of youth to the sallowest old age," he was +saying, "and every page is to be as dangerous as a Bowery cocktail." + +Then the storm howled forth again. Everyone talked to his or her +neighbor at top voice. Now and then pauses in the music left fag ends of +conversation struggling about the room. + +"The decadents are simply the people who refuse to write twaddle for the +magazines...." + +"The way to make a name in the world is to own a soap factory and ape +William Morris on the side...." + +"I can always tell when it is Spring by looking at the haberdashers' +windows. To watch shirts and ties blooming is so much nicer than flowers +and those smelly things...." + +"The pleasantest things in the world all begin with a P. Powders, +patches and poses--what should we do without them?..." + +This sort of thing came out at loose ends now and then. Suddenly the +music ceased altogether. The diners all looked as if they had been +caught in a crime. The lights went out in the room, and there were +little smothered shrieks. After an interval, a rosy glow lit up the +conservatory beyond the palms; a little stage showed in the distance. +Some notorious people from the music-halls began to do songs and dances, +and offer comic monologues. The diners fell into a sort of lethargy. +They did not even notice that Orson Vane's chair was empty. + +Vane was in a little boudoir lent him by the hostess. His nostrils +dilated with the perfume of her that he felt everywhere. He sank into a +silk-covered chair, before which he had arranged a full-length mirror, +and several smaller glasses, with candles glowing all about him. He was +conscious of a cloying sense of happiness over his physical perfections. +He stripped garment after garment from him with a care, a gentleness +that argued his belief that haste was a foe to beauty. He stretched +himself at full length, in epicurean enjoyment of himself. The flame of +life, he told himself, burnt the more steadily the less we wrapped it +up. If we could only return to the pagan life! And yet--what charm there +was in dress! The body had, after all, a monotony, a sameness; the +tenderest of its curves, the rosiest of its surfaces, must pall. But the +infinite variety of clothes! The delight of letting the most delicate +tints of gauze caress the flesh, while to the world only the soberest +stuffs were exposed! The rustle of fresh linen, the perfume that one +could filter through the layers of one's attire! + +Orson Vane closed his eyes, lazily, musingly. At that moment his proper +soul was quite in subjection; the ecstasy in the usurping soul was +all-powerful. + +He was thinking of what the cheval-glass in that little room must have +seen. + +It would be unspeakably fine to be a mirror. + +The little crystal clock ticking on the dressing-table tinkled an hour. +It brought him from his reveries with a start. He began gliding into +some shining, silken things of umber tints; they fitted him to the skin. + +He was a falconer. + +It was a costume to strike pale the idlers at a bathing beach. There was +not a crease, not a fold anywhere. A leathern thong upon a wrist, a +feathered cap upon his head, were almost the only points that rose away +from the body as God had fashioned it. Satisfaction filled him as he +surveyed himself. But there was more to do. Above this costume he put +the dress of a Spanish Queen. When he lifted the massively brocaded +train, there showed the most exquisitely chiseled ankles, the promise of +the most alluring legs. The corsage hinted a bust of the most soothing +softness. He spent fully ten minutes in happy admiration of his images +in the mirrors. + +When he proceeded to the conservatory, it was by a secret corridor. The +diners were wearily watching a Frenchwoman who sang with her gloves, +which were black and always on the point of falling down. She was very +pathetic; she was trying to sing rag-time melodies because some idiot +had told her the Newport set preferred that music. A smart young woman +had danced a dance of her own invention; everyone agreed, as they did +about the man who paints with his toes, that, considering her smartness +in the fashionable world, it was not so much a wonder that she danced so +well, as that she danced at all. They were quite sure the professional +managers would offer her the most lavish sums; she would be quite as +much of an attraction as the foreign peer who was trying to be a +gentleman, where they are most needed, on the stage. + +At a sign from Orson, the lights went out again, as the Frenchwoman +finished her song. Several of the guests began to talk scandal in the +dark; there are few occupations more fascinating than talking scandal in +the dark. The question of whether it was better to be a millionaire or +a fashionable and divorced beauty was beginning to agitate several +people into almost violent argument, when the lights flared to the full. + +The chorus of little "Ohs" and "Ahs," of rapid whispered comment, and of +discreetly patted gloves, was quite fervid for so smart an assemblage. +Except in the rarest cases, to gush is as fatal, in the smart world, as +to be intolerant. There is a smart avenue between fervor and frowning; +when you can find that avenue unconsciously, in the dark, as it were, +you have little more to learn in the code of smartness. + +Mrs. Sclatersby herself murmured, quite audibly: + +"How sweet the dear boy looks!" + +Her clan took the word up, and for a time the sibilance of it was like a +hiss in the room. A man or two in the company growled out something that +his fairer neighbor seemed unwilling to hear. These basso profundo +sounds, if one could formulate them into words at all, seemed more like +"Disgusting fool!" or "Sickening!" than anything else. But the company +had very few men in it; in this, as in many other respects, the room +resembled smart society itself. The smart world is engineered and +peopled chiefly by the feminine element. The male sex lends to it only +its more feminine side. + +It is almost unnecessary to describe the picture that Orson Vane +presented on that little stage. His beauty as "Isabella, Queen of +Spain," has long since become public property; none of his later efforts +in suppression of the many photographs that were taken, shortly after +the Sclatersby dinner, have succeeded in quite expunging the portraits. +At that time he gave the sittings willingly. He felt that these +photographs represented the highest notch in his fame, the completest +image of his ability to be as beautiful as the most beautiful woman. + +Shame or nervousness was not part of Orson Vane's personality that +night. He sat there, in the skillfully arranged scheme of lights, with +his whole body attuned only to accurate impersonation of the character +he represented. He got up. His motion, as he passed across the stage, +was so utterly feminine, so made of the swaying, undulating grace that +usually implies the woman; the gesture with his fan was so finically +alluring; the poise of his head above his bared shoulders so +coquettish,--that the women watching him almost held their breaths in +admiration. + +It was, you see, the most adroit flattery that a man could pay the +entire sex of womankind. + +Then the music, a little way off, began to strum a cachuca. The tempo +increased; when finally the pace was something infectious, Orson Vane +began a dance that remains, to this day, an episode in the annals of the +smart. The vigor of his poses, the charm of his skirt-manipulation, +carried the appreciation of his friends by storm. Some of the ladies +really had hard work to keep from rushing to the stage and kissing the +young man then and there. When we are emotional, we Americans--to what +lengths will we not go! + +But the surprises were not yet over. A dash of darkness stayed the +music; a swishing and a flapping came from the stage; then the lights. +Vane stood, in statue position, as a falconer. You could almost, under +the umber silk, see the rippling of his veins. + +Only a second he stood so, but it was a second of triumph. The company +was so agape with wonder, that there was no sound from it until the +music and the bare stage, following a brief period of blackness, +recalled it to its senses. Then it urged Mrs. Sclatersby to grant a +great favor. + +Mr. Vane must be persuaded not take off his falconer's costume; to +mingle, for what little time remained, with the company without resuming +his more conventional attire. + +Vane smiled when the message came to him. He nodded his head. Then he +sent for the Sclatersby butler. + +"Plenty of Red Ribbon!" he said to that person. + +"Plenty, sir." + +"Make a note of your commissions; a cheque in the morning." + +Then he mingled again with his fellow-guests, and there was much +toasting, and the bonds all loosened a little, and the sparkle came up +out of the glasses into the cheeks of the women. The other men, one by +one, took their way out. + +Women crushed one another to touch the hero of the evening. Jealousies +shot savage glances about. Every increase in this emulation increased +the love that Orson Vane felt for himself. He caressed a hand here, a +lock there, with a king's condescension. If he felt a kiss upon his +hand, he smiled a splendid, slightly wearied smile. If he had hot eyes +turned on him, burning so fiercely as to spell out passion boldly, he +returned, with his own glances, the most ineffable promises. + +There have been many things written and said about that curious affair +at the Sclatersbys, but for the entire history of it--well, there are +reasons why you will never be able to trace it. Orson Vane is perhaps +the only one who might tell some of the details; and he, as you will +find presently, has utterly forgotten that night. + +"Time we went home, girls," said Vane, at last, disengaging himself +gently from a number of warm hands, and putting away, as he moved into +freedom, more than one beautiful pair of shoulders. He needed the fresh +air; he was really quite worn out. But he still had a madcap notion left +in him; he still had a trump to play. + +"A pair of hose," he called out, "a pair of hose, with diamond-studded +garters, to the one who will play 'follow' to my 'leader!'" + +And the end of that dare-devil scamper did not come until the whole +throng reached Madison Square. + +Vane plunged to the knees in the fountain. + +That chilled the chase. But one would not be denied. Hers was a dark +type of beauty that needed magnolias and the moon and the South to frame +it properly. She lifted her skirts with a little tinkling laugh, and ran +to where Orson stood, splashing her way bravely through the water. + +Vane looked at her and took her hand. + +"I envy the prize I offered," he said to her. + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + + +Dawn found Orson Vane nodding in a hansom. He had told the man to drive +to Claremont. The Palisades were just getting the first rosy streaks the +sun was putting forth. The Hudson still lay with a light mist on it. The +ascent to Claremont, in sunshine so clustered with beauty, was now +deserted. A few carts belonging to the city were dragging along +sleepily. Harlem was at the hour when the dregs of one day still taint +the morn of the next one. + +Vane was drowsy. He felt the need of a fillip. He did not like to think +of getting back to his rooms and taking a nap. It was still too early, +it seemed, for anything to eat or drink. He spied the Fort Lee ferry, +and with it a notion came to him. The cabman was willing. In a few +minutes he was aboard the ferry, and the cooler air that sweeps the +Hudson was laving him. On the Jersey side he found a sleepy innkeeper +who patched up a breakfast for him. He had, fortunately, some smokable +cigars in his clothes. The day was well on when he reached the New York +side of the river again, and gave "The Park!" as the cabman's orders. + +His body now restored to energy again, his mind recounted the successes +of the night. He really had nothing much to wish for. The men envied him +to the point of hatred; the women adored him. He was the pet of the +smartest people. He was shrewd enough, too, to be petted for a +consideration; his adroitness in sales of Red Ribbon added comfortably +to his income. He took pride in this, as if there had ever been a time, +for several generations, when the name of Vane had not stood good for a +million or so. + +The Park was not well tenanted. Some robust members of the smart set +were cantering about the bridle paths, and now and then a carriage +turned a corner; but the people who preferred the Park for its own sake +to the Park of the afternoon drive were, evidently, but few. Vane felt +quite neglected; he was still able to count the number of times that he +had bowed to familiars. The deserted state of the Park somewhat +discounted the tonic effects of its morning freshness. Nature was +nothing unless it was a background for man. The country was a place from +which you could come to town. Still--there was really nothing better to +do, this fine morning. He rather dreaded the thought of his rooms after +the brilliance of the night. + +His meditations ceased at approach of a girlish figure on horseback, a +groom at a discreet distance behind. + +It was Miss Vanlief. + +He saw that she saw him, yet he saw no welcome in her eyes. He rapped +for the hansom to stop; got out, and waved his hat elaborately at the +young woman. She, in sheer politeness, had reined in her horse. + +"A sweet day," he minced, "and jolly luck my meeting you! Thought it was +rather dull in the old Park, till you turned up. Sweet animal you're +on." He looked up with that air that, the night before, had been so +bewitching. Somehow, as the girl eyed him, he felt haggard. She was not +smiling, not the least little bit. + +"I have read about the affair at Mrs. Sclatersby's," she said. + +"Really? Dreadful hurry these newspapers are always in, to be sure. It +was really a great lark." + +"It must have been," was her icy retort. She beckoned to the groom. +"That--that sheet," she ordered, sharply, holding out one gauntleted +hand. The groom gave her the folded newspaper. She began to read from +it, in a bitter monotone: + +"The antics of Mr. Orson Vane," she read, "for some time the subject of +comment in society, have now reached the point where they deserve the +censure of publicity. His doings at a certain fashionable dinner of last +night were the subject of outspoken disgust at the prominent clubs +later. Now that the case is openly discussed, it may be repeated that a +prominent publication recently had occasion to refuse print to a +distinctly questionable photograph of this young man, submitted, it is +alleged, by himself. In the more staid social circles, one wonders how +much longer Mrs. Carlos and the other leaders of the smartest set will +continue to countenance such behavior." + +Vane, as she read, was enjoying every inch of her. What freshness, what +grace! What a Lady Godiva she would have made! + +"Sweet of you to take such interest," he observed, as she handed the +paper to the groom. "Malice, you know, sheer malice. Dare say I forgot +to give that paper some news that I gave the others; they take that sort +of thing so bitterly, you know. As for the photo--it was really awfully +cunning. I'll send you one. Oh, must you go? I'm so cut up! Charming +chat we've had, I'm sure." + +She had given her horse a cut with the whip, had sent Vane a stare of +the most open contempt, and was now off and away. Vane stood staring +after her. "Very nice little filly," he murmured. "Very!" + +Then he gave his house number to the cabman. + +Turning into Park avenue, at Thirty-Ninth street, the horse slipped on +the asphalt. The hansom spun on one wheel, and then crashed against a +lamp-post. Vane was almost stunned, though there was no mark on him +anywhere. He felt himself all over, but he could feel not as much as a +lump. But his head ached horribly; he felt queerly incapable of thought. +Whatever it was that had happened to him, it had stunned something in +him. What that something was he did not realize even as he told Nevins, +who opened the door to him in some alarm: + +"Send the cab over to Mr. Reginald Hart's. Say I must--do you hear, +Nevins?--I must have him here within the hour--if he has to come in a +chair!" + +Not even when he let the veil glide from the new mirror did he +understand what part of him was stunned. He moved about in a sort of +half wakefulness. The time he spent before Hart's arrival was all a +stupor, spent on a couch, with eyes closed. + +Hart came in feebly, leaning on a stick. + +"Funny thing of you to do," he piped, "sending for me like this. What +the--" He straightened himself in front of the new mirror, and, for an +instant, swayed limply there. Then his stick took an upward swing, and +he minced across the room vigorously. "Why, Vane," he said, "not ill, +are you? Jove, you know, I've had a siege, myself. Feel nice and fit +this minute, though. Shouldn't wonder if the effort to get here had done +me good. What was the thing you wanted me for?" + +Vane shook his head, feebly. "Upon my word, Hart, I don't know. I had an +accident; cab crushed me; I was a little off my head, I think. All a +mistake." + +"Sorry, I'm sure," lisped Hart, "hope it won't be anything real. I tell +you I feel quite out of things. All the other way with you, eh! Hear +you're no end of a choice thing with the _cafe au lait_ gang. Well, +adios!" + +Vane lay quite still after the other had gone. When he spoke, it was to +say, to the emptiness of the room, but nodding to where Hart had last +stood: + +"What a worm! What an utter worm!" + +The voice was once more the voice of Orson Vane. + +As realization of that came to him, he spoke again, so loud that Nevins, +without, heard it. + +"Thank God," he said. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + + +The time that had passed since he began the experiment with the +Professor's mirror now filled Vane with horror. The life that had seemed +so splendid, so triumphant to him a short while ago, now presented +itself to him as despicable, mean, hateful. Now that he had safely +ousted the soul of Reginald Hart he loathed the things that, under the +dominance of that soul, he had done. The quick feeling of success that +he had expected from his adventure into the realm of the mind was not +his at all; his emotions were mixed, and in that mixture hatred of +himself was uppermost. It was true: he had succeeded. The thoughts, the +deeds of another man had become his thoughts, his deeds. The entire +point of view had been, for the time, changed. But, where he had +expected to keep the outland spirit in subjection, it was the reverse +that had happened; the usurping soul had been in positive dominance; he +had been carried along relentlessly by the desires and the reflections +of that other. + +The fact that he knew, now, to the very letter, the mind that animated +that fellow, Reginald Hart, was small consolation to him. The odium of +that reputation was inescapably his, Orson Vane's. Oh, the things he had +said,--and thought,--and done! He had not expected that any man's mind +could be so horrible as that. He thought of the visitation he had +conjured upon himself, and so thinking, shuddered. How was he ever to +elude the contempt that his masquerade, if he could call it so, would +bring him? + +Above all, that scene with Miss Vanlief came back to him with a bitter +pang. What did it profit him, now, to fathom the foul depths of Reginald +Hart's mind concerning any ever so girlish creature? It was he, Orson +Vane, for all that it was possible to explain to the contrary, who had +phrased Miss Vanlief's beauty in such abominable terms. + +Consternation sat on his face like a cloud. He could think of no way out +of the dark alley into which he had put himself. + +Each public appearance of his now had its tortures. Men who had +respected him now avoided him; women to whom he had once condescended +were now on an aggravating plane of intimacy. Sometimes he could almost +feel himself being pointed out on the street. + +The mental and physical reaction was beginning to trace itself on his +face. He feared his Florentine mirrors now almost as much as the +Professor's. The blithe poise had left him. He brooded a good deal. His +insight into another nature than his own filled him with a sense of +distaste for the human trend toward evil. + +He spent some weeks away from town, merely to pick up his health again. +His strength returned a little, but the joy of life came back but +tardily. + +On his first day in town he met Moncreith. There was an ominous wrinkle +gathering in the other's forehead, but Vane braved all chance of a +rebuff. + +"Luke," he said, "don't you know I've been ill? You can't think how ill +I've been. Do you remember I told you I was going abroad? I've been +abroad, mentally; I have, Luke, really I have. It's like a bad dream to +me. You know what I mean." + +Moncreith found his friend rather pathetic. At their last meeting he had +been hot in jealousy of Orson. Now he could afford to pity him. He had +made Jeannette Vanlief's acquaintance, and he stood quite well with her. +He had made up his mind to stand yet better; he was, in fact, in love +with her. He was quite sure that Vane had quite put himself out of that +race. So he took the other's hand, and walked amicably to the Town and +Country Club with him. + +"You have been doing strange things," he ventured. + +"Strange," echoed Vane, "strange isn't the word! Ghastly, +horrible--awful things I've been doing. I wish I could explain. But +it--it isn't my secret, Luke. All I can say is: I was ill. I am, I hope, +quite well again." + +It seemed an age since he had spent an hour or so in his favorite club. +The air of the members was unmistakably frosty. The conversation shrank +audibly. He was glad when Moncreith found a secluded corner and bore him +to it. But he was not a bright companion; his own thoughts were too +depressing to allow of his presenting a sparkling surface to the world. +They talked in mere snatches, in curt syllables. + +"I've seen a good deal of Miss Vanlief," said Moncreith, with conscious +triumph. + +"Oh," said Vane, with a start, "Miss Vanlief? So you know her? Is +she--is she well?" + +"Quite. I see her almost every day." + +"Fortunate man!" sighed Vane. He was a little weary of life. He wanted +to tell somebody what his dreams about Miss Vanlief were; he wanted to +cry out loud, "She is the dearest, sweetest girl in the world!" merely +to efface, in his own mind, the alien thought of her that had come to +him weeks ago. Moncreith did not seem the one to utter this cry to. +Moncreith was too engrossed in his own success. He could bear +Moncreith's company no longer, not just then. He muttered lame words; he +stumbled out to the avenue. + +Some echo of an instinct turned his steps to the little bookshop. + +It was quite empty of customers. He passed his fingers over the back of +books that he thought Miss Vanlief might have handled. It was an absurd +whim, a childish trick. Yet it soothed him perceptibly. Our nerves +control our bodies and our nerves are slaves of our imaginations. + +He was turning to go, when his eye fell on a parcel lying on the +counter. It was addressed to "Miss Jeannette Vanlief." + +"Jeannette, Jeannette!" he said the name over to himself time and again. +It brought the image of her before him more plainly than ever. The +sunset glint in her hair, the roses and lilies of her skin, the melody +in her voice! The charm with which she had first met him, in that very +shop. It all came to him keenly. The more remote the possibility of his +gaining her seemed, the more he hugged the thought of her. He admitted +to himself now, all the more since his excursion into an abominable side +of human nature, that she was the most unspoilt creature in his world. A +girl with that face, that hair, that wit, was sure to be of a charm that +could never lose its flavor; the allurement of her was a thing that +could never die. + +Nothing but thoughts of this girl came to him on the way to his rooms. +Once in his own place, he felt that his reflections on Miss Vanlief had +served him as a tonic. He felt an energy once more, a vigor, a desire +for action. In that mood he turned fiercely upon some of the drawings on +his walls. He called Nevins, and had a heap made of the things that now +filled him with loathing. + +"All of the Beardsleys must come down," he ordered. "No; not all. The +portrait of Mantegna may stay. That has nobility; the others have the +genius of hidden evil. They take too much of the trapping from our +horrible human nature. The funeral procession by Willette may hang; his +Montmartre things are trivially indecent. Heine and his grotesqueries +may stay in jail for all I care. Leave one or two of Thoeny's blue +dragoons. Leandre's crowned heads will do me no harm; I can see past +their cruelties. But take the Gibsons away; they are relegated to the +matinee girl. What is to be done with them? Really, Nevins, don't worry +me about such things. Sell them, give them, lose them: I don't care. +There's only one man in the world who'd really adore them, and he--" he +clenched his hands as he thought of Hart,--"he is a worm, a worm that +dieth and yet corrupts everything about him." + +He sat down, when this clearance was over, and wrote a rather long +letter to Professor Vanlief. He told as much as he could bring himself +to tell of the result of the experiment. He begged the Professor, +knowing the circumstances as no other did, to do what was possible to +reinstate him, Vane, in the esteem of Miss Vanlief. As to whether he +meant to go on with further experiments; he had not yet made up his +mind. There were consequences, obligations, following on this clear +reading of other men's souls, that he had not counted upon. + + + + +CHAPTER IX. + + +To cotton-batting and similar unromantic staples the great house of R.S. +Neargood & Co. first owed the prosperity that later developed into +world-wide fame. It was success in cotton-batting that enabled the firm +to make those speculations that eventually placed millions to its +credit, and familiarized the Bourse and Threadneedle Street with its +name. + +What ever else can be said of cotton-batting, however, it is hardly a +topic of smart conversation. So in smart circles there was never any +mention of cotton-batting when the name of Neargood came up. Instead, it +was customary to refer to them as "the people, you know, who built the +Equator Palace for the Tropical Government, and all that sort of thing." +A certain vagueness is indispensable to polite talk. + +Yet not even this detail of politics and finance counted most in the +smart world. The name of Neargood might never have been heard of in that +world if it had not been for the beautiful daughters of the house of +Neargood. There is nothing, nowadays, like having handsome daughters. +You may have made your millions in pig, or your thousands in whisky, +but, in the eyes of the complaisant present, the curse dies with the +debut of a beautiful daughter. It is true that the smart sometimes make +an absurd distinction between the older generation and the new; +sometimes a barrier is raised for the daughter that checks the mother; +but caprice was ever one of the qualities of smartness. + +Through two seasons the beautiful Misses Neargood--Mary and +Alice--reigned as belles. They were both good to look at, tall, stately, +with distinct profiles. There was not much to choose, so to put it, +between them. Mary was the handsomer; Alice the cleverer. Through two +seasons the society reporters, on the newspapers that are yellow as well +as those that make one blue, exhausted the well of journalese in +chronicling the doings of these two young women. + +The climax of descriptive eloquence was reached on the occasion of the +double wedding of Mary and Alice Neargood. + +Mary changed the name of Neargood for that of Spalding-Wentworth; Alice +became Mrs. Van Fenno. + +Up to this time--as far, at least, as was observable--these two sisters +had dwelt together in unity. Never had the spirits of envy or +uncharitableness entered them. But after marriage there came to each of +them that stormy petrel of Unhappiness, Ambition. + +As a composer of several songs and light operas. Van Fenno was fairly +well known. Spalding-Wentworth was known as a man of Western wealth, of +Western blue blood, and of prominence in the smart set. For some time +the worldly successes of the Van Fennos did not disturb Mrs. +Spalding-Wentworth at all. Her husband was smart, since he moved with +the smart; he and his hyphen were the leaders in a great many famous +ways, notably in fashion and in golf. From the smart point of view the +Van Fennos were not in the hunt with the other family. + +Mrs. Van Fenno chafed and churned a little in silence, but hope did not +die in her. She made up her mind to be as prominent as her sister or +perish in the attempt. + +She did not have to perish. Things took a turn, as they will even in the +smart world, and there came a time when it was fashionable to be +intellectual. The smart set turned from the distractions of dinners and +divorces to the allurements of the arts. Music, painting and literature +became the idols of the hour. With that bland, heedless facility that +distinguishes To-day, the men and women of fashion became quickly versed +in the patter of the Muses. + +The Van Fennos became the rage. Everybody talked of his music and her +charm. Where the reporters had once used space in describing +Spalding-Wentworth's leadership in a cotillon or conduct of a coach, +they were now required to spill ink in enumeration of "those present" +at Mrs. Van Fenno's "musical afternoons." + +Wherefore there was a cloud on the fair brow of Mary Wentworth. Her +intimates were privileged to call her that. Ordinary mortals, omitting +the hyphen, would have been frozen with a look. + +When there is a cloud on the wife's brow it bodes ill for the husband. +The follies of a married man should be dealt with leniently; they are +mostly of his wife's inspiration. One day the cloud cleared from Mary +Wentworth's brow. She was sitting at breakfast with her husband. + +"Why, Clarence," she exclaimed, with a suddenness that made him drop his +toast, "there's literature!" + +"Where?" said Clarence, anxiously. "Where?" He looked about, eager to +please. + +"Stupid," said his wife. "I mean--why shouldn't we, that is, you--" She +looked at him, sure that he would understand without her putting the +thing into syllables. "Yes," she repeated, "literature is the thing. +There it is, as easy, as easy--" + +"Hasn't it always been there?" asked her dear, dense husband. A woman +may brood over a thing, you see, for months, and the man will not get so +much as a suspicion. + +She went on as if he had never spoken. "Literature is the easiest. +Clarence, you must write novels!" + +He buttered himself another slice of toast. + +"Certainly, my dear," he nodded, with a pleasant smile. "Quite as you +please." + +It was in this way that the Spalding-Wentworth novels were incited. The +art of writing badly is, unfortunately, very easy. In painting and in +music some knowledge of technic is absolutely necessary, but in +literature the art of writing counts last, and technic is rarely +applauded. The fact remains that the smart set thought the +Spalding-Wentworth novels were "so clever!" Mrs. Van Fenno was utterly +crushed. Mary Wentworth informed an eager world that her husband's next +novel would be illustrated with caricatures by herself; she had +developed quite a trick in that direction. Now and again her husband +refused to bother his head with ambitions, and devoted himself entirely +to red coats and white balls. Mrs. Wentworth's only device at such times +was to take desperately to golf herself. She really played well; if she +had only had staying power, courage, she might have gone far. But, if +she could not win cups, she could look very charming on the clubhouse +lawn. One really does not expect more from even a queen. + +It did not disturb Mrs. Wentworth at all to know that, where he was best +known, her husband's artistic efforts were considered merely a joke. She +knew that everyone had some mask or other to hold up to the world; and +she knew there was nothing to fear from a brute of a man or two. In her +heart she agreed with them; she knew her husband was a large, kindly, +clumsy creature; a useful, powerful person, who needed guidance. + +Kindly and clumsy--Clarence Spalding-Wentworth had title to those two +adjectives: there was no denying that. It was his kindliness that moved +him, after a busy day at a metropolitan golf tournament, toward Orson +Vane's house. He had heard stories of Vane's illness; they had been at +college together; he wanted to see him, to have a chat, a smoke, a good, +chummy hour or two. + +It was his clumsiness that brought about the incident that came to have +such memorable consequences. Nevins told him Mr. Vane was out; Wentworth +thought he would go in and have a look at Vane's rooms, anyway; sit +down, perhaps, and write him a note. Nevins had swung the curtain to +behind him when Wentworth's heel caught in the wrapping around the new +mirror. + +He looked into the pool of glass blankly. + +"Funny thing to cover up a mirror like that!" he told himself. He flung +the stuff over the frame carelessly. It merely hung by a thread. Almost +any passing wind would be sure to lift it off. + +"Wonder where he keeps his smokes?" he hummed to himself, striding up +and down, like a good natured mammoth. + +He found some cigars began puffing at one with an audible satisfaction, +and at last let himself down to an ebony escritoire that he could have +smashed with one hand. He wrote a scrawl; waited again, whistled, looked +out of the window, picked up a book, peered at the pictures, and then, +with a puff of regret, strode out. + +As he passed the Professor's mirror the current of air he made swept the +curtain from the glass and left it exposed. + + + + +CHAPTER X. + + +At about the time that Wentworth was scrawling his note in Vane's rooms +a slender young woman, dressed in a grey that shimmered like the +winter-sea in sunlight, wearing a hat that had the air of having lit +upon her hair for the moment only,--merely to give the world an +instant's glance at the gracious combination that woman's beauty and +man's millinery could effect--was coming out from one of those huge +bazaars where you can buy almost everything in the world except the +things you want. As she reached the doors, a young man, entering, +brushed her arm; his sleeve caught her portemonnaie. He stooped for it, +offered it hastily, and then--and not until then, gave a little "Oh!" +of--what was it, joy? or mere wonder, or both? + +"Oh," he repeated, "I can't go in--now. It's--it's ages since I could +say two words to you. 'Good-morning!' and 'How do you do?' has been the +limit of our talk. Besides, you have a parcel. It weighs, at the very +least, an ounce. I could never think of letting you tire yourself so." +He took the flimsy mite from her, and ranged his steps to hers. + +It was true, what he had said about their brief encounters. Do what she +would to forget that morning in the Park, and the weeks before it, +Jeannette Vanlief had not quite succeeded. Not even the calm +dissertations of her father, the arguments pointing to the unfathomable +freakishness of human nature, had altogether ousted her aversion to +Orson Vane. It was an aversion made the more keen because it came on the +heels of a strong liking. She had been prepared to like this young man. +Something about him had drawn her; and then had come the something that +had simply flung her away. Yet, to-day, he seemed to be the Orson Vane +that she had been prepared to like. + +She remembered some of the strange things her father had been talking +about. She noted, as Orson spoke, that the false tenor note was gone out +of his voice. But she was still a little fluttered; she could not quite +trust herself, or him. + +"But I am only going to the car," she declared. "It will hardly be worth +while. I mustn't take you out of your way." + +"I see," he regretted, "you've not forgotten. I can't explain; I was--I +think I was a little mad. Perhaps it is in the family. But--I wish you +would imagine, for to-day, that we had only just known each other a very +little while, that we had been in that little bookshop only a day or so +ago, that you had read the book, and we had met again, and--." He was +looking at her with a glow in his eyes, a tenderness--! Her eyes met his +for only an instant, but they fathomed, in that instant, that there was +only homage, and worship, and--and something that she dared not spell, +even to her soul--in them. That burning greed that she had seen in the +Park was not there. + +She smiled, wistfully, hesitatingly. Yet it was enough for him to cling +to; it buoyed his mood to higher courage. + +"Let us pretend," he went on, "that there are no streetcars in the town. +Let us be primitive; let us play we are going to take a peep-show from +the top of the Avenue stage! Oh--please! It gets you just as near, you +know; and if you like we can go on, and on, and do it all over again. +Think of the tops of the hats and bonnets one sees from the roof! It's +such a delightful picture of the avenue; you see all the little +marionettes going like beads along the string. And then, think of the +danger of the climb to the roof! It is like the Alps. You never know, +until you are there, whether you will arrive in one piece or in several. +Come," he laughed, for she was now really smiling, openly, sweetly, "let +us be good children, come in from Westchester County, to see the big +city." + +"Perhaps," she ventured, "we will make it the fashion. And that would +spoil it for so many of the plainer people." + +"Oh," and he waved his hand, "after us--the daily papers! Let us +pretend--I beg your pardon, let me pretend--youth, and high spirits, +and the intention to enjoy to-day." + +A rattling and a scraping on the asphalt warned them of an approaching +stage, and after a scramble, that had its shy pleasures for both, they +found themselves on the top of the old relic. + +"It is a bit of the Middle Ages," said Orson, "look at those horses! +Aren't they delightfully slender? And the paint! Do you notice the +paint? And the stories those plush seats down below us could tell! Think +of the misers and the millionaires, the dowagers and the drabs, that +have let these old stages bump them over Murray Hill! You can't have +that feeling about a street-car, not one of the electric ones, at any +rate. Do you know the story of the New Yorker who was trying to sleep in +a first-class compartment on a French railway? There was a collision, +and he was pitched ten feet onto a coal-heap. He said he thought he was +at home and he was getting off the stage at Forty-Second street." + +They were passing through the most frequented part of the avenue. Noted +singers and famous players passed them; old beaux and fresh belles; +political notabilities and kings of corruption. A famous leader of +cotillions, a beauty whose profile vied with her Boston terriers for +being her chief distinction, and a noted polo-player came upon the scene +and vanished again. Vane and his companion gave, from time to time, +little nods to right and left. Their friends stared at them a little, +but that caused them no sorrow. Automobiles rushed by. They looked down +upon them, lofty in their ruined tower. + +"As a show," said Vane, "it is admirably arranged. It moves with a +beautiful precision. There is nothing hurried about it; the illusion of +life is nearly complete. Some of them, I suppose, really are alive?" + +"I am not sure," she answered, gravely. "Sometimes I think they merely +move because there is a button being pressed somewhere; a button we +cannot see, and that they spend their lives hiding from us." + +"I dare say you are right. In the words of Fay Templeton, 'I've been +there and I know.' I have made my little detours: but the lane had, +thank fortune, a turning." + +She saw through his playfulness, and her eyes went up to his in a +sympathy--oh, it made him reel for sweetness. + +"I am glad," she said, simply. + +"But we are getting serious again," he remonstrated, "that would never +do. Have we not sworn to be children? Let us pretend--let us pretend!" +He looked at the grey roofs, the spires oozing from the hill to the sky. +He looked at the grey dream beside him: so grey, so fair, so crowned +with the hue of the sun before the world had made him so brazen. "Let us +pretend," he went on, after a sigh, "that we are bound for the open +road, and that we are to come to an inn, and that we will order +something to eat. We--" + +"Oh," she laughed, "you men, you men! Always something to eat!" + +"You see, we are of coarse stuff; we cannot sup on star-dust, and dine +on bubbles. But--this is only to pretend! An imaginary meal is sometimes +so much more fun than a real one. At a real one, you see, I would have +to try to eat, and I could not spend the whole time looking at you, and +watching the sunshine on your hair, and the lilies--" He caught his +breath sharply, with a little clicking noise. "Dear God," he whispered, +"the lilies again! And I had never seen them until now." + +"You are going to be absurd," she said, though her voice was hardly a +rebuke. + +"And wouldn't I have excuse," he asked, "for all the absurdities in the +world! I want to be as absurd as I can; I want to think that there's +nothing in the world any uglier than--you." + +"And will you dine off that thought?" + +"Oh, no; that is merely one of the condiments. I keep that in reach, +while the other things come and go. I tell you: how would it be if we +began with a bisque of crab? The tenderest pink, you know, and not the +ghost of any spice that you can distinguish; a beautiful, creamy blend." + +"You make it sound delicious," she admitted. + +"We take it slowly, you know, religiously. The conversation is mostly +with the eyes. Dinner conversation is so often just as vapid as +dinner-music! The only point in favor of dinner-music is that we are +usually spared the sight of it. There is no truth more abused than the +one that music must be heard and not seen. When I am king I mean to +forbid any singing or playing of instruments within sight of the public; +it spoils all the pleasure of the music when one sees the uglinesses in +its execution." + +"But people would not thank you if you kept the sight of Paderewski or +De Pachmann from them." + +"They might not thank me at first, but they would learn gratitude in the +end, A contortionist is quite as oppressive a sight as an automaton. No; +I repeat, performers of music should never, never be visible. It is a +blow in the face of the art of music; it puts it on the plane of the +theatre. What persons of culture want to do is to listen, to listen, to +listen; to shut the eyes, and weave fancies about the strains as they +come from an unseen corner. Is there not always a subtle charm about +music floating over a distance? That is a case in point; that same charm +should always be preserved. The pianist, the soloist of any sort, as +well as the orchestra, or the band--except in the case of the regimental +band, in battle or in review, where actual spectacle, and visible +encouragement are the intention--should never be seen. There should +always be a screen, a curtain, between us and the players. It would make +the trick of music criticism harder, but it would still leave us the +real judges. Take out of music criticism the part that covers fingering, +throat manipulation, pedaling, and the like, and what have you left? +These fellows judge what they see more than what they hear. To give a +proper judgment of the music that comes from the unseen; that is the +only test of criticism. There can be no tricks, no paddings." + +"But the opera?" wondered the girl. + +"The opera? Oh, the opera is, at best, a contradiction in terms. But I +do not waive my theory for the sake of opera. It should be seen as +little as any other form of music. The audience, supplied with the story +of the dramatic action, should follow the incidents by ear, not by eye. +That would be the true test of dramatic writing in music. We would, +moreover, be spared the absurdity of watching singers with beautiful +voices make themselves ridiculous by clumsy actions. As to comic +opera--the music's appeal would suffer no tarnish from the merely +physical fascination of the star or the chorus ... I know the thought is +radical; it seems impossible to imagine a piano recital without long +hair, electric fingers, or visible melancholia; opera with only the +box-holders as appeals to the eye seems too good to be true; but--I +assure you it would emancipate music from all that now makes it the +most vicious of the arts. Painters do not expect us to watch them +painting, nor does the average breed of authors--I except the Manx--like +to be seen writing. Yet the musician--take away the visible part of his +art, and he is shorn of his self-esteem. I assure you I admire actors +much more than musicians; actors are frankly exponents of nothing that +requires genius, while musicians pretend to have an art that is over and +above the art of the composer.... Music--" + +"Do you realize," interrupted the girl, with a laugh that was melody +itself, "that you are feasting me upon dinner-music without dinner. It +must be ages since we began that imaginary feast. But now, I am quite +sure we are at the black coffee. And I have been able to notice nothing +except your ardor in debate. You were as eager as if you were being +contradicted." + +"You see," he said, "it only proves my point. Dinner-music is an +abomination. It takes the taste of the food away. While I was playing, +you admit, you tasted nothing between the soup and the coffee. Whereas, +in point of fact--" + +"Or fancy?" + +"As you please. At any rate--the menu was really something out of the +common. There were some delightful wines. A sherry that the innkeeper +had bought of a bankrupt nobleman; so would run his fable for the +occasion, and we would believe it, because, in cases of that sort, it +takes a very bad wine to make one pooh-pooh its pedigree. A Madeira that +had been hidden in a cellar since 1812. We would believe that, every +word of it, because we would know that there was really no Madeira in +all the world; and we must choose between insulting our stomachs or our +intelligence. And then the coffee. It would come in the tiniest, most +transparent, most fragile--" + +"Yes," she laughed, "I dare say. As transparent and as fragile as the +entire fabric of our repast, I have no doubt. But--pity me, do!--I shall +have to leave the beautiful banquet about where you have put it, in the +air. I have a ticking conscience here that says--" + +"Oh, hide it," he supplicated, "hide it. Watches are nothing but +mechanisms that are jealous of happiness; whenever there is a happy hour +a watch tries to end it. When I am king I shall prohibit the manufacture +and sale of watches. The fact that they may be carried about so easily +is one of their chief vices; one never knows nowadays from what corner a +woman will not bring one; they carry them on their wrists, their +parasols, their waists, their shoulders. Can you be so cruel as to let +that little golden monster spoil me my hour of happiness--" + +"But I would have to be cruel one way or the other. You see, my father +will wonder what has become of me. He expects me to dinner." + +"Ah, well," he admitted soberly, if a little sadly, "we must not keep +him waiting. You must tell the Professor where we have been, and what we +said, and how silly I was, and--Heigho, I wish I could tell you how the +little hour with you has buoyed me up. Your presence seems to stir my +possibilities for good. I wish I could see you oftener. I feel like the +provincial who says good-bye with a: 'May I come 'round this evening?' +as a rider." + +"A doubtful compliment, if I make you rustic," she said. "But I have +something on this evening; an appointment with a man. The most beautiful +man in the world, and the best, and the kindest--" + +"His name?" he cried, with elaborate pretense of melodrama, for he saw +that she was full of whimsies. + +"Professor Vanlief," she curtsied. + +They were walking, by now, in the shade of the afternoon sun. Vane saw a +stage approaching them, one that would take him back to the lower town. +She saw it, too, and his intention. She shook hands with him, and took +time to say, softly: + +"Do you never ride in the Park any more?" + +"Oh," he said, "tell me when. To-morrow morning? At McGowan's Pass? At +ten? Oh, how I wish that stage was not coming so fast!" + +In their confusion, and their joyous sense of having the same absurd +thought in common, they both laughed at the notion of a Fifth avenue +stage ever being too fast. Yet this one, and Time, sped so swiftly that +Vane could only shake hands hastily with his fair companion, look at her +worshipfully, and jump upon the clattering vehicle. + +He would never have believed that so ramshackle a conveyance could have +harbored so many dreams as had been his that day. + +That thought was his companion all the way home. That, and efforts to +define his feelings toward Miss Vanlief. Was it love? What else could it +be! And if it was, was he ready, for her, to give up those ambitions of +still further sounding hitherto unexplored avenues of the human mind? +Was this fragile bit of grace and glamour to come between him and the +chance of opening a new field to science? Had he not the opportunity to +become famous, or, at the very least, to become omnipotent in reading +the hearts, the souls, of men? Were not the possibilities of the +Professor's discovery unlimited? Was it not easy by means of that mirror +in his rooms, for any chief of police in the world to read the guilt or +innocence of every accused man? Yet, on the other hand, would marriage +interfere? Yes; it would. One could not serve two such goddesses as +woman and science. He would have to make up his mind, to decide. + +But, in the meanwhile, there was plenty of time. Surely, for the +present, he could be happy in the thought of the morrow, of the ride +they were to take in the Park, of the cantering, the chattering +together, the chance to see the morning wind spin the twists of gold +about her cheeks and bring the sparkle to her eyes. + +He let himself into his house without disturbing any of the servants. He +passed into his room. He lifted the curtain of the doorway with one +hand, and with the other turned the button that lighted the room. As the +globes filled with light they showed him his image in the new mirror. + +He reeled against the wall with the surprise of the thing. He noted the +mirror's curtain in a heap at the foot of the frame. Perhaps, after all, +it had been merely the wind. + +He summoned Nevins. The curtain he replaced on the staring face of the +mirror. Whence the thought came from, he did not know, but it occurred +to him that the scene was like a scene from a novel. + +"Nevins," he asked, "was anyone in my rooms?" + +"Mr. Spalding-Wentworth, sir." + +Orson Vane laughed,--a loud, gusty, trumpeting laugh. + +He understood. But he understood, also, that the accident that had +brought the soul of Spalding-Wentworth into his keeping had decreed, +also, that the dominance should not be, as on a former time, with the +usurper. + +He knew that the soul of Spalding-Wentworth, to which he gave the refuge +of his own body, was a small soul. + +Yet even little souls have their spheres of influence. + + + + +CHAPTER XI. + + +It was a morning such as the wild flowers, out in the suburban meadows, +must have thought fit for a birthday party. As for the town, it lost, +under that keen air and gentle sun, whatever of garish and unhealthy +glamour it had displayed the night before. + +"The morning," Orson Vane had once declared, in a moment of revelation, +"is God's, and the night is man's." He was speaking, of course, of the +town. In the severe selectiveness that had grown upon him after much +rout and riot through other lands, he pretended that the town was the +only spot on the map. Certainly this particular morning seemed to bear +out something of this saying; it swept away the smoke and the taint, the +fever and the flush of the night before; the visions of limelights and +glittering crystals and enmillioned vice fled before the gust of ozone +that came pouring into the streets. Before night, to be sure, man would +have asserted himself once more; the pomp and pageant of the primrose +path would have ousted, with its artificial charm, the clean, sweet +freshness of the morning. + +The grim houses on upper Fifth avenue put on semblance of life +reluctantly that morning. Houses take on the air of their inmates; these +houses wore their best manner only under artificial lights. Surly grooms +and housemaids went muttering and stumbling about the areas. Sad-faced +wheelmen flashed over the asphalt, cursing the sprinkling carts. It was +not too early for the time-honored preoccupation of the butcher cart, +which consists of turning corners as if the world's end was coming. +Pallid clubmen strode furtively in the growing sunshine. To them, as to +the whole town, the sun and its friend, the breeze, came as a tonic and +a cure. + +So strange a thing is the soul of man that Orson Vane, riding towards +the Park that morning, caught only vague, fleeting impressions of the +actual beauty of the day. He simply wondered, every foot of the way to +McGowan's Pass, whether Miss Vanlief played golf. The first thing he +said to her after they had exchanged greetings, was: + +"Of course you golf?" + +She looked at him in alarm. There was something--something, but what was +it?--in his voice, in his eye. She had expected a reference to the day +before, to their infantile escapade on the roof of the coach. Instead, +this banale, this stupid, this stereotyped phrase! Her flowerlike face +clouded; she gave her mare the whip. + +"No," she called out, "I cannot bear the game." His horse caught the +pace with difficulty; the groom was left far out of sight, beyond a +corner. But the diversion had not touched Vane's trend of thought at +all. + +"Oh," he assured her, when the horses were at an amble again, "it's one +of those things one has to do. Some things have to be done, you know; +society won't stand for anything less, you know, oh, no. I have to play +golf, you know; part of my reputation." + +"I didn't know," she faltered. She tried to remember when Orson Vane had +ever been seen on either the expert or the duffer list at the golf +matches. + +"Oh, yes; people expect it of me. If I don't play I have to arrange +tournaments. Handicapping is great fun; ever try it? No? You should. +Makes one feel quite like a judge at sessions. Oh, there's nothing like +golf. Not this year, at least. Next year it may be something else. I may +have to take to polo or tennis. One is expected to show the way, you +know; a man in my position--" He looked at her with a kind of 'bland, +blunt, clumsy egoism, that made her wonder where was the Orson Vane of +yesterday. This riddle began to sadden her. Perhaps it was true, as she +had heard somewhere, that the man was mentally unbalanced; that he had +his--well, his bad days. She sighed. She had looked forward to this ride +in the Park; she admitted that to herself. Not in a whole afternoon +spent with Luke Moncreith had she felt such happy childishness stirring +in her as yesterday, in the hour with Orson Vane. And now--She sighed. + +The hum of an approaching automobile reached them, the glittering +vehicle proclaiming its progress in that purring stage whisper that is +still the inalienable right of even the newest "bubble" machine. The +coat worn by the smart young person on the seat would have shocked the +unenlightened, for that sparkling, tingling morning it struck the exact +harmonious note of artifice. + +Orson Vane bowed. It was "the" Miss Carlos. Just as there is only one +Mrs. Carlos, so there is only one Miss Carlos. + +"She plays a decent game," said Vane to his companion. + +"Of life?" + +"No; golf." He looked at her in amazement. Life! What was life compared +to golf? Life? For most people it was, at best, a foozle. Nearly +everybody pressed; very few followed through, and the bunkers--good +Lord, the bunkers! + +"I'm thinking of writing a golfing novel," began Orson, after an +interval in which he managed to wonder whether one couldn't play golf +from horseback. + +"Oh," said Miss Vanlief wearily, "how does one set about it!" + +He was quite unaware of her weariness. He chirped his answer with blind +enthusiasm. + +"It's very easy," he declared. "There are always a lot of women, you +know, who are aching to do things in that line. You give them the +prestige of your name, that's all. One of them writes the thing; you +simply keep them from foozling the phrases now and then. Another +illustrates it." + +"And does anyone buy it?" + +"Oh, all the smart people do. It's one of those things one is supposed +to do. There's no particular reason or sense in it; but smart people +expect one another to read things like that. The newspapers get quite +silly over such books. Then, after novels, I think, I shall take to +having them done over for the stage? Don't you think a golfing comedy, +with a sprinkling of profanity and Scotch whiskey, would be all the +rage?" + +Jeannette Vanlief reined in her mare. She looked at Orson Vane; looked +him, as much as she could, through and through. Was it all a stupid +jest? She could find nothing but dense earnestness in her face, in his +eyes. Oh, the riddle was too tiresome, too hopeless. It was simply not +the same man at all! She gave it up, gave him up. + +"Do you mind," she said, "if I ride home now? I'm tired." + +It should have been a blow in the face, but Orson Vane never so much as +noticed it. + +"Tired?" he repeated. "Oh; all right. We'll turn about. Rather go back +alone? Oh, all right. Wish you'd learn to play golf; you really must!" +And upon that he let her canter away, the groom following, some little +wonder on his impassive front. + +As for Jeannette Vanlief she burst into her father's room a little +later, and then into tears. + +"And I wanted to love him!" she wailed presently, from out her confusion +and her distress. + +The Professor was patting her hair, and wondering what in all the world +was the matter. At her speech, he thought he saw a light. + +"And why not?" he asked, soothingly, "He seems quite estimable. He was +here only a moment ago?" + +"Who was here?" she asked in bewilderment. + +"Mr. Moncreith." + +At that she laughed. The storm was over, the sunshine peeped out again. + +"You dear, blind comfort, you!" she said, "What do I care if a thousand +Moncreiths--" + +"Then it's Orson Vane," said the Professor, not so blind after all. +"Well, dear, and what has he been doing now?" + +He listened to her rather rambling, rather spasmodic recital; listened +and grew moody, though he could scarce keep away some little mirth. He +saw through these masquerades, of course. Who else, if not he? Poor +Jeannette! So she had set her happy little heart upon that young man? A +young man who, to serve both their ends, was playing chameleon. A young +man who was mining greater secrets from the deeps of the human soul than +had ever been mined before. A wonderful young man, but--would that make +for Jeannette's happiness? At any rate he, the Professor, would have to +keep an eye open for Vane's doings. There was no knowing what strange +ways these borrowed souls might lead to. He wondered who it was that, +this time, had been rifled of his soul. + +Wonder did not long remain the adjuncts of the Professor and his +daughter only. The whole world of society began to wonder, as time went +on, at the new activities of Orson Vane. Wonder ceased, presently, and +there was passive acceptance of him in his new role. Fashions, after +all, are changed so often in the more external things, that the smart +set would not take it as a surprising innovation if some people took to +changing their souls to suit the social breeze. + +Orson Vane took a definite place in the world of fashion that season. He +became the arbiter of golf; he gave little putting contests for women +and children; he looked after the putting greens of a number of smart +clubs with as much care as a woman gives her favorite embroideries. He +took to the study of the Turkish language. There were rumors that he +meant to become the Minister to Turkey. He traveled a great deal, and he +published a book called "The Land of the Fez." Another little brochure +bearing his name was "The Caddy; His Ailments and Diseases." It was +rumored that he was busy in dramatization of his novel, "Five Loaves and +Two Fishes!" When Storman Pasha made his memorable visit to the States +it was Orson Vane who became his guide and friend. A jovial club of +newspaper roysterers poked fun at him by nominating him for Mayor. He +went through it all with a bland humorlessness and stubborn dignity that +nothing could affront. His indomitable energy, his intense seriousness +about everything, kept smart society unalterably loyal. He led its +cotillions, arranged its more sober functions, and was a household word +with the outsiders that reach society only through the printed page. His +novels--whether they were his own or done for him hardly matters--were +just dull enough to offend nobody. The most indolent dweller in Vanity +Fair could affect his books without the least mental exertion. The lives +of our fashionables are too full, too replete with a multitude of +interests and excitements, to allow of the concentration proper for the +reading of scintillating dialogue, or brilliant observations. Orson Vane +appeared to gauge his public admirably; he predominated in the outdoor +life, in golf, in yachting, in coaching, yet he did not allow anyone +else to dispute the region of the intellect, of indoors, with him. He +shone, with a severe dimness, in both fields. + +Jeannette Vanlief, meanwhile, lost much of the sparkle she had hitherto +worn. She drooped perceptibly. The courtship of Luke Moncreith left her +listless; he persevered on the strength of his own ambition rather than +her encouragement. His daughter's looks at last began seriously to worry +Professor Vanlief. Something ought to be done. But what? It was +apparently Orson Vane's intention to keep that borrowed soul with him +for a long time. In the meanwhile Jeannette.... The Professor, the more +he considered the matter, felt the more strongly that just as he was the +one who had given Vane this power, so had he the right, if need be, to +interfere. The need was urgent. The masquerade must be put an end to. + +His resolve finally taken, Professor Vanlief paid a visit to Orson +Vane's house. Vane was, as he had hoped, not at home. He +cross-questioned Nevins. + +The man was only too willing to admit that his master's actions were +queer. But Mr. Vane had given him warning to that effect; he must have +felt it coming on. It was a malady, no doubt. For his part he thought it +was something that Mr. Vane would wish to cure rather than endure. He +didn't pretend to understand his master of late, but-- + +The Professor put a period to the man's volubility with some effort. + +"I want you," he urged, "to jog your memory a little. Never mind the +symptoms. Give me straightforward answers. Now--did you touch the new +mirror, leaving it uncovered, at any time within the past few weeks?" + +"Oh," was the answer, "the new mirror, is it! I knows well the uncanny +thing was sure to make trouble for me. But I gives you my word, as I +hopes to be saved, that I've never so much as brushed the dust off it, +much less taken the curtain off. It's fearsome, is that mirror, I'm +thinking. It's--" + +"Then think back," pressed the Professor, again stemming the tide of the +other's talk relentlessly, "think back: was anyone, ever, at any time, +alone in Mr. Vane's rooms? Think, think!" + +"I disremember," stammered Nevins. "I think not--Oh, wait! It was a long +time ago, but I think a gentleman wrote Mr. Vane a note once, and I, +having work in the other rooms, let him be undisturbed. But I told the +master about it, the minute he came in, sir. He was not the least vexed, +sir. Oh, I'm easy in my mind about that time." + +"Yes, yes,--but the gentleman's name!" The Professor shook the man's +shoulder quite roughly. + +"His name? Oh, it was just Mr. Spalding-Wentworth, sir, that was all." + +The Professor sat down with a laugh. Spalding-Wentworth! He laughed +again. + +Nevins had the air of one aggrieved. "Mr. Vane laughed, too, I remember, +when I told him. Just the minute I told him, sir, he laughed. I've +puzzled over it, time and again, why--" + +The Professor left Nevins puzzling. There was no time to be lost. He +remembered now that Spalding-Wentworth had for some time been ailing. +The world, in its devotion to Orson Vane, had forgotten, almost, that +such a person as Spalding-Wentworth had ever existed. To be forgotten +one has only to disappear. Dead men's shoes are filled nowhere so +quickly as in Vanity Fair; though, to be paradoxic, for the most part +they are high-heeled slippers. + +It took some little time, some work, to arrange what the Professor had +decided must be done. He went about his plans with care and skill. He +suborned Nevins easily enough, using, chiefly, the plain truth. Nevins, +with the superstition of his class, was willing to believe far greater +mysteries than the Professor half hinted at. By Nevins' aid it happened +that Orson Vane slept, one night, face to face with the polished surface +of the new mirror. In the morning it was curtained as usual. + +That morning Augustus Vanlief called at the Wentworth house. He asked +for Mrs. Wentworth. He went to his point at once. + +"You know who I am, I dare say, Mrs. Wentworth. You love your husband, I +am sure; you will pardon my intrusion when I tell you that perhaps I can +do something the best thing of all--for him. It is, in its way, a +matter of life and death. Do the doctors give you any hope?" + +Mrs. Wentworth, her beauty now tired and touched by traces of spoilt +ambition, made a listless motion with her hands. + +"I don't know why I should tell you," she said, "or why I should not. +They tell me vague things, the doctors do, but I don't believe they know +what is the matter." + +"Do you?" + +"I?" she looked at Vanlief, and found a challenge in his regard. "It +seems," she admitted, "as if--I hardly like to say it,--but it seems as +if there was no soul in him any more. He is a shell, a husk. The life in +him seems purely muscular. It is very depressing. Why do you think you +can do anything for Clarence, Professor? I did not know your researches +took you into medicine?" + +"Ah, but you admit this is not a matter for medicine, but for the mind. +Will you allow me an experiment madame? I give you my word of honor, my +honor and my reputation, that there is no risk, and there may +be--perhaps, an entire restoration. There is--a certain operation that I +wish to try--" + +"An operation? The most eminent doctors have told me such a thing would +be useless. We might as well leave my poor husband clear of the knife, +Professor." + +"Oh, it is no operation, in that sense. Nothing surgical. I can hardly +explain; professional secrets are involved. If you did not know that I +am but a plodding old man of science--if I were an unknown charlatan--I +would not ask you to put faith in me. But--I give you my word, my +promise, that if you will let Mr. Wentworth come with me in my brougham +I will return with him within the hour. He will be either as he is now, +or--as he once was." + +"As he once was--!" Mrs. Wentworth repeated the phrase, and the thought +brought her a keen moment of anguish that left a visible impress on her +features. "Ah," she sighed, "if I could only think such a thing +possible!" She brooded in silence a moment or two. Then she spoke. + +"Very well. You will find him in the library. Prim, show the gentleman +to the library. If you can persuade him, Professor--" She smiled +bitterly. "But then, anybody can persuade him nowadays." She turned to +some embroidery as if to dismiss the subject, to show that she was +resigned even to hopeless experiments. The very fact that she was plying +the needle rather than the social sceptre was gauge of her descent from +the heights. As a matter of fact Vanlief found Wentworth amenable +enough. Wentworth was reading Marie Corelli. His mind was as empty as +that. Nothing could better define his utter lapse from intelligence. He +put the book down reluctantly as the Professor came in. He listened +without much enthusiasm. A drive? Why not? He hadn't driven much of +late, but if it was something that would please the Professor. He +remembered, through a mist, that he had known Vanlief when he himself +was a boy; his father had often spoken of Vanlief with respect. Nothing +further in the way of mental exertion came to him. He followed Vanlief +as a dog follows whoso speaks kindly to it. + +The conversation between the two, in the brougham, would hardly tend to +the general entertainment. It was a thing of shreds and patches. It led +nowhither. + +The brougham stopped at the door of Orson Vane's house. Nevins let them +in, whispering an assuring confidence to the professor. As they reached +the door of the dressing-room Vanlief pushed Wentworth ahead of him, and +bade him enter. He kept behind him, letting the other's body screen him +from the staring mirror. + +Wentworth looked at himself. A hand traveled slowly up to his forehead. + +"By Jove!" he said, hesitatingly, "I never put the curtain back, after +all." And he covered up the mirror. "Curious thing," he went on, with +energy vitalizing each word, "what possessed me to come here just now, +when I know for a fact that they're playing the Inter-State Golf +championships to-day. Dashed if I know why I didn't go!" He walked out, +plainly puzzled, clumsily heedless of Vanlief and Nevins, but--himself +once more. + +Orson Vane, at just that time, was on the links of the Fifeshire Golf +Club. He was wearing a little red coat with yellow facings. He was in +the act of stooping on a green, to look along the line of his putt, when +he got to his feet in a hurried, bewildered way. He threw his putter +down on the green. He blushed all over, shaming the tint of his scarlet +coat. + +"What a foolish game for a grown-up man!" he blurted out, and strode off +the grounds. + +The bystanders were aghast. They could not find words. Orson Vane, the +very prophet of golf, to throw it over in that fashion! It was +inexplicable! The episode was simply maddening. + +But it was remarked that the decline of golf on this side of the water +dated from that very day. + + + + +CHAPTER XII. + + +Orson Vane was taking lunch with Professor Vanlief. Jeannette, learning +of Vane's coming, had absented herself. + +"It is true," Vane was saying, "that I can assert what no other man has +asserted before,--that I know the exact mental machinery of two human +beings. Yes; that is quite true. But--" + +"I promised nothing more," remarked Vanlief. + +"No. That is true, too. I have lived the lives of others; I have given +their thoughts a dwelling. But I am none the happier for that." + +"Oh," admitted Vanlief, "wisdom does not guarantee happiness...." He +drummed with his fine, long fingers, upon the table-cloth. Vane, +watching him, noted the almost transparent quality of his skin. Under +that admirable mask of military uprightness there was an aging, a fading +process going on, that no keen observer could miss. "It is the pursuit, +not the capture of wisdom, that brings happiness. Wisdom is too often +only a bubble that bursts when you touch it." + +"Perhaps that is it. At any rate I know that I do not love my neighbor +any more because I have fathomed some of his thoughts. Moreover, +Professor, has it occurred to you that your discovery, your secret, +carries elements of danger with it? Take my own experiments; there might +have been tragic results; whole lives might have been ruined. In one +case I was nearly the victim of a tragedy myself; I might have become, +for all time, the dreadful creature I was giving house-room to. In the +other, there was no more than a farce possible; the visiting spirit was, +after all, in subjection to my own. I think you will have to simplify +the details of your marvelous secret. It works a little clumsily, a +little--" + +"Oh," the Professor put in, "I am perfecting the process. I spend my +days and my nights in elaborating the details. I mean to have it in the +simplest, most unmistakable perfection before I hand it over to the +human race." + +"Sometimes I think," mused Vane, "that your boon will be a doubtful one. +I can see no good to be gained. My whole point of view is changing. I +ached for such a chance of wisdom once; now that it has come to me I am +sad because the things I have learned are so horrible, so silly. I had +not thought there were such souls in the world; or not, at any rate, in +the immediate world about me." + +"Oh," the Professor went on, steadfastly, "there will be many benefits +in the plan. Doctors will be able to go at once to the root of any +ailments that have their seat in the brain. Witnesses cab be made to +testify the truth. Oh--there are ever so many possibilities." + +"As many for evil as for good. Second-rate artists could steal the +ideas, the inventions of others. No inventor, no scientist, would be +sure of keeping his secrets. The thing would be a weapon in the hands of +the unscrupulous." + +"Ah, well," smiled Vanlief, "so far I have not made my discovery public, +have I? It is a thing I must consider very carefully. As you say, there +are arguments on either side. But you must bear in mind that you are +somewhat embittered. It was your own fault; you chose the subject +wittingly. If you were to read a really beautiful mind, you might turn +to the other extreme; you might urge me to lose no time in giving the +world my secret. The wise way is between the two; I must go forward with +my plans, prepared for either course. I may take it to my grave with me, +or I may give it to the world; but, so far, it is still a little +incomplete; it is not ripe for general distribution. Instead of the one +magic mirror there must be myriads of them. There are stupendous +opportunities. All that you have told me of your own experiences in +these experiments has proved my skill to have been wisely employed; your +success was beyond my hopes. Do you think you will go on?" + +Orson Vane did not answer at once. It was something he had been asking +himself; he was not yet sure of the answer. + +"I haven't made up my mind," he replied. "So far I have hardly been +repaid for my time and the vital force employed. I almost feel toward +these experiments as toward a vice that refines the mind while +coarsening the frame. That is the story of the most terrible vices, I +think; they corrode the body while gilding the brain. But this much I +know; if I use your mirror again it will not be to borrow a merely smart +soul; I mean to go to some other sphere of life. That one is too +contracted." + +"Strange," said the Professor, "that you should have said that. +Jeannette pretends she thinks that, too. I cannot get her to take her +proper position in the world. She is a little elusive. But then, to be +sure, she is not, just now, at her best." + +"She is not ill?" asked Vane, with a guilty start. + +"Nothing tangible. But not--herself...." + +Vane observed that he wished he might have found her in; he feared he +had offended her; he hoped the Professor would use his kind offices +again to soften the young lady's feelings toward him. Then he got up to +go. + +Strolling along the avenue he noted certain aspects of the town with an +appreciation that he had not always given them. He had seen these things +from so many other points of view of late; had been in sympathy with +them, had made up a fraction of their more grotesque element; that to +see them clearly with his own eyes had a sort of novelty. The life of +to-day, as it appeared on the smartest surfaces, was, he reflected, a +colorful if somewhat soulless picture.... + +The young men sit in the clubs and in the summer casinos, smoking and +wondering what the new mode in trousers is to be; an acquaintance goes +by; he has a hat that is not quite correct, and his friends comment on +it yawningly; he has not the faintest notion of polite English, but +nobody cares; a man who has written great things walks by, but he wears +a creased coat, and the young men in the smoking-room sniff at him. In +the drags and the yachts the women and the girls sit in radiance and gay +colors and arrogant unconsciousness of position and power; they talk of +golfing and fashion and mustachios; Mrs. Blank is going a hot pace and +Mrs. Landthus is a thoroughbred; adjectives in the newest sporting slang +fly about blindingly; the language is a curious argot, as distinct as +the tortuous lingo of the Bowery. A coach goes rattling by, the horses +throwing their heads in air, and their feet longing for the Westchester +roads. The whip discusses bull-terriers; the people behind him are +declaring that the only thing you can possibly find in the Waldorf rooms +is an impossible lot of people. The complexions of all these people, +intellectually presentable in many ways, and fashionable in yet more +modes, are high in health. They look happy, prosperous and +satisfied.... + +Yes, there was a superficial fairness to the picture, Vane admitted. If +only, if only, he had not chosen to look under the surface! Now that he +had seen the world with other eyes, its fairness could rarely seem the +same to him. + +A sturdy beggar approached him, with a whine that proved him an +admirable actor. But Vane could not find it in him to reflect that if +there is one thing more than another that lends distinction to a town it +is an abundance of beggars. + +He wondered how it would be to annex this healthy impostor's mite of a +soul. But no; there could be little wisdom gained there. + +He made, finally, for the Town and Country Club, and tried to immerse +himself in the conversation that sped about. The talked turned to the +eminent actor, Arthur Wantage. The subject of that man's alleged +eccentricities invariably brought out a flood of the town's stalest +anecdotes. Vane, listening in a lazy mood, made up his mind to see +Wantage play that night. It would be a distraction. It would show him, +once again, the present limit in one human being's portraiture of +another; he would see the highest point to which external imitation +could be brought; he could contrast it with the heights to which he +himself had ascended. + +It would be a chance for him to consider Wantage, for the first time in +his life, as a merely second-rate actor. This player was an adept only +in the making the shell, the husk, seem lifelike; since he could not +read the character, how could he go deeper? + +The opportunities the theatre held for him suddenly loomed vast before +Vane. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII. + + +The fact that Arthur Wantage was to be seen and heard, nightly, in a +brilliant comedy by the author of "Pious Aeneas," was not so much the +attraction that drew people to his theatre, as was the fact that he had +not yet, that season, delivered himself of a curtain speech. His curtain +speeches were wont to be insults delivered in an elaborately honeyed +manner; he took the pose of considering his audiences with contempt; he +admired himself far more for his condescension in playing to them than +he respected his audiences for having the taste to admire him. + +The comedy in which he was now appearing was the perfection of paradox. +It pretended to be frivolous and was really philosophic. The kernel of +real wisdom was behind the elaborately poised mask of wit. A delightful +impertinence and exaggeration informed every line of the dialogue. The +pose of inimitable, candid egoism showed under every situation. The play +was typical of the author as well as of the player. It veiled, as thinly +as possible, a deal of irony at the expense of the play going public; it +took some of that public's dearest foibles and riddled them to shreds. + +It was currently reported that the only excuse for comparatively +amicable relations between Wantage and O'Deigh, who had written this +comedy, was the fact of there being an ocean between them. Even at that +Wantage found it difficult to suffer the many praises he heard bestowed, +not upon himself but O'Deigh. He had burst out in spleen at this +adulation, once, in the hearing of an intimate. + +"My dear Arthur," said the other, "you strike me as very ungrateful. For +my part, when I see your theatre crowded nightly, when I see how your +exchequer fills steadily, it occurs to me that you should go down on +your knees every night, and thank God that O'Deigh has done you such a +stunning play." + +"Oh," was Wantage's grudging answer, "I do, you know I do. But I also +say: Oh, God, why did it have to be by O'Deigh?" + +The secret of his hatred for O'Deigh was the secret of his hatred for +all dramatists. He was a curious compound of egoism, childishness and +shrewdness. Part of his shrewdness--or was it his childishness?--showed +in his aversion to paying authors' royalties. He always tried to +re-write all the plays he accepted; if the playwrights objected there +was sure to be a row of some sort. When he could find no writers willing +to make him a present of plays, for the sake, as he put it, of having it +done by as eminent an actor as himself, and in so beautiful a theatre, +he was in the habit of announcing that he would forsake the theatre, and +turn critic. He pretended that the world--the public, the press, even +the minor players--were in league against him. There was a conspiracy to +drive him from the theatre; the riff-raff resented that a man of genius +should be so successful. They lied about him; he was sure they lied; for +stories, of preposterous import, came to him; he vowed he never read the +newspapers--never. As for London--oh, he could spin you the most +fascinating yarn of the cabal that had dampened his London triumph. He +mentioned, with a world of meaning in his tone, the name of the other +great player of the time; he insinuated that to have him, Wantage, +succeed in London, had not been to that other player's mind; so the +wires had been pulled; oh, it was all very well done. He laughed at the +reminiscence,--a brave, bluff laugh, that told you he could afford to +let such petty jealousies amuse him. + +The riddle of Arthur Wantage's character had never yet been read. There +were those who averred he was never doing anything but acting, not in +the most intimate moments of his life; some called him a keen +moneymaker, retaining the mummer's pose off the stage for the mere +effect of it on the press and the public. What the man's really honest, +unrehearsed thoughts were,--or if he ever had such--no man could say. To +many earnest students of life this puzzle had presented itself. It +began to present itself, now, to Orson Vane. + +This, surely, was a secret worth the reading. Here were, so to say, two +masks to lift at once. This man, Arthur Wantage, who came out before the +curtain now as this, now as that, character of fancy or history, what +shred of vital, individual personality had he retained through all these +changings? The enthusiasm of discovery, of adventure came upon Vane with +a sharpness that he had not felt since the day he had mocked the +futility of human science because it could not unlock other men's +brains. + +The horseshoe-shaped space that held the audience glittered with babble +and beauty as Orson Vane took his seat in the stalls. The presence of +the smart set gave the theatre a very garland of charm, of grace, and of +beauty's bud and blossom. The stalls were radiant, and full of polite +chatter. The boxes wore an air of dignified twilight,--a twilight of +goddesses. The least garish of the goddesses, yet the one holding the +subtlest sway, was Jeanette Vanlief. She sat, in the shadow of an upper +box, with her father and Luke Moncreith. On her pale face the veins +showed, now and then; the flush of rose came to it like a surprise--like +the birth of a new world. She radiated no obvious, blatant fascination. +Her hands slim and white; her voice firm and low; her eyes of a hue like +that of bronze, streaked like the tiger-lilies; her profile sharp as a +cameo's; the nose, with its finely-chiseled nostrils, curved in Roman +mode; the mouth, thin and of the faintest possible red, slightly +drooping. And then, her hair! It held, again, a spray of lilies of the +valley; the artificial lights discovered in the waves and the curls of +it the most unexpected shades, the most mercurial tints. The slight +touch of melancholy that hovered over her merely enhanced her charm. +Moncreith told himself that he would go to the uttermost ends of evil to +win this woman. He had come, the afternoon of that day, through the most +dangerous stream in the world, the stream of loveliness that flows over +certain portions of the town at certain fashionable hours. It is a +stream the eddies of which are of lace and silk; its pools are the blue +of eye and the rose of mouth; its cataracts are skirts that swirl and +whisper and sing of ivory outlines and velvet shadows. Yet, as he looked +at Jeannette Vanlief, all that fascinating, dangerous stream lost its +enticement for him; he saw her as a dream too high for comparison with +the mere earthiness of the town. He felt, with a grim resolution, that +nothing human should come between him and Jeannette. + +Orson Vane, from his chair, paid scant attention to his fellow +spectators. He was intent upon the dish that O'Deigh and Wantage had +prepared for his delectation. He felt a delicious interest in every +line, every situation. He had made up his mind that he would go to the +root of the mystery that men called Arthur Wantage. Whether that mask +concealed a real, high intelligence, or a mere, cunning, monkeylike +facility in imitation--his was to be the solution of that question. +Wrapped up in that thought he never so much as glanced toward the box +where his friends sat. + +At the end of the first act Vane strolled out into the lobby. He nodded +hither and thither, but he felt no desire for nearer converse. A hand on +his shoulder brought him face to face with Professor Vanlief. He was +asked to come up to the box. He listened, gravely, to the Professor's +words, and thanked him. So Moncreith was smitten? He smiled in a kindly +way; he understood, now, the many brusqueries of his friend. That day, +long ago, when he had been so inexplicable in the little bookshop; the +many other occasions, since then, when Luke had been rude and bitter. A +man in love was never to be reckoned on. He wished Luke all the luck in +the world. It struck him but faintly that he himself had once longed for +that sweet daughter of Augustus Vanlief's; he told himself that it was a +dream he must put away. He was a mariner bent on many deep-sea voyages +and many hazards of fate; it would be unfair to ask any woman to share +in any such life. His life would be devoted to furthering the +Professor's discoveries; he meant to be an adventurer into the regions +of the human soul; it was a land whither none could follow. + +Perhaps, if he had seen Jeannette, he might have felt no such +resignation. His mood was so tense in its devotion to the puzzle +presented by the player, Wantage, that the news brought him by Vanlief +did not suffice to rouse him. He had a field of his own; that other one +he was content to leave to Moncreith. + +Moncreith, in the meanwhile, was making the most of the opportunity the +Professor, in the kindness of his heart, had given him. The orchestra +was playing a Puccini potpourri. It rose feebly against the prattle and +the chatter and the hissing of the human voices. Moncreith, at first, +found only the most obvious words. + +"A trifle bitter, the play," he said, "rather like a sneer, don't you +think?" + +"Well," granted Jeannette, indolently, "I suppose it is not called +'Voltaire' for nothing. And there are moods that such a play might +suit." + +"No doubt. But--do you think one can be bitter, when one loves?" + +The girl looked up in wonder. She blushed. The melancholy did not leave +her face. "Bitter? Love?" she echoed. "They spell the same thing." + +"Oh," he urged, "the play has made you morbid. As for me, I have heard +nothing, seen nothing, but you. The bitterness of the play has skimmed +by me, that is all; I have been in too sweet a dream to let those people +on the stage--" + +"How Wantage would rage if he heard you," said the girl. She felt what +was coming, and she meant to fence as well as she could to avoid it. + +"Wantage? Bother Wantage!" He leaned down to her, and whispered, +"Jeannette!" + +The flush on her cheek deepened, but she did not stir. It was as if she +had not heard. She shut her eyes. All her weapons dropped at once. She +knew it had to come; she knew, too, that, in this crisis, her heart +stood plainly legible to her. Moncreith's name was not there. + +"Jeannette," Moncreith went on, in his vibrant whisper, "don't you guess +what dream I have been living in for so long? Don't you know that it is +you, you, you--" He faltered, his emotions outstriding his words. "It is +you," he finished, "that spell happiness for me. I--oh, is there no +other, less crude way of putting it?--I love you, Jeannette! And you?" + +He waited. The chattering and light laughter in the stalls and +throughout the house seemed to lull into a mere hushed murmur, like the +fluttering and twittering of a thousand birds. Moncreith, in his tense +expectation, had heed only for the face of the girl beside him. He did +not see, in the aisle below, Orson Vane, sauntering to his seat. He did +not follow the direction of Jeannette Vanlief's eyes, the instant before +she turned, and answered. + +"I wish you had not spoken. I can't say anything--anything that you +would like. Please, please--" She shook her head, in evident distress. + +"Ah," he burst out, "then it is true, after all, what I have feared. It +is true that you prefer that--that--" + +She stayed him with a quick look. + +"I did not say I preferred anyone. I simply said that you must consider +the question closed. I am sorry, oh, so sorry. I wish a man and a woman +could ever be friends, in this world, without risking either love or +hate." + +"All the same," he muttered, fiercely, "I believe you prefer that +fellow--" + +"Orson Vane's downstairs," said the Professor entering the box at that +moment. + +"That damned chameleon!" So Moncreith closed, under his breath, his just +interrupted speech. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV. + + +A little before the end of that performance of "Voltaire," Orson Vane +made his way to Arthur Wantage's dressing-room. They had, in their +character of men in some position of eminence in different phases of the +town's life, a slight acquaintance. They met, now and then, at the +Mummers' Club. Vane's position put him above possibility of affront by +Wantage in even the most arrogant and mannerless of the latter's moods. + +Vane's invitation to a little supper, a little chat, and a little smoke, +just for the duet of them, brought forth Wantage's most winning smile of +acquiescence. + +"Delighted, dear chap," he vowed. He could be, when he chose, the most +winning of mortals. He was, during the drive to Vane's house, an +admirable companion. He told stories, he made polite rejoinders, he was +all glitter and graciousness. But it was when he was seated to an +appetizing little supper that he became most splendid. + +"My dear Vane," he said, lifting a glass to the light, "you should write +me a play. I am sure you could do it. These fellows who are in the mere +business of it,--well, they are really impossible. They are so vulgar, +so dreadful to do business with. I hate business, I am a child in such +affairs; everyone cheats me. I mean to have none but gentlemen on my +business staff next season. The others grate on me, Vane, they grate. +And if I could only gather a company of actors who were also +gentlemen--Oh, I assure you, one cannot believe what things I endure. +The stupidity of actors!" He pronounced the word as if it were accented +on the last syllable. He raised his eyes to heaven as he faltered in +description of the stupidities he had to contend with. + +"Write a play?" said Orson, "I fear that would be out of my line. I +merely live, you know; I do not describe." + +"Oh, I think you would be just the man. You would give me a play that +society would like. You would make no mistakes of taste. And think, my +dear fellow, just think of the prestige my performance would give you. +It would be the making of you. You would be launched. You would need no +other recommendation. When you approach any of these manager fellows all +you have to do is to say, 'Wantage is doing a play of mine.' That is a +hallmark; it means success for a young man." + +"Perhaps. But I have no ambitions in that way. How do you like my +Bonnheimer?" + +"H'm--not bad, Vane, not bad. But you should taste my St. Innesse. It is +a '74. I got it from the cellars of the Duke of Arran. You know Merrill, +the wine-merchant on Broadway? Shrewd fellow! Always keeps me in mind; +whenever he sees a sale of a good cellar on the other side, he puts in a +bid; knows he can always depend on Wantage taking the bouquet of it off +his hands. You must take dinner with me some night, and try that St. +Innesse. Ex-President Richards told me, the other evening, that it was +the mellowest vintage he had tasted in years. You know Richards? Oh, you +should, you should!" + +Vane listened, quietly amused. The vanity, the egoism of this player +were so obvious, so transparent, so blatant. He wondered, more than +ever, what was under that mask of arrogance and conceit. The perfect +frankness of the conceit made it almost admirable. + +"You know," Wantage remarked presently, "I'm really playing truant, +taking supper with you. I ought to be studying." + +"A new play?" + +"No. My curtain speech for to-morrow night. It's the last night of the +season, and they expect it of me, you know. I've vowed, time and again, +I would never make another curtain-speech in my life, but they will have +them, they will have them!" He sighed, in submission to his fate. Then +he returned to a previous thought. "I wish, though," he said, "that I +could persuade you to do a play for me. Think it over! Think of the name +it would give you. Or you might try managing me. Eh, how does that +strike you? Such a relief to me if I could deal with a gentleman. You +have no idea--the cads there are in the theatre! They resent my being a +man who tries to prove a little better educated than themselves. They +hate me because I am college-bred, you know; they prefer actors who +never read. How many books do you think I read before I attempted +_Voltaire_? A little library, I tell you. And then the days I spent in +noting the portraits! I traveled France in my search. For the actor who +takes historic characters there cannot be too many documents. +Imagination alone is not enough. And then the labor of making the play +presentable; I wish you could see the thing as it first came to me! You +would think a man like O'Deigh would have taken into consideration the +actor? But no; the play, as O'Deigh left it, might have been for a stock +company. _Frederick the Great_ was as fine a part as my own. Oh, they +are numbskulls. And the rehearsals! Actors are sheep, simply sheep. The +papers say I am a brute at rehearsals. My dear Vane, I swear to you that +if Nero were in my place he would massacre all the minor actors in the +land. And they expect the salaries of intelligent persons!" + +Vane, listening, wondered why Wantage, under such an avalanche of +irritations, continued such life. Gradually it dawned on him that all +this fume and fret was merely part of the man's mummery; it was his +appeal to the sympathy of his audience; his argument against the +reputation his occasional exhibitions of rage and waywardness had given +him. + +Vane's desire to penetrate the surface of this conscious imitator, this +fellow who slipped off this character to assume that, grew keener and +keener. Where, under all this crust of alien form and action, was the +individual, human thought and feeling? Or was there any left? Had the +constant corrosion of simulated emotions burnt out all the original +character of the mind? + +Vane could not sufficiently hasten the end for which he had invited +Wantage. + +"You are," he said presently, as a lull in the other's monologue allowed +him an opening, "something of an amateur of tapestry, of pictures, of +bijouterie. I have a little thing or two, in my dressing-room, that I +wish you would give me an opinion on." + +They took their cigarettes into the adjoining dressing-room. Wantage +went, at once, to the mirrors. + +"Ah, Florence, I see." He frowned, in critical judgment; he went humming +about the room, singing little German phrases to the pictures, snatches +of chansonettes to the tapestries. He was very enjoyable as a spectacle, +Vane told himself. He tiptoed over the room, now in the mode of his +earliest success, "The King of Dandies," now in the half limping style +of his "Rigoletto." + +"You should have seen the Flemish things I had!" he declared. That was +his usual way of noting the belongings of others; they reminded him of +his own superior specimens. "I sold them for a song, at auction. Don't +you think one tires of one's surroundings, after a time? People go to +the hills and the seashore, because they tire of town. I have the same +feeling about pictures, and furniture, and bric-a-brac. After a time, +they tire me. I have to get rid of them. I sell them at auction. People +are always glad to bid for something that has belonged to Arthur +Wantage. But everything goes for a song. Oh, it is ruinous, ruinous." He +peered, and pirouetted about the corners. "Ah," he exclaimed, "and here +is something covered up! A portrait? Something rare?" He posed in front +of it, affecting the most devouring curiosity. + +"A sort of portrait," said Vane, touching the cord at back of the +mirror. + +"Ah," said Wantage, gazing, "you are right. A sort of portrait." And he +laughed, feebly, feebly. "That Bonnheimer," he muttered, "a deuce of a +wine!" He clutched at a chair, reeling into it. + +Vane, passing to the mirror's face, took what image it turned to him, +and then, leisurely, replaced the curtain. + +He surveyed the figure in the chair for a moment or so. Then he called +Nevins. "Nevins," he said, "where the devil are you? Never where you're +wanted. What does one pay servants outrageous wages for! They conspire +to cheat one, they all do. Nevins!" Nevins appeared, wide-eyed at this +outburst. He was prepared for many queer exhibitions on the part of his +master, but this--this, to a faithful servant! He stood silent, +expectant, reproachful. + +"Nevins," his master commanded, "have this--this actor put to bed. Use +the library; make the two couches serve. He'll stay here for twenty-four +hours; you understand, twenty-four hours. You will take care of him. The +wine was badly corked, to-night, Nevins. You grow worse every day. You +are in league to drive me distracted. It is an outrage. Why do you stand +there, and shake, in that absurd fashion? It makes me quite nervous. Do +go away, Nevins, go away!" + + + + +CHAPTER XV. + + +The papers of that period are all agreed that the eminent actor, Arthur +Wantage, was never seen to more advantage than on the last night of that +particular season. His _Voltaire_ had never been a more brilliant +impersonation. The irony, the cruelty of the character had rarely come +out more effectively; the ingenuity of the dialogue was displayed at its +best. + +Yet, as a matter of fact, Arthur Wantage, all that day and evening, was +in Orson Vane's house, subject to a curious mental and spiritual aphasia +that afterwards became a puzzle to many famous physicians. + +The _Voltaire_ was Orson Vane. + +It was the final triumph of Professor Vanlief's thaumaturgy. Vane was +now in possession of the entire mental vitality sufficient for playing +the part of the evening; the lines, the every pose, came to him +spontaneously, as if he were machinery moving at another's guidance. The +detail of entering the theatre unobserved had been easy; it was dusk and +he was muffled to the eyes. Afterwards, it was merely a matter of +pigment and paints. His fingers found the use of the colors and powders +as easily as his mind held the words to be spoken. There was not a +soul, in the company, in the audience, that did not not find the +_Voltaire_ of that night the _Voltaire_ of the entire season. + +Above the mere current of his speeches and his displayed emotions Orson +Vane found a tide of exaltation bearing him on to a triumphant feeling +of contempt for his audience. These sheep, these herdlings, these +creatures of the fashion, how fine it was to fling into their faces the +bitter taunts of a _Voltaire_, to see them take them smilingly, +indulgently. They paid him his price, and he hated them for it. He felt +that they did not really understand the half of the play's delicate +finesse; he felt their appreciation was a sham, a pose, a bit of mummery +even more contemptible than his own, since they paid to pose, while he, +at least, had the satisfaction of their money. + +The curtain-fall found him aglow with the splendor of his success. The +two personalties in him joined in a fever of triumph. He, Orson Vane, +had been _Voltaire_; he would yet be all the other geniuses of history. +He would prove himself the greatest of them all, since he could simulate +them all. A certain vein of petty cunning ran under the major emotion; +Orson Vane laughed to think how he had despoiled Arthur Wantage of his +very temperament, his art, his spirit. This same cunning admonished, +too, the prompt return of Wantage's person, after the night was over, to +the Wantage residence. + +The commotion "in front" brought Orson to a sense of the immediate +moment. The cries for a speech came over a crackling of hand-claps. He +waited for several minutes. It was not well to be too complaisant with +one's public. Then he gave the signal to the man at the curtain, and +moved past him, to the narrow space behind the lights. He bowed. It had +the very air of irony, had that bow. It does not seem humanly possible +to express irony in a curving in the spine, a declension of the head, a +certain pose of the hands, but Vane succeeded, just as Wantage had so +often succeeded, in giving that impression. The bow over, he turned to +withdraw. Let them wait, let them chafe I Commuters were missing the +last trains for the night? So much the better! They would not forget him +so easily. + +When he finally condescended to stride before the curtain again, it was +a lift of the eyebrows, a little gesture, an air that said, quite +plainly: Really, it is very annoying of you. If I were not very gracious +indeed I should refuse to come out again. I do so, I assure you, under +protest. + +He gave a little, delicate cough, he lifted his eyes. At that the house +became still, utterly still. + +He began without any vocative at all. + +"The actor," he said, "who wins the applause of so distinguished a +company is exceedingly fortunate. The applause of such a very +distinguished company--" he succeeded in emphasizing his phrase to the +point where it became a subtle insult--"is very sweet to the actor. It +reconciles him to what he must take to be a breach of true art, the +introduction of his own person on the scene where he has appeared as an +impersonator of character. Some actors are expected to make speeches +after their exertions should be over. I am one of those poor actors. In +the name of myself, a poor actor, and the poor actors in my company, I +must thank this distinguished body of ladies and gentlemen for the +patience with which they have listened to Mr. O'Deigh's little trifle. +It is, of course, merely a trifle, _pour passer le temps_. Next season, +I hope, I may give you a really serious production. Mr. O'Deigh cables +me that he is happy such distinguished persons in such a critical town +have applauded his little effort. I am sure ever so many of you would +rather be at home than listening to the apologies of a poor actor. For I +feel I must apologize for presenting so inconsiderable a trifle. A mere +summer night's amusement. I have played it as a sort of rest for myself, +as preparation for larger productions. If I have amused you, I am +pleased. The actors' province is to please. The poor actor thanks you." + +He bowed, and the bewildered company who had heard him to the end, +clapped their hands a little. The newspaper men smiled at one another; +they had been there before. The old question of "Why does he do it?" no +longer stirred in them. They were used to Wantage's vagaries. + +The newspapers of the following day had Wantage's speech in full. The +critics wrote editorials on the necessity for curbing this player's +arrogance. The public was astonished to find that it had been insulted, +but it took the press' word for it. Wantage had made that sort of thing +the convention; it was the fashion to call these curtain speeches an +insult, yet to invoke them as eagerly as possible. The widespread +advertising that accrued to Wantage from this episode enabled his +manager to obtain, in his bookings for the following season, an even +higher percentage than usual. To that extent Orson Vane's imitation of +an imitator benefited his subject. In other respects it left Wantage a +mere walking automaton. + +It was fortunate that the closing time for Wantage's theatre was now on. +There was no hitch in Vane's plan of transporting Wantage to his home +quarters; the servants at the Wantage establishment found nothing +unusual in their master having been away for a day and a night; he was +too frequently in the habit, when his house displeased him in some +detail, to stay at hotels for weeks and months at a time; his household +was ready for any vagary. Indisposition was nothing new with him, +either; in reality and affectation these lapses from well-being were not +infrequent with the great player. The doctor told him he needed +rest--rest and sea-air; there was nothing to worry over; he had been +working too hard, that was all. + +So the shell of what had been Wantage proceeded to a watering-place, +while the kernel, now a part of Orson Vane, proceeded to astonish the +town with its doings and sayings. + +Practice had now enabled Vane to control, with a certain amount of +consciousness, whatsoever alien spirit he took to himself. Vigorous and +alert as was the mumming temperament he was now in possession of, he yet +contrived to exert a species of dominance over it; he submitted to it in +the mode, the expression of his character, yet in the main-spring of his +action he had it in subjection. He had reached, too, a plane from which +he was able, more than on any of the other occasions, to enjoy the +masquerade he knew himself taking part in. He realized, with a +contemptuous irony, that he was playing the part of one who played many +parts. The actor in him seemed, intellectually, merely a personified +palimpsest; the mind was receptive, ready to echo all it heard, keen to +reproduce traits and tricks of other characters. + +He held in himself, to be brief, a mirror that reflected whatever +crossed its face; the base of that mirror itself was as characterless, +as colorless, as the mere metal and glass. Superficialities were caught +with a skill that was astonishing; little tricks of manner and speech +were reproduced to the very dot upon the i; yet, under all the raiment +of other men's merely material attributes, there was no change of soul +at all; no transformation touched the little ego-screaming soul of the +actor. + +The superficial, in the meanwhile, was enough to make the town gossip +not a little about the newest diversions of Orson Vane. He talked, now, +of nothing but the theatre and the arts allied to it. He purposed doing +some little comedies at Newport in the course of the summer that was now +beginning. He eyed all the smart women of his acquaintance with an air +that implied either, "I wonder whether you could be cast for a girl I +must make love to," or, "You would be passable in _Prince Hal_ attire." +At home, to his servants, Vane was abominable. When the dreadful +champagne, that some impulse possessed him to buy of a Broadway +swindler, proved as flat as the Gowanus, his language to Nevins was +quite contemptible. "What," he shrieked, "do I pay you for? Tell me +that! This splendid wine spoiled, spoiled, utterly unfit for a gentleman +to drink, and all by your negligence. It is enough to turn one's mind. +It is an outrage. A splendid wine. And now--look at it!" As a conclusion +he threw the stuff in Nevins' face. Nevins made no answer at all. He +wiped the sour mess from his coat with the same air of apology that he +would have used had he spilt a glass himself. But his emotions were none +the less. They caused him, in the privacy of the servants' quarters, to +do what he had not done in years, to drop his h's. "It's the 'ost's +place," said Nevins, mournfully, "to entertain his guests, and not +bully the butler." Which, as a maxim, was valid enough, save that, in +this special case, the guests had come to look upon Vane's treatment of +the servants as part of the entertainment a dinner with him would +provide. + +Another distress that fell to the lot of poor Nevins was the fact that +his master was become averse to the paying of bills. The profanity fell +upon Nevins from both the duns and the dunned. + +"The man from Basser's, Mr. Vane, sir," Nevins would announce, timidly. +"Can't get him to go away at all, sir." + +"Basser's, Basser's? Oh--that tailor fellow. An impudent creature, to +plague me so, when I do him the honor of wearing his coats; they fit +very badly, but I put up with that because I want to help the fellow on. +And what is my reward? He pesters me, pesters me. Tell him--tell him +anything, Nevins. Only do leave me alone; I am very busy, very nervous. +I am going to write a comedy for myself. I have some water-colors to +paint for Mrs. Carlos; I have a ride in the Park, and ever so many other +things to do to-day, and you bother me with pestiferous tailors. Nevins, +you are, you are--" + +But Nevins quietly bowed himself out before he learned what new thing he +was in his master's eyes. + +A malady--for it surely is no less than a malady--for attempting cutting +speeches at any time and place possessed Vane. Shortsightedness was +another quality now obvious in him. He knew you to-day, to-morrow he +looked at you with the most unseeing eyes. His voice was the most +prominent organ in whatever room or club he happened to be; when he +spoke none else could be intelligible. When he knew himself observed, +though alone, he hummed little snatches to himself. His gait took on a +mincing step. There was not a moment, not a pose of his that had not its +forethought, its deliberation, its premeditated effect. + +The gradual increase in the publicity that was part of the penalty of +being in the smart world had made approachment between the stage and +society easier than ever before. Orson Vane's bias toward the theatre +did not displease the modish. Rumors as to this and that heroine of a +romantic divorce having theatric intentions became frequent. The gowns +of actresses were copied by the smart quite as much as the smart set's +gowns were copied by actresses. The intellectual factor had never been +very prominent in the social attitude toward the stage; it was now +frankly admitted that good-looking men and handsome dresses were as much +as one went to the theatre for. Theatrical people had a wonderful claim +upon the printer's ink of the continent; society was not averse to +borrowing as much of that claim as was possible. Compliments were +exchanged with amiable frequence; smart people married stage favorites, +and the stage looked to the smart for its recruits. + +Orson Vane could not have shown his devotion to the mummeries of the +stage at a better time. He gained, rather than lost, prestige. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI. + + +It was the fashionable bathing hour at the most exclusive summer resort +on the Atlantic coast. The sand in front of the Surf Club was dotted +with gaudy tents and umbrellas. Persons whom not to know was to be +unknowable were picturesquely distributed about the club verandahs in +wicker chairs and lounges. The eye of an artist would have been +distracted by the beauties that were suggested in the half-lifted skirts +of this beauty, and revealed in the bathing-suit of that one. The little +waves that came politely rippling up the slope of sand seemed to know +what was expected of them; they were in nowise rude. They may have +longed to ruffle this or that bit of feminine frippery, but they +refrained. They may have ached to drown out Orson Vane's voice as he +said "good morning" to everybody in and out of the water; but they +permitted themselves no such luxury. + +Orson Vane was a beautiful picture as he entered the water. His suit was +immaculate; a belt prevented the least wrinkle in his jersey; a rakish +sombrero gave his head a sort of halo. He poised a cigarette in one +hand, keeping himself afloat with the other. He bowed obsequiously to +all the pretty women; he invited all the rich ones to tea and toast--"We +always have a little tea and toast at my cottage on Sundays, you know; +you'll meet only nice-looking people, really; we have a jolly time." +Most of the men he was unable to see; the sunlight on the water did make +such a glare. + +On the raft Orson Vane found the only Mrs. Carlos. + +"If it were not for you, Mrs. Carlos," he assured her, "the ocean would +be quite unfashionable." + +Mrs. Carlos smiled amiably. Speeches of that sort were part of the +tribute the world was expected to pay her. She asked him if the yachts +in the harbor were not too pretty for anything. + +"No," said Vane, "no. Most melancholy sight. Bring up the wickedness of +man, whenever I look at them. I bought a yacht you know, early in the +summer. Liked her looks, made an offer, bought her. A swindle, Mrs. +Carlos, an utter swindle. A disgraceful hulk. And now I can't sell her. +And my cook is a rascal. Oh--don't mention yachts! And my private car, +Mrs. Carlos, you cannot imagine the trials I endure over that! The +railroads overcharge me, and the mob comes pottering about with those +beastly cameras. Really, you know, I am thinking of living abroad. The +theatre is better supported in Europe. I am thinking of devoting my life +to the theatre altogether. It is the one true passion. It shows people +how life should be lived; it is at once a school of morals and +comportment." He peered into the water near the raft. Then he plunged +prettily into the sea. "I see that dear little Imogene," he told Mrs. +Carlos, as he swam off. Imogene was the little heiress of the house of +Carlos; a mere schoolgirl. It was one of Vane's most deliberate appeals +for public admiration, this worship of the society of children. He +gamboled with all the tots and blossoms he could find. He knew them all +by name; they dispelled his shortsightedness marvelously. + +After a proper interval Vane appeared, in the coolest of flannels, on +the verandah of the Club. He bowed to all the women, whether he knew +them or not; he peered under the largest picture hats with an air that +said "What sweet creature is hidden here?" as plainly as words. + +Someone asked him why he had not been to the Casino the night before. + +"Oh," he sighed, "I was fearfully busy." + +"Busy?" The word came in a tone of reproach. A suspicion of any sort of +toil will brand one more hopelessly in the smart set of America than in +any other; one may pretend an occupation but one may not profess it in +actuality. + +"Oh, terribly busy," said Vane. "I am writing a comedy. I have decided +that we must make authorship smarter than it has been. I shall sacrifice +myself in that attempt. You've noticed that not one writing-chap in a +million knows anything about our little world except what is not true? +Yes; it's unmistakable. An entirely false impression of us is given to +the world at large. The real picture of us must come from one of +ourselves." + +"And you will try it?" + +"Yes. I shall do my very best. When it is finished I want you all to +play parts in it. We must do something for the arts, you know. Why not +the arts, as well as tailors and milliners? By the way, I want you all +to come to my little lantern-dance to-night, on the _Beaurivage_. It is +something quite novel. You must all come disguised as flowers. There +will be no lights but Chinese lanterns. I shall have launches ready for +you at the Casino landing. My cook is quite sober to-day, and the yacht +is as presentable as if she were not an arrant fraud. I mean to have a +dance that shall fit the history of society in America. For that reason +the newspapers must know nothing about it. There can be no history where +there are newspapers. I shall invite nobody who knows how to write; I am +the only one whose taste I can trust. Some people write to live, and +some live to write, and the worst class of all are merely dying to +write. They are all barred to-night. We must try and break all the +conventions. Conventions are like the strolling players: made to be +broke." + +He rattled on in this way, with painful efforts at brilliance, for quite +a time. His hearers really considered it brilliance and listened +patiently. Summer was not their season for intellectual exertion; it +might be a virtue in others, in themselves it would have been a mistake. + +The lantern-dance on Orson Vane's _Beaurivage_ was, as everyone will +remember, an event of exceeding picturesqueness. Mrs. Sclatersby +appeared as a carnation; Mrs. Carlos as a rose. Some of the younger and +divinely figured women appeared as various blossoms that necessitated +imitation of part of Rosalind's costume under the trees. The slender, +tapering stem of one white lily, fragrant and delicious, lingered long +in the memories of the men who were there. + +A sensation was caused by the arrival of Mrs. Barrett Weston. She came +in a scow, seated on her automobile. A shriek of delight from the +company greeted her. The weary minds of the elect were really tickled by +this conceit. The automobile was arranged to imitate a crysanthemum. +Just before she alighted Mrs. Barrett Weston touched a hidden lever and +the automobile began to grind out a rag-time tune. + +A stranger, approaching the _Beaurivage_ at that moment, might have +fancied himself in the politest ward of the most insane of asylums. But +Orson Vane found it all most delightful. It was the affair of the +season. + +"Look," he cried, in the midst of a game of leapfrog in which a number +of the younger guests had plunged with desperate glee, "there is the +moon. How pitably weak she seems, against this brilliance here! It bears +out the theory that art is always finer than nature, and that the +theatre is more picturesque than life. Look at what we are doing, this +moment! We are imitating pleasure. And will you show me any unconscious +pleasure that is so delightful as this?" + +By the time people had begun to feel a polite hunger Vane had completed +his scheme of having several unwieldy barges brought alongside the +_Beaurivage_. There were two of the clumsy but roomy decks on either +side of the slender, shapely yacht. Over this now quite wide space the +tables were arranged. While the supper went on, Orson Vane did a little +monologue of his own. Nobody paid any attention, but everyone applauded. + +"What a scene for a comedy," he explained, proudly surveying the picture +of the gaiety before him, "what a delicious scene! It is almost real. I +must write a play around it. I have quite made up my mind to devote my +life to the theatre. It is the only real life. It touches the emotions +at all points; it is not isolated in one narrow field of personality. +Have I your permission to put you all in my play? How sweet of you! I +shall have a scene where we all race in automobiles. We will be quite +like dear little children who have their donkey-races. But I think +automobiles are so much more intelligent than donkeys, don't you? And +they have such profound voices! Have you ever noticed the intonation of +the automobiles here? That one of Mrs. Barrett Weston has a delicate +tenor; it is always singing love-songs as if it were tired of life. Then +we have bassos, and baritones, and repulsive falsettos. My automobile +has a voice like a phonograph. When it bubbles along the avenue I can +hear, as plainly as anything, that it is imitating one of the other +automobiles. Some automobiles, I suppose, have the true instinct for the +theatre. Have you noticed how theatric some of the things are, how they +contrive to run away just when everyone is looking?" + +"Just like horses," murmured one of his listeners. + +"Oh, no; I wouldn't say that. Horses have a merely natural intelligence; +it is nothing like the splendidly artificial reasoning of the +automobile. The poor horse, I really pity him! He has nothing before him +but polo. But how thankful he should be to polo. He was a broncho with +disreputable manners; now he is a polo-pony with a neat tail. In time, I +dare say, the horse can learn some of the higher civilization of the +automobile, just as society may still manage to be as intelligent as the +theatre." + +The conclusion of that entertainment marked the height of Orson Vane's +peculiar fame. The radical newspapers caught echoes of it and invented +what they could not transcribe. The young men who owned newspapers had +not been invited by Orson Vane, because, in spite of his theatric mania, +he had no illusions about the decency of metropolitan journalism. He +avowed that the theatre might be a trifle highflavored, but it had, at +the least, nothing of the hypocrisy that smothers the town in lies +to-day and reads it a sermon to-morrow. The most conspicuous of these +newspaper owners went into something like convulsions over what he +called the degeneracy of our society. Himself most lamentably in a state +of table-d'hotage, this young man trumpeted forth the most bitter +editorials against Orson Vane and his doings. He frothed with +anarchistic ravings. Finally, since the world will always listen if you +only make noise loud enough and long enough, the general public began to +believe that Vane was really a dreadful person. He was a leader in the +smart set; he stood for the entire family. His taste for the theater +would debauch all society. His egoisms would spoil what little of the +natural was left in the regions of Vanity Fair. So went the chatter of +the man-on-the-street, that mighty power, whom the most insignificant of +little men-behind-the-pen can move at will. + +One may be ever so immersed in affairs that are not of the world and its +superficial doings, yet it is almost impossible to escape some faint +echo of what the world is chattering about. Professor Vanlief, who had +betaken himself and Jeanette, for the summer, to a little place in the +mountains, was finally routed out of his peace by the rumors concerning +Orson Vane. The give and take of conversation, even at a little +farm-house in the hills, does not long leave any prominent subject +untouched. So Augustus Vanlief one morning bought all the morning +papers. + +He found more than he had wanted. The editorials against the doings of +the smart set, the reports of the sermons preached against their +goings-on, were especially pregnant that morning. + +In another part of the paper he found a line or two, however, that +brought him sharply to a sense of necessary action. The lines were +these: + + "Mr. Arthur Wantage is still seriously ill at Framley + Lodge. Unless a decided turn for the better takes place + very shortly, it is doubtful if he can undertake his + starring season at the usual time this year." + +Augustus Vanlief saw what no other mortal could have guessed. He saw the +connection between those two newspaper items, the one about Vane and the +one about Wantage. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + +Professor Vanlief lost no time in inventing an excuse for his immediate +departure. Jeannette would be well looked after. He got a few +necessaries together and started for Framley Lodge. After some delay he +obtained an interview with the distinguished patient. + +"Try," urged Vanlief, "to tell me when this illness came upon you. Was +it after your curtain-speech at the end of last season?" + +Wantage looked with blank and futile eyes. "Curtain-speech? I made +none." + +"Oh, yes. Try to remember! It made a stir, did that speech of yours. Try +to think what happened that day!" + +"I made no speech. I remember nothing. I am Wantage, I think. Wantage. I +used to act, did I not?" He laughed, feebly. It was melancholy to watch +him. He could eat and drink and sleep; he had the intelligence of an +echo. Each thought of his needed a stimulant. + +Vanlief persisted, in spite of melancholy rebuffs. There was so much at +stake. This man's whole career was at stake. And, if matters were not +mended soon, the evil would be under way; the harm would have begun. It +meant loss, actual loss now, and one could scarcely compute how much +ruin afterwards. And he, Vanlief, would be the secret agent of this +ruin! Oh, it was monstrous! Something must be done. Yet, he could do +nothing until he was sure. To meddle, without absolute certainty, would +be criminal. + +"What do you remember before you fell ill?" he repeated. + +"Oh, leave me alone!" said Wantage. "Isn't the doctor bad enough, +without you. I tell you I remember nothing. I was well, and now I am +ill. Perhaps it was something Orson Vane gave me at supper that night, I +don't remember--" + +"At supper? Vane?" The Professor leaped at the words. + +"Yes. I said so, didn't I? I had supper in his rooms, and then--" + +But Vanlief was gone. He had no time for the amenities now. His age +seemed to leave him as his purpose warmed, and his goal neared. All the +fine military bearing came out again. The people who traveled with him +that day took him for nothing less than a distinguished General. + +At the end of the day he reached Vane's town house. Nevins was all alone +there; all the other servants were on the _Beaurivage_. The man looked +worn and aged. He trembled visibly when he walked; his nerves were +gone, and he had the taint of spirits on him. + +"Mr. Vanlief, sir," he whined, "it'll be the death of me, will this +place. First he buys a yacht, sir, like I buy a 'at, if you please; and +now I'm to sell the furniture and all the antics. These antics, sir, as +the master 'as collected all over the world, sir. It goes to me 'eart." + +Vanlief, even in his desperate mood, could not keep his smile back. +"Sell the antiques, eh? Well, they'll fetch plenty, I've no doubt. But +if I were you I wouldn't hurry; Mr. Vane may change his mind, you know." + +"Ah," nodded Nevins, brightening, "that's true, sir. You're right; I'll +wait the least bit. It's never too soon to do what you don't want to, +eh, sir? And I gives you my word, as a man that's 'ad places with the +nobility, sir, that the last year's been a sad drain on me system. What +with swearing, sir, and letters I wouldn't read to my father confessor, +sir, Mr. Vane's simply not the man he was at all. Of course, if he says +to sell the furniture, out it goes! But, like as not, he'll come in here +some line day and ask where I've got all his trappings. And then I'll +show him his own letter, and he'll say he never wrote it. Oh, it's a bad +life I've led of late, sir. Never knowing when I could call my soul my +own." + +The phrase struck the Professor with a sort of chill. It was true; if +his discovery went forth upon the world, no man would, in very truth, +know when he could call his soul his own. It would be at the mercy of +every poacher. But he could not, just now, afford reflections of such +wide scope; there was a nearer, more immediate duty. + +"Nevins," he said, "I came about that mirror of mine." + +"Yes, sir. I'm glad of that, sir; uncommon glad. You'll betaking it +away, sir? It's bad luck I've 'ad since that bit of plate come in the +house." + +"You're right. I mean to take it away. But only for a time. Seeing Mr. +Vane's thinking of selling up, perhaps it's just as well if I have this +out of the way for a time, eh? Might avoid any confusion. I set store by +that mirror, Nevins; I'd not like it sold by mistake." + +"Well, sir, if you sets more store by it than the master, I'd like to +see it done, sir. The master's made me life a burden about that there +glass. I've 'ad to watch it like a cat watches a mouse. I don't know now +whether I'd rightly let you take it or not." He scratched his head, and +looked in some quandary. + +"Nonsense, Nevins. You know it's mine as well as you know your own name. +Didn't you fetch it over from my house in the first place, and didn't +you pack it and wrap it under my very eyes?" + +"True, sir; I did. My memory's a bit shaky, sir, these days. You may do +as you like with your own, I'll never dispute that. But Mr. Vane's +orders was mighty strict about the plaguey thing. I wish I may never +see it again. It's been, 'Nevins, let nobody disturb the new mirror!' +and 'Nevins, did anyone touch the new mirror while I was gone?' and +'Nevins, was the window open near the new mirror?' until I fair feel +sick at the sight of it." + +"No doubt," said the professor, impatiently. "Then you'll oblige me by +wrapping it up for shipping purposes as soon as ever you can. I'm going +to take it away with me at once. I suppose there's no chance of Mr. Vane +dropping in here before I bring the glass back, but, if he does, tell +him you acted under my orders." + +"A good riddance," muttered Nevins, losing no time over his task of +covering and securing the mirror. "I'll pray it never comes this way +again," he remarked. + +The professor, after seeing that all danger of injury to the mirror's +exposed parts was over, walked nervously up and down the rooms. He would +have to carry his plan through with force of arms, with sheer +impertinence and energy of purpose. It was an interference in two lives +that he had in view. Had he any right to that? But was he not, after +all, to blame for the fact of the curious transfusion of soul that had +left one man a mental wreck, and stimulated the other's forces to a +course of life out of all character with the strivings of his real soul? +If he had not tempted Orson Vane to these experiments, Arthur Wantage +would never be drooping in the shadow of collapse, and in danger of +losing his proper place in the roll of prosperity. Vanlief shuddered at +thought of what an unscrupulous man might not do with this discovery of +his; what lives might be ruined, what successes built on fraud and +theft? Fraud and theft? Those words were foul enough in the material +things of life; but how much more horrid would they be when they covered +the spiritual realm. To steal a purse, in the old dramatic phrase, was a +petty thing; but to steal a soul--Professor Vanlief found himself +launched into a whirlpool of doubt and confusion. + +He had opened a new, vast region of mental science. He had enabled one +man to pass the wall with which nature had hedged the unforeseen forces +of humanity. Was he to learn that, in opening this new avenue of psychic +activity, he had gone counter to the eternal Scheme of Things, and let +in no divine light, but rather the fierce glare of diabolism? + +His thoughts traversed argument upon argument while Nevins completed his +work. He heard the man's voice, finally, with an actual relief, a +gladness at being recalled to the daring and doing that lay before him. + +When the Professor was gone, a wagon bearing away the precious mirror, +Nevins poured himself out a notably stiff glass of Five-Star. + +"Here's hoping," he toasted the silent room, "the silly thing gets +smashed into everlasting smithereens!" + +And he drowned any fears he might have had to the contrary. This +particular species of time-killing was now a daily matter with Nevins; +the incessant strain upon his nerves of some months past had finally +brought him to the pitch where he had only one haven of refuge left. + +The Professor sped over the miles to Framley Lodge. He took little +thought about meals or sleep. The excitement was marking him deeply; but +he paid no heed to, or was unaware of, that. Arrived at the Lodge a +campaign of bribery and corruption began. Servant after servant had to +be suborned. Nothing but the well-known fame and name of Augustus +Vanlief enabled him, even with his desperate expenditures of tips, to +avert the suspicion that he had some deadly, some covertly inimical end +in view. One does not, at this age of the world, burst into another +man's house and order that man's servants about, without coming under +suspicion, to put it mildly. Fortunately Vanlief encountered, just as +his plot seemed shattering against the rigor of the household +arrangements, the doctor who was in attendance on Wantage. The man +happened to be on the staff of the University where Vanlief held a +chair. He held the older man in the greatest respect; he listened to his +rapid talk with all the patience in the world. He looked astonished, +even uncomprehending, but he shook his shoulders up and down a few times +with complaisance. "There seems no possible harm," he assented. + +"Don't ask me to believe in the curative possibilities, Professor; +but--there can be no harm, that I see. He is not to be unduly excited. A +mirror, you say? You don't think vanity can send a man from illness to +health, do you? Not even an actor can be as vain as that, surely. +However, I shall tell the attendants to see that the thing is done as +quietly as possible. I trust you, you see, to let nothing detrimental +happen. I have to get over to the Port of Pines. I shall give the +orders. Goodbye. I wish I could see the result of your little--h'm, +notion--but I dare say to-morrow will be soon enough." + +And he smiled the somewhat condescending smile of the successful +practitioner who fancies he is addressing a campaigner whose usefulness +is passing. + +The setting up of the professor's mirror, so as to face Wantage's +sickbed, took no little time, no little care, no little exertion. When +it was in place, the professor tiptoed to the actor's side. + +"Well," queried Wantage, "what is it? Medicine? Lord, I thought I'd +taken all there was in the world. Where is it?" + +"No," said the professor, "not medicine. I am going to ask you to look +quite hard at that curtain by the foot of the bed for a moment. I have +something I think may interest you and--" + +As the actor's eyes, in mere physical obedience to the other's +suggestion, took the desired direction, Vanlief tugged at a cord that +rolled the curtain aside, revealing the mirror, which gave Wantage back +the somewhat haggard apparition of himself. + +A few seconds went by in silence. Then Wantage frowned sharply. + +"Gad," he exclaimed, vigorously and petulantly, "what a beastly bad bit +of make-up!" + +The voice was the voice of the man whom the town had a thousand times +applauded as "The King of the Dandies." + +An exceedingly bad quarter of an hour followed for Vanlief. Wantage, now +in full possession of all his mental faculties, abused the Professor up +hill and down dale. What was he doing there? What business had that +mirror there? What good was a covered-up mirror? Where were the +servants? The doctor had given orders? The doctor was a fool. Only the +mere physical infirmity consequent upon being bedridden for so long +prevented Wantage from becoming violent in his rage. Vanlief, sharp as +was his sense of relief at the success of his venture, was yet more +relieved when his bribes finally got his mirror and himself out of the +Lodge. The incident had its humors, but he was too tired, too enervated, +to enjoy them. The very moment of Wantage's recovery of his soul had its +note of ironic comedy; the succeeding vituperation from the restored +actor; Vanlief's own meekness; the marvel and rapacity of the +servants--all these were abrim with chances for merriment. But Vanlief +found himself, for, perhaps, the first time in his life, too old to +enjoy the happy interpretations of life. Into all his rejoicings over +the outcome of this affair there crept the constant doubts, the +ceaseless questionings, as to whether he had discovered a mine of wisdom +and benefit, or a mere addition to man's chances for evil. + +His return journey, his delivery of the mirror into Nevins' unwilling +care, were accomplished by him in a species of daze. + +He had hardly counted upon the danger of his discovery. Was he still +young enough to contend with them? + +Nevins almost flung the mirror to its accustomed place. He unwrapped it +spitefully. When he left the room, the curtain of the glass was flapping +in the wind. Nevins heard the sound quite distinctly; he went to the +sideboard and poured out a brimming potion. + +"I 'opes the wind'll play the Old 'Arry with it," he smiled to himself. +He smiled often that night; he went to bed smiling. His was the cheerful +mode of intoxication. + +Augustus Vanlief reached the cottage in the hills a sheer wreck. He had +left it a hale figure of a man who had ever kept himself keyed up to the +best; now he was old, shaking, trembling in nerves and muscles. + +Jeannette rushed toward him and put her arms around him. She looked her +loving, silent wonder into his weary eyes. + +"Sleep, dear, sleep," said this old, tired man of science, "first let me +sleep." + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII. + + +Orson Vane, scintillating theatrically by the sea, was in a fine rage +when Nevins ceased to answer his telegrams. Telegrams struck Vane as the +most dramatic of epistles; there was always a certain pictorial effect +in tearing open the envelope, in imagining the hushed expectation of an +audience. A letter--pooh! A letter might be anything from a bill to a +billet. But a telegram! Those little slips of paper struck immediate +terror, or joy, or despair, or confusion; they hit hard, and swiftly. +Certainly he had been hitting Nevins hard enough of late. He had +peppered him with telegrams about the furniture, about the pictures; he +had forbidden one day what he had ordered the day before. It never +occurred to him that Nevins might seek escape from these torments. Yet +that was what Nevins had done. He had tippled himself into a condition +where he signed sweetly for each telegram and put it in the hall-rack. +They made a beautiful, yellow festoon on the mahogany background. + +"Those," Nevins told himself, "is for a gentleman as is far too busy to +notice little things like telegrams." + +Nevins watched that yellow border growing daily with fresh delight. + +He could keep on accepting telegrams just as long as the sideboard held +its strength. Each new arrival from the Western Union drove him to more +glee and more spirits--of the kind one can buy bottled. + +At last Orson Vane felt some alarm creeping through his armor of +dramatic pose. Could Nevins have come to any harm? It was very annoying, +but he would have to go to town for a day or so. That seemed +unavoidable. Just as he had made up his mind to it, he happened to slip +on a bit of lemon-peel. At once he fell into a towering rage. He cursed +the entire service on the _Beaurivage_ up hill and down dale. You could +hear him all over the harbor. It was the voice of a profane Voltaire. + +That night, at the Casino, his rage found vent in action. He sold the +_Beaurivage_ as hastily as he had bought her. + +He left for town, by morning, full of bitterness at the world's +conspiracy to cheat him. He felt that for a careless deck-hand to leave +lemon-peel on the deck of the Beaurivage was nothing less than part of +the world-wide cabal against his peace of mind. + +He reached his town-house in a towering passion, all the accumulated +ill-temper of the last few days bubbling in him. He flung the housedoor +wide, stamped through the halls. "Nevins!" he shouted, "Nevins!" + +Nothing stirred in the house. He entered room after room. Passing into +his dressing-room he almost tore the hanging from its rod. A gust of air +struck him from the wide-open window. Before he proceeded another step +this gust, that his opening of the curtain had produced, lifted the veil +from the mirror facing him. The veil swung up gently, revealed the +glass, and dropped again. + +Then he realized the figure of Nevins on a couch. He walked up to him. +The smell of spirits met him at once. + +"Poor Nevins!" he muttered. + +Then he fell to further realizations. + +The whole history of his three experiments unfolded itself before him. +What, after them all, had he gained? What, save the knowledge of the +littleness of the motives controlling those lives? This actor, this man +the world thought great, whose soul he had held in usurpation, up to a +little while ago, what was he? A very batch of vanities, a mountain of +egoisms. Had there been, in any of the thoughts, the moods he had +experienced from out the mental repertoire of that player, anything +indicative of nobility, of large benevolence, of sweet and light in the +finest human sense? Nothing, nothing. The ambition to imitate the +obvious points of human action and conduct, to the end that one be +called a character-actor; the striving for an echoed fame rightly +belonging to the supreme names of history; a yearning for the stimulus +of immediate acclamation--these things were not worth gaining. To have +experienced them was to have caught nothing beneficial. + +Orson Vane began to consider himself with contempt. Upon himself must +fall the odium of what the souls he had borrowed had induced in him. The +littleness he had fathomed, the depths of character to which he had +sunk, all left their petty brands on him. He had penetrated the barriers +of other men's minds, but what had it profited him? As a ship becalmed +in foul waters takes on barnacles, so had he brought forth, from the +realm of alien springs and motives he had made his own, a dreadful +incrustation of painful conjectures on the supremacy of evil in the +world. + +It needed only a glance at the man, Nevins, to force home the +destructiveness born of these incursions into other lives. That +trembling, cowering thing had been, before Orson Vane's departure from +the limitations of his own temperament, a decent, self-respecting +fellow. While now-- + +Vane paced about the house in bitter unrest. In the outer hall he +noticed the yellow envelopes bordering the coat-rack. He took one of +them down, opened it, and smiled. "Poor Nevins!" he murmured. The next +moment a lad from the Telegraph office appeared in the doorway. Vane +went forward himself; there was no use disturbing Nevins. + +The wire had followed him on from the _Beaurivage_, or rather from the +man to whom he had sold her. It was from Augustus Vanlief. Its brevity +was like a blow in the face. + +"Am ill," it said, "must see you." + +It was still possible, that very hour, to get an express to the +Professor's mountain retreat. There was nothing to prevent immediate +departure. Nothing--except Nevins. The man really must exercise more +care about that mirror. He was safely out of all his experiments now, +but the thing was dangerous none the less; if it had been his own +property, he would have known how to deal with it. But it was the +Professor's secret, the discovery of a lifetime. For elaborate +precautions, or even for hiding the thing in some closet, there was no +time. He could only rouse Nevins as energetically as possible to a sense +of his previous defection from duty; gently and quite kindly he +admonished him to take every care of the new mirror in the time coming. +Nevins listened to him wide-eyed; his senses were still too much agog +for him to realize whence this change of voice and manner had come to +his master. It was merely another page in the chapter of bewilderment +that piled upon him. He bowed his promise to be careful, he assented to +a number of things he could not fathom, and when Vane was gone he +cleared the momentary trouble in his mind by an ardent drink. The liquor +brought him a most humorous notion, and one that he felt sure would +relieve him of all further anxieties on the score of the new mirror. He +approached the back of it, tore the curtain from its face, wheeled it to +the centre of the room, and placed all the other cheval-glasses close +by. Throughout this he had wit enough, or fear enough--for his memory +brought him just enough picture of Orson's own handling of this mirror +to inspire a certain awe of the front of the thing--never to pass in +face of the mirror. When he had the mirrors grouped in close ranks, he +spun about on his heels quickly, as if seized with the devout frenzy of +a dervish. He fell, finally, in a daze of dizziness and liquor. Yet he +had cunning enough left. He crept out of the room on his stomach, like a +snake with fiery breath. He knew that the angle at which the mirrors +were tilted would keep him, belly to the carpet, out of range. Then he +reeled, shouting, into the corridors. + +He had accomplished his desire. He no longer knew one mirror from the +other. + +Orson Vane, in the meanwhile, was being rushed to the mountains. It was +with a new shock of shame that he saw the ravages illness was making on +the fine face of Vanlief. This, too, was one of the items in the +profit-and-loss column of his experiments. Yet this burden was, +perhaps, a shared one. + +"Ah," said Vanlief, with a quick breath of gladness, "thank God!" He +knew, the instant Vane spoke, that it was Orson Vane himself who had +come; he knew that there was no more doubt as to the success of his own +recent headlong journeyings. They had prostrated him; but--they had won. +Yet there was no knowing how far this illness might go; it was still +imperative to come to final, frank conclusions with the partner in his +secret. + +The instant that Vane had been announced Jeannette Vanlief had left her +father's side. She withdrew to the adjoining room, where only a curtain +concealed her; the doors had all been taken down for the summer. She did +not wish to meet Orson Vane. Over her real feelings for him had come a +cloud of doubts and distastes. She had never admitted to herself, +openly, that she loved him; she tried to persuade herself that his +notorious vagaries had put him beyond her pale. She was determined, now, +to be an unseen ear to what might pass between Orson and her father. It +was not a nice thing to do, but, for all she knew, her father's very +life was at stake. What dire influence might Vane not have over her +father? She suspected there was some bond between them; in her father's +weakened state it seemed her duty to watch over him with every devotion +and alertness. + +Yet, for a long time, the purport of the conversation quite eluded her. + +"I have not gone the gamut of humanity," said Orson, "but I have almost, +it seems to me, gone the gamut of my own courage." + +Vanlief nodded. He, too, understood. Consequences! Consequences! How the +consequences of this world do spoil the castles one builds in it! +Castles in the air may be as pretty as you please, but they are sure to +obstruct some other mortal's view of the sky. + +"If I were younger," sighed Vanlief, "if I were only younger." + +They did not yet, either of them, dare to be open, brutal, forthright. + +"I could declare, I suppose," Vanlief went on, "that it was somewhat +your own fault. You chose your victims badly. You have, I presume, been +disenchanted. You found little that was beautiful, many things that were +despicable. The spectacles you borrowed have all turned out smoky. Yet, +consider--there are sure to be just as many rosy spectacles as dark ones +in the world." + +"No doubt," assented Vane, though without enthusiasm, "but there are +still--the consequences. There is still the chance that I could never +repay the soul I take on loan; still the horror of being left to face +the rest of my days with a cuckoo in my brain. Mind, I have no +reproaches, none at all. You overstated nothing. I have felt, have +thought, have done as other men have felt and thought and done; their +very inner secret souls have been completely in my keeping. The +experiment has been a triumph. Yet it leaves me joyless." + +"It has made me old," said Vanlief, simply. "Ah," he repeated, "if only +I were younger!" + +"The strain," he began again, "of putting an end to your last experiment +has told on me. I overdid it. Such emotion, and such physical tension, +is more than I should have attempted. I begin to fear I may not last +very long. And in that case I think I shall have to take my secret with +me. Orson, it comes to this; I am too old to perfect this marvelous +thing to the point where it will be safe for humanity at large. It is +still unsafe,--you will agree to that. You might wreck your own life and +that of others. The chances are one in a thousand of your ever finding a +human being whom God has so graciously endowed with the divine spirit as +to be able to lose part of it without collapse. I have hoped and hoped, +that such a thing would happen; then there would be two perfectly even, +exactly tempered creatures; even if, upon that transfusion, the mirror +disappeared, there would be no unhappiness as a reproach. But we have +found nothing like that. You have embittered yourself; the glimpses of +other souls you have had have almost stripped you of your belief in an +eternal Good." + +"You mean to send for the mirror?" + +"It would be better, wiser. If I live, it will still be here. If I die, +it must be destroyed. In any event--" + +At the actual approach of this conclusion to his experiments Orson Vane +felt a sense of coming loss. With all the dangers, all the loom of +possible disaster, he was not yet rid of the awful fascination of this +soul-snatching he had been engaged in. + +"Perhaps," he argued, "my next experiment might find the one in a +thousand you spoke of." + +"I think you had better not try again. Tell me, what was Wantage's soul +like?" + +"Oh, I cannot put it into words. A little, feverish, fretful soul, +shouting, all the time: I, I, I! Plotting, planning for public +attention, worldly prominence. No thoughts save those of self. An active +brain, all bent on the ego. A brain that deliberately chose the theatre +because it seems the most spectacular avenue to eminence. A magnetism +that keeps outsiders wondering whether childishness or genius lurks +behind the mask. The bacillus of restlessness is in that brain; it is +never idle, always planning a new pose for the body and the voice." + +"Well," urged Vanlief, "think what might have been had I not put a stop +to the thing. You don't realize the terrible anxiety I was in. You might +have ruined the man's career. However petty we, you and I, may hold +him, there are things the world expects of him; we came close to +spoiling all that. I had to act, and quickly. You may fancy the +difficulties of getting the mirror to Wantage. Oh, it is still all like +an evil dream." He lay silent a while, then resumed: "Is the mirror in +the old room?" + +"Yes. With the others, in the dressing-room." + +"Nevins looks out for it?" + +"As always. Though he grows old, too." + +Vanlief looked sharply at Orson, he suspected something behind that +phrase about Nevins. Again he urged: + +"Better have Nevins bring the mirror back to me." + +Vane hesitated. He murmured a reply that Jeannette no longer cared to +hear. The whole secret was open to her, now; she saw that the Orson Vane +she loved--she exulted now in her admission of that--was still the man +she thought him, that all his inexplicable divagations had been part of +this awful juggling with the soul that her father had found the trick +of. She realized, too, by the manner of Vane, that he had not yet given +up all thought of these experiments; he wanted one more. One more; one +more; it was the cry of the drunkard, the opium-eater, the victim of +every form of mania. + +It should never be, that one more trial. What her father had done, she +could do. She glided out of the room, on the heels of her quick +resolution. + +The two men, in their arguments, their widening discussions, did not +bring her to mind for hours. By that that time she was well on her way +to town. + +Her purpose was clear to her; nothing should hinder its achievement. She +must destroy the mirror. There were sciences that were better killed at +the outset. She did not enter deeply into those phases of the question, +but she had the clear determination to prevent further mischief, further +follies on the part of Vane, further chances of her father's collapse. + +The mirror must be destroyed. That was plain and simple. + +It took a tremendous ringing and knocking to bring Nevins to the door of +Vane's house. + +"I am Miss Vanlief," she said, "I want to see my father's mirror." + +"Certainly, miss, certainly." He tottered before her, chuckling and +chattering to himself. He was in the condition now when nothing +surprised him; any rascal could have led him with a word or a hint; he +was immeasurably gay at everything in the world. He reeled to the +dressing-room with an elaborate air of courtesy. + +"At your service, miss, there you are, miss. You walk straight on, and +there you are, miss. There's the mirror, miss, plain as pudding." + +She strode past him, drawing her skirt away from the horrible taint of +his breath. She knew she would find the mirror at once, curtained and +solitary sentinel before the doorway. She would simply break it with her +parasol, stab it, viciously, from behind. + +But, once past the portal, she gave a little cry. + +All the mirrors were jumbled together, all looked alike, and all faced +her, mysterious, glaringly. + +"Nevins," she called out, "which--which is the one?" + +"Ah, miss," he said, leeringly, "don't I wish I knew." + +No sense of possible danger to herself, only a despair at failure, came +upon Jeannette. Failure! Failure! She had meant to avert disaster, and +she had accomplished--nothing, nothing at all. + +She left the house almost in tears. She felt sure Vane would yield again +to the temptation of these frightful experiments. She could do nothing, +nothing. She had felt justified in attempting destruction of what was +her father's; but she could not wantonly offer all that array of mirrors +on the altar of her purpose. She stumbled along the street, suffering, +full of tears. It was with a sigh of relief that she saw a hansom and +hailed it. The cab had hardly turned a corner before Orson Vane, coming +from another direction, let himself into his house. His conference with +Vanlief had ceased at his own promise to make just one more trial of the +mirror. He could not go about the business of the life he led in town +without assuring himself the mirror was safe. + +He found Nevins incoherent and useless. He began to consider seriously +the advisability of discharging the man; still, he hated to do that to +an old servant, and the man might come to his senses and his duties. + +He spent some little time re-arranging the mirrors in his room. He was +sure there had been no intrusion since he was there himself, and he knew +Nevins well enough to know that individual's horror of facing the +mirror. He himself faced the new mirror boldly enough, sure that his own +image was the only one resting there. He knew the mirror easily, in +spite of the robbery that the wind, as he thought, had committed. + +Nevins, hiding in the corridor, watched him, in drunken amusement. + + + + +CHAPTER XIX. + + +The sun, glittering along the avenue, shimmering on the rustling gowns +of the women and smoothing the coats of the horses, smote Orson Vane +gently; the fairness of the day flooded his soul with a tide of +well-being. In the air and on the town there seemed some subtle +radiance, some glamour of enchantment. The smell of violets was all +about him. The colors of new fashions dotted the vision like a painting +by Hassam; a haze of warmth covered the town like a kiss. + +His thoughts, keyed, in some strange, sweet way, to all the pleasant, +happy, pretty things in life, brought him the vision of Jeannette +Vanlief. How long, how far away seemed that day when she had been at his +side, when her voice had enveloped him in its silver echoes! + +As carriage after carriage passed him, he began to fancy Jeannette, in +all her roseate beauty, driving toward him. He saw the curve of her +ankle as she stepped into the carriage; he dreamed of her flower-like +attitude as she leaned to the cushions. + +Then the miracle happened; Jeannette, a little tired, a little pale, a +little more fragile than when last he had seen her, was coming toward +him. A smile, a gentle, tender, slightly sad--but yet so sweet, so +sweet!--a smile was on her lips. He took her hand and held it and looked +into her eyes, and the two souls in that instant kissed and became one. + +"This time," he said--and as he spoke all that had happened since they +had pretended, childishly, on the top of the old stage on the Avenue, +seemed to slip away, to fade, to be forgotten--"it must be a real +luncheon. You are fagged. So am I. You are like a breath of +lilies-of-the-valley. Come!" + +They took a table by an open window. The procession of the town nearly +touched them, so close was it. To them both it seemed, to-day, a happy, +joyous, fine procession. + +"Will you tell me something?" asked the girl, presently, after they had +laughed and chattered like two children for awhile. + +"Anything in the world." + +"Well, then--are you ever, ever going to face that dreadful mirror +again?" + +He smiled, as if there was nothing astonishing in her knowledge, her +question. + +"Do you want me not to?" + +She nodded. + +He put his hand across the table, on one of hers. "Jeannette," he +whispered, "I promise. Why do you care? It is not possible that you +care because, because--Jeannette, will you promise me something, too?" + +They have excellent waiters at the Mayfair. They can be absolutely blind +at times. This was such a time. The particular waiter who was serving +Vane's table, took a sudden, rapt interest in the procession on the +avenue. + +Jeanette crumbled a macaroon with her free hand. + +"You have my hand," she pouted. + +"I need it," he said. "It is a very pretty hand. And very strong. I +think it must have lifted all my ills from me to-day. I feel nothing but +kindness toward the whole world. I could kiss--the whole world." + +"Oh," said Jeannette, pulling her hand away a little, "you monster! You +are worse than Nero." + +"Do you think my kisses would be so awful, then? Or is it simply the +piggishness of me that makes you call me a monster. That's not the right +way to look at it. Think of all the dreadful people there are in the +world; think how philanthropic you must make me feel if I want to kiss +even those." + +"Ah, but the world is full of beautiful women." + +"I do not believe it," he vowed. "I do not think God had any beauty left +after he fashioned--you." + +He was not ashamed, not one iota of the grossness of that fable. He +really felt so. Indeed, all his life he never felt otherwise than that +toward Jeannette. And she took the shocking compliment quite serenely. + +"You are absurd," she said, but she looked as if she loved absurdity. +"Please, may I take my hand?" + +"If you will be very good and promise--" + +"What?" + +"To give me something in exchange." + +"Something in exchange?" + +"Yes. The sweetest thing in the world, the best, and the dearest. You, +dear, yourself. Oh! dearest, if I could tell you what I feel. +Speech--what a silly thing speech is! It can only hint clumsily, +futilely. If I could only tell you, for instance, how the world has +suddenly taken on brightness for me since you smiled. I feel a +tenderness to all nature. I believe at heart there is good in everyone, +don't you? To-day I seem to see nothing but good. I could find you a +lovable spot in the worst villain you might name. I suppose it is the +stream of sweetness that comes from you, dear. Why can't this hour last +forever. I want it to, oh, I want it to!" + +"It is," she whispered, "an hour I shall always remember." + +"Yes, but it must last, it can't die; it sha'n't! Jeannette, let us make +this hour last us our lives! Can't we?" + +"Our lives?" she whispered. + +"Yes, our lives. This is only the first minute of our life. We must +never part again. I seem to have been behind a cloud of doubt and +distrust until this moment. I hardly realize what has happened to me. Is +love so refining a thing as all this? Does it turn bitter into sweet, +and make all the ups and downs of the world shine like one level, +beautiful sea of tenderness? It can be nothing else, but that--my love, +our--can I say our love, Jeannette?" + +The sun streamed in at the window, kissing the tendrils of her hair and +bringing to their copper shimmer a yet brighter blush. The day, with all +its perfume, the splendor of its people, the riot of color of its gowns, +the pride and pomp of its statues and its fountains, flushed the most +secret rills of life. + +"It is a marvel of a day," said Jeannette. + +"A marvel? It is an impossible day; it is not a day at all--it is merely +the hour of hours, the supreme instant, the melody so sweet that it must +break or blind our hearts. You are right, dear, it is a marvelous hour. +You make me repeat myself. Can we let this hour--escape, Jeannette?" + +"It goes fast." + +"Fast--fast as the wind. Fleet as air and fair as heaven are the +instants that bring happiness to common mortals. But we must hold the +hour, cage it, leash it to our lives." + +"Do you think we can?" + +She had used the "we!" Oh yes, and she had said it; she had said it; he +sang the refrain over to himself in a swoon of bliss. + +"I am sure of it," he urged. "Will you try?" + +"You are so much the stronger," she mocked. + +"Oh--if it depends on me--! Try? I shall succeed! I know it. Such love +as mine cannot fail. If only you will let me try. That is all; just +that. + +"I wish you luck!" she smiled. + +"You have said it," he jubilated, "you have said it!" And then, +realizing that she had meant it all the time, he threatened her with a +look, a shake of the head--oh, you would have said he wanted to punish +her in some terrible way, some way that was filled with kisses. + +"Jeannette," he whispered, "I have never heard you speak my name." + +"A pretty name, too," she said. "I have wondered if I might not spoil it +in my pronunciation." + +"You beautiful bit of mockery, you," he said, "will you condescend to +repeat a little sentence after me? You will say it far more prettily +than I, but perhaps you will forgive my lack of music. I am only a man. +You--ah, you are a goddess." + +"For how long?" she asked. "Men marry goddesses and find them clay, +don't they?" + +"You are not clay, dear, you are star-dust, and flowers, and fragrance. +There is not a thought in your dear head that is in tune with mere +clay. But listen! You must say this after me: I--" + +"I--" + +"Love--" + +"Love--" + +"You--" + +"You--" + +"Jeannette--" + +Her lips began to frame the consonant for her own name, but at sight of +the pleading in his gaze she stilled the playfulness of her, and +finished, shyly, but oh, so sweetly. + +"Orson." + +The dear, delightful absurdities of the hour when men and women tell +each other they love, how silly, and how pathetic they must seem to the +all-seeing force that flings our destinies back and forth at its will! +Yet how fair, how ineffably fair, those moments are to their heroes and +heroines; how vastly absurd the rest of the sad, serious world seems to +such lovers, and how happy are the mortals, after all, who through +fastnesses of doubt and darkness, come to the free spaces where the +heart, in tenderness and grace, rules supreme over the intellect, and +keeps in subjection, wisdom, ignorance and all the ills men plague their +minds with! + +When they left the Mayfair together their precious secret was anything +but a secret. Their dream lay fair and open to the world; one must have +been very blind not to see how much these two were in love with each +other. They had gone over every incident of their friendship; they had +stirred the embers of their earliest longings; they had touched their +growing happiness at every point save where Orson's steps aside had hurt +his sweetheart's memory. Those periods both avoided. All else they made +subject for, oh, the tenderest, the most lovelorn conversation +thinkable. It was enough, if overheard, to have sickened the whole day +for any ordinary mortal. + +One must, to repeat, have been very stupid not to see, when they issued +upon the avenue, that they shared the secret that this world appears to +have been created to keep alive. Love clothed them like a visible +garment. + +Luke Moncreith could never have been called blind or stupid. He saw the +truth at once. The truth; it rushed over him like a salt, bitter, acrid +sea. He swallowed it as a drowning man swallows what overwhelms him. One +instant of terrible rage spun him as if he had been a top; he faced +about and was for making, then and there, a scene with this shamelessly +happy pair. But the futility of that struck him on the following second. +He kept his way down the avenue, emotions surging in him; he felt that +his passions were becoming visible and conspicuous; he took a turning +into one of the streets leading eastward. A sign of a wineshop flashed +across his dancing vision, and he clung to it as to an anchor or a +poison. He found a table. He wanted nothing else, only rest, rest. The +wine stood untasted on the bare wood before him. He peered, through it, +into an unfathomable mystery. This chameleon, this fellow Vane--how was +it possible that he had won this glorious, flower-like creature, +Jeannette? This man had been, as the fancy took him, a court fool, a +sporting nonentity, and a blatant mummer. And what was he now? By the +looks of him, he was, to-day--and for how long, Moncreith wondered--a +very essence of meekness and sweetness; butter would not think of +melting in his mouth. What, in the devil's name, what was this riddle! +He might have repeated that question to himself until the end of his +life if the door had not opened then and let in Nevins. + +Nevins ordered the strongest liquor in the place. The sideboard on +Vanthuysen Square might be empty, but Nevins had still the money. As for +the gloomy old Vane house, he really could not stand it any longer. He +toasted himself, did Nevins, and he talked to himself. + +"'An now," he murmured, thickly, "'ere's to the mirror. May I never see +it again as long as I 'as breath in my body and wits in me 'ead. Which," +he observed, with a fatuous grin, "aint for long. No, sir; me nerves is +that a-shake I aint good for nothin' any more. And I asks you, is it +any wonder? 'Ere's Mr. Vane, one day, pleasant as pie. Next day, comes +in, takes a look at that dratted mirror of the Perfessor's, and takes to +'igh jinks. Yes, sir, 'igh jinks, very 'igh jinks. 'As pink tea-fights +in his rooms, 'angs up pictures I wouldn't let me own father see--no, +sir, not if 'e begged me on his bended knee, I wouldn't--and wears what +you might call a tenor voice. Then--one day, while you says 'One for his +Nob' 'e's 'imself again. An' it's always the mirror this, an' the mirror +that. I must look out for it, an' it mustn't be touched, and nobody must +come in. And what's the result of it all? Me nerves is gone, and me +self-respect is gone, and I'm a poor miserable drunkard!" + +He gulped down some of his misery. + +"Join me," said a voice nearby, "in another of those things!" + +Nevins turned, with a swaying motion, to note Moncreith, whose hand was +pointing to the empty glass before Nevins. + +"You are quite right," he went on, when the other's glass had been +filled again, "Mr. Vane's conduct has been most scandalous of late. You +say he has a mirror?" + +All circumspection had long since passed from Nevins. He was simply an +individual with a grievance. The many episodes that, in his filmy mind, +seemed to center about that mirror, shifted and twisted in him to where +they forced utterance. He began to talk, circuitously, wildly, rapidly, +of the many things that rankled in him. He told all he knew, all he had +observed. From out of the mass of inane, not pertinent ramblings, +Moncreith caught a glimmer of the facts. + +What a terrible power this must be that was in Orson Vane's possession! +Moncreith shuddered at the thought. Why, the man might turn himself, in +all but externals--and what, after all, was the husk, the shell, the +body?--into the finest wit, the most lovable hero of his time; he might +fare about the world wrecking now this, now that, happiness; he might +win--perhaps he actually had, even now, won Jeannette Vanlief? If he +had, if--perhaps there was yet time! There was need for sharp, desperate +action. + +He plunged out of the place and toward Vanthuysen Square. Then he +remembered that he could not get in. He aroused Nevins from his brutish +doze. He dragged him over the intervening space. Nevins gave him the +key, and dropped into one of the hall chairs. Moncreith leaped upstairs, +and entered the room where the mirror stood, white, silent, stately. + +He contemplated everything for a time. He conjured up the picture he had +been able to piece together from the rambling monologues of Nevins. He +wondered whether to simply smash in the mirrors--he would destroy them +all, to make sure--by taking a chair-leg to them, or whether he would +carefully pour some acid over them. + +The simpler plan appealed most to him. It was the quickest, the most +thorough. He took a little wooden chair that stood by an ebon +escritoire, swung it high in the air and brought it with a shattering +crash upon the face of the Professor's mirror. + +But there was more than a mere crash. A deadly, sickening, stifling fume +arose from the space the clinking glass unbared; a flame burst out, +leaped at Moncreith and seized him. The deadly white smoke flowed +through the room; flame followed flame, curtains, hangings, screens +went, one after the other, to feed the ravenous beast that Moncreith's +blow had liberated. The room was presently a seething furnace that +rattled in the cage of the walls and windows. Moncreith lay, choked with +the horrid smoke, on the floor. The flames licked at him again and +again; finally one took him on the tip of its tongue, twisted him about, +and shriveled him to black, charred shapelessness. + +The windows fell, finally, out upon the street below. The fire sneaked +downward, laughing and leaping. + +When the firemen came to save Orson Vane's house, they found a grinning, +sodden creature in the hall. + +It was Nevins. "That settles the mirror!" was all he kept repeating. + + + + +CHAPTER XX. + + +The Professor shivered a little when Jeannette came to him with her +budget of wonderful news. She told him of her engagement. He patted her +head, and blessed her and wished her happiness. Then she told him of her +visit to Vane's house. It was at that he shivered. + +He wondered if Vane had taken her image from that fatal glass. If he +had, how, he wondered, would this experiment end? Surely it could not +have happened; Jeannette was quite herself; there was no visible +diminution of charm, of vitality. + +When Vane arrived, presently, the Professor questioned him. The answer +brought the Professor wonder, but he did not count it altogether a +calamity. There could be no doubt that Orson Vane was now wearing +Jeannette's sweet and beautiful soul as a halo round his own. Well, +mused Vanlief, if anything should happen to Jeannette one can always-- + +"Oh, father!" + +Jeannette burst into the room with the morning paper from town. "Orson's +house is burnt to the ground. And who do you think is suspected? Luke +Moncreith! They found his body. Read it!" + +The Professor took the report and scanned it. There could be no doubt; +the mirror, the work of his life, was gone. He could never fashion one +like it. Never--Yet--He looked at the two young people at the window, +whither they had turned together, each with an arm about the other. + +"What a marvel of a day!" Jeannette was saying. + +"The days will all be marvels for us," said Orson. + +"The days, I think, must have souls, just as we have. Some days seem to +have such dark, such bitter thoughts. + +"Yes, I think you are right. There are days that strike one as having +souls; others that seem quite soulless. Beautiful, empty shells, some of +them; others, dim, yet tender, full of graciousness." + +"Orson!" + +"Sweetheart!" + +"Do you know how wonderfully you are changed? Do you know you once +talked bitterly, as one who was full of disappointments and +disenchantments?" + +"You have set me, dear, in a garden of enchantment from which I mean +never to escape. The garden is your heart." + +Something glistened in the Professor's eyes as he listened. "God, in +his infinite wisdom," he said, in a reverent whisper, "gave her so much +of grace; she had enough for both!" + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Imitator, by Percival Pollard + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 39724 *** diff --git a/39724-h/39724-h.htm b/39724-h/39724-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..aa1ebd6 --- /dev/null +++ b/39724-h/39724-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,4942 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<!-- $Id: header.txt 236 2009-12-07 18:57:00Z vlsimpson $ --> + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=UTF-8" /> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Imitator, by Percival Pollard. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> + +body { + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + background-color: #FAEBD7; +} + + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; +} + +p { + margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; +} + +hr { + width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; +} + + +.blockquot { + margin-left: 5%; + margin-right: 10%; +} + +a:link {color: #800000; text-decoration: none; } +v:link {color: #800000; text-decoration: none; } + +.bb {border-bottom: solid 2px;} + +.bl {border-left: solid 2px;} + +.bt {border-top: solid 2px;} + +.br {border-right: solid 2px;} + +.bbox {border: solid 2px;} + +.center {text-align: center;} + +.smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + +.u {text-decoration: underline;} + +.caption {font-weight: bold;} + + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 39724 ***</div> + + + + + + +<h1 style="color: #000066;">THE IMITATOR</h1> + +<h3>A NOVEL</h3> + +<h3>By</h3> + +<h2 style="color: #000066;">PERCIVAL POLLARD</h2> + +<h5>SAINT LOUIS</h5> + +<h5>WILLIAM MARION REEDY</h5> + +<h5>1901</h5> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /> + +<p><a href="#Contents">Contents</a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>CHAPTER I.</h3> + + +<p>"The thing is already on the wane," said young Orson Vane, making a wry +face over the entree, and sniffing at his glass, "and, if you ask me, I +think the general digestion of society will be the better for it."</p> + +<p>"Yes, there is nothing, after all, so tedious as the sham variety of a +table d'hote. Though it certainly wasn't the fare one came to this hole +for."</p> + +<p>Luke Moncreith turned his eyes, as he said that, over the place they sat +in, smiling at it with somewhat melancholy contempt. Its sanded floor, +its boisterously exposed wine-barrels, the meaningless vivacity of its +Hungarian orchestra, evidently stirred him no more.</p> + +<p>"No; that was the last detail. It was the notion of dining below stairs, +as the servants do. It had, for a time, the charm of an imitation. +Nothing is so delightful as to imitate others; yet to be mistaken for +them is always dreadful. Of course, nobody would mistake us here for +servants."</p> + +<p>The company, motley as it was, could not logically have come under any +such suspicion. Though it was dining in a cellar, on a sanded floor, +amid externals that were illegitimate offsprings of a <i>Studenten Kneipe</i> +and a crew of Christy minstrels, it still had, in the main, the air of +being recruited from the smart world. At every other table there were +people whom not to know was to argue oneself unknown. These persons +obviously treated the place, and their being there, as an elaborate +effort at gaiety; the others, the people who were plainly there for the +first time, took it with the bewildered manner of those whom each new +experience leaves mentally exhausted. The touch of rusticity, here and +there, did not suffice to spoil the sartorial sparkle of the smart +majority. The champagne that the sophisticated were wise enough to +oppose to the Magyar vintages sparkled into veins that ran beautifully +blue under skin that held curves the most aristocratic, tints the most +shell-like. Tinkling laughter, vocative of insincerity, rang between the +restless passion of the violins.</p> + +<p>"When it is not below stairs," continued Vane, "it is up on the roof. +One might think we were a society without houses of our own. It is, I +suppose, the human craving for opposites. When we have stored our +sideboards with the finest glass you can get in Vienna or Carlsbad, we +turn our backs on it and go to drinking from pewter in a cellar. We pay +abominable wages to have servants who shall be noiseless, and then go to +places where the service is as guttural as a wilderness of monkeys. +Fortunately, these fancies do not last. Presently, I dare say, it will +be the fashion to dine at home. That will make us feel quite like the +original Puritans." He laughed, and took his glass of wine at a gulp. +"The fact of the matter is that variety has become the vice of life. We +have not, as a society, any inner steadfastness of soul; we depend upon +externals, and the externals pall with fearful speed. Think of seeing in +the mirror the face of the same butler for more than thirty days!" He +shuddered and shook his head.</p> + +<p>"We are a restless lot," sighed the other, "but why discompose yourself +about it? Thank your stars you have nothing more important to worry +over!"</p> + +<p>"My dear Luke, there is nothing more important than the attitude of +society at large. It is the only thing one should allow oneself to +discuss. To consider one's individual life is to be guilty of as bad +form as to wear anything that is conspicuous. Society admires us chiefly +only as we sink ourselves in it. If we let the note of personality rise, +our social position is sure to suffer. Imitation is the keynote of +smartness. The rank and file imitate the leaders consciously, and the +leaders unconsciously imitate the average. We frequent cellars, and +roofs, and such places, because in doing so we imagine we are imitating +the days of the Hanging Gardens and the Catacombs. We abhor the bohemian +taint, but we are willing to give a champagne and chicken imitation of +it. We do not really care for music and musicians, but we give excellent +imitations of doing so. At present we are giving the most lifelike +imitation of being passionately fond of outdoor life; I suppose England +feels flattered. I am afraid I have forgotten whose the first +fashionable divorce in our world was; it is far easier to remember the +names of the people who have never been divorced; at any rate those +pioneers ought to feel proud of the hugeness of their following. We have +adopted a vulgarity from Chicago and made it a fashionable institution; +divorce used to be a shuttlecock for the comic papers, and now it makes +the bulk of the social register."</p> + +<p>Moncreith tapped his friend on the arm. "Drop it, Orson, drop it!" he +said. "I know this is a beastly bad dinner, but you shouldn't let it +make you maudlin. You know you don't really believe half you're saying. +Drop it, I say. These infernal poses make me ill." He attacked the +morsel of game on his plate with a zest that was beautiful to behold. +"If you go on in that biliously philosophic strain of yours, I shall +crunch this bird until I hear nothing but the grinding of bones. It is +really not a bad bit of quail. It is so small, and the casserole so +large, that you need an English setter to mark it, but once you've got +it,"—he wiped his lips with a flip of his napkin, "it's really worth +the search. Try it, and cheer up. The woman in rose, over there, under +the pseudo-palm, looks at you every time she sips her champagne; I have +no doubt she is calculating how untrue you could be to her. I suppose +your gloom strikes her as poetic; it strikes me as very absurd. You +really haven't a care in the world, and you sit here spouting +insincerity at a wasteful rate. If there's anything really and truly the +matter—tell me!"</p> + +<p>Orson Vane dropped, as if it had been a mask, the ironical smile his +lips had worn. "You want sincerity," he said, "well, then I shall be +sincere. Sincerity makes wrinkles, but it is the privilege of our +friends to make us old before our time. Sincerely, then, Luke, I am +very, very tired."</p> + +<p>"A fashionable imitation," mocked Moncreith.</p> + +<p>"No; a personal aversion, to myself, to the world I live in. I wish the +dear old governor hadn't been such a fine fellow; if he had been of the +newer generation of fathers I suppose I wouldn't have had an ideal to +bless myself with."</p> + +<p>Moncreith interrupted.</p> + +<p>"Good Lord, Luke, did you say ideals? I swear I never knew it was as bad +as that." He beckoned to the waiter and ordered a Dominican. "It is so +ideal a liquor that when you have tasted it you crave only for +brutalities. Poor Orson! Ideals!" He sighed elaborately.</p> + +<p>"If you imitate my manner of a while ago, I shall not say what I was +going to say. If I am to be sincere, so must you." He took the scarlet +drink the man set before him, and let it gurgle gently down his throat. +"It smacks of sin and I scent lies in it. I wish I had not taken it. It +is hard to be sincere after a drink that stirs the imagination. But I +shall try. And you are not to interrupt any more than you can help. If +we both shed the outer skin we wear for society, I believe we are +neither of us such bad sorts. That is just what I am getting at: I am +not quite bad enough to be blind to my own futility. Here I am, Luke, +young, decently looking, with money, position, and bodily health, and +yet I am cursed with thought of my own futility. When people have said +who I am, they have said it all; I have done nothing: I merely am. I +know others would sell their souls to be what I am; but it does not +content me. I have spent years considering my way. The arts have called +to me, but they have not held me. All arts are imitative, except music, +and music is not human enough for me; no people are so unhuman as +musical people, and no art is so entirely a creation of a self-centred +inventor. There can be no such thing as realism in music; the voices of +Nature can never be equalled on any humanly devised instruments or +notes. Painting and sculpture are mere imitations of what nature does +far better. When you see a beautiful woman as God made her you do not +care whether the Greeks colored their statues or not. Any average sunset +stamps the painted imitation as absurd. These arts, in fact, can never +be really great, since they are man's feeble efforts to copy God's +finest creations; between them and the ideal there must always be the +same distance as between man and his Creator. Then there is the art of +literature. It has the widest scope of them all. Whether it is imitative +or creative depends on the temperament of the individual; some men set +down what they see and hear, others invent a world of their own and busy +themselves with it. I believe it is the most human of the arts. Its +devotees not infrequently set themselves the task of discovering just +how their fellows think and live; they try to attune their souls to +other souls; they strive for an understanding of the larger humanity. +They—"</p> + +<p>Moncreith interrupted with a gesture.</p> + +<p>"Orson, you're not going to turn novelist? Don't tell me that! Your +enthusiasms fill me with melancholy forebodings."</p> + +<p>"Not at all. But, as you know, I've seen much of this sort of thing +lately. In the first place I had my own temperamental leanings; in the +next place, you'll remember, we've had a season or two lately when +clever people have been the rage. To invite painters and singers and +writers to one's house has been the smart thing to do. We have had the +spectacle of a society, that goes through a flippant imitation of +living, engaged in being polite to people who imitate at second hand, in +song, and color, and story. Some smart people have even taken to those +arts, thus imitating the professional imitators. As far as the smart +point of view goes, I couldn't do anything better than go in for the +studio, or novelistic business. The dull people whom smartness has +rubbed to a thin polish would conspire in calling me clever. Is there +anything more dreadful than being called clever?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing. It is the most damning adjective in the language. Whenever I +hear that a person is clever I am sure he will never amount to much. +There is only one word that approaches it in deadly significance. That +is 'rising.' I have known men whom the puffs have referred to as 'a +rising man' for twenty years. Can you imagine anything more dismal than +being called constantly by the same epithet? The very amiability in the +general opinion, permitting 'clever' and 'rising' to remain unalterable, +shows that the wearer of these terms is hopeless; a strong man would +have made enemies. I am glad you are wise enough to resist the +temptation of the Muses. Society's blessing would never console you for +anything short of a triumph. The triumphs are fearfully few; the clever +people—well, this cellar's full of them. There's Abbott Moore, for +instance."</p> + +<p>"You're right; there he is. He's a case in point. One of the best cases; +a man who has really, in the worldly sense, succeeded tremendously. His +system of give and take is one of the most lovely schemes imaginable; we +all know that. When a mining millionaire with marriageable daughters +comes to town his first hostage to the smart set is to order a palace +near Central Park and to give Abbott Moore the contract for the +decorations. In return Abbott Moore asks the millionaire's womenfolk to +one of his studio carnivals. That section of the smart set which keeps +itself constantly poised on the border between smart and tart is awfully +keen on Abbott Moore's studio affairs. It has never forgotten the famous +episode when he served a tart within a tart, and it is still expecting +him to outdo that feat. To be seen at one of these affairs, especially +if you have millions, is to have got in the point of the wedge. I call +it a fair exchange; the millionaire gets his foot just inside the magic +portal; Moore gets a slice of the millions. All the world counts Moore a +success from every point of view, the smart, the professional, the +financial. Yet that isn't my notion of a full life. It's only a replica +of the very thing I'm tired of, my own life."</p> + +<p>"Your life, my dear fellow, is generally considered a most enviable +article."</p> + +<p>"Of course. I suppose it does have a glamour for the unobserving. Yet, +at the best, what am I?"</p> + +<p>Moncreith laughed. "Another Dominican!" he said to the waiter. "The +liqueur," he said, "may enable me to rise to my subject." He smiled at +Vane over the glass, when it was brought to him, drained it under closed +eyes, and then settled himself well back into his chair.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II.</h3> + + +<p>"I will tell you what you are," began Moncreith, "to I the eye of the +average beholder. Here, in the most splendid town of the western world, +at the turning of two centuries, you are possessed of youth, health and +wealth. That really tells the tale. Never in the history of the world +have youth and health and wealth meant so much as they do now. These +three open the gates to all the earthly paradise. Your forbears did +their duty by you so admirably that you wear a distinguished name +without any sacrifice to poverty. You are good to look at. You are a +young man of fashion. If you chose you could lead the mode; you have the +instincts of a beau, though neither the severe suppression of Brummell +nor the obtrusive splendor of D'Aurevilly would suit you. Our age seems +to have come to too high an average in man's apparel to permit of any +single dictator; to be singled out is to be lowered. Yet there can be no +denying that you have often, unwittingly, set the fashion in waistcoats +and cravats. That aping has not hurt you, because the others never gave +their raiment the fine note of personal distinction that you wear. You +are a favorite in the clubs; people never go out when you come in; you +listen to the most stupid talk with the most graceful air imaginable; +that is one of the sure roads to popularity in clubdom. When it is the +fashion to be artistic, you can be so as easily as the others; when +sport is the watchword your fine physique forbids you no achievement. +You play tennis and golf and polo quite well enough to make women split +their gloves in applause, and not too well to make men sneer at you for +a 'pro.' When you are riding to hounds in Virginia you are never far +from the kill, and there is no automobilist whom the Newport villagers +are happier to fine for fast driving. You are equally at home in a +cotillon and on the deck of a racing yacht. You could marry whenever you +liked. Your character is unspotted either by the excessive vice that +shocks the mob, or the excessive virtue that tires the smart. You have +means, manners and manner. Finally, you have the two cardinal qualities +of smartness, levity and tolerance." He paused, and gave a smile of +satisfaction. "There, do you like the portrait?"</p> + +<p>"It is abominable," said Vane, "it is what I see in my most awful +dreams. And the horror of it is that it is so frightfully true. I am +merely one of the figures in the elaborate masquerade we call society. I +make no progress in life; I learn nothing except new fashions and +foibles. I am weary of the masquerade and the masks. Life in the smart +world is a game with masks; one shuffles them as one does cards. As for +me, I want to throw the whole pack into the fire. Everyone wears these +masks; nobody ever penetrates to the real soul behind the make-up."</p> + +<p>"It is a game you play perfectly. One should hesitate long about giving +up anything that one has brought to perfection. These others dabble and +squabble in what you call the secondary imitations of life; you, at any +rate, are giving your imitation at first hand."</p> + +<p>"Yes, but it no longer satisfies me. Listen, Luke. You must promise not +to laugh and not to frown. It will seem absurd to you; yet I am terribly +in earnest about it. When first I came out of college I went in for +science. When I gave it up, it was because I found it was leading me +away from the human interest. There is the butterfly I want to chase; +the human interest. I attempted all the arts; not one of them took me +far on my way. My failure, Luke, is an ironic sentence upon the vaunted +knowledge of the world."</p> + +<p>"Your failure? My dear Orson; come to the point. What do you mean by the +human interest?"</p> + +<p>"I mean that neither scientist nor scholar has yet shown the way to one +man's understanding of another's soul. The surgeon can take a body and +dissect its every fraction, arguing and proving each function of it. The +painter tries, with feeble success, to reach what he calls the spirit of +his subject. So does the author. He tries to put himself into the place +of each of his characters; he aims, always, for the nearest possible +approach to the lifelike. And, above all the others, there is the actor. +In this, as in its other qualities, the art of acting is the crudest, +the most obvious of them all; yet, in certain moments, it comes nearest +to the ideal. The actor in his mere self is—well, we all know the story +of the famous player being met by this greeting: 'And what art thou +to-night?' But he goes behind a door and he can come forth in a series +of selves. A trick or so with paint; a change of wig; a twist of the +face-muscles, and we have the same man appearing as <i>Napoleon</i>, as +<i>Richelieu</i>, as <i>Falstaff</i>. The thing is external, of course. Whether +there shall be anything more than the mere bodily mask depends upon the +actor's intelligence and his imagination. The supreme artist so +succeeds, by virtue of much study, much skill in imitating what he has +conceived to be the soul of his subject, in almost giving us a lifelike +portrait. And yet, and yet—it is not the real thing; the real soul of +his subject is as much a mystery to that actor as it is to you or me. +That is what I mean when I say that science fails us at the most +important point of all; the soul of my neighbor is as profound a mystery +to me as the soul of a man that lived a thousand years ago. I can know +your face, Luke, your clothes, your voice, the outward mask you wear; +but—can I reach the secrets of your soul? No. And if we cannot know how +others feel and think, how can we say we know the world? Bah! The world +is a realm of shadows in which all walk blindly. We touch hands every +day, but our souls are hidden in a veil that has not been passed since +God made the universe."</p> + +<p>"You cry for the moon," said Moncreith. "You long for the unspeakable. +Is it not terrible enough to know your neighbor's face, his voice, his +coat, without burdening yourself with knowledge of his inner self? It is +merely an egoistic curiosity, my dear Orson; you cannot prove that the +human interest, as you term it, would benefit by the extension in wisdom +you want."</p> + +<p>"Oh, you are wrong, you are wrong. The whole world of science undergoes +revolution, once you gain the point I speak of. Doctors will have the +mind as well as the body to diagnose; lovers will read each others +hearts as well as their voices; lies will become impossible, or, at +least, futile; oh—it would be a better world altogether. At any rate, +until this avenue of knowledge is opened to me, I shall call all the +rest a failure. I imitate; you imitate; we imitate; that is the +conjugation of life. When I think of the hopelessness of the thing,—do +you wonder I grow bitter? I want communion with real beings, and I meet +only masks. I tell you, Luke, it is abominable, this wall that stands +between each individual and the rest of the world. How can I love my +neighbor if I do not understand him? How can I understand him if I +cannot think his thoughts, dream his dreams, spell out his soul's +secrets?"</p> + +<p>Moncreith smiled at his friend, and let his eyes wander a trifle +ironically about his figure. "One would not think, to look at you, that +you were possessed of a mania, an itch! If you take my advice you will +content yourself with living life as you find it. It is really a very +decent world. It has good meat and drink in it, and some sweet women, +and a strong man or two. Most of us are quite ignorant of the fact that +we are merely engaged in incomplete imitations of life, or that there is +a Chinese wall between us and the others; the chances are we are all the +happier for our innocence. Consider, for instance, that rosy little face +behind us—you can see it perfectly in that mirror—can you deny that it +looks all happiness and innocence?"</p> + +<p>Vane looked, and presently sighed a little. The face of the girl, as he +found it in the glass, was the color of roses lying on a pool of clear +water. It was one of those faces that one scarce knows whether to think +finer in profile or in full view; the features were small, the hair +glistened with a tint of that burnish the moon sometimes wears on summer +nights, and the figure was a mere fillip to the imagination. A cluster +of lilies of the valley lay upon her hair; they seemed like countless +little cups pouring frost upon a copper glow. All about her radiated an +ineffable gentleness, a tenderness; she made all the other folk about +her seem garish and ugly and cruel. One wondered what she did in that +gallery.</p> + +<p>"To the outer eye," said Vane, as he sighed, "she is certainly a flower, +a thing of daintiness and delight. But—do you suppose I believe it, for +a moment? I have no doubt she is merely one of those creatures whom God +has made for the destruction of our dreams; her mind is probably as +corrupt as her body seems fair. She is perhaps—"</p> + +<p>He stopped, for the face in the mirror had its eyes thrown suddenly in +his direction. The eyes, in that reflex fashion, met, and something akin +to a smile, oh, an ever so wistful, wonderful a smile, crept upon the +lips and the eyes of the girl, while to the man there came only a sudden +silence.</p> + +<p>"She is," continued Vane, in another voice altogether, and as if he were +thinking of distant affairs, "very beautiful."</p> + +<p>The girl's eyes, meanwhile, had shifted towards Moncreith. He felt the +radiance of them and looked, too, and the girl's beauty came upon him +with a quick, personal force that was like pain. Vane's spoken +approbation of her angered him; he hardly knew why; for the first time +in his life he thought he could hate the man beside him.</p> + +<p>The girl turned her head a little, put up her hand and so hid her face +from both young men, or there is no telling what sudden excuse the two +might not have seized for open enmity. It sounds fantastic, perhaps, but +there are more enmities sown in a single glance from a woman's eyes +than a Machiavelli could build up by ever so devilish devices. Neither +of the two, in this case, could have said just what they felt, or why. +Moncreith thought, vaguely enough perhaps, that it was a sin for so fair +a flower to waste even a look upon a fellow so shorn of faith as was +Orson Vane. As for Vane—</p> + +<p>Vane brought his hand upon the table so that the glasses rocked.</p> + +<p>"Oh," he exclaimed, "if one could only be sure! If one could see past +the mask! What would I not give to believe in beauty when I see it, to +trust to appearances! Oh, for the ability to put myself in the place of +another, to know life from another plane than my own, to—"</p> + +<p>But here he was interrupted.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>CHAPTER III.</h3> + + +<p>"The secret you are seeking," said the man who had put his hand on Orson +Vane's shoulder, "is mine."</p> + +<p>Vane's eyes widened slightly, roving the stranger up and down. He was a +man of six feet in height, of striking, white-haired beauty, of the type +made familiar to us by pictures of the Old Guard under Napoleon. Here +was still the Imperial under the strong chin, the white mustache over +the shapely lips; the high, clear forehead; the long, thin hands, where +veins showed blue, and the nails were rosy. The head was bowed forward +of the shoulders; the man, now old, had once been inches taller. You +looked, on the spur of first noting him, for the sword and the epaulets, +or, at least, for the ribbon of an order. But his clothes were quite +plain, nor had his voice any touch of the military.</p> + +<p>"I overheard a part of your conversation," the stranger went on, "not +intentionally, yet unavoidably. I had either to move or to listen. And +you see the place is so full that moving was out of the question. Did +you mean what you were saying?"</p> + +<p>"About the—"</p> + +<p>"The Chinese wall," said the stranger.</p> + +<p>"Every word of it," said Vane.</p> + +<p>"If the chance to penetrate another's soul came to you, would you take +it?"</p> + +<p>"At once."</p> + +<p>Moncreith laughed aloud. "Where are we?" he said, "in Aladdin's cave? +What rubbish!" And he shook himself, as if to disturb a bad dream. He +was on the point of reaching for his hat, when he saw the face of the +girl in the mirror once more; the sight of it stayed him. He smiled to +himself, and waited for the curious conversation between Vane and the +stranger to continue.</p> + +<p>"My name," the stranger was observing, taking a card from an <i>etui</i>, +"may possibly be known to you?"</p> + +<p>Vane bent his head to the table, read, and looked at the white-haired +man with a quick access of interest.</p> + +<p>"I am honored," he said. "My name is Orson Vane."</p> + +<p>"Oh," said the other, "I knew that. I do not study the human interest in +mere theory; I delight in the tangible. That is why I presume upon +you"—he waved his hand gracefully—"thus."</p> + +<p>"You must join us," said Vane; "there is plenty of room at this table."</p> + +<p>"No; I must—if your friend will pardon me—see you alone. Will you come +to my place?"</p> + +<p>He spoke as youthfully as if he were of Vane's own age.</p> + +<p>Vane considered a second or so, and then sprang to his feet.</p> + +<p>"Yes," he said, "I will come. Good-night, Luke. Stay on; enjoy yourself. +Shall I see you to-morrow? Good-night!"</p> + +<p>They went out together, the young man and the one with the white hair. +One glance into the mirror flashed from Orson's eyes as he turned to go; +it brought him a memory of a burnished halo on a fragile, rosy, beauty. +He sighed to himself, wishing he could reach the truth behind the robe +of beauty, and, with that sigh, turned with a sort of fierceness upon +his companion.</p> + +<p>"Well," said Vane, "well?"</p> + +<p>They were passing through a most motley thoroughfare. Barrel-organs +dotted the asphalt; Italian and Sicilian poverty elbowed the poverty of +Russian and Polish Jews. The shops bore signs in Italian, Hebrew, +French—in anything but English. The Elevated roared above the music and +the chatter; the cool gloom of lower Broadway seemed far away.</p> + +<p>"Patience," said the old man, "patience, Mr. Vane. Look about you! How +much of the heart of this humanity that reeks all about us do we know? +Think,—think of your Chinese wall! Oh—how strange, how very strange +that I should have come upon you to-night, when, in despair of ever +finding my man, I had gone for distraction to a place where, I thought, +philosophy nor science were but little welcome."</p> + +<p>"My dear Professor," urged Vane finally, when they were come to a +stiller region, where many churches, some parks and ivy-sheltered houses +gave an air of age and sobriety and history, "I have no more patience +left. Did I not know your name for what it is I would not have followed +you. Even now I hardly know whether your name and your title suffice. If +it is an adventure, very well. But I have no more patience for +mysteries."</p> + +<p>"Not even when you are about to penetrate the greatest mystery of all? +Oh, youth, youth! Well, we have still a little distance to go. I shall +employ it to impress upon you that I, Professor Vanlief, am not +over-fond of the title of Professor. It has, here in America, a taint of +the charlatan. But it came to me, this title, in a place where only +honors were implied. I was, indeed, a fellow student with many of whom +the world has since heard; Bismarck was one of them. I have eaten smoked +goose with him in Pommern. You see, I am very old, very old. I have +spent my life solving a riddle. It is the same riddle that has balked +you, my young friend. But I have striven for the solution; you have +merely wailed against the riddle's existence."</p> + +<p>Vane felt a flush of shame.</p> + +<p>"True," he murmured, "true. I never went further into any art, any +science, than to find its shortcomings."</p> + +<p>"Yet even that," resumed the Professor, "is something. You are, at any +rate, the only man for my purpose."</p> + +<p>"Your purpose?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. It is the same as yours. You are to be the instrument; I furnish +the power. You are to be able to feel, to think, as others do."</p> + +<p>"Oh!" muttered Vane, "impossible." Now that his wish was called possible +of fulfilment, he shrank a little from it. He followed the Professor up +a long flight of curving steps, through dim halls, to where a bluish +light flickered. As they passed this feeble glow it flared suddenly into +a brilliant jet of flame; a door swung open, revealing a somewhat bare +chamber fitted up partly as a study, partly as a laboratory. The door +closed behind them silently.</p> + +<p>"Mere trickery," said the Professor, "the sort of thing that the knaves +of science fool the world with. Will you sit down? Here is where I have +worked for—for more years than you have lived, Mr. Vane. Here is where +I have succeeded. In pursuit of this success I have spent my life and +nearly all the fortune that my family made in generations gone. I have +this house, and my daughter, and my science. The world spins madly all +about me, in this splendid town; here, in this stillness, I have worked +to make that world richer than I found it. Will you help me?"</p> + +<p>Vane had flung himself upon a wicker couch. He watched his host +striding up and down the room with a fervor that had nothing of senility +in it. The look of earnestness upon that fine old face was magnetic. +Vane's mistrust vanished at sight of it.</p> + +<p>"If you will trust me," he answered. He saw himself as the beneficiary, +his host as the giver of a great gift.</p> + +<p>"I trust you. I heard enough, to-night, to believe you sincere in +wishing to see life from another soul than your own. But you must +promise to obey my instructions to the letter."</p> + +<p>"I promise."</p> + +<p>A sense of farce caught Vane. "And now," he said, "what is it? A powder +I must swallow, or a trance you pass me into, or what?"</p> + +<p>The professor shook his head gravely. "It is none of those things. It is +much simpler. I should not wonder but that the ancients knew it. But +human life is so much more complex now; the experiences you will gain +will be larger than they could ever have been in other ages. Do you +realize what I am about to give you? The power to take upon you the soul +of another, just as an actor puts on the outer mask of another! And I +ask for no reward. Simply the joy of seeing my process active; and +afterwards, perhaps, to give my secret to the world. But you are to +enjoy it alone, first. Of course—there may be risks. Do you take +them?"</p> + +<p>"I do," said Vane.</p> + +<p>He could hear the whistling of steamers out in the harbor, and the noise +of the great town came to him faintly. All that seemed strangely remote. +His whole intelligence was centered upon his host, upon the sparsely +furnished room, and the secret whose solution he thought himself +approaching. He was, for almost the first time in his life, intense in +the mere act of existence; he was conscious of no imitation of others; +his analysis of self was sunk in an eagerness, a tenseness of +purposeness hitherto unfelt.</p> + +<p>The professor went to a far, dark corner of the room, and rolled thence +a tall, sheeted thing that might have been a painting, or an easel. He +held it tenderly; his least motion with it revealed solicitude. When it +was immediately in front of where Vane reclined, Vanlief loosed his hold +of the thing, and began pacing up and down the room.</p> + +<p>"The question of mirrors," he began, after what seemed to Vane an age, +"has never, I suppose, interested you."</p> + +<p>"On the contrary," said Vane, "I have had Italy searched for the finest +of its cheval-glasses. In my dressing-room are several that would give +even a man of your fine height, sir, a complete reflection of every +detail, from a shoe-lace to an eyebrow. It is not altogether vanity; but +I never could do justice to my toilette before a mirror that showed me +only a shoulder, or a waist, or a foot, at a time; I want the +full-length portrait or nothing. I like to see myself as others will +see me; not in piece-meal. The Florentines made lovely mirrors."</p> + +<p>"They did." Vanlief smiled sweetly. "Yet I have made a better." He paced +the floor again, and then resumed speech. "I am glad you like tall +mirrors. You will have learned how careful one must be of them. One more +or less in your dressing-room will not matter, eh?"</p> + +<p>"I have an excellent man," said Vane. "There has not been a broken +mirror in my house for years. He looks after them as if they were his +own."</p> + +<p>"Ah, better and better."</p> + +<p>Vane interrupted the Professor's silence with, "It is a mirror, then?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Vanlief, nodding at the sheeted mirror, "it is a mirror. +Have you ever thought of the wonderfulness of mirrors? What wonder, and +yet what simplicity! To think that I—I, a simple, plodding old man of +science—should be the only one to have come upon the magic of a +mirror!" His talk took the note of monologue. He was pacing, pacing, +pacing; smiling at Vane now and then, and fingering the covered mirror +with loving touch as he passed near it. "Have you ever, as a child, +looked into a mirror in the twilight, and seen there another face beside +your own? Have you never thought that to the mirror were revealed more +things than the human eye can note? Have you heard of the old, old +folk-superstitions; of the bride that may not see herself in a mirror +without tragedy touching her; of the Warwickshire mirror that must be +covered in a house of death, lest the corpse be seen in it; of the +future that some magic mirrors could reveal? Fanciful tales, all of +them; yet they have their germ of truth, and for my present discovery I +owe them something." He drew the sheet from the mirror, and revealed +another veil of gauze resting upon the glass, as, in some houses, the +most prized pictures are sometimes doubly covered. "You see; it is just +a mirror, a full-length mirror. But, oh, my dear Vane, the wonderfulness +of this mirror! I have only to look into this mirror; to veil it; and +then, when next you glance into it, if it be within the hour, my soul, +my spirit, my very self, passes from the face of the mirror to you! That +is the whole secret, or at least, the manifestation of it! Do you wish +to be the President, to think his thoughts, feel as he feels, dream as +he dreams? He has only to look into this mirror, and you have only to +take from it, as one plucks a lily from the pool, the spiritual image he +has left there! Think of it, Vane, think of it! Is this not seeing life? +Is this not riddling the secret of existence? To reach the innermost +depths of another's spirit; to put on his soul, as others can put on +your clothes, if you left them on a chair,—is this not a stupendous +thing?" In his fever and fervor the professor had exhausted his +strength; he flung himself into a chair. Vane saw the old man's eyes +glowing and his chest throbbing with passion; he hardly knew whether +the whole scene was real or a something imposed upon his senses by a +species of hypnotism. He passed his hand before his forehead; he shook +his head. Yet nothing changed. Vanlief, in the chair, still quaking with +excitement; the mirror, veiled and immobile.</p> + +<p>For a time the room stood silent, save for Vanlief's heavy breathing.</p> + +<p>"Of course," he resumed presently, in a quieter tone, "you cannot be +expected to believe, until you have tried. But trial is the easiest +thing in the world. I can teach you the mere externals to be observed in +five minutes. One trial will convince you. After that,—my dear Vane, +you have the gamut of humanity to go. You can be another man every day. +No secret of any human heart will be a secret to you. All wisdom can be +gained by you; all knowledge, all thought, can be yours. Oh, Orson Vane, +I wonder if you realize your fortune! Or—is it possible that you +withdraw?"</p> + +<p>Vane got up resolutely.</p> + +<p>"No," he said, "I have faith—at last. I am with you, heart and soul. +Life seems splendid to me, for the first time. When can I have the +mirror taken to my house?"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV.</h3> + + +<p>Vane's dressing-room was a tasteful chamber, cool and light. Its walls, +its furniture, and its hangings told of a wide range of interest. There +was nowhere any obvious bias; the æsthetic was no more insistent than +the sporting. Orson Vane loved red-haired women as Henner painted them, +and he played the aristocratic waltzes of Chopin; but he also valued the +cruel breaking-bit that he had brought home from Texas, and read the +racing-column in the newspaper quite as carefully as he did the doings +of his society. Some hint of this diversity of tastes showed in this, +the most intimate room of his early mornings. There were some of those +ruddy British prints that are now almost depressingly conventional with +men of sporting habits; signed photographs of more or less prominent and +personable personages were scattered pell-mell. All the chairs and +lounges were of wicker; so much so that some of the men who hobnobbed +with Vane declared that a visit to his dressing-room was as good as a +yachting cruise.</p> + +<p>The morning was no longer young. On the avenue the advance guard of the +fashionable assault upon the shopping district was already astir. The +languorous heat that reflects from the town's asphalt was gaining in +power momentarily.</p> + +<p>Orson Vane, fresh from a chilling, invigorating bath, a Japanese robe of +exquisite coolness his only covering, sat regarding an addition to his +furniture. It had come while he slept. It was proof that the adventure +of the night had not been a mere figment of his dreams.</p> + +<p>He touched a bell. To the man who answered the call, he said:</p> + +<p>"Nevins, I have bought a new mirror. You are to observe a few simple +rules in regard to this mirror. In the first place, to avoid confusion, +it is always to be called the New Mirror. Is that plain?</p> + +<p>"Quite so, sir."</p> + +<p>"I may have orders to give about it, or notes to send, or things of that +sort, and I want no mistakes made. In the next place, the cord that +uncovers the mirror is never to be pulled, never to be touched, save at +my express order. Not—under any circumstances. I do not wish the mirror +used. Have you any curiosity left, Nevins?</p> + +<p>"None, sir."</p> + +<p>"So much the better. In Lord Keswick's time, I think, you still had a +touch of that vice, curiosity. Your meddling got you into something of a +scrape. Do you remember?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, sir," said the man, with a little gesture of shame and pain, "you +didn't need reminding me. Have I ever forgotten your saving me from that +foolishness?"</p> + +<p>"You're right, Nevins; I think I can trust you. But this is a greater +trust than any of the others. A great deal depends; mark that; a very +great deal. It is not an ordinary mirror, this one; not one of the +others compares with it; it is the gem of my collection. Not a breath is +to touch it, save as I command."</p> + +<p>"I'll see to it, sir."</p> + +<p>"Any callers, Nevins?"</p> + +<p>"Mr. Moncreith, sir, looked in, but left no word. And the postman."</p> + +<p>"No duns, Nevins?"</p> + +<p>"Not in person, sir."</p> + +<p>"Dear me! Is my position on the wane? When a man is no longer dunned his +credit is either too good or too bad; or else his social position is +declining." He picked up the tray with the letters, ran his eye over +them quickly, and said, "Thank the stars; they still dun me by post. +There should be a law against it; yet it is as sweet to one's vanity as +an angry letter from a woman. Nevins, is the day dull or garish?"</p> + +<p>"It's what I should call bright, sir."</p> + +<p>"Then you may lay out some gloomy clothes for me. I would not add to the +heat wittingly. And, Nevins!"</p> + +<p>"Yes sir."</p> + +<p>"If anyone calls before I breakfast, unless it happens to be Professor +Vanlief,—Vanlief, Nevins, of the Vanliefs of New Amsterdam—say I am +indisposed."</p> + +<p>He dressed himself leisurely, thinking of the wonderful adventures into +living that lay before him. He rehearsed the simple instructions that +Vanlief had given him the night before. It was all utterly simple. As +one looked into the mirror, the spirit of that one lay on the surface, +waiting for the next person that glanced that way. There followed a +complete exodus of the spirit from the one body into the other. The +recipient was himself plus the soul of the other. The exodus left that +other in a state something like physical collapse. There would be, for +the recipient of the new personality, a sense of double consciousness; +the mind would be like a palimpsest, the one will and the one habit +imposed upon the other. The fact that the person whose spirit passed +from him upon the magic mirror was left more or less a wreck was cause +for using the experiment charily, as the Professor took pains to warn +Orson. There was a certain risk. The mirror might be broken; one could +never tell. It would be better to pick one's subjects wisely, always +with a definite purpose. This man might be used to teach that side of +life; that man another. It was not a thing to toy with. It was to be +played with as little as human life itself. Vivisection was a pastime to +this; this implicated the spirit, the other only the body.</p> + +<p>Consideration of the new avenues opening for his intelligence had +already begun to alter Vane's outlook on life. Persons who remarked him, +a little later, strolling the avenue, wondered at the brilliance of his +look. He seemed suddenly sprayed with a new youth, a new enthusiasm. It +was not, as some of his conversations of that morning proved, an utter +lapse into optimism on his part; but it was an exchange of the mere +passive side of pessimism for its healthier, more buoyant side. He was +able to smile to himself as he met the various human marionettes of the +avenue; the persons whose names you would be sure to read every Sunday +in the society columns, and who seemed, consequently, out of place in +any more aristocratic air. He bowed to the newest beauty, he waved a +hand to the most perennial of the faded beaux. The vociferous attire of +the actors, who idled conspicuously before the shop-windows, caused him +inward shouts of laughter; a day or so ago the same sight would have +embittered his hour for him.</p> + +<p>At Twenty-third street something possessed him to patronize one of the +Sicilian flower-sellers. The man had, happily, not importuned him; he +merely held his wares, and waited, mutely. Orson put a sprig of +lily-of-the-valley into his coat.</p> + +<p>Before he left his rooms he had spent an hour or so writing curt notes +to the smartest addresses in town. All his invitations were declined by +him; a trip to Cairo, he had written, would keep him from town for some +time. He took this ruse because he felt that the complications of his +coming experiment might be awkward; it was as well to pave the way. +Certainly he could not hope to fulfil his social obligations in the time +to come. An impression that he was abroad was the best way out of the +dilemma. The riddance from fashionable duties added to his gaiety; he +felt like a school-boy on holiday.</p> + +<p>It was in this mood that he saw, on the other side of the avenue, a +figure that sent a flush to his skin. There was no mistaking that +wonderful hair; in the bright morning it shone with a glow a trifle less +garish than under the electric light, but it was the same, the same. To +make assurance surer, there, just under the hat—a hat that no mere male +could have expressed in phrases, a thing of gauze and shimmer—lay a +spray of lilies-of-the-valley. The gown—Vane knew at a glance that it +was a beautiful gown and a happy one, though as different as possible +from the filmy thing she had worn when first he saw her, in the mirror, +at night.</p> + +<p>At first unconsciously, and then with quite brazen intent, he found +himself keeping pace, on his side of the street, with the girl opposite. +He knew not what emotion possessed him; no hint of anything despicable +came to him; he had forgotten himself utterly, and he was merely +following some sweet, blind impulse. Orson Vane was a man who had +tasted the froth and dregs of his town no less thoroughly than other +men; there were few sensations, few emotions, he had not tried. Almost +the only sort of woman he did not know was The woman. In the year of his +majority he had made a summer of it on the Sound in his steam yacht, and +his enemies declared that all the harbors he had anchored in were left +empty of both champagne and virtue. Yet not even his bitterest enemy had +ever accused him of anything vulgar, brazen, coarse, conspicuous.</p> + +<p>Luke Moncreith was a friend of Vane's, there was no reason for doubting +that. But even he experienced a little shock when he met Vane, was +unseen of him, and was then conscious, in a quick turn of the head, that +Vane's eyes, his entire vitality, were upon a woman's figure across the +avenue.</p> + +<p>"The population of the Bowery, of Forty-second street, and of the +Tenderloin," said Moncreith to himself, "have a name for that sort of +thing." He clicked his tongue upon his teeth once or twice. "Poor Orson! +Is it the beginning of the end? Last night he seemed a little mad. Poor +Orson!" Then, with furtive shame at his bad manners, he turned about and +watched the two. Even at that distance the sunlight glowed like a caress +upon the hair of her whom Orson followed. "The girl," exclaimed +Moncreith, "the girl of the mirror." He came to a halt before a +photographer's window, the angle of which gave him a view of several +blocks behind.</p> + +<p>Orson Vane, in the meanwhile, was as if there was but one thing in life +for him: a meeting with this radiant creature with the lilies. Once he +thought he caught a sidelong glance of hers; a little smile even hovered +an instant upon her lips; yet, at that distance, he could not be sure. +None of the horrible things occurred to him as possibilities; that she +might be an adventuress, or a mere masquerading shop-girl, or an adroit +soubrette. No tangible intention came to the young man; he had not made +it clear to himself whether he would keep on, and on, and on, until she +came to her own door; whether he would accost her; whether he would +leave all to chance; or whether he would fashion circumstances to his +end.</p> + +<p>The girl turned into a little bookshop that, as it happened, was one of +Vane's familiar haunts. It was a place where one could always find the +new French and German things, and where the shopman was not a mere +instrument for selling whatever rubbish publishers chose to shoot at the +public. When Vane entered he found this shopman, who nodded smilingly at +him, busy with a bearded German. The girl stood at a little table, +passing her slim fingers lovingly over the titles of the books that lay +there. It was evident that she had no wish for advice from the assistant +who hovered in the background. She did not so much as glance at him. +Her eyes were all for her friends in print. She did look up, the veriest +trifle, it is true, when Orson came in; it was so swift, so shy a look +that he, in a mist of emotions, could not have sworn to it. As for him, +a boyish boldness took him to the other side of the table at which she +stood; he bent over the books, and his hands almost touched her fingers. +In that little, quiet nook, he became, all of a moment, once more a +youth of twenty; he felt the first shy stirrings of tenderness, of +worship. The names of the volumes swam for him in a mere haze. He saw +nothing save only the little figure before him, the shimmer of rose upon +her face passing into the ruddier shimmer of her hair; the perfume of +her lilies and some yet subtler scent, redolent of fairest linen, most +fragile laces and the utterest purity, came over him like a glow.</p> + +<p>And then the marvel, the miracle of her voice!</p> + +<p>"Oh, Mr. Vane," he heard her saying, "do help me!" Their eyes met and he +was conscious of a bewildering beauty in hers; it was with quite an +effort that he did not, then and there, do something absurd and stupid. +His hesitation, his astonishment, cost him a second or so; before he +caught his composure again, she was explaining, sweetly, plaintively, +"Help me to make up my mind. About a book."</p> + +<p>"Why did you add that?" he asked, his wits sharp now, and his voice +still a little unsteady. "There are so many other things I would like to +help you in. A book? What sort of a book? One of those stories where +the men are all eight feet high, and wear medals, and the women are all +models for Gibson? Or one of those aristocratic things where nobody is +less than a prince, except the inevitable American, who is a newspaper +man and an abomination? Or is it, by any chance," he paused, and dropped +his voice, as if he were approaching a dreadful disclosure, "poetry?"</p> + +<p>She shook her head. The lilies in her hair nodded, and her smile came up +like a radiance in that dark little corner. And, oh, the music in her +laugh! It blew ennui away as effectually as a storm whirls away a leaf.</p> + +<p>"No," she said, "it is none of those things. I told you I had not made +up my mind."</p> + +<p>"It is a thing you should never attempt. Making up the mind is a +temptation only the bravest of us can resist. One should always delegate +the task to someone else."</p> + +<p>The girl frowned gently. "If it is the fashion to talk like that," she +said, "I do not want to be in the fashion."</p> + +<p>He took the rebuke with a laugh. "It is hard," he pleaded, "to keep out +of the fashion. Everything we do is a fashion of one sort or another." +He glanced at her wonderful hat, at the gown that held her so closely, +so tenderly. "I am sure you are in the fashion," he said.</p> + +<p>"If Mr. Orson Vane tells me so, I must believe it," she answered. "But I +wear only what suits me; if the fashion does not suit me, I avoid the +fashion."</p> + +<p>"But you cannot avoid beauty," he urged, "and to be fair is always the +fashion."</p> + +<p>She turned her eyes to him full of reproach. They said, as plainly as +anything, "How crude! How stupidly obvious!" As if she had really +spoken, he went on, in plain embarassment:</p> + +<p>"I beg your pardon. I—I am very silly this morning. Something has gone +to my head. I really don't think I'd better advise you about anything to +read. I—"</p> + +<p>"Oh," she interrupted, already full of forgiveness, since it was not in +her nature to be cruel for more than a moment at a time, "but you must. +I am really desperate. All I ask is that you do not urge a fashionable +book, a book of the day, or a book that should be in the library of +every lady. I am afraid of those books. They are like the bores one +turns a corner to avoid."</p> + +<p>"You make advice harder and harder. Is it possible you really want a +book to read, rather than to talk about?"</p> + +<p>"I really do," she admitted, "I told you I had no thought about the +fashion."</p> + +<p>"You are like a figure from the Middle Ages," he said, "with your notion +about books."</p> + +<p>"Am I so very wrinkled?" she asked. She put her hand to her veil, with a +gesture of solicitous inquiry. "To be young," she sighed, with a pout, +"and yet to seem old. I am quite a tragedy."</p> + +<p>"A goddess," he murmured, "but not of tragedy." He laughed sharply, and +took a book from the table, using it to keep his eyes from the witchery +of her as he continued: "Don't you see why I'm talking such nonsense? If +it meant prolonging the glimpse of you, there's no end, simply no end, +to the rubbish I could talk!"</p> + +<p>"And no beginning," she put in, "to your sincerity."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I don't know. One still has fits and starts of it! There's no +telling what might not be done; it might come back to one, like +childishness in old age." He put down the book, and looked at her in +something like appeal. "There is such a thing as a sincerity one is +ashamed of, that one hides, and disguises, and that the world refuses to +see. The world? The world always means an individual. In this case the +world is—"</p> + +<p>"The world is yours, like <i>Monte Cristo</i>," she interposed, "how +embarassed you must feel. The responsibility must be enervating! I have +always thought the clever thing for <i>Monte Cristo</i> to have done was to +lose the world; to hide it where nobody could find it again." She tapped +her boot with her parasol, charmingly impatient. "I suppose," she +sighed, "I shall have to ask that stupid clerk for a book, after all. He +looks as if he would far rather sell them by weight."</p> + +<p>"No, no, I couldn't allow that. Consider me all eagerness to aid you. Is +it to be love, or ghosts, or laughter?"</p> + +<p>"Love and laughter go well together," she said. "I want a book I can +love and laugh with, not at."</p> + +<p>"I know," he nodded. "The tear that makes the smile come after. You want +something charming, something sweet, something that will taste +pleasantly no matter how often you read it. A trifle, and yet—a +treasure. Such a book as, I dare say, every writer dreams of doing once +in his life; the sort of book that should be bound in rose-leaves. And +you expect me to betray a treasure like that to you? And my reward? But +no, I beg your pardon; I have my reward now, and here, and the debt is +still mine. I can merely put you in the way of a printed page; while +you—" He stopped, roving for the right word. His eyes spoke what his +voice could not find. He finished, lamely, and yet aptly enough, +"You—are you."</p> + +<p>"I don't believe," she declared, with the most arch elevation of the +darkest eyebrows, "that you know one book from another. You are an +impostor. You are sparring for time. I have given you too much time as +it is. I am going." She picked up her skirts with one slim hand, turned +on a tiny heel, and looked over her shoulder with an air, a +mischievousness, that made Orson ache, yes, simply ache with curiosity +about her. He put out a hand in expostulation.</p> + +<p>"Please," he pleaded, "please don't go. I have found the book. I really +have. But you must take my word for it. You mustn't open it till you are +at home." He handed it to the clerk to be wrapped up. "And now," he went +on, "won't you tell me something? I—upon my honor, I can't think where +we met?"</p> + +<p>"One hardly expects Mr. Orson Vane to remember all the young women in +society," she smiled. "Besides, if I must confess: I am only just what +society calls 'out.' I have seen Mr. Orson Vane: but he has not seen me. +Mr. Vane is a leader; I am—" She shrugged her shoulder, raised her +eyebrows, pursed up her mouth, oh, to a complete gesture that was the +prettiest, most bewildering finish to any sentence ever uttered.</p> + +<p>"Oh," said Orson, "but you are mistaken. I have seen you. No longer ago +than last night. In—"</p> + +<p>"In a mirror," she laughed. Then she grew suddenly quite solemn. "Oh, +you mustn't think I didn't know who you were. It was all very rash of +me, and very improper, my speaking to you, just now, but—"</p> + +<p>"It was very sweet," he interposed.</p> + +<p>"But," she went on, not heeding his remark at all, "I knew you so well +by sight, and I had really been introduced to you once,—one of a bevy +of debutantes, merely an item in a chorus—and, besides, my father—"</p> + +<p>"Your father?" repeated Orson, jogging his memory, "you don't mean to +say—"</p> + +<p>"My father is Augustus Vanlief," she said.</p> + +<p>He took a little time to digest the news. The clerk handed him the book +and the change. He saw, now, whence that charm, that grace, that beauty +came; he recalled that the late Mrs. Vanlief had been one of the +Waddells; there was no better blood in the country. With the name, too, +there came the thought of the wonderful revelations that were presently +to come to him, thanks to this girl's father. A sort of dizziness +touched him: he felt a quick conflict between the wish to worship this +girl, and the wish to probe deeper into life. It was with a very real +effort that he brushed the charm of her from him, and relapsed, again, +into the man who meant to know more of human life than had ever been +known before.</p> + +<p>He took out a silver pencil and held it poised above the book.</p> + +<p>"This book," he said, "is for you, you know, not for your father. Your +father and I are to be great friends but—I want to be friends, also, +with—" he looked a smiling appeal, "with—whom?"</p> + +<p>"With Miss Vanlief," she replied, mockingly. "My other name? I hate it; +really I do. Perhaps my father will tell you."</p> + +<p>She had given him the tip of her fingers, her gown had swung perfume as +it followed her, and she was out and away before he could do more than +give her the book, bow her good-bye, and stand in amaze at her +impetuousness, her verve. The thought smote him that, on the night +before, he had seen her, in the mirror, and spurned the notion of her +being other than a sham, a mockery. How did he know, even now, that she +was other than that? Yet, what had happened to him that he had been able +so long to stay under her charm, to believe in her, to wish for her, to +feel that she was hardly mortal, but some strange, sweet, splendid +dream? Was he the same man who, only a few hours ago, had held himself +shorn of all the primal emotions? He beat these questionings back and +forth in his mind; now doubting himself, now doubting this girl. Surely +she had not, in that dining-room, been sitting with her father? Would he +not have seen them together? Perhaps she was with some of her family's +womenfolk? Yes; now he remembered; she had been at a table with several +other ladies, all elderly. He wished he knew the name one might call +her, if ... if....</p> + +<p>Luke Moncreith came into the shop. Orson caught a shadow of a frown on +the other's face. Moncreith's voice was sharp and bitter when he spoke.</p> + +<p>"Been buying the shop?" he asked.</p> + +<p>"No," said Orson, in some wonder. "Only one book."</p> + +<p>"Hope you'll like it," said the other, with a manner that meant the very +opposite.</p> + +<p>"I? Oh, I read it ages ago. It was for somebody else. You seem very +curious about it?"</p> + +<p>"I am. You aren't usually the man to dawdle in bookshops."</p> + +<p>"Dawdle?" Orson turned on the other sharply. "What the deuce do you +mean? Are you my keeper, or what? If I choose to, I can <i>live</i> in this +shop, can't I?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, Lord, yes! Looks odd, just the same, you trailing in here after a +petticoat, and hanging around for—" he pulled out his watch,—"for a +good half hour."</p> + +<p>Orson burst out in a sort of clenched breath of rage. He kept the +phrases down with difficulty. "Better choose your words," he said. "I +don't like your words, and your watch be damned. Since when have my—my +friends taken to timing my actions? It's a blessing I'm going abroad."</p> + +<p>He turned and walked out of the shop, fiercely, swiftly. As the fresh +air struck his face, he put his hand to it, and shook his head, +wonderingly. "What's the matter with Moncreith? With me?" He thought of +the title of the book he had just given away. "Are we all as mad as +that?" he asked himself.</p> + +<p>The title was "March Hares."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>CHAPTER V.</h3> + + +<p>A young man so prominent in the town as Orson Vane had naturally a very +large list of acquaintances. He knew, in the fashionable phrase, +"everybody," and "everybody" knew him. His acquaintances ranged beyond +the world of fashion; the theatre, the turf, and many other regions had +denizens who knew Orson Vane and held him in esteem. He had always lived +a careful, well-mannered life; his name had never been in the newspapers +save in the inescapable columns touching society.</p> + +<p>When he was ready to proceed with the experiment of the mirror, the +largeness of his social register was at once a pleasure and a pain. +There were so many, so many! It was evident that he must use the types +most promising in eccentricity; he must adventure forth in company with +the strangest souls, not the mere ordinary ones.</p> + +<p>Sitting in the twilight of his rooms one day, it occurred to him that he +was now ripe for his first decision. Whose soul should he seize? That +was the question. He had spent a week or so perfecting plans, stalling +off awkward episodes, schooling his servants. There was no telling what +might not happen.</p> + +<p>He picked up a newspaper. A name caught his eye; he gave a little laugh.</p> + +<p>"The very man!" he told himself, "the very man. Society's court fool; it +will be worth something to know what lies under his cap and bells."</p> + +<p>He scrawled a note, enclosed it, and rang for Nevins.</p> + +<p>"Have that taken, at once, to Mr. Reginald Hart. And then, presently, +have a hansom called and let it wait nearby."</p> + +<p>"Reggie will be sure to come," he said, when alone. "I've told him there +was a pretty woman here."</p> + +<p>He felt a nervous restlessness. He paced his room, fingering the frames +of his prints, trying the cord of his new mirror, adjusting the blinds +of the windows. He tingled with mental and physical expectation. He +wondered whether nothing, after all, would be the result. How insane it +was to expect any such thing to happen as Vanlief had vapored of! This +was the twentieth century rather than the tenth; miracles never +happened. Yet how fervently he wished for one! To feel the soul of +another superimposing itself upon his own; to know that he had committed +the grandest larceny under heaven, the theft of a soul, and to gain, +thereby, complete insight into the spiritual machinery of another +mortal!</p> + +<p>Nevins returned, within a little time, bringing word that Mr. Hart had +been found at home, and would call directly.</p> + +<p>Vane pushed the new mirror to a position where it would face the door. +He told Nevins not to enter the room after Mr. Hart; to let him enter, +and let the curtain fall behind him.</p> + +<p>He took up a position by a window and waited. The minutes seemed heavy +as lead. The air was unnaturally still.</p> + +<p>At last he heard Nevins, in gentle monosyllables. Another voice, high +almost to falsetto, clashed against the stillness.</p> + +<p>Then the curtain swung back.</p> + +<p>Reginald Hart, whom all the smart world never called other than Reggie +Hart, stood for a moment in the curtain-way, the mirror barring his +path. He caught his image there to the full, the effeminate, full face, +the narrow-waisted coat, the unpleasantly womanish hips. He put out his +right hand, as if groping in the dark. Then he said, shrilly, +stammeringly.</p> + +<p>"Vane! Oh, Vane, where the de—"</p> + +<p>He sank almost to his knees. Vane stepping forward, caught him by the +shoulder and put him into an arm-chair. Hart sat there, his head hunched +between his shoulders.</p> + +<p>"Silly thing to do, Vane, old chappy. Beastly sorry for this—stunt of +mine. Too many tea-parties lately, Vane, too much dancing, too much—" +his voice went off into a sigh. "Better get a cab," he said, limply.</p> + +<p>He had quite forgotten why he had come: he was simply in collapse, +mentally and physically. Vane, trembling with excitement and delight, +walked up to the mirror from behind and sent the veil upon its face +again. Then he had Nevins summon the cab. He watched Hart tottering out, +upon Nevins' shoulder, with a dry, forced smile.</p> + +<p>So it was real! He could hardly believe it. In seconds, in the merest +flash, his visitor had faded like a flower whose root is plucked. The +man had come in, full of vitality, quite, in fact, himself; he had gone +out a mere husk, a shell.</p> + +<p>But there was still the climax ahead. Had he courage for it, now that it +loomed imminent? Should he send for Hart and have him pick up his soul +where he had dropped it? Or should he, stern in his first purpose, fit +that soul upon his own, as one fits a glove upon the hand? There was yet +time. It depended only upon whether Hart or himself faced the mirror +when the veil was off.</p> + +<p>He cut his knot of indecision sharply, with a stride to the mirror, a +jerk at the cord and a steady gaze into the clear pool of light, +darkened only by his own reflection.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>Strain his eyes as he would, he could feel no change, not the faintest +stir of added emotion. He let the curtain drop upon the mirror +listlessly.</p> + +<p>Walking to his window-seat again, he was suddenly struck by his image in +one of the other glasses. He was really very well shaped; he felt a wish +to strip to the buff; it was rather a shame to clothe limbs as fine as +those. He was quite sure there were friends of his who would appreciate +photographs of himself, in some picturesque costume that would hide as +little as possible. It was an age since he had any pictures taken. He +called for Nevins. His voice struck Nevins as having a taint of tenor in +it.</p> + +<p>"Nevins," he said, "have the photographer call to-morrow, like a good +man, won't you? You know, the chap, I forget his name, who does all the +smart young women. I'll be glad to do the fellow a service; do him no +end of good to have his name on pictures of me. I'm thinking of +something a bit startling for the Cutter's costume ball, Nevins, so have +the man from Madame Boyer's come for instructions. And see if you can +find me some perfume at the chemist's; something heavy, Nevins. The +perfumes at once, that's a dear man. I want them in my pillows tonight."</p> + +<p>When the man was gone, his master went to the sideboard, opened it, and +gave a gentle sigh of disappointment.</p> + +<p>"Careless of me," he murmured, "to have no Red Ribbon in the place. How +can any gentleman afford to be without it? Dear, dear, if any of the +girls and boys had caught me without it. Another thing I must tell +Nevins. Nothing but whisky! Abominably vulgar stuff! Can't think, +really, 'pon honor I can't, how I ever came to lay any of it in. And no +cigarettes in the place. Goodness me! What sweet cigarettes those are +Mrs. Barrett Weston always has! Wonder if that woman will ask me to her +cottage this summer."</p> + +<p>He strolled to the window, yawned, stretched out his arms, drawing his +hands towards him at the end of his gesture. He inspected the fingers +minutely. They needed manicuring. He began to put down a little list of +things to be done. He strolled over to the tabouret where invitations +lay scattered all about. That dear Mrs. Sclatersby was giving a +studio-dance; she was depending on him for a novel feature. Perhaps if +he did a little skirt-dance. Yes; the notion pleased him. He would sit +down, at once, and write a hint to a newspaper man who would be sure to +make a sensation of this skirt-dance.</p> + +<p>That done, he heard Nevins knocking.</p> + +<p>"Oh," he murmured, "the perfumes. So sweet!" He buried his nose in a +handful of the sachet-bags. He sprayed some Maria Farina on his +forehead. Perfumes, he considered, were worth worship just as much as +jewels or music. The more sinful a perfume seemed, the more stimulating +it was to the imagination. Some perfumes were like drawings by +Beardsley.</p> + +<p>He looked at the walls. He really must get some Beardsleys put up. There +was nothing like a Beardsley for jogging a sluggish fancy; if you wanted +to see everything that milliners and dressmakers existed by hiding, all +you had to do was to sup sufficiently on Beardsley. He thought of +inventing a Beardsley cocktail; if he could find a mixture that would +make the brain quite pagan, he would certainly give it that name.</p> + +<p>His mind roved to the feud between the Montagues and Capulets of the +town. It was one of those modern feuds, made up of little social +frictions, infinitesimal jealousies, magnified by a malicious press into +a national calamity. It was a feud, he told himself, that he would have +to mend. It would mean, for him, the lustre from both houses. And there +was nothing, in the smart world, like plenty of lustre. There were +several sorts of lustre: that of money, of birth, and of public honors. +Personally, he cared little for the origin of his lustre; so it put him +in the very forefront of smartness he asked for nothing more. Of course, +his own position was quite impeccable. The smart world might narrow year +by year; the Newport set, and the Millionaire set, and the Knickerbocker +set—they might all dwindle to one small world of smartness; yet nothing +that could happen could keep out an Orson Vane. The name struck him, as +it shaped itself in his mind, a trifle odd. An Orson Vane? Yes, of +course, of course. For that matter, who had presumed to doubt the +position of a Vane? He asked himself that, with a sort of defiance. An +Orson Vane, an Orson Vane? He repeated the syllables over and over, in a +whisper at first, and then aloud, until the shrillness of his tone gave +him a positive start.</p> + +<p>He rang the bell for Nevins.</p> + +<p>"Nevins," he said, and something in him fought against his speech, "tell +me, that's a good man,—is there anything, anything wrong with—me?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing sir," said Nevins stolidly.</p> + +<p>Orson Vane gave a sort of gasp as the man withdrew. It had come to him +suddenly; the under-self was struggling beneath the borrowed self. He +was Orson Vane, but he was also another.</p> + +<p>Who? What other?</p> + +<p>He gave a little shrill laugh as he remembered. Reggie Hart,—that was +it,—Reggie Hart.</p> + +<p>He sat down to undress for sleep. He slipped into bed as daintily as a +woman, nestling to the perfumed pillows.</p> + +<p>Nevins, in his part of the house, sat shaking his head. "If he hadn't +given me warning," he told himself, "I'd have sent for a doctor."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI.</h3> + + +<p>The smart world received the change in Orson Vane with no immediate +wonder. Wonder is, at the outset, a vulgarity; to let nothing astonish +you is part of a smart education. A good many of the smartest hostesses +in town were glad that Vane had emerged from his erstwhile air of +aristocratic aloofness; he took, with them, the place that Reggie Hart's +continuing illness left vacant.</p> + +<p>In the regions where Vane had been actually intimate whispers began to +go about, it is true, and it was with no little difficulty that an +occasional story about him was kept out of the gossipy pages of the +papers. Vane was constantly busy seeking notoriety. His attentions to +several of the younger matrons were conspicuous. Yet he was so much of a +stimulating force, in a society where passivity was the rule, that he +was welcome everywhere.</p> + +<p>He had become the court fool of the smart set.</p> + +<p>To him, the position held nothing degrading. It was, he argued, a +reflection on smart society, rather on himself, that, to be prominent in +it, one must needs wear cap and bells. Moreover his position allowed +him, now and then, the utterance of grim truths that would not have +been listened to from anyone not wearing the jester's license.</p> + +<p>At the now famous dinner given by Mrs. Sclatersby, Orson Vane seized a +lull in the conversation, by remarking, in his ladylike lisp:</p> + +<p>"My dear Mrs. Sclatersby, I have such a charming idea. I am thinking of +syndicating myself."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Sclatersby put up her lorgnettes and smiled encouragement at Orson. +"It sounds Wall Streety," she said, "you're not going to desert us, are +you?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, nothing so dreadful. It would be an entirely smart syndicate, you +know; a syndicate of which you would be a member. I sometimes think, you +know, that I do not distribute myself to the best advantage. There have +been little jealousies, now and then, have there not?" He looked, in a +bird-like, perky way, at Mrs. Barrett Weston, and the only Mrs. Carlos. +"I have been unable to be in two places at once. Now a syndicate—a +syndicate could arrange things so that there would be no +disappointments, no clashings of engagements, no waste of opportunity.</p> + +<p>"How clever you always are," said a lady at Orson's right. She had +chameleon hair, and her poise was that of a soubrette. The theatre was +tremendously popular as a society model that season. Orson blew a kiss +at her, and went on with his speech.</p> + +<p>"Actors do it, you know. Painters have done it. Inventors do it. Why +not I?" He paused to nibble an olive. "To contribute to the gaiety of +our little world is, after all, the one thing worth while. Think how few +picturesque people we have! Eccentricity is terribly lacking in the +town. We have no Whistler; Mansfield is rather a dull imitation. Of +course there is George Francis Train; but he is a trifle, a trifle too +much of the larger world, don't you think?"</p> + +<p>"I never saw the man in my life," asserted the hostess.</p> + +<p>"Exactly," said Orson, "he makes himself too cheap. It keeps us from +seeing him. But Whistler; think of Whistler, in New York! He would wear +a French hat, fight duels every day, lampoon a critic every hour, and +paint nocturnes on the Fifth avenue pavement! He would make Diana fall +from the Tower in sheer envy. He would go through the Astoria with +monocle and mockery, and smile blue peacock smiles at Mr. Blashfield and +Mr. Simmons. He would etch himself upon the town. We would never let him +go again. We need that sort of thing. Our ambitions and our patience are +cosmopolitan; but we lack the public characters to properly give fire +and color to our streets. Now I—"</p> + +<p>He let his eyes wander about the room, a delicate smile of invitation on +his lips.</p> + +<p>"Don't you think," said one of the ladies, "that you are quite—quite +bohemian enough?"</p> + +<p>Orson shuddered obviously. "My dear lady," he urged, "it is a dreadful +thing to be bohemian. It is no longer smart. If I am considered the one, +I cannot possibly be the other. There is, to be sure, a polite +imitation; but it is quite an art to imitate the thing with just +sufficient indolence. But I really wish you would think the thing over, +Mrs. Sclatersby. I know nobody who would do the thing better than I. Our +men are mostly too fond of fashion, and too afraid of fancy. One must +not be ashamed of being called foolish. Whistler uses butterflies; +somebody else used sunflowers and green carnations; I should +use—lilies, I think, lilies-of-the-valley. Emblematic of the pure folly +of my pose, you know. One must do something like that, you see, to gain +smart applause; impossible hats and improbable hair, except in the case +of actresses, are quite extinct."</p> + +<p>A Polish orchestra that had been hitherto unsuccessful against the +shrill monologue of Orson, and the occasional laughter of the ladies, +now sent out a sudden, fierce stream of melody. It was evident that they +did not mean to take the insult of a large wage without offering some +stormy moments in exchange. The diners assumed a patient air, eating in +an abstracted manner, as if their stomachs were the only members of +their bodies left unstunned by the music. The assemblage wore, in its +furtive gluttony, an air of being in a plot of the most delicious +danger. Some rather dowdy anecdotes went about in whispers, and several +of the ladies made passionate efforts to blush. Orson Vane took a sip of +some apricotine, explaining to his neighbor that he took it for the +color; it was the color of verses by Verlaine. She had never heard of +the man. Ah; then of course Mallarmé, and Symons and Francis Saltus were +her gods? No; she said she liked Madame Louise; hers were by far the +most fragile hats purchasable; what was the use of a hat if it was not +fragile; to wear one twice was a crime, and to give one away unless it +was decently crushed was an indiscretion. Orson quite agreed with her. +To his other neighbor he confided that he was thinking of writing a +book. It would be something entirely in the key of blue. He was busy +explaining its future virtues, when an indiscreet lull came in the +orchestral tornado.</p> + +<p>"I mean to bring the pink of youth to the sallowest old age," he was +saying, "and every page is to be as dangerous as a Bowery cocktail."</p> + +<p>Then the storm howled forth again. Everyone talked to his or her +neighbor at top voice. Now and then pauses in the music left fag ends of +conversation struggling about the room.</p> + +<p>"The decadents are simply the people who refuse to write twaddle for the +magazines...."</p> + +<p>"The way to make a name in the world is to own a soap factory and ape +William Morris on the side...."</p> + +<p>"I can always tell when it is Spring by looking at the haberdashers' +windows. To watch shirts and ties blooming is so much nicer than flowers +and those smelly things...."</p> + +<p>"The pleasantest things in the world all begin with a P. Powders, +patches and poses—what should we do without them?..."</p> + +<p>This sort of thing came out at loose ends now and then. Suddenly the +music ceased altogether. The diners all looked as if they had been +caught in a crime. The lights went out in the room, and there were +little smothered shrieks. After an interval, a rosy glow lit up the +conservatory beyond the palms; a little stage showed in the distance. +Some notorious people from the music-halls began to do songs and dances, +and offer comic monologues. The diners fell into a sort of lethargy. +They did not even notice that Orson Vane's chair was empty.</p> + +<p>Vane was in a little boudoir lent him by the hostess. His nostrils +dilated with the perfume of her that he felt everywhere. He sank into a +silk-covered chair, before which he had arranged a full-length mirror, +and several smaller glasses, with candles glowing all about him. He was +conscious of a cloying sense of happiness over his physical perfections. +He stripped garment after garment from him with a care, a gentleness +that argued his belief that haste was a foe to beauty. He stretched +himself at full length, in epicurean enjoyment of himself. The flame of +life, he told himself, burnt the more steadily the less we wrapped it +up. If we could only return to the pagan life! And yet—what charm there +was in dress! The body had, after all, a monotony, a sameness; the +tenderest of its curves, the rosiest of its surfaces, must pall. But the +infinite variety of clothes! The delight of letting the most delicate +tints of gauze caress the flesh, while to the world only the soberest +stuffs were exposed! The rustle of fresh linen, the perfume that one +could filter through the layers of one's attire!</p> + +<p>Orson Vane closed his eyes, lazily, musingly. At that moment his proper +soul was quite in subjection; the ecstasy in the usurping soul was +all-powerful.</p> + +<p>He was thinking of what the cheval-glass in that little room must have +seen.</p> + +<p>It would be unspeakably fine to be a mirror.</p> + +<p>The little crystal clock ticking on the dressing-table tinkled an hour. +It brought him from his reveries with a start. He began gliding into +some shining, silken things of umber tints; they fitted him to the skin.</p> + +<p>He was a falconer.</p> + +<p>It was a costume to strike pale the idlers at a bathing beach. There was +not a crease, not a fold anywhere. A leathern thong upon a wrist, a +feathered cap upon his head, were almost the only points that rose away +from the body as God had fashioned it. Satisfaction filled him as he +surveyed himself. But there was more to do. Above this costume he put +the dress of a Spanish Queen. When he lifted the massively brocaded +train, there showed the most exquisitely chiseled ankles, the promise of +the most alluring legs. The corsage hinted a bust of the most soothing +softness. He spent fully ten minutes in happy admiration of his images +in the mirrors.</p> + +<p>When he proceeded to the conservatory, it was by a secret corridor. The +diners were wearily watching a Frenchwoman who sang with her gloves, +which were black and always on the point of falling down. She was very +pathetic; she was trying to sing rag-time melodies because some idiot +had told her the Newport set preferred that music. A smart young woman +had danced a dance of her own invention; everyone agreed, as they did +about the man who paints with his toes, that, considering her smartness +in the fashionable world, it was not so much a wonder that she danced so +well, as that she danced at all. They were quite sure the professional +managers would offer her the most lavish sums; she would be quite as +much of an attraction as the foreign peer who was trying to be a +gentleman, where they are most needed, on the stage.</p> + +<p>At a sign from Orson, the lights went out again, as the Frenchwoman +finished her song. Several of the guests began to talk scandal in the +dark; there are few occupations more fascinating than talking scandal in +the dark. The question of whether it was better to be a millionaire or +a fashionable and divorced beauty was beginning to agitate several +people into almost violent argument, when the lights flared to the full.</p> + +<p>The chorus of little "Ohs" and "Ahs," of rapid whispered comment, and of +discreetly patted gloves, was quite fervid for so smart an assemblage. +Except in the rarest cases, to gush is as fatal, in the smart world, as +to be intolerant. There is a smart avenue between fervor and frowning; +when you can find that avenue unconsciously, in the dark, as it were, +you have little more to learn in the code of smartness.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Sclatersby herself murmured, quite audibly:</p> + +<p>"How sweet the dear boy looks!"</p> + +<p>Her clan took the word up, and for a time the sibilance of it was like a +hiss in the room. A man or two in the company growled out something that +his fairer neighbor seemed unwilling to hear. These basso profundo +sounds, if one could formulate them into words at all, seemed more like +"Disgusting fool!" or "Sickening!" than anything else. But the company +had very few men in it; in this, as in many other respects, the room +resembled smart society itself. The smart world is engineered and +peopled chiefly by the feminine element. The male sex lends to it only +its more feminine side.</p> + +<p>It is almost unnecessary to describe the picture that Orson Vane +presented on that little stage. His beauty as "Isabella, Queen of +Spain," has long since become public property; none of his later efforts +in suppression of the many photographs that were taken, shortly after +the Sclatersby dinner, have succeeded in quite expunging the portraits. +At that time he gave the sittings willingly. He felt that these +photographs represented the highest notch in his fame, the completest +image of his ability to be as beautiful as the most beautiful woman.</p> + +<p>Shame or nervousness was not part of Orson Vane's personality that +night. He sat there, in the skillfully arranged scheme of lights, with +his whole body attuned only to accurate impersonation of the character +he represented. He got up. His motion, as he passed across the stage, +was so utterly feminine, so made of the swaying, undulating grace that +usually implies the woman; the gesture with his fan was so finically +alluring; the poise of his head above his bared shoulders so +coquettish,—that the women watching him almost held their breaths in +admiration.</p> + +<p>It was, you see, the most adroit flattery that a man could pay the +entire sex of womankind.</p> + +<p>Then the music, a little way off, began to strum a cachuca. The tempo +increased; when finally the pace was something infectious, Orson Vane +began a dance that remains, to this day, an episode in the annals of the +smart. The vigor of his poses, the charm of his skirt-manipulation, +carried the appreciation of his friends by storm. Some of the ladies +really had hard work to keep from rushing to the stage and kissing the +young man then and there. When we are emotional, we Americans—to what +lengths will we not go!</p> + +<p>But the surprises were not yet over. A dash of darkness stayed the +music; a swishing and a flapping came from the stage; then the lights. +Vane stood, in statue position, as a falconer. You could almost, under +the umber silk, see the rippling of his veins.</p> + +<p>Only a second he stood so, but it was a second of triumph. The company +was so agape with wonder, that there was no sound from it until the +music and the bare stage, following a brief period of blackness, +recalled it to its senses. Then it urged Mrs. Sclatersby to grant a +great favor.</p> + +<p>Mr. Vane must be persuaded not take off his falconer's costume; to +mingle, for what little time remained, with the company without resuming +his more conventional attire.</p> + +<p>Vane smiled when the message came to him. He nodded his head. Then he +sent for the Sclatersby butler.</p> + +<p>"Plenty of Red Ribbon!" he said to that person.</p> + +<p>"Plenty, sir."</p> + +<p>"Make a note of your commissions; a cheque in the morning."</p> + +<p>Then he mingled again with his fellow-guests, and there was much +toasting, and the bonds all loosened a little, and the sparkle came up +out of the glasses into the cheeks of the women. The other men, one by +one, took their way out.</p> + +<p>Women crushed one another to touch the hero of the evening. Jealousies +shot savage glances about. Every increase in this emulation increased +the love that Orson Vane felt for himself. He caressed a hand here, a +lock there, with a king's condescension. If he felt a kiss upon his +hand, he smiled a splendid, slightly wearied smile. If he had hot eyes +turned on him, burning so fiercely as to spell out passion boldly, he +returned, with his own glances, the most ineffable promises.</p> + +<p>There have been many things written and said about that curious affair +at the Sclatersbys, but for the entire history of it—well, there are +reasons why you will never be able to trace it. Orson Vane is perhaps +the only one who might tell some of the details; and he, as you will +find presently, has utterly forgotten that night.</p> + +<p>"Time we went home, girls," said Vane, at last, disengaging himself +gently from a number of warm hands, and putting away, as he moved into +freedom, more than one beautiful pair of shoulders. He needed the fresh +air; he was really quite worn out. But he still had a madcap notion left +in him; he still had a trump to play.</p> + +<p>"A pair of hose," he called out, "a pair of hose, with diamond-studded +garters, to the one who will play 'follow' to my 'leader!'"</p> + +<p>And the end of that dare-devil scamper did not come until the whole +throng reached Madison Square.</p> + +<p>Vane plunged to the knees in the fountain.</p> + +<p>That chilled the chase. But one would not be denied. Hers was a dark +type of beauty that needed magnolias and the moon and the South to frame +it properly. She lifted her skirts with a little tinkling laugh, and ran +to where Orson stood, splashing her way bravely through the water.</p> + +<p>Vane looked at her and took her hand.</p> + +<p>"I envy the prize I offered," he said to her.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII.</h3> + + +<p>Dawn found Orson Vane nodding in a hansom. He had told the man to drive +to Claremont. The Palisades were just getting the first rosy streaks the +sun was putting forth. The Hudson still lay with a light mist on it. The +ascent to Claremont, in sunshine so clustered with beauty, was now +deserted. A few carts belonging to the city were dragging along +sleepily. Harlem was at the hour when the dregs of one day still taint +the morn of the next one.</p> + +<p>Vane was drowsy. He felt the need of a fillip. He did not like to think +of getting back to his rooms and taking a nap. It was still too early, +it seemed, for anything to eat or drink. He spied the Fort Lee ferry, +and with it a notion came to him. The cabman was willing. In a few +minutes he was aboard the ferry, and the cooler air that sweeps the +Hudson was laving him. On the Jersey side he found a sleepy innkeeper +who patched up a breakfast for him. He had, fortunately, some smokable +cigars in his clothes. The day was well on when he reached the New York +side of the river again, and gave "The Park!" as the cabman's orders.</p> + +<p>His body now restored to energy again, his mind recounted the successes +of the night. He really had nothing much to wish for. The men envied him +to the point of hatred; the women adored him. He was the pet of the +smartest people. He was shrewd enough, too, to be petted for a +consideration; his adroitness in sales of Red Ribbon added comfortably +to his income. He took pride in this, as if there had ever been a time, +for several generations, when the name of Vane had not stood good for a +million or so.</p> + +<p>The Park was not well tenanted. Some robust members of the smart set +were cantering about the bridle paths, and now and then a carriage +turned a corner; but the people who preferred the Park for its own sake +to the Park of the afternoon drive were, evidently, but few. Vane felt +quite neglected; he was still able to count the number of times that he +had bowed to familiars. The deserted state of the Park somewhat +discounted the tonic effects of its morning freshness. Nature was +nothing unless it was a background for man. The country was a place from +which you could come to town. Still—there was really nothing better to +do, this fine morning. He rather dreaded the thought of his rooms after +the brilliance of the night.</p> + +<p>His meditations ceased at approach of a girlish figure on horseback, a +groom at a discreet distance behind.</p> + +<p>It was Miss Vanlief.</p> + +<p>He saw that she saw him, yet he saw no welcome in her eyes. He rapped +for the hansom to stop; got out, and waved his hat elaborately at the +young woman. She, in sheer politeness, had reined in her horse.</p> + +<p>"A sweet day," he minced, "and jolly luck my meeting you! Thought it was +rather dull in the old Park, till you turned up. Sweet animal you're +on." He looked up with that air that, the night before, had been so +bewitching. Somehow, as the girl eyed him, he felt haggard. She was not +smiling, not the least little bit.</p> + +<p>"I have read about the affair at Mrs. Sclatersby's," she said.</p> + +<p>"Really? Dreadful hurry these newspapers are always in, to be sure. It +was really a great lark."</p> + +<p>"It must have been," was her icy retort. She beckoned to the groom. +"That—that sheet," she ordered, sharply, holding out one gauntleted +hand. The groom gave her the folded newspaper. She began to read from +it, in a bitter monotone:</p> + +<p>"The antics of Mr. Orson Vane," she read, "for some time the subject of +comment in society, have now reached the point where they deserve the +censure of publicity. His doings at a certain fashionable dinner of last +night were the subject of outspoken disgust at the prominent clubs +later. Now that the case is openly discussed, it may be repeated that a +prominent publication recently had occasion to refuse print to a +distinctly questionable photograph of this young man, submitted, it is +alleged, by himself. In the more staid social circles, one wonders how +much longer Mrs. Carlos and the other leaders of the smartest set will +continue to countenance such behavior."</p> + +<p>Vane, as she read, was enjoying every inch of her. What freshness, what +grace! What a Lady Godiva she would have made!</p> + +<p>"Sweet of you to take such interest," he observed, as she handed the +paper to the groom. "Malice, you know, sheer malice. Dare say I forgot +to give that paper some news that I gave the others; they take that sort +of thing so bitterly, you know. As for the photo—it was really awfully +cunning. I'll send you one. Oh, must you go? I'm so cut up! Charming +chat we've had, I'm sure."</p> + +<p>She had given her horse a cut with the whip, had sent Vane a stare of +the most open contempt, and was now off and away. Vane stood staring +after her. "Very nice little filly," he murmured. "Very!"</p> + +<p>Then he gave his house number to the cabman.</p> + +<p>Turning into Park avenue, at Thirty-Ninth street, the horse slipped on +the asphalt. The hansom spun on one wheel, and then crashed against a +lamp-post. Vane was almost stunned, though there was no mark on him +anywhere. He felt himself all over, but he could feel not as much as a +lump. But his head ached horribly; he felt queerly incapable of thought. +Whatever it was that had happened to him, it had stunned something in +him. What that something was he did not realize even as he told Nevins, +who opened the door to him in some alarm:</p> + +<p>"Send the cab over to Mr. Reginald Hart's. Say I must—do you hear, +Nevins?—I must have him here within the hour—if he has to come in a +chair!"</p> + +<p>Not even when he let the veil glide from the new mirror did he +understand what part of him was stunned. He moved about in a sort of +half wakefulness. The time he spent before Hart's arrival was all a +stupor, spent on a couch, with eyes closed.</p> + +<p>Hart came in feebly, leaning on a stick.</p> + +<p>"Funny thing of you to do," he piped, "sending for me like this. What +the—" He straightened himself in front of the new mirror, and, for an +instant, swayed limply there. Then his stick took an upward swing, and +he minced across the room vigorously. "Why, Vane," he said, "not ill, +are you? Jove, you know, I've had a siege, myself. Feel nice and fit +this minute, though. Shouldn't wonder if the effort to get here had done +me good. What was the thing you wanted me for?"</p> + +<p>Vane shook his head, feebly. "Upon my word, Hart, I don't know. I had an +accident; cab crushed me; I was a little off my head, I think. All a +mistake."</p> + +<p>"Sorry, I'm sure," lisped Hart, "hope it won't be anything real. I tell +you I feel quite out of things. All the other way with you, eh! Hear +you're no end of a choice thing with the <i>cafe au lait</i> gang. Well, +adios!"</p> + +<p>Vane lay quite still after the other had gone. When he spoke, it was to +say, to the emptiness of the room, but nodding to where Hart had last +stood:</p> + +<p>"What a worm! What an utter worm!"</p> + +<p>The voice was once more the voice of Orson Vane.</p> + +<p>As realization of that came to him, he spoke again, so loud that Nevins, +without, heard it.</p> + +<p>"Thank God," he said.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII.</h3> + + +<p>The time that had passed since he began the experiment with the +Professor's mirror now filled Vane with horror. The life that had seemed +so splendid, so triumphant to him a short while ago, now presented +itself to him as despicable, mean, hateful. Now that he had safely +ousted the soul of Reginald Hart he loathed the things that, under the +dominance of that soul, he had done. The quick feeling of success that +he had expected from his adventure into the realm of the mind was not +his at all; his emotions were mixed, and in that mixture hatred of +himself was uppermost. It was true: he had succeeded. The thoughts, the +deeds of another man had become his thoughts, his deeds. The entire +point of view had been, for the time, changed. But, where he had +expected to keep the outland spirit in subjection, it was the reverse +that had happened; the usurping soul had been in positive dominance; he +had been carried along relentlessly by the desires and the reflections +of that other.</p> + +<p>The fact that he knew, now, to the very letter, the mind that animated +that fellow, Reginald Hart, was small consolation to him. The odium of +that reputation was inescapably his, Orson Vane's. Oh, the things he had +said,—and thought,—and done! He had not expected that any man's mind +could be so horrible as that. He thought of the visitation he had +conjured upon himself, and so thinking, shuddered. How was he ever to +elude the contempt that his masquerade, if he could call it so, would +bring him?</p> + +<p>Above all, that scene with Miss Vanlief came back to him with a bitter +pang. What did it profit him, now, to fathom the foul depths of Reginald +Hart's mind concerning any ever so girlish creature? It was he, Orson +Vane, for all that it was possible to explain to the contrary, who had +phrased Miss Vanlief's beauty in such abominable terms.</p> + +<p>Consternation sat on his face like a cloud. He could think of no way out +of the dark alley into which he had put himself.</p> + +<p>Each public appearance of his now had its tortures. Men who had +respected him now avoided him; women to whom he had once condescended +were now on an aggravating plane of intimacy. Sometimes he could almost +feel himself being pointed out on the street.</p> + +<p>The mental and physical reaction was beginning to trace itself on his +face. He feared his Florentine mirrors now almost as much as the +Professor's. The blithe poise had left him. He brooded a good deal. His +insight into another nature than his own filled him with a sense of +distaste for the human trend toward evil.</p> + +<p>He spent some weeks away from town, merely to pick up his health again. +His strength returned a little, but the joy of life came back but +tardily.</p> + +<p>On his first day in town he met Moncreith. There was an ominous wrinkle +gathering in the other's forehead, but Vane braved all chance of a +rebuff.</p> + +<p>"Luke," he said, "don't you know I've been ill? You can't think how ill +I've been. Do you remember I told you I was going abroad? I've been +abroad, mentally; I have, Luke, really I have. It's like a bad dream to +me. You know what I mean."</p> + +<p>Moncreith found his friend rather pathetic. At their last meeting he had +been hot in jealousy of Orson. Now he could afford to pity him. He had +made Jeannette Vanlief's acquaintance, and he stood quite well with her. +He had made up his mind to stand yet better; he was, in fact, in love +with her. He was quite sure that Vane had quite put himself out of that +race. So he took the other's hand, and walked amicably to the Town and +Country Club with him.</p> + +<p>"You have been doing strange things," he ventured.</p> + +<p>"Strange," echoed Vane, "strange isn't the word! Ghastly, +horrible—awful things I've been doing. I wish I could explain. But +it—it isn't my secret, Luke. All I can say is: I was ill. I am, I hope, +quite well again."</p> + +<p>It seemed an age since he had spent an hour or so in his favorite club. +The air of the members was unmistakably frosty. The conversation shrank +audibly. He was glad when Moncreith found a secluded corner and bore him +to it. But he was not a bright companion; his own thoughts were too +depressing to allow of his presenting a sparkling surface to the world. +They talked in mere snatches, in curt syllables.</p> + +<p>"I've seen a good deal of Miss Vanlief," said Moncreith, with conscious +triumph.</p> + +<p>"Oh," said Vane, with a start, "Miss Vanlief? So you know her? Is +she—is she well?"</p> + +<p>"Quite. I see her almost every day."</p> + +<p>"Fortunate man!" sighed Vane. He was a little weary of life. He wanted +to tell somebody what his dreams about Miss Vanlief were; he wanted to +cry out loud, "She is the dearest, sweetest girl in the world!" merely +to efface, in his own mind, the alien thought of her that had come to +him weeks ago. Moncreith did not seem the one to utter this cry to. +Moncreith was too engrossed in his own success. He could bear +Moncreith's company no longer, not just then. He muttered lame words; he +stumbled out to the avenue.</p> + +<p>Some echo of an instinct turned his steps to the little bookshop.</p> + +<p>It was quite empty of customers. He passed his fingers over the back of +books that he thought Miss Vanlief might have handled. It was an absurd +whim, a childish trick. Yet it soothed him perceptibly. Our nerves +control our bodies and our nerves are slaves of our imaginations.</p> + +<p>He was turning to go, when his eye fell on a parcel lying on the +counter. It was addressed to "Miss Jeannette Vanlief."</p> + +<p>"Jeannette, Jeannette!" he said the name over to himself time and again. +It brought the image of her before him more plainly than ever. The +sunset glint in her hair, the roses and lilies of her skin, the melody +in her voice! The charm with which she had first met him, in that very +shop. It all came to him keenly. The more remote the possibility of his +gaining her seemed, the more he hugged the thought of her. He admitted +to himself now, all the more since his excursion into an abominable side +of human nature, that she was the most unspoilt creature in his world. A +girl with that face, that hair, that wit, was sure to be of a charm that +could never lose its flavor; the allurement of her was a thing that +could never die.</p> + +<p>Nothing but thoughts of this girl came to him on the way to his rooms. +Once in his own place, he felt that his reflections on Miss Vanlief had +served him as a tonic. He felt an energy once more, a vigor, a desire +for action. In that mood he turned fiercely upon some of the drawings on +his walls. He called Nevins, and had a heap made of the things that now +filled him with loathing.</p> + +<p>"All of the Beardsleys must come down," he ordered. "No; not all. The +portrait of Mantegna may stay. That has nobility; the others have the +genius of hidden evil. They take too much of the trapping from our +horrible human nature. The funeral procession by Willette may hang; his +Montmartre things are trivially indecent. Heine and his grotesqueries +may stay in jail for all I care. Leave one or two of Thoeny's blue +dragoons. Leandre's crowned heads will do me no harm; I can see past +their cruelties. But take the Gibsons away; they are relegated to the +matinee girl. What is to be done with them? Really, Nevins, don't worry +me about such things. Sell them, give them, lose them: I don't care. +There's only one man in the world who'd really adore them, and he—" he +clenched his hands as he thought of Hart,—"he is a worm, a worm that +dieth and yet corrupts everything about him."</p> + +<p>He sat down, when this clearance was over, and wrote a rather long +letter to Professor Vanlief. He told as much as he could bring himself +to tell of the result of the experiment. He begged the Professor, +knowing the circumstances as no other did, to do what was possible to +reinstate him, Vane, in the esteem of Miss Vanlief. As to whether he +meant to go on with further experiments; he had not yet made up his +mind. There were consequences, obligations, following on this clear +reading of other men's souls, that he had not counted upon.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX.</h3> + + +<p>To cotton-batting and similar unromantic staples the great house of R.S. +Neargood & Co. first owed the prosperity that later developed into +world-wide fame. It was success in cotton-batting that enabled the firm +to make those speculations that eventually placed millions to its +credit, and familiarized the Bourse and Threadneedle Street with its +name.</p> + +<p>What ever else can be said of cotton-batting, however, it is hardly a +topic of smart conversation. So in smart circles there was never any +mention of cotton-batting when the name of Neargood came up. Instead, it +was customary to refer to them as "the people, you know, who built the +Equator Palace for the Tropical Government, and all that sort of thing." +A certain vagueness is indispensable to polite talk.</p> + +<p>Yet not even this detail of politics and finance counted most in the +smart world. The name of Neargood might never have been heard of in that +world if it had not been for the beautiful daughters of the house of +Neargood. There is nothing, nowadays, like having handsome daughters. +You may have made your millions in pig, or your thousands in whisky, +but, in the eyes of the complaisant present, the curse dies with the +debut of a beautiful daughter. It is true that the smart sometimes make +an absurd distinction between the older generation and the new; +sometimes a barrier is raised for the daughter that checks the mother; +but caprice was ever one of the qualities of smartness.</p> + +<p>Through two seasons the beautiful Misses Neargood—Mary and +Alice—reigned as belles. They were both good to look at, tall, stately, +with distinct profiles. There was not much to choose, so to put it, +between them. Mary was the handsomer; Alice the cleverer. Through two +seasons the society reporters, on the newspapers that are yellow as well +as those that make one blue, exhausted the well of journalese in +chronicling the doings of these two young women.</p> + +<p>The climax of descriptive eloquence was reached on the occasion of the +double wedding of Mary and Alice Neargood.</p> + +<p>Mary changed the name of Neargood for that of Spalding-Wentworth; Alice +became Mrs. Van Fenno.</p> + +<p>Up to this time—as far, at least, as was observable—these two sisters +had dwelt together in unity. Never had the spirits of envy or +uncharitableness entered them. But after marriage there came to each of +them that stormy petrel of Unhappiness, Ambition.</p> + +<p>As a composer of several songs and light operas. Van Fenno was fairly +well known. Spalding-Wentworth was known as a man of Western wealth, of +Western blue blood, and of prominence in the smart set. For some time +the worldly successes of the Van Fennos did not disturb Mrs. +Spalding-Wentworth at all. Her husband was smart, since he moved with +the smart; he and his hyphen were the leaders in a great many famous +ways, notably in fashion and in golf. From the smart point of view the +Van Fennos were not in the hunt with the other family.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Van Fenno chafed and churned a little in silence, but hope did not +die in her. She made up her mind to be as prominent as her sister or +perish in the attempt.</p> + +<p>She did not have to perish. Things took a turn, as they will even in the +smart world, and there came a time when it was fashionable to be +intellectual. The smart set turned from the distractions of dinners and +divorces to the allurements of the arts. Music, painting and literature +became the idols of the hour. With that bland, heedless facility that +distinguishes To-day, the men and women of fashion became quickly versed +in the patter of the Muses.</p> + +<p>The Van Fennos became the rage. Everybody talked of his music and her +charm. Where the reporters had once used space in describing +Spalding-Wentworth's leadership in a cotillon or conduct of a coach, +they were now required to spill ink in enumeration of "those present" +at Mrs. Van Fenno's "musical afternoons."</p> + +<p>Wherefore there was a cloud on the fair brow of Mary Wentworth. Her +intimates were privileged to call her that. Ordinary mortals, omitting +the hyphen, would have been frozen with a look.</p> + +<p>When there is a cloud on the wife's brow it bodes ill for the husband. +The follies of a married man should be dealt with leniently; they are +mostly of his wife's inspiration. One day the cloud cleared from Mary +Wentworth's brow. She was sitting at breakfast with her husband.</p> + +<p>"Why, Clarence," she exclaimed, with a suddenness that made him drop his +toast, "there's literature!"</p> + +<p>"Where?" said Clarence, anxiously. "Where?" He looked about, eager to +please.</p> + +<p>"Stupid," said his wife. "I mean—why shouldn't we, that is, you—" She +looked at him, sure that he would understand without her putting the +thing into syllables. "Yes," she repeated, "literature is the thing. +There it is, as easy, as easy—"</p> + +<p>"Hasn't it always been there?" asked her dear, dense husband. A woman +may brood over a thing, you see, for months, and the man will not get so +much as a suspicion.</p> + +<p>She went on as if he had never spoken. "Literature is the easiest. +Clarence, you must write novels!"</p> + +<p>He buttered himself another slice of toast.</p> + +<p>"Certainly, my dear," he nodded, with a pleasant smile. "Quite as you +please."</p> + +<p>It was in this way that the Spalding-Wentworth novels were incited. The +art of writing badly is, unfortunately, very easy. In painting and in +music some knowledge of technic is absolutely necessary, but in +literature the art of writing counts last, and technic is rarely +applauded. The fact remains that the smart set thought the +Spalding-Wentworth novels were "so clever!" Mrs. Van Fenno was utterly +crushed. Mary Wentworth informed an eager world that her husband's next +novel would be illustrated with caricatures by herself; she had +developed quite a trick in that direction. Now and again her husband +refused to bother his head with ambitions, and devoted himself entirely +to red coats and white balls. Mrs. Wentworth's only device at such times +was to take desperately to golf herself. She really played well; if she +had only had staying power, courage, she might have gone far. But, if +she could not win cups, she could look very charming on the clubhouse +lawn. One really does not expect more from even a queen.</p> + +<p>It did not disturb Mrs. Wentworth at all to know that, where he was best +known, her husband's artistic efforts were considered merely a joke. She +knew that everyone had some mask or other to hold up to the world; and +she knew there was nothing to fear from a brute of a man or two. In her +heart she agreed with them; she knew her husband was a large, kindly, +clumsy creature; a useful, powerful person, who needed guidance.</p> + +<p>Kindly and clumsy—Clarence Spalding-Wentworth had title to those two +adjectives: there was no denying that. It was his kindliness that moved +him, after a busy day at a metropolitan golf tournament, toward Orson +Vane's house. He had heard stories of Vane's illness; they had been at +college together; he wanted to see him, to have a chat, a smoke, a good, +chummy hour or two.</p> + +<p>It was his clumsiness that brought about the incident that came to have +such memorable consequences. Nevins told him Mr. Vane was out; Wentworth +thought he would go in and have a look at Vane's rooms, anyway; sit +down, perhaps, and write him a note. Nevins had swung the curtain to +behind him when Wentworth's heel caught in the wrapping around the new +mirror.</p> + +<p>He looked into the pool of glass blankly.</p> + +<p>"Funny thing to cover up a mirror like that!" he told himself. He flung +the stuff over the frame carelessly. It merely hung by a thread. Almost +any passing wind would be sure to lift it off.</p> + +<p>"Wonder where he keeps his smokes?" he hummed to himself, striding up +and down, like a good natured mammoth.</p> + +<p>He found some cigars began puffing at one with an audible satisfaction, +and at last let himself down to an ebony escritoire that he could have +smashed with one hand. He wrote a scrawl; waited again, whistled, looked +out of the window, picked up a book, peered at the pictures, and then, +with a puff of regret, strode out.</p> + +<p>As he passed the Professor's mirror the current of air he made swept the +curtain from the glass and left it exposed.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_X" id="CHAPTER_X"></a>CHAPTER X.</h3> + + +<p>At about the time that Wentworth was scrawling his note in Vane's rooms +a slender young woman, dressed in a grey that shimmered like the +winter-sea in sunlight, wearing a hat that had the air of having lit +upon her hair for the moment only,—merely to give the world an +instant's glance at the gracious combination that woman's beauty and +man's millinery could effect—was coming out from one of those huge +bazaars where you can buy almost everything in the world except the +things you want. As she reached the doors, a young man, entering, +brushed her arm; his sleeve caught her portemonnaie. He stooped for it, +offered it hastily, and then—and not until then, gave a little "Oh!" +of—what was it, joy? or mere wonder, or both?</p> + +<p>"Oh," he repeated, "I can't go in—now. It's—it's ages since I could +say two words to you. 'Good-morning!' and 'How do you do?' has been the +limit of our talk. Besides, you have a parcel. It weighs, at the very +least, an ounce. I could never think of letting you tire yourself so." +He took the flimsy mite from her, and ranged his steps to hers.</p> + +<p>It was true, what he had said about their brief encounters. Do what she +would to forget that morning in the Park, and the weeks before it, +Jeannette Vanlief had not quite succeeded. Not even the calm +dissertations of her father, the arguments pointing to the unfathomable +freakishness of human nature, had altogether ousted her aversion to +Orson Vane. It was an aversion made the more keen because it came on the +heels of a strong liking. She had been prepared to like this young man. +Something about him had drawn her; and then had come the something that +had simply flung her away. Yet, to-day, he seemed to be the Orson Vane +that she had been prepared to like.</p> + +<p>She remembered some of the strange things her father had been talking +about. She noted, as Orson spoke, that the false tenor note was gone out +of his voice. But she was still a little fluttered; she could not quite +trust herself, or him.</p> + +<p>"But I am only going to the car," she declared. "It will hardly be worth +while. I mustn't take you out of your way."</p> + +<p>"I see," he regretted, "you've not forgotten. I can't explain; I was—I +think I was a little mad. Perhaps it is in the family. But—I wish you +would imagine, for to-day, that we had only just known each other a very +little while, that we had been in that little bookshop only a day or so +ago, that you had read the book, and we had met again, and—." He was +looking at her with a glow in his eyes, a tenderness—! Her eyes met his +for only an instant, but they fathomed, in that instant, that there was +only homage, and worship, and—and something that she dared not spell, +even to her soul—in them. That burning greed that she had seen in the +Park was not there.</p> + +<p>She smiled, wistfully, hesitatingly. Yet it was enough for him to cling +to; it buoyed his mood to higher courage.</p> + +<p>"Let us pretend," he went on, "that there are no streetcars in the town. +Let us be primitive; let us play we are going to take a peep-show from +the top of the Avenue stage! Oh—please! It gets you just as near, you +know; and if you like we can go on, and on, and do it all over again. +Think of the tops of the hats and bonnets one sees from the roof! It's +such a delightful picture of the avenue; you see all the little +marionettes going like beads along the string. And then, think of the +danger of the climb to the roof! It is like the Alps. You never know, +until you are there, whether you will arrive in one piece or in several. +Come," he laughed, for she was now really smiling, openly, sweetly, "let +us be good children, come in from Westchester County, to see the big +city."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps," she ventured, "we will make it the fashion. And that would +spoil it for so many of the plainer people."</p> + +<p>"Oh," and he waved his hand, "after us—the daily papers! Let us +pretend—I beg your pardon, let me pretend—youth, and high spirits, +and the intention to enjoy to-day."</p> + +<p>A rattling and a scraping on the asphalt warned them of an approaching +stage, and after a scramble, that had its shy pleasures for both, they +found themselves on the top of the old relic.</p> + +<p>"It is a bit of the Middle Ages," said Orson, "look at those horses! +Aren't they delightfully slender? And the paint! Do you notice the +paint? And the stories those plush seats down below us could tell! Think +of the misers and the millionaires, the dowagers and the drabs, that +have let these old stages bump them over Murray Hill! You can't have +that feeling about a street-car, not one of the electric ones, at any +rate. Do you know the story of the New Yorker who was trying to sleep in +a first-class compartment on a French railway? There was a collision, +and he was pitched ten feet onto a coal-heap. He said he thought he was +at home and he was getting off the stage at Forty-Second street."</p> + +<p>They were passing through the most frequented part of the avenue. Noted +singers and famous players passed them; old beaux and fresh belles; +political notabilities and kings of corruption. A famous leader of +cotillions, a beauty whose profile vied with her Boston terriers for +being her chief distinction, and a noted polo-player came upon the scene +and vanished again. Vane and his companion gave, from time to time, +little nods to right and left. Their friends stared at them a little, +but that caused them no sorrow. Automobiles rushed by. They looked down +upon them, lofty in their ruined tower.</p> + +<p>"As a show," said Vane, "it is admirably arranged. It moves with a +beautiful precision. There is nothing hurried about it; the illusion of +life is nearly complete. Some of them, I suppose, really are alive?"</p> + +<p>"I am not sure," she answered, gravely. "Sometimes I think they merely +move because there is a button being pressed somewhere; a button we +cannot see, and that they spend their lives hiding from us."</p> + +<p>"I dare say you are right. In the words of Fay Templeton, 'I've been +there and I know.' I have made my little detours: but the lane had, +thank fortune, a turning."</p> + +<p>She saw through his playfulness, and her eyes went up to his in a +sympathy—oh, it made him reel for sweetness.</p> + +<p>"I am glad," she said, simply.</p> + +<p>"But we are getting serious again," he remonstrated, "that would never +do. Have we not sworn to be children? Let us pretend—let us pretend!" +He looked at the grey roofs, the spires oozing from the hill to the sky. +He looked at the grey dream beside him: so grey, so fair, so crowned +with the hue of the sun before the world had made him so brazen. "Let us +pretend," he went on, after a sigh, "that we are bound for the open +road, and that we are to come to an inn, and that we will order +something to eat. We—"</p> + +<p>"Oh," she laughed, "you men, you men! Always something to eat!"</p> + +<p>"You see, we are of coarse stuff; we cannot sup on star-dust, and dine +on bubbles. But—this is only to pretend! An imaginary meal is sometimes +so much more fun than a real one. At a real one, you see, I would have +to try to eat, and I could not spend the whole time looking at you, and +watching the sunshine on your hair, and the lilies—" He caught his +breath sharply, with a little clicking noise. "Dear God," he whispered, +"the lilies again! And I had never seen them until now."</p> + +<p>"You are going to be absurd," she said, though her voice was hardly a +rebuke.</p> + +<p>"And wouldn't I have excuse," he asked, "for all the absurdities in the +world! I want to be as absurd as I can; I want to think that there's +nothing in the world any uglier than—you."</p> + +<p>"And will you dine off that thought?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, no; that is merely one of the condiments. I keep that in reach, +while the other things come and go. I tell you: how would it be if we +began with a bisque of crab? The tenderest pink, you know, and not the +ghost of any spice that you can distinguish; a beautiful, creamy blend."</p> + +<p>"You make it sound delicious," she admitted.</p> + +<p>"We take it slowly, you know, religiously. The conversation is mostly +with the eyes. Dinner conversation is so often just as vapid as +dinner-music! The only point in favor of dinner-music is that we are +usually spared the sight of it. There is no truth more abused than the +one that music must be heard and not seen. When I am king I mean to +forbid any singing or playing of instruments within sight of the public; +it spoils all the pleasure of the music when one sees the uglinesses in +its execution."</p> + +<p>"But people would not thank you if you kept the sight of Paderewski or +De Pachmann from them."</p> + +<p>"They might not thank me at first, but they would learn gratitude in the +end, A contortionist is quite as oppressive a sight as an automaton. No; +I repeat, performers of music should never, never be visible. It is a +blow in the face of the art of music; it puts it on the plane of the +theatre. What persons of culture want to do is to listen, to listen, to +listen; to shut the eyes, and weave fancies about the strains as they +come from an unseen corner. Is there not always a subtle charm about +music floating over a distance? That is a case in point; that same charm +should always be preserved. The pianist, the soloist of any sort, as +well as the orchestra, or the band—except in the case of the regimental +band, in battle or in review, where actual spectacle, and visible +encouragement are the intention—should never be seen. There should +always be a screen, a curtain, between us and the players. It would make +the trick of music criticism harder, but it would still leave us the +real judges. Take out of music criticism the part that covers fingering, +throat manipulation, pedaling, and the like, and what have you left? +These fellows judge what they see more than what they hear. To give a +proper judgment of the music that comes from the unseen; that is the +only test of criticism. There can be no tricks, no paddings."</p> + +<p>"But the opera?" wondered the girl.</p> + +<p>"The opera? Oh, the opera is, at best, a contradiction in terms. But I +do not waive my theory for the sake of opera. It should be seen as +little as any other form of music. The audience, supplied with the story +of the dramatic action, should follow the incidents by ear, not by eye. +That would be the true test of dramatic writing in music. We would, +moreover, be spared the absurdity of watching singers with beautiful +voices make themselves ridiculous by clumsy actions. As to comic +opera—the music's appeal would suffer no tarnish from the merely +physical fascination of the star or the chorus ... I know the thought is +radical; it seems impossible to imagine a piano recital without long +hair, electric fingers, or visible melancholia; opera with only the +box-holders as appeals to the eye seems too good to be true; but—I +assure you it would emancipate music from all that now makes it the +most vicious of the arts. Painters do not expect us to watch them +painting, nor does the average breed of authors—I except the Manx—like +to be seen writing. Yet the musician—take away the visible part of his +art, and he is shorn of his self-esteem. I assure you I admire actors +much more than musicians; actors are frankly exponents of nothing that +requires genius, while musicians pretend to have an art that is over and +above the art of the composer.... Music—"</p> + +<p>"Do you realize," interrupted the girl, with a laugh that was melody +itself, "that you are feasting me upon dinner-music without dinner. It +must be ages since we began that imaginary feast. But now, I am quite +sure we are at the black coffee. And I have been able to notice nothing +except your ardor in debate. You were as eager as if you were being +contradicted."</p> + +<p>"You see," he said, "it only proves my point. Dinner-music is an +abomination. It takes the taste of the food away. While I was playing, +you admit, you tasted nothing between the soup and the coffee. Whereas, +in point of fact—"</p> + +<p>"Or fancy?"</p> + +<p>"As you please. At any rate—the menu was really something out of the +common. There were some delightful wines. A sherry that the innkeeper +had bought of a bankrupt nobleman; so would run his fable for the +occasion, and we would believe it, because, in cases of that sort, it +takes a very bad wine to make one pooh-pooh its pedigree. A Madeira that +had been hidden in a cellar since 1812. We would believe that, every +word of it, because we would know that there was really no Madeira in +all the world; and we must choose between insulting our stomachs or our +intelligence. And then the coffee. It would come in the tiniest, most +transparent, most fragile—"</p> + +<p>"Yes," she laughed, "I dare say. As transparent and as fragile as the +entire fabric of our repast, I have no doubt. But—pity me, do!—I shall +have to leave the beautiful banquet about where you have put it, in the +air. I have a ticking conscience here that says—"</p> + +<p>"Oh, hide it," he supplicated, "hide it. Watches are nothing but +mechanisms that are jealous of happiness; whenever there is a happy hour +a watch tries to end it. When I am king I shall prohibit the manufacture +and sale of watches. The fact that they may be carried about so easily +is one of their chief vices; one never knows nowadays from what corner a +woman will not bring one; they carry them on their wrists, their +parasols, their waists, their shoulders. Can you be so cruel as to let +that little golden monster spoil me my hour of happiness—"</p> + +<p>"But I would have to be cruel one way or the other. You see, my father +will wonder what has become of me. He expects me to dinner."</p> + +<p>"Ah, well," he admitted soberly, if a little sadly, "we must not keep +him waiting. You must tell the Professor where we have been, and what we +said, and how silly I was, and—Heigho, I wish I could tell you how the +little hour with you has buoyed me up. Your presence seems to stir my +possibilities for good. I wish I could see you oftener. I feel like the +provincial who says good-bye with a: 'May I come 'round this evening?' +as a rider."</p> + +<p>"A doubtful compliment, if I make you rustic," she said. "But I have +something on this evening; an appointment with a man. The most beautiful +man in the world, and the best, and the kindest—"</p> + +<p>"His name?" he cried, with elaborate pretense of melodrama, for he saw +that she was full of whimsies.</p> + +<p>"Professor Vanlief," she curtsied.</p> + +<p>They were walking, by now, in the shade of the afternoon sun. Vane saw a +stage approaching them, one that would take him back to the lower town. +She saw it, too, and his intention. She shook hands with him, and took +time to say, softly:</p> + +<p>"Do you never ride in the Park any more?"</p> + +<p>"Oh," he said, "tell me when. To-morrow morning? At McGowan's Pass? At +ten? Oh, how I wish that stage was not coming so fast!"</p> + +<p>In their confusion, and their joyous sense of having the same absurd +thought in common, they both laughed at the notion of a Fifth avenue +stage ever being too fast. Yet this one, and Time, sped so swiftly that +Vane could only shake hands hastily with his fair companion, look at her +worshipfully, and jump upon the clattering vehicle.</p> + +<p>He would never have believed that so ramshackle a conveyance could have +harbored so many dreams as had been his that day.</p> + +<p>That thought was his companion all the way home. That, and efforts to +define his feelings toward Miss Vanlief. Was it love? What else could it +be! And if it was, was he ready, for her, to give up those ambitions of +still further sounding hitherto unexplored avenues of the human mind? +Was this fragile bit of grace and glamour to come between him and the +chance of opening a new field to science? Had he not the opportunity to +become famous, or, at the very least, to become omnipotent in reading +the hearts, the souls, of men? Were not the possibilities of the +Professor's discovery unlimited? Was it not easy by means of that mirror +in his rooms, for any chief of police in the world to read the guilt or +innocence of every accused man? Yet, on the other hand, would marriage +interfere? Yes; it would. One could not serve two such goddesses as +woman and science. He would have to make up his mind, to decide.</p> + +<p>But, in the meanwhile, there was plenty of time. Surely, for the +present, he could be happy in the thought of the morrow, of the ride +they were to take in the Park, of the cantering, the chattering +together, the chance to see the morning wind spin the twists of gold +about her cheeks and bring the sparkle to her eyes.</p> + +<p>He let himself into his house without disturbing any of the servants. He +passed into his room. He lifted the curtain of the doorway with one +hand, and with the other turned the button that lighted the room. As the +globes filled with light they showed him his image in the new mirror.</p> + +<p>He reeled against the wall with the surprise of the thing. He noted the +mirror's curtain in a heap at the foot of the frame. Perhaps, after all, +it had been merely the wind.</p> + +<p>He summoned Nevins. The curtain he replaced on the staring face of the +mirror. Whence the thought came from, he did not know, but it occurred +to him that the scene was like a scene from a novel.</p> + +<p>"Nevins," he asked, "was anyone in my rooms?"</p> + +<p>"Mr. Spalding-Wentworth, sir."</p> + +<p>Orson Vane laughed,—a loud, gusty, trumpeting laugh.</p> + +<p>He understood. But he understood, also, that the accident that had +brought the soul of Spalding-Wentworth into his keeping had decreed, +also, that the dominance should not be, as on a former time, with the +usurper.</p> + +<p>He knew that the soul of Spalding-Wentworth, to which he gave the refuge +of his own body, was a small soul.</p> + +<p>Yet even little souls have their spheres of influence.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XI" id="CHAPTER_XI"></a>CHAPTER XI.</h3> + + +<p>It was a morning such as the wild flowers, out in the suburban meadows, +must have thought fit for a birthday party. As for the town, it lost, +under that keen air and gentle sun, whatever of garish and unhealthy +glamour it had displayed the night before.</p> + +<p>"The morning," Orson Vane had once declared, in a moment of revelation, +"is God's, and the night is man's." He was speaking, of course, of the +town. In the severe selectiveness that had grown upon him after much +rout and riot through other lands, he pretended that the town was the +only spot on the map. Certainly this particular morning seemed to bear +out something of this saying; it swept away the smoke and the taint, the +fever and the flush of the night before; the visions of limelights and +glittering crystals and enmillioned vice fled before the gust of ozone +that came pouring into the streets. Before night, to be sure, man would +have asserted himself once more; the pomp and pageant of the primrose +path would have ousted, with its artificial charm, the clean, sweet +freshness of the morning.</p> + +<p>The grim houses on upper Fifth avenue put on semblance of life +reluctantly that morning. Houses take on the air of their inmates; these +houses wore their best manner only under artificial lights. Surly grooms +and housemaids went muttering and stumbling about the areas. Sad-faced +wheelmen flashed over the asphalt, cursing the sprinkling carts. It was +not too early for the time-honored preoccupation of the butcher cart, +which consists of turning corners as if the world's end was coming. +Pallid clubmen strode furtively in the growing sunshine. To them, as to +the whole town, the sun and its friend, the breeze, came as a tonic and +a cure.</p> + +<p>So strange a thing is the soul of man that Orson Vane, riding towards +the Park that morning, caught only vague, fleeting impressions of the +actual beauty of the day. He simply wondered, every foot of the way to +McGowan's Pass, whether Miss Vanlief played golf. The first thing he +said to her after they had exchanged greetings, was:</p> + +<p>"Of course you golf?"</p> + +<p>She looked at him in alarm. There was something—something, but what was +it?—in his voice, in his eye. She had expected a reference to the day +before, to their infantile escapade on the roof of the coach. Instead, +this banale, this stupid, this stereotyped phrase! Her flowerlike face +clouded; she gave her mare the whip.</p> + +<p>"No," she called out, "I cannot bear the game." His horse caught the +pace with difficulty; the groom was left far out of sight, beyond a +corner. But the diversion had not touched Vane's trend of thought at +all.</p> + +<p>"Oh," he assured her, when the horses were at an amble again, "it's one +of those things one has to do. Some things have to be done, you know; +society won't stand for anything less, you know, oh, no. I have to play +golf, you know; part of my reputation."</p> + +<p>"I didn't know," she faltered. She tried to remember when Orson Vane had +ever been seen on either the expert or the duffer list at the golf +matches.</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes; people expect it of me. If I don't play I have to arrange +tournaments. Handicapping is great fun; ever try it? No? You should. +Makes one feel quite like a judge at sessions. Oh, there's nothing like +golf. Not this year, at least. Next year it may be something else. I may +have to take to polo or tennis. One is expected to show the way, you +know; a man in my position—" He looked at her with a kind of 'bland, +blunt, clumsy egoism, that made her wonder where was the Orson Vane of +yesterday. This riddle began to sadden her. Perhaps it was true, as she +had heard somewhere, that the man was mentally unbalanced; that he had +his—well, his bad days. She sighed. She had looked forward to this ride +in the Park; she admitted that to herself. Not in a whole afternoon +spent with Luke Moncreith had she felt such happy childishness stirring +in her as yesterday, in the hour with Orson Vane. And now—She sighed.</p> + +<p>The hum of an approaching automobile reached them, the glittering +vehicle proclaiming its progress in that purring stage whisper that is +still the inalienable right of even the newest "bubble" machine. The +coat worn by the smart young person on the seat would have shocked the +unenlightened, for that sparkling, tingling morning it struck the exact +harmonious note of artifice.</p> + +<p>Orson Vane bowed. It was "the" Miss Carlos. Just as there is only one +Mrs. Carlos, so there is only one Miss Carlos.</p> + +<p>"She plays a decent game," said Vane to his companion.</p> + +<p>"Of life?"</p> + +<p>"No; golf." He looked at her in amazement. Life! What was life compared +to golf? Life? For most people it was, at best, a foozle. Nearly +everybody pressed; very few followed through, and the bunkers—good +Lord, the bunkers!</p> + +<p>"I'm thinking of writing a golfing novel," began Orson, after an +interval in which he managed to wonder whether one couldn't play golf +from horseback.</p> + +<p>"Oh," said Miss Vanlief wearily, "how does one set about it!"</p> + +<p>He was quite unaware of her weariness. He chirped his answer with blind +enthusiasm.</p> + +<p>"It's very easy," he declared. "There are always a lot of women, you +know, who are aching to do things in that line. You give them the +prestige of your name, that's all. One of them writes the thing; you +simply keep them from foozling the phrases now and then. Another +illustrates it."</p> + +<p>"And does anyone buy it?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, all the smart people do. It's one of those things one is supposed +to do. There's no particular reason or sense in it; but smart people +expect one another to read things like that. The newspapers get quite +silly over such books. Then, after novels, I think, I shall take to +having them done over for the stage? Don't you think a golfing comedy, +with a sprinkling of profanity and Scotch whiskey, would be all the +rage?"</p> + +<p>Jeannette Vanlief reined in her mare. She looked at Orson Vane; looked +him, as much as she could, through and through. Was it all a stupid +jest? She could find nothing but dense earnestness in her face, in his +eyes. Oh, the riddle was too tiresome, too hopeless. It was simply not +the same man at all! She gave it up, gave him up.</p> + +<p>"Do you mind," she said, "if I ride home now? I'm tired."</p> + +<p>It should have been a blow in the face, but Orson Vane never so much as +noticed it.</p> + +<p>"Tired?" he repeated. "Oh; all right. We'll turn about. Rather go back +alone? Oh, all right. Wish you'd learn to play golf; you really must!" +And upon that he let her canter away, the groom following, some little +wonder on his impassive front.</p> + +<p>As for Jeannette Vanlief she burst into her father's room a little +later, and then into tears.</p> + +<p>"And I wanted to love him!" she wailed presently, from out her confusion +and her distress.</p> + +<p>The Professor was patting her hair, and wondering what in all the world +was the matter. At her speech, he thought he saw a light.</p> + +<p>"And why not?" he asked, soothingly, "He seems quite estimable. He was +here only a moment ago?"</p> + +<p>"Who was here?" she asked in bewilderment.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Moncreith."</p> + +<p>At that she laughed. The storm was over, the sunshine peeped out again.</p> + +<p>"You dear, blind comfort, you!" she said, "What do I care if a thousand +Moncreiths—"</p> + +<p>"Then it's Orson Vane," said the Professor, not so blind after all. +"Well, dear, and what has he been doing now?"</p> + +<p>He listened to her rather rambling, rather spasmodic recital; listened +and grew moody, though he could scarce keep away some little mirth. He +saw through these masquerades, of course. Who else, if not he? Poor +Jeannette! So she had set her happy little heart upon that young man? A +young man who, to serve both their ends, was playing chameleon. A young +man who was mining greater secrets from the deeps of the human soul than +had ever been mined before. A wonderful young man, but—would that make +for Jeannette's happiness? At any rate he, the Professor, would have to +keep an eye open for Vane's doings. There was no knowing what strange +ways these borrowed souls might lead to. He wondered who it was that, +this time, had been rifled of his soul.</p> + +<p>Wonder did not long remain the adjuncts of the Professor and his +daughter only. The whole world of society began to wonder, as time went +on, at the new activities of Orson Vane. Wonder ceased, presently, and +there was passive acceptance of him in his new role. Fashions, after +all, are changed so often in the more external things, that the smart +set would not take it as a surprising innovation if some people took to +changing their souls to suit the social breeze.</p> + +<p>Orson Vane took a definite place in the world of fashion that season. He +became the arbiter of golf; he gave little putting contests for women +and children; he looked after the putting greens of a number of smart +clubs with as much care as a woman gives her favorite embroideries. He +took to the study of the Turkish language. There were rumors that he +meant to become the Minister to Turkey. He traveled a great deal, and he +published a book called "The Land of the Fez." Another little brochure +bearing his name was "The Caddy; His Ailments and Diseases." It was +rumored that he was busy in dramatization of his novel, "Five Loaves and +Two Fishes!" When Storman Pasha made his memorable visit to the States +it was Orson Vane who became his guide and friend. A jovial club of +newspaper roysterers poked fun at him by nominating him for Mayor. He +went through it all with a bland humorlessness and stubborn dignity that +nothing could affront. His indomitable energy, his intense seriousness +about everything, kept smart society unalterably loyal. He led its +cotillions, arranged its more sober functions, and was a household word +with the outsiders that reach society only through the printed page. His +novels—whether they were his own or done for him hardly matters—were +just dull enough to offend nobody. The most indolent dweller in Vanity +Fair could affect his books without the least mental exertion. The lives +of our fashionables are too full, too replete with a multitude of +interests and excitements, to allow of the concentration proper for the +reading of scintillating dialogue, or brilliant observations. Orson Vane +appeared to gauge his public admirably; he predominated in the outdoor +life, in golf, in yachting, in coaching, yet he did not allow anyone +else to dispute the region of the intellect, of indoors, with him. He +shone, with a severe dimness, in both fields.</p> + +<p>Jeannette Vanlief, meanwhile, lost much of the sparkle she had hitherto +worn. She drooped perceptibly. The courtship of Luke Moncreith left her +listless; he persevered on the strength of his own ambition rather than +her encouragement. His daughter's looks at last began seriously to worry +Professor Vanlief. Something ought to be done. But what? It was +apparently Orson Vane's intention to keep that borrowed soul with him +for a long time. In the meanwhile Jeannette.... The Professor, the more +he considered the matter, felt the more strongly that just as he was the +one who had given Vane this power, so had he the right, if need be, to +interfere. The need was urgent. The masquerade must be put an end to.</p> + +<p>His resolve finally taken, Professor Vanlief paid a visit to Orson +Vane's house. Vane was, as he had hoped, not at home. He +cross-questioned Nevins.</p> + +<p>The man was only too willing to admit that his master's actions were +queer. But Mr. Vane had given him warning to that effect; he must have +felt it coming on. It was a malady, no doubt. For his part he thought it +was something that Mr. Vane would wish to cure rather than endure. He +didn't pretend to understand his master of late, but—</p> + +<p>The Professor put a period to the man's volubility with some effort.</p> + +<p>"I want you," he urged, "to jog your memory a little. Never mind the +symptoms. Give me straightforward answers. Now—did you touch the new +mirror, leaving it uncovered, at any time within the past few weeks?"</p> + +<p>"Oh," was the answer, "the new mirror, is it! I knows well the uncanny +thing was sure to make trouble for me. But I gives you my word, as I +hopes to be saved, that I've never so much as brushed the dust off it, +much less taken the curtain off. It's fearsome, is that mirror, I'm +thinking. It's—"</p> + +<p>"Then think back," pressed the Professor, again stemming the tide of the +other's talk relentlessly, "think back: was anyone, ever, at any time, +alone in Mr. Vane's rooms? Think, think!"</p> + +<p>"I disremember," stammered Nevins. "I think not—Oh, wait! It was a long +time ago, but I think a gentleman wrote Mr. Vane a note once, and I, +having work in the other rooms, let him be undisturbed. But I told the +master about it, the minute he came in, sir. He was not the least vexed, +sir. Oh, I'm easy in my mind about that time."</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes,—but the gentleman's name!" The Professor shook the man's +shoulder quite roughly.</p> + +<p>"His name? Oh, it was just Mr. Spalding-Wentworth, sir, that was all."</p> + +<p>The Professor sat down with a laugh. Spalding-Wentworth! He laughed +again.</p> + +<p>Nevins had the air of one aggrieved. "Mr. Vane laughed, too, I remember, +when I told him. Just the minute I told him, sir, he laughed. I've +puzzled over it, time and again, why—"</p> + +<p>The Professor left Nevins puzzling. There was no time to be lost. He +remembered now that Spalding-Wentworth had for some time been ailing. +The world, in its devotion to Orson Vane, had forgotten, almost, that +such a person as Spalding-Wentworth had ever existed. To be forgotten +one has only to disappear. Dead men's shoes are filled nowhere so +quickly as in Vanity Fair; though, to be paradoxic, for the most part +they are high-heeled slippers.</p> + +<p>It took some little time, some work, to arrange what the Professor had +decided must be done. He went about his plans with care and skill. He +suborned Nevins easily enough, using, chiefly, the plain truth. Nevins, +with the superstition of his class, was willing to believe far greater +mysteries than the Professor half hinted at. By Nevins' aid it happened +that Orson Vane slept, one night, face to face with the polished surface +of the new mirror. In the morning it was curtained as usual.</p> + +<p>That morning Augustus Vanlief called at the Wentworth house. He asked +for Mrs. Wentworth. He went to his point at once.</p> + +<p>"You know who I am, I dare say, Mrs. Wentworth. You love your husband, I +am sure; you will pardon my intrusion when I tell you that perhaps I can +do something the best thing of all—for him. It is, in its way, a +matter of life and death. Do the doctors give you any hope?"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Wentworth, her beauty now tired and touched by traces of spoilt +ambition, made a listless motion with her hands.</p> + +<p>"I don't know why I should tell you," she said, "or why I should not. +They tell me vague things, the doctors do, but I don't believe they know +what is the matter."</p> + +<p>"Do you?"</p> + +<p>"I?" she looked at Vanlief, and found a challenge in his regard. "It +seems," she admitted, "as if—I hardly like to say it,—but it seems as +if there was no soul in him any more. He is a shell, a husk. The life in +him seems purely muscular. It is very depressing. Why do you think you +can do anything for Clarence, Professor? I did not know your researches +took you into medicine?"</p> + +<p>"Ah, but you admit this is not a matter for medicine, but for the mind. +Will you allow me an experiment madame? I give you my word of honor, my +honor and my reputation, that there is no risk, and there may +be—perhaps, an entire restoration. There is—a certain operation that I +wish to try—"</p> + +<p>"An operation? The most eminent doctors have told me such a thing would +be useless. We might as well leave my poor husband clear of the knife, +Professor."</p> + +<p>"Oh, it is no operation, in that sense. Nothing surgical. I can hardly +explain; professional secrets are involved. If you did not know that I +am but a plodding old man of science—if I were an unknown charlatan—I +would not ask you to put faith in me. But—I give you my word, my +promise, that if you will let Mr. Wentworth come with me in my brougham +I will return with him within the hour. He will be either as he is now, +or—as he once was."</p> + +<p>"As he once was—!" Mrs. Wentworth repeated the phrase, and the thought +brought her a keen moment of anguish that left a visible impress on her +features. "Ah," she sighed, "if I could only think such a thing +possible!" She brooded in silence a moment or two. Then she spoke.</p> + +<p>"Very well. You will find him in the library. Prim, show the gentleman +to the library. If you can persuade him, Professor—" She smiled +bitterly. "But then, anybody can persuade him nowadays." She turned to +some embroidery as if to dismiss the subject, to show that she was +resigned even to hopeless experiments. The very fact that she was plying +the needle rather than the social sceptre was gauge of her descent from +the heights. As a matter of fact Vanlief found Wentworth amenable +enough. Wentworth was reading Marie Corelli. His mind was as empty as +that. Nothing could better define his utter lapse from intelligence. He +put the book down reluctantly as the Professor came in. He listened +without much enthusiasm. A drive? Why not? He hadn't driven much of +late, but if it was something that would please the Professor. He +remembered, through a mist, that he had known Vanlief when he himself +was a boy; his father had often spoken of Vanlief with respect. Nothing +further in the way of mental exertion came to him. He followed Vanlief +as a dog follows whoso speaks kindly to it.</p> + +<p>The conversation between the two, in the brougham, would hardly tend to +the general entertainment. It was a thing of shreds and patches. It led +nowhither.</p> + +<p>The brougham stopped at the door of Orson Vane's house. Nevins let them +in, whispering an assuring confidence to the professor. As they reached +the door of the dressing-room Vanlief pushed Wentworth ahead of him, and +bade him enter. He kept behind him, letting the other's body screen him +from the staring mirror.</p> + +<p>Wentworth looked at himself. A hand traveled slowly up to his forehead.</p> + +<p>"By Jove!" he said, hesitatingly, "I never put the curtain back, after +all." And he covered up the mirror. "Curious thing," he went on, with +energy vitalizing each word, "what possessed me to come here just now, +when I know for a fact that they're playing the Inter-State Golf +championships to-day. Dashed if I know why I didn't go!" He walked out, +plainly puzzled, clumsily heedless of Vanlief and Nevins, but—himself +once more.</p> + +<p>Orson Vane, at just that time, was on the links of the Fifeshire Golf +Club. He was wearing a little red coat with yellow facings. He was in +the act of stooping on a green, to look along the line of his putt, when +he got to his feet in a hurried, bewildered way. He threw his putter +down on the green. He blushed all over, shaming the tint of his scarlet +coat.</p> + +<p>"What a foolish game for a grown-up man!" he blurted out, and strode off +the grounds.</p> + +<p>The bystanders were aghast. They could not find words. Orson Vane, the +very prophet of golf, to throw it over in that fashion! It was +inexplicable! The episode was simply maddening.</p> + +<p>But it was remarked that the decline of golf on this side of the water +dated from that very day.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XII" id="CHAPTER_XII"></a>CHAPTER XII.</h3> + + +<p>Orson Vane was taking lunch with Professor Vanlief. Jeannette, learning +of Vane's coming, had absented herself.</p> + +<p>"It is true," Vane was saying, "that I can assert what no other man has +asserted before,—that I know the exact mental machinery of two human +beings. Yes; that is quite true. But—"</p> + +<p>"I promised nothing more," remarked Vanlief.</p> + +<p>"No. That is true, too. I have lived the lives of others; I have given +their thoughts a dwelling. But I am none the happier for that."</p> + +<p>"Oh," admitted Vanlief, "wisdom does not guarantee happiness...." He +drummed with his fine, long fingers, upon the table-cloth. Vane, +watching him, noted the almost transparent quality of his skin. Under +that admirable mask of military uprightness there was an aging, a fading +process going on, that no keen observer could miss. "It is the pursuit, +not the capture of wisdom, that brings happiness. Wisdom is too often +only a bubble that bursts when you touch it."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps that is it. At any rate I know that I do not love my neighbor +any more because I have fathomed some of his thoughts. Moreover, +Professor, has it occurred to you that your discovery, your secret, +carries elements of danger with it? Take my own experiments; there might +have been tragic results; whole lives might have been ruined. In one +case I was nearly the victim of a tragedy myself; I might have become, +for all time, the dreadful creature I was giving house-room to. In the +other, there was no more than a farce possible; the visiting spirit was, +after all, in subjection to my own. I think you will have to simplify +the details of your marvelous secret. It works a little clumsily, a +little—"</p> + +<p>"Oh," the Professor put in, "I am perfecting the process. I spend my +days and my nights in elaborating the details. I mean to have it in the +simplest, most unmistakable perfection before I hand it over to the +human race."</p> + +<p>"Sometimes I think," mused Vane, "that your boon will be a doubtful one. +I can see no good to be gained. My whole point of view is changing. I +ached for such a chance of wisdom once; now that it has come to me I am +sad because the things I have learned are so horrible, so silly. I had +not thought there were such souls in the world; or not, at any rate, in +the immediate world about me."</p> + +<p>"Oh," the Professor went on, steadfastly, "there will be many benefits +in the plan. Doctors will be able to go at once to the root of any +ailments that have their seat in the brain. Witnesses cab be made to +testify the truth. Oh—there are ever so many possibilities."</p> + +<p>"As many for evil as for good. Second-rate artists could steal the +ideas, the inventions of others. No inventor, no scientist, would be +sure of keeping his secrets. The thing would be a weapon in the hands of +the unscrupulous."</p> + +<p>"Ah, well," smiled Vanlief, "so far I have not made my discovery public, +have I? It is a thing I must consider very carefully. As you say, there +are arguments on either side. But you must bear in mind that you are +somewhat embittered. It was your own fault; you chose the subject +wittingly. If you were to read a really beautiful mind, you might turn +to the other extreme; you might urge me to lose no time in giving the +world my secret. The wise way is between the two; I must go forward with +my plans, prepared for either course. I may take it to my grave with me, +or I may give it to the world; but, so far, it is still a little +incomplete; it is not ripe for general distribution. Instead of the one +magic mirror there must be myriads of them. There are stupendous +opportunities. All that you have told me of your own experiences in +these experiments has proved my skill to have been wisely employed; your +success was beyond my hopes. Do you think you will go on?"</p> + +<p>Orson Vane did not answer at once. It was something he had been asking +himself; he was not yet sure of the answer.</p> + +<p>"I haven't made up my mind," he replied. "So far I have hardly been +repaid for my time and the vital force employed. I almost feel toward +these experiments as toward a vice that refines the mind while +coarsening the frame. That is the story of the most terrible vices, I +think; they corrode the body while gilding the brain. But this much I +know; if I use your mirror again it will not be to borrow a merely smart +soul; I mean to go to some other sphere of life. That one is too +contracted."</p> + +<p>"Strange," said the Professor, "that you should have said that. +Jeannette pretends she thinks that, too. I cannot get her to take her +proper position in the world. She is a little elusive. But then, to be +sure, she is not, just now, at her best."</p> + +<p>"She is not ill?" asked Vane, with a guilty start.</p> + +<p>"Nothing tangible. But not—herself...."</p> + +<p>Vane observed that he wished he might have found her in; he feared he +had offended her; he hoped the Professor would use his kind offices +again to soften the young lady's feelings toward him. Then he got up to +go.</p> + +<p>Strolling along the avenue he noted certain aspects of the town with an +appreciation that he had not always given them. He had seen these things +from so many other points of view of late; had been in sympathy with +them, had made up a fraction of their more grotesque element; that to +see them clearly with his own eyes had a sort of novelty. The life of +to-day, as it appeared on the smartest surfaces, was, he reflected, a +colorful if somewhat soulless picture....</p> + +<p>The young men sit in the clubs and in the summer casinos, smoking and +wondering what the new mode in trousers is to be; an acquaintance goes +by; he has a hat that is not quite correct, and his friends comment on +it yawningly; he has not the faintest notion of polite English, but +nobody cares; a man who has written great things walks by, but he wears +a creased coat, and the young men in the smoking-room sniff at him. In +the drags and the yachts the women and the girls sit in radiance and gay +colors and arrogant unconsciousness of position and power; they talk of +golfing and fashion and mustachios; Mrs. Blank is going a hot pace and +Mrs. Landthus is a thoroughbred; adjectives in the newest sporting slang +fly about blindingly; the language is a curious argot, as distinct as +the tortuous lingo of the Bowery. A coach goes rattling by, the horses +throwing their heads in air, and their feet longing for the Westchester +roads. The whip discusses bull-terriers; the people behind him are +declaring that the only thing you can possibly find in the Waldorf rooms +is an impossible lot of people. The complexions of all these people, +intellectually presentable in many ways, and fashionable in yet more +modes, are high in health. They look happy, prosperous and +satisfied....</p> + +<p>Yes, there was a superficial fairness to the picture, Vane admitted. If +only, if only, he had not chosen to look under the surface! Now that he +had seen the world with other eyes, its fairness could rarely seem the +same to him.</p> + +<p>A sturdy beggar approached him, with a whine that proved him an +admirable actor. But Vane could not find it in him to reflect that if +there is one thing more than another that lends distinction to a town it +is an abundance of beggars.</p> + +<p>He wondered how it would be to annex this healthy impostor's mite of a +soul. But no; there could be little wisdom gained there.</p> + +<p>He made, finally, for the Town and Country Club, and tried to immerse +himself in the conversation that sped about. The talked turned to the +eminent actor, Arthur Wantage. The subject of that man's alleged +eccentricities invariably brought out a flood of the town's stalest +anecdotes. Vane, listening in a lazy mood, made up his mind to see +Wantage play that night. It would be a distraction. It would show him, +once again, the present limit in one human being's portraiture of +another; he would see the highest point to which external imitation +could be brought; he could contrast it with the heights to which he +himself had ascended.</p> + +<p>It would be a chance for him to consider Wantage, for the first time in +his life, as a merely second-rate actor. This player was an adept only +in the making the shell, the husk, seem lifelike; since he could not +read the character, how could he go deeper?</p> + +<p>The opportunities the theatre held for him suddenly loomed vast before +Vane.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XIII" id="CHAPTER_XIII"></a>CHAPTER XIII.</h3> + + +<p>The fact that Arthur Wantage was to be seen and heard, nightly, in a +brilliant comedy by the author of "Pious Aeneas," was not so much the +attraction that drew people to his theatre, as was the fact that he had +not yet, that season, delivered himself of a curtain speech. His curtain +speeches were wont to be insults delivered in an elaborately honeyed +manner; he took the pose of considering his audiences with contempt; he +admired himself far more for his condescension in playing to them than +he respected his audiences for having the taste to admire him.</p> + +<p>The comedy in which he was now appearing was the perfection of paradox. +It pretended to be frivolous and was really philosophic. The kernel of +real wisdom was behind the elaborately poised mask of wit. A delightful +impertinence and exaggeration informed every line of the dialogue. The +pose of inimitable, candid egoism showed under every situation. The play +was typical of the author as well as of the player. It veiled, as thinly +as possible, a deal of irony at the expense of the play going public; it +took some of that public's dearest foibles and riddled them to shreds.</p> + +<p>It was currently reported that the only excuse for comparatively +amicable relations between Wantage and O'Deigh, who had written this +comedy, was the fact of there being an ocean between them. Even at that +Wantage found it difficult to suffer the many praises he heard bestowed, +not upon himself but O'Deigh. He had burst out in spleen at this +adulation, once, in the hearing of an intimate.</p> + +<p>"My dear Arthur," said the other, "you strike me as very ungrateful. For +my part, when I see your theatre crowded nightly, when I see how your +exchequer fills steadily, it occurs to me that you should go down on +your knees every night, and thank God that O'Deigh has done you such a +stunning play."</p> + +<p>"Oh," was Wantage's grudging answer, "I do, you know I do. But I also +say: Oh, God, why did it have to be by O'Deigh?"</p> + +<p>The secret of his hatred for O'Deigh was the secret of his hatred for +all dramatists. He was a curious compound of egoism, childishness and +shrewdness. Part of his shrewdness—or was it his childishness?—showed +in his aversion to paying authors' royalties. He always tried to +re-write all the plays he accepted; if the playwrights objected there +was sure to be a row of some sort. When he could find no writers willing +to make him a present of plays, for the sake, as he put it, of having it +done by as eminent an actor as himself, and in so beautiful a theatre, +he was in the habit of announcing that he would forsake the theatre, and +turn critic. He pretended that the world—the public, the press, even +the minor players—were in league against him. There was a conspiracy to +drive him from the theatre; the riff-raff resented that a man of genius +should be so successful. They lied about him; he was sure they lied; for +stories, of preposterous import, came to him; he vowed he never read the +newspapers—never. As for London—oh, he could spin you the most +fascinating yarn of the cabal that had dampened his London triumph. He +mentioned, with a world of meaning in his tone, the name of the other +great player of the time; he insinuated that to have him, Wantage, +succeed in London, had not been to that other player's mind; so the +wires had been pulled; oh, it was all very well done. He laughed at the +reminiscence,—a brave, bluff laugh, that told you he could afford to +let such petty jealousies amuse him.</p> + +<p>The riddle of Arthur Wantage's character had never yet been read. There +were those who averred he was never doing anything but acting, not in +the most intimate moments of his life; some called him a keen +moneymaker, retaining the mummer's pose off the stage for the mere +effect of it on the press and the public. What the man's really honest, +unrehearsed thoughts were,—or if he ever had such—no man could say. To +many earnest students of life this puzzle had presented itself. It +began to present itself, now, to Orson Vane.</p> + +<p>This, surely, was a secret worth the reading. Here were, so to say, two +masks to lift at once. This man, Arthur Wantage, who came out before the +curtain now as this, now as that, character of fancy or history, what +shred of vital, individual personality had he retained through all these +changings? The enthusiasm of discovery, of adventure came upon Vane with +a sharpness that he had not felt since the day he had mocked the +futility of human science because it could not unlock other men's +brains.</p> + +<p>The horseshoe-shaped space that held the audience glittered with babble +and beauty as Orson Vane took his seat in the stalls. The presence of +the smart set gave the theatre a very garland of charm, of grace, and of +beauty's bud and blossom. The stalls were radiant, and full of polite +chatter. The boxes wore an air of dignified twilight,—a twilight of +goddesses. The least garish of the goddesses, yet the one holding the +subtlest sway, was Jeanette Vanlief. She sat, in the shadow of an upper +box, with her father and Luke Moncreith. On her pale face the veins +showed, now and then; the flush of rose came to it like a surprise—like +the birth of a new world. She radiated no obvious, blatant fascination. +Her hands slim and white; her voice firm and low; her eyes of a hue like +that of bronze, streaked like the tiger-lilies; her profile sharp as a +cameo's; the nose, with its finely-chiseled nostrils, curved in Roman +mode; the mouth, thin and of the faintest possible red, slightly +drooping. And then, her hair! It held, again, a spray of lilies of the +valley; the artificial lights discovered in the waves and the curls of +it the most unexpected shades, the most mercurial tints. The slight +touch of melancholy that hovered over her merely enhanced her charm. +Moncreith told himself that he would go to the uttermost ends of evil to +win this woman. He had come, the afternoon of that day, through the most +dangerous stream in the world, the stream of loveliness that flows over +certain portions of the town at certain fashionable hours. It is a +stream the eddies of which are of lace and silk; its pools are the blue +of eye and the rose of mouth; its cataracts are skirts that swirl and +whisper and sing of ivory outlines and velvet shadows. Yet, as he looked +at Jeannette Vanlief, all that fascinating, dangerous stream lost its +enticement for him; he saw her as a dream too high for comparison with +the mere earthiness of the town. He felt, with a grim resolution, that +nothing human should come between him and Jeannette.</p> + +<p>Orson Vane, from his chair, paid scant attention to his fellow +spectators. He was intent upon the dish that O'Deigh and Wantage had +prepared for his delectation. He felt a delicious interest in every +line, every situation. He had made up his mind that he would go to the +root of the mystery that men called Arthur Wantage. Whether that mask +concealed a real, high intelligence, or a mere, cunning, monkeylike +facility in imitation—his was to be the solution of that question. +Wrapped up in that thought he never so much as glanced toward the box +where his friends sat.</p> + +<p>At the end of the first act Vane strolled out into the lobby. He nodded +hither and thither, but he felt no desire for nearer converse. A hand on +his shoulder brought him face to face with Professor Vanlief. He was +asked to come up to the box. He listened, gravely, to the Professor's +words, and thanked him. So Moncreith was smitten? He smiled in a kindly +way; he understood, now, the many brusqueries of his friend. That day, +long ago, when he had been so inexplicable in the little bookshop; the +many other occasions, since then, when Luke had been rude and bitter. A +man in love was never to be reckoned on. He wished Luke all the luck in +the world. It struck him but faintly that he himself had once longed for +that sweet daughter of Augustus Vanlief's; he told himself that it was a +dream he must put away. He was a mariner bent on many deep-sea voyages +and many hazards of fate; it would be unfair to ask any woman to share +in any such life. His life would be devoted to furthering the +Professor's discoveries; he meant to be an adventurer into the regions +of the human soul; it was a land whither none could follow.</p> + +<p>Perhaps, if he had seen Jeannette, he might have felt no such +resignation. His mood was so tense in its devotion to the puzzle +presented by the player, Wantage, that the news brought him by Vanlief +did not suffice to rouse him. He had a field of his own; that other one +he was content to leave to Moncreith.</p> + +<p>Moncreith, in the meanwhile, was making the most of the opportunity the +Professor, in the kindness of his heart, had given him. The orchestra +was playing a Puccini potpourri. It rose feebly against the prattle and +the chatter and the hissing of the human voices. Moncreith, at first, +found only the most obvious words.</p> + +<p>"A trifle bitter, the play," he said, "rather like a sneer, don't you +think?"</p> + +<p>"Well," granted Jeannette, indolently, "I suppose it is not called +'Voltaire' for nothing. And there are moods that such a play might +suit."</p> + +<p>"No doubt. But—do you think one can be bitter, when one loves?"</p> + +<p>The girl looked up in wonder. She blushed. The melancholy did not leave +her face. "Bitter? Love?" she echoed. "They spell the same thing."</p> + +<p>"Oh," he urged, "the play has made you morbid. As for me, I have heard +nothing, seen nothing, but you. The bitterness of the play has skimmed +by me, that is all; I have been in too sweet a dream to let those people +on the stage—"</p> + +<p>"How Wantage would rage if he heard you," said the girl. She felt what +was coming, and she meant to fence as well as she could to avoid it.</p> + +<p>"Wantage? Bother Wantage!" He leaned down to her, and whispered, +"Jeannette!"</p> + +<p>The flush on her cheek deepened, but she did not stir. It was as if she +had not heard. She shut her eyes. All her weapons dropped at once. She +knew it had to come; she knew, too, that, in this crisis, her heart +stood plainly legible to her. Moncreith's name was not there.</p> + +<p>"Jeannette," Moncreith went on, in his vibrant whisper, "don't you guess +what dream I have been living in for so long? Don't you know that it is +you, you, you—" He faltered, his emotions outstriding his words. "It is +you," he finished, "that spell happiness for me. I—oh, is there no +other, less crude way of putting it?—I love you, Jeannette! And you?"</p> + +<p>He waited. The chattering and light laughter in the stalls and +throughout the house seemed to lull into a mere hushed murmur, like the +fluttering and twittering of a thousand birds. Moncreith, in his tense +expectation, had heed only for the face of the girl beside him. He did +not see, in the aisle below, Orson Vane, sauntering to his seat. He did +not follow the direction of Jeannette Vanlief's eyes, the instant before +she turned, and answered.</p> + +<p>"I wish you had not spoken. I can't say anything—anything that you +would like. Please, please—" She shook her head, in evident distress.</p> + +<p>"Ah," he burst out, "then it is true, after all, what I have feared. It +is true that you prefer that—that—"</p> + +<p>She stayed him with a quick look.</p> + +<p>"I did not say I preferred anyone. I simply said that you must consider +the question closed. I am sorry, oh, so sorry. I wish a man and a woman +could ever be friends, in this world, without risking either love or +hate."</p> + +<p>"All the same," he muttered, fiercely, "I believe you prefer that +fellow—"</p> + +<p>"Orson Vane's downstairs," said the Professor entering the box at that +moment.</p> + +<p>"That damned chameleon!" So Moncreith closed, under his breath, his just +interrupted speech.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XIV" id="CHAPTER_XIV"></a>CHAPTER XIV.</h3> + + +<p>A little before the end of that performance of "Voltaire," Orson Vane +made his way to Arthur Wantage's dressing-room. They had, in their +character of men in some position of eminence in different phases of the +town's life, a slight acquaintance. They met, now and then, at the +Mummers' Club. Vane's position put him above possibility of affront by +Wantage in even the most arrogant and mannerless of the latter's moods.</p> + +<p>Vane's invitation to a little supper, a little chat, and a little smoke, +just for the duet of them, brought forth Wantage's most winning smile of +acquiescence.</p> + +<p>"Delighted, dear chap," he vowed. He could be, when he chose, the most +winning of mortals. He was, during the drive to Vane's house, an +admirable companion. He told stories, he made polite rejoinders, he was +all glitter and graciousness. But it was when he was seated to an +appetizing little supper that he became most splendid.</p> + +<p>"My dear Vane," he said, lifting a glass to the light, "you should write +me a play. I am sure you could do it. These fellows who are in the mere +business of it,—well, they are really impossible. They are so vulgar, +so dreadful to do business with. I hate business, I am a child in such +affairs; everyone cheats me. I mean to have none but gentlemen on my +business staff next season. The others grate on me, Vane, they grate. +And if I could only gather a company of actors who were also +gentlemen—Oh, I assure you, one cannot believe what things I endure. +The stupidity of actors!" He pronounced the word as if it were accented +on the last syllable. He raised his eyes to heaven as he faltered in +description of the stupidities he had to contend with.</p> + +<p>"Write a play?" said Orson, "I fear that would be out of my line. I +merely live, you know; I do not describe."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I think you would be just the man. You would give me a play that +society would like. You would make no mistakes of taste. And think, my +dear fellow, just think of the prestige my performance would give you. +It would be the making of you. You would be launched. You would need no +other recommendation. When you approach any of these manager fellows all +you have to do is to say, 'Wantage is doing a play of mine.' That is a +hallmark; it means success for a young man."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps. But I have no ambitions in that way. How do you like my +Bonnheimer?"</p> + +<p>"H'm—not bad, Vane, not bad. But you should taste my St. Innesse. It is +a '74. I got it from the cellars of the Duke of Arran. You know Merrill, +the wine-merchant on Broadway? Shrewd fellow! Always keeps me in mind; +whenever he sees a sale of a good cellar on the other side, he puts in a +bid; knows he can always depend on Wantage taking the bouquet of it off +his hands. You must take dinner with me some night, and try that St. +Innesse. Ex-President Richards told me, the other evening, that it was +the mellowest vintage he had tasted in years. You know Richards? Oh, you +should, you should!"</p> + +<p>Vane listened, quietly amused. The vanity, the egoism of this player +were so obvious, so transparent, so blatant. He wondered, more than +ever, what was under that mask of arrogance and conceit. The perfect +frankness of the conceit made it almost admirable.</p> + +<p>"You know," Wantage remarked presently, "I'm really playing truant, +taking supper with you. I ought to be studying."</p> + +<p>"A new play?"</p> + +<p>"No. My curtain speech for to-morrow night. It's the last night of the +season, and they expect it of me, you know. I've vowed, time and again, +I would never make another curtain-speech in my life, but they will have +them, they will have them!" He sighed, in submission to his fate. Then +he returned to a previous thought. "I wish, though," he said, "that I +could persuade you to do a play for me. Think it over! Think of the name +it would give you. Or you might try managing me. Eh, how does that +strike you? Such a relief to me if I could deal with a gentleman. You +have no idea—the cads there are in the theatre! They resent my being a +man who tries to prove a little better educated than themselves. They +hate me because I am college-bred, you know; they prefer actors who +never read. How many books do you think I read before I attempted +<i>Voltaire</i>? A little library, I tell you. And then the days I spent in +noting the portraits! I traveled France in my search. For the actor who +takes historic characters there cannot be too many documents. +Imagination alone is not enough. And then the labor of making the play +presentable; I wish you could see the thing as it first came to me! You +would think a man like O'Deigh would have taken into consideration the +actor? But no; the play, as O'Deigh left it, might have been for a stock +company. <i>Frederick the Great</i> was as fine a part as my own. Oh, they +are numbskulls. And the rehearsals! Actors are sheep, simply sheep. The +papers say I am a brute at rehearsals. My dear Vane, I swear to you that +if Nero were in my place he would massacre all the minor actors in the +land. And they expect the salaries of intelligent persons!"</p> + +<p>Vane, listening, wondered why Wantage, under such an avalanche of +irritations, continued such life. Gradually it dawned on him that all +this fume and fret was merely part of the man's mummery; it was his +appeal to the sympathy of his audience; his argument against the +reputation his occasional exhibitions of rage and waywardness had given +him.</p> + +<p>Vane's desire to penetrate the surface of this conscious imitator, this +fellow who slipped off this character to assume that, grew keener and +keener. Where, under all this crust of alien form and action, was the +individual, human thought and feeling? Or was there any left? Had the +constant corrosion of simulated emotions burnt out all the original +character of the mind?</p> + +<p>Vane could not sufficiently hasten the end for which he had invited +Wantage.</p> + +<p>"You are," he said presently, as a lull in the other's monologue allowed +him an opening, "something of an amateur of tapestry, of pictures, of +bijouterie. I have a little thing or two, in my dressing-room, that I +wish you would give me an opinion on."</p> + +<p>They took their cigarettes into the adjoining dressing-room. Wantage +went, at once, to the mirrors.</p> + +<p>"Ah, Florence, I see." He frowned, in critical judgment; he went humming +about the room, singing little German phrases to the pictures, snatches +of chansonettes to the tapestries. He was very enjoyable as a spectacle, +Vane told himself. He tiptoed over the room, now in the mode of his +earliest success, "The King of Dandies," now in the half limping style +of his "Rigoletto."</p> + +<p>"You should have seen the Flemish things I had!" he declared. That was +his usual way of noting the belongings of others; they reminded him of +his own superior specimens. "I sold them for a song, at auction. Don't +you think one tires of one's surroundings, after a time? People go to +the hills and the seashore, because they tire of town. I have the same +feeling about pictures, and furniture, and bric-a-brac. After a time, +they tire me. I have to get rid of them. I sell them at auction. People +are always glad to bid for something that has belonged to Arthur +Wantage. But everything goes for a song. Oh, it is ruinous, ruinous." He +peered, and pirouetted about the corners. "Ah," he exclaimed, "and here +is something covered up! A portrait? Something rare?" He posed in front +of it, affecting the most devouring curiosity.</p> + +<p>"A sort of portrait," said Vane, touching the cord at back of the +mirror.</p> + +<p>"Ah," said Wantage, gazing, "you are right. A sort of portrait." And he +laughed, feebly, feebly. "That Bonnheimer," he muttered, "a deuce of a +wine!" He clutched at a chair, reeling into it.</p> + +<p>Vane, passing to the mirror's face, took what image it turned to him, +and then, leisurely, replaced the curtain.</p> + +<p>He surveyed the figure in the chair for a moment or so. Then he called +Nevins. "Nevins," he said, "where the devil are you? Never where you're +wanted. What does one pay servants outrageous wages for! They conspire +to cheat one, they all do. Nevins!" Nevins appeared, wide-eyed at this +outburst. He was prepared for many queer exhibitions on the part of his +master, but this—this, to a faithful servant! He stood silent, +expectant, reproachful.</p> + +<p>"Nevins," his master commanded, "have this—this actor put to bed. Use +the library; make the two couches serve. He'll stay here for twenty-four +hours; you understand, twenty-four hours. You will take care of him. The +wine was badly corked, to-night, Nevins. You grow worse every day. You +are in league to drive me distracted. It is an outrage. Why do you stand +there, and shake, in that absurd fashion? It makes me quite nervous. Do +go away, Nevins, go away!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XV" id="CHAPTER_XV"></a>CHAPTER XV.</h3> + + +<p>The papers of that period are all agreed that the eminent actor, Arthur +Wantage, was never seen to more advantage than on the last night of that +particular season. His <i>Voltaire</i> had never been a more brilliant +impersonation. The irony, the cruelty of the character had rarely come +out more effectively; the ingenuity of the dialogue was displayed at its +best.</p> + +<p>Yet, as a matter of fact, Arthur Wantage, all that day and evening, was +in Orson Vane's house, subject to a curious mental and spiritual aphasia +that afterwards became a puzzle to many famous physicians.</p> + +<p>The <i>Voltaire</i> was Orson Vane.</p> + +<p>It was the final triumph of Professor Vanlief's thaumaturgy. Vane was +now in possession of the entire mental vitality sufficient for playing +the part of the evening; the lines, the every pose, came to him +spontaneously, as if he were machinery moving at another's guidance. The +detail of entering the theatre unobserved had been easy; it was dusk and +he was muffled to the eyes. Afterwards, it was merely a matter of +pigment and paints. His fingers found the use of the colors and powders +as easily as his mind held the words to be spoken. There was not a +soul, in the company, in the audience, that did not not find the +<i>Voltaire</i> of that night the <i>Voltaire</i> of the entire season.</p> + +<p>Above the mere current of his speeches and his displayed emotions Orson +Vane found a tide of exaltation bearing him on to a triumphant feeling +of contempt for his audience. These sheep, these herdlings, these +creatures of the fashion, how fine it was to fling into their faces the +bitter taunts of a <i>Voltaire</i>, to see them take them smilingly, +indulgently. They paid him his price, and he hated them for it. He felt +that they did not really understand the half of the play's delicate +finesse; he felt their appreciation was a sham, a pose, a bit of mummery +even more contemptible than his own, since they paid to pose, while he, +at least, had the satisfaction of their money.</p> + +<p>The curtain-fall found him aglow with the splendor of his success. The +two personalties in him joined in a fever of triumph. He, Orson Vane, +had been <i>Voltaire</i>; he would yet be all the other geniuses of history. +He would prove himself the greatest of them all, since he could simulate +them all. A certain vein of petty cunning ran under the major emotion; +Orson Vane laughed to think how he had despoiled Arthur Wantage of his +very temperament, his art, his spirit. This same cunning admonished, +too, the prompt return of Wantage's person, after the night was over, to +the Wantage residence.</p> + +<p>The commotion "in front" brought Orson to a sense of the immediate +moment. The cries for a speech came over a crackling of hand-claps. He +waited for several minutes. It was not well to be too complaisant with +one's public. Then he gave the signal to the man at the curtain, and +moved past him, to the narrow space behind the lights. He bowed. It had +the very air of irony, had that bow. It does not seem humanly possible +to express irony in a curving in the spine, a declension of the head, a +certain pose of the hands, but Vane succeeded, just as Wantage had so +often succeeded, in giving that impression. The bow over, he turned to +withdraw. Let them wait, let them chafe I Commuters were missing the +last trains for the night? So much the better! They would not forget him +so easily.</p> + +<p>When he finally condescended to stride before the curtain again, it was +a lift of the eyebrows, a little gesture, an air that said, quite +plainly: Really, it is very annoying of you. If I were not very gracious +indeed I should refuse to come out again. I do so, I assure you, under +protest.</p> + +<p>He gave a little, delicate cough, he lifted his eyes. At that the house +became still, utterly still.</p> + +<p>He began without any vocative at all.</p> + +<p>"The actor," he said, "who wins the applause of so distinguished a +company is exceedingly fortunate. The applause of such a very +distinguished company—" he succeeded in emphasizing his phrase to the +point where it became a subtle insult—"is very sweet to the actor. It +reconciles him to what he must take to be a breach of true art, the +introduction of his own person on the scene where he has appeared as an +impersonator of character. Some actors are expected to make speeches +after their exertions should be over. I am one of those poor actors. In +the name of myself, a poor actor, and the poor actors in my company, I +must thank this distinguished body of ladies and gentlemen for the +patience with which they have listened to Mr. O'Deigh's little trifle. +It is, of course, merely a trifle, <i>pour passer le temps</i>. Next season, +I hope, I may give you a really serious production. Mr. O'Deigh cables +me that he is happy such distinguished persons in such a critical town +have applauded his little effort. I am sure ever so many of you would +rather be at home than listening to the apologies of a poor actor. For I +feel I must apologize for presenting so inconsiderable a trifle. A mere +summer night's amusement. I have played it as a sort of rest for myself, +as preparation for larger productions. If I have amused you, I am +pleased. The actors' province is to please. The poor actor thanks you."</p> + +<p>He bowed, and the bewildered company who had heard him to the end, +clapped their hands a little. The newspaper men smiled at one another; +they had been there before. The old question of "Why does he do it?" no +longer stirred in them. They were used to Wantage's vagaries.</p> + +<p>The newspapers of the following day had Wantage's speech in full. The +critics wrote editorials on the necessity for curbing this player's +arrogance. The public was astonished to find that it had been insulted, +but it took the press' word for it. Wantage had made that sort of thing +the convention; it was the fashion to call these curtain speeches an +insult, yet to invoke them as eagerly as possible. The widespread +advertising that accrued to Wantage from this episode enabled his +manager to obtain, in his bookings for the following season, an even +higher percentage than usual. To that extent Orson Vane's imitation of +an imitator benefited his subject. In other respects it left Wantage a +mere walking automaton.</p> + +<p>It was fortunate that the closing time for Wantage's theatre was now on. +There was no hitch in Vane's plan of transporting Wantage to his home +quarters; the servants at the Wantage establishment found nothing +unusual in their master having been away for a day and a night; he was +too frequently in the habit, when his house displeased him in some +detail, to stay at hotels for weeks and months at a time; his household +was ready for any vagary. Indisposition was nothing new with him, +either; in reality and affectation these lapses from well-being were not +infrequent with the great player. The doctor told him he needed +rest—rest and sea-air; there was nothing to worry over; he had been +working too hard, that was all.</p> + +<p>So the shell of what had been Wantage proceeded to a watering-place, +while the kernel, now a part of Orson Vane, proceeded to astonish the +town with its doings and sayings.</p> + +<p>Practice had now enabled Vane to control, with a certain amount of +consciousness, whatsoever alien spirit he took to himself. Vigorous and +alert as was the mumming temperament he was now in possession of, he yet +contrived to exert a species of dominance over it; he submitted to it in +the mode, the expression of his character, yet in the main-spring of his +action he had it in subjection. He had reached, too, a plane from which +he was able, more than on any of the other occasions, to enjoy the +masquerade he knew himself taking part in. He realized, with a +contemptuous irony, that he was playing the part of one who played many +parts. The actor in him seemed, intellectually, merely a personified +palimpsest; the mind was receptive, ready to echo all it heard, keen to +reproduce traits and tricks of other characters.</p> + +<p>He held in himself, to be brief, a mirror that reflected whatever +crossed its face; the base of that mirror itself was as characterless, +as colorless, as the mere metal and glass. Superficialities were caught +with a skill that was astonishing; little tricks of manner and speech +were reproduced to the very dot upon the i; yet, under all the raiment +of other men's merely material attributes, there was no change of soul +at all; no transformation touched the little ego-screaming soul of the +actor.</p> + +<p>The superficial, in the meanwhile, was enough to make the town gossip +not a little about the newest diversions of Orson Vane. He talked, now, +of nothing but the theatre and the arts allied to it. He purposed doing +some little comedies at Newport in the course of the summer that was now +beginning. He eyed all the smart women of his acquaintance with an air +that implied either, "I wonder whether you could be cast for a girl I +must make love to," or, "You would be passable in <i>Prince Hal</i> attire." +At home, to his servants, Vane was abominable. When the dreadful +champagne, that some impulse possessed him to buy of a Broadway +swindler, proved as flat as the Gowanus, his language to Nevins was +quite contemptible. "What," he shrieked, "do I pay you for? Tell me +that! This splendid wine spoiled, spoiled, utterly unfit for a gentleman +to drink, and all by your negligence. It is enough to turn one's mind. +It is an outrage. A splendid wine. And now—look at it!" As a conclusion +he threw the stuff in Nevins' face. Nevins made no answer at all. He +wiped the sour mess from his coat with the same air of apology that he +would have used had he spilt a glass himself. But his emotions were none +the less. They caused him, in the privacy of the servants' quarters, to +do what he had not done in years, to drop his h's. "It's the 'ost's +place," said Nevins, mournfully, "to entertain his guests, and not +bully the butler." Which, as a maxim, was valid enough, save that, in +this special case, the guests had come to look upon Vane's treatment of +the servants as part of the entertainment a dinner with him would +provide.</p> + +<p>Another distress that fell to the lot of poor Nevins was the fact that +his master was become averse to the paying of bills. The profanity fell +upon Nevins from both the duns and the dunned.</p> + +<p>"The man from Basser's, Mr. Vane, sir," Nevins would announce, timidly. +"Can't get him to go away at all, sir."</p> + +<p>"Basser's, Basser's? Oh—that tailor fellow. An impudent creature, to +plague me so, when I do him the honor of wearing his coats; they fit +very badly, but I put up with that because I want to help the fellow on. +And what is my reward? He pesters me, pesters me. Tell him—tell him +anything, Nevins. Only do leave me alone; I am very busy, very nervous. +I am going to write a comedy for myself. I have some water-colors to +paint for Mrs. Carlos; I have a ride in the Park, and ever so many other +things to do to-day, and you bother me with pestiferous tailors. Nevins, +you are, you are—"</p> + +<p>But Nevins quietly bowed himself out before he learned what new thing he +was in his master's eyes.</p> + +<p>A malady—for it surely is no less than a malady—for attempting cutting +speeches at any time and place possessed Vane. Shortsightedness was +another quality now obvious in him. He knew you to-day, to-morrow he +looked at you with the most unseeing eyes. His voice was the most +prominent organ in whatever room or club he happened to be; when he +spoke none else could be intelligible. When he knew himself observed, +though alone, he hummed little snatches to himself. His gait took on a +mincing step. There was not a moment, not a pose of his that had not its +forethought, its deliberation, its premeditated effect.</p> + +<p>The gradual increase in the publicity that was part of the penalty of +being in the smart world had made approachment between the stage and +society easier than ever before. Orson Vane's bias toward the theatre +did not displease the modish. Rumors as to this and that heroine of a +romantic divorce having theatric intentions became frequent. The gowns +of actresses were copied by the smart quite as much as the smart set's +gowns were copied by actresses. The intellectual factor had never been +very prominent in the social attitude toward the stage; it was now +frankly admitted that good-looking men and handsome dresses were as much +as one went to the theatre for. Theatrical people had a wonderful claim +upon the printer's ink of the continent; society was not averse to +borrowing as much of that claim as was possible. Compliments were +exchanged with amiable frequence; smart people married stage favorites, +and the stage looked to the smart for its recruits.</p> + +<p>Orson Vane could not have shown his devotion to the mummeries of the +stage at a better time. He gained, rather than lost, prestige.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XVI" id="CHAPTER_XVI"></a>CHAPTER XVI.</h3> + + +<p>It was the fashionable bathing hour at the most exclusive summer resort +on the Atlantic coast. The sand in front of the Surf Club was dotted +with gaudy tents and umbrellas. Persons whom not to know was to be +unknowable were picturesquely distributed about the club verandahs in +wicker chairs and lounges. The eye of an artist would have been +distracted by the beauties that were suggested in the half-lifted skirts +of this beauty, and revealed in the bathing-suit of that one. The little +waves that came politely rippling up the slope of sand seemed to know +what was expected of them; they were in nowise rude. They may have +longed to ruffle this or that bit of feminine frippery, but they +refrained. They may have ached to drown out Orson Vane's voice as he +said "good morning" to everybody in and out of the water; but they +permitted themselves no such luxury.</p> + +<p>Orson Vane was a beautiful picture as he entered the water. His suit was +immaculate; a belt prevented the least wrinkle in his jersey; a rakish +sombrero gave his head a sort of halo. He poised a cigarette in one +hand, keeping himself afloat with the other. He bowed obsequiously to +all the pretty women; he invited all the rich ones to tea and toast—"We +always have a little tea and toast at my cottage on Sundays, you know; +you'll meet only nice-looking people, really; we have a jolly time." +Most of the men he was unable to see; the sunlight on the water did make +such a glare.</p> + +<p>On the raft Orson Vane found the only Mrs. Carlos.</p> + +<p>"If it were not for you, Mrs. Carlos," he assured her, "the ocean would +be quite unfashionable."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Carlos smiled amiably. Speeches of that sort were part of the +tribute the world was expected to pay her. She asked him if the yachts +in the harbor were not too pretty for anything.</p> + +<p>"No," said Vane, "no. Most melancholy sight. Bring up the wickedness of +man, whenever I look at them. I bought a yacht you know, early in the +summer. Liked her looks, made an offer, bought her. A swindle, Mrs. +Carlos, an utter swindle. A disgraceful hulk. And now I can't sell her. +And my cook is a rascal. Oh—don't mention yachts! And my private car, +Mrs. Carlos, you cannot imagine the trials I endure over that! The +railroads overcharge me, and the mob comes pottering about with those +beastly cameras. Really, you know, I am thinking of living abroad. The +theatre is better supported in Europe. I am thinking of devoting my life +to the theatre altogether. It is the one true passion. It shows people +how life should be lived; it is at once a school of morals and +comportment." He peered into the water near the raft. Then he plunged +prettily into the sea. "I see that dear little Imogene," he told Mrs. +Carlos, as he swam off. Imogene was the little heiress of the house of +Carlos; a mere schoolgirl. It was one of Vane's most deliberate appeals +for public admiration, this worship of the society of children. He +gamboled with all the tots and blossoms he could find. He knew them all +by name; they dispelled his shortsightedness marvelously.</p> + +<p>After a proper interval Vane appeared, in the coolest of flannels, on +the verandah of the Club. He bowed to all the women, whether he knew +them or not; he peered under the largest picture hats with an air that +said "What sweet creature is hidden here?" as plainly as words.</p> + +<p>Someone asked him why he had not been to the Casino the night before.</p> + +<p>"Oh," he sighed, "I was fearfully busy."</p> + +<p>"Busy?" The word came in a tone of reproach. A suspicion of any sort of +toil will brand one more hopelessly in the smart set of America than in +any other; one may pretend an occupation but one may not profess it in +actuality.</p> + +<p>"Oh, terribly busy," said Vane. "I am writing a comedy. I have decided +that we must make authorship smarter than it has been. I shall sacrifice +myself in that attempt. You've noticed that not one writing-chap in a +million knows anything about our little world except what is not true? +Yes; it's unmistakable. An entirely false impression of us is given to +the world at large. The real picture of us must come from one of +ourselves."</p> + +<p>"And you will try it?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. I shall do my very best. When it is finished I want you all to +play parts in it. We must do something for the arts, you know. Why not +the arts, as well as tailors and milliners? By the way, I want you all +to come to my little lantern-dance to-night, on the <i>Beaurivage</i>. It is +something quite novel. You must all come disguised as flowers. There +will be no lights but Chinese lanterns. I shall have launches ready for +you at the Casino landing. My cook is quite sober to-day, and the yacht +is as presentable as if she were not an arrant fraud. I mean to have a +dance that shall fit the history of society in America. For that reason +the newspapers must know nothing about it. There can be no history where +there are newspapers. I shall invite nobody who knows how to write; I am +the only one whose taste I can trust. Some people write to live, and +some live to write, and the worst class of all are merely dying to +write. They are all barred to-night. We must try and break all the +conventions. Conventions are like the strolling players: made to be +broke."</p> + +<p>He rattled on in this way, with painful efforts at brilliance, for quite +a time. His hearers really considered it brilliance and listened +patiently. Summer was not their season for intellectual exertion; it +might be a virtue in others, in themselves it would have been a mistake.</p> + +<p>The lantern-dance on Orson Vane's <i>Beaurivage</i> was, as everyone will +remember, an event of exceeding picturesqueness. Mrs. Sclatersby +appeared as a carnation; Mrs. Carlos as a rose. Some of the younger and +divinely figured women appeared as various blossoms that necessitated +imitation of part of Rosalind's costume under the trees. The slender, +tapering stem of one white lily, fragrant and delicious, lingered long +in the memories of the men who were there.</p> + +<p>A sensation was caused by the arrival of Mrs. Barrett Weston. She came +in a scow, seated on her automobile. A shriek of delight from the +company greeted her. The weary minds of the elect were really tickled by +this conceit. The automobile was arranged to imitate a crysanthemum. +Just before she alighted Mrs. Barrett Weston touched a hidden lever and +the automobile began to grind out a rag-time tune.</p> + +<p>A stranger, approaching the <i>Beaurivage</i> at that moment, might have +fancied himself in the politest ward of the most insane of asylums. But +Orson Vane found it all most delightful. It was the affair of the +season.</p> + +<p>"Look," he cried, in the midst of a game of leapfrog in which a number +of the younger guests had plunged with desperate glee, "there is the +moon. How pitably weak she seems, against this brilliance here! It bears +out the theory that art is always finer than nature, and that the +theatre is more picturesque than life. Look at what we are doing, this +moment! We are imitating pleasure. And will you show me any unconscious +pleasure that is so delightful as this?"</p> + +<p>By the time people had begun to feel a polite hunger Vane had completed +his scheme of having several unwieldy barges brought alongside the +<i>Beaurivage</i>. There were two of the clumsy but roomy decks on either +side of the slender, shapely yacht. Over this now quite wide space the +tables were arranged. While the supper went on, Orson Vane did a little +monologue of his own. Nobody paid any attention, but everyone applauded.</p> + +<p>"What a scene for a comedy," he explained, proudly surveying the picture +of the gaiety before him, "what a delicious scene! It is almost real. I +must write a play around it. I have quite made up my mind to devote my +life to the theatre. It is the only real life. It touches the emotions +at all points; it is not isolated in one narrow field of personality. +Have I your permission to put you all in my play? How sweet of you! I +shall have a scene where we all race in automobiles. We will be quite +like dear little children who have their donkey-races. But I think +automobiles are so much more intelligent than donkeys, don't you? And +they have such profound voices! Have you ever noticed the intonation of +the automobiles here? That one of Mrs. Barrett Weston has a delicate +tenor; it is always singing love-songs as if it were tired of life. Then +we have bassos, and baritones, and repulsive falsettos. My automobile +has a voice like a phonograph. When it bubbles along the avenue I can +hear, as plainly as anything, that it is imitating one of the other +automobiles. Some automobiles, I suppose, have the true instinct for the +theatre. Have you noticed how theatric some of the things are, how they +contrive to run away just when everyone is looking?"</p> + +<p>"Just like horses," murmured one of his listeners.</p> + +<p>"Oh, no; I wouldn't say that. Horses have a merely natural intelligence; +it is nothing like the splendidly artificial reasoning of the +automobile. The poor horse, I really pity him! He has nothing before him +but polo. But how thankful he should be to polo. He was a broncho with +disreputable manners; now he is a polo-pony with a neat tail. In time, I +dare say, the horse can learn some of the higher civilization of the +automobile, just as society may still manage to be as intelligent as the +theatre."</p> + +<p>The conclusion of that entertainment marked the height of Orson Vane's +peculiar fame. The radical newspapers caught echoes of it and invented +what they could not transcribe. The young men who owned newspapers had +not been invited by Orson Vane, because, in spite of his theatric mania, +he had no illusions about the decency of metropolitan journalism. He +avowed that the theatre might be a trifle highflavored, but it had, at +the least, nothing of the hypocrisy that smothers the town in lies +to-day and reads it a sermon to-morrow. The most conspicuous of these +newspaper owners went into something like convulsions over what he +called the degeneracy of our society. Himself most lamentably in a state +of table-d'hotage, this young man trumpeted forth the most bitter +editorials against Orson Vane and his doings. He frothed with +anarchistic ravings. Finally, since the world will always listen if you +only make noise loud enough and long enough, the general public began to +believe that Vane was really a dreadful person. He was a leader in the +smart set; he stood for the entire family. His taste for the theater +would debauch all society. His egoisms would spoil what little of the +natural was left in the regions of Vanity Fair. So went the chatter of +the man-on-the-street, that mighty power, whom the most insignificant of +little men-behind-the-pen can move at will.</p> + +<p>One may be ever so immersed in affairs that are not of the world and its +superficial doings, yet it is almost impossible to escape some faint +echo of what the world is chattering about. Professor Vanlief, who had +betaken himself and Jeanette, for the summer, to a little place in the +mountains, was finally routed out of his peace by the rumors concerning +Orson Vane. The give and take of conversation, even at a little +farm-house in the hills, does not long leave any prominent subject +untouched. So Augustus Vanlief one morning bought all the morning +papers.</p> + +<p>He found more than he had wanted. The editorials against the doings of +the smart set, the reports of the sermons preached against their +goings-on, were especially pregnant that morning.</p> + +<p>In another part of the paper he found a line or two, however, that +brought him sharply to a sense of necessary action. The lines were +these:</p> + +<blockquote><p>"Mr. Arthur Wantage is still seriously ill at Framley +Lodge. Unless a decided turn for the better takes place +very shortly, it is doubtful if he can undertake his +starring season at the usual time this year." </p></blockquote> + +<p>Augustus Vanlief saw what no other mortal could have guessed. He saw the +connection between those two newspaper items, the one about Vane and the +one about Wantage.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XVII" id="CHAPTER_XVII"></a>CHAPTER XVII</h3> + +<p>Professor Vanlief lost no time in inventing an excuse for his immediate +departure. Jeannette would be well looked after. He got a few +necessaries together and started for Framley Lodge. After some delay he +obtained an interview with the distinguished patient.</p> + +<p>"Try," urged Vanlief, "to tell me when this illness came upon you. Was +it after your curtain-speech at the end of last season?"</p> + +<p>Wantage looked with blank and futile eyes. "Curtain-speech? I made +none."</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes. Try to remember! It made a stir, did that speech of yours. Try +to think what happened that day!"</p> + +<p>"I made no speech. I remember nothing. I am Wantage, I think. Wantage. I +used to act, did I not?" He laughed, feebly. It was melancholy to watch +him. He could eat and drink and sleep; he had the intelligence of an +echo. Each thought of his needed a stimulant.</p> + +<p>Vanlief persisted, in spite of melancholy rebuffs. There was so much at +stake. This man's whole career was at stake. And, if matters were not +mended soon, the evil would be under way; the harm would have begun. It +meant loss, actual loss now, and one could scarcely compute how much +ruin afterwards. And he, Vanlief, would be the secret agent of this +ruin! Oh, it was monstrous! Something must be done. Yet, he could do +nothing until he was sure. To meddle, without absolute certainty, would +be criminal.</p> + +<p>"What do you remember before you fell ill?" he repeated.</p> + +<p>"Oh, leave me alone!" said Wantage. "Isn't the doctor bad enough, +without you. I tell you I remember nothing. I was well, and now I am +ill. Perhaps it was something Orson Vane gave me at supper that night, I +don't remember—"</p> + +<p>"At supper? Vane?" The Professor leaped at the words.</p> + +<p>"Yes. I said so, didn't I? I had supper in his rooms, and then—"</p> + +<p>But Vanlief was gone. He had no time for the amenities now. His age +seemed to leave him as his purpose warmed, and his goal neared. All the +fine military bearing came out again. The people who traveled with him +that day took him for nothing less than a distinguished General.</p> + +<p>At the end of the day he reached Vane's town house. Nevins was all alone +there; all the other servants were on the <i>Beaurivage</i>. The man looked +worn and aged. He trembled visibly when he walked; his nerves were +gone, and he had the taint of spirits on him.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Vanlief, sir," he whined, "it'll be the death of me, will this +place. First he buys a yacht, sir, like I buy a 'at, if you please; and +now I'm to sell the furniture and all the antics. These antics, sir, as +the master 'as collected all over the world, sir. It goes to me 'eart."</p> + +<p>Vanlief, even in his desperate mood, could not keep his smile back. +"Sell the antiques, eh? Well, they'll fetch plenty, I've no doubt. But +if I were you I wouldn't hurry; Mr. Vane may change his mind, you know."</p> + +<p>"Ah," nodded Nevins, brightening, "that's true, sir. You're right; I'll +wait the least bit. It's never too soon to do what you don't want to, +eh, sir? And I gives you my word, as a man that's 'ad places with the +nobility, sir, that the last year's been a sad drain on me system. What +with swearing, sir, and letters I wouldn't read to my father confessor, +sir, Mr. Vane's simply not the man he was at all. Of course, if he says +to sell the furniture, out it goes! But, like as not, he'll come in here +some line day and ask where I've got all his trappings. And then I'll +show him his own letter, and he'll say he never wrote it. Oh, it's a bad +life I've led of late, sir. Never knowing when I could call my soul my +own."</p> + +<p>The phrase struck the Professor with a sort of chill. It was true; if +his discovery went forth upon the world, no man would, in very truth, +know when he could call his soul his own. It would be at the mercy of +every poacher. But he could not, just now, afford reflections of such +wide scope; there was a nearer, more immediate duty.</p> + +<p>"Nevins," he said, "I came about that mirror of mine."</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir. I'm glad of that, sir; uncommon glad. You'll betaking it +away, sir? It's bad luck I've 'ad since that bit of plate come in the +house."</p> + +<p>"You're right. I mean to take it away. But only for a time. Seeing Mr. +Vane's thinking of selling up, perhaps it's just as well if I have this +out of the way for a time, eh? Might avoid any confusion. I set store by +that mirror, Nevins; I'd not like it sold by mistake."</p> + +<p>"Well, sir, if you sets more store by it than the master, I'd like to +see it done, sir. The master's made me life a burden about that there +glass. I've 'ad to watch it like a cat watches a mouse. I don't know now +whether I'd rightly let you take it or not." He scratched his head, and +looked in some quandary.</p> + +<p>"Nonsense, Nevins. You know it's mine as well as you know your own name. +Didn't you fetch it over from my house in the first place, and didn't +you pack it and wrap it under my very eyes?"</p> + +<p>"True, sir; I did. My memory's a bit shaky, sir, these days. You may do +as you like with your own, I'll never dispute that. But Mr. Vane's +orders was mighty strict about the plaguey thing. I wish I may never +see it again. It's been, 'Nevins, let nobody disturb the new mirror!' +and 'Nevins, did anyone touch the new mirror while I was gone?' and +'Nevins, was the window open near the new mirror?' until I fair feel +sick at the sight of it."</p> + +<p>"No doubt," said the professor, impatiently. "Then you'll oblige me by +wrapping it up for shipping purposes as soon as ever you can. I'm going +to take it away with me at once. I suppose there's no chance of Mr. Vane +dropping in here before I bring the glass back, but, if he does, tell +him you acted under my orders."</p> + +<p>"A good riddance," muttered Nevins, losing no time over his task of +covering and securing the mirror. "I'll pray it never comes this way +again," he remarked.</p> + +<p>The professor, after seeing that all danger of injury to the mirror's +exposed parts was over, walked nervously up and down the rooms. He would +have to carry his plan through with force of arms, with sheer +impertinence and energy of purpose. It was an interference in two lives +that he had in view. Had he any right to that? But was he not, after +all, to blame for the fact of the curious transfusion of soul that had +left one man a mental wreck, and stimulated the other's forces to a +course of life out of all character with the strivings of his real soul? +If he had not tempted Orson Vane to these experiments, Arthur Wantage +would never be drooping in the shadow of collapse, and in danger of +losing his proper place in the roll of prosperity. Vanlief shuddered at +thought of what an unscrupulous man might not do with this discovery of +his; what lives might be ruined, what successes built on fraud and +theft? Fraud and theft? Those words were foul enough in the material +things of life; but how much more horrid would they be when they covered +the spiritual realm. To steal a purse, in the old dramatic phrase, was a +petty thing; but to steal a soul—Professor Vanlief found himself +launched into a whirlpool of doubt and confusion.</p> + +<p>He had opened a new, vast region of mental science. He had enabled one +man to pass the wall with which nature had hedged the unforeseen forces +of humanity. Was he to learn that, in opening this new avenue of psychic +activity, he had gone counter to the eternal Scheme of Things, and let +in no divine light, but rather the fierce glare of diabolism?</p> + +<p>His thoughts traversed argument upon argument while Nevins completed his +work. He heard the man's voice, finally, with an actual relief, a +gladness at being recalled to the daring and doing that lay before him.</p> + +<p>When the Professor was gone, a wagon bearing away the precious mirror, +Nevins poured himself out a notably stiff glass of Five-Star.</p> + +<p>"Here's hoping," he toasted the silent room, "the silly thing gets +smashed into everlasting smithereens!"</p> + +<p>And he drowned any fears he might have had to the contrary. This +particular species of time-killing was now a daily matter with Nevins; +the incessant strain upon his nerves of some months past had finally +brought him to the pitch where he had only one haven of refuge left.</p> + +<p>The Professor sped over the miles to Framley Lodge. He took little +thought about meals or sleep. The excitement was marking him deeply; but +he paid no heed to, or was unaware of, that. Arrived at the Lodge a +campaign of bribery and corruption began. Servant after servant had to +be suborned. Nothing but the well-known fame and name of Augustus +Vanlief enabled him, even with his desperate expenditures of tips, to +avert the suspicion that he had some deadly, some covertly inimical end +in view. One does not, at this age of the world, burst into another +man's house and order that man's servants about, without coming under +suspicion, to put it mildly. Fortunately Vanlief encountered, just as +his plot seemed shattering against the rigor of the household +arrangements, the doctor who was in attendance on Wantage. The man +happened to be on the staff of the University where Vanlief held a +chair. He held the older man in the greatest respect; he listened to his +rapid talk with all the patience in the world. He looked astonished, +even uncomprehending, but he shook his shoulders up and down a few times +with complaisance. "There seems no possible harm," he assented.</p> + +<p>"Don't ask me to believe in the curative possibilities, Professor; +but—there can be no harm, that I see. He is not to be unduly excited. A +mirror, you say? You don't think vanity can send a man from illness to +health, do you? Not even an actor can be as vain as that, surely. +However, I shall tell the attendants to see that the thing is done as +quietly as possible. I trust you, you see, to let nothing detrimental +happen. I have to get over to the Port of Pines. I shall give the +orders. Goodbye. I wish I could see the result of your little—h'm, +notion—but I dare say to-morrow will be soon enough."</p> + +<p>And he smiled the somewhat condescending smile of the successful +practitioner who fancies he is addressing a campaigner whose usefulness +is passing.</p> + +<p>The setting up of the professor's mirror, so as to face Wantage's +sickbed, took no little time, no little care, no little exertion. When +it was in place, the professor tiptoed to the actor's side.</p> + +<p>"Well," queried Wantage, "what is it? Medicine? Lord, I thought I'd +taken all there was in the world. Where is it?"</p> + +<p>"No," said the professor, "not medicine. I am going to ask you to look +quite hard at that curtain by the foot of the bed for a moment. I have +something I think may interest you and—"</p> + +<p>As the actor's eyes, in mere physical obedience to the other's +suggestion, took the desired direction, Vanlief tugged at a cord that +rolled the curtain aside, revealing the mirror, which gave Wantage back +the somewhat haggard apparition of himself.</p> + +<p>A few seconds went by in silence. Then Wantage frowned sharply.</p> + +<p>"Gad," he exclaimed, vigorously and petulantly, "what a beastly bad bit +of make-up!"</p> + +<p>The voice was the voice of the man whom the town had a thousand times +applauded as "The King of the Dandies."</p> + +<p>An exceedingly bad quarter of an hour followed for Vanlief. Wantage, now +in full possession of all his mental faculties, abused the Professor up +hill and down dale. What was he doing there? What business had that +mirror there? What good was a covered-up mirror? Where were the +servants? The doctor had given orders? The doctor was a fool. Only the +mere physical infirmity consequent upon being bedridden for so long +prevented Wantage from becoming violent in his rage. Vanlief, sharp as +was his sense of relief at the success of his venture, was yet more +relieved when his bribes finally got his mirror and himself out of the +Lodge. The incident had its humors, but he was too tired, too enervated, +to enjoy them. The very moment of Wantage's recovery of his soul had its +note of ironic comedy; the succeeding vituperation from the restored +actor; Vanlief's own meekness; the marvel and rapacity of the +servants—all these were abrim with chances for merriment. But Vanlief +found himself, for, perhaps, the first time in his life, too old to +enjoy the happy interpretations of life. Into all his rejoicings over +the outcome of this affair there crept the constant doubts, the +ceaseless questionings, as to whether he had discovered a mine of wisdom +and benefit, or a mere addition to man's chances for evil.</p> + +<p>His return journey, his delivery of the mirror into Nevins' unwilling +care, were accomplished by him in a species of daze.</p> + +<p>He had hardly counted upon the danger of his discovery. Was he still +young enough to contend with them?</p> + +<p>Nevins almost flung the mirror to its accustomed place. He unwrapped it +spitefully. When he left the room, the curtain of the glass was flapping +in the wind. Nevins heard the sound quite distinctly; he went to the +sideboard and poured out a brimming potion.</p> + +<p>"I 'opes the wind'll play the Old 'Arry with it," he smiled to himself. +He smiled often that night; he went to bed smiling. His was the cheerful +mode of intoxication.</p> + +<p>Augustus Vanlief reached the cottage in the hills a sheer wreck. He had +left it a hale figure of a man who had ever kept himself keyed up to the +best; now he was old, shaking, trembling in nerves and muscles.</p> + +<p>Jeannette rushed toward him and put her arms around him. She looked her +loving, silent wonder into his weary eyes.</p> + +<p>"Sleep, dear, sleep," said this old, tired man of science, "first let me +sleep."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XVIII" id="CHAPTER_XVIII"></a>CHAPTER XVIII.</h3> + + +<p>Orson Vane, scintillating theatrically by the sea, was in a fine rage +when Nevins ceased to answer his telegrams. Telegrams struck Vane as the +most dramatic of epistles; there was always a certain pictorial effect +in tearing open the envelope, in imagining the hushed expectation of an +audience. A letter—pooh! A letter might be anything from a bill to a +billet. But a telegram! Those little slips of paper struck immediate +terror, or joy, or despair, or confusion; they hit hard, and swiftly. +Certainly he had been hitting Nevins hard enough of late. He had +peppered him with telegrams about the furniture, about the pictures; he +had forbidden one day what he had ordered the day before. It never +occurred to him that Nevins might seek escape from these torments. Yet +that was what Nevins had done. He had tippled himself into a condition +where he signed sweetly for each telegram and put it in the hall-rack. +They made a beautiful, yellow festoon on the mahogany background.</p> + +<p>"Those," Nevins told himself, "is for a gentleman as is far too busy to +notice little things like telegrams."</p> + +<p>Nevins watched that yellow border growing daily with fresh delight.</p> + +<p>He could keep on accepting telegrams just as long as the sideboard held +its strength. Each new arrival from the Western Union drove him to more +glee and more spirits—of the kind one can buy bottled.</p> + +<p>At last Orson Vane felt some alarm creeping through his armor of +dramatic pose. Could Nevins have come to any harm? It was very annoying, +but he would have to go to town for a day or so. That seemed +unavoidable. Just as he had made up his mind to it, he happened to slip +on a bit of lemon-peel. At once he fell into a towering rage. He cursed +the entire service on the <i>Beaurivage</i> up hill and down dale. You could +hear him all over the harbor. It was the voice of a profane Voltaire.</p> + +<p>That night, at the Casino, his rage found vent in action. He sold the +<i>Beaurivage</i> as hastily as he had bought her.</p> + +<p>He left for town, by morning, full of bitterness at the world's +conspiracy to cheat him. He felt that for a careless deck-hand to leave +lemon-peel on the deck of the Beaurivage was nothing less than part of +the world-wide cabal against his peace of mind.</p> + +<p>He reached his town-house in a towering passion, all the accumulated +ill-temper of the last few days bubbling in him. He flung the housedoor +wide, stamped through the halls. "Nevins!" he shouted, "Nevins!"</p> + +<p>Nothing stirred in the house. He entered room after room. Passing into +his dressing-room he almost tore the hanging from its rod. A gust of air +struck him from the wide-open window. Before he proceeded another step +this gust, that his opening of the curtain had produced, lifted the veil +from the mirror facing him. The veil swung up gently, revealed the +glass, and dropped again.</p> + +<p>Then he realized the figure of Nevins on a couch. He walked up to him. +The smell of spirits met him at once.</p> + +<p>"Poor Nevins!" he muttered.</p> + +<p>Then he fell to further realizations.</p> + +<p>The whole history of his three experiments unfolded itself before him. +What, after them all, had he gained? What, save the knowledge of the +littleness of the motives controlling those lives? This actor, this man +the world thought great, whose soul he had held in usurpation, up to a +little while ago, what was he? A very batch of vanities, a mountain of +egoisms. Had there been, in any of the thoughts, the moods he had +experienced from out the mental repertoire of that player, anything +indicative of nobility, of large benevolence, of sweet and light in the +finest human sense? Nothing, nothing. The ambition to imitate the +obvious points of human action and conduct, to the end that one be +called a character-actor; the striving for an echoed fame rightly +belonging to the supreme names of history; a yearning for the stimulus +of immediate acclamation—these things were not worth gaining. To have +experienced them was to have caught nothing beneficial.</p> + +<p>Orson Vane began to consider himself with contempt. Upon himself must +fall the odium of what the souls he had borrowed had induced in him. The +littleness he had fathomed, the depths of character to which he had +sunk, all left their petty brands on him. He had penetrated the barriers +of other men's minds, but what had it profited him? As a ship becalmed +in foul waters takes on barnacles, so had he brought forth, from the +realm of alien springs and motives he had made his own, a dreadful +incrustation of painful conjectures on the supremacy of evil in the +world.</p> + +<p>It needed only a glance at the man, Nevins, to force home the +destructiveness born of these incursions into other lives. That +trembling, cowering thing had been, before Orson Vane's departure from +the limitations of his own temperament, a decent, self-respecting +fellow. While now—</p> + +<p>Vane paced about the house in bitter unrest. In the outer hall he +noticed the yellow envelopes bordering the coat-rack. He took one of +them down, opened it, and smiled. "Poor Nevins!" he murmured. The next +moment a lad from the Telegraph office appeared in the doorway. Vane +went forward himself; there was no use disturbing Nevins.</p> + +<p>The wire had followed him on from the <i>Beaurivage</i>, or rather from the +man to whom he had sold her. It was from Augustus Vanlief. Its brevity +was like a blow in the face.</p> + +<p>"Am ill," it said, "must see you."</p> + +<p>It was still possible, that very hour, to get an express to the +Professor's mountain retreat. There was nothing to prevent immediate +departure. Nothing—except Nevins. The man really must exercise more +care about that mirror. He was safely out of all his experiments now, +but the thing was dangerous none the less; if it had been his own +property, he would have known how to deal with it. But it was the +Professor's secret, the discovery of a lifetime. For elaborate +precautions, or even for hiding the thing in some closet, there was no +time. He could only rouse Nevins as energetically as possible to a sense +of his previous defection from duty; gently and quite kindly he +admonished him to take every care of the new mirror in the time coming. +Nevins listened to him wide-eyed; his senses were still too much agog +for him to realize whence this change of voice and manner had come to +his master. It was merely another page in the chapter of bewilderment +that piled upon him. He bowed his promise to be careful, he assented to +a number of things he could not fathom, and when Vane was gone he +cleared the momentary trouble in his mind by an ardent drink. The liquor +brought him a most humorous notion, and one that he felt sure would +relieve him of all further anxieties on the score of the new mirror. He +approached the back of it, tore the curtain from its face, wheeled it to +the centre of the room, and placed all the other cheval-glasses close +by. Throughout this he had wit enough, or fear enough—for his memory +brought him just enough picture of Orson's own handling of this mirror +to inspire a certain awe of the front of the thing—never to pass in +face of the mirror. When he had the mirrors grouped in close ranks, he +spun about on his heels quickly, as if seized with the devout frenzy of +a dervish. He fell, finally, in a daze of dizziness and liquor. Yet he +had cunning enough left. He crept out of the room on his stomach, like a +snake with fiery breath. He knew that the angle at which the mirrors +were tilted would keep him, belly to the carpet, out of range. Then he +reeled, shouting, into the corridors.</p> + +<p>He had accomplished his desire. He no longer knew one mirror from the +other.</p> + +<p>Orson Vane, in the meanwhile, was being rushed to the mountains. It was +with a new shock of shame that he saw the ravages illness was making on +the fine face of Vanlief. This, too, was one of the items in the +profit-and-loss column of his experiments. Yet this burden was, +perhaps, a shared one.</p> + +<p>"Ah," said Vanlief, with a quick breath of gladness, "thank God!" He +knew, the instant Vane spoke, that it was Orson Vane himself who had +come; he knew that there was no more doubt as to the success of his own +recent headlong journeyings. They had prostrated him; but—they had won. +Yet there was no knowing how far this illness might go; it was still +imperative to come to final, frank conclusions with the partner in his +secret.</p> + +<p>The instant that Vane had been announced Jeannette Vanlief had left her +father's side. She withdrew to the adjoining room, where only a curtain +concealed her; the doors had all been taken down for the summer. She did +not wish to meet Orson Vane. Over her real feelings for him had come a +cloud of doubts and distastes. She had never admitted to herself, +openly, that she loved him; she tried to persuade herself that his +notorious vagaries had put him beyond her pale. She was determined, now, +to be an unseen ear to what might pass between Orson and her father. It +was not a nice thing to do, but, for all she knew, her father's very +life was at stake. What dire influence might Vane not have over her +father? She suspected there was some bond between them; in her father's +weakened state it seemed her duty to watch over him with every devotion +and alertness.</p> + +<p>Yet, for a long time, the purport of the conversation quite eluded her.</p> + +<p>"I have not gone the gamut of humanity," said Orson, "but I have almost, +it seems to me, gone the gamut of my own courage."</p> + +<p>Vanlief nodded. He, too, understood. Consequences! Consequences! How the +consequences of this world do spoil the castles one builds in it! +Castles in the air may be as pretty as you please, but they are sure to +obstruct some other mortal's view of the sky.</p> + +<p>"If I were younger," sighed Vanlief, "if I were only younger."</p> + +<p>They did not yet, either of them, dare to be open, brutal, forthright.</p> + +<p>"I could declare, I suppose," Vanlief went on, "that it was somewhat +your own fault. You chose your victims badly. You have, I presume, been +disenchanted. You found little that was beautiful, many things that were +despicable. The spectacles you borrowed have all turned out smoky. Yet, +consider—there are sure to be just as many rosy spectacles as dark ones +in the world."</p> + +<p>"No doubt," assented Vane, though without enthusiasm, "but there are +still—the consequences. There is still the chance that I could never +repay the soul I take on loan; still the horror of being left to face +the rest of my days with a cuckoo in my brain. Mind, I have no +reproaches, none at all. You overstated nothing. I have felt, have +thought, have done as other men have felt and thought and done; their +very inner secret souls have been completely in my keeping. The +experiment has been a triumph. Yet it leaves me joyless."</p> + +<p>"It has made me old," said Vanlief, simply. "Ah," he repeated, "if only +I were younger!"</p> + +<p>"The strain," he began again, "of putting an end to your last experiment +has told on me. I overdid it. Such emotion, and such physical tension, +is more than I should have attempted. I begin to fear I may not last +very long. And in that case I think I shall have to take my secret with +me. Orson, it comes to this; I am too old to perfect this marvelous +thing to the point where it will be safe for humanity at large. It is +still unsafe,—you will agree to that. You might wreck your own life and +that of others. The chances are one in a thousand of your ever finding a +human being whom God has so graciously endowed with the divine spirit as +to be able to lose part of it without collapse. I have hoped and hoped, +that such a thing would happen; then there would be two perfectly even, +exactly tempered creatures; even if, upon that transfusion, the mirror +disappeared, there would be no unhappiness as a reproach. But we have +found nothing like that. You have embittered yourself; the glimpses of +other souls you have had have almost stripped you of your belief in an +eternal Good."</p> + +<p>"You mean to send for the mirror?"</p> + +<p>"It would be better, wiser. If I live, it will still be here. If I die, +it must be destroyed. In any event—"</p> + +<p>At the actual approach of this conclusion to his experiments Orson Vane +felt a sense of coming loss. With all the dangers, all the loom of +possible disaster, he was not yet rid of the awful fascination of this +soul-snatching he had been engaged in.</p> + +<p>"Perhaps," he argued, "my next experiment might find the one in a +thousand you spoke of."</p> + +<p>"I think you had better not try again. Tell me, what was Wantage's soul +like?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, I cannot put it into words. A little, feverish, fretful soul, +shouting, all the time: I, I, I! Plotting, planning for public +attention, worldly prominence. No thoughts save those of self. An active +brain, all bent on the ego. A brain that deliberately chose the theatre +because it seems the most spectacular avenue to eminence. A magnetism +that keeps outsiders wondering whether childishness or genius lurks +behind the mask. The bacillus of restlessness is in that brain; it is +never idle, always planning a new pose for the body and the voice."</p> + +<p>"Well," urged Vanlief, "think what might have been had I not put a stop +to the thing. You don't realize the terrible anxiety I was in. You might +have ruined the man's career. However petty we, you and I, may hold +him, there are things the world expects of him; we came close to +spoiling all that. I had to act, and quickly. You may fancy the +difficulties of getting the mirror to Wantage. Oh, it is still all like +an evil dream." He lay silent a while, then resumed: "Is the mirror in +the old room?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. With the others, in the dressing-room."</p> + +<p>"Nevins looks out for it?"</p> + +<p>"As always. Though he grows old, too."</p> + +<p>Vanlief looked sharply at Orson, he suspected something behind that +phrase about Nevins. Again he urged:</p> + +<p>"Better have Nevins bring the mirror back to me."</p> + +<p>Vane hesitated. He murmured a reply that Jeannette no longer cared to +hear. The whole secret was open to her, now; she saw that the Orson Vane +she loved—she exulted now in her admission of that—was still the man +she thought him, that all his inexplicable divagations had been part of +this awful juggling with the soul that her father had found the trick +of. She realized, too, by the manner of Vane, that he had not yet given +up all thought of these experiments; he wanted one more. One more; one +more; it was the cry of the drunkard, the opium-eater, the victim of +every form of mania.</p> + +<p>It should never be, that one more trial. What her father had done, she +could do. She glided out of the room, on the heels of her quick +resolution.</p> + +<p>The two men, in their arguments, their widening discussions, did not +bring her to mind for hours. By that that time she was well on her way +to town.</p> + +<p>Her purpose was clear to her; nothing should hinder its achievement. She +must destroy the mirror. There were sciences that were better killed at +the outset. She did not enter deeply into those phases of the question, +but she had the clear determination to prevent further mischief, further +follies on the part of Vane, further chances of her father's collapse.</p> + +<p>The mirror must be destroyed. That was plain and simple.</p> + +<p>It took a tremendous ringing and knocking to bring Nevins to the door of +Vane's house.</p> + +<p>"I am Miss Vanlief," she said, "I want to see my father's mirror."</p> + +<p>"Certainly, miss, certainly." He tottered before her, chuckling and +chattering to himself. He was in the condition now when nothing +surprised him; any rascal could have led him with a word or a hint; he +was immeasurably gay at everything in the world. He reeled to the +dressing-room with an elaborate air of courtesy.</p> + +<p>"At your service, miss, there you are, miss. You walk straight on, and +there you are, miss. There's the mirror, miss, plain as pudding."</p> + +<p>She strode past him, drawing her skirt away from the horrible taint of +his breath. She knew she would find the mirror at once, curtained and +solitary sentinel before the doorway. She would simply break it with her +parasol, stab it, viciously, from behind.</p> + +<p>But, once past the portal, she gave a little cry.</p> + +<p>All the mirrors were jumbled together, all looked alike, and all faced +her, mysterious, glaringly.</p> + +<p>"Nevins," she called out, "which—which is the one?"</p> + +<p>"Ah, miss," he said, leeringly, "don't I wish I knew."</p> + +<p>No sense of possible danger to herself, only a despair at failure, came +upon Jeannette. Failure! Failure! She had meant to avert disaster, and +she had accomplished—nothing, nothing at all.</p> + +<p>She left the house almost in tears. She felt sure Vane would yield again +to the temptation of these frightful experiments. She could do nothing, +nothing. She had felt justified in attempting destruction of what was +her father's; but she could not wantonly offer all that array of mirrors +on the altar of her purpose. She stumbled along the street, suffering, +full of tears. It was with a sigh of relief that she saw a hansom and +hailed it. The cab had hardly turned a corner before Orson Vane, coming +from another direction, let himself into his house. His conference with +Vanlief had ceased at his own promise to make just one more trial of the +mirror. He could not go about the business of the life he led in town +without assuring himself the mirror was safe.</p> + +<p>He found Nevins incoherent and useless. He began to consider seriously +the advisability of discharging the man; still, he hated to do that to +an old servant, and the man might come to his senses and his duties.</p> + +<p>He spent some little time re-arranging the mirrors in his room. He was +sure there had been no intrusion since he was there himself, and he knew +Nevins well enough to know that individual's horror of facing the +mirror. He himself faced the new mirror boldly enough, sure that his own +image was the only one resting there. He knew the mirror easily, in +spite of the robbery that the wind, as he thought, had committed.</p> + +<p>Nevins, hiding in the corridor, watched him, in drunken amusement.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XIX" id="CHAPTER_XIX"></a>CHAPTER XIX.</h3> + + +<p>The sun, glittering along the avenue, shimmering on the rustling gowns +of the women and smoothing the coats of the horses, smote Orson Vane +gently; the fairness of the day flooded his soul with a tide of +well-being. In the air and on the town there seemed some subtle +radiance, some glamour of enchantment. The smell of violets was all +about him. The colors of new fashions dotted the vision like a painting +by Hassam; a haze of warmth covered the town like a kiss.</p> + +<p>His thoughts, keyed, in some strange, sweet way, to all the pleasant, +happy, pretty things in life, brought him the vision of Jeannette +Vanlief. How long, how far away seemed that day when she had been at his +side, when her voice had enveloped him in its silver echoes!</p> + +<p>As carriage after carriage passed him, he began to fancy Jeannette, in +all her roseate beauty, driving toward him. He saw the curve of her +ankle as she stepped into the carriage; he dreamed of her flower-like +attitude as she leaned to the cushions.</p> + +<p>Then the miracle happened; Jeannette, a little tired, a little pale, a +little more fragile than when last he had seen her, was coming toward +him. A smile, a gentle, tender, slightly sad—but yet so sweet, so +sweet!—a smile was on her lips. He took her hand and held it and looked +into her eyes, and the two souls in that instant kissed and became one.</p> + +<p>"This time," he said—and as he spoke all that had happened since they +had pretended, childishly, on the top of the old stage on the Avenue, +seemed to slip away, to fade, to be forgotten—"it must be a real +luncheon. You are fagged. So am I. You are like a breath of +lilies-of-the-valley. Come!"</p> + +<p>They took a table by an open window. The procession of the town nearly +touched them, so close was it. To them both it seemed, to-day, a happy, +joyous, fine procession.</p> + +<p>"Will you tell me something?" asked the girl, presently, after they had +laughed and chattered like two children for awhile.</p> + +<p>"Anything in the world."</p> + +<p>"Well, then—are you ever, ever going to face that dreadful mirror +again?"</p> + +<p>He smiled, as if there was nothing astonishing in her knowledge, her +question.</p> + +<p>"Do you want me not to?"</p> + +<p>She nodded.</p> + +<p>He put his hand across the table, on one of hers. "Jeannette," he +whispered, "I promise. Why do you care? It is not possible that you +care because, because—Jeannette, will you promise me something, too?"</p> + +<p>They have excellent waiters at the Mayfair. They can be absolutely blind +at times. This was such a time. The particular waiter who was serving +Vane's table, took a sudden, rapt interest in the procession on the +avenue.</p> + +<p>Jeanette crumbled a macaroon with her free hand.</p> + +<p>"You have my hand," she pouted.</p> + +<p>"I need it," he said. "It is a very pretty hand. And very strong. I +think it must have lifted all my ills from me to-day. I feel nothing but +kindness toward the whole world. I could kiss—the whole world."</p> + +<p>"Oh," said Jeannette, pulling her hand away a little, "you monster! You +are worse than Nero."</p> + +<p>"Do you think my kisses would be so awful, then? Or is it simply the +piggishness of me that makes you call me a monster. That's not the right +way to look at it. Think of all the dreadful people there are in the +world; think how philanthropic you must make me feel if I want to kiss +even those."</p> + +<p>"Ah, but the world is full of beautiful women."</p> + +<p>"I do not believe it," he vowed. "I do not think God had any beauty left +after he fashioned—you."</p> + +<p>He was not ashamed, not one iota of the grossness of that fable. He +really felt so. Indeed, all his life he never felt otherwise than that +toward Jeannette. And she took the shocking compliment quite serenely.</p> + +<p>"You are absurd," she said, but she looked as if she loved absurdity. +"Please, may I take my hand?"</p> + +<p>"If you will be very good and promise—"</p> + +<p>"What?"</p> + +<p>"To give me something in exchange."</p> + +<p>"Something in exchange?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. The sweetest thing in the world, the best, and the dearest. You, +dear, yourself. Oh! dearest, if I could tell you what I feel. +Speech—what a silly thing speech is! It can only hint clumsily, +futilely. If I could only tell you, for instance, how the world has +suddenly taken on brightness for me since you smiled. I feel a +tenderness to all nature. I believe at heart there is good in everyone, +don't you? To-day I seem to see nothing but good. I could find you a +lovable spot in the worst villain you might name. I suppose it is the +stream of sweetness that comes from you, dear. Why can't this hour last +forever. I want it to, oh, I want it to!"</p> + +<p>"It is," she whispered, "an hour I shall always remember."</p> + +<p>"Yes, but it must last, it can't die; it sha'n't! Jeannette, let us make +this hour last us our lives! Can't we?"</p> + +<p>"Our lives?" she whispered.</p> + +<p>"Yes, our lives. This is only the first minute of our life. We must +never part again. I seem to have been behind a cloud of doubt and +distrust until this moment. I hardly realize what has happened to me. Is +love so refining a thing as all this? Does it turn bitter into sweet, +and make all the ups and downs of the world shine like one level, +beautiful sea of tenderness? It can be nothing else, but that—my love, +our—can I say our love, Jeannette?"</p> + +<p>The sun streamed in at the window, kissing the tendrils of her hair and +bringing to their copper shimmer a yet brighter blush. The day, with all +its perfume, the splendor of its people, the riot of color of its gowns, +the pride and pomp of its statues and its fountains, flushed the most +secret rills of life.</p> + +<p>"It is a marvel of a day," said Jeannette.</p> + +<p>"A marvel? It is an impossible day; it is not a day at all—it is merely +the hour of hours, the supreme instant, the melody so sweet that it must +break or blind our hearts. You are right, dear, it is a marvelous hour. +You make me repeat myself. Can we let this hour—escape, Jeannette?"</p> + +<p>"It goes fast."</p> + +<p>"Fast—fast as the wind. Fleet as air and fair as heaven are the +instants that bring happiness to common mortals. But we must hold the +hour, cage it, leash it to our lives."</p> + +<p>"Do you think we can?"</p> + +<p>She had used the "we!" Oh yes, and she had said it; she had said it; he +sang the refrain over to himself in a swoon of bliss.</p> + +<p>"I am sure of it," he urged. "Will you try?"</p> + +<p>"You are so much the stronger," she mocked.</p> + +<p>"Oh—if it depends on me—! Try? I shall succeed! I know it. Such love +as mine cannot fail. If only you will let me try. That is all; just +that.</p> + +<p>"I wish you luck!" she smiled.</p> + +<p>"You have said it," he jubilated, "you have said it!" And then, +realizing that she had meant it all the time, he threatened her with a +look, a shake of the head—oh, you would have said he wanted to punish +her in some terrible way, some way that was filled with kisses.</p> + +<p>"Jeannette," he whispered, "I have never heard you speak my name."</p> + +<p>"A pretty name, too," she said. "I have wondered if I might not spoil it +in my pronunciation."</p> + +<p>"You beautiful bit of mockery, you," he said, "will you condescend to +repeat a little sentence after me? You will say it far more prettily +than I, but perhaps you will forgive my lack of music. I am only a man. +You—ah, you are a goddess."</p> + +<p>"For how long?" she asked. "Men marry goddesses and find them clay, +don't they?"</p> + +<p>"You are not clay, dear, you are star-dust, and flowers, and fragrance. +There is not a thought in your dear head that is in tune with mere +clay. But listen! You must say this after me: I—"</p> + +<p>"I—"</p> + +<p>"Love—"</p> + +<p>"Love—"</p> + +<p>"You—"</p> + +<p>"You—"</p> + +<p>"Jeannette—"</p> + +<p>Her lips began to frame the consonant for her own name, but at sight of +the pleading in his gaze she stilled the playfulness of her, and +finished, shyly, but oh, so sweetly.</p> + +<p>"Orson."</p> + +<p>The dear, delightful absurdities of the hour when men and women tell +each other they love, how silly, and how pathetic they must seem to the +all-seeing force that flings our destinies back and forth at its will! +Yet how fair, how ineffably fair, those moments are to their heroes and +heroines; how vastly absurd the rest of the sad, serious world seems to +such lovers, and how happy are the mortals, after all, who through +fastnesses of doubt and darkness, come to the free spaces where the +heart, in tenderness and grace, rules supreme over the intellect, and +keeps in subjection, wisdom, ignorance and all the ills men plague their +minds with!</p> + +<p>When they left the Mayfair together their precious secret was anything +but a secret. Their dream lay fair and open to the world; one must have +been very blind not to see how much these two were in love with each +other. They had gone over every incident of their friendship; they had +stirred the embers of their earliest longings; they had touched their +growing happiness at every point save where Orson's steps aside had hurt +his sweetheart's memory. Those periods both avoided. All else they made +subject for, oh, the tenderest, the most lovelorn conversation +thinkable. It was enough, if overheard, to have sickened the whole day +for any ordinary mortal.</p> + +<p>One must, to repeat, have been very stupid not to see, when they issued +upon the avenue, that they shared the secret that this world appears to +have been created to keep alive. Love clothed them like a visible +garment.</p> + +<p>Luke Moncreith could never have been called blind or stupid. He saw the +truth at once. The truth; it rushed over him like a salt, bitter, acrid +sea. He swallowed it as a drowning man swallows what overwhelms him. One +instant of terrible rage spun him as if he had been a top; he faced +about and was for making, then and there, a scene with this shamelessly +happy pair. But the futility of that struck him on the following second. +He kept his way down the avenue, emotions surging in him; he felt that +his passions were becoming visible and conspicuous; he took a turning +into one of the streets leading eastward. A sign of a wineshop flashed +across his dancing vision, and he clung to it as to an anchor or a +poison. He found a table. He wanted nothing else, only rest, rest. The +wine stood untasted on the bare wood before him. He peered, through it, +into an unfathomable mystery. This chameleon, this fellow Vane—how was +it possible that he had won this glorious, flower-like creature, +Jeannette? This man had been, as the fancy took him, a court fool, a +sporting nonentity, and a blatant mummer. And what was he now? By the +looks of him, he was, to-day—and for how long, Moncreith wondered—a +very essence of meekness and sweetness; butter would not think of +melting in his mouth. What, in the devil's name, what was this riddle! +He might have repeated that question to himself until the end of his +life if the door had not opened then and let in Nevins.</p> + +<p>Nevins ordered the strongest liquor in the place. The sideboard on +Vanthuysen Square might be empty, but Nevins had still the money. As for +the gloomy old Vane house, he really could not stand it any longer. He +toasted himself, did Nevins, and he talked to himself.</p> + +<p>"'An now," he murmured, thickly, "'ere's to the mirror. May I never see +it again as long as I 'as breath in my body and wits in me 'ead. Which," +he observed, with a fatuous grin, "aint for long. No, sir; me nerves is +that a-shake I aint good for nothin' any more. And I asks you, is it +any wonder? 'Ere's Mr. Vane, one day, pleasant as pie. Next day, comes +in, takes a look at that dratted mirror of the Perfessor's, and takes to +'igh jinks. Yes, sir, 'igh jinks, very 'igh jinks. 'As pink tea-fights +in his rooms, 'angs up pictures I wouldn't let me own father see—no, +sir, not if 'e begged me on his bended knee, I wouldn't—and wears what +you might call a tenor voice. Then—one day, while you says 'One for his +Nob' 'e's 'imself again. An' it's always the mirror this, an' the mirror +that. I must look out for it, an' it mustn't be touched, and nobody must +come in. And what's the result of it all? Me nerves is gone, and me +self-respect is gone, and I'm a poor miserable drunkard!"</p> + +<p>He gulped down some of his misery.</p> + +<p>"Join me," said a voice nearby, "in another of those things!"</p> + +<p>Nevins turned, with a swaying motion, to note Moncreith, whose hand was +pointing to the empty glass before Nevins.</p> + +<p>"You are quite right," he went on, when the other's glass had been +filled again, "Mr. Vane's conduct has been most scandalous of late. You +say he has a mirror?"</p> + +<p>All circumspection had long since passed from Nevins. He was simply an +individual with a grievance. The many episodes that, in his filmy mind, +seemed to center about that mirror, shifted and twisted in him to where +they forced utterance. He began to talk, circuitously, wildly, rapidly, +of the many things that rankled in him. He told all he knew, all he had +observed. From out of the mass of inane, not pertinent ramblings, +Moncreith caught a glimmer of the facts.</p> + +<p>What a terrible power this must be that was in Orson Vane's possession! +Moncreith shuddered at the thought. Why, the man might turn himself, in +all but externals—and what, after all, was the husk, the shell, the +body?—into the finest wit, the most lovable hero of his time; he might +fare about the world wrecking now this, now that, happiness; he might +win—perhaps he actually had, even now, won Jeannette Vanlief? If he +had, if—perhaps there was yet time! There was need for sharp, desperate +action.</p> + +<p>He plunged out of the place and toward Vanthuysen Square. Then he +remembered that he could not get in. He aroused Nevins from his brutish +doze. He dragged him over the intervening space. Nevins gave him the +key, and dropped into one of the hall chairs. Moncreith leaped upstairs, +and entered the room where the mirror stood, white, silent, stately.</p> + +<p>He contemplated everything for a time. He conjured up the picture he had +been able to piece together from the rambling monologues of Nevins. He +wondered whether to simply smash in the mirrors—he would destroy them +all, to make sure—by taking a chair-leg to them, or whether he would +carefully pour some acid over them.</p> + +<p>The simpler plan appealed most to him. It was the quickest, the most +thorough. He took a little wooden chair that stood by an ebon +escritoire, swung it high in the air and brought it with a shattering +crash upon the face of the Professor's mirror.</p> + +<p>But there was more than a mere crash. A deadly, sickening, stifling fume +arose from the space the clinking glass unbared; a flame burst out, +leaped at Moncreith and seized him. The deadly white smoke flowed +through the room; flame followed flame, curtains, hangings, screens +went, one after the other, to feed the ravenous beast that Moncreith's +blow had liberated. The room was presently a seething furnace that +rattled in the cage of the walls and windows. Moncreith lay, choked with +the horrid smoke, on the floor. The flames licked at him again and +again; finally one took him on the tip of its tongue, twisted him about, +and shriveled him to black, charred shapelessness.</p> + +<p>The windows fell, finally, out upon the street below. The fire sneaked +downward, laughing and leaping.</p> + +<p>When the firemen came to save Orson Vane's house, they found a grinning, +sodden creature in the hall.</p> + +<p>It was Nevins. "That settles the mirror!" was all he kept repeating.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XX" id="CHAPTER_XX"></a>CHAPTER XX.</h3> + + +<p>The Professor shivered a little when Jeannette came to him with her +budget of wonderful news. She told him of her engagement. He patted her +head, and blessed her and wished her happiness. Then she told him of her +visit to Vane's house. It was at that he shivered.</p> + +<p>He wondered if Vane had taken her image from that fatal glass. If he +had, how, he wondered, would this experiment end? Surely it could not +have happened; Jeannette was quite herself; there was no visible +diminution of charm, of vitality.</p> + +<p>When Vane arrived, presently, the Professor questioned him. The answer +brought the Professor wonder, but he did not count it altogether a +calamity. There could be no doubt that Orson Vane was now wearing +Jeannette's sweet and beautiful soul as a halo round his own. Well, +mused Vanlief, if anything should happen to Jeannette one can always—</p> + +<p>"Oh, father!"</p> + +<p>Jeannette burst into the room with the morning paper from town. "Orson's +house is burnt to the ground. And who do you think is suspected? Luke +Moncreith! They found his body. Read it!"</p> + +<p>The Professor took the report and scanned it. There could be no doubt; +the mirror, the work of his life, was gone. He could never fashion one +like it. Never—Yet—He looked at the two young people at the window, +whither they had turned together, each with an arm about the other.</p> + +<p>"What a marvel of a day!" Jeannette was saying.</p> + +<p>"The days will all be marvels for us," said Orson.</p> + +<p>"The days, I think, must have souls, just as we have. Some days seem to +have such dark, such bitter thoughts.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I think you are right. There are days that strike one as having +souls; others that seem quite soulless. Beautiful, empty shells, some of +them; others, dim, yet tender, full of graciousness."</p> + +<p>"Orson!"</p> + +<p>"Sweetheart!"</p> + +<p>"Do you know how wonderfully you are changed? Do you know you once +talked bitterly, as one who was full of disappointments and +disenchantments?"</p> + +<p>"You have set me, dear, in a garden of enchantment from which I mean +never to escape. The garden is your heart."</p> + +<p>Something glistened in the Professor's eyes as he listened. "God, in +his infinite wisdom," he said, in a reverent whisper, "gave her so much +of grace; she had enough for both!"</p> + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /> +<p class="caption"><a name="Contents" id="Contents"></a>Contents</p> +<p> +<a href="#CHAPTER_I">CHAPTER I.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_II">CHAPTER II.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_III">CHAPTER III.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_IV">CHAPTER IV.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_V">CHAPTER V.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_VI">CHAPTER VI.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_VII">CHAPTER VII.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">CHAPTER VIII.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_IX">CHAPTER IX.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_X">CHAPTER X.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XI">CHAPTER XI.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XII">CHAPTER XII.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XIII">CHAPTER XIII.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XIV">CHAPTER XIV.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XV">CHAPTER XV.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XVI">CHAPTER XVI.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XVII">CHAPTER XVII</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XVIII">CHAPTER XVIII.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XIX">CHAPTER XIX.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XX">CHAPTER XX.</a><br /> +</p> + + + + + + + +<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 39724 ***</div> + +</body> +</html> diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b1a89f7 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #39724 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/39724) diff --git a/old/39724-8.txt b/old/39724-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..edf8680 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/39724-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5221 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Imitator, by Percival Pollard + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Imitator + +Author: Percival Pollard + +Release Date: May 18, 2012 [EBook #39724] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE IMITATOR *** + + + + +Produced by Don Wills and Marc D'Hooghe at +http://www.freeliterature.org (Images generously made +available by the Hathi Trust) + + + + + +THE IMITATOR + +A NOVEL + +By + +PERCIVAL POLLARD + +SAINT LOUIS + +WILLIAM MARION REEDY + +1901 + + + + +CHAPTER I. + + +"The thing is already on the wane," said young Orson Vane, making a wry +face over the entree, and sniffing at his glass, "and, if you ask me, I +think the general digestion of society will be the better for it." + +"Yes, there is nothing, after all, so tedious as the sham variety of a +table d'hote. Though it certainly wasn't the fare one came to this hole +for." + +Luke Moncreith turned his eyes, as he said that, over the place they sat +in, smiling at it with somewhat melancholy contempt. Its sanded floor, +its boisterously exposed wine-barrels, the meaningless vivacity of its +Hungarian orchestra, evidently stirred him no more. + +"No; that was the last detail. It was the notion of dining below stairs, +as the servants do. It had, for a time, the charm of an imitation. +Nothing is so delightful as to imitate others; yet to be mistaken for +them is always dreadful. Of course, nobody would mistake us here for +servants." + +The company, motley as it was, could not logically have come under any +such suspicion. Though it was dining in a cellar, on a sanded floor, +amid externals that were illegitimate offsprings of a _Studenten Kneipe_ +and a crew of Christy minstrels, it still had, in the main, the air of +being recruited from the smart world. At every other table there were +people whom not to know was to argue oneself unknown. These persons +obviously treated the place, and their being there, as an elaborate +effort at gaiety; the others, the people who were plainly there for the +first time, took it with the bewildered manner of those whom each new +experience leaves mentally exhausted. The touch of rusticity, here and +there, did not suffice to spoil the sartorial sparkle of the smart +majority. The champagne that the sophisticated were wise enough to +oppose to the Magyar vintages sparkled into veins that ran beautifully +blue under skin that held curves the most aristocratic, tints the most +shell-like. Tinkling laughter, vocative of insincerity, rang between the +restless passion of the violins. + +"When it is not below stairs," continued Vane, "it is up on the roof. +One might think we were a society without houses of our own. It is, I +suppose, the human craving for opposites. When we have stored our +sideboards with the finest glass you can get in Vienna or Carlsbad, we +turn our backs on it and go to drinking from pewter in a cellar. We pay +abominable wages to have servants who shall be noiseless, and then go to +places where the service is as guttural as a wilderness of monkeys. +Fortunately, these fancies do not last. Presently, I dare say, it will +be the fashion to dine at home. That will make us feel quite like the +original Puritans." He laughed, and took his glass of wine at a gulp. +"The fact of the matter is that variety has become the vice of life. We +have not, as a society, any inner steadfastness of soul; we depend upon +externals, and the externals pall with fearful speed. Think of seeing in +the mirror the face of the same butler for more than thirty days!" He +shuddered and shook his head. + +"We are a restless lot," sighed the other, "but why discompose yourself +about it? Thank your stars you have nothing more important to worry +over!" + +"My dear Luke, there is nothing more important than the attitude of +society at large. It is the only thing one should allow oneself to +discuss. To consider one's individual life is to be guilty of as bad +form as to wear anything that is conspicuous. Society admires us chiefly +only as we sink ourselves in it. If we let the note of personality rise, +our social position is sure to suffer. Imitation is the keynote of +smartness. The rank and file imitate the leaders consciously, and the +leaders unconsciously imitate the average. We frequent cellars, and +roofs, and such places, because in doing so we imagine we are imitating +the days of the Hanging Gardens and the Catacombs. We abhor the bohemian +taint, but we are willing to give a champagne and chicken imitation of +it. We do not really care for music and musicians, but we give excellent +imitations of doing so. At present we are giving the most lifelike +imitation of being passionately fond of outdoor life; I suppose England +feels flattered. I am afraid I have forgotten whose the first +fashionable divorce in our world was; it is far easier to remember the +names of the people who have never been divorced; at any rate those +pioneers ought to feel proud of the hugeness of their following. We have +adopted a vulgarity from Chicago and made it a fashionable institution; +divorce used to be a shuttlecock for the comic papers, and now it makes +the bulk of the social register." + +Moncreith tapped his friend on the arm. "Drop it, Orson, drop it!" he +said. "I know this is a beastly bad dinner, but you shouldn't let it +make you maudlin. You know you don't really believe half you're saying. +Drop it, I say. These infernal poses make me ill." He attacked the +morsel of game on his plate with a zest that was beautiful to behold. +"If you go on in that biliously philosophic strain of yours, I shall +crunch this bird until I hear nothing but the grinding of bones. It is +really not a bad bit of quail. It is so small, and the casserole so +large, that you need an English setter to mark it, but once you've got +it,"--he wiped his lips with a flip of his napkin, "it's really worth +the search. Try it, and cheer up. The woman in rose, over there, under +the pseudo-palm, looks at you every time she sips her champagne; I have +no doubt she is calculating how untrue you could be to her. I suppose +your gloom strikes her as poetic; it strikes me as very absurd. You +really haven't a care in the world, and you sit here spouting +insincerity at a wasteful rate. If there's anything really and truly the +matter--tell me!" + +Orson Vane dropped, as if it had been a mask, the ironical smile his +lips had worn. "You want sincerity," he said, "well, then I shall be +sincere. Sincerity makes wrinkles, but it is the privilege of our +friends to make us old before our time. Sincerely, then, Luke, I am +very, very tired." + +"A fashionable imitation," mocked Moncreith. + +"No; a personal aversion, to myself, to the world I live in. I wish the +dear old governor hadn't been such a fine fellow; if he had been of the +newer generation of fathers I suppose I wouldn't have had an ideal to +bless myself with." + +Moncreith interrupted. + +"Good Lord, Luke, did you say ideals? I swear I never knew it was as bad +as that." He beckoned to the waiter and ordered a Dominican. "It is so +ideal a liquor that when you have tasted it you crave only for +brutalities. Poor Orson! Ideals!" He sighed elaborately. + +"If you imitate my manner of a while ago, I shall not say what I was +going to say. If I am to be sincere, so must you." He took the scarlet +drink the man set before him, and let it gurgle gently down his throat. +"It smacks of sin and I scent lies in it. I wish I had not taken it. It +is hard to be sincere after a drink that stirs the imagination. But I +shall try. And you are not to interrupt any more than you can help. If +we both shed the outer skin we wear for society, I believe we are +neither of us such bad sorts. That is just what I am getting at: I am +not quite bad enough to be blind to my own futility. Here I am, Luke, +young, decently looking, with money, position, and bodily health, and +yet I am cursed with thought of my own futility. When people have said +who I am, they have said it all; I have done nothing: I merely am. I +know others would sell their souls to be what I am; but it does not +content me. I have spent years considering my way. The arts have called +to me, but they have not held me. All arts are imitative, except music, +and music is not human enough for me; no people are so unhuman as +musical people, and no art is so entirely a creation of a self-centred +inventor. There can be no such thing as realism in music; the voices of +Nature can never be equalled on any humanly devised instruments or +notes. Painting and sculpture are mere imitations of what nature does +far better. When you see a beautiful woman as God made her you do not +care whether the Greeks colored their statues or not. Any average sunset +stamps the painted imitation as absurd. These arts, in fact, can never +be really great, since they are man's feeble efforts to copy God's +finest creations; between them and the ideal there must always be the +same distance as between man and his Creator. Then there is the art of +literature. It has the widest scope of them all. Whether it is imitative +or creative depends on the temperament of the individual; some men set +down what they see and hear, others invent a world of their own and busy +themselves with it. I believe it is the most human of the arts. Its +devotees not infrequently set themselves the task of discovering just +how their fellows think and live; they try to attune their souls to +other souls; they strive for an understanding of the larger humanity. +They--" + +Moncreith interrupted with a gesture. + +"Orson, you're not going to turn novelist? Don't tell me that! Your +enthusiasms fill me with melancholy forebodings." + +"Not at all. But, as you know, I've seen much of this sort of thing +lately. In the first place I had my own temperamental leanings; in the +next place, you'll remember, we've had a season or two lately when +clever people have been the rage. To invite painters and singers and +writers to one's house has been the smart thing to do. We have had the +spectacle of a society, that goes through a flippant imitation of +living, engaged in being polite to people who imitate at second hand, in +song, and color, and story. Some smart people have even taken to those +arts, thus imitating the professional imitators. As far as the smart +point of view goes, I couldn't do anything better than go in for the +studio, or novelistic business. The dull people whom smartness has +rubbed to a thin polish would conspire in calling me clever. Is there +anything more dreadful than being called clever?" + +"Nothing. It is the most damning adjective in the language. Whenever I +hear that a person is clever I am sure he will never amount to much. +There is only one word that approaches it in deadly significance. That +is 'rising.' I have known men whom the puffs have referred to as 'a +rising man' for twenty years. Can you imagine anything more dismal than +being called constantly by the same epithet? The very amiability in the +general opinion, permitting 'clever' and 'rising' to remain unalterable, +shows that the wearer of these terms is hopeless; a strong man would +have made enemies. I am glad you are wise enough to resist the +temptation of the Muses. Society's blessing would never console you for +anything short of a triumph. The triumphs are fearfully few; the clever +people--well, this cellar's full of them. There's Abbott Moore, for +instance." + +"You're right; there he is. He's a case in point. One of the best cases; +a man who has really, in the worldly sense, succeeded tremendously. His +system of give and take is one of the most lovely schemes imaginable; we +all know that. When a mining millionaire with marriageable daughters +comes to town his first hostage to the smart set is to order a palace +near Central Park and to give Abbott Moore the contract for the +decorations. In return Abbott Moore asks the millionaire's womenfolk to +one of his studio carnivals. That section of the smart set which keeps +itself constantly poised on the border between smart and tart is awfully +keen on Abbott Moore's studio affairs. It has never forgotten the famous +episode when he served a tart within a tart, and it is still expecting +him to outdo that feat. To be seen at one of these affairs, especially +if you have millions, is to have got in the point of the wedge. I call +it a fair exchange; the millionaire gets his foot just inside the magic +portal; Moore gets a slice of the millions. All the world counts Moore a +success from every point of view, the smart, the professional, the +financial. Yet that isn't my notion of a full life. It's only a replica +of the very thing I'm tired of, my own life." + +"Your life, my dear fellow, is generally considered a most enviable +article." + +"Of course. I suppose it does have a glamour for the unobserving. Yet, +at the best, what am I?" + +Moncreith laughed. "Another Dominican!" he said to the waiter. "The +liqueur," he said, "may enable me to rise to my subject." He smiled at +Vane over the glass, when it was brought to him, drained it under closed +eyes, and then settled himself well back into his chair. + + + + +CHAPTER II. + + +"I will tell you what you are," began Moncreith, "to I the eye of the +average beholder. Here, in the most splendid town of the western world, +at the turning of two centuries, you are possessed of youth, health and +wealth. That really tells the tale. Never in the history of the world +have youth and health and wealth meant so much as they do now. These +three open the gates to all the earthly paradise. Your forbears did +their duty by you so admirably that you wear a distinguished name +without any sacrifice to poverty. You are good to look at. You are a +young man of fashion. If you chose you could lead the mode; you have the +instincts of a beau, though neither the severe suppression of Brummell +nor the obtrusive splendor of D'Aurevilly would suit you. Our age seems +to have come to too high an average in man's apparel to permit of any +single dictator; to be singled out is to be lowered. Yet there can be no +denying that you have often, unwittingly, set the fashion in waistcoats +and cravats. That aping has not hurt you, because the others never gave +their raiment the fine note of personal distinction that you wear. You +are a favorite in the clubs; people never go out when you come in; you +listen to the most stupid talk with the most graceful air imaginable; +that is one of the sure roads to popularity in clubdom. When it is the +fashion to be artistic, you can be so as easily as the others; when +sport is the watchword your fine physique forbids you no achievement. +You play tennis and golf and polo quite well enough to make women split +their gloves in applause, and not too well to make men sneer at you for +a 'pro.' When you are riding to hounds in Virginia you are never far +from the kill, and there is no automobilist whom the Newport villagers +are happier to fine for fast driving. You are equally at home in a +cotillon and on the deck of a racing yacht. You could marry whenever you +liked. Your character is unspotted either by the excessive vice that +shocks the mob, or the excessive virtue that tires the smart. You have +means, manners and manner. Finally, you have the two cardinal qualities +of smartness, levity and tolerance." He paused, and gave a smile of +satisfaction. "There, do you like the portrait?" + +"It is abominable," said Vane, "it is what I see in my most awful +dreams. And the horror of it is that it is so frightfully true. I am +merely one of the figures in the elaborate masquerade we call society. I +make no progress in life; I learn nothing except new fashions and +foibles. I am weary of the masquerade and the masks. Life in the smart +world is a game with masks; one shuffles them as one does cards. As for +me, I want to throw the whole pack into the fire. Everyone wears these +masks; nobody ever penetrates to the real soul behind the make-up." + +"It is a game you play perfectly. One should hesitate long about giving +up anything that one has brought to perfection. These others dabble and +squabble in what you call the secondary imitations of life; you, at any +rate, are giving your imitation at first hand." + +"Yes, but it no longer satisfies me. Listen, Luke. You must promise not +to laugh and not to frown. It will seem absurd to you; yet I am terribly +in earnest about it. When first I came out of college I went in for +science. When I gave it up, it was because I found it was leading me +away from the human interest. There is the butterfly I want to chase; +the human interest. I attempted all the arts; not one of them took me +far on my way. My failure, Luke, is an ironic sentence upon the vaunted +knowledge of the world." + +"Your failure? My dear Orson; come to the point. What do you mean by the +human interest?" + +"I mean that neither scientist nor scholar has yet shown the way to one +man's understanding of another's soul. The surgeon can take a body and +dissect its every fraction, arguing and proving each function of it. The +painter tries, with feeble success, to reach what he calls the spirit of +his subject. So does the author. He tries to put himself into the place +of each of his characters; he aims, always, for the nearest possible +approach to the lifelike. And, above all the others, there is the actor. +In this, as in its other qualities, the art of acting is the crudest, +the most obvious of them all; yet, in certain moments, it comes nearest +to the ideal. The actor in his mere self is--well, we all know the story +of the famous player being met by this greeting: 'And what art thou +to-night?' But he goes behind a door and he can come forth in a series +of selves. A trick or so with paint; a change of wig; a twist of the +face-muscles, and we have the same man appearing as _Napoleon_, as +_Richelieu_, as _Falstaff_. The thing is external, of course. Whether +there shall be anything more than the mere bodily mask depends upon the +actor's intelligence and his imagination. The supreme artist so +succeeds, by virtue of much study, much skill in imitating what he has +conceived to be the soul of his subject, in almost giving us a lifelike +portrait. And yet, and yet--it is not the real thing; the real soul of +his subject is as much a mystery to that actor as it is to you or me. +That is what I mean when I say that science fails us at the most +important point of all; the soul of my neighbor is as profound a mystery +to me as the soul of a man that lived a thousand years ago. I can know +your face, Luke, your clothes, your voice, the outward mask you wear; +but--can I reach the secrets of your soul? No. And if we cannot know how +others feel and think, how can we say we know the world? Bah! The world +is a realm of shadows in which all walk blindly. We touch hands every +day, but our souls are hidden in a veil that has not been passed since +God made the universe." + +"You cry for the moon," said Moncreith. "You long for the unspeakable. +Is it not terrible enough to know your neighbor's face, his voice, his +coat, without burdening yourself with knowledge of his inner self? It is +merely an egoistic curiosity, my dear Orson; you cannot prove that the +human interest, as you term it, would benefit by the extension in wisdom +you want." + +"Oh, you are wrong, you are wrong. The whole world of science undergoes +revolution, once you gain the point I speak of. Doctors will have the +mind as well as the body to diagnose; lovers will read each others +hearts as well as their voices; lies will become impossible, or, at +least, futile; oh--it would be a better world altogether. At any rate, +until this avenue of knowledge is opened to me, I shall call all the +rest a failure. I imitate; you imitate; we imitate; that is the +conjugation of life. When I think of the hopelessness of the thing,--do +you wonder I grow bitter? I want communion with real beings, and I meet +only masks. I tell you, Luke, it is abominable, this wall that stands +between each individual and the rest of the world. How can I love my +neighbor if I do not understand him? How can I understand him if I +cannot think his thoughts, dream his dreams, spell out his soul's +secrets?" + +Moncreith smiled at his friend, and let his eyes wander a trifle +ironically about his figure. "One would not think, to look at you, that +you were possessed of a mania, an itch! If you take my advice you will +content yourself with living life as you find it. It is really a very +decent world. It has good meat and drink in it, and some sweet women, +and a strong man or two. Most of us are quite ignorant of the fact that +we are merely engaged in incomplete imitations of life, or that there is +a Chinese wall between us and the others; the chances are we are all the +happier for our innocence. Consider, for instance, that rosy little face +behind us--you can see it perfectly in that mirror--can you deny that it +looks all happiness and innocence?" + +Vane looked, and presently sighed a little. The face of the girl, as he +found it in the glass, was the color of roses lying on a pool of clear +water. It was one of those faces that one scarce knows whether to think +finer in profile or in full view; the features were small, the hair +glistened with a tint of that burnish the moon sometimes wears on summer +nights, and the figure was a mere fillip to the imagination. A cluster +of lilies of the valley lay upon her hair; they seemed like countless +little cups pouring frost upon a copper glow. All about her radiated an +ineffable gentleness, a tenderness; she made all the other folk about +her seem garish and ugly and cruel. One wondered what she did in that +gallery. + +"To the outer eye," said Vane, as he sighed, "she is certainly a flower, +a thing of daintiness and delight. But--do you suppose I believe it, for +a moment? I have no doubt she is merely one of those creatures whom God +has made for the destruction of our dreams; her mind is probably as +corrupt as her body seems fair. She is perhaps--" + +He stopped, for the face in the mirror had its eyes thrown suddenly in +his direction. The eyes, in that reflex fashion, met, and something akin +to a smile, oh, an ever so wistful, wonderful a smile, crept upon the +lips and the eyes of the girl, while to the man there came only a sudden +silence. + +"She is," continued Vane, in another voice altogether, and as if he were +thinking of distant affairs, "very beautiful." + +The girl's eyes, meanwhile, had shifted towards Moncreith. He felt the +radiance of them and looked, too, and the girl's beauty came upon him +with a quick, personal force that was like pain. Vane's spoken +approbation of her angered him; he hardly knew why; for the first time +in his life he thought he could hate the man beside him. + +The girl turned her head a little, put up her hand and so hid her face +from both young men, or there is no telling what sudden excuse the two +might not have seized for open enmity. It sounds fantastic, perhaps, but +there are more enmities sown in a single glance from a woman's eyes +than a Machiavelli could build up by ever so devilish devices. Neither +of the two, in this case, could have said just what they felt, or why. +Moncreith thought, vaguely enough perhaps, that it was a sin for so fair +a flower to waste even a look upon a fellow so shorn of faith as was +Orson Vane. As for Vane-- + +Vane brought his hand upon the table so that the glasses rocked. + +"Oh," he exclaimed, "if one could only be sure! If one could see past +the mask! What would I not give to believe in beauty when I see it, to +trust to appearances! Oh, for the ability to put myself in the place of +another, to know life from another plane than my own, to--" + +But here he was interrupted. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + + +"The secret you are seeking," said the man who had put his hand on Orson +Vane's shoulder, "is mine." + +Vane's eyes widened slightly, roving the stranger up and down. He was a +man of six feet in height, of striking, white-haired beauty, of the type +made familiar to us by pictures of the Old Guard under Napoleon. Here +was still the Imperial under the strong chin, the white mustache over +the shapely lips; the high, clear forehead; the long, thin hands, where +veins showed blue, and the nails were rosy. The head was bowed forward +of the shoulders; the man, now old, had once been inches taller. You +looked, on the spur of first noting him, for the sword and the epaulets, +or, at least, for the ribbon of an order. But his clothes were quite +plain, nor had his voice any touch of the military. + +"I overheard a part of your conversation," the stranger went on, "not +intentionally, yet unavoidably. I had either to move or to listen. And +you see the place is so full that moving was out of the question. Did +you mean what you were saying?" + +"About the--" + +"The Chinese wall," said the stranger. + +"Every word of it," said Vane. + +"If the chance to penetrate another's soul came to you, would you take +it?" + +"At once." + +Moncreith laughed aloud. "Where are we?" he said, "in Aladdin's cave? +What rubbish!" And he shook himself, as if to disturb a bad dream. He +was on the point of reaching for his hat, when he saw the face of the +girl in the mirror once more; the sight of it stayed him. He smiled to +himself, and waited for the curious conversation between Vane and the +stranger to continue. + +"My name," the stranger was observing, taking a card from an _etui_, +"may possibly be known to you?" + +Vane bent his head to the table, read, and looked at the white-haired +man with a quick access of interest. + +"I am honored," he said. "My name is Orson Vane." + +"Oh," said the other, "I knew that. I do not study the human interest in +mere theory; I delight in the tangible. That is why I presume upon +you"--he waved his hand gracefully--"thus." + +"You must join us," said Vane; "there is plenty of room at this table." + +"No; I must--if your friend will pardon me--see you alone. Will you come +to my place?" + +He spoke as youthfully as if he were of Vane's own age. + +Vane considered a second or so, and then sprang to his feet. + +"Yes," he said, "I will come. Good-night, Luke. Stay on; enjoy yourself. +Shall I see you to-morrow? Good-night!" + +They went out together, the young man and the one with the white hair. +One glance into the mirror flashed from Orson's eyes as he turned to go; +it brought him a memory of a burnished halo on a fragile, rosy, beauty. +He sighed to himself, wishing he could reach the truth behind the robe +of beauty, and, with that sigh, turned with a sort of fierceness upon +his companion. + +"Well," said Vane, "well?" + +They were passing through a most motley thoroughfare. Barrel-organs +dotted the asphalt; Italian and Sicilian poverty elbowed the poverty of +Russian and Polish Jews. The shops bore signs in Italian, Hebrew, +French--in anything but English. The Elevated roared above the music and +the chatter; the cool gloom of lower Broadway seemed far away. + +"Patience," said the old man, "patience, Mr. Vane. Look about you! How +much of the heart of this humanity that reeks all about us do we know? +Think,--think of your Chinese wall! Oh--how strange, how very strange +that I should have come upon you to-night, when, in despair of ever +finding my man, I had gone for distraction to a place where, I thought, +philosophy nor science were but little welcome." + +"My dear Professor," urged Vane finally, when they were come to a +stiller region, where many churches, some parks and ivy-sheltered houses +gave an air of age and sobriety and history, "I have no more patience +left. Did I not know your name for what it is I would not have followed +you. Even now I hardly know whether your name and your title suffice. If +it is an adventure, very well. But I have no more patience for +mysteries." + +"Not even when you are about to penetrate the greatest mystery of all? +Oh, youth, youth! Well, we have still a little distance to go. I shall +employ it to impress upon you that I, Professor Vanlief, am not +over-fond of the title of Professor. It has, here in America, a taint of +the charlatan. But it came to me, this title, in a place where only +honors were implied. I was, indeed, a fellow student with many of whom +the world has since heard; Bismarck was one of them. I have eaten smoked +goose with him in Pommern. You see, I am very old, very old. I have +spent my life solving a riddle. It is the same riddle that has balked +you, my young friend. But I have striven for the solution; you have +merely wailed against the riddle's existence." + +Vane felt a flush of shame. + +"True," he murmured, "true. I never went further into any art, any +science, than to find its shortcomings." + +"Yet even that," resumed the Professor, "is something. You are, at any +rate, the only man for my purpose." + +"Your purpose?" + +"Yes. It is the same as yours. You are to be the instrument; I furnish +the power. You are to be able to feel, to think, as others do." + +"Oh!" muttered Vane, "impossible." Now that his wish was called possible +of fulfilment, he shrank a little from it. He followed the Professor up +a long flight of curving steps, through dim halls, to where a bluish +light flickered. As they passed this feeble glow it flared suddenly into +a brilliant jet of flame; a door swung open, revealing a somewhat bare +chamber fitted up partly as a study, partly as a laboratory. The door +closed behind them silently. + +"Mere trickery," said the Professor, "the sort of thing that the knaves +of science fool the world with. Will you sit down? Here is where I have +worked for--for more years than you have lived, Mr. Vane. Here is where +I have succeeded. In pursuit of this success I have spent my life and +nearly all the fortune that my family made in generations gone. I have +this house, and my daughter, and my science. The world spins madly all +about me, in this splendid town; here, in this stillness, I have worked +to make that world richer than I found it. Will you help me?" + +Vane had flung himself upon a wicker couch. He watched his host +striding up and down the room with a fervor that had nothing of senility +in it. The look of earnestness upon that fine old face was magnetic. +Vane's mistrust vanished at sight of it. + +"If you will trust me," he answered. He saw himself as the beneficiary, +his host as the giver of a great gift. + +"I trust you. I heard enough, to-night, to believe you sincere in +wishing to see life from another soul than your own. But you must +promise to obey my instructions to the letter." + +"I promise." + +A sense of farce caught Vane. "And now," he said, "what is it? A powder +I must swallow, or a trance you pass me into, or what?" + +The professor shook his head gravely. "It is none of those things. It is +much simpler. I should not wonder but that the ancients knew it. But +human life is so much more complex now; the experiences you will gain +will be larger than they could ever have been in other ages. Do you +realize what I am about to give you? The power to take upon you the soul +of another, just as an actor puts on the outer mask of another! And I +ask for no reward. Simply the joy of seeing my process active; and +afterwards, perhaps, to give my secret to the world. But you are to +enjoy it alone, first. Of course--there may be risks. Do you take +them?" + +"I do," said Vane. + +He could hear the whistling of steamers out in the harbor, and the noise +of the great town came to him faintly. All that seemed strangely remote. +His whole intelligence was centered upon his host, upon the sparsely +furnished room, and the secret whose solution he thought himself +approaching. He was, for almost the first time in his life, intense in +the mere act of existence; he was conscious of no imitation of others; +his analysis of self was sunk in an eagerness, a tenseness of +purposeness hitherto unfelt. + +The professor went to a far, dark corner of the room, and rolled thence +a tall, sheeted thing that might have been a painting, or an easel. He +held it tenderly; his least motion with it revealed solicitude. When it +was immediately in front of where Vane reclined, Vanlief loosed his hold +of the thing, and began pacing up and down the room. + +"The question of mirrors," he began, after what seemed to Vane an age, +"has never, I suppose, interested you." + +"On the contrary," said Vane, "I have had Italy searched for the finest +of its cheval-glasses. In my dressing-room are several that would give +even a man of your fine height, sir, a complete reflection of every +detail, from a shoe-lace to an eyebrow. It is not altogether vanity; but +I never could do justice to my toilette before a mirror that showed me +only a shoulder, or a waist, or a foot, at a time; I want the +full-length portrait or nothing. I like to see myself as others will +see me; not in piece-meal. The Florentines made lovely mirrors." + +"They did." Vanlief smiled sweetly. "Yet I have made a better." He paced +the floor again, and then resumed speech. "I am glad you like tall +mirrors. You will have learned how careful one must be of them. One more +or less in your dressing-room will not matter, eh?" + +"I have an excellent man," said Vane. "There has not been a broken +mirror in my house for years. He looks after them as if they were his +own." + +"Ah, better and better." + +Vane interrupted the Professor's silence with, "It is a mirror, then?" + +"Yes," said Vanlief, nodding at the sheeted mirror, "it is a mirror. +Have you ever thought of the wonderfulness of mirrors? What wonder, and +yet what simplicity! To think that I--I, a simple, plodding old man of +science--should be the only one to have come upon the magic of a +mirror!" His talk took the note of monologue. He was pacing, pacing, +pacing; smiling at Vane now and then, and fingering the covered mirror +with loving touch as he passed near it. "Have you ever, as a child, +looked into a mirror in the twilight, and seen there another face beside +your own? Have you never thought that to the mirror were revealed more +things than the human eye can note? Have you heard of the old, old +folk-superstitions; of the bride that may not see herself in a mirror +without tragedy touching her; of the Warwickshire mirror that must be +covered in a house of death, lest the corpse be seen in it; of the +future that some magic mirrors could reveal? Fanciful tales, all of +them; yet they have their germ of truth, and for my present discovery I +owe them something." He drew the sheet from the mirror, and revealed +another veil of gauze resting upon the glass, as, in some houses, the +most prized pictures are sometimes doubly covered. "You see; it is just +a mirror, a full-length mirror. But, oh, my dear Vane, the wonderfulness +of this mirror! I have only to look into this mirror; to veil it; and +then, when next you glance into it, if it be within the hour, my soul, +my spirit, my very self, passes from the face of the mirror to you! That +is the whole secret, or at least, the manifestation of it! Do you wish +to be the President, to think his thoughts, feel as he feels, dream as +he dreams? He has only to look into this mirror, and you have only to +take from it, as one plucks a lily from the pool, the spiritual image he +has left there! Think of it, Vane, think of it! Is this not seeing life? +Is this not riddling the secret of existence? To reach the innermost +depths of another's spirit; to put on his soul, as others can put on +your clothes, if you left them on a chair,--is this not a stupendous +thing?" In his fever and fervor the professor had exhausted his +strength; he flung himself into a chair. Vane saw the old man's eyes +glowing and his chest throbbing with passion; he hardly knew whether +the whole scene was real or a something imposed upon his senses by a +species of hypnotism. He passed his hand before his forehead; he shook +his head. Yet nothing changed. Vanlief, in the chair, still quaking with +excitement; the mirror, veiled and immobile. + +For a time the room stood silent, save for Vanlief's heavy breathing. + +"Of course," he resumed presently, in a quieter tone, "you cannot be +expected to believe, until you have tried. But trial is the easiest +thing in the world. I can teach you the mere externals to be observed in +five minutes. One trial will convince you. After that,--my dear Vane, +you have the gamut of humanity to go. You can be another man every day. +No secret of any human heart will be a secret to you. All wisdom can be +gained by you; all knowledge, all thought, can be yours. Oh, Orson Vane, +I wonder if you realize your fortune! Or--is it possible that you +withdraw?" + +Vane got up resolutely. + +"No," he said, "I have faith--at last. I am with you, heart and soul. +Life seems splendid to me, for the first time. When can I have the +mirror taken to my house?" + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + + +Vane's dressing-room was a tasteful chamber, cool and light. Its walls, +its furniture, and its hangings told of a wide range of interest. There +was nowhere any obvious bias; the æsthetic was no more insistent than +the sporting. Orson Vane loved red-haired women as Henner painted them, +and he played the aristocratic waltzes of Chopin; but he also valued the +cruel breaking-bit that he had brought home from Texas, and read the +racing-column in the newspaper quite as carefully as he did the doings +of his society. Some hint of this diversity of tastes showed in this, +the most intimate room of his early mornings. There were some of those +ruddy British prints that are now almost depressingly conventional with +men of sporting habits; signed photographs of more or less prominent and +personable personages were scattered pell-mell. All the chairs and +lounges were of wicker; so much so that some of the men who hobnobbed +with Vane declared that a visit to his dressing-room was as good as a +yachting cruise. + +The morning was no longer young. On the avenue the advance guard of the +fashionable assault upon the shopping district was already astir. The +languorous heat that reflects from the town's asphalt was gaining in +power momentarily. + +Orson Vane, fresh from a chilling, invigorating bath, a Japanese robe of +exquisite coolness his only covering, sat regarding an addition to his +furniture. It had come while he slept. It was proof that the adventure +of the night had not been a mere figment of his dreams. + +He touched a bell. To the man who answered the call, he said: + +"Nevins, I have bought a new mirror. You are to observe a few simple +rules in regard to this mirror. In the first place, to avoid confusion, +it is always to be called the New Mirror. Is that plain? + +"Quite so, sir." + +"I may have orders to give about it, or notes to send, or things of that +sort, and I want no mistakes made. In the next place, the cord that +uncovers the mirror is never to be pulled, never to be touched, save at +my express order. Not--under any circumstances. I do not wish the mirror +used. Have you any curiosity left, Nevins? + +"None, sir." + +"So much the better. In Lord Keswick's time, I think, you still had a +touch of that vice, curiosity. Your meddling got you into something of a +scrape. Do you remember?" + +"Oh, sir," said the man, with a little gesture of shame and pain, "you +didn't need reminding me. Have I ever forgotten your saving me from that +foolishness?" + +"You're right, Nevins; I think I can trust you. But this is a greater +trust than any of the others. A great deal depends; mark that; a very +great deal. It is not an ordinary mirror, this one; not one of the +others compares with it; it is the gem of my collection. Not a breath is +to touch it, save as I command." + +"I'll see to it, sir." + +"Any callers, Nevins?" + +"Mr. Moncreith, sir, looked in, but left no word. And the postman." + +"No duns, Nevins?" + +"Not in person, sir." + +"Dear me! Is my position on the wane? When a man is no longer dunned his +credit is either too good or too bad; or else his social position is +declining." He picked up the tray with the letters, ran his eye over +them quickly, and said, "Thank the stars; they still dun me by post. +There should be a law against it; yet it is as sweet to one's vanity as +an angry letter from a woman. Nevins, is the day dull or garish?" + +"It's what I should call bright, sir." + +"Then you may lay out some gloomy clothes for me. I would not add to the +heat wittingly. And, Nevins!" + +"Yes sir." + +"If anyone calls before I breakfast, unless it happens to be Professor +Vanlief,--Vanlief, Nevins, of the Vanliefs of New Amsterdam--say I am +indisposed." + +He dressed himself leisurely, thinking of the wonderful adventures into +living that lay before him. He rehearsed the simple instructions that +Vanlief had given him the night before. It was all utterly simple. As +one looked into the mirror, the spirit of that one lay on the surface, +waiting for the next person that glanced that way. There followed a +complete exodus of the spirit from the one body into the other. The +recipient was himself plus the soul of the other. The exodus left that +other in a state something like physical collapse. There would be, for +the recipient of the new personality, a sense of double consciousness; +the mind would be like a palimpsest, the one will and the one habit +imposed upon the other. The fact that the person whose spirit passed +from him upon the magic mirror was left more or less a wreck was cause +for using the experiment charily, as the Professor took pains to warn +Orson. There was a certain risk. The mirror might be broken; one could +never tell. It would be better to pick one's subjects wisely, always +with a definite purpose. This man might be used to teach that side of +life; that man another. It was not a thing to toy with. It was to be +played with as little as human life itself. Vivisection was a pastime to +this; this implicated the spirit, the other only the body. + +Consideration of the new avenues opening for his intelligence had +already begun to alter Vane's outlook on life. Persons who remarked him, +a little later, strolling the avenue, wondered at the brilliance of his +look. He seemed suddenly sprayed with a new youth, a new enthusiasm. It +was not, as some of his conversations of that morning proved, an utter +lapse into optimism on his part; but it was an exchange of the mere +passive side of pessimism for its healthier, more buoyant side. He was +able to smile to himself as he met the various human marionettes of the +avenue; the persons whose names you would be sure to read every Sunday +in the society columns, and who seemed, consequently, out of place in +any more aristocratic air. He bowed to the newest beauty, he waved a +hand to the most perennial of the faded beaux. The vociferous attire of +the actors, who idled conspicuously before the shop-windows, caused him +inward shouts of laughter; a day or so ago the same sight would have +embittered his hour for him. + +At Twenty-third street something possessed him to patronize one of the +Sicilian flower-sellers. The man had, happily, not importuned him; he +merely held his wares, and waited, mutely. Orson put a sprig of +lily-of-the-valley into his coat. + +Before he left his rooms he had spent an hour or so writing curt notes +to the smartest addresses in town. All his invitations were declined by +him; a trip to Cairo, he had written, would keep him from town for some +time. He took this ruse because he felt that the complications of his +coming experiment might be awkward; it was as well to pave the way. +Certainly he could not hope to fulfil his social obligations in the time +to come. An impression that he was abroad was the best way out of the +dilemma. The riddance from fashionable duties added to his gaiety; he +felt like a school-boy on holiday. + +It was in this mood that he saw, on the other side of the avenue, a +figure that sent a flush to his skin. There was no mistaking that +wonderful hair; in the bright morning it shone with a glow a trifle less +garish than under the electric light, but it was the same, the same. To +make assurance surer, there, just under the hat--a hat that no mere male +could have expressed in phrases, a thing of gauze and shimmer--lay a +spray of lilies-of-the-valley. The gown--Vane knew at a glance that it +was a beautiful gown and a happy one, though as different as possible +from the filmy thing she had worn when first he saw her, in the mirror, +at night. + +At first unconsciously, and then with quite brazen intent, he found +himself keeping pace, on his side of the street, with the girl opposite. +He knew not what emotion possessed him; no hint of anything despicable +came to him; he had forgotten himself utterly, and he was merely +following some sweet, blind impulse. Orson Vane was a man who had +tasted the froth and dregs of his town no less thoroughly than other +men; there were few sensations, few emotions, he had not tried. Almost +the only sort of woman he did not know was The woman. In the year of his +majority he had made a summer of it on the Sound in his steam yacht, and +his enemies declared that all the harbors he had anchored in were left +empty of both champagne and virtue. Yet not even his bitterest enemy had +ever accused him of anything vulgar, brazen, coarse, conspicuous. + +Luke Moncreith was a friend of Vane's, there was no reason for doubting +that. But even he experienced a little shock when he met Vane, was +unseen of him, and was then conscious, in a quick turn of the head, that +Vane's eyes, his entire vitality, were upon a woman's figure across the +avenue. + +"The population of the Bowery, of Forty-second street, and of the +Tenderloin," said Moncreith to himself, "have a name for that sort of +thing." He clicked his tongue upon his teeth once or twice. "Poor Orson! +Is it the beginning of the end? Last night he seemed a little mad. Poor +Orson!" Then, with furtive shame at his bad manners, he turned about and +watched the two. Even at that distance the sunlight glowed like a caress +upon the hair of her whom Orson followed. "The girl," exclaimed +Moncreith, "the girl of the mirror." He came to a halt before a +photographer's window, the angle of which gave him a view of several +blocks behind. + +Orson Vane, in the meanwhile, was as if there was but one thing in life +for him: a meeting with this radiant creature with the lilies. Once he +thought he caught a sidelong glance of hers; a little smile even hovered +an instant upon her lips; yet, at that distance, he could not be sure. +None of the horrible things occurred to him as possibilities; that she +might be an adventuress, or a mere masquerading shop-girl, or an adroit +soubrette. No tangible intention came to the young man; he had not made +it clear to himself whether he would keep on, and on, and on, until she +came to her own door; whether he would accost her; whether he would +leave all to chance; or whether he would fashion circumstances to his +end. + +The girl turned into a little bookshop that, as it happened, was one of +Vane's familiar haunts. It was a place where one could always find the +new French and German things, and where the shopman was not a mere +instrument for selling whatever rubbish publishers chose to shoot at the +public. When Vane entered he found this shopman, who nodded smilingly at +him, busy with a bearded German. The girl stood at a little table, +passing her slim fingers lovingly over the titles of the books that lay +there. It was evident that she had no wish for advice from the assistant +who hovered in the background. She did not so much as glance at him. +Her eyes were all for her friends in print. She did look up, the veriest +trifle, it is true, when Orson came in; it was so swift, so shy a look +that he, in a mist of emotions, could not have sworn to it. As for him, +a boyish boldness took him to the other side of the table at which she +stood; he bent over the books, and his hands almost touched her fingers. +In that little, quiet nook, he became, all of a moment, once more a +youth of twenty; he felt the first shy stirrings of tenderness, of +worship. The names of the volumes swam for him in a mere haze. He saw +nothing save only the little figure before him, the shimmer of rose upon +her face passing into the ruddier shimmer of her hair; the perfume of +her lilies and some yet subtler scent, redolent of fairest linen, most +fragile laces and the utterest purity, came over him like a glow. + +And then the marvel, the miracle of her voice! + +"Oh, Mr. Vane," he heard her saying, "do help me!" Their eyes met and he +was conscious of a bewildering beauty in hers; it was with quite an +effort that he did not, then and there, do something absurd and stupid. +His hesitation, his astonishment, cost him a second or so; before he +caught his composure again, she was explaining, sweetly, plaintively, +"Help me to make up my mind. About a book." + +"Why did you add that?" he asked, his wits sharp now, and his voice +still a little unsteady. "There are so many other things I would like to +help you in. A book? What sort of a book? One of those stories where +the men are all eight feet high, and wear medals, and the women are all +models for Gibson? Or one of those aristocratic things where nobody is +less than a prince, except the inevitable American, who is a newspaper +man and an abomination? Or is it, by any chance," he paused, and dropped +his voice, as if he were approaching a dreadful disclosure, "poetry?" + +She shook her head. The lilies in her hair nodded, and her smile came up +like a radiance in that dark little corner. And, oh, the music in her +laugh! It blew ennui away as effectually as a storm whirls away a leaf. + +"No," she said, "it is none of those things. I told you I had not made +up my mind." + +"It is a thing you should never attempt. Making up the mind is a +temptation only the bravest of us can resist. One should always delegate +the task to someone else." + +The girl frowned gently. "If it is the fashion to talk like that," she +said, "I do not want to be in the fashion." + +He took the rebuke with a laugh. "It is hard," he pleaded, "to keep out +of the fashion. Everything we do is a fashion of one sort or another." +He glanced at her wonderful hat, at the gown that held her so closely, +so tenderly. "I am sure you are in the fashion," he said. + +"If Mr. Orson Vane tells me so, I must believe it," she answered. "But I +wear only what suits me; if the fashion does not suit me, I avoid the +fashion." + +"But you cannot avoid beauty," he urged, "and to be fair is always the +fashion." + +She turned her eyes to him full of reproach. They said, as plainly as +anything, "How crude! How stupidly obvious!" As if she had really +spoken, he went on, in plain embarassment: + +"I beg your pardon. I--I am very silly this morning. Something has gone +to my head. I really don't think I'd better advise you about anything to +read. I--" + +"Oh," she interrupted, already full of forgiveness, since it was not in +her nature to be cruel for more than a moment at a time, "but you must. +I am really desperate. All I ask is that you do not urge a fashionable +book, a book of the day, or a book that should be in the library of +every lady. I am afraid of those books. They are like the bores one +turns a corner to avoid." + +"You make advice harder and harder. Is it possible you really want a +book to read, rather than to talk about?" + +"I really do," she admitted, "I told you I had no thought about the +fashion." + +"You are like a figure from the Middle Ages," he said, "with your notion +about books." + +"Am I so very wrinkled?" she asked. She put her hand to her veil, with a +gesture of solicitous inquiry. "To be young," she sighed, with a pout, +"and yet to seem old. I am quite a tragedy." + +"A goddess," he murmured, "but not of tragedy." He laughed sharply, and +took a book from the table, using it to keep his eyes from the witchery +of her as he continued: "Don't you see why I'm talking such nonsense? If +it meant prolonging the glimpse of you, there's no end, simply no end, +to the rubbish I could talk!" + +"And no beginning," she put in, "to your sincerity." + +"Oh, I don't know. One still has fits and starts of it! There's no +telling what might not be done; it might come back to one, like +childishness in old age." He put down the book, and looked at her in +something like appeal. "There is such a thing as a sincerity one is +ashamed of, that one hides, and disguises, and that the world refuses to +see. The world? The world always means an individual. In this case the +world is--" + +"The world is yours, like _Monte Cristo_," she interposed, "how +embarassed you must feel. The responsibility must be enervating! I have +always thought the clever thing for _Monte Cristo_ to have done was to +lose the world; to hide it where nobody could find it again." She tapped +her boot with her parasol, charmingly impatient. "I suppose," she +sighed, "I shall have to ask that stupid clerk for a book, after all. He +looks as if he would far rather sell them by weight." + +"No, no, I couldn't allow that. Consider me all eagerness to aid you. Is +it to be love, or ghosts, or laughter?" + +"Love and laughter go well together," she said. "I want a book I can +love and laugh with, not at." + +"I know," he nodded. "The tear that makes the smile come after. You want +something charming, something sweet, something that will taste +pleasantly no matter how often you read it. A trifle, and yet--a +treasure. Such a book as, I dare say, every writer dreams of doing once +in his life; the sort of book that should be bound in rose-leaves. And +you expect me to betray a treasure like that to you? And my reward? But +no, I beg your pardon; I have my reward now, and here, and the debt is +still mine. I can merely put you in the way of a printed page; while +you--" He stopped, roving for the right word. His eyes spoke what his +voice could not find. He finished, lamely, and yet aptly enough, +"You--are you." + +"I don't believe," she declared, with the most arch elevation of the +darkest eyebrows, "that you know one book from another. You are an +impostor. You are sparring for time. I have given you too much time as +it is. I am going." She picked up her skirts with one slim hand, turned +on a tiny heel, and looked over her shoulder with an air, a +mischievousness, that made Orson ache, yes, simply ache with curiosity +about her. He put out a hand in expostulation. + +"Please," he pleaded, "please don't go. I have found the book. I really +have. But you must take my word for it. You mustn't open it till you are +at home." He handed it to the clerk to be wrapped up. "And now," he went +on, "won't you tell me something? I--upon my honor, I can't think where +we met?" + +"One hardly expects Mr. Orson Vane to remember all the young women in +society," she smiled. "Besides, if I must confess: I am only just what +society calls 'out.' I have seen Mr. Orson Vane: but he has not seen me. +Mr. Vane is a leader; I am--" She shrugged her shoulder, raised her +eyebrows, pursed up her mouth, oh, to a complete gesture that was the +prettiest, most bewildering finish to any sentence ever uttered. + +"Oh," said Orson, "but you are mistaken. I have seen you. No longer ago +than last night. In--" + +"In a mirror," she laughed. Then she grew suddenly quite solemn. "Oh, +you mustn't think I didn't know who you were. It was all very rash of +me, and very improper, my speaking to you, just now, but--" + +"It was very sweet," he interposed. + +"But," she went on, not heeding his remark at all, "I knew you so well +by sight, and I had really been introduced to you once,--one of a bevy +of debutantes, merely an item in a chorus--and, besides, my father--" + +"Your father?" repeated Orson, jogging his memory, "you don't mean to +say--" + +"My father is Augustus Vanlief," she said. + +He took a little time to digest the news. The clerk handed him the book +and the change. He saw, now, whence that charm, that grace, that beauty +came; he recalled that the late Mrs. Vanlief had been one of the +Waddells; there was no better blood in the country. With the name, too, +there came the thought of the wonderful revelations that were presently +to come to him, thanks to this girl's father. A sort of dizziness +touched him: he felt a quick conflict between the wish to worship this +girl, and the wish to probe deeper into life. It was with a very real +effort that he brushed the charm of her from him, and relapsed, again, +into the man who meant to know more of human life than had ever been +known before. + +He took out a silver pencil and held it poised above the book. + +"This book," he said, "is for you, you know, not for your father. Your +father and I are to be great friends but--I want to be friends, also, +with--" he looked a smiling appeal, "with--whom?" + +"With Miss Vanlief," she replied, mockingly. "My other name? I hate it; +really I do. Perhaps my father will tell you." + +She had given him the tip of her fingers, her gown had swung perfume as +it followed her, and she was out and away before he could do more than +give her the book, bow her good-bye, and stand in amaze at her +impetuousness, her verve. The thought smote him that, on the night +before, he had seen her, in the mirror, and spurned the notion of her +being other than a sham, a mockery. How did he know, even now, that she +was other than that? Yet, what had happened to him that he had been able +so long to stay under her charm, to believe in her, to wish for her, to +feel that she was hardly mortal, but some strange, sweet, splendid +dream? Was he the same man who, only a few hours ago, had held himself +shorn of all the primal emotions? He beat these questionings back and +forth in his mind; now doubting himself, now doubting this girl. Surely +she had not, in that dining-room, been sitting with her father? Would he +not have seen them together? Perhaps she was with some of her family's +womenfolk? Yes; now he remembered; she had been at a table with several +other ladies, all elderly. He wished he knew the name one might call +her, if ... if.... + +Luke Moncreith came into the shop. Orson caught a shadow of a frown on +the other's face. Moncreith's voice was sharp and bitter when he spoke. + +"Been buying the shop?" he asked. + +"No," said Orson, in some wonder. "Only one book." + +"Hope you'll like it," said the other, with a manner that meant the very +opposite. + +"I? Oh, I read it ages ago. It was for somebody else. You seem very +curious about it?" + +"I am. You aren't usually the man to dawdle in bookshops." + +"Dawdle?" Orson turned on the other sharply. "What the deuce do you +mean? Are you my keeper, or what? If I choose to, I can _live_ in this +shop, can't I?" + +"Oh, Lord, yes! Looks odd, just the same, you trailing in here after a +petticoat, and hanging around for--" he pulled out his watch,--"for a +good half hour." + +Orson burst out in a sort of clenched breath of rage. He kept the +phrases down with difficulty. "Better choose your words," he said. "I +don't like your words, and your watch be damned. Since when have my--my +friends taken to timing my actions? It's a blessing I'm going abroad." + +He turned and walked out of the shop, fiercely, swiftly. As the fresh +air struck his face, he put his hand to it, and shook his head, +wonderingly. "What's the matter with Moncreith? With me?" He thought of +the title of the book he had just given away. "Are we all as mad as +that?" he asked himself. + +The title was "March Hares." + + + + +CHAPTER V. + + +A young man so prominent in the town as Orson Vane had naturally a very +large list of acquaintances. He knew, in the fashionable phrase, +"everybody," and "everybody" knew him. His acquaintances ranged beyond +the world of fashion; the theatre, the turf, and many other regions had +denizens who knew Orson Vane and held him in esteem. He had always lived +a careful, well-mannered life; his name had never been in the newspapers +save in the inescapable columns touching society. + +When he was ready to proceed with the experiment of the mirror, the +largeness of his social register was at once a pleasure and a pain. +There were so many, so many! It was evident that he must use the types +most promising in eccentricity; he must adventure forth in company with +the strangest souls, not the mere ordinary ones. + +Sitting in the twilight of his rooms one day, it occurred to him that he +was now ripe for his first decision. Whose soul should he seize? That +was the question. He had spent a week or so perfecting plans, stalling +off awkward episodes, schooling his servants. There was no telling what +might not happen. + +He picked up a newspaper. A name caught his eye; he gave a little laugh. + +"The very man!" he told himself, "the very man. Society's court fool; it +will be worth something to know what lies under his cap and bells." + +He scrawled a note, enclosed it, and rang for Nevins. + +"Have that taken, at once, to Mr. Reginald Hart. And then, presently, +have a hansom called and let it wait nearby." + +"Reggie will be sure to come," he said, when alone. "I've told him there +was a pretty woman here." + +He felt a nervous restlessness. He paced his room, fingering the frames +of his prints, trying the cord of his new mirror, adjusting the blinds +of the windows. He tingled with mental and physical expectation. He +wondered whether nothing, after all, would be the result. How insane it +was to expect any such thing to happen as Vanlief had vapored of! This +was the twentieth century rather than the tenth; miracles never +happened. Yet how fervently he wished for one! To feel the soul of +another superimposing itself upon his own; to know that he had committed +the grandest larceny under heaven, the theft of a soul, and to gain, +thereby, complete insight into the spiritual machinery of another +mortal! + +Nevins returned, within a little time, bringing word that Mr. Hart had +been found at home, and would call directly. + +Vane pushed the new mirror to a position where it would face the door. +He told Nevins not to enter the room after Mr. Hart; to let him enter, +and let the curtain fall behind him. + +He took up a position by a window and waited. The minutes seemed heavy +as lead. The air was unnaturally still. + +At last he heard Nevins, in gentle monosyllables. Another voice, high +almost to falsetto, clashed against the stillness. + +Then the curtain swung back. + +Reginald Hart, whom all the smart world never called other than Reggie +Hart, stood for a moment in the curtain-way, the mirror barring his +path. He caught his image there to the full, the effeminate, full face, +the narrow-waisted coat, the unpleasantly womanish hips. He put out his +right hand, as if groping in the dark. Then he said, shrilly, +stammeringly. + +"Vane! Oh, Vane, where the de--" + +He sank almost to his knees. Vane stepping forward, caught him by the +shoulder and put him into an arm-chair. Hart sat there, his head hunched +between his shoulders. + +"Silly thing to do, Vane, old chappy. Beastly sorry for this--stunt of +mine. Too many tea-parties lately, Vane, too much dancing, too much--" +his voice went off into a sigh. "Better get a cab," he said, limply. + +He had quite forgotten why he had come: he was simply in collapse, +mentally and physically. Vane, trembling with excitement and delight, +walked up to the mirror from behind and sent the veil upon its face +again. Then he had Nevins summon the cab. He watched Hart tottering out, +upon Nevins' shoulder, with a dry, forced smile. + +So it was real! He could hardly believe it. In seconds, in the merest +flash, his visitor had faded like a flower whose root is plucked. The +man had come in, full of vitality, quite, in fact, himself; he had gone +out a mere husk, a shell. + +But there was still the climax ahead. Had he courage for it, now that it +loomed imminent? Should he send for Hart and have him pick up his soul +where he had dropped it? Or should he, stern in his first purpose, fit +that soul upon his own, as one fits a glove upon the hand? There was yet +time. It depended only upon whether Hart or himself faced the mirror +when the veil was off. + +He cut his knot of indecision sharply, with a stride to the mirror, a +jerk at the cord and a steady gaze into the clear pool of light, +darkened only by his own reflection. + + * * * * * + +Strain his eyes as he would, he could feel no change, not the faintest +stir of added emotion. He let the curtain drop upon the mirror +listlessly. + +Walking to his window-seat again, he was suddenly struck by his image in +one of the other glasses. He was really very well shaped; he felt a wish +to strip to the buff; it was rather a shame to clothe limbs as fine as +those. He was quite sure there were friends of his who would appreciate +photographs of himself, in some picturesque costume that would hide as +little as possible. It was an age since he had any pictures taken. He +called for Nevins. His voice struck Nevins as having a taint of tenor in +it. + +"Nevins," he said, "have the photographer call to-morrow, like a good +man, won't you? You know, the chap, I forget his name, who does all the +smart young women. I'll be glad to do the fellow a service; do him no +end of good to have his name on pictures of me. I'm thinking of +something a bit startling for the Cutter's costume ball, Nevins, so have +the man from Madame Boyer's come for instructions. And see if you can +find me some perfume at the chemist's; something heavy, Nevins. The +perfumes at once, that's a dear man. I want them in my pillows tonight." + +When the man was gone, his master went to the sideboard, opened it, and +gave a gentle sigh of disappointment. + +"Careless of me," he murmured, "to have no Red Ribbon in the place. How +can any gentleman afford to be without it? Dear, dear, if any of the +girls and boys had caught me without it. Another thing I must tell +Nevins. Nothing but whisky! Abominably vulgar stuff! Can't think, +really, 'pon honor I can't, how I ever came to lay any of it in. And no +cigarettes in the place. Goodness me! What sweet cigarettes those are +Mrs. Barrett Weston always has! Wonder if that woman will ask me to her +cottage this summer." + +He strolled to the window, yawned, stretched out his arms, drawing his +hands towards him at the end of his gesture. He inspected the fingers +minutely. They needed manicuring. He began to put down a little list of +things to be done. He strolled over to the tabouret where invitations +lay scattered all about. That dear Mrs. Sclatersby was giving a +studio-dance; she was depending on him for a novel feature. Perhaps if +he did a little skirt-dance. Yes; the notion pleased him. He would sit +down, at once, and write a hint to a newspaper man who would be sure to +make a sensation of this skirt-dance. + +That done, he heard Nevins knocking. + +"Oh," he murmured, "the perfumes. So sweet!" He buried his nose in a +handful of the sachet-bags. He sprayed some Maria Farina on his +forehead. Perfumes, he considered, were worth worship just as much as +jewels or music. The more sinful a perfume seemed, the more stimulating +it was to the imagination. Some perfumes were like drawings by +Beardsley. + +He looked at the walls. He really must get some Beardsleys put up. There +was nothing like a Beardsley for jogging a sluggish fancy; if you wanted +to see everything that milliners and dressmakers existed by hiding, all +you had to do was to sup sufficiently on Beardsley. He thought of +inventing a Beardsley cocktail; if he could find a mixture that would +make the brain quite pagan, he would certainly give it that name. + +His mind roved to the feud between the Montagues and Capulets of the +town. It was one of those modern feuds, made up of little social +frictions, infinitesimal jealousies, magnified by a malicious press into +a national calamity. It was a feud, he told himself, that he would have +to mend. It would mean, for him, the lustre from both houses. And there +was nothing, in the smart world, like plenty of lustre. There were +several sorts of lustre: that of money, of birth, and of public honors. +Personally, he cared little for the origin of his lustre; so it put him +in the very forefront of smartness he asked for nothing more. Of course, +his own position was quite impeccable. The smart world might narrow year +by year; the Newport set, and the Millionaire set, and the Knickerbocker +set--they might all dwindle to one small world of smartness; yet nothing +that could happen could keep out an Orson Vane. The name struck him, as +it shaped itself in his mind, a trifle odd. An Orson Vane? Yes, of +course, of course. For that matter, who had presumed to doubt the +position of a Vane? He asked himself that, with a sort of defiance. An +Orson Vane, an Orson Vane? He repeated the syllables over and over, in a +whisper at first, and then aloud, until the shrillness of his tone gave +him a positive start. + +He rang the bell for Nevins. + +"Nevins," he said, and something in him fought against his speech, "tell +me, that's a good man,--is there anything, anything wrong with--me?" + +"Nothing sir," said Nevins stolidly. + +Orson Vane gave a sort of gasp as the man withdrew. It had come to him +suddenly; the under-self was struggling beneath the borrowed self. He +was Orson Vane, but he was also another. + +Who? What other? + +He gave a little shrill laugh as he remembered. Reggie Hart,--that was +it,--Reggie Hart. + +He sat down to undress for sleep. He slipped into bed as daintily as a +woman, nestling to the perfumed pillows. + +Nevins, in his part of the house, sat shaking his head. "If he hadn't +given me warning," he told himself, "I'd have sent for a doctor." + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + + +The smart world received the change in Orson Vane with no immediate +wonder. Wonder is, at the outset, a vulgarity; to let nothing astonish +you is part of a smart education. A good many of the smartest hostesses +in town were glad that Vane had emerged from his erstwhile air of +aristocratic aloofness; he took, with them, the place that Reggie Hart's +continuing illness left vacant. + +In the regions where Vane had been actually intimate whispers began to +go about, it is true, and it was with no little difficulty that an +occasional story about him was kept out of the gossipy pages of the +papers. Vane was constantly busy seeking notoriety. His attentions to +several of the younger matrons were conspicuous. Yet he was so much of a +stimulating force, in a society where passivity was the rule, that he +was welcome everywhere. + +He had become the court fool of the smart set. + +To him, the position held nothing degrading. It was, he argued, a +reflection on smart society, rather on himself, that, to be prominent in +it, one must needs wear cap and bells. Moreover his position allowed +him, now and then, the utterance of grim truths that would not have +been listened to from anyone not wearing the jester's license. + +At the now famous dinner given by Mrs. Sclatersby, Orson Vane seized a +lull in the conversation, by remarking, in his ladylike lisp: + +"My dear Mrs. Sclatersby, I have such a charming idea. I am thinking of +syndicating myself." + +Mrs. Sclatersby put up her lorgnettes and smiled encouragement at Orson. +"It sounds Wall Streety," she said, "you're not going to desert us, are +you?" + +"Oh, nothing so dreadful. It would be an entirely smart syndicate, you +know; a syndicate of which you would be a member. I sometimes think, you +know, that I do not distribute myself to the best advantage. There have +been little jealousies, now and then, have there not?" He looked, in a +bird-like, perky way, at Mrs. Barrett Weston, and the only Mrs. Carlos. +"I have been unable to be in two places at once. Now a syndicate--a +syndicate could arrange things so that there would be no +disappointments, no clashings of engagements, no waste of opportunity. + +"How clever you always are," said a lady at Orson's right. She had +chameleon hair, and her poise was that of a soubrette. The theatre was +tremendously popular as a society model that season. Orson blew a kiss +at her, and went on with his speech. + +"Actors do it, you know. Painters have done it. Inventors do it. Why +not I?" He paused to nibble an olive. "To contribute to the gaiety of +our little world is, after all, the one thing worth while. Think how few +picturesque people we have! Eccentricity is terribly lacking in the +town. We have no Whistler; Mansfield is rather a dull imitation. Of +course there is George Francis Train; but he is a trifle, a trifle too +much of the larger world, don't you think?" + +"I never saw the man in my life," asserted the hostess. + +"Exactly," said Orson, "he makes himself too cheap. It keeps us from +seeing him. But Whistler; think of Whistler, in New York! He would wear +a French hat, fight duels every day, lampoon a critic every hour, and +paint nocturnes on the Fifth avenue pavement! He would make Diana fall +from the Tower in sheer envy. He would go through the Astoria with +monocle and mockery, and smile blue peacock smiles at Mr. Blashfield and +Mr. Simmons. He would etch himself upon the town. We would never let him +go again. We need that sort of thing. Our ambitions and our patience are +cosmopolitan; but we lack the public characters to properly give fire +and color to our streets. Now I--" + +He let his eyes wander about the room, a delicate smile of invitation on +his lips. + +"Don't you think," said one of the ladies, "that you are quite--quite +bohemian enough?" + +Orson shuddered obviously. "My dear lady," he urged, "it is a dreadful +thing to be bohemian. It is no longer smart. If I am considered the one, +I cannot possibly be the other. There is, to be sure, a polite +imitation; but it is quite an art to imitate the thing with just +sufficient indolence. But I really wish you would think the thing over, +Mrs. Sclatersby. I know nobody who would do the thing better than I. Our +men are mostly too fond of fashion, and too afraid of fancy. One must +not be ashamed of being called foolish. Whistler uses butterflies; +somebody else used sunflowers and green carnations; I should +use--lilies, I think, lilies-of-the-valley. Emblematic of the pure folly +of my pose, you know. One must do something like that, you see, to gain +smart applause; impossible hats and improbable hair, except in the case +of actresses, are quite extinct." + +A Polish orchestra that had been hitherto unsuccessful against the +shrill monologue of Orson, and the occasional laughter of the ladies, +now sent out a sudden, fierce stream of melody. It was evident that they +did not mean to take the insult of a large wage without offering some +stormy moments in exchange. The diners assumed a patient air, eating in +an abstracted manner, as if their stomachs were the only members of +their bodies left unstunned by the music. The assemblage wore, in its +furtive gluttony, an air of being in a plot of the most delicious +danger. Some rather dowdy anecdotes went about in whispers, and several +of the ladies made passionate efforts to blush. Orson Vane took a sip of +some apricotine, explaining to his neighbor that he took it for the +color; it was the color of verses by Verlaine. She had never heard of +the man. Ah; then of course Mallarmé, and Symons and Francis Saltus were +her gods? No; she said she liked Madame Louise; hers were by far the +most fragile hats purchasable; what was the use of a hat if it was not +fragile; to wear one twice was a crime, and to give one away unless it +was decently crushed was an indiscretion. Orson quite agreed with her. +To his other neighbor he confided that he was thinking of writing a +book. It would be something entirely in the key of blue. He was busy +explaining its future virtues, when an indiscreet lull came in the +orchestral tornado. + +"I mean to bring the pink of youth to the sallowest old age," he was +saying, "and every page is to be as dangerous as a Bowery cocktail." + +Then the storm howled forth again. Everyone talked to his or her +neighbor at top voice. Now and then pauses in the music left fag ends of +conversation struggling about the room. + +"The decadents are simply the people who refuse to write twaddle for the +magazines...." + +"The way to make a name in the world is to own a soap factory and ape +William Morris on the side...." + +"I can always tell when it is Spring by looking at the haberdashers' +windows. To watch shirts and ties blooming is so much nicer than flowers +and those smelly things...." + +"The pleasantest things in the world all begin with a P. Powders, +patches and poses--what should we do without them?..." + +This sort of thing came out at loose ends now and then. Suddenly the +music ceased altogether. The diners all looked as if they had been +caught in a crime. The lights went out in the room, and there were +little smothered shrieks. After an interval, a rosy glow lit up the +conservatory beyond the palms; a little stage showed in the distance. +Some notorious people from the music-halls began to do songs and dances, +and offer comic monologues. The diners fell into a sort of lethargy. +They did not even notice that Orson Vane's chair was empty. + +Vane was in a little boudoir lent him by the hostess. His nostrils +dilated with the perfume of her that he felt everywhere. He sank into a +silk-covered chair, before which he had arranged a full-length mirror, +and several smaller glasses, with candles glowing all about him. He was +conscious of a cloying sense of happiness over his physical perfections. +He stripped garment after garment from him with a care, a gentleness +that argued his belief that haste was a foe to beauty. He stretched +himself at full length, in epicurean enjoyment of himself. The flame of +life, he told himself, burnt the more steadily the less we wrapped it +up. If we could only return to the pagan life! And yet--what charm there +was in dress! The body had, after all, a monotony, a sameness; the +tenderest of its curves, the rosiest of its surfaces, must pall. But the +infinite variety of clothes! The delight of letting the most delicate +tints of gauze caress the flesh, while to the world only the soberest +stuffs were exposed! The rustle of fresh linen, the perfume that one +could filter through the layers of one's attire! + +Orson Vane closed his eyes, lazily, musingly. At that moment his proper +soul was quite in subjection; the ecstasy in the usurping soul was +all-powerful. + +He was thinking of what the cheval-glass in that little room must have +seen. + +It would be unspeakably fine to be a mirror. + +The little crystal clock ticking on the dressing-table tinkled an hour. +It brought him from his reveries with a start. He began gliding into +some shining, silken things of umber tints; they fitted him to the skin. + +He was a falconer. + +It was a costume to strike pale the idlers at a bathing beach. There was +not a crease, not a fold anywhere. A leathern thong upon a wrist, a +feathered cap upon his head, were almost the only points that rose away +from the body as God had fashioned it. Satisfaction filled him as he +surveyed himself. But there was more to do. Above this costume he put +the dress of a Spanish Queen. When he lifted the massively brocaded +train, there showed the most exquisitely chiseled ankles, the promise of +the most alluring legs. The corsage hinted a bust of the most soothing +softness. He spent fully ten minutes in happy admiration of his images +in the mirrors. + +When he proceeded to the conservatory, it was by a secret corridor. The +diners were wearily watching a Frenchwoman who sang with her gloves, +which were black and always on the point of falling down. She was very +pathetic; she was trying to sing rag-time melodies because some idiot +had told her the Newport set preferred that music. A smart young woman +had danced a dance of her own invention; everyone agreed, as they did +about the man who paints with his toes, that, considering her smartness +in the fashionable world, it was not so much a wonder that she danced so +well, as that she danced at all. They were quite sure the professional +managers would offer her the most lavish sums; she would be quite as +much of an attraction as the foreign peer who was trying to be a +gentleman, where they are most needed, on the stage. + +At a sign from Orson, the lights went out again, as the Frenchwoman +finished her song. Several of the guests began to talk scandal in the +dark; there are few occupations more fascinating than talking scandal in +the dark. The question of whether it was better to be a millionaire or +a fashionable and divorced beauty was beginning to agitate several +people into almost violent argument, when the lights flared to the full. + +The chorus of little "Ohs" and "Ahs," of rapid whispered comment, and of +discreetly patted gloves, was quite fervid for so smart an assemblage. +Except in the rarest cases, to gush is as fatal, in the smart world, as +to be intolerant. There is a smart avenue between fervor and frowning; +when you can find that avenue unconsciously, in the dark, as it were, +you have little more to learn in the code of smartness. + +Mrs. Sclatersby herself murmured, quite audibly: + +"How sweet the dear boy looks!" + +Her clan took the word up, and for a time the sibilance of it was like a +hiss in the room. A man or two in the company growled out something that +his fairer neighbor seemed unwilling to hear. These basso profundo +sounds, if one could formulate them into words at all, seemed more like +"Disgusting fool!" or "Sickening!" than anything else. But the company +had very few men in it; in this, as in many other respects, the room +resembled smart society itself. The smart world is engineered and +peopled chiefly by the feminine element. The male sex lends to it only +its more feminine side. + +It is almost unnecessary to describe the picture that Orson Vane +presented on that little stage. His beauty as "Isabella, Queen of +Spain," has long since become public property; none of his later efforts +in suppression of the many photographs that were taken, shortly after +the Sclatersby dinner, have succeeded in quite expunging the portraits. +At that time he gave the sittings willingly. He felt that these +photographs represented the highest notch in his fame, the completest +image of his ability to be as beautiful as the most beautiful woman. + +Shame or nervousness was not part of Orson Vane's personality that +night. He sat there, in the skillfully arranged scheme of lights, with +his whole body attuned only to accurate impersonation of the character +he represented. He got up. His motion, as he passed across the stage, +was so utterly feminine, so made of the swaying, undulating grace that +usually implies the woman; the gesture with his fan was so finically +alluring; the poise of his head above his bared shoulders so +coquettish,--that the women watching him almost held their breaths in +admiration. + +It was, you see, the most adroit flattery that a man could pay the +entire sex of womankind. + +Then the music, a little way off, began to strum a cachuca. The tempo +increased; when finally the pace was something infectious, Orson Vane +began a dance that remains, to this day, an episode in the annals of the +smart. The vigor of his poses, the charm of his skirt-manipulation, +carried the appreciation of his friends by storm. Some of the ladies +really had hard work to keep from rushing to the stage and kissing the +young man then and there. When we are emotional, we Americans--to what +lengths will we not go! + +But the surprises were not yet over. A dash of darkness stayed the +music; a swishing and a flapping came from the stage; then the lights. +Vane stood, in statue position, as a falconer. You could almost, under +the umber silk, see the rippling of his veins. + +Only a second he stood so, but it was a second of triumph. The company +was so agape with wonder, that there was no sound from it until the +music and the bare stage, following a brief period of blackness, +recalled it to its senses. Then it urged Mrs. Sclatersby to grant a +great favor. + +Mr. Vane must be persuaded not take off his falconer's costume; to +mingle, for what little time remained, with the company without resuming +his more conventional attire. + +Vane smiled when the message came to him. He nodded his head. Then he +sent for the Sclatersby butler. + +"Plenty of Red Ribbon!" he said to that person. + +"Plenty, sir." + +"Make a note of your commissions; a cheque in the morning." + +Then he mingled again with his fellow-guests, and there was much +toasting, and the bonds all loosened a little, and the sparkle came up +out of the glasses into the cheeks of the women. The other men, one by +one, took their way out. + +Women crushed one another to touch the hero of the evening. Jealousies +shot savage glances about. Every increase in this emulation increased +the love that Orson Vane felt for himself. He caressed a hand here, a +lock there, with a king's condescension. If he felt a kiss upon his +hand, he smiled a splendid, slightly wearied smile. If he had hot eyes +turned on him, burning so fiercely as to spell out passion boldly, he +returned, with his own glances, the most ineffable promises. + +There have been many things written and said about that curious affair +at the Sclatersbys, but for the entire history of it--well, there are +reasons why you will never be able to trace it. Orson Vane is perhaps +the only one who might tell some of the details; and he, as you will +find presently, has utterly forgotten that night. + +"Time we went home, girls," said Vane, at last, disengaging himself +gently from a number of warm hands, and putting away, as he moved into +freedom, more than one beautiful pair of shoulders. He needed the fresh +air; he was really quite worn out. But he still had a madcap notion left +in him; he still had a trump to play. + +"A pair of hose," he called out, "a pair of hose, with diamond-studded +garters, to the one who will play 'follow' to my 'leader!'" + +And the end of that dare-devil scamper did not come until the whole +throng reached Madison Square. + +Vane plunged to the knees in the fountain. + +That chilled the chase. But one would not be denied. Hers was a dark +type of beauty that needed magnolias and the moon and the South to frame +it properly. She lifted her skirts with a little tinkling laugh, and ran +to where Orson stood, splashing her way bravely through the water. + +Vane looked at her and took her hand. + +"I envy the prize I offered," he said to her. + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + + +Dawn found Orson Vane nodding in a hansom. He had told the man to drive +to Claremont. The Palisades were just getting the first rosy streaks the +sun was putting forth. The Hudson still lay with a light mist on it. The +ascent to Claremont, in sunshine so clustered with beauty, was now +deserted. A few carts belonging to the city were dragging along +sleepily. Harlem was at the hour when the dregs of one day still taint +the morn of the next one. + +Vane was drowsy. He felt the need of a fillip. He did not like to think +of getting back to his rooms and taking a nap. It was still too early, +it seemed, for anything to eat or drink. He spied the Fort Lee ferry, +and with it a notion came to him. The cabman was willing. In a few +minutes he was aboard the ferry, and the cooler air that sweeps the +Hudson was laving him. On the Jersey side he found a sleepy innkeeper +who patched up a breakfast for him. He had, fortunately, some smokable +cigars in his clothes. The day was well on when he reached the New York +side of the river again, and gave "The Park!" as the cabman's orders. + +His body now restored to energy again, his mind recounted the successes +of the night. He really had nothing much to wish for. The men envied him +to the point of hatred; the women adored him. He was the pet of the +smartest people. He was shrewd enough, too, to be petted for a +consideration; his adroitness in sales of Red Ribbon added comfortably +to his income. He took pride in this, as if there had ever been a time, +for several generations, when the name of Vane had not stood good for a +million or so. + +The Park was not well tenanted. Some robust members of the smart set +were cantering about the bridle paths, and now and then a carriage +turned a corner; but the people who preferred the Park for its own sake +to the Park of the afternoon drive were, evidently, but few. Vane felt +quite neglected; he was still able to count the number of times that he +had bowed to familiars. The deserted state of the Park somewhat +discounted the tonic effects of its morning freshness. Nature was +nothing unless it was a background for man. The country was a place from +which you could come to town. Still--there was really nothing better to +do, this fine morning. He rather dreaded the thought of his rooms after +the brilliance of the night. + +His meditations ceased at approach of a girlish figure on horseback, a +groom at a discreet distance behind. + +It was Miss Vanlief. + +He saw that she saw him, yet he saw no welcome in her eyes. He rapped +for the hansom to stop; got out, and waved his hat elaborately at the +young woman. She, in sheer politeness, had reined in her horse. + +"A sweet day," he minced, "and jolly luck my meeting you! Thought it was +rather dull in the old Park, till you turned up. Sweet animal you're +on." He looked up with that air that, the night before, had been so +bewitching. Somehow, as the girl eyed him, he felt haggard. She was not +smiling, not the least little bit. + +"I have read about the affair at Mrs. Sclatersby's," she said. + +"Really? Dreadful hurry these newspapers are always in, to be sure. It +was really a great lark." + +"It must have been," was her icy retort. She beckoned to the groom. +"That--that sheet," she ordered, sharply, holding out one gauntleted +hand. The groom gave her the folded newspaper. She began to read from +it, in a bitter monotone: + +"The antics of Mr. Orson Vane," she read, "for some time the subject of +comment in society, have now reached the point where they deserve the +censure of publicity. His doings at a certain fashionable dinner of last +night were the subject of outspoken disgust at the prominent clubs +later. Now that the case is openly discussed, it may be repeated that a +prominent publication recently had occasion to refuse print to a +distinctly questionable photograph of this young man, submitted, it is +alleged, by himself. In the more staid social circles, one wonders how +much longer Mrs. Carlos and the other leaders of the smartest set will +continue to countenance such behavior." + +Vane, as she read, was enjoying every inch of her. What freshness, what +grace! What a Lady Godiva she would have made! + +"Sweet of you to take such interest," he observed, as she handed the +paper to the groom. "Malice, you know, sheer malice. Dare say I forgot +to give that paper some news that I gave the others; they take that sort +of thing so bitterly, you know. As for the photo--it was really awfully +cunning. I'll send you one. Oh, must you go? I'm so cut up! Charming +chat we've had, I'm sure." + +She had given her horse a cut with the whip, had sent Vane a stare of +the most open contempt, and was now off and away. Vane stood staring +after her. "Very nice little filly," he murmured. "Very!" + +Then he gave his house number to the cabman. + +Turning into Park avenue, at Thirty-Ninth street, the horse slipped on +the asphalt. The hansom spun on one wheel, and then crashed against a +lamp-post. Vane was almost stunned, though there was no mark on him +anywhere. He felt himself all over, but he could feel not as much as a +lump. But his head ached horribly; he felt queerly incapable of thought. +Whatever it was that had happened to him, it had stunned something in +him. What that something was he did not realize even as he told Nevins, +who opened the door to him in some alarm: + +"Send the cab over to Mr. Reginald Hart's. Say I must--do you hear, +Nevins?--I must have him here within the hour--if he has to come in a +chair!" + +Not even when he let the veil glide from the new mirror did he +understand what part of him was stunned. He moved about in a sort of +half wakefulness. The time he spent before Hart's arrival was all a +stupor, spent on a couch, with eyes closed. + +Hart came in feebly, leaning on a stick. + +"Funny thing of you to do," he piped, "sending for me like this. What +the--" He straightened himself in front of the new mirror, and, for an +instant, swayed limply there. Then his stick took an upward swing, and +he minced across the room vigorously. "Why, Vane," he said, "not ill, +are you? Jove, you know, I've had a siege, myself. Feel nice and fit +this minute, though. Shouldn't wonder if the effort to get here had done +me good. What was the thing you wanted me for?" + +Vane shook his head, feebly. "Upon my word, Hart, I don't know. I had an +accident; cab crushed me; I was a little off my head, I think. All a +mistake." + +"Sorry, I'm sure," lisped Hart, "hope it won't be anything real. I tell +you I feel quite out of things. All the other way with you, eh! Hear +you're no end of a choice thing with the _cafe au lait_ gang. Well, +adios!" + +Vane lay quite still after the other had gone. When he spoke, it was to +say, to the emptiness of the room, but nodding to where Hart had last +stood: + +"What a worm! What an utter worm!" + +The voice was once more the voice of Orson Vane. + +As realization of that came to him, he spoke again, so loud that Nevins, +without, heard it. + +"Thank God," he said. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + + +The time that had passed since he began the experiment with the +Professor's mirror now filled Vane with horror. The life that had seemed +so splendid, so triumphant to him a short while ago, now presented +itself to him as despicable, mean, hateful. Now that he had safely +ousted the soul of Reginald Hart he loathed the things that, under the +dominance of that soul, he had done. The quick feeling of success that +he had expected from his adventure into the realm of the mind was not +his at all; his emotions were mixed, and in that mixture hatred of +himself was uppermost. It was true: he had succeeded. The thoughts, the +deeds of another man had become his thoughts, his deeds. The entire +point of view had been, for the time, changed. But, where he had +expected to keep the outland spirit in subjection, it was the reverse +that had happened; the usurping soul had been in positive dominance; he +had been carried along relentlessly by the desires and the reflections +of that other. + +The fact that he knew, now, to the very letter, the mind that animated +that fellow, Reginald Hart, was small consolation to him. The odium of +that reputation was inescapably his, Orson Vane's. Oh, the things he had +said,--and thought,--and done! He had not expected that any man's mind +could be so horrible as that. He thought of the visitation he had +conjured upon himself, and so thinking, shuddered. How was he ever to +elude the contempt that his masquerade, if he could call it so, would +bring him? + +Above all, that scene with Miss Vanlief came back to him with a bitter +pang. What did it profit him, now, to fathom the foul depths of Reginald +Hart's mind concerning any ever so girlish creature? It was he, Orson +Vane, for all that it was possible to explain to the contrary, who had +phrased Miss Vanlief's beauty in such abominable terms. + +Consternation sat on his face like a cloud. He could think of no way out +of the dark alley into which he had put himself. + +Each public appearance of his now had its tortures. Men who had +respected him now avoided him; women to whom he had once condescended +were now on an aggravating plane of intimacy. Sometimes he could almost +feel himself being pointed out on the street. + +The mental and physical reaction was beginning to trace itself on his +face. He feared his Florentine mirrors now almost as much as the +Professor's. The blithe poise had left him. He brooded a good deal. His +insight into another nature than his own filled him with a sense of +distaste for the human trend toward evil. + +He spent some weeks away from town, merely to pick up his health again. +His strength returned a little, but the joy of life came back but +tardily. + +On his first day in town he met Moncreith. There was an ominous wrinkle +gathering in the other's forehead, but Vane braved all chance of a +rebuff. + +"Luke," he said, "don't you know I've been ill? You can't think how ill +I've been. Do you remember I told you I was going abroad? I've been +abroad, mentally; I have, Luke, really I have. It's like a bad dream to +me. You know what I mean." + +Moncreith found his friend rather pathetic. At their last meeting he had +been hot in jealousy of Orson. Now he could afford to pity him. He had +made Jeannette Vanlief's acquaintance, and he stood quite well with her. +He had made up his mind to stand yet better; he was, in fact, in love +with her. He was quite sure that Vane had quite put himself out of that +race. So he took the other's hand, and walked amicably to the Town and +Country Club with him. + +"You have been doing strange things," he ventured. + +"Strange," echoed Vane, "strange isn't the word! Ghastly, +horrible--awful things I've been doing. I wish I could explain. But +it--it isn't my secret, Luke. All I can say is: I was ill. I am, I hope, +quite well again." + +It seemed an age since he had spent an hour or so in his favorite club. +The air of the members was unmistakably frosty. The conversation shrank +audibly. He was glad when Moncreith found a secluded corner and bore him +to it. But he was not a bright companion; his own thoughts were too +depressing to allow of his presenting a sparkling surface to the world. +They talked in mere snatches, in curt syllables. + +"I've seen a good deal of Miss Vanlief," said Moncreith, with conscious +triumph. + +"Oh," said Vane, with a start, "Miss Vanlief? So you know her? Is +she--is she well?" + +"Quite. I see her almost every day." + +"Fortunate man!" sighed Vane. He was a little weary of life. He wanted +to tell somebody what his dreams about Miss Vanlief were; he wanted to +cry out loud, "She is the dearest, sweetest girl in the world!" merely +to efface, in his own mind, the alien thought of her that had come to +him weeks ago. Moncreith did not seem the one to utter this cry to. +Moncreith was too engrossed in his own success. He could bear +Moncreith's company no longer, not just then. He muttered lame words; he +stumbled out to the avenue. + +Some echo of an instinct turned his steps to the little bookshop. + +It was quite empty of customers. He passed his fingers over the back of +books that he thought Miss Vanlief might have handled. It was an absurd +whim, a childish trick. Yet it soothed him perceptibly. Our nerves +control our bodies and our nerves are slaves of our imaginations. + +He was turning to go, when his eye fell on a parcel lying on the +counter. It was addressed to "Miss Jeannette Vanlief." + +"Jeannette, Jeannette!" he said the name over to himself time and again. +It brought the image of her before him more plainly than ever. The +sunset glint in her hair, the roses and lilies of her skin, the melody +in her voice! The charm with which she had first met him, in that very +shop. It all came to him keenly. The more remote the possibility of his +gaining her seemed, the more he hugged the thought of her. He admitted +to himself now, all the more since his excursion into an abominable side +of human nature, that she was the most unspoilt creature in his world. A +girl with that face, that hair, that wit, was sure to be of a charm that +could never lose its flavor; the allurement of her was a thing that +could never die. + +Nothing but thoughts of this girl came to him on the way to his rooms. +Once in his own place, he felt that his reflections on Miss Vanlief had +served him as a tonic. He felt an energy once more, a vigor, a desire +for action. In that mood he turned fiercely upon some of the drawings on +his walls. He called Nevins, and had a heap made of the things that now +filled him with loathing. + +"All of the Beardsleys must come down," he ordered. "No; not all. The +portrait of Mantegna may stay. That has nobility; the others have the +genius of hidden evil. They take too much of the trapping from our +horrible human nature. The funeral procession by Willette may hang; his +Montmartre things are trivially indecent. Heine and his grotesqueries +may stay in jail for all I care. Leave one or two of Thoeny's blue +dragoons. Leandre's crowned heads will do me no harm; I can see past +their cruelties. But take the Gibsons away; they are relegated to the +matinee girl. What is to be done with them? Really, Nevins, don't worry +me about such things. Sell them, give them, lose them: I don't care. +There's only one man in the world who'd really adore them, and he--" he +clenched his hands as he thought of Hart,--"he is a worm, a worm that +dieth and yet corrupts everything about him." + +He sat down, when this clearance was over, and wrote a rather long +letter to Professor Vanlief. He told as much as he could bring himself +to tell of the result of the experiment. He begged the Professor, +knowing the circumstances as no other did, to do what was possible to +reinstate him, Vane, in the esteem of Miss Vanlief. As to whether he +meant to go on with further experiments; he had not yet made up his +mind. There were consequences, obligations, following on this clear +reading of other men's souls, that he had not counted upon. + + + + +CHAPTER IX. + + +To cotton-batting and similar unromantic staples the great house of R.S. +Neargood & Co. first owed the prosperity that later developed into +world-wide fame. It was success in cotton-batting that enabled the firm +to make those speculations that eventually placed millions to its +credit, and familiarized the Bourse and Threadneedle Street with its +name. + +What ever else can be said of cotton-batting, however, it is hardly a +topic of smart conversation. So in smart circles there was never any +mention of cotton-batting when the name of Neargood came up. Instead, it +was customary to refer to them as "the people, you know, who built the +Equator Palace for the Tropical Government, and all that sort of thing." +A certain vagueness is indispensable to polite talk. + +Yet not even this detail of politics and finance counted most in the +smart world. The name of Neargood might never have been heard of in that +world if it had not been for the beautiful daughters of the house of +Neargood. There is nothing, nowadays, like having handsome daughters. +You may have made your millions in pig, or your thousands in whisky, +but, in the eyes of the complaisant present, the curse dies with the +debut of a beautiful daughter. It is true that the smart sometimes make +an absurd distinction between the older generation and the new; +sometimes a barrier is raised for the daughter that checks the mother; +but caprice was ever one of the qualities of smartness. + +Through two seasons the beautiful Misses Neargood--Mary and +Alice--reigned as belles. They were both good to look at, tall, stately, +with distinct profiles. There was not much to choose, so to put it, +between them. Mary was the handsomer; Alice the cleverer. Through two +seasons the society reporters, on the newspapers that are yellow as well +as those that make one blue, exhausted the well of journalese in +chronicling the doings of these two young women. + +The climax of descriptive eloquence was reached on the occasion of the +double wedding of Mary and Alice Neargood. + +Mary changed the name of Neargood for that of Spalding-Wentworth; Alice +became Mrs. Van Fenno. + +Up to this time--as far, at least, as was observable--these two sisters +had dwelt together in unity. Never had the spirits of envy or +uncharitableness entered them. But after marriage there came to each of +them that stormy petrel of Unhappiness, Ambition. + +As a composer of several songs and light operas. Van Fenno was fairly +well known. Spalding-Wentworth was known as a man of Western wealth, of +Western blue blood, and of prominence in the smart set. For some time +the worldly successes of the Van Fennos did not disturb Mrs. +Spalding-Wentworth at all. Her husband was smart, since he moved with +the smart; he and his hyphen were the leaders in a great many famous +ways, notably in fashion and in golf. From the smart point of view the +Van Fennos were not in the hunt with the other family. + +Mrs. Van Fenno chafed and churned a little in silence, but hope did not +die in her. She made up her mind to be as prominent as her sister or +perish in the attempt. + +She did not have to perish. Things took a turn, as they will even in the +smart world, and there came a time when it was fashionable to be +intellectual. The smart set turned from the distractions of dinners and +divorces to the allurements of the arts. Music, painting and literature +became the idols of the hour. With that bland, heedless facility that +distinguishes To-day, the men and women of fashion became quickly versed +in the patter of the Muses. + +The Van Fennos became the rage. Everybody talked of his music and her +charm. Where the reporters had once used space in describing +Spalding-Wentworth's leadership in a cotillon or conduct of a coach, +they were now required to spill ink in enumeration of "those present" +at Mrs. Van Fenno's "musical afternoons." + +Wherefore there was a cloud on the fair brow of Mary Wentworth. Her +intimates were privileged to call her that. Ordinary mortals, omitting +the hyphen, would have been frozen with a look. + +When there is a cloud on the wife's brow it bodes ill for the husband. +The follies of a married man should be dealt with leniently; they are +mostly of his wife's inspiration. One day the cloud cleared from Mary +Wentworth's brow. She was sitting at breakfast with her husband. + +"Why, Clarence," she exclaimed, with a suddenness that made him drop his +toast, "there's literature!" + +"Where?" said Clarence, anxiously. "Where?" He looked about, eager to +please. + +"Stupid," said his wife. "I mean--why shouldn't we, that is, you--" She +looked at him, sure that he would understand without her putting the +thing into syllables. "Yes," she repeated, "literature is the thing. +There it is, as easy, as easy--" + +"Hasn't it always been there?" asked her dear, dense husband. A woman +may brood over a thing, you see, for months, and the man will not get so +much as a suspicion. + +She went on as if he had never spoken. "Literature is the easiest. +Clarence, you must write novels!" + +He buttered himself another slice of toast. + +"Certainly, my dear," he nodded, with a pleasant smile. "Quite as you +please." + +It was in this way that the Spalding-Wentworth novels were incited. The +art of writing badly is, unfortunately, very easy. In painting and in +music some knowledge of technic is absolutely necessary, but in +literature the art of writing counts last, and technic is rarely +applauded. The fact remains that the smart set thought the +Spalding-Wentworth novels were "so clever!" Mrs. Van Fenno was utterly +crushed. Mary Wentworth informed an eager world that her husband's next +novel would be illustrated with caricatures by herself; she had +developed quite a trick in that direction. Now and again her husband +refused to bother his head with ambitions, and devoted himself entirely +to red coats and white balls. Mrs. Wentworth's only device at such times +was to take desperately to golf herself. She really played well; if she +had only had staying power, courage, she might have gone far. But, if +she could not win cups, she could look very charming on the clubhouse +lawn. One really does not expect more from even a queen. + +It did not disturb Mrs. Wentworth at all to know that, where he was best +known, her husband's artistic efforts were considered merely a joke. She +knew that everyone had some mask or other to hold up to the world; and +she knew there was nothing to fear from a brute of a man or two. In her +heart she agreed with them; she knew her husband was a large, kindly, +clumsy creature; a useful, powerful person, who needed guidance. + +Kindly and clumsy--Clarence Spalding-Wentworth had title to those two +adjectives: there was no denying that. It was his kindliness that moved +him, after a busy day at a metropolitan golf tournament, toward Orson +Vane's house. He had heard stories of Vane's illness; they had been at +college together; he wanted to see him, to have a chat, a smoke, a good, +chummy hour or two. + +It was his clumsiness that brought about the incident that came to have +such memorable consequences. Nevins told him Mr. Vane was out; Wentworth +thought he would go in and have a look at Vane's rooms, anyway; sit +down, perhaps, and write him a note. Nevins had swung the curtain to +behind him when Wentworth's heel caught in the wrapping around the new +mirror. + +He looked into the pool of glass blankly. + +"Funny thing to cover up a mirror like that!" he told himself. He flung +the stuff over the frame carelessly. It merely hung by a thread. Almost +any passing wind would be sure to lift it off. + +"Wonder where he keeps his smokes?" he hummed to himself, striding up +and down, like a good natured mammoth. + +He found some cigars began puffing at one with an audible satisfaction, +and at last let himself down to an ebony escritoire that he could have +smashed with one hand. He wrote a scrawl; waited again, whistled, looked +out of the window, picked up a book, peered at the pictures, and then, +with a puff of regret, strode out. + +As he passed the Professor's mirror the current of air he made swept the +curtain from the glass and left it exposed. + + + + +CHAPTER X. + + +At about the time that Wentworth was scrawling his note in Vane's rooms +a slender young woman, dressed in a grey that shimmered like the +winter-sea in sunlight, wearing a hat that had the air of having lit +upon her hair for the moment only,--merely to give the world an +instant's glance at the gracious combination that woman's beauty and +man's millinery could effect--was coming out from one of those huge +bazaars where you can buy almost everything in the world except the +things you want. As she reached the doors, a young man, entering, +brushed her arm; his sleeve caught her portemonnaie. He stooped for it, +offered it hastily, and then--and not until then, gave a little "Oh!" +of--what was it, joy? or mere wonder, or both? + +"Oh," he repeated, "I can't go in--now. It's--it's ages since I could +say two words to you. 'Good-morning!' and 'How do you do?' has been the +limit of our talk. Besides, you have a parcel. It weighs, at the very +least, an ounce. I could never think of letting you tire yourself so." +He took the flimsy mite from her, and ranged his steps to hers. + +It was true, what he had said about their brief encounters. Do what she +would to forget that morning in the Park, and the weeks before it, +Jeannette Vanlief had not quite succeeded. Not even the calm +dissertations of her father, the arguments pointing to the unfathomable +freakishness of human nature, had altogether ousted her aversion to +Orson Vane. It was an aversion made the more keen because it came on the +heels of a strong liking. She had been prepared to like this young man. +Something about him had drawn her; and then had come the something that +had simply flung her away. Yet, to-day, he seemed to be the Orson Vane +that she had been prepared to like. + +She remembered some of the strange things her father had been talking +about. She noted, as Orson spoke, that the false tenor note was gone out +of his voice. But she was still a little fluttered; she could not quite +trust herself, or him. + +"But I am only going to the car," she declared. "It will hardly be worth +while. I mustn't take you out of your way." + +"I see," he regretted, "you've not forgotten. I can't explain; I was--I +think I was a little mad. Perhaps it is in the family. But--I wish you +would imagine, for to-day, that we had only just known each other a very +little while, that we had been in that little bookshop only a day or so +ago, that you had read the book, and we had met again, and--." He was +looking at her with a glow in his eyes, a tenderness--! Her eyes met his +for only an instant, but they fathomed, in that instant, that there was +only homage, and worship, and--and something that she dared not spell, +even to her soul--in them. That burning greed that she had seen in the +Park was not there. + +She smiled, wistfully, hesitatingly. Yet it was enough for him to cling +to; it buoyed his mood to higher courage. + +"Let us pretend," he went on, "that there are no streetcars in the town. +Let us be primitive; let us play we are going to take a peep-show from +the top of the Avenue stage! Oh--please! It gets you just as near, you +know; and if you like we can go on, and on, and do it all over again. +Think of the tops of the hats and bonnets one sees from the roof! It's +such a delightful picture of the avenue; you see all the little +marionettes going like beads along the string. And then, think of the +danger of the climb to the roof! It is like the Alps. You never know, +until you are there, whether you will arrive in one piece or in several. +Come," he laughed, for she was now really smiling, openly, sweetly, "let +us be good children, come in from Westchester County, to see the big +city." + +"Perhaps," she ventured, "we will make it the fashion. And that would +spoil it for so many of the plainer people." + +"Oh," and he waved his hand, "after us--the daily papers! Let us +pretend--I beg your pardon, let me pretend--youth, and high spirits, +and the intention to enjoy to-day." + +A rattling and a scraping on the asphalt warned them of an approaching +stage, and after a scramble, that had its shy pleasures for both, they +found themselves on the top of the old relic. + +"It is a bit of the Middle Ages," said Orson, "look at those horses! +Aren't they delightfully slender? And the paint! Do you notice the +paint? And the stories those plush seats down below us could tell! Think +of the misers and the millionaires, the dowagers and the drabs, that +have let these old stages bump them over Murray Hill! You can't have +that feeling about a street-car, not one of the electric ones, at any +rate. Do you know the story of the New Yorker who was trying to sleep in +a first-class compartment on a French railway? There was a collision, +and he was pitched ten feet onto a coal-heap. He said he thought he was +at home and he was getting off the stage at Forty-Second street." + +They were passing through the most frequented part of the avenue. Noted +singers and famous players passed them; old beaux and fresh belles; +political notabilities and kings of corruption. A famous leader of +cotillions, a beauty whose profile vied with her Boston terriers for +being her chief distinction, and a noted polo-player came upon the scene +and vanished again. Vane and his companion gave, from time to time, +little nods to right and left. Their friends stared at them a little, +but that caused them no sorrow. Automobiles rushed by. They looked down +upon them, lofty in their ruined tower. + +"As a show," said Vane, "it is admirably arranged. It moves with a +beautiful precision. There is nothing hurried about it; the illusion of +life is nearly complete. Some of them, I suppose, really are alive?" + +"I am not sure," she answered, gravely. "Sometimes I think they merely +move because there is a button being pressed somewhere; a button we +cannot see, and that they spend their lives hiding from us." + +"I dare say you are right. In the words of Fay Templeton, 'I've been +there and I know.' I have made my little detours: but the lane had, +thank fortune, a turning." + +She saw through his playfulness, and her eyes went up to his in a +sympathy--oh, it made him reel for sweetness. + +"I am glad," she said, simply. + +"But we are getting serious again," he remonstrated, "that would never +do. Have we not sworn to be children? Let us pretend--let us pretend!" +He looked at the grey roofs, the spires oozing from the hill to the sky. +He looked at the grey dream beside him: so grey, so fair, so crowned +with the hue of the sun before the world had made him so brazen. "Let us +pretend," he went on, after a sigh, "that we are bound for the open +road, and that we are to come to an inn, and that we will order +something to eat. We--" + +"Oh," she laughed, "you men, you men! Always something to eat!" + +"You see, we are of coarse stuff; we cannot sup on star-dust, and dine +on bubbles. But--this is only to pretend! An imaginary meal is sometimes +so much more fun than a real one. At a real one, you see, I would have +to try to eat, and I could not spend the whole time looking at you, and +watching the sunshine on your hair, and the lilies--" He caught his +breath sharply, with a little clicking noise. "Dear God," he whispered, +"the lilies again! And I had never seen them until now." + +"You are going to be absurd," she said, though her voice was hardly a +rebuke. + +"And wouldn't I have excuse," he asked, "for all the absurdities in the +world! I want to be as absurd as I can; I want to think that there's +nothing in the world any uglier than--you." + +"And will you dine off that thought?" + +"Oh, no; that is merely one of the condiments. I keep that in reach, +while the other things come and go. I tell you: how would it be if we +began with a bisque of crab? The tenderest pink, you know, and not the +ghost of any spice that you can distinguish; a beautiful, creamy blend." + +"You make it sound delicious," she admitted. + +"We take it slowly, you know, religiously. The conversation is mostly +with the eyes. Dinner conversation is so often just as vapid as +dinner-music! The only point in favor of dinner-music is that we are +usually spared the sight of it. There is no truth more abused than the +one that music must be heard and not seen. When I am king I mean to +forbid any singing or playing of instruments within sight of the public; +it spoils all the pleasure of the music when one sees the uglinesses in +its execution." + +"But people would not thank you if you kept the sight of Paderewski or +De Pachmann from them." + +"They might not thank me at first, but they would learn gratitude in the +end, A contortionist is quite as oppressive a sight as an automaton. No; +I repeat, performers of music should never, never be visible. It is a +blow in the face of the art of music; it puts it on the plane of the +theatre. What persons of culture want to do is to listen, to listen, to +listen; to shut the eyes, and weave fancies about the strains as they +come from an unseen corner. Is there not always a subtle charm about +music floating over a distance? That is a case in point; that same charm +should always be preserved. The pianist, the soloist of any sort, as +well as the orchestra, or the band--except in the case of the regimental +band, in battle or in review, where actual spectacle, and visible +encouragement are the intention--should never be seen. There should +always be a screen, a curtain, between us and the players. It would make +the trick of music criticism harder, but it would still leave us the +real judges. Take out of music criticism the part that covers fingering, +throat manipulation, pedaling, and the like, and what have you left? +These fellows judge what they see more than what they hear. To give a +proper judgment of the music that comes from the unseen; that is the +only test of criticism. There can be no tricks, no paddings." + +"But the opera?" wondered the girl. + +"The opera? Oh, the opera is, at best, a contradiction in terms. But I +do not waive my theory for the sake of opera. It should be seen as +little as any other form of music. The audience, supplied with the story +of the dramatic action, should follow the incidents by ear, not by eye. +That would be the true test of dramatic writing in music. We would, +moreover, be spared the absurdity of watching singers with beautiful +voices make themselves ridiculous by clumsy actions. As to comic +opera--the music's appeal would suffer no tarnish from the merely +physical fascination of the star or the chorus ... I know the thought is +radical; it seems impossible to imagine a piano recital without long +hair, electric fingers, or visible melancholia; opera with only the +box-holders as appeals to the eye seems too good to be true; but--I +assure you it would emancipate music from all that now makes it the +most vicious of the arts. Painters do not expect us to watch them +painting, nor does the average breed of authors--I except the Manx--like +to be seen writing. Yet the musician--take away the visible part of his +art, and he is shorn of his self-esteem. I assure you I admire actors +much more than musicians; actors are frankly exponents of nothing that +requires genius, while musicians pretend to have an art that is over and +above the art of the composer.... Music--" + +"Do you realize," interrupted the girl, with a laugh that was melody +itself, "that you are feasting me upon dinner-music without dinner. It +must be ages since we began that imaginary feast. But now, I am quite +sure we are at the black coffee. And I have been able to notice nothing +except your ardor in debate. You were as eager as if you were being +contradicted." + +"You see," he said, "it only proves my point. Dinner-music is an +abomination. It takes the taste of the food away. While I was playing, +you admit, you tasted nothing between the soup and the coffee. Whereas, +in point of fact--" + +"Or fancy?" + +"As you please. At any rate--the menu was really something out of the +common. There were some delightful wines. A sherry that the innkeeper +had bought of a bankrupt nobleman; so would run his fable for the +occasion, and we would believe it, because, in cases of that sort, it +takes a very bad wine to make one pooh-pooh its pedigree. A Madeira that +had been hidden in a cellar since 1812. We would believe that, every +word of it, because we would know that there was really no Madeira in +all the world; and we must choose between insulting our stomachs or our +intelligence. And then the coffee. It would come in the tiniest, most +transparent, most fragile--" + +"Yes," she laughed, "I dare say. As transparent and as fragile as the +entire fabric of our repast, I have no doubt. But--pity me, do!--I shall +have to leave the beautiful banquet about where you have put it, in the +air. I have a ticking conscience here that says--" + +"Oh, hide it," he supplicated, "hide it. Watches are nothing but +mechanisms that are jealous of happiness; whenever there is a happy hour +a watch tries to end it. When I am king I shall prohibit the manufacture +and sale of watches. The fact that they may be carried about so easily +is one of their chief vices; one never knows nowadays from what corner a +woman will not bring one; they carry them on their wrists, their +parasols, their waists, their shoulders. Can you be so cruel as to let +that little golden monster spoil me my hour of happiness--" + +"But I would have to be cruel one way or the other. You see, my father +will wonder what has become of me. He expects me to dinner." + +"Ah, well," he admitted soberly, if a little sadly, "we must not keep +him waiting. You must tell the Professor where we have been, and what we +said, and how silly I was, and--Heigho, I wish I could tell you how the +little hour with you has buoyed me up. Your presence seems to stir my +possibilities for good. I wish I could see you oftener. I feel like the +provincial who says good-bye with a: 'May I come 'round this evening?' +as a rider." + +"A doubtful compliment, if I make you rustic," she said. "But I have +something on this evening; an appointment with a man. The most beautiful +man in the world, and the best, and the kindest--" + +"His name?" he cried, with elaborate pretense of melodrama, for he saw +that she was full of whimsies. + +"Professor Vanlief," she curtsied. + +They were walking, by now, in the shade of the afternoon sun. Vane saw a +stage approaching them, one that would take him back to the lower town. +She saw it, too, and his intention. She shook hands with him, and took +time to say, softly: + +"Do you never ride in the Park any more?" + +"Oh," he said, "tell me when. To-morrow morning? At McGowan's Pass? At +ten? Oh, how I wish that stage was not coming so fast!" + +In their confusion, and their joyous sense of having the same absurd +thought in common, they both laughed at the notion of a Fifth avenue +stage ever being too fast. Yet this one, and Time, sped so swiftly that +Vane could only shake hands hastily with his fair companion, look at her +worshipfully, and jump upon the clattering vehicle. + +He would never have believed that so ramshackle a conveyance could have +harbored so many dreams as had been his that day. + +That thought was his companion all the way home. That, and efforts to +define his feelings toward Miss Vanlief. Was it love? What else could it +be! And if it was, was he ready, for her, to give up those ambitions of +still further sounding hitherto unexplored avenues of the human mind? +Was this fragile bit of grace and glamour to come between him and the +chance of opening a new field to science? Had he not the opportunity to +become famous, or, at the very least, to become omnipotent in reading +the hearts, the souls, of men? Were not the possibilities of the +Professor's discovery unlimited? Was it not easy by means of that mirror +in his rooms, for any chief of police in the world to read the guilt or +innocence of every accused man? Yet, on the other hand, would marriage +interfere? Yes; it would. One could not serve two such goddesses as +woman and science. He would have to make up his mind, to decide. + +But, in the meanwhile, there was plenty of time. Surely, for the +present, he could be happy in the thought of the morrow, of the ride +they were to take in the Park, of the cantering, the chattering +together, the chance to see the morning wind spin the twists of gold +about her cheeks and bring the sparkle to her eyes. + +He let himself into his house without disturbing any of the servants. He +passed into his room. He lifted the curtain of the doorway with one +hand, and with the other turned the button that lighted the room. As the +globes filled with light they showed him his image in the new mirror. + +He reeled against the wall with the surprise of the thing. He noted the +mirror's curtain in a heap at the foot of the frame. Perhaps, after all, +it had been merely the wind. + +He summoned Nevins. The curtain he replaced on the staring face of the +mirror. Whence the thought came from, he did not know, but it occurred +to him that the scene was like a scene from a novel. + +"Nevins," he asked, "was anyone in my rooms?" + +"Mr. Spalding-Wentworth, sir." + +Orson Vane laughed,--a loud, gusty, trumpeting laugh. + +He understood. But he understood, also, that the accident that had +brought the soul of Spalding-Wentworth into his keeping had decreed, +also, that the dominance should not be, as on a former time, with the +usurper. + +He knew that the soul of Spalding-Wentworth, to which he gave the refuge +of his own body, was a small soul. + +Yet even little souls have their spheres of influence. + + + + +CHAPTER XI. + + +It was a morning such as the wild flowers, out in the suburban meadows, +must have thought fit for a birthday party. As for the town, it lost, +under that keen air and gentle sun, whatever of garish and unhealthy +glamour it had displayed the night before. + +"The morning," Orson Vane had once declared, in a moment of revelation, +"is God's, and the night is man's." He was speaking, of course, of the +town. In the severe selectiveness that had grown upon him after much +rout and riot through other lands, he pretended that the town was the +only spot on the map. Certainly this particular morning seemed to bear +out something of this saying; it swept away the smoke and the taint, the +fever and the flush of the night before; the visions of limelights and +glittering crystals and enmillioned vice fled before the gust of ozone +that came pouring into the streets. Before night, to be sure, man would +have asserted himself once more; the pomp and pageant of the primrose +path would have ousted, with its artificial charm, the clean, sweet +freshness of the morning. + +The grim houses on upper Fifth avenue put on semblance of life +reluctantly that morning. Houses take on the air of their inmates; these +houses wore their best manner only under artificial lights. Surly grooms +and housemaids went muttering and stumbling about the areas. Sad-faced +wheelmen flashed over the asphalt, cursing the sprinkling carts. It was +not too early for the time-honored preoccupation of the butcher cart, +which consists of turning corners as if the world's end was coming. +Pallid clubmen strode furtively in the growing sunshine. To them, as to +the whole town, the sun and its friend, the breeze, came as a tonic and +a cure. + +So strange a thing is the soul of man that Orson Vane, riding towards +the Park that morning, caught only vague, fleeting impressions of the +actual beauty of the day. He simply wondered, every foot of the way to +McGowan's Pass, whether Miss Vanlief played golf. The first thing he +said to her after they had exchanged greetings, was: + +"Of course you golf?" + +She looked at him in alarm. There was something--something, but what was +it?--in his voice, in his eye. She had expected a reference to the day +before, to their infantile escapade on the roof of the coach. Instead, +this banale, this stupid, this stereotyped phrase! Her flowerlike face +clouded; she gave her mare the whip. + +"No," she called out, "I cannot bear the game." His horse caught the +pace with difficulty; the groom was left far out of sight, beyond a +corner. But the diversion had not touched Vane's trend of thought at +all. + +"Oh," he assured her, when the horses were at an amble again, "it's one +of those things one has to do. Some things have to be done, you know; +society won't stand for anything less, you know, oh, no. I have to play +golf, you know; part of my reputation." + +"I didn't know," she faltered. She tried to remember when Orson Vane had +ever been seen on either the expert or the duffer list at the golf +matches. + +"Oh, yes; people expect it of me. If I don't play I have to arrange +tournaments. Handicapping is great fun; ever try it? No? You should. +Makes one feel quite like a judge at sessions. Oh, there's nothing like +golf. Not this year, at least. Next year it may be something else. I may +have to take to polo or tennis. One is expected to show the way, you +know; a man in my position--" He looked at her with a kind of 'bland, +blunt, clumsy egoism, that made her wonder where was the Orson Vane of +yesterday. This riddle began to sadden her. Perhaps it was true, as she +had heard somewhere, that the man was mentally unbalanced; that he had +his--well, his bad days. She sighed. She had looked forward to this ride +in the Park; she admitted that to herself. Not in a whole afternoon +spent with Luke Moncreith had she felt such happy childishness stirring +in her as yesterday, in the hour with Orson Vane. And now--She sighed. + +The hum of an approaching automobile reached them, the glittering +vehicle proclaiming its progress in that purring stage whisper that is +still the inalienable right of even the newest "bubble" machine. The +coat worn by the smart young person on the seat would have shocked the +unenlightened, for that sparkling, tingling morning it struck the exact +harmonious note of artifice. + +Orson Vane bowed. It was "the" Miss Carlos. Just as there is only one +Mrs. Carlos, so there is only one Miss Carlos. + +"She plays a decent game," said Vane to his companion. + +"Of life?" + +"No; golf." He looked at her in amazement. Life! What was life compared +to golf? Life? For most people it was, at best, a foozle. Nearly +everybody pressed; very few followed through, and the bunkers--good +Lord, the bunkers! + +"I'm thinking of writing a golfing novel," began Orson, after an +interval in which he managed to wonder whether one couldn't play golf +from horseback. + +"Oh," said Miss Vanlief wearily, "how does one set about it!" + +He was quite unaware of her weariness. He chirped his answer with blind +enthusiasm. + +"It's very easy," he declared. "There are always a lot of women, you +know, who are aching to do things in that line. You give them the +prestige of your name, that's all. One of them writes the thing; you +simply keep them from foozling the phrases now and then. Another +illustrates it." + +"And does anyone buy it?" + +"Oh, all the smart people do. It's one of those things one is supposed +to do. There's no particular reason or sense in it; but smart people +expect one another to read things like that. The newspapers get quite +silly over such books. Then, after novels, I think, I shall take to +having them done over for the stage? Don't you think a golfing comedy, +with a sprinkling of profanity and Scotch whiskey, would be all the +rage?" + +Jeannette Vanlief reined in her mare. She looked at Orson Vane; looked +him, as much as she could, through and through. Was it all a stupid +jest? She could find nothing but dense earnestness in her face, in his +eyes. Oh, the riddle was too tiresome, too hopeless. It was simply not +the same man at all! She gave it up, gave him up. + +"Do you mind," she said, "if I ride home now? I'm tired." + +It should have been a blow in the face, but Orson Vane never so much as +noticed it. + +"Tired?" he repeated. "Oh; all right. We'll turn about. Rather go back +alone? Oh, all right. Wish you'd learn to play golf; you really must!" +And upon that he let her canter away, the groom following, some little +wonder on his impassive front. + +As for Jeannette Vanlief she burst into her father's room a little +later, and then into tears. + +"And I wanted to love him!" she wailed presently, from out her confusion +and her distress. + +The Professor was patting her hair, and wondering what in all the world +was the matter. At her speech, he thought he saw a light. + +"And why not?" he asked, soothingly, "He seems quite estimable. He was +here only a moment ago?" + +"Who was here?" she asked in bewilderment. + +"Mr. Moncreith." + +At that she laughed. The storm was over, the sunshine peeped out again. + +"You dear, blind comfort, you!" she said, "What do I care if a thousand +Moncreiths--" + +"Then it's Orson Vane," said the Professor, not so blind after all. +"Well, dear, and what has he been doing now?" + +He listened to her rather rambling, rather spasmodic recital; listened +and grew moody, though he could scarce keep away some little mirth. He +saw through these masquerades, of course. Who else, if not he? Poor +Jeannette! So she had set her happy little heart upon that young man? A +young man who, to serve both their ends, was playing chameleon. A young +man who was mining greater secrets from the deeps of the human soul than +had ever been mined before. A wonderful young man, but--would that make +for Jeannette's happiness? At any rate he, the Professor, would have to +keep an eye open for Vane's doings. There was no knowing what strange +ways these borrowed souls might lead to. He wondered who it was that, +this time, had been rifled of his soul. + +Wonder did not long remain the adjuncts of the Professor and his +daughter only. The whole world of society began to wonder, as time went +on, at the new activities of Orson Vane. Wonder ceased, presently, and +there was passive acceptance of him in his new role. Fashions, after +all, are changed so often in the more external things, that the smart +set would not take it as a surprising innovation if some people took to +changing their souls to suit the social breeze. + +Orson Vane took a definite place in the world of fashion that season. He +became the arbiter of golf; he gave little putting contests for women +and children; he looked after the putting greens of a number of smart +clubs with as much care as a woman gives her favorite embroideries. He +took to the study of the Turkish language. There were rumors that he +meant to become the Minister to Turkey. He traveled a great deal, and he +published a book called "The Land of the Fez." Another little brochure +bearing his name was "The Caddy; His Ailments and Diseases." It was +rumored that he was busy in dramatization of his novel, "Five Loaves and +Two Fishes!" When Storman Pasha made his memorable visit to the States +it was Orson Vane who became his guide and friend. A jovial club of +newspaper roysterers poked fun at him by nominating him for Mayor. He +went through it all with a bland humorlessness and stubborn dignity that +nothing could affront. His indomitable energy, his intense seriousness +about everything, kept smart society unalterably loyal. He led its +cotillions, arranged its more sober functions, and was a household word +with the outsiders that reach society only through the printed page. His +novels--whether they were his own or done for him hardly matters--were +just dull enough to offend nobody. The most indolent dweller in Vanity +Fair could affect his books without the least mental exertion. The lives +of our fashionables are too full, too replete with a multitude of +interests and excitements, to allow of the concentration proper for the +reading of scintillating dialogue, or brilliant observations. Orson Vane +appeared to gauge his public admirably; he predominated in the outdoor +life, in golf, in yachting, in coaching, yet he did not allow anyone +else to dispute the region of the intellect, of indoors, with him. He +shone, with a severe dimness, in both fields. + +Jeannette Vanlief, meanwhile, lost much of the sparkle she had hitherto +worn. She drooped perceptibly. The courtship of Luke Moncreith left her +listless; he persevered on the strength of his own ambition rather than +her encouragement. His daughter's looks at last began seriously to worry +Professor Vanlief. Something ought to be done. But what? It was +apparently Orson Vane's intention to keep that borrowed soul with him +for a long time. In the meanwhile Jeannette.... The Professor, the more +he considered the matter, felt the more strongly that just as he was the +one who had given Vane this power, so had he the right, if need be, to +interfere. The need was urgent. The masquerade must be put an end to. + +His resolve finally taken, Professor Vanlief paid a visit to Orson +Vane's house. Vane was, as he had hoped, not at home. He +cross-questioned Nevins. + +The man was only too willing to admit that his master's actions were +queer. But Mr. Vane had given him warning to that effect; he must have +felt it coming on. It was a malady, no doubt. For his part he thought it +was something that Mr. Vane would wish to cure rather than endure. He +didn't pretend to understand his master of late, but-- + +The Professor put a period to the man's volubility with some effort. + +"I want you," he urged, "to jog your memory a little. Never mind the +symptoms. Give me straightforward answers. Now--did you touch the new +mirror, leaving it uncovered, at any time within the past few weeks?" + +"Oh," was the answer, "the new mirror, is it! I knows well the uncanny +thing was sure to make trouble for me. But I gives you my word, as I +hopes to be saved, that I've never so much as brushed the dust off it, +much less taken the curtain off. It's fearsome, is that mirror, I'm +thinking. It's--" + +"Then think back," pressed the Professor, again stemming the tide of the +other's talk relentlessly, "think back: was anyone, ever, at any time, +alone in Mr. Vane's rooms? Think, think!" + +"I disremember," stammered Nevins. "I think not--Oh, wait! It was a long +time ago, but I think a gentleman wrote Mr. Vane a note once, and I, +having work in the other rooms, let him be undisturbed. But I told the +master about it, the minute he came in, sir. He was not the least vexed, +sir. Oh, I'm easy in my mind about that time." + +"Yes, yes,--but the gentleman's name!" The Professor shook the man's +shoulder quite roughly. + +"His name? Oh, it was just Mr. Spalding-Wentworth, sir, that was all." + +The Professor sat down with a laugh. Spalding-Wentworth! He laughed +again. + +Nevins had the air of one aggrieved. "Mr. Vane laughed, too, I remember, +when I told him. Just the minute I told him, sir, he laughed. I've +puzzled over it, time and again, why--" + +The Professor left Nevins puzzling. There was no time to be lost. He +remembered now that Spalding-Wentworth had for some time been ailing. +The world, in its devotion to Orson Vane, had forgotten, almost, that +such a person as Spalding-Wentworth had ever existed. To be forgotten +one has only to disappear. Dead men's shoes are filled nowhere so +quickly as in Vanity Fair; though, to be paradoxic, for the most part +they are high-heeled slippers. + +It took some little time, some work, to arrange what the Professor had +decided must be done. He went about his plans with care and skill. He +suborned Nevins easily enough, using, chiefly, the plain truth. Nevins, +with the superstition of his class, was willing to believe far greater +mysteries than the Professor half hinted at. By Nevins' aid it happened +that Orson Vane slept, one night, face to face with the polished surface +of the new mirror. In the morning it was curtained as usual. + +That morning Augustus Vanlief called at the Wentworth house. He asked +for Mrs. Wentworth. He went to his point at once. + +"You know who I am, I dare say, Mrs. Wentworth. You love your husband, I +am sure; you will pardon my intrusion when I tell you that perhaps I can +do something the best thing of all--for him. It is, in its way, a +matter of life and death. Do the doctors give you any hope?" + +Mrs. Wentworth, her beauty now tired and touched by traces of spoilt +ambition, made a listless motion with her hands. + +"I don't know why I should tell you," she said, "or why I should not. +They tell me vague things, the doctors do, but I don't believe they know +what is the matter." + +"Do you?" + +"I?" she looked at Vanlief, and found a challenge in his regard. "It +seems," she admitted, "as if--I hardly like to say it,--but it seems as +if there was no soul in him any more. He is a shell, a husk. The life in +him seems purely muscular. It is very depressing. Why do you think you +can do anything for Clarence, Professor? I did not know your researches +took you into medicine?" + +"Ah, but you admit this is not a matter for medicine, but for the mind. +Will you allow me an experiment madame? I give you my word of honor, my +honor and my reputation, that there is no risk, and there may +be--perhaps, an entire restoration. There is--a certain operation that I +wish to try--" + +"An operation? The most eminent doctors have told me such a thing would +be useless. We might as well leave my poor husband clear of the knife, +Professor." + +"Oh, it is no operation, in that sense. Nothing surgical. I can hardly +explain; professional secrets are involved. If you did not know that I +am but a plodding old man of science--if I were an unknown charlatan--I +would not ask you to put faith in me. But--I give you my word, my +promise, that if you will let Mr. Wentworth come with me in my brougham +I will return with him within the hour. He will be either as he is now, +or--as he once was." + +"As he once was--!" Mrs. Wentworth repeated the phrase, and the thought +brought her a keen moment of anguish that left a visible impress on her +features. "Ah," she sighed, "if I could only think such a thing +possible!" She brooded in silence a moment or two. Then she spoke. + +"Very well. You will find him in the library. Prim, show the gentleman +to the library. If you can persuade him, Professor--" She smiled +bitterly. "But then, anybody can persuade him nowadays." She turned to +some embroidery as if to dismiss the subject, to show that she was +resigned even to hopeless experiments. The very fact that she was plying +the needle rather than the social sceptre was gauge of her descent from +the heights. As a matter of fact Vanlief found Wentworth amenable +enough. Wentworth was reading Marie Corelli. His mind was as empty as +that. Nothing could better define his utter lapse from intelligence. He +put the book down reluctantly as the Professor came in. He listened +without much enthusiasm. A drive? Why not? He hadn't driven much of +late, but if it was something that would please the Professor. He +remembered, through a mist, that he had known Vanlief when he himself +was a boy; his father had often spoken of Vanlief with respect. Nothing +further in the way of mental exertion came to him. He followed Vanlief +as a dog follows whoso speaks kindly to it. + +The conversation between the two, in the brougham, would hardly tend to +the general entertainment. It was a thing of shreds and patches. It led +nowhither. + +The brougham stopped at the door of Orson Vane's house. Nevins let them +in, whispering an assuring confidence to the professor. As they reached +the door of the dressing-room Vanlief pushed Wentworth ahead of him, and +bade him enter. He kept behind him, letting the other's body screen him +from the staring mirror. + +Wentworth looked at himself. A hand traveled slowly up to his forehead. + +"By Jove!" he said, hesitatingly, "I never put the curtain back, after +all." And he covered up the mirror. "Curious thing," he went on, with +energy vitalizing each word, "what possessed me to come here just now, +when I know for a fact that they're playing the Inter-State Golf +championships to-day. Dashed if I know why I didn't go!" He walked out, +plainly puzzled, clumsily heedless of Vanlief and Nevins, but--himself +once more. + +Orson Vane, at just that time, was on the links of the Fifeshire Golf +Club. He was wearing a little red coat with yellow facings. He was in +the act of stooping on a green, to look along the line of his putt, when +he got to his feet in a hurried, bewildered way. He threw his putter +down on the green. He blushed all over, shaming the tint of his scarlet +coat. + +"What a foolish game for a grown-up man!" he blurted out, and strode off +the grounds. + +The bystanders were aghast. They could not find words. Orson Vane, the +very prophet of golf, to throw it over in that fashion! It was +inexplicable! The episode was simply maddening. + +But it was remarked that the decline of golf on this side of the water +dated from that very day. + + + + +CHAPTER XII. + + +Orson Vane was taking lunch with Professor Vanlief. Jeannette, learning +of Vane's coming, had absented herself. + +"It is true," Vane was saying, "that I can assert what no other man has +asserted before,--that I know the exact mental machinery of two human +beings. Yes; that is quite true. But--" + +"I promised nothing more," remarked Vanlief. + +"No. That is true, too. I have lived the lives of others; I have given +their thoughts a dwelling. But I am none the happier for that." + +"Oh," admitted Vanlief, "wisdom does not guarantee happiness...." He +drummed with his fine, long fingers, upon the table-cloth. Vane, +watching him, noted the almost transparent quality of his skin. Under +that admirable mask of military uprightness there was an aging, a fading +process going on, that no keen observer could miss. "It is the pursuit, +not the capture of wisdom, that brings happiness. Wisdom is too often +only a bubble that bursts when you touch it." + +"Perhaps that is it. At any rate I know that I do not love my neighbor +any more because I have fathomed some of his thoughts. Moreover, +Professor, has it occurred to you that your discovery, your secret, +carries elements of danger with it? Take my own experiments; there might +have been tragic results; whole lives might have been ruined. In one +case I was nearly the victim of a tragedy myself; I might have become, +for all time, the dreadful creature I was giving house-room to. In the +other, there was no more than a farce possible; the visiting spirit was, +after all, in subjection to my own. I think you will have to simplify +the details of your marvelous secret. It works a little clumsily, a +little--" + +"Oh," the Professor put in, "I am perfecting the process. I spend my +days and my nights in elaborating the details. I mean to have it in the +simplest, most unmistakable perfection before I hand it over to the +human race." + +"Sometimes I think," mused Vane, "that your boon will be a doubtful one. +I can see no good to be gained. My whole point of view is changing. I +ached for such a chance of wisdom once; now that it has come to me I am +sad because the things I have learned are so horrible, so silly. I had +not thought there were such souls in the world; or not, at any rate, in +the immediate world about me." + +"Oh," the Professor went on, steadfastly, "there will be many benefits +in the plan. Doctors will be able to go at once to the root of any +ailments that have their seat in the brain. Witnesses cab be made to +testify the truth. Oh--there are ever so many possibilities." + +"As many for evil as for good. Second-rate artists could steal the +ideas, the inventions of others. No inventor, no scientist, would be +sure of keeping his secrets. The thing would be a weapon in the hands of +the unscrupulous." + +"Ah, well," smiled Vanlief, "so far I have not made my discovery public, +have I? It is a thing I must consider very carefully. As you say, there +are arguments on either side. But you must bear in mind that you are +somewhat embittered. It was your own fault; you chose the subject +wittingly. If you were to read a really beautiful mind, you might turn +to the other extreme; you might urge me to lose no time in giving the +world my secret. The wise way is between the two; I must go forward with +my plans, prepared for either course. I may take it to my grave with me, +or I may give it to the world; but, so far, it is still a little +incomplete; it is not ripe for general distribution. Instead of the one +magic mirror there must be myriads of them. There are stupendous +opportunities. All that you have told me of your own experiences in +these experiments has proved my skill to have been wisely employed; your +success was beyond my hopes. Do you think you will go on?" + +Orson Vane did not answer at once. It was something he had been asking +himself; he was not yet sure of the answer. + +"I haven't made up my mind," he replied. "So far I have hardly been +repaid for my time and the vital force employed. I almost feel toward +these experiments as toward a vice that refines the mind while +coarsening the frame. That is the story of the most terrible vices, I +think; they corrode the body while gilding the brain. But this much I +know; if I use your mirror again it will not be to borrow a merely smart +soul; I mean to go to some other sphere of life. That one is too +contracted." + +"Strange," said the Professor, "that you should have said that. +Jeannette pretends she thinks that, too. I cannot get her to take her +proper position in the world. She is a little elusive. But then, to be +sure, she is not, just now, at her best." + +"She is not ill?" asked Vane, with a guilty start. + +"Nothing tangible. But not--herself...." + +Vane observed that he wished he might have found her in; he feared he +had offended her; he hoped the Professor would use his kind offices +again to soften the young lady's feelings toward him. Then he got up to +go. + +Strolling along the avenue he noted certain aspects of the town with an +appreciation that he had not always given them. He had seen these things +from so many other points of view of late; had been in sympathy with +them, had made up a fraction of their more grotesque element; that to +see them clearly with his own eyes had a sort of novelty. The life of +to-day, as it appeared on the smartest surfaces, was, he reflected, a +colorful if somewhat soulless picture.... + +The young men sit in the clubs and in the summer casinos, smoking and +wondering what the new mode in trousers is to be; an acquaintance goes +by; he has a hat that is not quite correct, and his friends comment on +it yawningly; he has not the faintest notion of polite English, but +nobody cares; a man who has written great things walks by, but he wears +a creased coat, and the young men in the smoking-room sniff at him. In +the drags and the yachts the women and the girls sit in radiance and gay +colors and arrogant unconsciousness of position and power; they talk of +golfing and fashion and mustachios; Mrs. Blank is going a hot pace and +Mrs. Landthus is a thoroughbred; adjectives in the newest sporting slang +fly about blindingly; the language is a curious argot, as distinct as +the tortuous lingo of the Bowery. A coach goes rattling by, the horses +throwing their heads in air, and their feet longing for the Westchester +roads. The whip discusses bull-terriers; the people behind him are +declaring that the only thing you can possibly find in the Waldorf rooms +is an impossible lot of people. The complexions of all these people, +intellectually presentable in many ways, and fashionable in yet more +modes, are high in health. They look happy, prosperous and +satisfied.... + +Yes, there was a superficial fairness to the picture, Vane admitted. If +only, if only, he had not chosen to look under the surface! Now that he +had seen the world with other eyes, its fairness could rarely seem the +same to him. + +A sturdy beggar approached him, with a whine that proved him an +admirable actor. But Vane could not find it in him to reflect that if +there is one thing more than another that lends distinction to a town it +is an abundance of beggars. + +He wondered how it would be to annex this healthy impostor's mite of a +soul. But no; there could be little wisdom gained there. + +He made, finally, for the Town and Country Club, and tried to immerse +himself in the conversation that sped about. The talked turned to the +eminent actor, Arthur Wantage. The subject of that man's alleged +eccentricities invariably brought out a flood of the town's stalest +anecdotes. Vane, listening in a lazy mood, made up his mind to see +Wantage play that night. It would be a distraction. It would show him, +once again, the present limit in one human being's portraiture of +another; he would see the highest point to which external imitation +could be brought; he could contrast it with the heights to which he +himself had ascended. + +It would be a chance for him to consider Wantage, for the first time in +his life, as a merely second-rate actor. This player was an adept only +in the making the shell, the husk, seem lifelike; since he could not +read the character, how could he go deeper? + +The opportunities the theatre held for him suddenly loomed vast before +Vane. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII. + + +The fact that Arthur Wantage was to be seen and heard, nightly, in a +brilliant comedy by the author of "Pious Aeneas," was not so much the +attraction that drew people to his theatre, as was the fact that he had +not yet, that season, delivered himself of a curtain speech. His curtain +speeches were wont to be insults delivered in an elaborately honeyed +manner; he took the pose of considering his audiences with contempt; he +admired himself far more for his condescension in playing to them than +he respected his audiences for having the taste to admire him. + +The comedy in which he was now appearing was the perfection of paradox. +It pretended to be frivolous and was really philosophic. The kernel of +real wisdom was behind the elaborately poised mask of wit. A delightful +impertinence and exaggeration informed every line of the dialogue. The +pose of inimitable, candid egoism showed under every situation. The play +was typical of the author as well as of the player. It veiled, as thinly +as possible, a deal of irony at the expense of the play going public; it +took some of that public's dearest foibles and riddled them to shreds. + +It was currently reported that the only excuse for comparatively +amicable relations between Wantage and O'Deigh, who had written this +comedy, was the fact of there being an ocean between them. Even at that +Wantage found it difficult to suffer the many praises he heard bestowed, +not upon himself but O'Deigh. He had burst out in spleen at this +adulation, once, in the hearing of an intimate. + +"My dear Arthur," said the other, "you strike me as very ungrateful. For +my part, when I see your theatre crowded nightly, when I see how your +exchequer fills steadily, it occurs to me that you should go down on +your knees every night, and thank God that O'Deigh has done you such a +stunning play." + +"Oh," was Wantage's grudging answer, "I do, you know I do. But I also +say: Oh, God, why did it have to be by O'Deigh?" + +The secret of his hatred for O'Deigh was the secret of his hatred for +all dramatists. He was a curious compound of egoism, childishness and +shrewdness. Part of his shrewdness--or was it his childishness?--showed +in his aversion to paying authors' royalties. He always tried to +re-write all the plays he accepted; if the playwrights objected there +was sure to be a row of some sort. When he could find no writers willing +to make him a present of plays, for the sake, as he put it, of having it +done by as eminent an actor as himself, and in so beautiful a theatre, +he was in the habit of announcing that he would forsake the theatre, and +turn critic. He pretended that the world--the public, the press, even +the minor players--were in league against him. There was a conspiracy to +drive him from the theatre; the riff-raff resented that a man of genius +should be so successful. They lied about him; he was sure they lied; for +stories, of preposterous import, came to him; he vowed he never read the +newspapers--never. As for London--oh, he could spin you the most +fascinating yarn of the cabal that had dampened his London triumph. He +mentioned, with a world of meaning in his tone, the name of the other +great player of the time; he insinuated that to have him, Wantage, +succeed in London, had not been to that other player's mind; so the +wires had been pulled; oh, it was all very well done. He laughed at the +reminiscence,--a brave, bluff laugh, that told you he could afford to +let such petty jealousies amuse him. + +The riddle of Arthur Wantage's character had never yet been read. There +were those who averred he was never doing anything but acting, not in +the most intimate moments of his life; some called him a keen +moneymaker, retaining the mummer's pose off the stage for the mere +effect of it on the press and the public. What the man's really honest, +unrehearsed thoughts were,--or if he ever had such--no man could say. To +many earnest students of life this puzzle had presented itself. It +began to present itself, now, to Orson Vane. + +This, surely, was a secret worth the reading. Here were, so to say, two +masks to lift at once. This man, Arthur Wantage, who came out before the +curtain now as this, now as that, character of fancy or history, what +shred of vital, individual personality had he retained through all these +changings? The enthusiasm of discovery, of adventure came upon Vane with +a sharpness that he had not felt since the day he had mocked the +futility of human science because it could not unlock other men's +brains. + +The horseshoe-shaped space that held the audience glittered with babble +and beauty as Orson Vane took his seat in the stalls. The presence of +the smart set gave the theatre a very garland of charm, of grace, and of +beauty's bud and blossom. The stalls were radiant, and full of polite +chatter. The boxes wore an air of dignified twilight,--a twilight of +goddesses. The least garish of the goddesses, yet the one holding the +subtlest sway, was Jeanette Vanlief. She sat, in the shadow of an upper +box, with her father and Luke Moncreith. On her pale face the veins +showed, now and then; the flush of rose came to it like a surprise--like +the birth of a new world. She radiated no obvious, blatant fascination. +Her hands slim and white; her voice firm and low; her eyes of a hue like +that of bronze, streaked like the tiger-lilies; her profile sharp as a +cameo's; the nose, with its finely-chiseled nostrils, curved in Roman +mode; the mouth, thin and of the faintest possible red, slightly +drooping. And then, her hair! It held, again, a spray of lilies of the +valley; the artificial lights discovered in the waves and the curls of +it the most unexpected shades, the most mercurial tints. The slight +touch of melancholy that hovered over her merely enhanced her charm. +Moncreith told himself that he would go to the uttermost ends of evil to +win this woman. He had come, the afternoon of that day, through the most +dangerous stream in the world, the stream of loveliness that flows over +certain portions of the town at certain fashionable hours. It is a +stream the eddies of which are of lace and silk; its pools are the blue +of eye and the rose of mouth; its cataracts are skirts that swirl and +whisper and sing of ivory outlines and velvet shadows. Yet, as he looked +at Jeannette Vanlief, all that fascinating, dangerous stream lost its +enticement for him; he saw her as a dream too high for comparison with +the mere earthiness of the town. He felt, with a grim resolution, that +nothing human should come between him and Jeannette. + +Orson Vane, from his chair, paid scant attention to his fellow +spectators. He was intent upon the dish that O'Deigh and Wantage had +prepared for his delectation. He felt a delicious interest in every +line, every situation. He had made up his mind that he would go to the +root of the mystery that men called Arthur Wantage. Whether that mask +concealed a real, high intelligence, or a mere, cunning, monkeylike +facility in imitation--his was to be the solution of that question. +Wrapped up in that thought he never so much as glanced toward the box +where his friends sat. + +At the end of the first act Vane strolled out into the lobby. He nodded +hither and thither, but he felt no desire for nearer converse. A hand on +his shoulder brought him face to face with Professor Vanlief. He was +asked to come up to the box. He listened, gravely, to the Professor's +words, and thanked him. So Moncreith was smitten? He smiled in a kindly +way; he understood, now, the many brusqueries of his friend. That day, +long ago, when he had been so inexplicable in the little bookshop; the +many other occasions, since then, when Luke had been rude and bitter. A +man in love was never to be reckoned on. He wished Luke all the luck in +the world. It struck him but faintly that he himself had once longed for +that sweet daughter of Augustus Vanlief's; he told himself that it was a +dream he must put away. He was a mariner bent on many deep-sea voyages +and many hazards of fate; it would be unfair to ask any woman to share +in any such life. His life would be devoted to furthering the +Professor's discoveries; he meant to be an adventurer into the regions +of the human soul; it was a land whither none could follow. + +Perhaps, if he had seen Jeannette, he might have felt no such +resignation. His mood was so tense in its devotion to the puzzle +presented by the player, Wantage, that the news brought him by Vanlief +did not suffice to rouse him. He had a field of his own; that other one +he was content to leave to Moncreith. + +Moncreith, in the meanwhile, was making the most of the opportunity the +Professor, in the kindness of his heart, had given him. The orchestra +was playing a Puccini potpourri. It rose feebly against the prattle and +the chatter and the hissing of the human voices. Moncreith, at first, +found only the most obvious words. + +"A trifle bitter, the play," he said, "rather like a sneer, don't you +think?" + +"Well," granted Jeannette, indolently, "I suppose it is not called +'Voltaire' for nothing. And there are moods that such a play might +suit." + +"No doubt. But--do you think one can be bitter, when one loves?" + +The girl looked up in wonder. She blushed. The melancholy did not leave +her face. "Bitter? Love?" she echoed. "They spell the same thing." + +"Oh," he urged, "the play has made you morbid. As for me, I have heard +nothing, seen nothing, but you. The bitterness of the play has skimmed +by me, that is all; I have been in too sweet a dream to let those people +on the stage--" + +"How Wantage would rage if he heard you," said the girl. She felt what +was coming, and she meant to fence as well as she could to avoid it. + +"Wantage? Bother Wantage!" He leaned down to her, and whispered, +"Jeannette!" + +The flush on her cheek deepened, but she did not stir. It was as if she +had not heard. She shut her eyes. All her weapons dropped at once. She +knew it had to come; she knew, too, that, in this crisis, her heart +stood plainly legible to her. Moncreith's name was not there. + +"Jeannette," Moncreith went on, in his vibrant whisper, "don't you guess +what dream I have been living in for so long? Don't you know that it is +you, you, you--" He faltered, his emotions outstriding his words. "It is +you," he finished, "that spell happiness for me. I--oh, is there no +other, less crude way of putting it?--I love you, Jeannette! And you?" + +He waited. The chattering and light laughter in the stalls and +throughout the house seemed to lull into a mere hushed murmur, like the +fluttering and twittering of a thousand birds. Moncreith, in his tense +expectation, had heed only for the face of the girl beside him. He did +not see, in the aisle below, Orson Vane, sauntering to his seat. He did +not follow the direction of Jeannette Vanlief's eyes, the instant before +she turned, and answered. + +"I wish you had not spoken. I can't say anything--anything that you +would like. Please, please--" She shook her head, in evident distress. + +"Ah," he burst out, "then it is true, after all, what I have feared. It +is true that you prefer that--that--" + +She stayed him with a quick look. + +"I did not say I preferred anyone. I simply said that you must consider +the question closed. I am sorry, oh, so sorry. I wish a man and a woman +could ever be friends, in this world, without risking either love or +hate." + +"All the same," he muttered, fiercely, "I believe you prefer that +fellow--" + +"Orson Vane's downstairs," said the Professor entering the box at that +moment. + +"That damned chameleon!" So Moncreith closed, under his breath, his just +interrupted speech. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV. + + +A little before the end of that performance of "Voltaire," Orson Vane +made his way to Arthur Wantage's dressing-room. They had, in their +character of men in some position of eminence in different phases of the +town's life, a slight acquaintance. They met, now and then, at the +Mummers' Club. Vane's position put him above possibility of affront by +Wantage in even the most arrogant and mannerless of the latter's moods. + +Vane's invitation to a little supper, a little chat, and a little smoke, +just for the duet of them, brought forth Wantage's most winning smile of +acquiescence. + +"Delighted, dear chap," he vowed. He could be, when he chose, the most +winning of mortals. He was, during the drive to Vane's house, an +admirable companion. He told stories, he made polite rejoinders, he was +all glitter and graciousness. But it was when he was seated to an +appetizing little supper that he became most splendid. + +"My dear Vane," he said, lifting a glass to the light, "you should write +me a play. I am sure you could do it. These fellows who are in the mere +business of it,--well, they are really impossible. They are so vulgar, +so dreadful to do business with. I hate business, I am a child in such +affairs; everyone cheats me. I mean to have none but gentlemen on my +business staff next season. The others grate on me, Vane, they grate. +And if I could only gather a company of actors who were also +gentlemen--Oh, I assure you, one cannot believe what things I endure. +The stupidity of actors!" He pronounced the word as if it were accented +on the last syllable. He raised his eyes to heaven as he faltered in +description of the stupidities he had to contend with. + +"Write a play?" said Orson, "I fear that would be out of my line. I +merely live, you know; I do not describe." + +"Oh, I think you would be just the man. You would give me a play that +society would like. You would make no mistakes of taste. And think, my +dear fellow, just think of the prestige my performance would give you. +It would be the making of you. You would be launched. You would need no +other recommendation. When you approach any of these manager fellows all +you have to do is to say, 'Wantage is doing a play of mine.' That is a +hallmark; it means success for a young man." + +"Perhaps. But I have no ambitions in that way. How do you like my +Bonnheimer?" + +"H'm--not bad, Vane, not bad. But you should taste my St. Innesse. It is +a '74. I got it from the cellars of the Duke of Arran. You know Merrill, +the wine-merchant on Broadway? Shrewd fellow! Always keeps me in mind; +whenever he sees a sale of a good cellar on the other side, he puts in a +bid; knows he can always depend on Wantage taking the bouquet of it off +his hands. You must take dinner with me some night, and try that St. +Innesse. Ex-President Richards told me, the other evening, that it was +the mellowest vintage he had tasted in years. You know Richards? Oh, you +should, you should!" + +Vane listened, quietly amused. The vanity, the egoism of this player +were so obvious, so transparent, so blatant. He wondered, more than +ever, what was under that mask of arrogance and conceit. The perfect +frankness of the conceit made it almost admirable. + +"You know," Wantage remarked presently, "I'm really playing truant, +taking supper with you. I ought to be studying." + +"A new play?" + +"No. My curtain speech for to-morrow night. It's the last night of the +season, and they expect it of me, you know. I've vowed, time and again, +I would never make another curtain-speech in my life, but they will have +them, they will have them!" He sighed, in submission to his fate. Then +he returned to a previous thought. "I wish, though," he said, "that I +could persuade you to do a play for me. Think it over! Think of the name +it would give you. Or you might try managing me. Eh, how does that +strike you? Such a relief to me if I could deal with a gentleman. You +have no idea--the cads there are in the theatre! They resent my being a +man who tries to prove a little better educated than themselves. They +hate me because I am college-bred, you know; they prefer actors who +never read. How many books do you think I read before I attempted +_Voltaire_? A little library, I tell you. And then the days I spent in +noting the portraits! I traveled France in my search. For the actor who +takes historic characters there cannot be too many documents. +Imagination alone is not enough. And then the labor of making the play +presentable; I wish you could see the thing as it first came to me! You +would think a man like O'Deigh would have taken into consideration the +actor? But no; the play, as O'Deigh left it, might have been for a stock +company. _Frederick the Great_ was as fine a part as my own. Oh, they +are numbskulls. And the rehearsals! Actors are sheep, simply sheep. The +papers say I am a brute at rehearsals. My dear Vane, I swear to you that +if Nero were in my place he would massacre all the minor actors in the +land. And they expect the salaries of intelligent persons!" + +Vane, listening, wondered why Wantage, under such an avalanche of +irritations, continued such life. Gradually it dawned on him that all +this fume and fret was merely part of the man's mummery; it was his +appeal to the sympathy of his audience; his argument against the +reputation his occasional exhibitions of rage and waywardness had given +him. + +Vane's desire to penetrate the surface of this conscious imitator, this +fellow who slipped off this character to assume that, grew keener and +keener. Where, under all this crust of alien form and action, was the +individual, human thought and feeling? Or was there any left? Had the +constant corrosion of simulated emotions burnt out all the original +character of the mind? + +Vane could not sufficiently hasten the end for which he had invited +Wantage. + +"You are," he said presently, as a lull in the other's monologue allowed +him an opening, "something of an amateur of tapestry, of pictures, of +bijouterie. I have a little thing or two, in my dressing-room, that I +wish you would give me an opinion on." + +They took their cigarettes into the adjoining dressing-room. Wantage +went, at once, to the mirrors. + +"Ah, Florence, I see." He frowned, in critical judgment; he went humming +about the room, singing little German phrases to the pictures, snatches +of chansonettes to the tapestries. He was very enjoyable as a spectacle, +Vane told himself. He tiptoed over the room, now in the mode of his +earliest success, "The King of Dandies," now in the half limping style +of his "Rigoletto." + +"You should have seen the Flemish things I had!" he declared. That was +his usual way of noting the belongings of others; they reminded him of +his own superior specimens. "I sold them for a song, at auction. Don't +you think one tires of one's surroundings, after a time? People go to +the hills and the seashore, because they tire of town. I have the same +feeling about pictures, and furniture, and bric-a-brac. After a time, +they tire me. I have to get rid of them. I sell them at auction. People +are always glad to bid for something that has belonged to Arthur +Wantage. But everything goes for a song. Oh, it is ruinous, ruinous." He +peered, and pirouetted about the corners. "Ah," he exclaimed, "and here +is something covered up! A portrait? Something rare?" He posed in front +of it, affecting the most devouring curiosity. + +"A sort of portrait," said Vane, touching the cord at back of the +mirror. + +"Ah," said Wantage, gazing, "you are right. A sort of portrait." And he +laughed, feebly, feebly. "That Bonnheimer," he muttered, "a deuce of a +wine!" He clutched at a chair, reeling into it. + +Vane, passing to the mirror's face, took what image it turned to him, +and then, leisurely, replaced the curtain. + +He surveyed the figure in the chair for a moment or so. Then he called +Nevins. "Nevins," he said, "where the devil are you? Never where you're +wanted. What does one pay servants outrageous wages for! They conspire +to cheat one, they all do. Nevins!" Nevins appeared, wide-eyed at this +outburst. He was prepared for many queer exhibitions on the part of his +master, but this--this, to a faithful servant! He stood silent, +expectant, reproachful. + +"Nevins," his master commanded, "have this--this actor put to bed. Use +the library; make the two couches serve. He'll stay here for twenty-four +hours; you understand, twenty-four hours. You will take care of him. The +wine was badly corked, to-night, Nevins. You grow worse every day. You +are in league to drive me distracted. It is an outrage. Why do you stand +there, and shake, in that absurd fashion? It makes me quite nervous. Do +go away, Nevins, go away!" + + + + +CHAPTER XV. + + +The papers of that period are all agreed that the eminent actor, Arthur +Wantage, was never seen to more advantage than on the last night of that +particular season. His _Voltaire_ had never been a more brilliant +impersonation. The irony, the cruelty of the character had rarely come +out more effectively; the ingenuity of the dialogue was displayed at its +best. + +Yet, as a matter of fact, Arthur Wantage, all that day and evening, was +in Orson Vane's house, subject to a curious mental and spiritual aphasia +that afterwards became a puzzle to many famous physicians. + +The _Voltaire_ was Orson Vane. + +It was the final triumph of Professor Vanlief's thaumaturgy. Vane was +now in possession of the entire mental vitality sufficient for playing +the part of the evening; the lines, the every pose, came to him +spontaneously, as if he were machinery moving at another's guidance. The +detail of entering the theatre unobserved had been easy; it was dusk and +he was muffled to the eyes. Afterwards, it was merely a matter of +pigment and paints. His fingers found the use of the colors and powders +as easily as his mind held the words to be spoken. There was not a +soul, in the company, in the audience, that did not not find the +_Voltaire_ of that night the _Voltaire_ of the entire season. + +Above the mere current of his speeches and his displayed emotions Orson +Vane found a tide of exaltation bearing him on to a triumphant feeling +of contempt for his audience. These sheep, these herdlings, these +creatures of the fashion, how fine it was to fling into their faces the +bitter taunts of a _Voltaire_, to see them take them smilingly, +indulgently. They paid him his price, and he hated them for it. He felt +that they did not really understand the half of the play's delicate +finesse; he felt their appreciation was a sham, a pose, a bit of mummery +even more contemptible than his own, since they paid to pose, while he, +at least, had the satisfaction of their money. + +The curtain-fall found him aglow with the splendor of his success. The +two personalties in him joined in a fever of triumph. He, Orson Vane, +had been _Voltaire_; he would yet be all the other geniuses of history. +He would prove himself the greatest of them all, since he could simulate +them all. A certain vein of petty cunning ran under the major emotion; +Orson Vane laughed to think how he had despoiled Arthur Wantage of his +very temperament, his art, his spirit. This same cunning admonished, +too, the prompt return of Wantage's person, after the night was over, to +the Wantage residence. + +The commotion "in front" brought Orson to a sense of the immediate +moment. The cries for a speech came over a crackling of hand-claps. He +waited for several minutes. It was not well to be too complaisant with +one's public. Then he gave the signal to the man at the curtain, and +moved past him, to the narrow space behind the lights. He bowed. It had +the very air of irony, had that bow. It does not seem humanly possible +to express irony in a curving in the spine, a declension of the head, a +certain pose of the hands, but Vane succeeded, just as Wantage had so +often succeeded, in giving that impression. The bow over, he turned to +withdraw. Let them wait, let them chafe I Commuters were missing the +last trains for the night? So much the better! They would not forget him +so easily. + +When he finally condescended to stride before the curtain again, it was +a lift of the eyebrows, a little gesture, an air that said, quite +plainly: Really, it is very annoying of you. If I were not very gracious +indeed I should refuse to come out again. I do so, I assure you, under +protest. + +He gave a little, delicate cough, he lifted his eyes. At that the house +became still, utterly still. + +He began without any vocative at all. + +"The actor," he said, "who wins the applause of so distinguished a +company is exceedingly fortunate. The applause of such a very +distinguished company--" he succeeded in emphasizing his phrase to the +point where it became a subtle insult--"is very sweet to the actor. It +reconciles him to what he must take to be a breach of true art, the +introduction of his own person on the scene where he has appeared as an +impersonator of character. Some actors are expected to make speeches +after their exertions should be over. I am one of those poor actors. In +the name of myself, a poor actor, and the poor actors in my company, I +must thank this distinguished body of ladies and gentlemen for the +patience with which they have listened to Mr. O'Deigh's little trifle. +It is, of course, merely a trifle, _pour passer le temps_. Next season, +I hope, I may give you a really serious production. Mr. O'Deigh cables +me that he is happy such distinguished persons in such a critical town +have applauded his little effort. I am sure ever so many of you would +rather be at home than listening to the apologies of a poor actor. For I +feel I must apologize for presenting so inconsiderable a trifle. A mere +summer night's amusement. I have played it as a sort of rest for myself, +as preparation for larger productions. If I have amused you, I am +pleased. The actors' province is to please. The poor actor thanks you." + +He bowed, and the bewildered company who had heard him to the end, +clapped their hands a little. The newspaper men smiled at one another; +they had been there before. The old question of "Why does he do it?" no +longer stirred in them. They were used to Wantage's vagaries. + +The newspapers of the following day had Wantage's speech in full. The +critics wrote editorials on the necessity for curbing this player's +arrogance. The public was astonished to find that it had been insulted, +but it took the press' word for it. Wantage had made that sort of thing +the convention; it was the fashion to call these curtain speeches an +insult, yet to invoke them as eagerly as possible. The widespread +advertising that accrued to Wantage from this episode enabled his +manager to obtain, in his bookings for the following season, an even +higher percentage than usual. To that extent Orson Vane's imitation of +an imitator benefited his subject. In other respects it left Wantage a +mere walking automaton. + +It was fortunate that the closing time for Wantage's theatre was now on. +There was no hitch in Vane's plan of transporting Wantage to his home +quarters; the servants at the Wantage establishment found nothing +unusual in their master having been away for a day and a night; he was +too frequently in the habit, when his house displeased him in some +detail, to stay at hotels for weeks and months at a time; his household +was ready for any vagary. Indisposition was nothing new with him, +either; in reality and affectation these lapses from well-being were not +infrequent with the great player. The doctor told him he needed +rest--rest and sea-air; there was nothing to worry over; he had been +working too hard, that was all. + +So the shell of what had been Wantage proceeded to a watering-place, +while the kernel, now a part of Orson Vane, proceeded to astonish the +town with its doings and sayings. + +Practice had now enabled Vane to control, with a certain amount of +consciousness, whatsoever alien spirit he took to himself. Vigorous and +alert as was the mumming temperament he was now in possession of, he yet +contrived to exert a species of dominance over it; he submitted to it in +the mode, the expression of his character, yet in the main-spring of his +action he had it in subjection. He had reached, too, a plane from which +he was able, more than on any of the other occasions, to enjoy the +masquerade he knew himself taking part in. He realized, with a +contemptuous irony, that he was playing the part of one who played many +parts. The actor in him seemed, intellectually, merely a personified +palimpsest; the mind was receptive, ready to echo all it heard, keen to +reproduce traits and tricks of other characters. + +He held in himself, to be brief, a mirror that reflected whatever +crossed its face; the base of that mirror itself was as characterless, +as colorless, as the mere metal and glass. Superficialities were caught +with a skill that was astonishing; little tricks of manner and speech +were reproduced to the very dot upon the i; yet, under all the raiment +of other men's merely material attributes, there was no change of soul +at all; no transformation touched the little ego-screaming soul of the +actor. + +The superficial, in the meanwhile, was enough to make the town gossip +not a little about the newest diversions of Orson Vane. He talked, now, +of nothing but the theatre and the arts allied to it. He purposed doing +some little comedies at Newport in the course of the summer that was now +beginning. He eyed all the smart women of his acquaintance with an air +that implied either, "I wonder whether you could be cast for a girl I +must make love to," or, "You would be passable in _Prince Hal_ attire." +At home, to his servants, Vane was abominable. When the dreadful +champagne, that some impulse possessed him to buy of a Broadway +swindler, proved as flat as the Gowanus, his language to Nevins was +quite contemptible. "What," he shrieked, "do I pay you for? Tell me +that! This splendid wine spoiled, spoiled, utterly unfit for a gentleman +to drink, and all by your negligence. It is enough to turn one's mind. +It is an outrage. A splendid wine. And now--look at it!" As a conclusion +he threw the stuff in Nevins' face. Nevins made no answer at all. He +wiped the sour mess from his coat with the same air of apology that he +would have used had he spilt a glass himself. But his emotions were none +the less. They caused him, in the privacy of the servants' quarters, to +do what he had not done in years, to drop his h's. "It's the 'ost's +place," said Nevins, mournfully, "to entertain his guests, and not +bully the butler." Which, as a maxim, was valid enough, save that, in +this special case, the guests had come to look upon Vane's treatment of +the servants as part of the entertainment a dinner with him would +provide. + +Another distress that fell to the lot of poor Nevins was the fact that +his master was become averse to the paying of bills. The profanity fell +upon Nevins from both the duns and the dunned. + +"The man from Basser's, Mr. Vane, sir," Nevins would announce, timidly. +"Can't get him to go away at all, sir." + +"Basser's, Basser's? Oh--that tailor fellow. An impudent creature, to +plague me so, when I do him the honor of wearing his coats; they fit +very badly, but I put up with that because I want to help the fellow on. +And what is my reward? He pesters me, pesters me. Tell him--tell him +anything, Nevins. Only do leave me alone; I am very busy, very nervous. +I am going to write a comedy for myself. I have some water-colors to +paint for Mrs. Carlos; I have a ride in the Park, and ever so many other +things to do to-day, and you bother me with pestiferous tailors. Nevins, +you are, you are--" + +But Nevins quietly bowed himself out before he learned what new thing he +was in his master's eyes. + +A malady--for it surely is no less than a malady--for attempting cutting +speeches at any time and place possessed Vane. Shortsightedness was +another quality now obvious in him. He knew you to-day, to-morrow he +looked at you with the most unseeing eyes. His voice was the most +prominent organ in whatever room or club he happened to be; when he +spoke none else could be intelligible. When he knew himself observed, +though alone, he hummed little snatches to himself. His gait took on a +mincing step. There was not a moment, not a pose of his that had not its +forethought, its deliberation, its premeditated effect. + +The gradual increase in the publicity that was part of the penalty of +being in the smart world had made approachment between the stage and +society easier than ever before. Orson Vane's bias toward the theatre +did not displease the modish. Rumors as to this and that heroine of a +romantic divorce having theatric intentions became frequent. The gowns +of actresses were copied by the smart quite as much as the smart set's +gowns were copied by actresses. The intellectual factor had never been +very prominent in the social attitude toward the stage; it was now +frankly admitted that good-looking men and handsome dresses were as much +as one went to the theatre for. Theatrical people had a wonderful claim +upon the printer's ink of the continent; society was not averse to +borrowing as much of that claim as was possible. Compliments were +exchanged with amiable frequence; smart people married stage favorites, +and the stage looked to the smart for its recruits. + +Orson Vane could not have shown his devotion to the mummeries of the +stage at a better time. He gained, rather than lost, prestige. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI. + + +It was the fashionable bathing hour at the most exclusive summer resort +on the Atlantic coast. The sand in front of the Surf Club was dotted +with gaudy tents and umbrellas. Persons whom not to know was to be +unknowable were picturesquely distributed about the club verandahs in +wicker chairs and lounges. The eye of an artist would have been +distracted by the beauties that were suggested in the half-lifted skirts +of this beauty, and revealed in the bathing-suit of that one. The little +waves that came politely rippling up the slope of sand seemed to know +what was expected of them; they were in nowise rude. They may have +longed to ruffle this or that bit of feminine frippery, but they +refrained. They may have ached to drown out Orson Vane's voice as he +said "good morning" to everybody in and out of the water; but they +permitted themselves no such luxury. + +Orson Vane was a beautiful picture as he entered the water. His suit was +immaculate; a belt prevented the least wrinkle in his jersey; a rakish +sombrero gave his head a sort of halo. He poised a cigarette in one +hand, keeping himself afloat with the other. He bowed obsequiously to +all the pretty women; he invited all the rich ones to tea and toast--"We +always have a little tea and toast at my cottage on Sundays, you know; +you'll meet only nice-looking people, really; we have a jolly time." +Most of the men he was unable to see; the sunlight on the water did make +such a glare. + +On the raft Orson Vane found the only Mrs. Carlos. + +"If it were not for you, Mrs. Carlos," he assured her, "the ocean would +be quite unfashionable." + +Mrs. Carlos smiled amiably. Speeches of that sort were part of the +tribute the world was expected to pay her. She asked him if the yachts +in the harbor were not too pretty for anything. + +"No," said Vane, "no. Most melancholy sight. Bring up the wickedness of +man, whenever I look at them. I bought a yacht you know, early in the +summer. Liked her looks, made an offer, bought her. A swindle, Mrs. +Carlos, an utter swindle. A disgraceful hulk. And now I can't sell her. +And my cook is a rascal. Oh--don't mention yachts! And my private car, +Mrs. Carlos, you cannot imagine the trials I endure over that! The +railroads overcharge me, and the mob comes pottering about with those +beastly cameras. Really, you know, I am thinking of living abroad. The +theatre is better supported in Europe. I am thinking of devoting my life +to the theatre altogether. It is the one true passion. It shows people +how life should be lived; it is at once a school of morals and +comportment." He peered into the water near the raft. Then he plunged +prettily into the sea. "I see that dear little Imogene," he told Mrs. +Carlos, as he swam off. Imogene was the little heiress of the house of +Carlos; a mere schoolgirl. It was one of Vane's most deliberate appeals +for public admiration, this worship of the society of children. He +gamboled with all the tots and blossoms he could find. He knew them all +by name; they dispelled his shortsightedness marvelously. + +After a proper interval Vane appeared, in the coolest of flannels, on +the verandah of the Club. He bowed to all the women, whether he knew +them or not; he peered under the largest picture hats with an air that +said "What sweet creature is hidden here?" as plainly as words. + +Someone asked him why he had not been to the Casino the night before. + +"Oh," he sighed, "I was fearfully busy." + +"Busy?" The word came in a tone of reproach. A suspicion of any sort of +toil will brand one more hopelessly in the smart set of America than in +any other; one may pretend an occupation but one may not profess it in +actuality. + +"Oh, terribly busy," said Vane. "I am writing a comedy. I have decided +that we must make authorship smarter than it has been. I shall sacrifice +myself in that attempt. You've noticed that not one writing-chap in a +million knows anything about our little world except what is not true? +Yes; it's unmistakable. An entirely false impression of us is given to +the world at large. The real picture of us must come from one of +ourselves." + +"And you will try it?" + +"Yes. I shall do my very best. When it is finished I want you all to +play parts in it. We must do something for the arts, you know. Why not +the arts, as well as tailors and milliners? By the way, I want you all +to come to my little lantern-dance to-night, on the _Beaurivage_. It is +something quite novel. You must all come disguised as flowers. There +will be no lights but Chinese lanterns. I shall have launches ready for +you at the Casino landing. My cook is quite sober to-day, and the yacht +is as presentable as if she were not an arrant fraud. I mean to have a +dance that shall fit the history of society in America. For that reason +the newspapers must know nothing about it. There can be no history where +there are newspapers. I shall invite nobody who knows how to write; I am +the only one whose taste I can trust. Some people write to live, and +some live to write, and the worst class of all are merely dying to +write. They are all barred to-night. We must try and break all the +conventions. Conventions are like the strolling players: made to be +broke." + +He rattled on in this way, with painful efforts at brilliance, for quite +a time. His hearers really considered it brilliance and listened +patiently. Summer was not their season for intellectual exertion; it +might be a virtue in others, in themselves it would have been a mistake. + +The lantern-dance on Orson Vane's _Beaurivage_ was, as everyone will +remember, an event of exceeding picturesqueness. Mrs. Sclatersby +appeared as a carnation; Mrs. Carlos as a rose. Some of the younger and +divinely figured women appeared as various blossoms that necessitated +imitation of part of Rosalind's costume under the trees. The slender, +tapering stem of one white lily, fragrant and delicious, lingered long +in the memories of the men who were there. + +A sensation was caused by the arrival of Mrs. Barrett Weston. She came +in a scow, seated on her automobile. A shriek of delight from the +company greeted her. The weary minds of the elect were really tickled by +this conceit. The automobile was arranged to imitate a crysanthemum. +Just before she alighted Mrs. Barrett Weston touched a hidden lever and +the automobile began to grind out a rag-time tune. + +A stranger, approaching the _Beaurivage_ at that moment, might have +fancied himself in the politest ward of the most insane of asylums. But +Orson Vane found it all most delightful. It was the affair of the +season. + +"Look," he cried, in the midst of a game of leapfrog in which a number +of the younger guests had plunged with desperate glee, "there is the +moon. How pitably weak she seems, against this brilliance here! It bears +out the theory that art is always finer than nature, and that the +theatre is more picturesque than life. Look at what we are doing, this +moment! We are imitating pleasure. And will you show me any unconscious +pleasure that is so delightful as this?" + +By the time people had begun to feel a polite hunger Vane had completed +his scheme of having several unwieldy barges brought alongside the +_Beaurivage_. There were two of the clumsy but roomy decks on either +side of the slender, shapely yacht. Over this now quite wide space the +tables were arranged. While the supper went on, Orson Vane did a little +monologue of his own. Nobody paid any attention, but everyone applauded. + +"What a scene for a comedy," he explained, proudly surveying the picture +of the gaiety before him, "what a delicious scene! It is almost real. I +must write a play around it. I have quite made up my mind to devote my +life to the theatre. It is the only real life. It touches the emotions +at all points; it is not isolated in one narrow field of personality. +Have I your permission to put you all in my play? How sweet of you! I +shall have a scene where we all race in automobiles. We will be quite +like dear little children who have their donkey-races. But I think +automobiles are so much more intelligent than donkeys, don't you? And +they have such profound voices! Have you ever noticed the intonation of +the automobiles here? That one of Mrs. Barrett Weston has a delicate +tenor; it is always singing love-songs as if it were tired of life. Then +we have bassos, and baritones, and repulsive falsettos. My automobile +has a voice like a phonograph. When it bubbles along the avenue I can +hear, as plainly as anything, that it is imitating one of the other +automobiles. Some automobiles, I suppose, have the true instinct for the +theatre. Have you noticed how theatric some of the things are, how they +contrive to run away just when everyone is looking?" + +"Just like horses," murmured one of his listeners. + +"Oh, no; I wouldn't say that. Horses have a merely natural intelligence; +it is nothing like the splendidly artificial reasoning of the +automobile. The poor horse, I really pity him! He has nothing before him +but polo. But how thankful he should be to polo. He was a broncho with +disreputable manners; now he is a polo-pony with a neat tail. In time, I +dare say, the horse can learn some of the higher civilization of the +automobile, just as society may still manage to be as intelligent as the +theatre." + +The conclusion of that entertainment marked the height of Orson Vane's +peculiar fame. The radical newspapers caught echoes of it and invented +what they could not transcribe. The young men who owned newspapers had +not been invited by Orson Vane, because, in spite of his theatric mania, +he had no illusions about the decency of metropolitan journalism. He +avowed that the theatre might be a trifle highflavored, but it had, at +the least, nothing of the hypocrisy that smothers the town in lies +to-day and reads it a sermon to-morrow. The most conspicuous of these +newspaper owners went into something like convulsions over what he +called the degeneracy of our society. Himself most lamentably in a state +of table-d'hotage, this young man trumpeted forth the most bitter +editorials against Orson Vane and his doings. He frothed with +anarchistic ravings. Finally, since the world will always listen if you +only make noise loud enough and long enough, the general public began to +believe that Vane was really a dreadful person. He was a leader in the +smart set; he stood for the entire family. His taste for the theater +would debauch all society. His egoisms would spoil what little of the +natural was left in the regions of Vanity Fair. So went the chatter of +the man-on-the-street, that mighty power, whom the most insignificant of +little men-behind-the-pen can move at will. + +One may be ever so immersed in affairs that are not of the world and its +superficial doings, yet it is almost impossible to escape some faint +echo of what the world is chattering about. Professor Vanlief, who had +betaken himself and Jeanette, for the summer, to a little place in the +mountains, was finally routed out of his peace by the rumors concerning +Orson Vane. The give and take of conversation, even at a little +farm-house in the hills, does not long leave any prominent subject +untouched. So Augustus Vanlief one morning bought all the morning +papers. + +He found more than he had wanted. The editorials against the doings of +the smart set, the reports of the sermons preached against their +goings-on, were especially pregnant that morning. + +In another part of the paper he found a line or two, however, that +brought him sharply to a sense of necessary action. The lines were +these: + + "Mr. Arthur Wantage is still seriously ill at Framley + Lodge. Unless a decided turn for the better takes place + very shortly, it is doubtful if he can undertake his + starring season at the usual time this year." + +Augustus Vanlief saw what no other mortal could have guessed. He saw the +connection between those two newspaper items, the one about Vane and the +one about Wantage. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + +Professor Vanlief lost no time in inventing an excuse for his immediate +departure. Jeannette would be well looked after. He got a few +necessaries together and started for Framley Lodge. After some delay he +obtained an interview with the distinguished patient. + +"Try," urged Vanlief, "to tell me when this illness came upon you. Was +it after your curtain-speech at the end of last season?" + +Wantage looked with blank and futile eyes. "Curtain-speech? I made +none." + +"Oh, yes. Try to remember! It made a stir, did that speech of yours. Try +to think what happened that day!" + +"I made no speech. I remember nothing. I am Wantage, I think. Wantage. I +used to act, did I not?" He laughed, feebly. It was melancholy to watch +him. He could eat and drink and sleep; he had the intelligence of an +echo. Each thought of his needed a stimulant. + +Vanlief persisted, in spite of melancholy rebuffs. There was so much at +stake. This man's whole career was at stake. And, if matters were not +mended soon, the evil would be under way; the harm would have begun. It +meant loss, actual loss now, and one could scarcely compute how much +ruin afterwards. And he, Vanlief, would be the secret agent of this +ruin! Oh, it was monstrous! Something must be done. Yet, he could do +nothing until he was sure. To meddle, without absolute certainty, would +be criminal. + +"What do you remember before you fell ill?" he repeated. + +"Oh, leave me alone!" said Wantage. "Isn't the doctor bad enough, +without you. I tell you I remember nothing. I was well, and now I am +ill. Perhaps it was something Orson Vane gave me at supper that night, I +don't remember--" + +"At supper? Vane?" The Professor leaped at the words. + +"Yes. I said so, didn't I? I had supper in his rooms, and then--" + +But Vanlief was gone. He had no time for the amenities now. His age +seemed to leave him as his purpose warmed, and his goal neared. All the +fine military bearing came out again. The people who traveled with him +that day took him for nothing less than a distinguished General. + +At the end of the day he reached Vane's town house. Nevins was all alone +there; all the other servants were on the _Beaurivage_. The man looked +worn and aged. He trembled visibly when he walked; his nerves were +gone, and he had the taint of spirits on him. + +"Mr. Vanlief, sir," he whined, "it'll be the death of me, will this +place. First he buys a yacht, sir, like I buy a 'at, if you please; and +now I'm to sell the furniture and all the antics. These antics, sir, as +the master 'as collected all over the world, sir. It goes to me 'eart." + +Vanlief, even in his desperate mood, could not keep his smile back. +"Sell the antiques, eh? Well, they'll fetch plenty, I've no doubt. But +if I were you I wouldn't hurry; Mr. Vane may change his mind, you know." + +"Ah," nodded Nevins, brightening, "that's true, sir. You're right; I'll +wait the least bit. It's never too soon to do what you don't want to, +eh, sir? And I gives you my word, as a man that's 'ad places with the +nobility, sir, that the last year's been a sad drain on me system. What +with swearing, sir, and letters I wouldn't read to my father confessor, +sir, Mr. Vane's simply not the man he was at all. Of course, if he says +to sell the furniture, out it goes! But, like as not, he'll come in here +some line day and ask where I've got all his trappings. And then I'll +show him his own letter, and he'll say he never wrote it. Oh, it's a bad +life I've led of late, sir. Never knowing when I could call my soul my +own." + +The phrase struck the Professor with a sort of chill. It was true; if +his discovery went forth upon the world, no man would, in very truth, +know when he could call his soul his own. It would be at the mercy of +every poacher. But he could not, just now, afford reflections of such +wide scope; there was a nearer, more immediate duty. + +"Nevins," he said, "I came about that mirror of mine." + +"Yes, sir. I'm glad of that, sir; uncommon glad. You'll betaking it +away, sir? It's bad luck I've 'ad since that bit of plate come in the +house." + +"You're right. I mean to take it away. But only for a time. Seeing Mr. +Vane's thinking of selling up, perhaps it's just as well if I have this +out of the way for a time, eh? Might avoid any confusion. I set store by +that mirror, Nevins; I'd not like it sold by mistake." + +"Well, sir, if you sets more store by it than the master, I'd like to +see it done, sir. The master's made me life a burden about that there +glass. I've 'ad to watch it like a cat watches a mouse. I don't know now +whether I'd rightly let you take it or not." He scratched his head, and +looked in some quandary. + +"Nonsense, Nevins. You know it's mine as well as you know your own name. +Didn't you fetch it over from my house in the first place, and didn't +you pack it and wrap it under my very eyes?" + +"True, sir; I did. My memory's a bit shaky, sir, these days. You may do +as you like with your own, I'll never dispute that. But Mr. Vane's +orders was mighty strict about the plaguey thing. I wish I may never +see it again. It's been, 'Nevins, let nobody disturb the new mirror!' +and 'Nevins, did anyone touch the new mirror while I was gone?' and +'Nevins, was the window open near the new mirror?' until I fair feel +sick at the sight of it." + +"No doubt," said the professor, impatiently. "Then you'll oblige me by +wrapping it up for shipping purposes as soon as ever you can. I'm going +to take it away with me at once. I suppose there's no chance of Mr. Vane +dropping in here before I bring the glass back, but, if he does, tell +him you acted under my orders." + +"A good riddance," muttered Nevins, losing no time over his task of +covering and securing the mirror. "I'll pray it never comes this way +again," he remarked. + +The professor, after seeing that all danger of injury to the mirror's +exposed parts was over, walked nervously up and down the rooms. He would +have to carry his plan through with force of arms, with sheer +impertinence and energy of purpose. It was an interference in two lives +that he had in view. Had he any right to that? But was he not, after +all, to blame for the fact of the curious transfusion of soul that had +left one man a mental wreck, and stimulated the other's forces to a +course of life out of all character with the strivings of his real soul? +If he had not tempted Orson Vane to these experiments, Arthur Wantage +would never be drooping in the shadow of collapse, and in danger of +losing his proper place in the roll of prosperity. Vanlief shuddered at +thought of what an unscrupulous man might not do with this discovery of +his; what lives might be ruined, what successes built on fraud and +theft? Fraud and theft? Those words were foul enough in the material +things of life; but how much more horrid would they be when they covered +the spiritual realm. To steal a purse, in the old dramatic phrase, was a +petty thing; but to steal a soul--Professor Vanlief found himself +launched into a whirlpool of doubt and confusion. + +He had opened a new, vast region of mental science. He had enabled one +man to pass the wall with which nature had hedged the unforeseen forces +of humanity. Was he to learn that, in opening this new avenue of psychic +activity, he had gone counter to the eternal Scheme of Things, and let +in no divine light, but rather the fierce glare of diabolism? + +His thoughts traversed argument upon argument while Nevins completed his +work. He heard the man's voice, finally, with an actual relief, a +gladness at being recalled to the daring and doing that lay before him. + +When the Professor was gone, a wagon bearing away the precious mirror, +Nevins poured himself out a notably stiff glass of Five-Star. + +"Here's hoping," he toasted the silent room, "the silly thing gets +smashed into everlasting smithereens!" + +And he drowned any fears he might have had to the contrary. This +particular species of time-killing was now a daily matter with Nevins; +the incessant strain upon his nerves of some months past had finally +brought him to the pitch where he had only one haven of refuge left. + +The Professor sped over the miles to Framley Lodge. He took little +thought about meals or sleep. The excitement was marking him deeply; but +he paid no heed to, or was unaware of, that. Arrived at the Lodge a +campaign of bribery and corruption began. Servant after servant had to +be suborned. Nothing but the well-known fame and name of Augustus +Vanlief enabled him, even with his desperate expenditures of tips, to +avert the suspicion that he had some deadly, some covertly inimical end +in view. One does not, at this age of the world, burst into another +man's house and order that man's servants about, without coming under +suspicion, to put it mildly. Fortunately Vanlief encountered, just as +his plot seemed shattering against the rigor of the household +arrangements, the doctor who was in attendance on Wantage. The man +happened to be on the staff of the University where Vanlief held a +chair. He held the older man in the greatest respect; he listened to his +rapid talk with all the patience in the world. He looked astonished, +even uncomprehending, but he shook his shoulders up and down a few times +with complaisance. "There seems no possible harm," he assented. + +"Don't ask me to believe in the curative possibilities, Professor; +but--there can be no harm, that I see. He is not to be unduly excited. A +mirror, you say? You don't think vanity can send a man from illness to +health, do you? Not even an actor can be as vain as that, surely. +However, I shall tell the attendants to see that the thing is done as +quietly as possible. I trust you, you see, to let nothing detrimental +happen. I have to get over to the Port of Pines. I shall give the +orders. Goodbye. I wish I could see the result of your little--h'm, +notion--but I dare say to-morrow will be soon enough." + +And he smiled the somewhat condescending smile of the successful +practitioner who fancies he is addressing a campaigner whose usefulness +is passing. + +The setting up of the professor's mirror, so as to face Wantage's +sickbed, took no little time, no little care, no little exertion. When +it was in place, the professor tiptoed to the actor's side. + +"Well," queried Wantage, "what is it? Medicine? Lord, I thought I'd +taken all there was in the world. Where is it?" + +"No," said the professor, "not medicine. I am going to ask you to look +quite hard at that curtain by the foot of the bed for a moment. I have +something I think may interest you and--" + +As the actor's eyes, in mere physical obedience to the other's +suggestion, took the desired direction, Vanlief tugged at a cord that +rolled the curtain aside, revealing the mirror, which gave Wantage back +the somewhat haggard apparition of himself. + +A few seconds went by in silence. Then Wantage frowned sharply. + +"Gad," he exclaimed, vigorously and petulantly, "what a beastly bad bit +of make-up!" + +The voice was the voice of the man whom the town had a thousand times +applauded as "The King of the Dandies." + +An exceedingly bad quarter of an hour followed for Vanlief. Wantage, now +in full possession of all his mental faculties, abused the Professor up +hill and down dale. What was he doing there? What business had that +mirror there? What good was a covered-up mirror? Where were the +servants? The doctor had given orders? The doctor was a fool. Only the +mere physical infirmity consequent upon being bedridden for so long +prevented Wantage from becoming violent in his rage. Vanlief, sharp as +was his sense of relief at the success of his venture, was yet more +relieved when his bribes finally got his mirror and himself out of the +Lodge. The incident had its humors, but he was too tired, too enervated, +to enjoy them. The very moment of Wantage's recovery of his soul had its +note of ironic comedy; the succeeding vituperation from the restored +actor; Vanlief's own meekness; the marvel and rapacity of the +servants--all these were abrim with chances for merriment. But Vanlief +found himself, for, perhaps, the first time in his life, too old to +enjoy the happy interpretations of life. Into all his rejoicings over +the outcome of this affair there crept the constant doubts, the +ceaseless questionings, as to whether he had discovered a mine of wisdom +and benefit, or a mere addition to man's chances for evil. + +His return journey, his delivery of the mirror into Nevins' unwilling +care, were accomplished by him in a species of daze. + +He had hardly counted upon the danger of his discovery. Was he still +young enough to contend with them? + +Nevins almost flung the mirror to its accustomed place. He unwrapped it +spitefully. When he left the room, the curtain of the glass was flapping +in the wind. Nevins heard the sound quite distinctly; he went to the +sideboard and poured out a brimming potion. + +"I 'opes the wind'll play the Old 'Arry with it," he smiled to himself. +He smiled often that night; he went to bed smiling. His was the cheerful +mode of intoxication. + +Augustus Vanlief reached the cottage in the hills a sheer wreck. He had +left it a hale figure of a man who had ever kept himself keyed up to the +best; now he was old, shaking, trembling in nerves and muscles. + +Jeannette rushed toward him and put her arms around him. She looked her +loving, silent wonder into his weary eyes. + +"Sleep, dear, sleep," said this old, tired man of science, "first let me +sleep." + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII. + + +Orson Vane, scintillating theatrically by the sea, was in a fine rage +when Nevins ceased to answer his telegrams. Telegrams struck Vane as the +most dramatic of epistles; there was always a certain pictorial effect +in tearing open the envelope, in imagining the hushed expectation of an +audience. A letter--pooh! A letter might be anything from a bill to a +billet. But a telegram! Those little slips of paper struck immediate +terror, or joy, or despair, or confusion; they hit hard, and swiftly. +Certainly he had been hitting Nevins hard enough of late. He had +peppered him with telegrams about the furniture, about the pictures; he +had forbidden one day what he had ordered the day before. It never +occurred to him that Nevins might seek escape from these torments. Yet +that was what Nevins had done. He had tippled himself into a condition +where he signed sweetly for each telegram and put it in the hall-rack. +They made a beautiful, yellow festoon on the mahogany background. + +"Those," Nevins told himself, "is for a gentleman as is far too busy to +notice little things like telegrams." + +Nevins watched that yellow border growing daily with fresh delight. + +He could keep on accepting telegrams just as long as the sideboard held +its strength. Each new arrival from the Western Union drove him to more +glee and more spirits--of the kind one can buy bottled. + +At last Orson Vane felt some alarm creeping through his armor of +dramatic pose. Could Nevins have come to any harm? It was very annoying, +but he would have to go to town for a day or so. That seemed +unavoidable. Just as he had made up his mind to it, he happened to slip +on a bit of lemon-peel. At once he fell into a towering rage. He cursed +the entire service on the _Beaurivage_ up hill and down dale. You could +hear him all over the harbor. It was the voice of a profane Voltaire. + +That night, at the Casino, his rage found vent in action. He sold the +_Beaurivage_ as hastily as he had bought her. + +He left for town, by morning, full of bitterness at the world's +conspiracy to cheat him. He felt that for a careless deck-hand to leave +lemon-peel on the deck of the Beaurivage was nothing less than part of +the world-wide cabal against his peace of mind. + +He reached his town-house in a towering passion, all the accumulated +ill-temper of the last few days bubbling in him. He flung the housedoor +wide, stamped through the halls. "Nevins!" he shouted, "Nevins!" + +Nothing stirred in the house. He entered room after room. Passing into +his dressing-room he almost tore the hanging from its rod. A gust of air +struck him from the wide-open window. Before he proceeded another step +this gust, that his opening of the curtain had produced, lifted the veil +from the mirror facing him. The veil swung up gently, revealed the +glass, and dropped again. + +Then he realized the figure of Nevins on a couch. He walked up to him. +The smell of spirits met him at once. + +"Poor Nevins!" he muttered. + +Then he fell to further realizations. + +The whole history of his three experiments unfolded itself before him. +What, after them all, had he gained? What, save the knowledge of the +littleness of the motives controlling those lives? This actor, this man +the world thought great, whose soul he had held in usurpation, up to a +little while ago, what was he? A very batch of vanities, a mountain of +egoisms. Had there been, in any of the thoughts, the moods he had +experienced from out the mental repertoire of that player, anything +indicative of nobility, of large benevolence, of sweet and light in the +finest human sense? Nothing, nothing. The ambition to imitate the +obvious points of human action and conduct, to the end that one be +called a character-actor; the striving for an echoed fame rightly +belonging to the supreme names of history; a yearning for the stimulus +of immediate acclamation--these things were not worth gaining. To have +experienced them was to have caught nothing beneficial. + +Orson Vane began to consider himself with contempt. Upon himself must +fall the odium of what the souls he had borrowed had induced in him. The +littleness he had fathomed, the depths of character to which he had +sunk, all left their petty brands on him. He had penetrated the barriers +of other men's minds, but what had it profited him? As a ship becalmed +in foul waters takes on barnacles, so had he brought forth, from the +realm of alien springs and motives he had made his own, a dreadful +incrustation of painful conjectures on the supremacy of evil in the +world. + +It needed only a glance at the man, Nevins, to force home the +destructiveness born of these incursions into other lives. That +trembling, cowering thing had been, before Orson Vane's departure from +the limitations of his own temperament, a decent, self-respecting +fellow. While now-- + +Vane paced about the house in bitter unrest. In the outer hall he +noticed the yellow envelopes bordering the coat-rack. He took one of +them down, opened it, and smiled. "Poor Nevins!" he murmured. The next +moment a lad from the Telegraph office appeared in the doorway. Vane +went forward himself; there was no use disturbing Nevins. + +The wire had followed him on from the _Beaurivage_, or rather from the +man to whom he had sold her. It was from Augustus Vanlief. Its brevity +was like a blow in the face. + +"Am ill," it said, "must see you." + +It was still possible, that very hour, to get an express to the +Professor's mountain retreat. There was nothing to prevent immediate +departure. Nothing--except Nevins. The man really must exercise more +care about that mirror. He was safely out of all his experiments now, +but the thing was dangerous none the less; if it had been his own +property, he would have known how to deal with it. But it was the +Professor's secret, the discovery of a lifetime. For elaborate +precautions, or even for hiding the thing in some closet, there was no +time. He could only rouse Nevins as energetically as possible to a sense +of his previous defection from duty; gently and quite kindly he +admonished him to take every care of the new mirror in the time coming. +Nevins listened to him wide-eyed; his senses were still too much agog +for him to realize whence this change of voice and manner had come to +his master. It was merely another page in the chapter of bewilderment +that piled upon him. He bowed his promise to be careful, he assented to +a number of things he could not fathom, and when Vane was gone he +cleared the momentary trouble in his mind by an ardent drink. The liquor +brought him a most humorous notion, and one that he felt sure would +relieve him of all further anxieties on the score of the new mirror. He +approached the back of it, tore the curtain from its face, wheeled it to +the centre of the room, and placed all the other cheval-glasses close +by. Throughout this he had wit enough, or fear enough--for his memory +brought him just enough picture of Orson's own handling of this mirror +to inspire a certain awe of the front of the thing--never to pass in +face of the mirror. When he had the mirrors grouped in close ranks, he +spun about on his heels quickly, as if seized with the devout frenzy of +a dervish. He fell, finally, in a daze of dizziness and liquor. Yet he +had cunning enough left. He crept out of the room on his stomach, like a +snake with fiery breath. He knew that the angle at which the mirrors +were tilted would keep him, belly to the carpet, out of range. Then he +reeled, shouting, into the corridors. + +He had accomplished his desire. He no longer knew one mirror from the +other. + +Orson Vane, in the meanwhile, was being rushed to the mountains. It was +with a new shock of shame that he saw the ravages illness was making on +the fine face of Vanlief. This, too, was one of the items in the +profit-and-loss column of his experiments. Yet this burden was, +perhaps, a shared one. + +"Ah," said Vanlief, with a quick breath of gladness, "thank God!" He +knew, the instant Vane spoke, that it was Orson Vane himself who had +come; he knew that there was no more doubt as to the success of his own +recent headlong journeyings. They had prostrated him; but--they had won. +Yet there was no knowing how far this illness might go; it was still +imperative to come to final, frank conclusions with the partner in his +secret. + +The instant that Vane had been announced Jeannette Vanlief had left her +father's side. She withdrew to the adjoining room, where only a curtain +concealed her; the doors had all been taken down for the summer. She did +not wish to meet Orson Vane. Over her real feelings for him had come a +cloud of doubts and distastes. She had never admitted to herself, +openly, that she loved him; she tried to persuade herself that his +notorious vagaries had put him beyond her pale. She was determined, now, +to be an unseen ear to what might pass between Orson and her father. It +was not a nice thing to do, but, for all she knew, her father's very +life was at stake. What dire influence might Vane not have over her +father? She suspected there was some bond between them; in her father's +weakened state it seemed her duty to watch over him with every devotion +and alertness. + +Yet, for a long time, the purport of the conversation quite eluded her. + +"I have not gone the gamut of humanity," said Orson, "but I have almost, +it seems to me, gone the gamut of my own courage." + +Vanlief nodded. He, too, understood. Consequences! Consequences! How the +consequences of this world do spoil the castles one builds in it! +Castles in the air may be as pretty as you please, but they are sure to +obstruct some other mortal's view of the sky. + +"If I were younger," sighed Vanlief, "if I were only younger." + +They did not yet, either of them, dare to be open, brutal, forthright. + +"I could declare, I suppose," Vanlief went on, "that it was somewhat +your own fault. You chose your victims badly. You have, I presume, been +disenchanted. You found little that was beautiful, many things that were +despicable. The spectacles you borrowed have all turned out smoky. Yet, +consider--there are sure to be just as many rosy spectacles as dark ones +in the world." + +"No doubt," assented Vane, though without enthusiasm, "but there are +still--the consequences. There is still the chance that I could never +repay the soul I take on loan; still the horror of being left to face +the rest of my days with a cuckoo in my brain. Mind, I have no +reproaches, none at all. You overstated nothing. I have felt, have +thought, have done as other men have felt and thought and done; their +very inner secret souls have been completely in my keeping. The +experiment has been a triumph. Yet it leaves me joyless." + +"It has made me old," said Vanlief, simply. "Ah," he repeated, "if only +I were younger!" + +"The strain," he began again, "of putting an end to your last experiment +has told on me. I overdid it. Such emotion, and such physical tension, +is more than I should have attempted. I begin to fear I may not last +very long. And in that case I think I shall have to take my secret with +me. Orson, it comes to this; I am too old to perfect this marvelous +thing to the point where it will be safe for humanity at large. It is +still unsafe,--you will agree to that. You might wreck your own life and +that of others. The chances are one in a thousand of your ever finding a +human being whom God has so graciously endowed with the divine spirit as +to be able to lose part of it without collapse. I have hoped and hoped, +that such a thing would happen; then there would be two perfectly even, +exactly tempered creatures; even if, upon that transfusion, the mirror +disappeared, there would be no unhappiness as a reproach. But we have +found nothing like that. You have embittered yourself; the glimpses of +other souls you have had have almost stripped you of your belief in an +eternal Good." + +"You mean to send for the mirror?" + +"It would be better, wiser. If I live, it will still be here. If I die, +it must be destroyed. In any event--" + +At the actual approach of this conclusion to his experiments Orson Vane +felt a sense of coming loss. With all the dangers, all the loom of +possible disaster, he was not yet rid of the awful fascination of this +soul-snatching he had been engaged in. + +"Perhaps," he argued, "my next experiment might find the one in a +thousand you spoke of." + +"I think you had better not try again. Tell me, what was Wantage's soul +like?" + +"Oh, I cannot put it into words. A little, feverish, fretful soul, +shouting, all the time: I, I, I! Plotting, planning for public +attention, worldly prominence. No thoughts save those of self. An active +brain, all bent on the ego. A brain that deliberately chose the theatre +because it seems the most spectacular avenue to eminence. A magnetism +that keeps outsiders wondering whether childishness or genius lurks +behind the mask. The bacillus of restlessness is in that brain; it is +never idle, always planning a new pose for the body and the voice." + +"Well," urged Vanlief, "think what might have been had I not put a stop +to the thing. You don't realize the terrible anxiety I was in. You might +have ruined the man's career. However petty we, you and I, may hold +him, there are things the world expects of him; we came close to +spoiling all that. I had to act, and quickly. You may fancy the +difficulties of getting the mirror to Wantage. Oh, it is still all like +an evil dream." He lay silent a while, then resumed: "Is the mirror in +the old room?" + +"Yes. With the others, in the dressing-room." + +"Nevins looks out for it?" + +"As always. Though he grows old, too." + +Vanlief looked sharply at Orson, he suspected something behind that +phrase about Nevins. Again he urged: + +"Better have Nevins bring the mirror back to me." + +Vane hesitated. He murmured a reply that Jeannette no longer cared to +hear. The whole secret was open to her, now; she saw that the Orson Vane +she loved--she exulted now in her admission of that--was still the man +she thought him, that all his inexplicable divagations had been part of +this awful juggling with the soul that her father had found the trick +of. She realized, too, by the manner of Vane, that he had not yet given +up all thought of these experiments; he wanted one more. One more; one +more; it was the cry of the drunkard, the opium-eater, the victim of +every form of mania. + +It should never be, that one more trial. What her father had done, she +could do. She glided out of the room, on the heels of her quick +resolution. + +The two men, in their arguments, their widening discussions, did not +bring her to mind for hours. By that that time she was well on her way +to town. + +Her purpose was clear to her; nothing should hinder its achievement. She +must destroy the mirror. There were sciences that were better killed at +the outset. She did not enter deeply into those phases of the question, +but she had the clear determination to prevent further mischief, further +follies on the part of Vane, further chances of her father's collapse. + +The mirror must be destroyed. That was plain and simple. + +It took a tremendous ringing and knocking to bring Nevins to the door of +Vane's house. + +"I am Miss Vanlief," she said, "I want to see my father's mirror." + +"Certainly, miss, certainly." He tottered before her, chuckling and +chattering to himself. He was in the condition now when nothing +surprised him; any rascal could have led him with a word or a hint; he +was immeasurably gay at everything in the world. He reeled to the +dressing-room with an elaborate air of courtesy. + +"At your service, miss, there you are, miss. You walk straight on, and +there you are, miss. There's the mirror, miss, plain as pudding." + +She strode past him, drawing her skirt away from the horrible taint of +his breath. She knew she would find the mirror at once, curtained and +solitary sentinel before the doorway. She would simply break it with her +parasol, stab it, viciously, from behind. + +But, once past the portal, she gave a little cry. + +All the mirrors were jumbled together, all looked alike, and all faced +her, mysterious, glaringly. + +"Nevins," she called out, "which--which is the one?" + +"Ah, miss," he said, leeringly, "don't I wish I knew." + +No sense of possible danger to herself, only a despair at failure, came +upon Jeannette. Failure! Failure! She had meant to avert disaster, and +she had accomplished--nothing, nothing at all. + +She left the house almost in tears. She felt sure Vane would yield again +to the temptation of these frightful experiments. She could do nothing, +nothing. She had felt justified in attempting destruction of what was +her father's; but she could not wantonly offer all that array of mirrors +on the altar of her purpose. She stumbled along the street, suffering, +full of tears. It was with a sigh of relief that she saw a hansom and +hailed it. The cab had hardly turned a corner before Orson Vane, coming +from another direction, let himself into his house. His conference with +Vanlief had ceased at his own promise to make just one more trial of the +mirror. He could not go about the business of the life he led in town +without assuring himself the mirror was safe. + +He found Nevins incoherent and useless. He began to consider seriously +the advisability of discharging the man; still, he hated to do that to +an old servant, and the man might come to his senses and his duties. + +He spent some little time re-arranging the mirrors in his room. He was +sure there had been no intrusion since he was there himself, and he knew +Nevins well enough to know that individual's horror of facing the +mirror. He himself faced the new mirror boldly enough, sure that his own +image was the only one resting there. He knew the mirror easily, in +spite of the robbery that the wind, as he thought, had committed. + +Nevins, hiding in the corridor, watched him, in drunken amusement. + + + + +CHAPTER XIX. + + +The sun, glittering along the avenue, shimmering on the rustling gowns +of the women and smoothing the coats of the horses, smote Orson Vane +gently; the fairness of the day flooded his soul with a tide of +well-being. In the air and on the town there seemed some subtle +radiance, some glamour of enchantment. The smell of violets was all +about him. The colors of new fashions dotted the vision like a painting +by Hassam; a haze of warmth covered the town like a kiss. + +His thoughts, keyed, in some strange, sweet way, to all the pleasant, +happy, pretty things in life, brought him the vision of Jeannette +Vanlief. How long, how far away seemed that day when she had been at his +side, when her voice had enveloped him in its silver echoes! + +As carriage after carriage passed him, he began to fancy Jeannette, in +all her roseate beauty, driving toward him. He saw the curve of her +ankle as she stepped into the carriage; he dreamed of her flower-like +attitude as she leaned to the cushions. + +Then the miracle happened; Jeannette, a little tired, a little pale, a +little more fragile than when last he had seen her, was coming toward +him. A smile, a gentle, tender, slightly sad--but yet so sweet, so +sweet!--a smile was on her lips. He took her hand and held it and looked +into her eyes, and the two souls in that instant kissed and became one. + +"This time," he said--and as he spoke all that had happened since they +had pretended, childishly, on the top of the old stage on the Avenue, +seemed to slip away, to fade, to be forgotten--"it must be a real +luncheon. You are fagged. So am I. You are like a breath of +lilies-of-the-valley. Come!" + +They took a table by an open window. The procession of the town nearly +touched them, so close was it. To them both it seemed, to-day, a happy, +joyous, fine procession. + +"Will you tell me something?" asked the girl, presently, after they had +laughed and chattered like two children for awhile. + +"Anything in the world." + +"Well, then--are you ever, ever going to face that dreadful mirror +again?" + +He smiled, as if there was nothing astonishing in her knowledge, her +question. + +"Do you want me not to?" + +She nodded. + +He put his hand across the table, on one of hers. "Jeannette," he +whispered, "I promise. Why do you care? It is not possible that you +care because, because--Jeannette, will you promise me something, too?" + +They have excellent waiters at the Mayfair. They can be absolutely blind +at times. This was such a time. The particular waiter who was serving +Vane's table, took a sudden, rapt interest in the procession on the +avenue. + +Jeanette crumbled a macaroon with her free hand. + +"You have my hand," she pouted. + +"I need it," he said. "It is a very pretty hand. And very strong. I +think it must have lifted all my ills from me to-day. I feel nothing but +kindness toward the whole world. I could kiss--the whole world." + +"Oh," said Jeannette, pulling her hand away a little, "you monster! You +are worse than Nero." + +"Do you think my kisses would be so awful, then? Or is it simply the +piggishness of me that makes you call me a monster. That's not the right +way to look at it. Think of all the dreadful people there are in the +world; think how philanthropic you must make me feel if I want to kiss +even those." + +"Ah, but the world is full of beautiful women." + +"I do not believe it," he vowed. "I do not think God had any beauty left +after he fashioned--you." + +He was not ashamed, not one iota of the grossness of that fable. He +really felt so. Indeed, all his life he never felt otherwise than that +toward Jeannette. And she took the shocking compliment quite serenely. + +"You are absurd," she said, but she looked as if she loved absurdity. +"Please, may I take my hand?" + +"If you will be very good and promise--" + +"What?" + +"To give me something in exchange." + +"Something in exchange?" + +"Yes. The sweetest thing in the world, the best, and the dearest. You, +dear, yourself. Oh! dearest, if I could tell you what I feel. +Speech--what a silly thing speech is! It can only hint clumsily, +futilely. If I could only tell you, for instance, how the world has +suddenly taken on brightness for me since you smiled. I feel a +tenderness to all nature. I believe at heart there is good in everyone, +don't you? To-day I seem to see nothing but good. I could find you a +lovable spot in the worst villain you might name. I suppose it is the +stream of sweetness that comes from you, dear. Why can't this hour last +forever. I want it to, oh, I want it to!" + +"It is," she whispered, "an hour I shall always remember." + +"Yes, but it must last, it can't die; it sha'n't! Jeannette, let us make +this hour last us our lives! Can't we?" + +"Our lives?" she whispered. + +"Yes, our lives. This is only the first minute of our life. We must +never part again. I seem to have been behind a cloud of doubt and +distrust until this moment. I hardly realize what has happened to me. Is +love so refining a thing as all this? Does it turn bitter into sweet, +and make all the ups and downs of the world shine like one level, +beautiful sea of tenderness? It can be nothing else, but that--my love, +our--can I say our love, Jeannette?" + +The sun streamed in at the window, kissing the tendrils of her hair and +bringing to their copper shimmer a yet brighter blush. The day, with all +its perfume, the splendor of its people, the riot of color of its gowns, +the pride and pomp of its statues and its fountains, flushed the most +secret rills of life. + +"It is a marvel of a day," said Jeannette. + +"A marvel? It is an impossible day; it is not a day at all--it is merely +the hour of hours, the supreme instant, the melody so sweet that it must +break or blind our hearts. You are right, dear, it is a marvelous hour. +You make me repeat myself. Can we let this hour--escape, Jeannette?" + +"It goes fast." + +"Fast--fast as the wind. Fleet as air and fair as heaven are the +instants that bring happiness to common mortals. But we must hold the +hour, cage it, leash it to our lives." + +"Do you think we can?" + +She had used the "we!" Oh yes, and she had said it; she had said it; he +sang the refrain over to himself in a swoon of bliss. + +"I am sure of it," he urged. "Will you try?" + +"You are so much the stronger," she mocked. + +"Oh--if it depends on me--! Try? I shall succeed! I know it. Such love +as mine cannot fail. If only you will let me try. That is all; just +that. + +"I wish you luck!" she smiled. + +"You have said it," he jubilated, "you have said it!" And then, +realizing that she had meant it all the time, he threatened her with a +look, a shake of the head--oh, you would have said he wanted to punish +her in some terrible way, some way that was filled with kisses. + +"Jeannette," he whispered, "I have never heard you speak my name." + +"A pretty name, too," she said. "I have wondered if I might not spoil it +in my pronunciation." + +"You beautiful bit of mockery, you," he said, "will you condescend to +repeat a little sentence after me? You will say it far more prettily +than I, but perhaps you will forgive my lack of music. I am only a man. +You--ah, you are a goddess." + +"For how long?" she asked. "Men marry goddesses and find them clay, +don't they?" + +"You are not clay, dear, you are star-dust, and flowers, and fragrance. +There is not a thought in your dear head that is in tune with mere +clay. But listen! You must say this after me: I--" + +"I--" + +"Love--" + +"Love--" + +"You--" + +"You--" + +"Jeannette--" + +Her lips began to frame the consonant for her own name, but at sight of +the pleading in his gaze she stilled the playfulness of her, and +finished, shyly, but oh, so sweetly. + +"Orson." + +The dear, delightful absurdities of the hour when men and women tell +each other they love, how silly, and how pathetic they must seem to the +all-seeing force that flings our destinies back and forth at its will! +Yet how fair, how ineffably fair, those moments are to their heroes and +heroines; how vastly absurd the rest of the sad, serious world seems to +such lovers, and how happy are the mortals, after all, who through +fastnesses of doubt and darkness, come to the free spaces where the +heart, in tenderness and grace, rules supreme over the intellect, and +keeps in subjection, wisdom, ignorance and all the ills men plague their +minds with! + +When they left the Mayfair together their precious secret was anything +but a secret. Their dream lay fair and open to the world; one must have +been very blind not to see how much these two were in love with each +other. They had gone over every incident of their friendship; they had +stirred the embers of their earliest longings; they had touched their +growing happiness at every point save where Orson's steps aside had hurt +his sweetheart's memory. Those periods both avoided. All else they made +subject for, oh, the tenderest, the most lovelorn conversation +thinkable. It was enough, if overheard, to have sickened the whole day +for any ordinary mortal. + +One must, to repeat, have been very stupid not to see, when they issued +upon the avenue, that they shared the secret that this world appears to +have been created to keep alive. Love clothed them like a visible +garment. + +Luke Moncreith could never have been called blind or stupid. He saw the +truth at once. The truth; it rushed over him like a salt, bitter, acrid +sea. He swallowed it as a drowning man swallows what overwhelms him. One +instant of terrible rage spun him as if he had been a top; he faced +about and was for making, then and there, a scene with this shamelessly +happy pair. But the futility of that struck him on the following second. +He kept his way down the avenue, emotions surging in him; he felt that +his passions were becoming visible and conspicuous; he took a turning +into one of the streets leading eastward. A sign of a wineshop flashed +across his dancing vision, and he clung to it as to an anchor or a +poison. He found a table. He wanted nothing else, only rest, rest. The +wine stood untasted on the bare wood before him. He peered, through it, +into an unfathomable mystery. This chameleon, this fellow Vane--how was +it possible that he had won this glorious, flower-like creature, +Jeannette? This man had been, as the fancy took him, a court fool, a +sporting nonentity, and a blatant mummer. And what was he now? By the +looks of him, he was, to-day--and for how long, Moncreith wondered--a +very essence of meekness and sweetness; butter would not think of +melting in his mouth. What, in the devil's name, what was this riddle! +He might have repeated that question to himself until the end of his +life if the door had not opened then and let in Nevins. + +Nevins ordered the strongest liquor in the place. The sideboard on +Vanthuysen Square might be empty, but Nevins had still the money. As for +the gloomy old Vane house, he really could not stand it any longer. He +toasted himself, did Nevins, and he talked to himself. + +"'An now," he murmured, thickly, "'ere's to the mirror. May I never see +it again as long as I 'as breath in my body and wits in me 'ead. Which," +he observed, with a fatuous grin, "aint for long. No, sir; me nerves is +that a-shake I aint good for nothin' any more. And I asks you, is it +any wonder? 'Ere's Mr. Vane, one day, pleasant as pie. Next day, comes +in, takes a look at that dratted mirror of the Perfessor's, and takes to +'igh jinks. Yes, sir, 'igh jinks, very 'igh jinks. 'As pink tea-fights +in his rooms, 'angs up pictures I wouldn't let me own father see--no, +sir, not if 'e begged me on his bended knee, I wouldn't--and wears what +you might call a tenor voice. Then--one day, while you says 'One for his +Nob' 'e's 'imself again. An' it's always the mirror this, an' the mirror +that. I must look out for it, an' it mustn't be touched, and nobody must +come in. And what's the result of it all? Me nerves is gone, and me +self-respect is gone, and I'm a poor miserable drunkard!" + +He gulped down some of his misery. + +"Join me," said a voice nearby, "in another of those things!" + +Nevins turned, with a swaying motion, to note Moncreith, whose hand was +pointing to the empty glass before Nevins. + +"You are quite right," he went on, when the other's glass had been +filled again, "Mr. Vane's conduct has been most scandalous of late. You +say he has a mirror?" + +All circumspection had long since passed from Nevins. He was simply an +individual with a grievance. The many episodes that, in his filmy mind, +seemed to center about that mirror, shifted and twisted in him to where +they forced utterance. He began to talk, circuitously, wildly, rapidly, +of the many things that rankled in him. He told all he knew, all he had +observed. From out of the mass of inane, not pertinent ramblings, +Moncreith caught a glimmer of the facts. + +What a terrible power this must be that was in Orson Vane's possession! +Moncreith shuddered at the thought. Why, the man might turn himself, in +all but externals--and what, after all, was the husk, the shell, the +body?--into the finest wit, the most lovable hero of his time; he might +fare about the world wrecking now this, now that, happiness; he might +win--perhaps he actually had, even now, won Jeannette Vanlief? If he +had, if--perhaps there was yet time! There was need for sharp, desperate +action. + +He plunged out of the place and toward Vanthuysen Square. Then he +remembered that he could not get in. He aroused Nevins from his brutish +doze. He dragged him over the intervening space. Nevins gave him the +key, and dropped into one of the hall chairs. Moncreith leaped upstairs, +and entered the room where the mirror stood, white, silent, stately. + +He contemplated everything for a time. He conjured up the picture he had +been able to piece together from the rambling monologues of Nevins. He +wondered whether to simply smash in the mirrors--he would destroy them +all, to make sure--by taking a chair-leg to them, or whether he would +carefully pour some acid over them. + +The simpler plan appealed most to him. It was the quickest, the most +thorough. He took a little wooden chair that stood by an ebon +escritoire, swung it high in the air and brought it with a shattering +crash upon the face of the Professor's mirror. + +But there was more than a mere crash. A deadly, sickening, stifling fume +arose from the space the clinking glass unbared; a flame burst out, +leaped at Moncreith and seized him. The deadly white smoke flowed +through the room; flame followed flame, curtains, hangings, screens +went, one after the other, to feed the ravenous beast that Moncreith's +blow had liberated. The room was presently a seething furnace that +rattled in the cage of the walls and windows. Moncreith lay, choked with +the horrid smoke, on the floor. The flames licked at him again and +again; finally one took him on the tip of its tongue, twisted him about, +and shriveled him to black, charred shapelessness. + +The windows fell, finally, out upon the street below. The fire sneaked +downward, laughing and leaping. + +When the firemen came to save Orson Vane's house, they found a grinning, +sodden creature in the hall. + +It was Nevins. "That settles the mirror!" was all he kept repeating. + + + + +CHAPTER XX. + + +The Professor shivered a little when Jeannette came to him with her +budget of wonderful news. She told him of her engagement. He patted her +head, and blessed her and wished her happiness. Then she told him of her +visit to Vane's house. It was at that he shivered. + +He wondered if Vane had taken her image from that fatal glass. If he +had, how, he wondered, would this experiment end? Surely it could not +have happened; Jeannette was quite herself; there was no visible +diminution of charm, of vitality. + +When Vane arrived, presently, the Professor questioned him. The answer +brought the Professor wonder, but he did not count it altogether a +calamity. There could be no doubt that Orson Vane was now wearing +Jeannette's sweet and beautiful soul as a halo round his own. Well, +mused Vanlief, if anything should happen to Jeannette one can always-- + +"Oh, father!" + +Jeannette burst into the room with the morning paper from town. "Orson's +house is burnt to the ground. And who do you think is suspected? Luke +Moncreith! They found his body. Read it!" + +The Professor took the report and scanned it. There could be no doubt; +the mirror, the work of his life, was gone. He could never fashion one +like it. Never--Yet--He looked at the two young people at the window, +whither they had turned together, each with an arm about the other. + +"What a marvel of a day!" Jeannette was saying. + +"The days will all be marvels for us," said Orson. + +"The days, I think, must have souls, just as we have. Some days seem to +have such dark, such bitter thoughts. + +"Yes, I think you are right. There are days that strike one as having +souls; others that seem quite soulless. Beautiful, empty shells, some of +them; others, dim, yet tender, full of graciousness." + +"Orson!" + +"Sweetheart!" + +"Do you know how wonderfully you are changed? Do you know you once +talked bitterly, as one who was full of disappointments and +disenchantments?" + +"You have set me, dear, in a garden of enchantment from which I mean +never to escape. The garden is your heart." + +Something glistened in the Professor's eyes as he listened. "God, in +his infinite wisdom," he said, in a reverent whisper, "gave her so much +of grace; she had enough for both!" + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Imitator, by Percival Pollard + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE IMITATOR *** + +***** This file should be named 39724-8.txt or 39724-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/9/7/2/39724/ + +Produced by Don Wills and Marc D'Hooghe at +http://www.freeliterature.org (Images generously made +available by the Hathi Trust) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Imitator + +Author: Percival Pollard + +Release Date: May 18, 2012 [EBook #39724] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE IMITATOR *** + + + + +Produced by Don Wills and Marc D'Hooghe at +http://www.freeliterature.org (Images generously made +available by the Hathi Trust) + + + + + + +</pre> + + + + + + +<h1 style="color: #000066;">THE IMITATOR</h1> + +<h3>A NOVEL</h3> + +<h3>By</h3> + +<h2 style="color: #000066;">PERCIVAL POLLARD</h2> + +<h5>SAINT LOUIS</h5> + +<h5>WILLIAM MARION REEDY</h5> + +<h5>1901</h5> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /> + +<p><a href="#Contents">Contents</a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>CHAPTER I.</h3> + + +<p>"The thing is already on the wane," said young Orson Vane, making a wry +face over the entree, and sniffing at his glass, "and, if you ask me, I +think the general digestion of society will be the better for it."</p> + +<p>"Yes, there is nothing, after all, so tedious as the sham variety of a +table d'hote. Though it certainly wasn't the fare one came to this hole +for."</p> + +<p>Luke Moncreith turned his eyes, as he said that, over the place they sat +in, smiling at it with somewhat melancholy contempt. Its sanded floor, +its boisterously exposed wine-barrels, the meaningless vivacity of its +Hungarian orchestra, evidently stirred him no more.</p> + +<p>"No; that was the last detail. It was the notion of dining below stairs, +as the servants do. It had, for a time, the charm of an imitation. +Nothing is so delightful as to imitate others; yet to be mistaken for +them is always dreadful. Of course, nobody would mistake us here for +servants."</p> + +<p>The company, motley as it was, could not logically have come under any +such suspicion. Though it was dining in a cellar, on a sanded floor, +amid externals that were illegitimate offsprings of a <i>Studenten Kneipe</i> +and a crew of Christy minstrels, it still had, in the main, the air of +being recruited from the smart world. At every other table there were +people whom not to know was to argue oneself unknown. These persons +obviously treated the place, and their being there, as an elaborate +effort at gaiety; the others, the people who were plainly there for the +first time, took it with the bewildered manner of those whom each new +experience leaves mentally exhausted. The touch of rusticity, here and +there, did not suffice to spoil the sartorial sparkle of the smart +majority. The champagne that the sophisticated were wise enough to +oppose to the Magyar vintages sparkled into veins that ran beautifully +blue under skin that held curves the most aristocratic, tints the most +shell-like. Tinkling laughter, vocative of insincerity, rang between the +restless passion of the violins.</p> + +<p>"When it is not below stairs," continued Vane, "it is up on the roof. +One might think we were a society without houses of our own. It is, I +suppose, the human craving for opposites. When we have stored our +sideboards with the finest glass you can get in Vienna or Carlsbad, we +turn our backs on it and go to drinking from pewter in a cellar. We pay +abominable wages to have servants who shall be noiseless, and then go to +places where the service is as guttural as a wilderness of monkeys. +Fortunately, these fancies do not last. Presently, I dare say, it will +be the fashion to dine at home. That will make us feel quite like the +original Puritans." He laughed, and took his glass of wine at a gulp. +"The fact of the matter is that variety has become the vice of life. We +have not, as a society, any inner steadfastness of soul; we depend upon +externals, and the externals pall with fearful speed. Think of seeing in +the mirror the face of the same butler for more than thirty days!" He +shuddered and shook his head.</p> + +<p>"We are a restless lot," sighed the other, "but why discompose yourself +about it? Thank your stars you have nothing more important to worry +over!"</p> + +<p>"My dear Luke, there is nothing more important than the attitude of +society at large. It is the only thing one should allow oneself to +discuss. To consider one's individual life is to be guilty of as bad +form as to wear anything that is conspicuous. Society admires us chiefly +only as we sink ourselves in it. If we let the note of personality rise, +our social position is sure to suffer. Imitation is the keynote of +smartness. The rank and file imitate the leaders consciously, and the +leaders unconsciously imitate the average. We frequent cellars, and +roofs, and such places, because in doing so we imagine we are imitating +the days of the Hanging Gardens and the Catacombs. We abhor the bohemian +taint, but we are willing to give a champagne and chicken imitation of +it. We do not really care for music and musicians, but we give excellent +imitations of doing so. At present we are giving the most lifelike +imitation of being passionately fond of outdoor life; I suppose England +feels flattered. I am afraid I have forgotten whose the first +fashionable divorce in our world was; it is far easier to remember the +names of the people who have never been divorced; at any rate those +pioneers ought to feel proud of the hugeness of their following. We have +adopted a vulgarity from Chicago and made it a fashionable institution; +divorce used to be a shuttlecock for the comic papers, and now it makes +the bulk of the social register."</p> + +<p>Moncreith tapped his friend on the arm. "Drop it, Orson, drop it!" he +said. "I know this is a beastly bad dinner, but you shouldn't let it +make you maudlin. You know you don't really believe half you're saying. +Drop it, I say. These infernal poses make me ill." He attacked the +morsel of game on his plate with a zest that was beautiful to behold. +"If you go on in that biliously philosophic strain of yours, I shall +crunch this bird until I hear nothing but the grinding of bones. It is +really not a bad bit of quail. It is so small, and the casserole so +large, that you need an English setter to mark it, but once you've got +it,"—he wiped his lips with a flip of his napkin, "it's really worth +the search. Try it, and cheer up. The woman in rose, over there, under +the pseudo-palm, looks at you every time she sips her champagne; I have +no doubt she is calculating how untrue you could be to her. I suppose +your gloom strikes her as poetic; it strikes me as very absurd. You +really haven't a care in the world, and you sit here spouting +insincerity at a wasteful rate. If there's anything really and truly the +matter—tell me!"</p> + +<p>Orson Vane dropped, as if it had been a mask, the ironical smile his +lips had worn. "You want sincerity," he said, "well, then I shall be +sincere. Sincerity makes wrinkles, but it is the privilege of our +friends to make us old before our time. Sincerely, then, Luke, I am +very, very tired."</p> + +<p>"A fashionable imitation," mocked Moncreith.</p> + +<p>"No; a personal aversion, to myself, to the world I live in. I wish the +dear old governor hadn't been such a fine fellow; if he had been of the +newer generation of fathers I suppose I wouldn't have had an ideal to +bless myself with."</p> + +<p>Moncreith interrupted.</p> + +<p>"Good Lord, Luke, did you say ideals? I swear I never knew it was as bad +as that." He beckoned to the waiter and ordered a Dominican. "It is so +ideal a liquor that when you have tasted it you crave only for +brutalities. Poor Orson! Ideals!" He sighed elaborately.</p> + +<p>"If you imitate my manner of a while ago, I shall not say what I was +going to say. If I am to be sincere, so must you." He took the scarlet +drink the man set before him, and let it gurgle gently down his throat. +"It smacks of sin and I scent lies in it. I wish I had not taken it. It +is hard to be sincere after a drink that stirs the imagination. But I +shall try. And you are not to interrupt any more than you can help. If +we both shed the outer skin we wear for society, I believe we are +neither of us such bad sorts. That is just what I am getting at: I am +not quite bad enough to be blind to my own futility. Here I am, Luke, +young, decently looking, with money, position, and bodily health, and +yet I am cursed with thought of my own futility. When people have said +who I am, they have said it all; I have done nothing: I merely am. I +know others would sell their souls to be what I am; but it does not +content me. I have spent years considering my way. The arts have called +to me, but they have not held me. All arts are imitative, except music, +and music is not human enough for me; no people are so unhuman as +musical people, and no art is so entirely a creation of a self-centred +inventor. There can be no such thing as realism in music; the voices of +Nature can never be equalled on any humanly devised instruments or +notes. Painting and sculpture are mere imitations of what nature does +far better. When you see a beautiful woman as God made her you do not +care whether the Greeks colored their statues or not. Any average sunset +stamps the painted imitation as absurd. These arts, in fact, can never +be really great, since they are man's feeble efforts to copy God's +finest creations; between them and the ideal there must always be the +same distance as between man and his Creator. Then there is the art of +literature. It has the widest scope of them all. Whether it is imitative +or creative depends on the temperament of the individual; some men set +down what they see and hear, others invent a world of their own and busy +themselves with it. I believe it is the most human of the arts. Its +devotees not infrequently set themselves the task of discovering just +how their fellows think and live; they try to attune their souls to +other souls; they strive for an understanding of the larger humanity. +They—"</p> + +<p>Moncreith interrupted with a gesture.</p> + +<p>"Orson, you're not going to turn novelist? Don't tell me that! Your +enthusiasms fill me with melancholy forebodings."</p> + +<p>"Not at all. But, as you know, I've seen much of this sort of thing +lately. In the first place I had my own temperamental leanings; in the +next place, you'll remember, we've had a season or two lately when +clever people have been the rage. To invite painters and singers and +writers to one's house has been the smart thing to do. We have had the +spectacle of a society, that goes through a flippant imitation of +living, engaged in being polite to people who imitate at second hand, in +song, and color, and story. Some smart people have even taken to those +arts, thus imitating the professional imitators. As far as the smart +point of view goes, I couldn't do anything better than go in for the +studio, or novelistic business. The dull people whom smartness has +rubbed to a thin polish would conspire in calling me clever. Is there +anything more dreadful than being called clever?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing. It is the most damning adjective in the language. Whenever I +hear that a person is clever I am sure he will never amount to much. +There is only one word that approaches it in deadly significance. That +is 'rising.' I have known men whom the puffs have referred to as 'a +rising man' for twenty years. Can you imagine anything more dismal than +being called constantly by the same epithet? The very amiability in the +general opinion, permitting 'clever' and 'rising' to remain unalterable, +shows that the wearer of these terms is hopeless; a strong man would +have made enemies. I am glad you are wise enough to resist the +temptation of the Muses. Society's blessing would never console you for +anything short of a triumph. The triumphs are fearfully few; the clever +people—well, this cellar's full of them. There's Abbott Moore, for +instance."</p> + +<p>"You're right; there he is. He's a case in point. One of the best cases; +a man who has really, in the worldly sense, succeeded tremendously. His +system of give and take is one of the most lovely schemes imaginable; we +all know that. When a mining millionaire with marriageable daughters +comes to town his first hostage to the smart set is to order a palace +near Central Park and to give Abbott Moore the contract for the +decorations. In return Abbott Moore asks the millionaire's womenfolk to +one of his studio carnivals. That section of the smart set which keeps +itself constantly poised on the border between smart and tart is awfully +keen on Abbott Moore's studio affairs. It has never forgotten the famous +episode when he served a tart within a tart, and it is still expecting +him to outdo that feat. To be seen at one of these affairs, especially +if you have millions, is to have got in the point of the wedge. I call +it a fair exchange; the millionaire gets his foot just inside the magic +portal; Moore gets a slice of the millions. All the world counts Moore a +success from every point of view, the smart, the professional, the +financial. Yet that isn't my notion of a full life. It's only a replica +of the very thing I'm tired of, my own life."</p> + +<p>"Your life, my dear fellow, is generally considered a most enviable +article."</p> + +<p>"Of course. I suppose it does have a glamour for the unobserving. Yet, +at the best, what am I?"</p> + +<p>Moncreith laughed. "Another Dominican!" he said to the waiter. "The +liqueur," he said, "may enable me to rise to my subject." He smiled at +Vane over the glass, when it was brought to him, drained it under closed +eyes, and then settled himself well back into his chair.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II.</h3> + + +<p>"I will tell you what you are," began Moncreith, "to I the eye of the +average beholder. Here, in the most splendid town of the western world, +at the turning of two centuries, you are possessed of youth, health and +wealth. That really tells the tale. Never in the history of the world +have youth and health and wealth meant so much as they do now. These +three open the gates to all the earthly paradise. Your forbears did +their duty by you so admirably that you wear a distinguished name +without any sacrifice to poverty. You are good to look at. You are a +young man of fashion. If you chose you could lead the mode; you have the +instincts of a beau, though neither the severe suppression of Brummell +nor the obtrusive splendor of D'Aurevilly would suit you. Our age seems +to have come to too high an average in man's apparel to permit of any +single dictator; to be singled out is to be lowered. Yet there can be no +denying that you have often, unwittingly, set the fashion in waistcoats +and cravats. That aping has not hurt you, because the others never gave +their raiment the fine note of personal distinction that you wear. You +are a favorite in the clubs; people never go out when you come in; you +listen to the most stupid talk with the most graceful air imaginable; +that is one of the sure roads to popularity in clubdom. When it is the +fashion to be artistic, you can be so as easily as the others; when +sport is the watchword your fine physique forbids you no achievement. +You play tennis and golf and polo quite well enough to make women split +their gloves in applause, and not too well to make men sneer at you for +a 'pro.' When you are riding to hounds in Virginia you are never far +from the kill, and there is no automobilist whom the Newport villagers +are happier to fine for fast driving. You are equally at home in a +cotillon and on the deck of a racing yacht. You could marry whenever you +liked. Your character is unspotted either by the excessive vice that +shocks the mob, or the excessive virtue that tires the smart. You have +means, manners and manner. Finally, you have the two cardinal qualities +of smartness, levity and tolerance." He paused, and gave a smile of +satisfaction. "There, do you like the portrait?"</p> + +<p>"It is abominable," said Vane, "it is what I see in my most awful +dreams. And the horror of it is that it is so frightfully true. I am +merely one of the figures in the elaborate masquerade we call society. I +make no progress in life; I learn nothing except new fashions and +foibles. I am weary of the masquerade and the masks. Life in the smart +world is a game with masks; one shuffles them as one does cards. As for +me, I want to throw the whole pack into the fire. Everyone wears these +masks; nobody ever penetrates to the real soul behind the make-up."</p> + +<p>"It is a game you play perfectly. One should hesitate long about giving +up anything that one has brought to perfection. These others dabble and +squabble in what you call the secondary imitations of life; you, at any +rate, are giving your imitation at first hand."</p> + +<p>"Yes, but it no longer satisfies me. Listen, Luke. You must promise not +to laugh and not to frown. It will seem absurd to you; yet I am terribly +in earnest about it. When first I came out of college I went in for +science. When I gave it up, it was because I found it was leading me +away from the human interest. There is the butterfly I want to chase; +the human interest. I attempted all the arts; not one of them took me +far on my way. My failure, Luke, is an ironic sentence upon the vaunted +knowledge of the world."</p> + +<p>"Your failure? My dear Orson; come to the point. What do you mean by the +human interest?"</p> + +<p>"I mean that neither scientist nor scholar has yet shown the way to one +man's understanding of another's soul. The surgeon can take a body and +dissect its every fraction, arguing and proving each function of it. The +painter tries, with feeble success, to reach what he calls the spirit of +his subject. So does the author. He tries to put himself into the place +of each of his characters; he aims, always, for the nearest possible +approach to the lifelike. And, above all the others, there is the actor. +In this, as in its other qualities, the art of acting is the crudest, +the most obvious of them all; yet, in certain moments, it comes nearest +to the ideal. The actor in his mere self is—well, we all know the story +of the famous player being met by this greeting: 'And what art thou +to-night?' But he goes behind a door and he can come forth in a series +of selves. A trick or so with paint; a change of wig; a twist of the +face-muscles, and we have the same man appearing as <i>Napoleon</i>, as +<i>Richelieu</i>, as <i>Falstaff</i>. The thing is external, of course. Whether +there shall be anything more than the mere bodily mask depends upon the +actor's intelligence and his imagination. The supreme artist so +succeeds, by virtue of much study, much skill in imitating what he has +conceived to be the soul of his subject, in almost giving us a lifelike +portrait. And yet, and yet—it is not the real thing; the real soul of +his subject is as much a mystery to that actor as it is to you or me. +That is what I mean when I say that science fails us at the most +important point of all; the soul of my neighbor is as profound a mystery +to me as the soul of a man that lived a thousand years ago. I can know +your face, Luke, your clothes, your voice, the outward mask you wear; +but—can I reach the secrets of your soul? No. And if we cannot know how +others feel and think, how can we say we know the world? Bah! The world +is a realm of shadows in which all walk blindly. We touch hands every +day, but our souls are hidden in a veil that has not been passed since +God made the universe."</p> + +<p>"You cry for the moon," said Moncreith. "You long for the unspeakable. +Is it not terrible enough to know your neighbor's face, his voice, his +coat, without burdening yourself with knowledge of his inner self? It is +merely an egoistic curiosity, my dear Orson; you cannot prove that the +human interest, as you term it, would benefit by the extension in wisdom +you want."</p> + +<p>"Oh, you are wrong, you are wrong. The whole world of science undergoes +revolution, once you gain the point I speak of. Doctors will have the +mind as well as the body to diagnose; lovers will read each others +hearts as well as their voices; lies will become impossible, or, at +least, futile; oh—it would be a better world altogether. At any rate, +until this avenue of knowledge is opened to me, I shall call all the +rest a failure. I imitate; you imitate; we imitate; that is the +conjugation of life. When I think of the hopelessness of the thing,—do +you wonder I grow bitter? I want communion with real beings, and I meet +only masks. I tell you, Luke, it is abominable, this wall that stands +between each individual and the rest of the world. How can I love my +neighbor if I do not understand him? How can I understand him if I +cannot think his thoughts, dream his dreams, spell out his soul's +secrets?"</p> + +<p>Moncreith smiled at his friend, and let his eyes wander a trifle +ironically about his figure. "One would not think, to look at you, that +you were possessed of a mania, an itch! If you take my advice you will +content yourself with living life as you find it. It is really a very +decent world. It has good meat and drink in it, and some sweet women, +and a strong man or two. Most of us are quite ignorant of the fact that +we are merely engaged in incomplete imitations of life, or that there is +a Chinese wall between us and the others; the chances are we are all the +happier for our innocence. Consider, for instance, that rosy little face +behind us—you can see it perfectly in that mirror—can you deny that it +looks all happiness and innocence?"</p> + +<p>Vane looked, and presently sighed a little. The face of the girl, as he +found it in the glass, was the color of roses lying on a pool of clear +water. It was one of those faces that one scarce knows whether to think +finer in profile or in full view; the features were small, the hair +glistened with a tint of that burnish the moon sometimes wears on summer +nights, and the figure was a mere fillip to the imagination. A cluster +of lilies of the valley lay upon her hair; they seemed like countless +little cups pouring frost upon a copper glow. All about her radiated an +ineffable gentleness, a tenderness; she made all the other folk about +her seem garish and ugly and cruel. One wondered what she did in that +gallery.</p> + +<p>"To the outer eye," said Vane, as he sighed, "she is certainly a flower, +a thing of daintiness and delight. But—do you suppose I believe it, for +a moment? I have no doubt she is merely one of those creatures whom God +has made for the destruction of our dreams; her mind is probably as +corrupt as her body seems fair. She is perhaps—"</p> + +<p>He stopped, for the face in the mirror had its eyes thrown suddenly in +his direction. The eyes, in that reflex fashion, met, and something akin +to a smile, oh, an ever so wistful, wonderful a smile, crept upon the +lips and the eyes of the girl, while to the man there came only a sudden +silence.</p> + +<p>"She is," continued Vane, in another voice altogether, and as if he were +thinking of distant affairs, "very beautiful."</p> + +<p>The girl's eyes, meanwhile, had shifted towards Moncreith. He felt the +radiance of them and looked, too, and the girl's beauty came upon him +with a quick, personal force that was like pain. Vane's spoken +approbation of her angered him; he hardly knew why; for the first time +in his life he thought he could hate the man beside him.</p> + +<p>The girl turned her head a little, put up her hand and so hid her face +from both young men, or there is no telling what sudden excuse the two +might not have seized for open enmity. It sounds fantastic, perhaps, but +there are more enmities sown in a single glance from a woman's eyes +than a Machiavelli could build up by ever so devilish devices. Neither +of the two, in this case, could have said just what they felt, or why. +Moncreith thought, vaguely enough perhaps, that it was a sin for so fair +a flower to waste even a look upon a fellow so shorn of faith as was +Orson Vane. As for Vane—</p> + +<p>Vane brought his hand upon the table so that the glasses rocked.</p> + +<p>"Oh," he exclaimed, "if one could only be sure! If one could see past +the mask! What would I not give to believe in beauty when I see it, to +trust to appearances! Oh, for the ability to put myself in the place of +another, to know life from another plane than my own, to—"</p> + +<p>But here he was interrupted.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>CHAPTER III.</h3> + + +<p>"The secret you are seeking," said the man who had put his hand on Orson +Vane's shoulder, "is mine."</p> + +<p>Vane's eyes widened slightly, roving the stranger up and down. He was a +man of six feet in height, of striking, white-haired beauty, of the type +made familiar to us by pictures of the Old Guard under Napoleon. Here +was still the Imperial under the strong chin, the white mustache over +the shapely lips; the high, clear forehead; the long, thin hands, where +veins showed blue, and the nails were rosy. The head was bowed forward +of the shoulders; the man, now old, had once been inches taller. You +looked, on the spur of first noting him, for the sword and the epaulets, +or, at least, for the ribbon of an order. But his clothes were quite +plain, nor had his voice any touch of the military.</p> + +<p>"I overheard a part of your conversation," the stranger went on, "not +intentionally, yet unavoidably. I had either to move or to listen. And +you see the place is so full that moving was out of the question. Did +you mean what you were saying?"</p> + +<p>"About the—"</p> + +<p>"The Chinese wall," said the stranger.</p> + +<p>"Every word of it," said Vane.</p> + +<p>"If the chance to penetrate another's soul came to you, would you take +it?"</p> + +<p>"At once."</p> + +<p>Moncreith laughed aloud. "Where are we?" he said, "in Aladdin's cave? +What rubbish!" And he shook himself, as if to disturb a bad dream. He +was on the point of reaching for his hat, when he saw the face of the +girl in the mirror once more; the sight of it stayed him. He smiled to +himself, and waited for the curious conversation between Vane and the +stranger to continue.</p> + +<p>"My name," the stranger was observing, taking a card from an <i>etui</i>, +"may possibly be known to you?"</p> + +<p>Vane bent his head to the table, read, and looked at the white-haired +man with a quick access of interest.</p> + +<p>"I am honored," he said. "My name is Orson Vane."</p> + +<p>"Oh," said the other, "I knew that. I do not study the human interest in +mere theory; I delight in the tangible. That is why I presume upon +you"—he waved his hand gracefully—"thus."</p> + +<p>"You must join us," said Vane; "there is plenty of room at this table."</p> + +<p>"No; I must—if your friend will pardon me—see you alone. Will you come +to my place?"</p> + +<p>He spoke as youthfully as if he were of Vane's own age.</p> + +<p>Vane considered a second or so, and then sprang to his feet.</p> + +<p>"Yes," he said, "I will come. Good-night, Luke. Stay on; enjoy yourself. +Shall I see you to-morrow? Good-night!"</p> + +<p>They went out together, the young man and the one with the white hair. +One glance into the mirror flashed from Orson's eyes as he turned to go; +it brought him a memory of a burnished halo on a fragile, rosy, beauty. +He sighed to himself, wishing he could reach the truth behind the robe +of beauty, and, with that sigh, turned with a sort of fierceness upon +his companion.</p> + +<p>"Well," said Vane, "well?"</p> + +<p>They were passing through a most motley thoroughfare. Barrel-organs +dotted the asphalt; Italian and Sicilian poverty elbowed the poverty of +Russian and Polish Jews. The shops bore signs in Italian, Hebrew, +French—in anything but English. The Elevated roared above the music and +the chatter; the cool gloom of lower Broadway seemed far away.</p> + +<p>"Patience," said the old man, "patience, Mr. Vane. Look about you! How +much of the heart of this humanity that reeks all about us do we know? +Think,—think of your Chinese wall! Oh—how strange, how very strange +that I should have come upon you to-night, when, in despair of ever +finding my man, I had gone for distraction to a place where, I thought, +philosophy nor science were but little welcome."</p> + +<p>"My dear Professor," urged Vane finally, when they were come to a +stiller region, where many churches, some parks and ivy-sheltered houses +gave an air of age and sobriety and history, "I have no more patience +left. Did I not know your name for what it is I would not have followed +you. Even now I hardly know whether your name and your title suffice. If +it is an adventure, very well. But I have no more patience for +mysteries."</p> + +<p>"Not even when you are about to penetrate the greatest mystery of all? +Oh, youth, youth! Well, we have still a little distance to go. I shall +employ it to impress upon you that I, Professor Vanlief, am not +over-fond of the title of Professor. It has, here in America, a taint of +the charlatan. But it came to me, this title, in a place where only +honors were implied. I was, indeed, a fellow student with many of whom +the world has since heard; Bismarck was one of them. I have eaten smoked +goose with him in Pommern. You see, I am very old, very old. I have +spent my life solving a riddle. It is the same riddle that has balked +you, my young friend. But I have striven for the solution; you have +merely wailed against the riddle's existence."</p> + +<p>Vane felt a flush of shame.</p> + +<p>"True," he murmured, "true. I never went further into any art, any +science, than to find its shortcomings."</p> + +<p>"Yet even that," resumed the Professor, "is something. You are, at any +rate, the only man for my purpose."</p> + +<p>"Your purpose?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. It is the same as yours. You are to be the instrument; I furnish +the power. You are to be able to feel, to think, as others do."</p> + +<p>"Oh!" muttered Vane, "impossible." Now that his wish was called possible +of fulfilment, he shrank a little from it. He followed the Professor up +a long flight of curving steps, through dim halls, to where a bluish +light flickered. As they passed this feeble glow it flared suddenly into +a brilliant jet of flame; a door swung open, revealing a somewhat bare +chamber fitted up partly as a study, partly as a laboratory. The door +closed behind them silently.</p> + +<p>"Mere trickery," said the Professor, "the sort of thing that the knaves +of science fool the world with. Will you sit down? Here is where I have +worked for—for more years than you have lived, Mr. Vane. Here is where +I have succeeded. In pursuit of this success I have spent my life and +nearly all the fortune that my family made in generations gone. I have +this house, and my daughter, and my science. The world spins madly all +about me, in this splendid town; here, in this stillness, I have worked +to make that world richer than I found it. Will you help me?"</p> + +<p>Vane had flung himself upon a wicker couch. He watched his host +striding up and down the room with a fervor that had nothing of senility +in it. The look of earnestness upon that fine old face was magnetic. +Vane's mistrust vanished at sight of it.</p> + +<p>"If you will trust me," he answered. He saw himself as the beneficiary, +his host as the giver of a great gift.</p> + +<p>"I trust you. I heard enough, to-night, to believe you sincere in +wishing to see life from another soul than your own. But you must +promise to obey my instructions to the letter."</p> + +<p>"I promise."</p> + +<p>A sense of farce caught Vane. "And now," he said, "what is it? A powder +I must swallow, or a trance you pass me into, or what?"</p> + +<p>The professor shook his head gravely. "It is none of those things. It is +much simpler. I should not wonder but that the ancients knew it. But +human life is so much more complex now; the experiences you will gain +will be larger than they could ever have been in other ages. Do you +realize what I am about to give you? The power to take upon you the soul +of another, just as an actor puts on the outer mask of another! And I +ask for no reward. Simply the joy of seeing my process active; and +afterwards, perhaps, to give my secret to the world. But you are to +enjoy it alone, first. Of course—there may be risks. Do you take +them?"</p> + +<p>"I do," said Vane.</p> + +<p>He could hear the whistling of steamers out in the harbor, and the noise +of the great town came to him faintly. All that seemed strangely remote. +His whole intelligence was centered upon his host, upon the sparsely +furnished room, and the secret whose solution he thought himself +approaching. He was, for almost the first time in his life, intense in +the mere act of existence; he was conscious of no imitation of others; +his analysis of self was sunk in an eagerness, a tenseness of +purposeness hitherto unfelt.</p> + +<p>The professor went to a far, dark corner of the room, and rolled thence +a tall, sheeted thing that might have been a painting, or an easel. He +held it tenderly; his least motion with it revealed solicitude. When it +was immediately in front of where Vane reclined, Vanlief loosed his hold +of the thing, and began pacing up and down the room.</p> + +<p>"The question of mirrors," he began, after what seemed to Vane an age, +"has never, I suppose, interested you."</p> + +<p>"On the contrary," said Vane, "I have had Italy searched for the finest +of its cheval-glasses. In my dressing-room are several that would give +even a man of your fine height, sir, a complete reflection of every +detail, from a shoe-lace to an eyebrow. It is not altogether vanity; but +I never could do justice to my toilette before a mirror that showed me +only a shoulder, or a waist, or a foot, at a time; I want the +full-length portrait or nothing. I like to see myself as others will +see me; not in piece-meal. The Florentines made lovely mirrors."</p> + +<p>"They did." Vanlief smiled sweetly. "Yet I have made a better." He paced +the floor again, and then resumed speech. "I am glad you like tall +mirrors. You will have learned how careful one must be of them. One more +or less in your dressing-room will not matter, eh?"</p> + +<p>"I have an excellent man," said Vane. "There has not been a broken +mirror in my house for years. He looks after them as if they were his +own."</p> + +<p>"Ah, better and better."</p> + +<p>Vane interrupted the Professor's silence with, "It is a mirror, then?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Vanlief, nodding at the sheeted mirror, "it is a mirror. +Have you ever thought of the wonderfulness of mirrors? What wonder, and +yet what simplicity! To think that I—I, a simple, plodding old man of +science—should be the only one to have come upon the magic of a +mirror!" His talk took the note of monologue. He was pacing, pacing, +pacing; smiling at Vane now and then, and fingering the covered mirror +with loving touch as he passed near it. "Have you ever, as a child, +looked into a mirror in the twilight, and seen there another face beside +your own? Have you never thought that to the mirror were revealed more +things than the human eye can note? Have you heard of the old, old +folk-superstitions; of the bride that may not see herself in a mirror +without tragedy touching her; of the Warwickshire mirror that must be +covered in a house of death, lest the corpse be seen in it; of the +future that some magic mirrors could reveal? Fanciful tales, all of +them; yet they have their germ of truth, and for my present discovery I +owe them something." He drew the sheet from the mirror, and revealed +another veil of gauze resting upon the glass, as, in some houses, the +most prized pictures are sometimes doubly covered. "You see; it is just +a mirror, a full-length mirror. But, oh, my dear Vane, the wonderfulness +of this mirror! I have only to look into this mirror; to veil it; and +then, when next you glance into it, if it be within the hour, my soul, +my spirit, my very self, passes from the face of the mirror to you! That +is the whole secret, or at least, the manifestation of it! Do you wish +to be the President, to think his thoughts, feel as he feels, dream as +he dreams? He has only to look into this mirror, and you have only to +take from it, as one plucks a lily from the pool, the spiritual image he +has left there! Think of it, Vane, think of it! Is this not seeing life? +Is this not riddling the secret of existence? To reach the innermost +depths of another's spirit; to put on his soul, as others can put on +your clothes, if you left them on a chair,—is this not a stupendous +thing?" In his fever and fervor the professor had exhausted his +strength; he flung himself into a chair. Vane saw the old man's eyes +glowing and his chest throbbing with passion; he hardly knew whether +the whole scene was real or a something imposed upon his senses by a +species of hypnotism. He passed his hand before his forehead; he shook +his head. Yet nothing changed. Vanlief, in the chair, still quaking with +excitement; the mirror, veiled and immobile.</p> + +<p>For a time the room stood silent, save for Vanlief's heavy breathing.</p> + +<p>"Of course," he resumed presently, in a quieter tone, "you cannot be +expected to believe, until you have tried. But trial is the easiest +thing in the world. I can teach you the mere externals to be observed in +five minutes. One trial will convince you. After that,—my dear Vane, +you have the gamut of humanity to go. You can be another man every day. +No secret of any human heart will be a secret to you. All wisdom can be +gained by you; all knowledge, all thought, can be yours. Oh, Orson Vane, +I wonder if you realize your fortune! Or—is it possible that you +withdraw?"</p> + +<p>Vane got up resolutely.</p> + +<p>"No," he said, "I have faith—at last. I am with you, heart and soul. +Life seems splendid to me, for the first time. When can I have the +mirror taken to my house?"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV.</h3> + + +<p>Vane's dressing-room was a tasteful chamber, cool and light. Its walls, +its furniture, and its hangings told of a wide range of interest. There +was nowhere any obvious bias; the æsthetic was no more insistent than +the sporting. Orson Vane loved red-haired women as Henner painted them, +and he played the aristocratic waltzes of Chopin; but he also valued the +cruel breaking-bit that he had brought home from Texas, and read the +racing-column in the newspaper quite as carefully as he did the doings +of his society. Some hint of this diversity of tastes showed in this, +the most intimate room of his early mornings. There were some of those +ruddy British prints that are now almost depressingly conventional with +men of sporting habits; signed photographs of more or less prominent and +personable personages were scattered pell-mell. All the chairs and +lounges were of wicker; so much so that some of the men who hobnobbed +with Vane declared that a visit to his dressing-room was as good as a +yachting cruise.</p> + +<p>The morning was no longer young. On the avenue the advance guard of the +fashionable assault upon the shopping district was already astir. The +languorous heat that reflects from the town's asphalt was gaining in +power momentarily.</p> + +<p>Orson Vane, fresh from a chilling, invigorating bath, a Japanese robe of +exquisite coolness his only covering, sat regarding an addition to his +furniture. It had come while he slept. It was proof that the adventure +of the night had not been a mere figment of his dreams.</p> + +<p>He touched a bell. To the man who answered the call, he said:</p> + +<p>"Nevins, I have bought a new mirror. You are to observe a few simple +rules in regard to this mirror. In the first place, to avoid confusion, +it is always to be called the New Mirror. Is that plain?</p> + +<p>"Quite so, sir."</p> + +<p>"I may have orders to give about it, or notes to send, or things of that +sort, and I want no mistakes made. In the next place, the cord that +uncovers the mirror is never to be pulled, never to be touched, save at +my express order. Not—under any circumstances. I do not wish the mirror +used. Have you any curiosity left, Nevins?</p> + +<p>"None, sir."</p> + +<p>"So much the better. In Lord Keswick's time, I think, you still had a +touch of that vice, curiosity. Your meddling got you into something of a +scrape. Do you remember?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, sir," said the man, with a little gesture of shame and pain, "you +didn't need reminding me. Have I ever forgotten your saving me from that +foolishness?"</p> + +<p>"You're right, Nevins; I think I can trust you. But this is a greater +trust than any of the others. A great deal depends; mark that; a very +great deal. It is not an ordinary mirror, this one; not one of the +others compares with it; it is the gem of my collection. Not a breath is +to touch it, save as I command."</p> + +<p>"I'll see to it, sir."</p> + +<p>"Any callers, Nevins?"</p> + +<p>"Mr. Moncreith, sir, looked in, but left no word. And the postman."</p> + +<p>"No duns, Nevins?"</p> + +<p>"Not in person, sir."</p> + +<p>"Dear me! Is my position on the wane? When a man is no longer dunned his +credit is either too good or too bad; or else his social position is +declining." He picked up the tray with the letters, ran his eye over +them quickly, and said, "Thank the stars; they still dun me by post. +There should be a law against it; yet it is as sweet to one's vanity as +an angry letter from a woman. Nevins, is the day dull or garish?"</p> + +<p>"It's what I should call bright, sir."</p> + +<p>"Then you may lay out some gloomy clothes for me. I would not add to the +heat wittingly. And, Nevins!"</p> + +<p>"Yes sir."</p> + +<p>"If anyone calls before I breakfast, unless it happens to be Professor +Vanlief,—Vanlief, Nevins, of the Vanliefs of New Amsterdam—say I am +indisposed."</p> + +<p>He dressed himself leisurely, thinking of the wonderful adventures into +living that lay before him. He rehearsed the simple instructions that +Vanlief had given him the night before. It was all utterly simple. As +one looked into the mirror, the spirit of that one lay on the surface, +waiting for the next person that glanced that way. There followed a +complete exodus of the spirit from the one body into the other. The +recipient was himself plus the soul of the other. The exodus left that +other in a state something like physical collapse. There would be, for +the recipient of the new personality, a sense of double consciousness; +the mind would be like a palimpsest, the one will and the one habit +imposed upon the other. The fact that the person whose spirit passed +from him upon the magic mirror was left more or less a wreck was cause +for using the experiment charily, as the Professor took pains to warn +Orson. There was a certain risk. The mirror might be broken; one could +never tell. It would be better to pick one's subjects wisely, always +with a definite purpose. This man might be used to teach that side of +life; that man another. It was not a thing to toy with. It was to be +played with as little as human life itself. Vivisection was a pastime to +this; this implicated the spirit, the other only the body.</p> + +<p>Consideration of the new avenues opening for his intelligence had +already begun to alter Vane's outlook on life. Persons who remarked him, +a little later, strolling the avenue, wondered at the brilliance of his +look. He seemed suddenly sprayed with a new youth, a new enthusiasm. It +was not, as some of his conversations of that morning proved, an utter +lapse into optimism on his part; but it was an exchange of the mere +passive side of pessimism for its healthier, more buoyant side. He was +able to smile to himself as he met the various human marionettes of the +avenue; the persons whose names you would be sure to read every Sunday +in the society columns, and who seemed, consequently, out of place in +any more aristocratic air. He bowed to the newest beauty, he waved a +hand to the most perennial of the faded beaux. The vociferous attire of +the actors, who idled conspicuously before the shop-windows, caused him +inward shouts of laughter; a day or so ago the same sight would have +embittered his hour for him.</p> + +<p>At Twenty-third street something possessed him to patronize one of the +Sicilian flower-sellers. The man had, happily, not importuned him; he +merely held his wares, and waited, mutely. Orson put a sprig of +lily-of-the-valley into his coat.</p> + +<p>Before he left his rooms he had spent an hour or so writing curt notes +to the smartest addresses in town. All his invitations were declined by +him; a trip to Cairo, he had written, would keep him from town for some +time. He took this ruse because he felt that the complications of his +coming experiment might be awkward; it was as well to pave the way. +Certainly he could not hope to fulfil his social obligations in the time +to come. An impression that he was abroad was the best way out of the +dilemma. The riddance from fashionable duties added to his gaiety; he +felt like a school-boy on holiday.</p> + +<p>It was in this mood that he saw, on the other side of the avenue, a +figure that sent a flush to his skin. There was no mistaking that +wonderful hair; in the bright morning it shone with a glow a trifle less +garish than under the electric light, but it was the same, the same. To +make assurance surer, there, just under the hat—a hat that no mere male +could have expressed in phrases, a thing of gauze and shimmer—lay a +spray of lilies-of-the-valley. The gown—Vane knew at a glance that it +was a beautiful gown and a happy one, though as different as possible +from the filmy thing she had worn when first he saw her, in the mirror, +at night.</p> + +<p>At first unconsciously, and then with quite brazen intent, he found +himself keeping pace, on his side of the street, with the girl opposite. +He knew not what emotion possessed him; no hint of anything despicable +came to him; he had forgotten himself utterly, and he was merely +following some sweet, blind impulse. Orson Vane was a man who had +tasted the froth and dregs of his town no less thoroughly than other +men; there were few sensations, few emotions, he had not tried. Almost +the only sort of woman he did not know was The woman. In the year of his +majority he had made a summer of it on the Sound in his steam yacht, and +his enemies declared that all the harbors he had anchored in were left +empty of both champagne and virtue. Yet not even his bitterest enemy had +ever accused him of anything vulgar, brazen, coarse, conspicuous.</p> + +<p>Luke Moncreith was a friend of Vane's, there was no reason for doubting +that. But even he experienced a little shock when he met Vane, was +unseen of him, and was then conscious, in a quick turn of the head, that +Vane's eyes, his entire vitality, were upon a woman's figure across the +avenue.</p> + +<p>"The population of the Bowery, of Forty-second street, and of the +Tenderloin," said Moncreith to himself, "have a name for that sort of +thing." He clicked his tongue upon his teeth once or twice. "Poor Orson! +Is it the beginning of the end? Last night he seemed a little mad. Poor +Orson!" Then, with furtive shame at his bad manners, he turned about and +watched the two. Even at that distance the sunlight glowed like a caress +upon the hair of her whom Orson followed. "The girl," exclaimed +Moncreith, "the girl of the mirror." He came to a halt before a +photographer's window, the angle of which gave him a view of several +blocks behind.</p> + +<p>Orson Vane, in the meanwhile, was as if there was but one thing in life +for him: a meeting with this radiant creature with the lilies. Once he +thought he caught a sidelong glance of hers; a little smile even hovered +an instant upon her lips; yet, at that distance, he could not be sure. +None of the horrible things occurred to him as possibilities; that she +might be an adventuress, or a mere masquerading shop-girl, or an adroit +soubrette. No tangible intention came to the young man; he had not made +it clear to himself whether he would keep on, and on, and on, until she +came to her own door; whether he would accost her; whether he would +leave all to chance; or whether he would fashion circumstances to his +end.</p> + +<p>The girl turned into a little bookshop that, as it happened, was one of +Vane's familiar haunts. It was a place where one could always find the +new French and German things, and where the shopman was not a mere +instrument for selling whatever rubbish publishers chose to shoot at the +public. When Vane entered he found this shopman, who nodded smilingly at +him, busy with a bearded German. The girl stood at a little table, +passing her slim fingers lovingly over the titles of the books that lay +there. It was evident that she had no wish for advice from the assistant +who hovered in the background. She did not so much as glance at him. +Her eyes were all for her friends in print. She did look up, the veriest +trifle, it is true, when Orson came in; it was so swift, so shy a look +that he, in a mist of emotions, could not have sworn to it. As for him, +a boyish boldness took him to the other side of the table at which she +stood; he bent over the books, and his hands almost touched her fingers. +In that little, quiet nook, he became, all of a moment, once more a +youth of twenty; he felt the first shy stirrings of tenderness, of +worship. The names of the volumes swam for him in a mere haze. He saw +nothing save only the little figure before him, the shimmer of rose upon +her face passing into the ruddier shimmer of her hair; the perfume of +her lilies and some yet subtler scent, redolent of fairest linen, most +fragile laces and the utterest purity, came over him like a glow.</p> + +<p>And then the marvel, the miracle of her voice!</p> + +<p>"Oh, Mr. Vane," he heard her saying, "do help me!" Their eyes met and he +was conscious of a bewildering beauty in hers; it was with quite an +effort that he did not, then and there, do something absurd and stupid. +His hesitation, his astonishment, cost him a second or so; before he +caught his composure again, she was explaining, sweetly, plaintively, +"Help me to make up my mind. About a book."</p> + +<p>"Why did you add that?" he asked, his wits sharp now, and his voice +still a little unsteady. "There are so many other things I would like to +help you in. A book? What sort of a book? One of those stories where +the men are all eight feet high, and wear medals, and the women are all +models for Gibson? Or one of those aristocratic things where nobody is +less than a prince, except the inevitable American, who is a newspaper +man and an abomination? Or is it, by any chance," he paused, and dropped +his voice, as if he were approaching a dreadful disclosure, "poetry?"</p> + +<p>She shook her head. The lilies in her hair nodded, and her smile came up +like a radiance in that dark little corner. And, oh, the music in her +laugh! It blew ennui away as effectually as a storm whirls away a leaf.</p> + +<p>"No," she said, "it is none of those things. I told you I had not made +up my mind."</p> + +<p>"It is a thing you should never attempt. Making up the mind is a +temptation only the bravest of us can resist. One should always delegate +the task to someone else."</p> + +<p>The girl frowned gently. "If it is the fashion to talk like that," she +said, "I do not want to be in the fashion."</p> + +<p>He took the rebuke with a laugh. "It is hard," he pleaded, "to keep out +of the fashion. Everything we do is a fashion of one sort or another." +He glanced at her wonderful hat, at the gown that held her so closely, +so tenderly. "I am sure you are in the fashion," he said.</p> + +<p>"If Mr. Orson Vane tells me so, I must believe it," she answered. "But I +wear only what suits me; if the fashion does not suit me, I avoid the +fashion."</p> + +<p>"But you cannot avoid beauty," he urged, "and to be fair is always the +fashion."</p> + +<p>She turned her eyes to him full of reproach. They said, as plainly as +anything, "How crude! How stupidly obvious!" As if she had really +spoken, he went on, in plain embarassment:</p> + +<p>"I beg your pardon. I—I am very silly this morning. Something has gone +to my head. I really don't think I'd better advise you about anything to +read. I—"</p> + +<p>"Oh," she interrupted, already full of forgiveness, since it was not in +her nature to be cruel for more than a moment at a time, "but you must. +I am really desperate. All I ask is that you do not urge a fashionable +book, a book of the day, or a book that should be in the library of +every lady. I am afraid of those books. They are like the bores one +turns a corner to avoid."</p> + +<p>"You make advice harder and harder. Is it possible you really want a +book to read, rather than to talk about?"</p> + +<p>"I really do," she admitted, "I told you I had no thought about the +fashion."</p> + +<p>"You are like a figure from the Middle Ages," he said, "with your notion +about books."</p> + +<p>"Am I so very wrinkled?" she asked. She put her hand to her veil, with a +gesture of solicitous inquiry. "To be young," she sighed, with a pout, +"and yet to seem old. I am quite a tragedy."</p> + +<p>"A goddess," he murmured, "but not of tragedy." He laughed sharply, and +took a book from the table, using it to keep his eyes from the witchery +of her as he continued: "Don't you see why I'm talking such nonsense? If +it meant prolonging the glimpse of you, there's no end, simply no end, +to the rubbish I could talk!"</p> + +<p>"And no beginning," she put in, "to your sincerity."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I don't know. One still has fits and starts of it! There's no +telling what might not be done; it might come back to one, like +childishness in old age." He put down the book, and looked at her in +something like appeal. "There is such a thing as a sincerity one is +ashamed of, that one hides, and disguises, and that the world refuses to +see. The world? The world always means an individual. In this case the +world is—"</p> + +<p>"The world is yours, like <i>Monte Cristo</i>," she interposed, "how +embarassed you must feel. The responsibility must be enervating! I have +always thought the clever thing for <i>Monte Cristo</i> to have done was to +lose the world; to hide it where nobody could find it again." She tapped +her boot with her parasol, charmingly impatient. "I suppose," she +sighed, "I shall have to ask that stupid clerk for a book, after all. He +looks as if he would far rather sell them by weight."</p> + +<p>"No, no, I couldn't allow that. Consider me all eagerness to aid you. Is +it to be love, or ghosts, or laughter?"</p> + +<p>"Love and laughter go well together," she said. "I want a book I can +love and laugh with, not at."</p> + +<p>"I know," he nodded. "The tear that makes the smile come after. You want +something charming, something sweet, something that will taste +pleasantly no matter how often you read it. A trifle, and yet—a +treasure. Such a book as, I dare say, every writer dreams of doing once +in his life; the sort of book that should be bound in rose-leaves. And +you expect me to betray a treasure like that to you? And my reward? But +no, I beg your pardon; I have my reward now, and here, and the debt is +still mine. I can merely put you in the way of a printed page; while +you—" He stopped, roving for the right word. His eyes spoke what his +voice could not find. He finished, lamely, and yet aptly enough, +"You—are you."</p> + +<p>"I don't believe," she declared, with the most arch elevation of the +darkest eyebrows, "that you know one book from another. You are an +impostor. You are sparring for time. I have given you too much time as +it is. I am going." She picked up her skirts with one slim hand, turned +on a tiny heel, and looked over her shoulder with an air, a +mischievousness, that made Orson ache, yes, simply ache with curiosity +about her. He put out a hand in expostulation.</p> + +<p>"Please," he pleaded, "please don't go. I have found the book. I really +have. But you must take my word for it. You mustn't open it till you are +at home." He handed it to the clerk to be wrapped up. "And now," he went +on, "won't you tell me something? I—upon my honor, I can't think where +we met?"</p> + +<p>"One hardly expects Mr. Orson Vane to remember all the young women in +society," she smiled. "Besides, if I must confess: I am only just what +society calls 'out.' I have seen Mr. Orson Vane: but he has not seen me. +Mr. Vane is a leader; I am—" She shrugged her shoulder, raised her +eyebrows, pursed up her mouth, oh, to a complete gesture that was the +prettiest, most bewildering finish to any sentence ever uttered.</p> + +<p>"Oh," said Orson, "but you are mistaken. I have seen you. No longer ago +than last night. In—"</p> + +<p>"In a mirror," she laughed. Then she grew suddenly quite solemn. "Oh, +you mustn't think I didn't know who you were. It was all very rash of +me, and very improper, my speaking to you, just now, but—"</p> + +<p>"It was very sweet," he interposed.</p> + +<p>"But," she went on, not heeding his remark at all, "I knew you so well +by sight, and I had really been introduced to you once,—one of a bevy +of debutantes, merely an item in a chorus—and, besides, my father—"</p> + +<p>"Your father?" repeated Orson, jogging his memory, "you don't mean to +say—"</p> + +<p>"My father is Augustus Vanlief," she said.</p> + +<p>He took a little time to digest the news. The clerk handed him the book +and the change. He saw, now, whence that charm, that grace, that beauty +came; he recalled that the late Mrs. Vanlief had been one of the +Waddells; there was no better blood in the country. With the name, too, +there came the thought of the wonderful revelations that were presently +to come to him, thanks to this girl's father. A sort of dizziness +touched him: he felt a quick conflict between the wish to worship this +girl, and the wish to probe deeper into life. It was with a very real +effort that he brushed the charm of her from him, and relapsed, again, +into the man who meant to know more of human life than had ever been +known before.</p> + +<p>He took out a silver pencil and held it poised above the book.</p> + +<p>"This book," he said, "is for you, you know, not for your father. Your +father and I are to be great friends but—I want to be friends, also, +with—" he looked a smiling appeal, "with—whom?"</p> + +<p>"With Miss Vanlief," she replied, mockingly. "My other name? I hate it; +really I do. Perhaps my father will tell you."</p> + +<p>She had given him the tip of her fingers, her gown had swung perfume as +it followed her, and she was out and away before he could do more than +give her the book, bow her good-bye, and stand in amaze at her +impetuousness, her verve. The thought smote him that, on the night +before, he had seen her, in the mirror, and spurned the notion of her +being other than a sham, a mockery. How did he know, even now, that she +was other than that? Yet, what had happened to him that he had been able +so long to stay under her charm, to believe in her, to wish for her, to +feel that she was hardly mortal, but some strange, sweet, splendid +dream? Was he the same man who, only a few hours ago, had held himself +shorn of all the primal emotions? He beat these questionings back and +forth in his mind; now doubting himself, now doubting this girl. Surely +she had not, in that dining-room, been sitting with her father? Would he +not have seen them together? Perhaps she was with some of her family's +womenfolk? Yes; now he remembered; she had been at a table with several +other ladies, all elderly. He wished he knew the name one might call +her, if ... if....</p> + +<p>Luke Moncreith came into the shop. Orson caught a shadow of a frown on +the other's face. Moncreith's voice was sharp and bitter when he spoke.</p> + +<p>"Been buying the shop?" he asked.</p> + +<p>"No," said Orson, in some wonder. "Only one book."</p> + +<p>"Hope you'll like it," said the other, with a manner that meant the very +opposite.</p> + +<p>"I? Oh, I read it ages ago. It was for somebody else. You seem very +curious about it?"</p> + +<p>"I am. You aren't usually the man to dawdle in bookshops."</p> + +<p>"Dawdle?" Orson turned on the other sharply. "What the deuce do you +mean? Are you my keeper, or what? If I choose to, I can <i>live</i> in this +shop, can't I?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, Lord, yes! Looks odd, just the same, you trailing in here after a +petticoat, and hanging around for—" he pulled out his watch,—"for a +good half hour."</p> + +<p>Orson burst out in a sort of clenched breath of rage. He kept the +phrases down with difficulty. "Better choose your words," he said. "I +don't like your words, and your watch be damned. Since when have my—my +friends taken to timing my actions? It's a blessing I'm going abroad."</p> + +<p>He turned and walked out of the shop, fiercely, swiftly. As the fresh +air struck his face, he put his hand to it, and shook his head, +wonderingly. "What's the matter with Moncreith? With me?" He thought of +the title of the book he had just given away. "Are we all as mad as +that?" he asked himself.</p> + +<p>The title was "March Hares."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>CHAPTER V.</h3> + + +<p>A young man so prominent in the town as Orson Vane had naturally a very +large list of acquaintances. He knew, in the fashionable phrase, +"everybody," and "everybody" knew him. His acquaintances ranged beyond +the world of fashion; the theatre, the turf, and many other regions had +denizens who knew Orson Vane and held him in esteem. He had always lived +a careful, well-mannered life; his name had never been in the newspapers +save in the inescapable columns touching society.</p> + +<p>When he was ready to proceed with the experiment of the mirror, the +largeness of his social register was at once a pleasure and a pain. +There were so many, so many! It was evident that he must use the types +most promising in eccentricity; he must adventure forth in company with +the strangest souls, not the mere ordinary ones.</p> + +<p>Sitting in the twilight of his rooms one day, it occurred to him that he +was now ripe for his first decision. Whose soul should he seize? That +was the question. He had spent a week or so perfecting plans, stalling +off awkward episodes, schooling his servants. There was no telling what +might not happen.</p> + +<p>He picked up a newspaper. A name caught his eye; he gave a little laugh.</p> + +<p>"The very man!" he told himself, "the very man. Society's court fool; it +will be worth something to know what lies under his cap and bells."</p> + +<p>He scrawled a note, enclosed it, and rang for Nevins.</p> + +<p>"Have that taken, at once, to Mr. Reginald Hart. And then, presently, +have a hansom called and let it wait nearby."</p> + +<p>"Reggie will be sure to come," he said, when alone. "I've told him there +was a pretty woman here."</p> + +<p>He felt a nervous restlessness. He paced his room, fingering the frames +of his prints, trying the cord of his new mirror, adjusting the blinds +of the windows. He tingled with mental and physical expectation. He +wondered whether nothing, after all, would be the result. How insane it +was to expect any such thing to happen as Vanlief had vapored of! This +was the twentieth century rather than the tenth; miracles never +happened. Yet how fervently he wished for one! To feel the soul of +another superimposing itself upon his own; to know that he had committed +the grandest larceny under heaven, the theft of a soul, and to gain, +thereby, complete insight into the spiritual machinery of another +mortal!</p> + +<p>Nevins returned, within a little time, bringing word that Mr. Hart had +been found at home, and would call directly.</p> + +<p>Vane pushed the new mirror to a position where it would face the door. +He told Nevins not to enter the room after Mr. Hart; to let him enter, +and let the curtain fall behind him.</p> + +<p>He took up a position by a window and waited. The minutes seemed heavy +as lead. The air was unnaturally still.</p> + +<p>At last he heard Nevins, in gentle monosyllables. Another voice, high +almost to falsetto, clashed against the stillness.</p> + +<p>Then the curtain swung back.</p> + +<p>Reginald Hart, whom all the smart world never called other than Reggie +Hart, stood for a moment in the curtain-way, the mirror barring his +path. He caught his image there to the full, the effeminate, full face, +the narrow-waisted coat, the unpleasantly womanish hips. He put out his +right hand, as if groping in the dark. Then he said, shrilly, +stammeringly.</p> + +<p>"Vane! Oh, Vane, where the de—"</p> + +<p>He sank almost to his knees. Vane stepping forward, caught him by the +shoulder and put him into an arm-chair. Hart sat there, his head hunched +between his shoulders.</p> + +<p>"Silly thing to do, Vane, old chappy. Beastly sorry for this—stunt of +mine. Too many tea-parties lately, Vane, too much dancing, too much—" +his voice went off into a sigh. "Better get a cab," he said, limply.</p> + +<p>He had quite forgotten why he had come: he was simply in collapse, +mentally and physically. Vane, trembling with excitement and delight, +walked up to the mirror from behind and sent the veil upon its face +again. Then he had Nevins summon the cab. He watched Hart tottering out, +upon Nevins' shoulder, with a dry, forced smile.</p> + +<p>So it was real! He could hardly believe it. In seconds, in the merest +flash, his visitor had faded like a flower whose root is plucked. The +man had come in, full of vitality, quite, in fact, himself; he had gone +out a mere husk, a shell.</p> + +<p>But there was still the climax ahead. Had he courage for it, now that it +loomed imminent? Should he send for Hart and have him pick up his soul +where he had dropped it? Or should he, stern in his first purpose, fit +that soul upon his own, as one fits a glove upon the hand? There was yet +time. It depended only upon whether Hart or himself faced the mirror +when the veil was off.</p> + +<p>He cut his knot of indecision sharply, with a stride to the mirror, a +jerk at the cord and a steady gaze into the clear pool of light, +darkened only by his own reflection.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>Strain his eyes as he would, he could feel no change, not the faintest +stir of added emotion. He let the curtain drop upon the mirror +listlessly.</p> + +<p>Walking to his window-seat again, he was suddenly struck by his image in +one of the other glasses. He was really very well shaped; he felt a wish +to strip to the buff; it was rather a shame to clothe limbs as fine as +those. He was quite sure there were friends of his who would appreciate +photographs of himself, in some picturesque costume that would hide as +little as possible. It was an age since he had any pictures taken. He +called for Nevins. His voice struck Nevins as having a taint of tenor in +it.</p> + +<p>"Nevins," he said, "have the photographer call to-morrow, like a good +man, won't you? You know, the chap, I forget his name, who does all the +smart young women. I'll be glad to do the fellow a service; do him no +end of good to have his name on pictures of me. I'm thinking of +something a bit startling for the Cutter's costume ball, Nevins, so have +the man from Madame Boyer's come for instructions. And see if you can +find me some perfume at the chemist's; something heavy, Nevins. The +perfumes at once, that's a dear man. I want them in my pillows tonight."</p> + +<p>When the man was gone, his master went to the sideboard, opened it, and +gave a gentle sigh of disappointment.</p> + +<p>"Careless of me," he murmured, "to have no Red Ribbon in the place. How +can any gentleman afford to be without it? Dear, dear, if any of the +girls and boys had caught me without it. Another thing I must tell +Nevins. Nothing but whisky! Abominably vulgar stuff! Can't think, +really, 'pon honor I can't, how I ever came to lay any of it in. And no +cigarettes in the place. Goodness me! What sweet cigarettes those are +Mrs. Barrett Weston always has! Wonder if that woman will ask me to her +cottage this summer."</p> + +<p>He strolled to the window, yawned, stretched out his arms, drawing his +hands towards him at the end of his gesture. He inspected the fingers +minutely. They needed manicuring. He began to put down a little list of +things to be done. He strolled over to the tabouret where invitations +lay scattered all about. That dear Mrs. Sclatersby was giving a +studio-dance; she was depending on him for a novel feature. Perhaps if +he did a little skirt-dance. Yes; the notion pleased him. He would sit +down, at once, and write a hint to a newspaper man who would be sure to +make a sensation of this skirt-dance.</p> + +<p>That done, he heard Nevins knocking.</p> + +<p>"Oh," he murmured, "the perfumes. So sweet!" He buried his nose in a +handful of the sachet-bags. He sprayed some Maria Farina on his +forehead. Perfumes, he considered, were worth worship just as much as +jewels or music. The more sinful a perfume seemed, the more stimulating +it was to the imagination. Some perfumes were like drawings by +Beardsley.</p> + +<p>He looked at the walls. He really must get some Beardsleys put up. There +was nothing like a Beardsley for jogging a sluggish fancy; if you wanted +to see everything that milliners and dressmakers existed by hiding, all +you had to do was to sup sufficiently on Beardsley. He thought of +inventing a Beardsley cocktail; if he could find a mixture that would +make the brain quite pagan, he would certainly give it that name.</p> + +<p>His mind roved to the feud between the Montagues and Capulets of the +town. It was one of those modern feuds, made up of little social +frictions, infinitesimal jealousies, magnified by a malicious press into +a national calamity. It was a feud, he told himself, that he would have +to mend. It would mean, for him, the lustre from both houses. And there +was nothing, in the smart world, like plenty of lustre. There were +several sorts of lustre: that of money, of birth, and of public honors. +Personally, he cared little for the origin of his lustre; so it put him +in the very forefront of smartness he asked for nothing more. Of course, +his own position was quite impeccable. The smart world might narrow year +by year; the Newport set, and the Millionaire set, and the Knickerbocker +set—they might all dwindle to one small world of smartness; yet nothing +that could happen could keep out an Orson Vane. The name struck him, as +it shaped itself in his mind, a trifle odd. An Orson Vane? Yes, of +course, of course. For that matter, who had presumed to doubt the +position of a Vane? He asked himself that, with a sort of defiance. An +Orson Vane, an Orson Vane? He repeated the syllables over and over, in a +whisper at first, and then aloud, until the shrillness of his tone gave +him a positive start.</p> + +<p>He rang the bell for Nevins.</p> + +<p>"Nevins," he said, and something in him fought against his speech, "tell +me, that's a good man,—is there anything, anything wrong with—me?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing sir," said Nevins stolidly.</p> + +<p>Orson Vane gave a sort of gasp as the man withdrew. It had come to him +suddenly; the under-self was struggling beneath the borrowed self. He +was Orson Vane, but he was also another.</p> + +<p>Who? What other?</p> + +<p>He gave a little shrill laugh as he remembered. Reggie Hart,—that was +it,—Reggie Hart.</p> + +<p>He sat down to undress for sleep. He slipped into bed as daintily as a +woman, nestling to the perfumed pillows.</p> + +<p>Nevins, in his part of the house, sat shaking his head. "If he hadn't +given me warning," he told himself, "I'd have sent for a doctor."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI.</h3> + + +<p>The smart world received the change in Orson Vane with no immediate +wonder. Wonder is, at the outset, a vulgarity; to let nothing astonish +you is part of a smart education. A good many of the smartest hostesses +in town were glad that Vane had emerged from his erstwhile air of +aristocratic aloofness; he took, with them, the place that Reggie Hart's +continuing illness left vacant.</p> + +<p>In the regions where Vane had been actually intimate whispers began to +go about, it is true, and it was with no little difficulty that an +occasional story about him was kept out of the gossipy pages of the +papers. Vane was constantly busy seeking notoriety. His attentions to +several of the younger matrons were conspicuous. Yet he was so much of a +stimulating force, in a society where passivity was the rule, that he +was welcome everywhere.</p> + +<p>He had become the court fool of the smart set.</p> + +<p>To him, the position held nothing degrading. It was, he argued, a +reflection on smart society, rather on himself, that, to be prominent in +it, one must needs wear cap and bells. Moreover his position allowed +him, now and then, the utterance of grim truths that would not have +been listened to from anyone not wearing the jester's license.</p> + +<p>At the now famous dinner given by Mrs. Sclatersby, Orson Vane seized a +lull in the conversation, by remarking, in his ladylike lisp:</p> + +<p>"My dear Mrs. Sclatersby, I have such a charming idea. I am thinking of +syndicating myself."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Sclatersby put up her lorgnettes and smiled encouragement at Orson. +"It sounds Wall Streety," she said, "you're not going to desert us, are +you?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, nothing so dreadful. It would be an entirely smart syndicate, you +know; a syndicate of which you would be a member. I sometimes think, you +know, that I do not distribute myself to the best advantage. There have +been little jealousies, now and then, have there not?" He looked, in a +bird-like, perky way, at Mrs. Barrett Weston, and the only Mrs. Carlos. +"I have been unable to be in two places at once. Now a syndicate—a +syndicate could arrange things so that there would be no +disappointments, no clashings of engagements, no waste of opportunity.</p> + +<p>"How clever you always are," said a lady at Orson's right. She had +chameleon hair, and her poise was that of a soubrette. The theatre was +tremendously popular as a society model that season. Orson blew a kiss +at her, and went on with his speech.</p> + +<p>"Actors do it, you know. Painters have done it. Inventors do it. Why +not I?" He paused to nibble an olive. "To contribute to the gaiety of +our little world is, after all, the one thing worth while. Think how few +picturesque people we have! Eccentricity is terribly lacking in the +town. We have no Whistler; Mansfield is rather a dull imitation. Of +course there is George Francis Train; but he is a trifle, a trifle too +much of the larger world, don't you think?"</p> + +<p>"I never saw the man in my life," asserted the hostess.</p> + +<p>"Exactly," said Orson, "he makes himself too cheap. It keeps us from +seeing him. But Whistler; think of Whistler, in New York! He would wear +a French hat, fight duels every day, lampoon a critic every hour, and +paint nocturnes on the Fifth avenue pavement! He would make Diana fall +from the Tower in sheer envy. He would go through the Astoria with +monocle and mockery, and smile blue peacock smiles at Mr. Blashfield and +Mr. Simmons. He would etch himself upon the town. We would never let him +go again. We need that sort of thing. Our ambitions and our patience are +cosmopolitan; but we lack the public characters to properly give fire +and color to our streets. Now I—"</p> + +<p>He let his eyes wander about the room, a delicate smile of invitation on +his lips.</p> + +<p>"Don't you think," said one of the ladies, "that you are quite—quite +bohemian enough?"</p> + +<p>Orson shuddered obviously. "My dear lady," he urged, "it is a dreadful +thing to be bohemian. It is no longer smart. If I am considered the one, +I cannot possibly be the other. There is, to be sure, a polite +imitation; but it is quite an art to imitate the thing with just +sufficient indolence. But I really wish you would think the thing over, +Mrs. Sclatersby. I know nobody who would do the thing better than I. Our +men are mostly too fond of fashion, and too afraid of fancy. One must +not be ashamed of being called foolish. Whistler uses butterflies; +somebody else used sunflowers and green carnations; I should +use—lilies, I think, lilies-of-the-valley. Emblematic of the pure folly +of my pose, you know. One must do something like that, you see, to gain +smart applause; impossible hats and improbable hair, except in the case +of actresses, are quite extinct."</p> + +<p>A Polish orchestra that had been hitherto unsuccessful against the +shrill monologue of Orson, and the occasional laughter of the ladies, +now sent out a sudden, fierce stream of melody. It was evident that they +did not mean to take the insult of a large wage without offering some +stormy moments in exchange. The diners assumed a patient air, eating in +an abstracted manner, as if their stomachs were the only members of +their bodies left unstunned by the music. The assemblage wore, in its +furtive gluttony, an air of being in a plot of the most delicious +danger. Some rather dowdy anecdotes went about in whispers, and several +of the ladies made passionate efforts to blush. Orson Vane took a sip of +some apricotine, explaining to his neighbor that he took it for the +color; it was the color of verses by Verlaine. She had never heard of +the man. Ah; then of course Mallarmé, and Symons and Francis Saltus were +her gods? No; she said she liked Madame Louise; hers were by far the +most fragile hats purchasable; what was the use of a hat if it was not +fragile; to wear one twice was a crime, and to give one away unless it +was decently crushed was an indiscretion. Orson quite agreed with her. +To his other neighbor he confided that he was thinking of writing a +book. It would be something entirely in the key of blue. He was busy +explaining its future virtues, when an indiscreet lull came in the +orchestral tornado.</p> + +<p>"I mean to bring the pink of youth to the sallowest old age," he was +saying, "and every page is to be as dangerous as a Bowery cocktail."</p> + +<p>Then the storm howled forth again. Everyone talked to his or her +neighbor at top voice. Now and then pauses in the music left fag ends of +conversation struggling about the room.</p> + +<p>"The decadents are simply the people who refuse to write twaddle for the +magazines...."</p> + +<p>"The way to make a name in the world is to own a soap factory and ape +William Morris on the side...."</p> + +<p>"I can always tell when it is Spring by looking at the haberdashers' +windows. To watch shirts and ties blooming is so much nicer than flowers +and those smelly things...."</p> + +<p>"The pleasantest things in the world all begin with a P. Powders, +patches and poses—what should we do without them?..."</p> + +<p>This sort of thing came out at loose ends now and then. Suddenly the +music ceased altogether. The diners all looked as if they had been +caught in a crime. The lights went out in the room, and there were +little smothered shrieks. After an interval, a rosy glow lit up the +conservatory beyond the palms; a little stage showed in the distance. +Some notorious people from the music-halls began to do songs and dances, +and offer comic monologues. The diners fell into a sort of lethargy. +They did not even notice that Orson Vane's chair was empty.</p> + +<p>Vane was in a little boudoir lent him by the hostess. His nostrils +dilated with the perfume of her that he felt everywhere. He sank into a +silk-covered chair, before which he had arranged a full-length mirror, +and several smaller glasses, with candles glowing all about him. He was +conscious of a cloying sense of happiness over his physical perfections. +He stripped garment after garment from him with a care, a gentleness +that argued his belief that haste was a foe to beauty. He stretched +himself at full length, in epicurean enjoyment of himself. The flame of +life, he told himself, burnt the more steadily the less we wrapped it +up. If we could only return to the pagan life! And yet—what charm there +was in dress! The body had, after all, a monotony, a sameness; the +tenderest of its curves, the rosiest of its surfaces, must pall. But the +infinite variety of clothes! The delight of letting the most delicate +tints of gauze caress the flesh, while to the world only the soberest +stuffs were exposed! The rustle of fresh linen, the perfume that one +could filter through the layers of one's attire!</p> + +<p>Orson Vane closed his eyes, lazily, musingly. At that moment his proper +soul was quite in subjection; the ecstasy in the usurping soul was +all-powerful.</p> + +<p>He was thinking of what the cheval-glass in that little room must have +seen.</p> + +<p>It would be unspeakably fine to be a mirror.</p> + +<p>The little crystal clock ticking on the dressing-table tinkled an hour. +It brought him from his reveries with a start. He began gliding into +some shining, silken things of umber tints; they fitted him to the skin.</p> + +<p>He was a falconer.</p> + +<p>It was a costume to strike pale the idlers at a bathing beach. There was +not a crease, not a fold anywhere. A leathern thong upon a wrist, a +feathered cap upon his head, were almost the only points that rose away +from the body as God had fashioned it. Satisfaction filled him as he +surveyed himself. But there was more to do. Above this costume he put +the dress of a Spanish Queen. When he lifted the massively brocaded +train, there showed the most exquisitely chiseled ankles, the promise of +the most alluring legs. The corsage hinted a bust of the most soothing +softness. He spent fully ten minutes in happy admiration of his images +in the mirrors.</p> + +<p>When he proceeded to the conservatory, it was by a secret corridor. The +diners were wearily watching a Frenchwoman who sang with her gloves, +which were black and always on the point of falling down. She was very +pathetic; she was trying to sing rag-time melodies because some idiot +had told her the Newport set preferred that music. A smart young woman +had danced a dance of her own invention; everyone agreed, as they did +about the man who paints with his toes, that, considering her smartness +in the fashionable world, it was not so much a wonder that she danced so +well, as that she danced at all. They were quite sure the professional +managers would offer her the most lavish sums; she would be quite as +much of an attraction as the foreign peer who was trying to be a +gentleman, where they are most needed, on the stage.</p> + +<p>At a sign from Orson, the lights went out again, as the Frenchwoman +finished her song. Several of the guests began to talk scandal in the +dark; there are few occupations more fascinating than talking scandal in +the dark. The question of whether it was better to be a millionaire or +a fashionable and divorced beauty was beginning to agitate several +people into almost violent argument, when the lights flared to the full.</p> + +<p>The chorus of little "Ohs" and "Ahs," of rapid whispered comment, and of +discreetly patted gloves, was quite fervid for so smart an assemblage. +Except in the rarest cases, to gush is as fatal, in the smart world, as +to be intolerant. There is a smart avenue between fervor and frowning; +when you can find that avenue unconsciously, in the dark, as it were, +you have little more to learn in the code of smartness.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Sclatersby herself murmured, quite audibly:</p> + +<p>"How sweet the dear boy looks!"</p> + +<p>Her clan took the word up, and for a time the sibilance of it was like a +hiss in the room. A man or two in the company growled out something that +his fairer neighbor seemed unwilling to hear. These basso profundo +sounds, if one could formulate them into words at all, seemed more like +"Disgusting fool!" or "Sickening!" than anything else. But the company +had very few men in it; in this, as in many other respects, the room +resembled smart society itself. The smart world is engineered and +peopled chiefly by the feminine element. The male sex lends to it only +its more feminine side.</p> + +<p>It is almost unnecessary to describe the picture that Orson Vane +presented on that little stage. His beauty as "Isabella, Queen of +Spain," has long since become public property; none of his later efforts +in suppression of the many photographs that were taken, shortly after +the Sclatersby dinner, have succeeded in quite expunging the portraits. +At that time he gave the sittings willingly. He felt that these +photographs represented the highest notch in his fame, the completest +image of his ability to be as beautiful as the most beautiful woman.</p> + +<p>Shame or nervousness was not part of Orson Vane's personality that +night. He sat there, in the skillfully arranged scheme of lights, with +his whole body attuned only to accurate impersonation of the character +he represented. He got up. His motion, as he passed across the stage, +was so utterly feminine, so made of the swaying, undulating grace that +usually implies the woman; the gesture with his fan was so finically +alluring; the poise of his head above his bared shoulders so +coquettish,—that the women watching him almost held their breaths in +admiration.</p> + +<p>It was, you see, the most adroit flattery that a man could pay the +entire sex of womankind.</p> + +<p>Then the music, a little way off, began to strum a cachuca. The tempo +increased; when finally the pace was something infectious, Orson Vane +began a dance that remains, to this day, an episode in the annals of the +smart. The vigor of his poses, the charm of his skirt-manipulation, +carried the appreciation of his friends by storm. Some of the ladies +really had hard work to keep from rushing to the stage and kissing the +young man then and there. When we are emotional, we Americans—to what +lengths will we not go!</p> + +<p>But the surprises were not yet over. A dash of darkness stayed the +music; a swishing and a flapping came from the stage; then the lights. +Vane stood, in statue position, as a falconer. You could almost, under +the umber silk, see the rippling of his veins.</p> + +<p>Only a second he stood so, but it was a second of triumph. The company +was so agape with wonder, that there was no sound from it until the +music and the bare stage, following a brief period of blackness, +recalled it to its senses. Then it urged Mrs. Sclatersby to grant a +great favor.</p> + +<p>Mr. Vane must be persuaded not take off his falconer's costume; to +mingle, for what little time remained, with the company without resuming +his more conventional attire.</p> + +<p>Vane smiled when the message came to him. He nodded his head. Then he +sent for the Sclatersby butler.</p> + +<p>"Plenty of Red Ribbon!" he said to that person.</p> + +<p>"Plenty, sir."</p> + +<p>"Make a note of your commissions; a cheque in the morning."</p> + +<p>Then he mingled again with his fellow-guests, and there was much +toasting, and the bonds all loosened a little, and the sparkle came up +out of the glasses into the cheeks of the women. The other men, one by +one, took their way out.</p> + +<p>Women crushed one another to touch the hero of the evening. Jealousies +shot savage glances about. Every increase in this emulation increased +the love that Orson Vane felt for himself. He caressed a hand here, a +lock there, with a king's condescension. If he felt a kiss upon his +hand, he smiled a splendid, slightly wearied smile. If he had hot eyes +turned on him, burning so fiercely as to spell out passion boldly, he +returned, with his own glances, the most ineffable promises.</p> + +<p>There have been many things written and said about that curious affair +at the Sclatersbys, but for the entire history of it—well, there are +reasons why you will never be able to trace it. Orson Vane is perhaps +the only one who might tell some of the details; and he, as you will +find presently, has utterly forgotten that night.</p> + +<p>"Time we went home, girls," said Vane, at last, disengaging himself +gently from a number of warm hands, and putting away, as he moved into +freedom, more than one beautiful pair of shoulders. He needed the fresh +air; he was really quite worn out. But he still had a madcap notion left +in him; he still had a trump to play.</p> + +<p>"A pair of hose," he called out, "a pair of hose, with diamond-studded +garters, to the one who will play 'follow' to my 'leader!'"</p> + +<p>And the end of that dare-devil scamper did not come until the whole +throng reached Madison Square.</p> + +<p>Vane plunged to the knees in the fountain.</p> + +<p>That chilled the chase. But one would not be denied. Hers was a dark +type of beauty that needed magnolias and the moon and the South to frame +it properly. She lifted her skirts with a little tinkling laugh, and ran +to where Orson stood, splashing her way bravely through the water.</p> + +<p>Vane looked at her and took her hand.</p> + +<p>"I envy the prize I offered," he said to her.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII.</h3> + + +<p>Dawn found Orson Vane nodding in a hansom. He had told the man to drive +to Claremont. The Palisades were just getting the first rosy streaks the +sun was putting forth. The Hudson still lay with a light mist on it. The +ascent to Claremont, in sunshine so clustered with beauty, was now +deserted. A few carts belonging to the city were dragging along +sleepily. Harlem was at the hour when the dregs of one day still taint +the morn of the next one.</p> + +<p>Vane was drowsy. He felt the need of a fillip. He did not like to think +of getting back to his rooms and taking a nap. It was still too early, +it seemed, for anything to eat or drink. He spied the Fort Lee ferry, +and with it a notion came to him. The cabman was willing. In a few +minutes he was aboard the ferry, and the cooler air that sweeps the +Hudson was laving him. On the Jersey side he found a sleepy innkeeper +who patched up a breakfast for him. He had, fortunately, some smokable +cigars in his clothes. The day was well on when he reached the New York +side of the river again, and gave "The Park!" as the cabman's orders.</p> + +<p>His body now restored to energy again, his mind recounted the successes +of the night. He really had nothing much to wish for. The men envied him +to the point of hatred; the women adored him. He was the pet of the +smartest people. He was shrewd enough, too, to be petted for a +consideration; his adroitness in sales of Red Ribbon added comfortably +to his income. He took pride in this, as if there had ever been a time, +for several generations, when the name of Vane had not stood good for a +million or so.</p> + +<p>The Park was not well tenanted. Some robust members of the smart set +were cantering about the bridle paths, and now and then a carriage +turned a corner; but the people who preferred the Park for its own sake +to the Park of the afternoon drive were, evidently, but few. Vane felt +quite neglected; he was still able to count the number of times that he +had bowed to familiars. The deserted state of the Park somewhat +discounted the tonic effects of its morning freshness. Nature was +nothing unless it was a background for man. The country was a place from +which you could come to town. Still—there was really nothing better to +do, this fine morning. He rather dreaded the thought of his rooms after +the brilliance of the night.</p> + +<p>His meditations ceased at approach of a girlish figure on horseback, a +groom at a discreet distance behind.</p> + +<p>It was Miss Vanlief.</p> + +<p>He saw that she saw him, yet he saw no welcome in her eyes. He rapped +for the hansom to stop; got out, and waved his hat elaborately at the +young woman. She, in sheer politeness, had reined in her horse.</p> + +<p>"A sweet day," he minced, "and jolly luck my meeting you! Thought it was +rather dull in the old Park, till you turned up. Sweet animal you're +on." He looked up with that air that, the night before, had been so +bewitching. Somehow, as the girl eyed him, he felt haggard. She was not +smiling, not the least little bit.</p> + +<p>"I have read about the affair at Mrs. Sclatersby's," she said.</p> + +<p>"Really? Dreadful hurry these newspapers are always in, to be sure. It +was really a great lark."</p> + +<p>"It must have been," was her icy retort. She beckoned to the groom. +"That—that sheet," she ordered, sharply, holding out one gauntleted +hand. The groom gave her the folded newspaper. She began to read from +it, in a bitter monotone:</p> + +<p>"The antics of Mr. Orson Vane," she read, "for some time the subject of +comment in society, have now reached the point where they deserve the +censure of publicity. His doings at a certain fashionable dinner of last +night were the subject of outspoken disgust at the prominent clubs +later. Now that the case is openly discussed, it may be repeated that a +prominent publication recently had occasion to refuse print to a +distinctly questionable photograph of this young man, submitted, it is +alleged, by himself. In the more staid social circles, one wonders how +much longer Mrs. Carlos and the other leaders of the smartest set will +continue to countenance such behavior."</p> + +<p>Vane, as she read, was enjoying every inch of her. What freshness, what +grace! What a Lady Godiva she would have made!</p> + +<p>"Sweet of you to take such interest," he observed, as she handed the +paper to the groom. "Malice, you know, sheer malice. Dare say I forgot +to give that paper some news that I gave the others; they take that sort +of thing so bitterly, you know. As for the photo—it was really awfully +cunning. I'll send you one. Oh, must you go? I'm so cut up! Charming +chat we've had, I'm sure."</p> + +<p>She had given her horse a cut with the whip, had sent Vane a stare of +the most open contempt, and was now off and away. Vane stood staring +after her. "Very nice little filly," he murmured. "Very!"</p> + +<p>Then he gave his house number to the cabman.</p> + +<p>Turning into Park avenue, at Thirty-Ninth street, the horse slipped on +the asphalt. The hansom spun on one wheel, and then crashed against a +lamp-post. Vane was almost stunned, though there was no mark on him +anywhere. He felt himself all over, but he could feel not as much as a +lump. But his head ached horribly; he felt queerly incapable of thought. +Whatever it was that had happened to him, it had stunned something in +him. What that something was he did not realize even as he told Nevins, +who opened the door to him in some alarm:</p> + +<p>"Send the cab over to Mr. Reginald Hart's. Say I must—do you hear, +Nevins?—I must have him here within the hour—if he has to come in a +chair!"</p> + +<p>Not even when he let the veil glide from the new mirror did he +understand what part of him was stunned. He moved about in a sort of +half wakefulness. The time he spent before Hart's arrival was all a +stupor, spent on a couch, with eyes closed.</p> + +<p>Hart came in feebly, leaning on a stick.</p> + +<p>"Funny thing of you to do," he piped, "sending for me like this. What +the—" He straightened himself in front of the new mirror, and, for an +instant, swayed limply there. Then his stick took an upward swing, and +he minced across the room vigorously. "Why, Vane," he said, "not ill, +are you? Jove, you know, I've had a siege, myself. Feel nice and fit +this minute, though. Shouldn't wonder if the effort to get here had done +me good. What was the thing you wanted me for?"</p> + +<p>Vane shook his head, feebly. "Upon my word, Hart, I don't know. I had an +accident; cab crushed me; I was a little off my head, I think. All a +mistake."</p> + +<p>"Sorry, I'm sure," lisped Hart, "hope it won't be anything real. I tell +you I feel quite out of things. All the other way with you, eh! Hear +you're no end of a choice thing with the <i>cafe au lait</i> gang. Well, +adios!"</p> + +<p>Vane lay quite still after the other had gone. When he spoke, it was to +say, to the emptiness of the room, but nodding to where Hart had last +stood:</p> + +<p>"What a worm! What an utter worm!"</p> + +<p>The voice was once more the voice of Orson Vane.</p> + +<p>As realization of that came to him, he spoke again, so loud that Nevins, +without, heard it.</p> + +<p>"Thank God," he said.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII.</h3> + + +<p>The time that had passed since he began the experiment with the +Professor's mirror now filled Vane with horror. The life that had seemed +so splendid, so triumphant to him a short while ago, now presented +itself to him as despicable, mean, hateful. Now that he had safely +ousted the soul of Reginald Hart he loathed the things that, under the +dominance of that soul, he had done. The quick feeling of success that +he had expected from his adventure into the realm of the mind was not +his at all; his emotions were mixed, and in that mixture hatred of +himself was uppermost. It was true: he had succeeded. The thoughts, the +deeds of another man had become his thoughts, his deeds. The entire +point of view had been, for the time, changed. But, where he had +expected to keep the outland spirit in subjection, it was the reverse +that had happened; the usurping soul had been in positive dominance; he +had been carried along relentlessly by the desires and the reflections +of that other.</p> + +<p>The fact that he knew, now, to the very letter, the mind that animated +that fellow, Reginald Hart, was small consolation to him. The odium of +that reputation was inescapably his, Orson Vane's. Oh, the things he had +said,—and thought,—and done! He had not expected that any man's mind +could be so horrible as that. He thought of the visitation he had +conjured upon himself, and so thinking, shuddered. How was he ever to +elude the contempt that his masquerade, if he could call it so, would +bring him?</p> + +<p>Above all, that scene with Miss Vanlief came back to him with a bitter +pang. What did it profit him, now, to fathom the foul depths of Reginald +Hart's mind concerning any ever so girlish creature? It was he, Orson +Vane, for all that it was possible to explain to the contrary, who had +phrased Miss Vanlief's beauty in such abominable terms.</p> + +<p>Consternation sat on his face like a cloud. He could think of no way out +of the dark alley into which he had put himself.</p> + +<p>Each public appearance of his now had its tortures. Men who had +respected him now avoided him; women to whom he had once condescended +were now on an aggravating plane of intimacy. Sometimes he could almost +feel himself being pointed out on the street.</p> + +<p>The mental and physical reaction was beginning to trace itself on his +face. He feared his Florentine mirrors now almost as much as the +Professor's. The blithe poise had left him. He brooded a good deal. His +insight into another nature than his own filled him with a sense of +distaste for the human trend toward evil.</p> + +<p>He spent some weeks away from town, merely to pick up his health again. +His strength returned a little, but the joy of life came back but +tardily.</p> + +<p>On his first day in town he met Moncreith. There was an ominous wrinkle +gathering in the other's forehead, but Vane braved all chance of a +rebuff.</p> + +<p>"Luke," he said, "don't you know I've been ill? You can't think how ill +I've been. Do you remember I told you I was going abroad? I've been +abroad, mentally; I have, Luke, really I have. It's like a bad dream to +me. You know what I mean."</p> + +<p>Moncreith found his friend rather pathetic. At their last meeting he had +been hot in jealousy of Orson. Now he could afford to pity him. He had +made Jeannette Vanlief's acquaintance, and he stood quite well with her. +He had made up his mind to stand yet better; he was, in fact, in love +with her. He was quite sure that Vane had quite put himself out of that +race. So he took the other's hand, and walked amicably to the Town and +Country Club with him.</p> + +<p>"You have been doing strange things," he ventured.</p> + +<p>"Strange," echoed Vane, "strange isn't the word! Ghastly, +horrible—awful things I've been doing. I wish I could explain. But +it—it isn't my secret, Luke. All I can say is: I was ill. I am, I hope, +quite well again."</p> + +<p>It seemed an age since he had spent an hour or so in his favorite club. +The air of the members was unmistakably frosty. The conversation shrank +audibly. He was glad when Moncreith found a secluded corner and bore him +to it. But he was not a bright companion; his own thoughts were too +depressing to allow of his presenting a sparkling surface to the world. +They talked in mere snatches, in curt syllables.</p> + +<p>"I've seen a good deal of Miss Vanlief," said Moncreith, with conscious +triumph.</p> + +<p>"Oh," said Vane, with a start, "Miss Vanlief? So you know her? Is +she—is she well?"</p> + +<p>"Quite. I see her almost every day."</p> + +<p>"Fortunate man!" sighed Vane. He was a little weary of life. He wanted +to tell somebody what his dreams about Miss Vanlief were; he wanted to +cry out loud, "She is the dearest, sweetest girl in the world!" merely +to efface, in his own mind, the alien thought of her that had come to +him weeks ago. Moncreith did not seem the one to utter this cry to. +Moncreith was too engrossed in his own success. He could bear +Moncreith's company no longer, not just then. He muttered lame words; he +stumbled out to the avenue.</p> + +<p>Some echo of an instinct turned his steps to the little bookshop.</p> + +<p>It was quite empty of customers. He passed his fingers over the back of +books that he thought Miss Vanlief might have handled. It was an absurd +whim, a childish trick. Yet it soothed him perceptibly. Our nerves +control our bodies and our nerves are slaves of our imaginations.</p> + +<p>He was turning to go, when his eye fell on a parcel lying on the +counter. It was addressed to "Miss Jeannette Vanlief."</p> + +<p>"Jeannette, Jeannette!" he said the name over to himself time and again. +It brought the image of her before him more plainly than ever. The +sunset glint in her hair, the roses and lilies of her skin, the melody +in her voice! The charm with which she had first met him, in that very +shop. It all came to him keenly. The more remote the possibility of his +gaining her seemed, the more he hugged the thought of her. He admitted +to himself now, all the more since his excursion into an abominable side +of human nature, that she was the most unspoilt creature in his world. A +girl with that face, that hair, that wit, was sure to be of a charm that +could never lose its flavor; the allurement of her was a thing that +could never die.</p> + +<p>Nothing but thoughts of this girl came to him on the way to his rooms. +Once in his own place, he felt that his reflections on Miss Vanlief had +served him as a tonic. He felt an energy once more, a vigor, a desire +for action. In that mood he turned fiercely upon some of the drawings on +his walls. He called Nevins, and had a heap made of the things that now +filled him with loathing.</p> + +<p>"All of the Beardsleys must come down," he ordered. "No; not all. The +portrait of Mantegna may stay. That has nobility; the others have the +genius of hidden evil. They take too much of the trapping from our +horrible human nature. The funeral procession by Willette may hang; his +Montmartre things are trivially indecent. Heine and his grotesqueries +may stay in jail for all I care. Leave one or two of Thoeny's blue +dragoons. Leandre's crowned heads will do me no harm; I can see past +their cruelties. But take the Gibsons away; they are relegated to the +matinee girl. What is to be done with them? Really, Nevins, don't worry +me about such things. Sell them, give them, lose them: I don't care. +There's only one man in the world who'd really adore them, and he—" he +clenched his hands as he thought of Hart,—"he is a worm, a worm that +dieth and yet corrupts everything about him."</p> + +<p>He sat down, when this clearance was over, and wrote a rather long +letter to Professor Vanlief. He told as much as he could bring himself +to tell of the result of the experiment. He begged the Professor, +knowing the circumstances as no other did, to do what was possible to +reinstate him, Vane, in the esteem of Miss Vanlief. As to whether he +meant to go on with further experiments; he had not yet made up his +mind. There were consequences, obligations, following on this clear +reading of other men's souls, that he had not counted upon.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX.</h3> + + +<p>To cotton-batting and similar unromantic staples the great house of R.S. +Neargood & Co. first owed the prosperity that later developed into +world-wide fame. It was success in cotton-batting that enabled the firm +to make those speculations that eventually placed millions to its +credit, and familiarized the Bourse and Threadneedle Street with its +name.</p> + +<p>What ever else can be said of cotton-batting, however, it is hardly a +topic of smart conversation. So in smart circles there was never any +mention of cotton-batting when the name of Neargood came up. Instead, it +was customary to refer to them as "the people, you know, who built the +Equator Palace for the Tropical Government, and all that sort of thing." +A certain vagueness is indispensable to polite talk.</p> + +<p>Yet not even this detail of politics and finance counted most in the +smart world. The name of Neargood might never have been heard of in that +world if it had not been for the beautiful daughters of the house of +Neargood. There is nothing, nowadays, like having handsome daughters. +You may have made your millions in pig, or your thousands in whisky, +but, in the eyes of the complaisant present, the curse dies with the +debut of a beautiful daughter. It is true that the smart sometimes make +an absurd distinction between the older generation and the new; +sometimes a barrier is raised for the daughter that checks the mother; +but caprice was ever one of the qualities of smartness.</p> + +<p>Through two seasons the beautiful Misses Neargood—Mary and +Alice—reigned as belles. They were both good to look at, tall, stately, +with distinct profiles. There was not much to choose, so to put it, +between them. Mary was the handsomer; Alice the cleverer. Through two +seasons the society reporters, on the newspapers that are yellow as well +as those that make one blue, exhausted the well of journalese in +chronicling the doings of these two young women.</p> + +<p>The climax of descriptive eloquence was reached on the occasion of the +double wedding of Mary and Alice Neargood.</p> + +<p>Mary changed the name of Neargood for that of Spalding-Wentworth; Alice +became Mrs. Van Fenno.</p> + +<p>Up to this time—as far, at least, as was observable—these two sisters +had dwelt together in unity. Never had the spirits of envy or +uncharitableness entered them. But after marriage there came to each of +them that stormy petrel of Unhappiness, Ambition.</p> + +<p>As a composer of several songs and light operas. Van Fenno was fairly +well known. Spalding-Wentworth was known as a man of Western wealth, of +Western blue blood, and of prominence in the smart set. For some time +the worldly successes of the Van Fennos did not disturb Mrs. +Spalding-Wentworth at all. Her husband was smart, since he moved with +the smart; he and his hyphen were the leaders in a great many famous +ways, notably in fashion and in golf. From the smart point of view the +Van Fennos were not in the hunt with the other family.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Van Fenno chafed and churned a little in silence, but hope did not +die in her. She made up her mind to be as prominent as her sister or +perish in the attempt.</p> + +<p>She did not have to perish. Things took a turn, as they will even in the +smart world, and there came a time when it was fashionable to be +intellectual. The smart set turned from the distractions of dinners and +divorces to the allurements of the arts. Music, painting and literature +became the idols of the hour. With that bland, heedless facility that +distinguishes To-day, the men and women of fashion became quickly versed +in the patter of the Muses.</p> + +<p>The Van Fennos became the rage. Everybody talked of his music and her +charm. Where the reporters had once used space in describing +Spalding-Wentworth's leadership in a cotillon or conduct of a coach, +they were now required to spill ink in enumeration of "those present" +at Mrs. Van Fenno's "musical afternoons."</p> + +<p>Wherefore there was a cloud on the fair brow of Mary Wentworth. Her +intimates were privileged to call her that. Ordinary mortals, omitting +the hyphen, would have been frozen with a look.</p> + +<p>When there is a cloud on the wife's brow it bodes ill for the husband. +The follies of a married man should be dealt with leniently; they are +mostly of his wife's inspiration. One day the cloud cleared from Mary +Wentworth's brow. She was sitting at breakfast with her husband.</p> + +<p>"Why, Clarence," she exclaimed, with a suddenness that made him drop his +toast, "there's literature!"</p> + +<p>"Where?" said Clarence, anxiously. "Where?" He looked about, eager to +please.</p> + +<p>"Stupid," said his wife. "I mean—why shouldn't we, that is, you—" She +looked at him, sure that he would understand without her putting the +thing into syllables. "Yes," she repeated, "literature is the thing. +There it is, as easy, as easy—"</p> + +<p>"Hasn't it always been there?" asked her dear, dense husband. A woman +may brood over a thing, you see, for months, and the man will not get so +much as a suspicion.</p> + +<p>She went on as if he had never spoken. "Literature is the easiest. +Clarence, you must write novels!"</p> + +<p>He buttered himself another slice of toast.</p> + +<p>"Certainly, my dear," he nodded, with a pleasant smile. "Quite as you +please."</p> + +<p>It was in this way that the Spalding-Wentworth novels were incited. The +art of writing badly is, unfortunately, very easy. In painting and in +music some knowledge of technic is absolutely necessary, but in +literature the art of writing counts last, and technic is rarely +applauded. The fact remains that the smart set thought the +Spalding-Wentworth novels were "so clever!" Mrs. Van Fenno was utterly +crushed. Mary Wentworth informed an eager world that her husband's next +novel would be illustrated with caricatures by herself; she had +developed quite a trick in that direction. Now and again her husband +refused to bother his head with ambitions, and devoted himself entirely +to red coats and white balls. Mrs. Wentworth's only device at such times +was to take desperately to golf herself. She really played well; if she +had only had staying power, courage, she might have gone far. But, if +she could not win cups, she could look very charming on the clubhouse +lawn. One really does not expect more from even a queen.</p> + +<p>It did not disturb Mrs. Wentworth at all to know that, where he was best +known, her husband's artistic efforts were considered merely a joke. She +knew that everyone had some mask or other to hold up to the world; and +she knew there was nothing to fear from a brute of a man or two. In her +heart she agreed with them; she knew her husband was a large, kindly, +clumsy creature; a useful, powerful person, who needed guidance.</p> + +<p>Kindly and clumsy—Clarence Spalding-Wentworth had title to those two +adjectives: there was no denying that. It was his kindliness that moved +him, after a busy day at a metropolitan golf tournament, toward Orson +Vane's house. He had heard stories of Vane's illness; they had been at +college together; he wanted to see him, to have a chat, a smoke, a good, +chummy hour or two.</p> + +<p>It was his clumsiness that brought about the incident that came to have +such memorable consequences. Nevins told him Mr. Vane was out; Wentworth +thought he would go in and have a look at Vane's rooms, anyway; sit +down, perhaps, and write him a note. Nevins had swung the curtain to +behind him when Wentworth's heel caught in the wrapping around the new +mirror.</p> + +<p>He looked into the pool of glass blankly.</p> + +<p>"Funny thing to cover up a mirror like that!" he told himself. He flung +the stuff over the frame carelessly. It merely hung by a thread. Almost +any passing wind would be sure to lift it off.</p> + +<p>"Wonder where he keeps his smokes?" he hummed to himself, striding up +and down, like a good natured mammoth.</p> + +<p>He found some cigars began puffing at one with an audible satisfaction, +and at last let himself down to an ebony escritoire that he could have +smashed with one hand. He wrote a scrawl; waited again, whistled, looked +out of the window, picked up a book, peered at the pictures, and then, +with a puff of regret, strode out.</p> + +<p>As he passed the Professor's mirror the current of air he made swept the +curtain from the glass and left it exposed.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_X" id="CHAPTER_X"></a>CHAPTER X.</h3> + + +<p>At about the time that Wentworth was scrawling his note in Vane's rooms +a slender young woman, dressed in a grey that shimmered like the +winter-sea in sunlight, wearing a hat that had the air of having lit +upon her hair for the moment only,—merely to give the world an +instant's glance at the gracious combination that woman's beauty and +man's millinery could effect—was coming out from one of those huge +bazaars where you can buy almost everything in the world except the +things you want. As she reached the doors, a young man, entering, +brushed her arm; his sleeve caught her portemonnaie. He stooped for it, +offered it hastily, and then—and not until then, gave a little "Oh!" +of—what was it, joy? or mere wonder, or both?</p> + +<p>"Oh," he repeated, "I can't go in—now. It's—it's ages since I could +say two words to you. 'Good-morning!' and 'How do you do?' has been the +limit of our talk. Besides, you have a parcel. It weighs, at the very +least, an ounce. I could never think of letting you tire yourself so." +He took the flimsy mite from her, and ranged his steps to hers.</p> + +<p>It was true, what he had said about their brief encounters. Do what she +would to forget that morning in the Park, and the weeks before it, +Jeannette Vanlief had not quite succeeded. Not even the calm +dissertations of her father, the arguments pointing to the unfathomable +freakishness of human nature, had altogether ousted her aversion to +Orson Vane. It was an aversion made the more keen because it came on the +heels of a strong liking. She had been prepared to like this young man. +Something about him had drawn her; and then had come the something that +had simply flung her away. Yet, to-day, he seemed to be the Orson Vane +that she had been prepared to like.</p> + +<p>She remembered some of the strange things her father had been talking +about. She noted, as Orson spoke, that the false tenor note was gone out +of his voice. But she was still a little fluttered; she could not quite +trust herself, or him.</p> + +<p>"But I am only going to the car," she declared. "It will hardly be worth +while. I mustn't take you out of your way."</p> + +<p>"I see," he regretted, "you've not forgotten. I can't explain; I was—I +think I was a little mad. Perhaps it is in the family. But—I wish you +would imagine, for to-day, that we had only just known each other a very +little while, that we had been in that little bookshop only a day or so +ago, that you had read the book, and we had met again, and—." He was +looking at her with a glow in his eyes, a tenderness—! Her eyes met his +for only an instant, but they fathomed, in that instant, that there was +only homage, and worship, and—and something that she dared not spell, +even to her soul—in them. That burning greed that she had seen in the +Park was not there.</p> + +<p>She smiled, wistfully, hesitatingly. Yet it was enough for him to cling +to; it buoyed his mood to higher courage.</p> + +<p>"Let us pretend," he went on, "that there are no streetcars in the town. +Let us be primitive; let us play we are going to take a peep-show from +the top of the Avenue stage! Oh—please! It gets you just as near, you +know; and if you like we can go on, and on, and do it all over again. +Think of the tops of the hats and bonnets one sees from the roof! It's +such a delightful picture of the avenue; you see all the little +marionettes going like beads along the string. And then, think of the +danger of the climb to the roof! It is like the Alps. You never know, +until you are there, whether you will arrive in one piece or in several. +Come," he laughed, for she was now really smiling, openly, sweetly, "let +us be good children, come in from Westchester County, to see the big +city."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps," she ventured, "we will make it the fashion. And that would +spoil it for so many of the plainer people."</p> + +<p>"Oh," and he waved his hand, "after us—the daily papers! Let us +pretend—I beg your pardon, let me pretend—youth, and high spirits, +and the intention to enjoy to-day."</p> + +<p>A rattling and a scraping on the asphalt warned them of an approaching +stage, and after a scramble, that had its shy pleasures for both, they +found themselves on the top of the old relic.</p> + +<p>"It is a bit of the Middle Ages," said Orson, "look at those horses! +Aren't they delightfully slender? And the paint! Do you notice the +paint? And the stories those plush seats down below us could tell! Think +of the misers and the millionaires, the dowagers and the drabs, that +have let these old stages bump them over Murray Hill! You can't have +that feeling about a street-car, not one of the electric ones, at any +rate. Do you know the story of the New Yorker who was trying to sleep in +a first-class compartment on a French railway? There was a collision, +and he was pitched ten feet onto a coal-heap. He said he thought he was +at home and he was getting off the stage at Forty-Second street."</p> + +<p>They were passing through the most frequented part of the avenue. Noted +singers and famous players passed them; old beaux and fresh belles; +political notabilities and kings of corruption. A famous leader of +cotillions, a beauty whose profile vied with her Boston terriers for +being her chief distinction, and a noted polo-player came upon the scene +and vanished again. Vane and his companion gave, from time to time, +little nods to right and left. Their friends stared at them a little, +but that caused them no sorrow. Automobiles rushed by. They looked down +upon them, lofty in their ruined tower.</p> + +<p>"As a show," said Vane, "it is admirably arranged. It moves with a +beautiful precision. There is nothing hurried about it; the illusion of +life is nearly complete. Some of them, I suppose, really are alive?"</p> + +<p>"I am not sure," she answered, gravely. "Sometimes I think they merely +move because there is a button being pressed somewhere; a button we +cannot see, and that they spend their lives hiding from us."</p> + +<p>"I dare say you are right. In the words of Fay Templeton, 'I've been +there and I know.' I have made my little detours: but the lane had, +thank fortune, a turning."</p> + +<p>She saw through his playfulness, and her eyes went up to his in a +sympathy—oh, it made him reel for sweetness.</p> + +<p>"I am glad," she said, simply.</p> + +<p>"But we are getting serious again," he remonstrated, "that would never +do. Have we not sworn to be children? Let us pretend—let us pretend!" +He looked at the grey roofs, the spires oozing from the hill to the sky. +He looked at the grey dream beside him: so grey, so fair, so crowned +with the hue of the sun before the world had made him so brazen. "Let us +pretend," he went on, after a sigh, "that we are bound for the open +road, and that we are to come to an inn, and that we will order +something to eat. We—"</p> + +<p>"Oh," she laughed, "you men, you men! Always something to eat!"</p> + +<p>"You see, we are of coarse stuff; we cannot sup on star-dust, and dine +on bubbles. But—this is only to pretend! An imaginary meal is sometimes +so much more fun than a real one. At a real one, you see, I would have +to try to eat, and I could not spend the whole time looking at you, and +watching the sunshine on your hair, and the lilies—" He caught his +breath sharply, with a little clicking noise. "Dear God," he whispered, +"the lilies again! And I had never seen them until now."</p> + +<p>"You are going to be absurd," she said, though her voice was hardly a +rebuke.</p> + +<p>"And wouldn't I have excuse," he asked, "for all the absurdities in the +world! I want to be as absurd as I can; I want to think that there's +nothing in the world any uglier than—you."</p> + +<p>"And will you dine off that thought?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, no; that is merely one of the condiments. I keep that in reach, +while the other things come and go. I tell you: how would it be if we +began with a bisque of crab? The tenderest pink, you know, and not the +ghost of any spice that you can distinguish; a beautiful, creamy blend."</p> + +<p>"You make it sound delicious," she admitted.</p> + +<p>"We take it slowly, you know, religiously. The conversation is mostly +with the eyes. Dinner conversation is so often just as vapid as +dinner-music! The only point in favor of dinner-music is that we are +usually spared the sight of it. There is no truth more abused than the +one that music must be heard and not seen. When I am king I mean to +forbid any singing or playing of instruments within sight of the public; +it spoils all the pleasure of the music when one sees the uglinesses in +its execution."</p> + +<p>"But people would not thank you if you kept the sight of Paderewski or +De Pachmann from them."</p> + +<p>"They might not thank me at first, but they would learn gratitude in the +end, A contortionist is quite as oppressive a sight as an automaton. No; +I repeat, performers of music should never, never be visible. It is a +blow in the face of the art of music; it puts it on the plane of the +theatre. What persons of culture want to do is to listen, to listen, to +listen; to shut the eyes, and weave fancies about the strains as they +come from an unseen corner. Is there not always a subtle charm about +music floating over a distance? That is a case in point; that same charm +should always be preserved. The pianist, the soloist of any sort, as +well as the orchestra, or the band—except in the case of the regimental +band, in battle or in review, where actual spectacle, and visible +encouragement are the intention—should never be seen. There should +always be a screen, a curtain, between us and the players. It would make +the trick of music criticism harder, but it would still leave us the +real judges. Take out of music criticism the part that covers fingering, +throat manipulation, pedaling, and the like, and what have you left? +These fellows judge what they see more than what they hear. To give a +proper judgment of the music that comes from the unseen; that is the +only test of criticism. There can be no tricks, no paddings."</p> + +<p>"But the opera?" wondered the girl.</p> + +<p>"The opera? Oh, the opera is, at best, a contradiction in terms. But I +do not waive my theory for the sake of opera. It should be seen as +little as any other form of music. The audience, supplied with the story +of the dramatic action, should follow the incidents by ear, not by eye. +That would be the true test of dramatic writing in music. We would, +moreover, be spared the absurdity of watching singers with beautiful +voices make themselves ridiculous by clumsy actions. As to comic +opera—the music's appeal would suffer no tarnish from the merely +physical fascination of the star or the chorus ... I know the thought is +radical; it seems impossible to imagine a piano recital without long +hair, electric fingers, or visible melancholia; opera with only the +box-holders as appeals to the eye seems too good to be true; but—I +assure you it would emancipate music from all that now makes it the +most vicious of the arts. Painters do not expect us to watch them +painting, nor does the average breed of authors—I except the Manx—like +to be seen writing. Yet the musician—take away the visible part of his +art, and he is shorn of his self-esteem. I assure you I admire actors +much more than musicians; actors are frankly exponents of nothing that +requires genius, while musicians pretend to have an art that is over and +above the art of the composer.... Music—"</p> + +<p>"Do you realize," interrupted the girl, with a laugh that was melody +itself, "that you are feasting me upon dinner-music without dinner. It +must be ages since we began that imaginary feast. But now, I am quite +sure we are at the black coffee. And I have been able to notice nothing +except your ardor in debate. You were as eager as if you were being +contradicted."</p> + +<p>"You see," he said, "it only proves my point. Dinner-music is an +abomination. It takes the taste of the food away. While I was playing, +you admit, you tasted nothing between the soup and the coffee. Whereas, +in point of fact—"</p> + +<p>"Or fancy?"</p> + +<p>"As you please. At any rate—the menu was really something out of the +common. There were some delightful wines. A sherry that the innkeeper +had bought of a bankrupt nobleman; so would run his fable for the +occasion, and we would believe it, because, in cases of that sort, it +takes a very bad wine to make one pooh-pooh its pedigree. A Madeira that +had been hidden in a cellar since 1812. We would believe that, every +word of it, because we would know that there was really no Madeira in +all the world; and we must choose between insulting our stomachs or our +intelligence. And then the coffee. It would come in the tiniest, most +transparent, most fragile—"</p> + +<p>"Yes," she laughed, "I dare say. As transparent and as fragile as the +entire fabric of our repast, I have no doubt. But—pity me, do!—I shall +have to leave the beautiful banquet about where you have put it, in the +air. I have a ticking conscience here that says—"</p> + +<p>"Oh, hide it," he supplicated, "hide it. Watches are nothing but +mechanisms that are jealous of happiness; whenever there is a happy hour +a watch tries to end it. When I am king I shall prohibit the manufacture +and sale of watches. The fact that they may be carried about so easily +is one of their chief vices; one never knows nowadays from what corner a +woman will not bring one; they carry them on their wrists, their +parasols, their waists, their shoulders. Can you be so cruel as to let +that little golden monster spoil me my hour of happiness—"</p> + +<p>"But I would have to be cruel one way or the other. You see, my father +will wonder what has become of me. He expects me to dinner."</p> + +<p>"Ah, well," he admitted soberly, if a little sadly, "we must not keep +him waiting. You must tell the Professor where we have been, and what we +said, and how silly I was, and—Heigho, I wish I could tell you how the +little hour with you has buoyed me up. Your presence seems to stir my +possibilities for good. I wish I could see you oftener. I feel like the +provincial who says good-bye with a: 'May I come 'round this evening?' +as a rider."</p> + +<p>"A doubtful compliment, if I make you rustic," she said. "But I have +something on this evening; an appointment with a man. The most beautiful +man in the world, and the best, and the kindest—"</p> + +<p>"His name?" he cried, with elaborate pretense of melodrama, for he saw +that she was full of whimsies.</p> + +<p>"Professor Vanlief," she curtsied.</p> + +<p>They were walking, by now, in the shade of the afternoon sun. Vane saw a +stage approaching them, one that would take him back to the lower town. +She saw it, too, and his intention. She shook hands with him, and took +time to say, softly:</p> + +<p>"Do you never ride in the Park any more?"</p> + +<p>"Oh," he said, "tell me when. To-morrow morning? At McGowan's Pass? At +ten? Oh, how I wish that stage was not coming so fast!"</p> + +<p>In their confusion, and their joyous sense of having the same absurd +thought in common, they both laughed at the notion of a Fifth avenue +stage ever being too fast. Yet this one, and Time, sped so swiftly that +Vane could only shake hands hastily with his fair companion, look at her +worshipfully, and jump upon the clattering vehicle.</p> + +<p>He would never have believed that so ramshackle a conveyance could have +harbored so many dreams as had been his that day.</p> + +<p>That thought was his companion all the way home. That, and efforts to +define his feelings toward Miss Vanlief. Was it love? What else could it +be! And if it was, was he ready, for her, to give up those ambitions of +still further sounding hitherto unexplored avenues of the human mind? +Was this fragile bit of grace and glamour to come between him and the +chance of opening a new field to science? Had he not the opportunity to +become famous, or, at the very least, to become omnipotent in reading +the hearts, the souls, of men? Were not the possibilities of the +Professor's discovery unlimited? Was it not easy by means of that mirror +in his rooms, for any chief of police in the world to read the guilt or +innocence of every accused man? Yet, on the other hand, would marriage +interfere? Yes; it would. One could not serve two such goddesses as +woman and science. He would have to make up his mind, to decide.</p> + +<p>But, in the meanwhile, there was plenty of time. Surely, for the +present, he could be happy in the thought of the morrow, of the ride +they were to take in the Park, of the cantering, the chattering +together, the chance to see the morning wind spin the twists of gold +about her cheeks and bring the sparkle to her eyes.</p> + +<p>He let himself into his house without disturbing any of the servants. He +passed into his room. He lifted the curtain of the doorway with one +hand, and with the other turned the button that lighted the room. As the +globes filled with light they showed him his image in the new mirror.</p> + +<p>He reeled against the wall with the surprise of the thing. He noted the +mirror's curtain in a heap at the foot of the frame. Perhaps, after all, +it had been merely the wind.</p> + +<p>He summoned Nevins. The curtain he replaced on the staring face of the +mirror. Whence the thought came from, he did not know, but it occurred +to him that the scene was like a scene from a novel.</p> + +<p>"Nevins," he asked, "was anyone in my rooms?"</p> + +<p>"Mr. Spalding-Wentworth, sir."</p> + +<p>Orson Vane laughed,—a loud, gusty, trumpeting laugh.</p> + +<p>He understood. But he understood, also, that the accident that had +brought the soul of Spalding-Wentworth into his keeping had decreed, +also, that the dominance should not be, as on a former time, with the +usurper.</p> + +<p>He knew that the soul of Spalding-Wentworth, to which he gave the refuge +of his own body, was a small soul.</p> + +<p>Yet even little souls have their spheres of influence.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XI" id="CHAPTER_XI"></a>CHAPTER XI.</h3> + + +<p>It was a morning such as the wild flowers, out in the suburban meadows, +must have thought fit for a birthday party. As for the town, it lost, +under that keen air and gentle sun, whatever of garish and unhealthy +glamour it had displayed the night before.</p> + +<p>"The morning," Orson Vane had once declared, in a moment of revelation, +"is God's, and the night is man's." He was speaking, of course, of the +town. In the severe selectiveness that had grown upon him after much +rout and riot through other lands, he pretended that the town was the +only spot on the map. Certainly this particular morning seemed to bear +out something of this saying; it swept away the smoke and the taint, the +fever and the flush of the night before; the visions of limelights and +glittering crystals and enmillioned vice fled before the gust of ozone +that came pouring into the streets. Before night, to be sure, man would +have asserted himself once more; the pomp and pageant of the primrose +path would have ousted, with its artificial charm, the clean, sweet +freshness of the morning.</p> + +<p>The grim houses on upper Fifth avenue put on semblance of life +reluctantly that morning. Houses take on the air of their inmates; these +houses wore their best manner only under artificial lights. Surly grooms +and housemaids went muttering and stumbling about the areas. Sad-faced +wheelmen flashed over the asphalt, cursing the sprinkling carts. It was +not too early for the time-honored preoccupation of the butcher cart, +which consists of turning corners as if the world's end was coming. +Pallid clubmen strode furtively in the growing sunshine. To them, as to +the whole town, the sun and its friend, the breeze, came as a tonic and +a cure.</p> + +<p>So strange a thing is the soul of man that Orson Vane, riding towards +the Park that morning, caught only vague, fleeting impressions of the +actual beauty of the day. He simply wondered, every foot of the way to +McGowan's Pass, whether Miss Vanlief played golf. The first thing he +said to her after they had exchanged greetings, was:</p> + +<p>"Of course you golf?"</p> + +<p>She looked at him in alarm. There was something—something, but what was +it?—in his voice, in his eye. She had expected a reference to the day +before, to their infantile escapade on the roof of the coach. Instead, +this banale, this stupid, this stereotyped phrase! Her flowerlike face +clouded; she gave her mare the whip.</p> + +<p>"No," she called out, "I cannot bear the game." His horse caught the +pace with difficulty; the groom was left far out of sight, beyond a +corner. But the diversion had not touched Vane's trend of thought at +all.</p> + +<p>"Oh," he assured her, when the horses were at an amble again, "it's one +of those things one has to do. Some things have to be done, you know; +society won't stand for anything less, you know, oh, no. I have to play +golf, you know; part of my reputation."</p> + +<p>"I didn't know," she faltered. She tried to remember when Orson Vane had +ever been seen on either the expert or the duffer list at the golf +matches.</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes; people expect it of me. If I don't play I have to arrange +tournaments. Handicapping is great fun; ever try it? No? You should. +Makes one feel quite like a judge at sessions. Oh, there's nothing like +golf. Not this year, at least. Next year it may be something else. I may +have to take to polo or tennis. One is expected to show the way, you +know; a man in my position—" He looked at her with a kind of 'bland, +blunt, clumsy egoism, that made her wonder where was the Orson Vane of +yesterday. This riddle began to sadden her. Perhaps it was true, as she +had heard somewhere, that the man was mentally unbalanced; that he had +his—well, his bad days. She sighed. She had looked forward to this ride +in the Park; she admitted that to herself. Not in a whole afternoon +spent with Luke Moncreith had she felt such happy childishness stirring +in her as yesterday, in the hour with Orson Vane. And now—She sighed.</p> + +<p>The hum of an approaching automobile reached them, the glittering +vehicle proclaiming its progress in that purring stage whisper that is +still the inalienable right of even the newest "bubble" machine. The +coat worn by the smart young person on the seat would have shocked the +unenlightened, for that sparkling, tingling morning it struck the exact +harmonious note of artifice.</p> + +<p>Orson Vane bowed. It was "the" Miss Carlos. Just as there is only one +Mrs. Carlos, so there is only one Miss Carlos.</p> + +<p>"She plays a decent game," said Vane to his companion.</p> + +<p>"Of life?"</p> + +<p>"No; golf." He looked at her in amazement. Life! What was life compared +to golf? Life? For most people it was, at best, a foozle. Nearly +everybody pressed; very few followed through, and the bunkers—good +Lord, the bunkers!</p> + +<p>"I'm thinking of writing a golfing novel," began Orson, after an +interval in which he managed to wonder whether one couldn't play golf +from horseback.</p> + +<p>"Oh," said Miss Vanlief wearily, "how does one set about it!"</p> + +<p>He was quite unaware of her weariness. He chirped his answer with blind +enthusiasm.</p> + +<p>"It's very easy," he declared. "There are always a lot of women, you +know, who are aching to do things in that line. You give them the +prestige of your name, that's all. One of them writes the thing; you +simply keep them from foozling the phrases now and then. Another +illustrates it."</p> + +<p>"And does anyone buy it?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, all the smart people do. It's one of those things one is supposed +to do. There's no particular reason or sense in it; but smart people +expect one another to read things like that. The newspapers get quite +silly over such books. Then, after novels, I think, I shall take to +having them done over for the stage? Don't you think a golfing comedy, +with a sprinkling of profanity and Scotch whiskey, would be all the +rage?"</p> + +<p>Jeannette Vanlief reined in her mare. She looked at Orson Vane; looked +him, as much as she could, through and through. Was it all a stupid +jest? She could find nothing but dense earnestness in her face, in his +eyes. Oh, the riddle was too tiresome, too hopeless. It was simply not +the same man at all! She gave it up, gave him up.</p> + +<p>"Do you mind," she said, "if I ride home now? I'm tired."</p> + +<p>It should have been a blow in the face, but Orson Vane never so much as +noticed it.</p> + +<p>"Tired?" he repeated. "Oh; all right. We'll turn about. Rather go back +alone? Oh, all right. Wish you'd learn to play golf; you really must!" +And upon that he let her canter away, the groom following, some little +wonder on his impassive front.</p> + +<p>As for Jeannette Vanlief she burst into her father's room a little +later, and then into tears.</p> + +<p>"And I wanted to love him!" she wailed presently, from out her confusion +and her distress.</p> + +<p>The Professor was patting her hair, and wondering what in all the world +was the matter. At her speech, he thought he saw a light.</p> + +<p>"And why not?" he asked, soothingly, "He seems quite estimable. He was +here only a moment ago?"</p> + +<p>"Who was here?" she asked in bewilderment.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Moncreith."</p> + +<p>At that she laughed. The storm was over, the sunshine peeped out again.</p> + +<p>"You dear, blind comfort, you!" she said, "What do I care if a thousand +Moncreiths—"</p> + +<p>"Then it's Orson Vane," said the Professor, not so blind after all. +"Well, dear, and what has he been doing now?"</p> + +<p>He listened to her rather rambling, rather spasmodic recital; listened +and grew moody, though he could scarce keep away some little mirth. He +saw through these masquerades, of course. Who else, if not he? Poor +Jeannette! So she had set her happy little heart upon that young man? A +young man who, to serve both their ends, was playing chameleon. A young +man who was mining greater secrets from the deeps of the human soul than +had ever been mined before. A wonderful young man, but—would that make +for Jeannette's happiness? At any rate he, the Professor, would have to +keep an eye open for Vane's doings. There was no knowing what strange +ways these borrowed souls might lead to. He wondered who it was that, +this time, had been rifled of his soul.</p> + +<p>Wonder did not long remain the adjuncts of the Professor and his +daughter only. The whole world of society began to wonder, as time went +on, at the new activities of Orson Vane. Wonder ceased, presently, and +there was passive acceptance of him in his new role. Fashions, after +all, are changed so often in the more external things, that the smart +set would not take it as a surprising innovation if some people took to +changing their souls to suit the social breeze.</p> + +<p>Orson Vane took a definite place in the world of fashion that season. He +became the arbiter of golf; he gave little putting contests for women +and children; he looked after the putting greens of a number of smart +clubs with as much care as a woman gives her favorite embroideries. He +took to the study of the Turkish language. There were rumors that he +meant to become the Minister to Turkey. He traveled a great deal, and he +published a book called "The Land of the Fez." Another little brochure +bearing his name was "The Caddy; His Ailments and Diseases." It was +rumored that he was busy in dramatization of his novel, "Five Loaves and +Two Fishes!" When Storman Pasha made his memorable visit to the States +it was Orson Vane who became his guide and friend. A jovial club of +newspaper roysterers poked fun at him by nominating him for Mayor. He +went through it all with a bland humorlessness and stubborn dignity that +nothing could affront. His indomitable energy, his intense seriousness +about everything, kept smart society unalterably loyal. He led its +cotillions, arranged its more sober functions, and was a household word +with the outsiders that reach society only through the printed page. His +novels—whether they were his own or done for him hardly matters—were +just dull enough to offend nobody. The most indolent dweller in Vanity +Fair could affect his books without the least mental exertion. The lives +of our fashionables are too full, too replete with a multitude of +interests and excitements, to allow of the concentration proper for the +reading of scintillating dialogue, or brilliant observations. Orson Vane +appeared to gauge his public admirably; he predominated in the outdoor +life, in golf, in yachting, in coaching, yet he did not allow anyone +else to dispute the region of the intellect, of indoors, with him. He +shone, with a severe dimness, in both fields.</p> + +<p>Jeannette Vanlief, meanwhile, lost much of the sparkle she had hitherto +worn. She drooped perceptibly. The courtship of Luke Moncreith left her +listless; he persevered on the strength of his own ambition rather than +her encouragement. His daughter's looks at last began seriously to worry +Professor Vanlief. Something ought to be done. But what? It was +apparently Orson Vane's intention to keep that borrowed soul with him +for a long time. In the meanwhile Jeannette.... The Professor, the more +he considered the matter, felt the more strongly that just as he was the +one who had given Vane this power, so had he the right, if need be, to +interfere. The need was urgent. The masquerade must be put an end to.</p> + +<p>His resolve finally taken, Professor Vanlief paid a visit to Orson +Vane's house. Vane was, as he had hoped, not at home. He +cross-questioned Nevins.</p> + +<p>The man was only too willing to admit that his master's actions were +queer. But Mr. Vane had given him warning to that effect; he must have +felt it coming on. It was a malady, no doubt. For his part he thought it +was something that Mr. Vane would wish to cure rather than endure. He +didn't pretend to understand his master of late, but—</p> + +<p>The Professor put a period to the man's volubility with some effort.</p> + +<p>"I want you," he urged, "to jog your memory a little. Never mind the +symptoms. Give me straightforward answers. Now—did you touch the new +mirror, leaving it uncovered, at any time within the past few weeks?"</p> + +<p>"Oh," was the answer, "the new mirror, is it! I knows well the uncanny +thing was sure to make trouble for me. But I gives you my word, as I +hopes to be saved, that I've never so much as brushed the dust off it, +much less taken the curtain off. It's fearsome, is that mirror, I'm +thinking. It's—"</p> + +<p>"Then think back," pressed the Professor, again stemming the tide of the +other's talk relentlessly, "think back: was anyone, ever, at any time, +alone in Mr. Vane's rooms? Think, think!"</p> + +<p>"I disremember," stammered Nevins. "I think not—Oh, wait! It was a long +time ago, but I think a gentleman wrote Mr. Vane a note once, and I, +having work in the other rooms, let him be undisturbed. But I told the +master about it, the minute he came in, sir. He was not the least vexed, +sir. Oh, I'm easy in my mind about that time."</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes,—but the gentleman's name!" The Professor shook the man's +shoulder quite roughly.</p> + +<p>"His name? Oh, it was just Mr. Spalding-Wentworth, sir, that was all."</p> + +<p>The Professor sat down with a laugh. Spalding-Wentworth! He laughed +again.</p> + +<p>Nevins had the air of one aggrieved. "Mr. Vane laughed, too, I remember, +when I told him. Just the minute I told him, sir, he laughed. I've +puzzled over it, time and again, why—"</p> + +<p>The Professor left Nevins puzzling. There was no time to be lost. He +remembered now that Spalding-Wentworth had for some time been ailing. +The world, in its devotion to Orson Vane, had forgotten, almost, that +such a person as Spalding-Wentworth had ever existed. To be forgotten +one has only to disappear. Dead men's shoes are filled nowhere so +quickly as in Vanity Fair; though, to be paradoxic, for the most part +they are high-heeled slippers.</p> + +<p>It took some little time, some work, to arrange what the Professor had +decided must be done. He went about his plans with care and skill. He +suborned Nevins easily enough, using, chiefly, the plain truth. Nevins, +with the superstition of his class, was willing to believe far greater +mysteries than the Professor half hinted at. By Nevins' aid it happened +that Orson Vane slept, one night, face to face with the polished surface +of the new mirror. In the morning it was curtained as usual.</p> + +<p>That morning Augustus Vanlief called at the Wentworth house. He asked +for Mrs. Wentworth. He went to his point at once.</p> + +<p>"You know who I am, I dare say, Mrs. Wentworth. You love your husband, I +am sure; you will pardon my intrusion when I tell you that perhaps I can +do something the best thing of all—for him. It is, in its way, a +matter of life and death. Do the doctors give you any hope?"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Wentworth, her beauty now tired and touched by traces of spoilt +ambition, made a listless motion with her hands.</p> + +<p>"I don't know why I should tell you," she said, "or why I should not. +They tell me vague things, the doctors do, but I don't believe they know +what is the matter."</p> + +<p>"Do you?"</p> + +<p>"I?" she looked at Vanlief, and found a challenge in his regard. "It +seems," she admitted, "as if—I hardly like to say it,—but it seems as +if there was no soul in him any more. He is a shell, a husk. The life in +him seems purely muscular. It is very depressing. Why do you think you +can do anything for Clarence, Professor? I did not know your researches +took you into medicine?"</p> + +<p>"Ah, but you admit this is not a matter for medicine, but for the mind. +Will you allow me an experiment madame? I give you my word of honor, my +honor and my reputation, that there is no risk, and there may +be—perhaps, an entire restoration. There is—a certain operation that I +wish to try—"</p> + +<p>"An operation? The most eminent doctors have told me such a thing would +be useless. We might as well leave my poor husband clear of the knife, +Professor."</p> + +<p>"Oh, it is no operation, in that sense. Nothing surgical. I can hardly +explain; professional secrets are involved. If you did not know that I +am but a plodding old man of science—if I were an unknown charlatan—I +would not ask you to put faith in me. But—I give you my word, my +promise, that if you will let Mr. Wentworth come with me in my brougham +I will return with him within the hour. He will be either as he is now, +or—as he once was."</p> + +<p>"As he once was—!" Mrs. Wentworth repeated the phrase, and the thought +brought her a keen moment of anguish that left a visible impress on her +features. "Ah," she sighed, "if I could only think such a thing +possible!" She brooded in silence a moment or two. Then she spoke.</p> + +<p>"Very well. You will find him in the library. Prim, show the gentleman +to the library. If you can persuade him, Professor—" She smiled +bitterly. "But then, anybody can persuade him nowadays." She turned to +some embroidery as if to dismiss the subject, to show that she was +resigned even to hopeless experiments. The very fact that she was plying +the needle rather than the social sceptre was gauge of her descent from +the heights. As a matter of fact Vanlief found Wentworth amenable +enough. Wentworth was reading Marie Corelli. His mind was as empty as +that. Nothing could better define his utter lapse from intelligence. He +put the book down reluctantly as the Professor came in. He listened +without much enthusiasm. A drive? Why not? He hadn't driven much of +late, but if it was something that would please the Professor. He +remembered, through a mist, that he had known Vanlief when he himself +was a boy; his father had often spoken of Vanlief with respect. Nothing +further in the way of mental exertion came to him. He followed Vanlief +as a dog follows whoso speaks kindly to it.</p> + +<p>The conversation between the two, in the brougham, would hardly tend to +the general entertainment. It was a thing of shreds and patches. It led +nowhither.</p> + +<p>The brougham stopped at the door of Orson Vane's house. Nevins let them +in, whispering an assuring confidence to the professor. As they reached +the door of the dressing-room Vanlief pushed Wentworth ahead of him, and +bade him enter. He kept behind him, letting the other's body screen him +from the staring mirror.</p> + +<p>Wentworth looked at himself. A hand traveled slowly up to his forehead.</p> + +<p>"By Jove!" he said, hesitatingly, "I never put the curtain back, after +all." And he covered up the mirror. "Curious thing," he went on, with +energy vitalizing each word, "what possessed me to come here just now, +when I know for a fact that they're playing the Inter-State Golf +championships to-day. Dashed if I know why I didn't go!" He walked out, +plainly puzzled, clumsily heedless of Vanlief and Nevins, but—himself +once more.</p> + +<p>Orson Vane, at just that time, was on the links of the Fifeshire Golf +Club. He was wearing a little red coat with yellow facings. He was in +the act of stooping on a green, to look along the line of his putt, when +he got to his feet in a hurried, bewildered way. He threw his putter +down on the green. He blushed all over, shaming the tint of his scarlet +coat.</p> + +<p>"What a foolish game for a grown-up man!" he blurted out, and strode off +the grounds.</p> + +<p>The bystanders were aghast. They could not find words. Orson Vane, the +very prophet of golf, to throw it over in that fashion! It was +inexplicable! The episode was simply maddening.</p> + +<p>But it was remarked that the decline of golf on this side of the water +dated from that very day.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XII" id="CHAPTER_XII"></a>CHAPTER XII.</h3> + + +<p>Orson Vane was taking lunch with Professor Vanlief. Jeannette, learning +of Vane's coming, had absented herself.</p> + +<p>"It is true," Vane was saying, "that I can assert what no other man has +asserted before,—that I know the exact mental machinery of two human +beings. Yes; that is quite true. But—"</p> + +<p>"I promised nothing more," remarked Vanlief.</p> + +<p>"No. That is true, too. I have lived the lives of others; I have given +their thoughts a dwelling. But I am none the happier for that."</p> + +<p>"Oh," admitted Vanlief, "wisdom does not guarantee happiness...." He +drummed with his fine, long fingers, upon the table-cloth. Vane, +watching him, noted the almost transparent quality of his skin. Under +that admirable mask of military uprightness there was an aging, a fading +process going on, that no keen observer could miss. "It is the pursuit, +not the capture of wisdom, that brings happiness. Wisdom is too often +only a bubble that bursts when you touch it."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps that is it. At any rate I know that I do not love my neighbor +any more because I have fathomed some of his thoughts. Moreover, +Professor, has it occurred to you that your discovery, your secret, +carries elements of danger with it? Take my own experiments; there might +have been tragic results; whole lives might have been ruined. In one +case I was nearly the victim of a tragedy myself; I might have become, +for all time, the dreadful creature I was giving house-room to. In the +other, there was no more than a farce possible; the visiting spirit was, +after all, in subjection to my own. I think you will have to simplify +the details of your marvelous secret. It works a little clumsily, a +little—"</p> + +<p>"Oh," the Professor put in, "I am perfecting the process. I spend my +days and my nights in elaborating the details. I mean to have it in the +simplest, most unmistakable perfection before I hand it over to the +human race."</p> + +<p>"Sometimes I think," mused Vane, "that your boon will be a doubtful one. +I can see no good to be gained. My whole point of view is changing. I +ached for such a chance of wisdom once; now that it has come to me I am +sad because the things I have learned are so horrible, so silly. I had +not thought there were such souls in the world; or not, at any rate, in +the immediate world about me."</p> + +<p>"Oh," the Professor went on, steadfastly, "there will be many benefits +in the plan. Doctors will be able to go at once to the root of any +ailments that have their seat in the brain. Witnesses cab be made to +testify the truth. Oh—there are ever so many possibilities."</p> + +<p>"As many for evil as for good. Second-rate artists could steal the +ideas, the inventions of others. No inventor, no scientist, would be +sure of keeping his secrets. The thing would be a weapon in the hands of +the unscrupulous."</p> + +<p>"Ah, well," smiled Vanlief, "so far I have not made my discovery public, +have I? It is a thing I must consider very carefully. As you say, there +are arguments on either side. But you must bear in mind that you are +somewhat embittered. It was your own fault; you chose the subject +wittingly. If you were to read a really beautiful mind, you might turn +to the other extreme; you might urge me to lose no time in giving the +world my secret. The wise way is between the two; I must go forward with +my plans, prepared for either course. I may take it to my grave with me, +or I may give it to the world; but, so far, it is still a little +incomplete; it is not ripe for general distribution. Instead of the one +magic mirror there must be myriads of them. There are stupendous +opportunities. All that you have told me of your own experiences in +these experiments has proved my skill to have been wisely employed; your +success was beyond my hopes. Do you think you will go on?"</p> + +<p>Orson Vane did not answer at once. It was something he had been asking +himself; he was not yet sure of the answer.</p> + +<p>"I haven't made up my mind," he replied. "So far I have hardly been +repaid for my time and the vital force employed. I almost feel toward +these experiments as toward a vice that refines the mind while +coarsening the frame. That is the story of the most terrible vices, I +think; they corrode the body while gilding the brain. But this much I +know; if I use your mirror again it will not be to borrow a merely smart +soul; I mean to go to some other sphere of life. That one is too +contracted."</p> + +<p>"Strange," said the Professor, "that you should have said that. +Jeannette pretends she thinks that, too. I cannot get her to take her +proper position in the world. She is a little elusive. But then, to be +sure, she is not, just now, at her best."</p> + +<p>"She is not ill?" asked Vane, with a guilty start.</p> + +<p>"Nothing tangible. But not—herself...."</p> + +<p>Vane observed that he wished he might have found her in; he feared he +had offended her; he hoped the Professor would use his kind offices +again to soften the young lady's feelings toward him. Then he got up to +go.</p> + +<p>Strolling along the avenue he noted certain aspects of the town with an +appreciation that he had not always given them. He had seen these things +from so many other points of view of late; had been in sympathy with +them, had made up a fraction of their more grotesque element; that to +see them clearly with his own eyes had a sort of novelty. The life of +to-day, as it appeared on the smartest surfaces, was, he reflected, a +colorful if somewhat soulless picture....</p> + +<p>The young men sit in the clubs and in the summer casinos, smoking and +wondering what the new mode in trousers is to be; an acquaintance goes +by; he has a hat that is not quite correct, and his friends comment on +it yawningly; he has not the faintest notion of polite English, but +nobody cares; a man who has written great things walks by, but he wears +a creased coat, and the young men in the smoking-room sniff at him. In +the drags and the yachts the women and the girls sit in radiance and gay +colors and arrogant unconsciousness of position and power; they talk of +golfing and fashion and mustachios; Mrs. Blank is going a hot pace and +Mrs. Landthus is a thoroughbred; adjectives in the newest sporting slang +fly about blindingly; the language is a curious argot, as distinct as +the tortuous lingo of the Bowery. A coach goes rattling by, the horses +throwing their heads in air, and their feet longing for the Westchester +roads. The whip discusses bull-terriers; the people behind him are +declaring that the only thing you can possibly find in the Waldorf rooms +is an impossible lot of people. The complexions of all these people, +intellectually presentable in many ways, and fashionable in yet more +modes, are high in health. They look happy, prosperous and +satisfied....</p> + +<p>Yes, there was a superficial fairness to the picture, Vane admitted. If +only, if only, he had not chosen to look under the surface! Now that he +had seen the world with other eyes, its fairness could rarely seem the +same to him.</p> + +<p>A sturdy beggar approached him, with a whine that proved him an +admirable actor. But Vane could not find it in him to reflect that if +there is one thing more than another that lends distinction to a town it +is an abundance of beggars.</p> + +<p>He wondered how it would be to annex this healthy impostor's mite of a +soul. But no; there could be little wisdom gained there.</p> + +<p>He made, finally, for the Town and Country Club, and tried to immerse +himself in the conversation that sped about. The talked turned to the +eminent actor, Arthur Wantage. The subject of that man's alleged +eccentricities invariably brought out a flood of the town's stalest +anecdotes. Vane, listening in a lazy mood, made up his mind to see +Wantage play that night. It would be a distraction. It would show him, +once again, the present limit in one human being's portraiture of +another; he would see the highest point to which external imitation +could be brought; he could contrast it with the heights to which he +himself had ascended.</p> + +<p>It would be a chance for him to consider Wantage, for the first time in +his life, as a merely second-rate actor. This player was an adept only +in the making the shell, the husk, seem lifelike; since he could not +read the character, how could he go deeper?</p> + +<p>The opportunities the theatre held for him suddenly loomed vast before +Vane.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XIII" id="CHAPTER_XIII"></a>CHAPTER XIII.</h3> + + +<p>The fact that Arthur Wantage was to be seen and heard, nightly, in a +brilliant comedy by the author of "Pious Aeneas," was not so much the +attraction that drew people to his theatre, as was the fact that he had +not yet, that season, delivered himself of a curtain speech. His curtain +speeches were wont to be insults delivered in an elaborately honeyed +manner; he took the pose of considering his audiences with contempt; he +admired himself far more for his condescension in playing to them than +he respected his audiences for having the taste to admire him.</p> + +<p>The comedy in which he was now appearing was the perfection of paradox. +It pretended to be frivolous and was really philosophic. The kernel of +real wisdom was behind the elaborately poised mask of wit. A delightful +impertinence and exaggeration informed every line of the dialogue. The +pose of inimitable, candid egoism showed under every situation. The play +was typical of the author as well as of the player. It veiled, as thinly +as possible, a deal of irony at the expense of the play going public; it +took some of that public's dearest foibles and riddled them to shreds.</p> + +<p>It was currently reported that the only excuse for comparatively +amicable relations between Wantage and O'Deigh, who had written this +comedy, was the fact of there being an ocean between them. Even at that +Wantage found it difficult to suffer the many praises he heard bestowed, +not upon himself but O'Deigh. He had burst out in spleen at this +adulation, once, in the hearing of an intimate.</p> + +<p>"My dear Arthur," said the other, "you strike me as very ungrateful. For +my part, when I see your theatre crowded nightly, when I see how your +exchequer fills steadily, it occurs to me that you should go down on +your knees every night, and thank God that O'Deigh has done you such a +stunning play."</p> + +<p>"Oh," was Wantage's grudging answer, "I do, you know I do. But I also +say: Oh, God, why did it have to be by O'Deigh?"</p> + +<p>The secret of his hatred for O'Deigh was the secret of his hatred for +all dramatists. He was a curious compound of egoism, childishness and +shrewdness. Part of his shrewdness—or was it his childishness?—showed +in his aversion to paying authors' royalties. He always tried to +re-write all the plays he accepted; if the playwrights objected there +was sure to be a row of some sort. When he could find no writers willing +to make him a present of plays, for the sake, as he put it, of having it +done by as eminent an actor as himself, and in so beautiful a theatre, +he was in the habit of announcing that he would forsake the theatre, and +turn critic. He pretended that the world—the public, the press, even +the minor players—were in league against him. There was a conspiracy to +drive him from the theatre; the riff-raff resented that a man of genius +should be so successful. They lied about him; he was sure they lied; for +stories, of preposterous import, came to him; he vowed he never read the +newspapers—never. As for London—oh, he could spin you the most +fascinating yarn of the cabal that had dampened his London triumph. He +mentioned, with a world of meaning in his tone, the name of the other +great player of the time; he insinuated that to have him, Wantage, +succeed in London, had not been to that other player's mind; so the +wires had been pulled; oh, it was all very well done. He laughed at the +reminiscence,—a brave, bluff laugh, that told you he could afford to +let such petty jealousies amuse him.</p> + +<p>The riddle of Arthur Wantage's character had never yet been read. There +were those who averred he was never doing anything but acting, not in +the most intimate moments of his life; some called him a keen +moneymaker, retaining the mummer's pose off the stage for the mere +effect of it on the press and the public. What the man's really honest, +unrehearsed thoughts were,—or if he ever had such—no man could say. To +many earnest students of life this puzzle had presented itself. It +began to present itself, now, to Orson Vane.</p> + +<p>This, surely, was a secret worth the reading. Here were, so to say, two +masks to lift at once. This man, Arthur Wantage, who came out before the +curtain now as this, now as that, character of fancy or history, what +shred of vital, individual personality had he retained through all these +changings? The enthusiasm of discovery, of adventure came upon Vane with +a sharpness that he had not felt since the day he had mocked the +futility of human science because it could not unlock other men's +brains.</p> + +<p>The horseshoe-shaped space that held the audience glittered with babble +and beauty as Orson Vane took his seat in the stalls. The presence of +the smart set gave the theatre a very garland of charm, of grace, and of +beauty's bud and blossom. The stalls were radiant, and full of polite +chatter. The boxes wore an air of dignified twilight,—a twilight of +goddesses. The least garish of the goddesses, yet the one holding the +subtlest sway, was Jeanette Vanlief. She sat, in the shadow of an upper +box, with her father and Luke Moncreith. On her pale face the veins +showed, now and then; the flush of rose came to it like a surprise—like +the birth of a new world. She radiated no obvious, blatant fascination. +Her hands slim and white; her voice firm and low; her eyes of a hue like +that of bronze, streaked like the tiger-lilies; her profile sharp as a +cameo's; the nose, with its finely-chiseled nostrils, curved in Roman +mode; the mouth, thin and of the faintest possible red, slightly +drooping. And then, her hair! It held, again, a spray of lilies of the +valley; the artificial lights discovered in the waves and the curls of +it the most unexpected shades, the most mercurial tints. The slight +touch of melancholy that hovered over her merely enhanced her charm. +Moncreith told himself that he would go to the uttermost ends of evil to +win this woman. He had come, the afternoon of that day, through the most +dangerous stream in the world, the stream of loveliness that flows over +certain portions of the town at certain fashionable hours. It is a +stream the eddies of which are of lace and silk; its pools are the blue +of eye and the rose of mouth; its cataracts are skirts that swirl and +whisper and sing of ivory outlines and velvet shadows. Yet, as he looked +at Jeannette Vanlief, all that fascinating, dangerous stream lost its +enticement for him; he saw her as a dream too high for comparison with +the mere earthiness of the town. He felt, with a grim resolution, that +nothing human should come between him and Jeannette.</p> + +<p>Orson Vane, from his chair, paid scant attention to his fellow +spectators. He was intent upon the dish that O'Deigh and Wantage had +prepared for his delectation. He felt a delicious interest in every +line, every situation. He had made up his mind that he would go to the +root of the mystery that men called Arthur Wantage. Whether that mask +concealed a real, high intelligence, or a mere, cunning, monkeylike +facility in imitation—his was to be the solution of that question. +Wrapped up in that thought he never so much as glanced toward the box +where his friends sat.</p> + +<p>At the end of the first act Vane strolled out into the lobby. He nodded +hither and thither, but he felt no desire for nearer converse. A hand on +his shoulder brought him face to face with Professor Vanlief. He was +asked to come up to the box. He listened, gravely, to the Professor's +words, and thanked him. So Moncreith was smitten? He smiled in a kindly +way; he understood, now, the many brusqueries of his friend. That day, +long ago, when he had been so inexplicable in the little bookshop; the +many other occasions, since then, when Luke had been rude and bitter. A +man in love was never to be reckoned on. He wished Luke all the luck in +the world. It struck him but faintly that he himself had once longed for +that sweet daughter of Augustus Vanlief's; he told himself that it was a +dream he must put away. He was a mariner bent on many deep-sea voyages +and many hazards of fate; it would be unfair to ask any woman to share +in any such life. His life would be devoted to furthering the +Professor's discoveries; he meant to be an adventurer into the regions +of the human soul; it was a land whither none could follow.</p> + +<p>Perhaps, if he had seen Jeannette, he might have felt no such +resignation. His mood was so tense in its devotion to the puzzle +presented by the player, Wantage, that the news brought him by Vanlief +did not suffice to rouse him. He had a field of his own; that other one +he was content to leave to Moncreith.</p> + +<p>Moncreith, in the meanwhile, was making the most of the opportunity the +Professor, in the kindness of his heart, had given him. The orchestra +was playing a Puccini potpourri. It rose feebly against the prattle and +the chatter and the hissing of the human voices. Moncreith, at first, +found only the most obvious words.</p> + +<p>"A trifle bitter, the play," he said, "rather like a sneer, don't you +think?"</p> + +<p>"Well," granted Jeannette, indolently, "I suppose it is not called +'Voltaire' for nothing. And there are moods that such a play might +suit."</p> + +<p>"No doubt. But—do you think one can be bitter, when one loves?"</p> + +<p>The girl looked up in wonder. She blushed. The melancholy did not leave +her face. "Bitter? Love?" she echoed. "They spell the same thing."</p> + +<p>"Oh," he urged, "the play has made you morbid. As for me, I have heard +nothing, seen nothing, but you. The bitterness of the play has skimmed +by me, that is all; I have been in too sweet a dream to let those people +on the stage—"</p> + +<p>"How Wantage would rage if he heard you," said the girl. She felt what +was coming, and she meant to fence as well as she could to avoid it.</p> + +<p>"Wantage? Bother Wantage!" He leaned down to her, and whispered, +"Jeannette!"</p> + +<p>The flush on her cheek deepened, but she did not stir. It was as if she +had not heard. She shut her eyes. All her weapons dropped at once. She +knew it had to come; she knew, too, that, in this crisis, her heart +stood plainly legible to her. Moncreith's name was not there.</p> + +<p>"Jeannette," Moncreith went on, in his vibrant whisper, "don't you guess +what dream I have been living in for so long? Don't you know that it is +you, you, you—" He faltered, his emotions outstriding his words. "It is +you," he finished, "that spell happiness for me. I—oh, is there no +other, less crude way of putting it?—I love you, Jeannette! And you?"</p> + +<p>He waited. The chattering and light laughter in the stalls and +throughout the house seemed to lull into a mere hushed murmur, like the +fluttering and twittering of a thousand birds. Moncreith, in his tense +expectation, had heed only for the face of the girl beside him. He did +not see, in the aisle below, Orson Vane, sauntering to his seat. He did +not follow the direction of Jeannette Vanlief's eyes, the instant before +she turned, and answered.</p> + +<p>"I wish you had not spoken. I can't say anything—anything that you +would like. Please, please—" She shook her head, in evident distress.</p> + +<p>"Ah," he burst out, "then it is true, after all, what I have feared. It +is true that you prefer that—that—"</p> + +<p>She stayed him with a quick look.</p> + +<p>"I did not say I preferred anyone. I simply said that you must consider +the question closed. I am sorry, oh, so sorry. I wish a man and a woman +could ever be friends, in this world, without risking either love or +hate."</p> + +<p>"All the same," he muttered, fiercely, "I believe you prefer that +fellow—"</p> + +<p>"Orson Vane's downstairs," said the Professor entering the box at that +moment.</p> + +<p>"That damned chameleon!" So Moncreith closed, under his breath, his just +interrupted speech.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XIV" id="CHAPTER_XIV"></a>CHAPTER XIV.</h3> + + +<p>A little before the end of that performance of "Voltaire," Orson Vane +made his way to Arthur Wantage's dressing-room. They had, in their +character of men in some position of eminence in different phases of the +town's life, a slight acquaintance. They met, now and then, at the +Mummers' Club. Vane's position put him above possibility of affront by +Wantage in even the most arrogant and mannerless of the latter's moods.</p> + +<p>Vane's invitation to a little supper, a little chat, and a little smoke, +just for the duet of them, brought forth Wantage's most winning smile of +acquiescence.</p> + +<p>"Delighted, dear chap," he vowed. He could be, when he chose, the most +winning of mortals. He was, during the drive to Vane's house, an +admirable companion. He told stories, he made polite rejoinders, he was +all glitter and graciousness. But it was when he was seated to an +appetizing little supper that he became most splendid.</p> + +<p>"My dear Vane," he said, lifting a glass to the light, "you should write +me a play. I am sure you could do it. These fellows who are in the mere +business of it,—well, they are really impossible. They are so vulgar, +so dreadful to do business with. I hate business, I am a child in such +affairs; everyone cheats me. I mean to have none but gentlemen on my +business staff next season. The others grate on me, Vane, they grate. +And if I could only gather a company of actors who were also +gentlemen—Oh, I assure you, one cannot believe what things I endure. +The stupidity of actors!" He pronounced the word as if it were accented +on the last syllable. He raised his eyes to heaven as he faltered in +description of the stupidities he had to contend with.</p> + +<p>"Write a play?" said Orson, "I fear that would be out of my line. I +merely live, you know; I do not describe."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I think you would be just the man. You would give me a play that +society would like. You would make no mistakes of taste. And think, my +dear fellow, just think of the prestige my performance would give you. +It would be the making of you. You would be launched. You would need no +other recommendation. When you approach any of these manager fellows all +you have to do is to say, 'Wantage is doing a play of mine.' That is a +hallmark; it means success for a young man."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps. But I have no ambitions in that way. How do you like my +Bonnheimer?"</p> + +<p>"H'm—not bad, Vane, not bad. But you should taste my St. Innesse. It is +a '74. I got it from the cellars of the Duke of Arran. You know Merrill, +the wine-merchant on Broadway? Shrewd fellow! Always keeps me in mind; +whenever he sees a sale of a good cellar on the other side, he puts in a +bid; knows he can always depend on Wantage taking the bouquet of it off +his hands. You must take dinner with me some night, and try that St. +Innesse. Ex-President Richards told me, the other evening, that it was +the mellowest vintage he had tasted in years. You know Richards? Oh, you +should, you should!"</p> + +<p>Vane listened, quietly amused. The vanity, the egoism of this player +were so obvious, so transparent, so blatant. He wondered, more than +ever, what was under that mask of arrogance and conceit. The perfect +frankness of the conceit made it almost admirable.</p> + +<p>"You know," Wantage remarked presently, "I'm really playing truant, +taking supper with you. I ought to be studying."</p> + +<p>"A new play?"</p> + +<p>"No. My curtain speech for to-morrow night. It's the last night of the +season, and they expect it of me, you know. I've vowed, time and again, +I would never make another curtain-speech in my life, but they will have +them, they will have them!" He sighed, in submission to his fate. Then +he returned to a previous thought. "I wish, though," he said, "that I +could persuade you to do a play for me. Think it over! Think of the name +it would give you. Or you might try managing me. Eh, how does that +strike you? Such a relief to me if I could deal with a gentleman. You +have no idea—the cads there are in the theatre! They resent my being a +man who tries to prove a little better educated than themselves. They +hate me because I am college-bred, you know; they prefer actors who +never read. How many books do you think I read before I attempted +<i>Voltaire</i>? A little library, I tell you. And then the days I spent in +noting the portraits! I traveled France in my search. For the actor who +takes historic characters there cannot be too many documents. +Imagination alone is not enough. And then the labor of making the play +presentable; I wish you could see the thing as it first came to me! You +would think a man like O'Deigh would have taken into consideration the +actor? But no; the play, as O'Deigh left it, might have been for a stock +company. <i>Frederick the Great</i> was as fine a part as my own. Oh, they +are numbskulls. And the rehearsals! Actors are sheep, simply sheep. The +papers say I am a brute at rehearsals. My dear Vane, I swear to you that +if Nero were in my place he would massacre all the minor actors in the +land. And they expect the salaries of intelligent persons!"</p> + +<p>Vane, listening, wondered why Wantage, under such an avalanche of +irritations, continued such life. Gradually it dawned on him that all +this fume and fret was merely part of the man's mummery; it was his +appeal to the sympathy of his audience; his argument against the +reputation his occasional exhibitions of rage and waywardness had given +him.</p> + +<p>Vane's desire to penetrate the surface of this conscious imitator, this +fellow who slipped off this character to assume that, grew keener and +keener. Where, under all this crust of alien form and action, was the +individual, human thought and feeling? Or was there any left? Had the +constant corrosion of simulated emotions burnt out all the original +character of the mind?</p> + +<p>Vane could not sufficiently hasten the end for which he had invited +Wantage.</p> + +<p>"You are," he said presently, as a lull in the other's monologue allowed +him an opening, "something of an amateur of tapestry, of pictures, of +bijouterie. I have a little thing or two, in my dressing-room, that I +wish you would give me an opinion on."</p> + +<p>They took their cigarettes into the adjoining dressing-room. Wantage +went, at once, to the mirrors.</p> + +<p>"Ah, Florence, I see." He frowned, in critical judgment; he went humming +about the room, singing little German phrases to the pictures, snatches +of chansonettes to the tapestries. He was very enjoyable as a spectacle, +Vane told himself. He tiptoed over the room, now in the mode of his +earliest success, "The King of Dandies," now in the half limping style +of his "Rigoletto."</p> + +<p>"You should have seen the Flemish things I had!" he declared. That was +his usual way of noting the belongings of others; they reminded him of +his own superior specimens. "I sold them for a song, at auction. Don't +you think one tires of one's surroundings, after a time? People go to +the hills and the seashore, because they tire of town. I have the same +feeling about pictures, and furniture, and bric-a-brac. After a time, +they tire me. I have to get rid of them. I sell them at auction. People +are always glad to bid for something that has belonged to Arthur +Wantage. But everything goes for a song. Oh, it is ruinous, ruinous." He +peered, and pirouetted about the corners. "Ah," he exclaimed, "and here +is something covered up! A portrait? Something rare?" He posed in front +of it, affecting the most devouring curiosity.</p> + +<p>"A sort of portrait," said Vane, touching the cord at back of the +mirror.</p> + +<p>"Ah," said Wantage, gazing, "you are right. A sort of portrait." And he +laughed, feebly, feebly. "That Bonnheimer," he muttered, "a deuce of a +wine!" He clutched at a chair, reeling into it.</p> + +<p>Vane, passing to the mirror's face, took what image it turned to him, +and then, leisurely, replaced the curtain.</p> + +<p>He surveyed the figure in the chair for a moment or so. Then he called +Nevins. "Nevins," he said, "where the devil are you? Never where you're +wanted. What does one pay servants outrageous wages for! They conspire +to cheat one, they all do. Nevins!" Nevins appeared, wide-eyed at this +outburst. He was prepared for many queer exhibitions on the part of his +master, but this—this, to a faithful servant! He stood silent, +expectant, reproachful.</p> + +<p>"Nevins," his master commanded, "have this—this actor put to bed. Use +the library; make the two couches serve. He'll stay here for twenty-four +hours; you understand, twenty-four hours. You will take care of him. The +wine was badly corked, to-night, Nevins. You grow worse every day. You +are in league to drive me distracted. It is an outrage. Why do you stand +there, and shake, in that absurd fashion? It makes me quite nervous. Do +go away, Nevins, go away!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XV" id="CHAPTER_XV"></a>CHAPTER XV.</h3> + + +<p>The papers of that period are all agreed that the eminent actor, Arthur +Wantage, was never seen to more advantage than on the last night of that +particular season. His <i>Voltaire</i> had never been a more brilliant +impersonation. The irony, the cruelty of the character had rarely come +out more effectively; the ingenuity of the dialogue was displayed at its +best.</p> + +<p>Yet, as a matter of fact, Arthur Wantage, all that day and evening, was +in Orson Vane's house, subject to a curious mental and spiritual aphasia +that afterwards became a puzzle to many famous physicians.</p> + +<p>The <i>Voltaire</i> was Orson Vane.</p> + +<p>It was the final triumph of Professor Vanlief's thaumaturgy. Vane was +now in possession of the entire mental vitality sufficient for playing +the part of the evening; the lines, the every pose, came to him +spontaneously, as if he were machinery moving at another's guidance. The +detail of entering the theatre unobserved had been easy; it was dusk and +he was muffled to the eyes. Afterwards, it was merely a matter of +pigment and paints. His fingers found the use of the colors and powders +as easily as his mind held the words to be spoken. There was not a +soul, in the company, in the audience, that did not not find the +<i>Voltaire</i> of that night the <i>Voltaire</i> of the entire season.</p> + +<p>Above the mere current of his speeches and his displayed emotions Orson +Vane found a tide of exaltation bearing him on to a triumphant feeling +of contempt for his audience. These sheep, these herdlings, these +creatures of the fashion, how fine it was to fling into their faces the +bitter taunts of a <i>Voltaire</i>, to see them take them smilingly, +indulgently. They paid him his price, and he hated them for it. He felt +that they did not really understand the half of the play's delicate +finesse; he felt their appreciation was a sham, a pose, a bit of mummery +even more contemptible than his own, since they paid to pose, while he, +at least, had the satisfaction of their money.</p> + +<p>The curtain-fall found him aglow with the splendor of his success. The +two personalties in him joined in a fever of triumph. He, Orson Vane, +had been <i>Voltaire</i>; he would yet be all the other geniuses of history. +He would prove himself the greatest of them all, since he could simulate +them all. A certain vein of petty cunning ran under the major emotion; +Orson Vane laughed to think how he had despoiled Arthur Wantage of his +very temperament, his art, his spirit. This same cunning admonished, +too, the prompt return of Wantage's person, after the night was over, to +the Wantage residence.</p> + +<p>The commotion "in front" brought Orson to a sense of the immediate +moment. The cries for a speech came over a crackling of hand-claps. He +waited for several minutes. It was not well to be too complaisant with +one's public. Then he gave the signal to the man at the curtain, and +moved past him, to the narrow space behind the lights. He bowed. It had +the very air of irony, had that bow. It does not seem humanly possible +to express irony in a curving in the spine, a declension of the head, a +certain pose of the hands, but Vane succeeded, just as Wantage had so +often succeeded, in giving that impression. The bow over, he turned to +withdraw. Let them wait, let them chafe I Commuters were missing the +last trains for the night? So much the better! They would not forget him +so easily.</p> + +<p>When he finally condescended to stride before the curtain again, it was +a lift of the eyebrows, a little gesture, an air that said, quite +plainly: Really, it is very annoying of you. If I were not very gracious +indeed I should refuse to come out again. I do so, I assure you, under +protest.</p> + +<p>He gave a little, delicate cough, he lifted his eyes. At that the house +became still, utterly still.</p> + +<p>He began without any vocative at all.</p> + +<p>"The actor," he said, "who wins the applause of so distinguished a +company is exceedingly fortunate. The applause of such a very +distinguished company—" he succeeded in emphasizing his phrase to the +point where it became a subtle insult—"is very sweet to the actor. It +reconciles him to what he must take to be a breach of true art, the +introduction of his own person on the scene where he has appeared as an +impersonator of character. Some actors are expected to make speeches +after their exertions should be over. I am one of those poor actors. In +the name of myself, a poor actor, and the poor actors in my company, I +must thank this distinguished body of ladies and gentlemen for the +patience with which they have listened to Mr. O'Deigh's little trifle. +It is, of course, merely a trifle, <i>pour passer le temps</i>. Next season, +I hope, I may give you a really serious production. Mr. O'Deigh cables +me that he is happy such distinguished persons in such a critical town +have applauded his little effort. I am sure ever so many of you would +rather be at home than listening to the apologies of a poor actor. For I +feel I must apologize for presenting so inconsiderable a trifle. A mere +summer night's amusement. I have played it as a sort of rest for myself, +as preparation for larger productions. If I have amused you, I am +pleased. The actors' province is to please. The poor actor thanks you."</p> + +<p>He bowed, and the bewildered company who had heard him to the end, +clapped their hands a little. The newspaper men smiled at one another; +they had been there before. The old question of "Why does he do it?" no +longer stirred in them. They were used to Wantage's vagaries.</p> + +<p>The newspapers of the following day had Wantage's speech in full. The +critics wrote editorials on the necessity for curbing this player's +arrogance. The public was astonished to find that it had been insulted, +but it took the press' word for it. Wantage had made that sort of thing +the convention; it was the fashion to call these curtain speeches an +insult, yet to invoke them as eagerly as possible. The widespread +advertising that accrued to Wantage from this episode enabled his +manager to obtain, in his bookings for the following season, an even +higher percentage than usual. To that extent Orson Vane's imitation of +an imitator benefited his subject. In other respects it left Wantage a +mere walking automaton.</p> + +<p>It was fortunate that the closing time for Wantage's theatre was now on. +There was no hitch in Vane's plan of transporting Wantage to his home +quarters; the servants at the Wantage establishment found nothing +unusual in their master having been away for a day and a night; he was +too frequently in the habit, when his house displeased him in some +detail, to stay at hotels for weeks and months at a time; his household +was ready for any vagary. Indisposition was nothing new with him, +either; in reality and affectation these lapses from well-being were not +infrequent with the great player. The doctor told him he needed +rest—rest and sea-air; there was nothing to worry over; he had been +working too hard, that was all.</p> + +<p>So the shell of what had been Wantage proceeded to a watering-place, +while the kernel, now a part of Orson Vane, proceeded to astonish the +town with its doings and sayings.</p> + +<p>Practice had now enabled Vane to control, with a certain amount of +consciousness, whatsoever alien spirit he took to himself. Vigorous and +alert as was the mumming temperament he was now in possession of, he yet +contrived to exert a species of dominance over it; he submitted to it in +the mode, the expression of his character, yet in the main-spring of his +action he had it in subjection. He had reached, too, a plane from which +he was able, more than on any of the other occasions, to enjoy the +masquerade he knew himself taking part in. He realized, with a +contemptuous irony, that he was playing the part of one who played many +parts. The actor in him seemed, intellectually, merely a personified +palimpsest; the mind was receptive, ready to echo all it heard, keen to +reproduce traits and tricks of other characters.</p> + +<p>He held in himself, to be brief, a mirror that reflected whatever +crossed its face; the base of that mirror itself was as characterless, +as colorless, as the mere metal and glass. Superficialities were caught +with a skill that was astonishing; little tricks of manner and speech +were reproduced to the very dot upon the i; yet, under all the raiment +of other men's merely material attributes, there was no change of soul +at all; no transformation touched the little ego-screaming soul of the +actor.</p> + +<p>The superficial, in the meanwhile, was enough to make the town gossip +not a little about the newest diversions of Orson Vane. He talked, now, +of nothing but the theatre and the arts allied to it. He purposed doing +some little comedies at Newport in the course of the summer that was now +beginning. He eyed all the smart women of his acquaintance with an air +that implied either, "I wonder whether you could be cast for a girl I +must make love to," or, "You would be passable in <i>Prince Hal</i> attire." +At home, to his servants, Vane was abominable. When the dreadful +champagne, that some impulse possessed him to buy of a Broadway +swindler, proved as flat as the Gowanus, his language to Nevins was +quite contemptible. "What," he shrieked, "do I pay you for? Tell me +that! This splendid wine spoiled, spoiled, utterly unfit for a gentleman +to drink, and all by your negligence. It is enough to turn one's mind. +It is an outrage. A splendid wine. And now—look at it!" As a conclusion +he threw the stuff in Nevins' face. Nevins made no answer at all. He +wiped the sour mess from his coat with the same air of apology that he +would have used had he spilt a glass himself. But his emotions were none +the less. They caused him, in the privacy of the servants' quarters, to +do what he had not done in years, to drop his h's. "It's the 'ost's +place," said Nevins, mournfully, "to entertain his guests, and not +bully the butler." Which, as a maxim, was valid enough, save that, in +this special case, the guests had come to look upon Vane's treatment of +the servants as part of the entertainment a dinner with him would +provide.</p> + +<p>Another distress that fell to the lot of poor Nevins was the fact that +his master was become averse to the paying of bills. The profanity fell +upon Nevins from both the duns and the dunned.</p> + +<p>"The man from Basser's, Mr. Vane, sir," Nevins would announce, timidly. +"Can't get him to go away at all, sir."</p> + +<p>"Basser's, Basser's? Oh—that tailor fellow. An impudent creature, to +plague me so, when I do him the honor of wearing his coats; they fit +very badly, but I put up with that because I want to help the fellow on. +And what is my reward? He pesters me, pesters me. Tell him—tell him +anything, Nevins. Only do leave me alone; I am very busy, very nervous. +I am going to write a comedy for myself. I have some water-colors to +paint for Mrs. Carlos; I have a ride in the Park, and ever so many other +things to do to-day, and you bother me with pestiferous tailors. Nevins, +you are, you are—"</p> + +<p>But Nevins quietly bowed himself out before he learned what new thing he +was in his master's eyes.</p> + +<p>A malady—for it surely is no less than a malady—for attempting cutting +speeches at any time and place possessed Vane. Shortsightedness was +another quality now obvious in him. He knew you to-day, to-morrow he +looked at you with the most unseeing eyes. His voice was the most +prominent organ in whatever room or club he happened to be; when he +spoke none else could be intelligible. When he knew himself observed, +though alone, he hummed little snatches to himself. His gait took on a +mincing step. There was not a moment, not a pose of his that had not its +forethought, its deliberation, its premeditated effect.</p> + +<p>The gradual increase in the publicity that was part of the penalty of +being in the smart world had made approachment between the stage and +society easier than ever before. Orson Vane's bias toward the theatre +did not displease the modish. Rumors as to this and that heroine of a +romantic divorce having theatric intentions became frequent. The gowns +of actresses were copied by the smart quite as much as the smart set's +gowns were copied by actresses. The intellectual factor had never been +very prominent in the social attitude toward the stage; it was now +frankly admitted that good-looking men and handsome dresses were as much +as one went to the theatre for. Theatrical people had a wonderful claim +upon the printer's ink of the continent; society was not averse to +borrowing as much of that claim as was possible. Compliments were +exchanged with amiable frequence; smart people married stage favorites, +and the stage looked to the smart for its recruits.</p> + +<p>Orson Vane could not have shown his devotion to the mummeries of the +stage at a better time. He gained, rather than lost, prestige.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XVI" id="CHAPTER_XVI"></a>CHAPTER XVI.</h3> + + +<p>It was the fashionable bathing hour at the most exclusive summer resort +on the Atlantic coast. The sand in front of the Surf Club was dotted +with gaudy tents and umbrellas. Persons whom not to know was to be +unknowable were picturesquely distributed about the club verandahs in +wicker chairs and lounges. The eye of an artist would have been +distracted by the beauties that were suggested in the half-lifted skirts +of this beauty, and revealed in the bathing-suit of that one. The little +waves that came politely rippling up the slope of sand seemed to know +what was expected of them; they were in nowise rude. They may have +longed to ruffle this or that bit of feminine frippery, but they +refrained. They may have ached to drown out Orson Vane's voice as he +said "good morning" to everybody in and out of the water; but they +permitted themselves no such luxury.</p> + +<p>Orson Vane was a beautiful picture as he entered the water. His suit was +immaculate; a belt prevented the least wrinkle in his jersey; a rakish +sombrero gave his head a sort of halo. He poised a cigarette in one +hand, keeping himself afloat with the other. He bowed obsequiously to +all the pretty women; he invited all the rich ones to tea and toast—"We +always have a little tea and toast at my cottage on Sundays, you know; +you'll meet only nice-looking people, really; we have a jolly time." +Most of the men he was unable to see; the sunlight on the water did make +such a glare.</p> + +<p>On the raft Orson Vane found the only Mrs. Carlos.</p> + +<p>"If it were not for you, Mrs. Carlos," he assured her, "the ocean would +be quite unfashionable."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Carlos smiled amiably. Speeches of that sort were part of the +tribute the world was expected to pay her. She asked him if the yachts +in the harbor were not too pretty for anything.</p> + +<p>"No," said Vane, "no. Most melancholy sight. Bring up the wickedness of +man, whenever I look at them. I bought a yacht you know, early in the +summer. Liked her looks, made an offer, bought her. A swindle, Mrs. +Carlos, an utter swindle. A disgraceful hulk. And now I can't sell her. +And my cook is a rascal. Oh—don't mention yachts! And my private car, +Mrs. Carlos, you cannot imagine the trials I endure over that! The +railroads overcharge me, and the mob comes pottering about with those +beastly cameras. Really, you know, I am thinking of living abroad. The +theatre is better supported in Europe. I am thinking of devoting my life +to the theatre altogether. It is the one true passion. It shows people +how life should be lived; it is at once a school of morals and +comportment." He peered into the water near the raft. Then he plunged +prettily into the sea. "I see that dear little Imogene," he told Mrs. +Carlos, as he swam off. Imogene was the little heiress of the house of +Carlos; a mere schoolgirl. It was one of Vane's most deliberate appeals +for public admiration, this worship of the society of children. He +gamboled with all the tots and blossoms he could find. He knew them all +by name; they dispelled his shortsightedness marvelously.</p> + +<p>After a proper interval Vane appeared, in the coolest of flannels, on +the verandah of the Club. He bowed to all the women, whether he knew +them or not; he peered under the largest picture hats with an air that +said "What sweet creature is hidden here?" as plainly as words.</p> + +<p>Someone asked him why he had not been to the Casino the night before.</p> + +<p>"Oh," he sighed, "I was fearfully busy."</p> + +<p>"Busy?" The word came in a tone of reproach. A suspicion of any sort of +toil will brand one more hopelessly in the smart set of America than in +any other; one may pretend an occupation but one may not profess it in +actuality.</p> + +<p>"Oh, terribly busy," said Vane. "I am writing a comedy. I have decided +that we must make authorship smarter than it has been. I shall sacrifice +myself in that attempt. You've noticed that not one writing-chap in a +million knows anything about our little world except what is not true? +Yes; it's unmistakable. An entirely false impression of us is given to +the world at large. The real picture of us must come from one of +ourselves."</p> + +<p>"And you will try it?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. I shall do my very best. When it is finished I want you all to +play parts in it. We must do something for the arts, you know. Why not +the arts, as well as tailors and milliners? By the way, I want you all +to come to my little lantern-dance to-night, on the <i>Beaurivage</i>. It is +something quite novel. You must all come disguised as flowers. There +will be no lights but Chinese lanterns. I shall have launches ready for +you at the Casino landing. My cook is quite sober to-day, and the yacht +is as presentable as if she were not an arrant fraud. I mean to have a +dance that shall fit the history of society in America. For that reason +the newspapers must know nothing about it. There can be no history where +there are newspapers. I shall invite nobody who knows how to write; I am +the only one whose taste I can trust. Some people write to live, and +some live to write, and the worst class of all are merely dying to +write. They are all barred to-night. We must try and break all the +conventions. Conventions are like the strolling players: made to be +broke."</p> + +<p>He rattled on in this way, with painful efforts at brilliance, for quite +a time. His hearers really considered it brilliance and listened +patiently. Summer was not their season for intellectual exertion; it +might be a virtue in others, in themselves it would have been a mistake.</p> + +<p>The lantern-dance on Orson Vane's <i>Beaurivage</i> was, as everyone will +remember, an event of exceeding picturesqueness. Mrs. Sclatersby +appeared as a carnation; Mrs. Carlos as a rose. Some of the younger and +divinely figured women appeared as various blossoms that necessitated +imitation of part of Rosalind's costume under the trees. The slender, +tapering stem of one white lily, fragrant and delicious, lingered long +in the memories of the men who were there.</p> + +<p>A sensation was caused by the arrival of Mrs. Barrett Weston. She came +in a scow, seated on her automobile. A shriek of delight from the +company greeted her. The weary minds of the elect were really tickled by +this conceit. The automobile was arranged to imitate a crysanthemum. +Just before she alighted Mrs. Barrett Weston touched a hidden lever and +the automobile began to grind out a rag-time tune.</p> + +<p>A stranger, approaching the <i>Beaurivage</i> at that moment, might have +fancied himself in the politest ward of the most insane of asylums. But +Orson Vane found it all most delightful. It was the affair of the +season.</p> + +<p>"Look," he cried, in the midst of a game of leapfrog in which a number +of the younger guests had plunged with desperate glee, "there is the +moon. How pitably weak she seems, against this brilliance here! It bears +out the theory that art is always finer than nature, and that the +theatre is more picturesque than life. Look at what we are doing, this +moment! We are imitating pleasure. And will you show me any unconscious +pleasure that is so delightful as this?"</p> + +<p>By the time people had begun to feel a polite hunger Vane had completed +his scheme of having several unwieldy barges brought alongside the +<i>Beaurivage</i>. There were two of the clumsy but roomy decks on either +side of the slender, shapely yacht. Over this now quite wide space the +tables were arranged. While the supper went on, Orson Vane did a little +monologue of his own. Nobody paid any attention, but everyone applauded.</p> + +<p>"What a scene for a comedy," he explained, proudly surveying the picture +of the gaiety before him, "what a delicious scene! It is almost real. I +must write a play around it. I have quite made up my mind to devote my +life to the theatre. It is the only real life. It touches the emotions +at all points; it is not isolated in one narrow field of personality. +Have I your permission to put you all in my play? How sweet of you! I +shall have a scene where we all race in automobiles. We will be quite +like dear little children who have their donkey-races. But I think +automobiles are so much more intelligent than donkeys, don't you? And +they have such profound voices! Have you ever noticed the intonation of +the automobiles here? That one of Mrs. Barrett Weston has a delicate +tenor; it is always singing love-songs as if it were tired of life. Then +we have bassos, and baritones, and repulsive falsettos. My automobile +has a voice like a phonograph. When it bubbles along the avenue I can +hear, as plainly as anything, that it is imitating one of the other +automobiles. Some automobiles, I suppose, have the true instinct for the +theatre. Have you noticed how theatric some of the things are, how they +contrive to run away just when everyone is looking?"</p> + +<p>"Just like horses," murmured one of his listeners.</p> + +<p>"Oh, no; I wouldn't say that. Horses have a merely natural intelligence; +it is nothing like the splendidly artificial reasoning of the +automobile. The poor horse, I really pity him! He has nothing before him +but polo. But how thankful he should be to polo. He was a broncho with +disreputable manners; now he is a polo-pony with a neat tail. In time, I +dare say, the horse can learn some of the higher civilization of the +automobile, just as society may still manage to be as intelligent as the +theatre."</p> + +<p>The conclusion of that entertainment marked the height of Orson Vane's +peculiar fame. The radical newspapers caught echoes of it and invented +what they could not transcribe. The young men who owned newspapers had +not been invited by Orson Vane, because, in spite of his theatric mania, +he had no illusions about the decency of metropolitan journalism. He +avowed that the theatre might be a trifle highflavored, but it had, at +the least, nothing of the hypocrisy that smothers the town in lies +to-day and reads it a sermon to-morrow. The most conspicuous of these +newspaper owners went into something like convulsions over what he +called the degeneracy of our society. Himself most lamentably in a state +of table-d'hotage, this young man trumpeted forth the most bitter +editorials against Orson Vane and his doings. He frothed with +anarchistic ravings. Finally, since the world will always listen if you +only make noise loud enough and long enough, the general public began to +believe that Vane was really a dreadful person. He was a leader in the +smart set; he stood for the entire family. His taste for the theater +would debauch all society. His egoisms would spoil what little of the +natural was left in the regions of Vanity Fair. So went the chatter of +the man-on-the-street, that mighty power, whom the most insignificant of +little men-behind-the-pen can move at will.</p> + +<p>One may be ever so immersed in affairs that are not of the world and its +superficial doings, yet it is almost impossible to escape some faint +echo of what the world is chattering about. Professor Vanlief, who had +betaken himself and Jeanette, for the summer, to a little place in the +mountains, was finally routed out of his peace by the rumors concerning +Orson Vane. The give and take of conversation, even at a little +farm-house in the hills, does not long leave any prominent subject +untouched. So Augustus Vanlief one morning bought all the morning +papers.</p> + +<p>He found more than he had wanted. The editorials against the doings of +the smart set, the reports of the sermons preached against their +goings-on, were especially pregnant that morning.</p> + +<p>In another part of the paper he found a line or two, however, that +brought him sharply to a sense of necessary action. The lines were +these:</p> + +<blockquote><p>"Mr. Arthur Wantage is still seriously ill at Framley +Lodge. Unless a decided turn for the better takes place +very shortly, it is doubtful if he can undertake his +starring season at the usual time this year." </p></blockquote> + +<p>Augustus Vanlief saw what no other mortal could have guessed. He saw the +connection between those two newspaper items, the one about Vane and the +one about Wantage.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XVII" id="CHAPTER_XVII"></a>CHAPTER XVII</h3> + +<p>Professor Vanlief lost no time in inventing an excuse for his immediate +departure. Jeannette would be well looked after. He got a few +necessaries together and started for Framley Lodge. After some delay he +obtained an interview with the distinguished patient.</p> + +<p>"Try," urged Vanlief, "to tell me when this illness came upon you. Was +it after your curtain-speech at the end of last season?"</p> + +<p>Wantage looked with blank and futile eyes. "Curtain-speech? I made +none."</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes. Try to remember! It made a stir, did that speech of yours. Try +to think what happened that day!"</p> + +<p>"I made no speech. I remember nothing. I am Wantage, I think. Wantage. I +used to act, did I not?" He laughed, feebly. It was melancholy to watch +him. He could eat and drink and sleep; he had the intelligence of an +echo. Each thought of his needed a stimulant.</p> + +<p>Vanlief persisted, in spite of melancholy rebuffs. There was so much at +stake. This man's whole career was at stake. And, if matters were not +mended soon, the evil would be under way; the harm would have begun. It +meant loss, actual loss now, and one could scarcely compute how much +ruin afterwards. And he, Vanlief, would be the secret agent of this +ruin! Oh, it was monstrous! Something must be done. Yet, he could do +nothing until he was sure. To meddle, without absolute certainty, would +be criminal.</p> + +<p>"What do you remember before you fell ill?" he repeated.</p> + +<p>"Oh, leave me alone!" said Wantage. "Isn't the doctor bad enough, +without you. I tell you I remember nothing. I was well, and now I am +ill. Perhaps it was something Orson Vane gave me at supper that night, I +don't remember—"</p> + +<p>"At supper? Vane?" The Professor leaped at the words.</p> + +<p>"Yes. I said so, didn't I? I had supper in his rooms, and then—"</p> + +<p>But Vanlief was gone. He had no time for the amenities now. His age +seemed to leave him as his purpose warmed, and his goal neared. All the +fine military bearing came out again. The people who traveled with him +that day took him for nothing less than a distinguished General.</p> + +<p>At the end of the day he reached Vane's town house. Nevins was all alone +there; all the other servants were on the <i>Beaurivage</i>. The man looked +worn and aged. He trembled visibly when he walked; his nerves were +gone, and he had the taint of spirits on him.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Vanlief, sir," he whined, "it'll be the death of me, will this +place. First he buys a yacht, sir, like I buy a 'at, if you please; and +now I'm to sell the furniture and all the antics. These antics, sir, as +the master 'as collected all over the world, sir. It goes to me 'eart."</p> + +<p>Vanlief, even in his desperate mood, could not keep his smile back. +"Sell the antiques, eh? Well, they'll fetch plenty, I've no doubt. But +if I were you I wouldn't hurry; Mr. Vane may change his mind, you know."</p> + +<p>"Ah," nodded Nevins, brightening, "that's true, sir. You're right; I'll +wait the least bit. It's never too soon to do what you don't want to, +eh, sir? And I gives you my word, as a man that's 'ad places with the +nobility, sir, that the last year's been a sad drain on me system. What +with swearing, sir, and letters I wouldn't read to my father confessor, +sir, Mr. Vane's simply not the man he was at all. Of course, if he says +to sell the furniture, out it goes! But, like as not, he'll come in here +some line day and ask where I've got all his trappings. And then I'll +show him his own letter, and he'll say he never wrote it. Oh, it's a bad +life I've led of late, sir. Never knowing when I could call my soul my +own."</p> + +<p>The phrase struck the Professor with a sort of chill. It was true; if +his discovery went forth upon the world, no man would, in very truth, +know when he could call his soul his own. It would be at the mercy of +every poacher. But he could not, just now, afford reflections of such +wide scope; there was a nearer, more immediate duty.</p> + +<p>"Nevins," he said, "I came about that mirror of mine."</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir. I'm glad of that, sir; uncommon glad. You'll betaking it +away, sir? It's bad luck I've 'ad since that bit of plate come in the +house."</p> + +<p>"You're right. I mean to take it away. But only for a time. Seeing Mr. +Vane's thinking of selling up, perhaps it's just as well if I have this +out of the way for a time, eh? Might avoid any confusion. I set store by +that mirror, Nevins; I'd not like it sold by mistake."</p> + +<p>"Well, sir, if you sets more store by it than the master, I'd like to +see it done, sir. The master's made me life a burden about that there +glass. I've 'ad to watch it like a cat watches a mouse. I don't know now +whether I'd rightly let you take it or not." He scratched his head, and +looked in some quandary.</p> + +<p>"Nonsense, Nevins. You know it's mine as well as you know your own name. +Didn't you fetch it over from my house in the first place, and didn't +you pack it and wrap it under my very eyes?"</p> + +<p>"True, sir; I did. My memory's a bit shaky, sir, these days. You may do +as you like with your own, I'll never dispute that. But Mr. Vane's +orders was mighty strict about the plaguey thing. I wish I may never +see it again. It's been, 'Nevins, let nobody disturb the new mirror!' +and 'Nevins, did anyone touch the new mirror while I was gone?' and +'Nevins, was the window open near the new mirror?' until I fair feel +sick at the sight of it."</p> + +<p>"No doubt," said the professor, impatiently. "Then you'll oblige me by +wrapping it up for shipping purposes as soon as ever you can. I'm going +to take it away with me at once. I suppose there's no chance of Mr. Vane +dropping in here before I bring the glass back, but, if he does, tell +him you acted under my orders."</p> + +<p>"A good riddance," muttered Nevins, losing no time over his task of +covering and securing the mirror. "I'll pray it never comes this way +again," he remarked.</p> + +<p>The professor, after seeing that all danger of injury to the mirror's +exposed parts was over, walked nervously up and down the rooms. He would +have to carry his plan through with force of arms, with sheer +impertinence and energy of purpose. It was an interference in two lives +that he had in view. Had he any right to that? But was he not, after +all, to blame for the fact of the curious transfusion of soul that had +left one man a mental wreck, and stimulated the other's forces to a +course of life out of all character with the strivings of his real soul? +If he had not tempted Orson Vane to these experiments, Arthur Wantage +would never be drooping in the shadow of collapse, and in danger of +losing his proper place in the roll of prosperity. Vanlief shuddered at +thought of what an unscrupulous man might not do with this discovery of +his; what lives might be ruined, what successes built on fraud and +theft? Fraud and theft? Those words were foul enough in the material +things of life; but how much more horrid would they be when they covered +the spiritual realm. To steal a purse, in the old dramatic phrase, was a +petty thing; but to steal a soul—Professor Vanlief found himself +launched into a whirlpool of doubt and confusion.</p> + +<p>He had opened a new, vast region of mental science. He had enabled one +man to pass the wall with which nature had hedged the unforeseen forces +of humanity. Was he to learn that, in opening this new avenue of psychic +activity, he had gone counter to the eternal Scheme of Things, and let +in no divine light, but rather the fierce glare of diabolism?</p> + +<p>His thoughts traversed argument upon argument while Nevins completed his +work. He heard the man's voice, finally, with an actual relief, a +gladness at being recalled to the daring and doing that lay before him.</p> + +<p>When the Professor was gone, a wagon bearing away the precious mirror, +Nevins poured himself out a notably stiff glass of Five-Star.</p> + +<p>"Here's hoping," he toasted the silent room, "the silly thing gets +smashed into everlasting smithereens!"</p> + +<p>And he drowned any fears he might have had to the contrary. This +particular species of time-killing was now a daily matter with Nevins; +the incessant strain upon his nerves of some months past had finally +brought him to the pitch where he had only one haven of refuge left.</p> + +<p>The Professor sped over the miles to Framley Lodge. He took little +thought about meals or sleep. The excitement was marking him deeply; but +he paid no heed to, or was unaware of, that. Arrived at the Lodge a +campaign of bribery and corruption began. Servant after servant had to +be suborned. Nothing but the well-known fame and name of Augustus +Vanlief enabled him, even with his desperate expenditures of tips, to +avert the suspicion that he had some deadly, some covertly inimical end +in view. One does not, at this age of the world, burst into another +man's house and order that man's servants about, without coming under +suspicion, to put it mildly. Fortunately Vanlief encountered, just as +his plot seemed shattering against the rigor of the household +arrangements, the doctor who was in attendance on Wantage. The man +happened to be on the staff of the University where Vanlief held a +chair. He held the older man in the greatest respect; he listened to his +rapid talk with all the patience in the world. He looked astonished, +even uncomprehending, but he shook his shoulders up and down a few times +with complaisance. "There seems no possible harm," he assented.</p> + +<p>"Don't ask me to believe in the curative possibilities, Professor; +but—there can be no harm, that I see. He is not to be unduly excited. A +mirror, you say? You don't think vanity can send a man from illness to +health, do you? Not even an actor can be as vain as that, surely. +However, I shall tell the attendants to see that the thing is done as +quietly as possible. I trust you, you see, to let nothing detrimental +happen. I have to get over to the Port of Pines. I shall give the +orders. Goodbye. I wish I could see the result of your little—h'm, +notion—but I dare say to-morrow will be soon enough."</p> + +<p>And he smiled the somewhat condescending smile of the successful +practitioner who fancies he is addressing a campaigner whose usefulness +is passing.</p> + +<p>The setting up of the professor's mirror, so as to face Wantage's +sickbed, took no little time, no little care, no little exertion. When +it was in place, the professor tiptoed to the actor's side.</p> + +<p>"Well," queried Wantage, "what is it? Medicine? Lord, I thought I'd +taken all there was in the world. Where is it?"</p> + +<p>"No," said the professor, "not medicine. I am going to ask you to look +quite hard at that curtain by the foot of the bed for a moment. I have +something I think may interest you and—"</p> + +<p>As the actor's eyes, in mere physical obedience to the other's +suggestion, took the desired direction, Vanlief tugged at a cord that +rolled the curtain aside, revealing the mirror, which gave Wantage back +the somewhat haggard apparition of himself.</p> + +<p>A few seconds went by in silence. Then Wantage frowned sharply.</p> + +<p>"Gad," he exclaimed, vigorously and petulantly, "what a beastly bad bit +of make-up!"</p> + +<p>The voice was the voice of the man whom the town had a thousand times +applauded as "The King of the Dandies."</p> + +<p>An exceedingly bad quarter of an hour followed for Vanlief. Wantage, now +in full possession of all his mental faculties, abused the Professor up +hill and down dale. What was he doing there? What business had that +mirror there? What good was a covered-up mirror? Where were the +servants? The doctor had given orders? The doctor was a fool. Only the +mere physical infirmity consequent upon being bedridden for so long +prevented Wantage from becoming violent in his rage. Vanlief, sharp as +was his sense of relief at the success of his venture, was yet more +relieved when his bribes finally got his mirror and himself out of the +Lodge. The incident had its humors, but he was too tired, too enervated, +to enjoy them. The very moment of Wantage's recovery of his soul had its +note of ironic comedy; the succeeding vituperation from the restored +actor; Vanlief's own meekness; the marvel and rapacity of the +servants—all these were abrim with chances for merriment. But Vanlief +found himself, for, perhaps, the first time in his life, too old to +enjoy the happy interpretations of life. Into all his rejoicings over +the outcome of this affair there crept the constant doubts, the +ceaseless questionings, as to whether he had discovered a mine of wisdom +and benefit, or a mere addition to man's chances for evil.</p> + +<p>His return journey, his delivery of the mirror into Nevins' unwilling +care, were accomplished by him in a species of daze.</p> + +<p>He had hardly counted upon the danger of his discovery. Was he still +young enough to contend with them?</p> + +<p>Nevins almost flung the mirror to its accustomed place. He unwrapped it +spitefully. When he left the room, the curtain of the glass was flapping +in the wind. Nevins heard the sound quite distinctly; he went to the +sideboard and poured out a brimming potion.</p> + +<p>"I 'opes the wind'll play the Old 'Arry with it," he smiled to himself. +He smiled often that night; he went to bed smiling. His was the cheerful +mode of intoxication.</p> + +<p>Augustus Vanlief reached the cottage in the hills a sheer wreck. He had +left it a hale figure of a man who had ever kept himself keyed up to the +best; now he was old, shaking, trembling in nerves and muscles.</p> + +<p>Jeannette rushed toward him and put her arms around him. She looked her +loving, silent wonder into his weary eyes.</p> + +<p>"Sleep, dear, sleep," said this old, tired man of science, "first let me +sleep."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XVIII" id="CHAPTER_XVIII"></a>CHAPTER XVIII.</h3> + + +<p>Orson Vane, scintillating theatrically by the sea, was in a fine rage +when Nevins ceased to answer his telegrams. Telegrams struck Vane as the +most dramatic of epistles; there was always a certain pictorial effect +in tearing open the envelope, in imagining the hushed expectation of an +audience. A letter—pooh! A letter might be anything from a bill to a +billet. But a telegram! Those little slips of paper struck immediate +terror, or joy, or despair, or confusion; they hit hard, and swiftly. +Certainly he had been hitting Nevins hard enough of late. He had +peppered him with telegrams about the furniture, about the pictures; he +had forbidden one day what he had ordered the day before. It never +occurred to him that Nevins might seek escape from these torments. Yet +that was what Nevins had done. He had tippled himself into a condition +where he signed sweetly for each telegram and put it in the hall-rack. +They made a beautiful, yellow festoon on the mahogany background.</p> + +<p>"Those," Nevins told himself, "is for a gentleman as is far too busy to +notice little things like telegrams."</p> + +<p>Nevins watched that yellow border growing daily with fresh delight.</p> + +<p>He could keep on accepting telegrams just as long as the sideboard held +its strength. Each new arrival from the Western Union drove him to more +glee and more spirits—of the kind one can buy bottled.</p> + +<p>At last Orson Vane felt some alarm creeping through his armor of +dramatic pose. Could Nevins have come to any harm? It was very annoying, +but he would have to go to town for a day or so. That seemed +unavoidable. Just as he had made up his mind to it, he happened to slip +on a bit of lemon-peel. At once he fell into a towering rage. He cursed +the entire service on the <i>Beaurivage</i> up hill and down dale. You could +hear him all over the harbor. It was the voice of a profane Voltaire.</p> + +<p>That night, at the Casino, his rage found vent in action. He sold the +<i>Beaurivage</i> as hastily as he had bought her.</p> + +<p>He left for town, by morning, full of bitterness at the world's +conspiracy to cheat him. He felt that for a careless deck-hand to leave +lemon-peel on the deck of the Beaurivage was nothing less than part of +the world-wide cabal against his peace of mind.</p> + +<p>He reached his town-house in a towering passion, all the accumulated +ill-temper of the last few days bubbling in him. He flung the housedoor +wide, stamped through the halls. "Nevins!" he shouted, "Nevins!"</p> + +<p>Nothing stirred in the house. He entered room after room. Passing into +his dressing-room he almost tore the hanging from its rod. A gust of air +struck him from the wide-open window. Before he proceeded another step +this gust, that his opening of the curtain had produced, lifted the veil +from the mirror facing him. The veil swung up gently, revealed the +glass, and dropped again.</p> + +<p>Then he realized the figure of Nevins on a couch. He walked up to him. +The smell of spirits met him at once.</p> + +<p>"Poor Nevins!" he muttered.</p> + +<p>Then he fell to further realizations.</p> + +<p>The whole history of his three experiments unfolded itself before him. +What, after them all, had he gained? What, save the knowledge of the +littleness of the motives controlling those lives? This actor, this man +the world thought great, whose soul he had held in usurpation, up to a +little while ago, what was he? A very batch of vanities, a mountain of +egoisms. Had there been, in any of the thoughts, the moods he had +experienced from out the mental repertoire of that player, anything +indicative of nobility, of large benevolence, of sweet and light in the +finest human sense? Nothing, nothing. The ambition to imitate the +obvious points of human action and conduct, to the end that one be +called a character-actor; the striving for an echoed fame rightly +belonging to the supreme names of history; a yearning for the stimulus +of immediate acclamation—these things were not worth gaining. To have +experienced them was to have caught nothing beneficial.</p> + +<p>Orson Vane began to consider himself with contempt. Upon himself must +fall the odium of what the souls he had borrowed had induced in him. The +littleness he had fathomed, the depths of character to which he had +sunk, all left their petty brands on him. He had penetrated the barriers +of other men's minds, but what had it profited him? As a ship becalmed +in foul waters takes on barnacles, so had he brought forth, from the +realm of alien springs and motives he had made his own, a dreadful +incrustation of painful conjectures on the supremacy of evil in the +world.</p> + +<p>It needed only a glance at the man, Nevins, to force home the +destructiveness born of these incursions into other lives. That +trembling, cowering thing had been, before Orson Vane's departure from +the limitations of his own temperament, a decent, self-respecting +fellow. While now—</p> + +<p>Vane paced about the house in bitter unrest. In the outer hall he +noticed the yellow envelopes bordering the coat-rack. He took one of +them down, opened it, and smiled. "Poor Nevins!" he murmured. The next +moment a lad from the Telegraph office appeared in the doorway. Vane +went forward himself; there was no use disturbing Nevins.</p> + +<p>The wire had followed him on from the <i>Beaurivage</i>, or rather from the +man to whom he had sold her. It was from Augustus Vanlief. Its brevity +was like a blow in the face.</p> + +<p>"Am ill," it said, "must see you."</p> + +<p>It was still possible, that very hour, to get an express to the +Professor's mountain retreat. There was nothing to prevent immediate +departure. Nothing—except Nevins. The man really must exercise more +care about that mirror. He was safely out of all his experiments now, +but the thing was dangerous none the less; if it had been his own +property, he would have known how to deal with it. But it was the +Professor's secret, the discovery of a lifetime. For elaborate +precautions, or even for hiding the thing in some closet, there was no +time. He could only rouse Nevins as energetically as possible to a sense +of his previous defection from duty; gently and quite kindly he +admonished him to take every care of the new mirror in the time coming. +Nevins listened to him wide-eyed; his senses were still too much agog +for him to realize whence this change of voice and manner had come to +his master. It was merely another page in the chapter of bewilderment +that piled upon him. He bowed his promise to be careful, he assented to +a number of things he could not fathom, and when Vane was gone he +cleared the momentary trouble in his mind by an ardent drink. The liquor +brought him a most humorous notion, and one that he felt sure would +relieve him of all further anxieties on the score of the new mirror. He +approached the back of it, tore the curtain from its face, wheeled it to +the centre of the room, and placed all the other cheval-glasses close +by. Throughout this he had wit enough, or fear enough—for his memory +brought him just enough picture of Orson's own handling of this mirror +to inspire a certain awe of the front of the thing—never to pass in +face of the mirror. When he had the mirrors grouped in close ranks, he +spun about on his heels quickly, as if seized with the devout frenzy of +a dervish. He fell, finally, in a daze of dizziness and liquor. Yet he +had cunning enough left. He crept out of the room on his stomach, like a +snake with fiery breath. He knew that the angle at which the mirrors +were tilted would keep him, belly to the carpet, out of range. Then he +reeled, shouting, into the corridors.</p> + +<p>He had accomplished his desire. He no longer knew one mirror from the +other.</p> + +<p>Orson Vane, in the meanwhile, was being rushed to the mountains. It was +with a new shock of shame that he saw the ravages illness was making on +the fine face of Vanlief. This, too, was one of the items in the +profit-and-loss column of his experiments. Yet this burden was, +perhaps, a shared one.</p> + +<p>"Ah," said Vanlief, with a quick breath of gladness, "thank God!" He +knew, the instant Vane spoke, that it was Orson Vane himself who had +come; he knew that there was no more doubt as to the success of his own +recent headlong journeyings. They had prostrated him; but—they had won. +Yet there was no knowing how far this illness might go; it was still +imperative to come to final, frank conclusions with the partner in his +secret.</p> + +<p>The instant that Vane had been announced Jeannette Vanlief had left her +father's side. She withdrew to the adjoining room, where only a curtain +concealed her; the doors had all been taken down for the summer. She did +not wish to meet Orson Vane. Over her real feelings for him had come a +cloud of doubts and distastes. She had never admitted to herself, +openly, that she loved him; she tried to persuade herself that his +notorious vagaries had put him beyond her pale. She was determined, now, +to be an unseen ear to what might pass between Orson and her father. It +was not a nice thing to do, but, for all she knew, her father's very +life was at stake. What dire influence might Vane not have over her +father? She suspected there was some bond between them; in her father's +weakened state it seemed her duty to watch over him with every devotion +and alertness.</p> + +<p>Yet, for a long time, the purport of the conversation quite eluded her.</p> + +<p>"I have not gone the gamut of humanity," said Orson, "but I have almost, +it seems to me, gone the gamut of my own courage."</p> + +<p>Vanlief nodded. He, too, understood. Consequences! Consequences! How the +consequences of this world do spoil the castles one builds in it! +Castles in the air may be as pretty as you please, but they are sure to +obstruct some other mortal's view of the sky.</p> + +<p>"If I were younger," sighed Vanlief, "if I were only younger."</p> + +<p>They did not yet, either of them, dare to be open, brutal, forthright.</p> + +<p>"I could declare, I suppose," Vanlief went on, "that it was somewhat +your own fault. You chose your victims badly. You have, I presume, been +disenchanted. You found little that was beautiful, many things that were +despicable. The spectacles you borrowed have all turned out smoky. Yet, +consider—there are sure to be just as many rosy spectacles as dark ones +in the world."</p> + +<p>"No doubt," assented Vane, though without enthusiasm, "but there are +still—the consequences. There is still the chance that I could never +repay the soul I take on loan; still the horror of being left to face +the rest of my days with a cuckoo in my brain. Mind, I have no +reproaches, none at all. You overstated nothing. I have felt, have +thought, have done as other men have felt and thought and done; their +very inner secret souls have been completely in my keeping. The +experiment has been a triumph. Yet it leaves me joyless."</p> + +<p>"It has made me old," said Vanlief, simply. "Ah," he repeated, "if only +I were younger!"</p> + +<p>"The strain," he began again, "of putting an end to your last experiment +has told on me. I overdid it. Such emotion, and such physical tension, +is more than I should have attempted. I begin to fear I may not last +very long. And in that case I think I shall have to take my secret with +me. Orson, it comes to this; I am too old to perfect this marvelous +thing to the point where it will be safe for humanity at large. It is +still unsafe,—you will agree to that. You might wreck your own life and +that of others. The chances are one in a thousand of your ever finding a +human being whom God has so graciously endowed with the divine spirit as +to be able to lose part of it without collapse. I have hoped and hoped, +that such a thing would happen; then there would be two perfectly even, +exactly tempered creatures; even if, upon that transfusion, the mirror +disappeared, there would be no unhappiness as a reproach. But we have +found nothing like that. You have embittered yourself; the glimpses of +other souls you have had have almost stripped you of your belief in an +eternal Good."</p> + +<p>"You mean to send for the mirror?"</p> + +<p>"It would be better, wiser. If I live, it will still be here. If I die, +it must be destroyed. In any event—"</p> + +<p>At the actual approach of this conclusion to his experiments Orson Vane +felt a sense of coming loss. With all the dangers, all the loom of +possible disaster, he was not yet rid of the awful fascination of this +soul-snatching he had been engaged in.</p> + +<p>"Perhaps," he argued, "my next experiment might find the one in a +thousand you spoke of."</p> + +<p>"I think you had better not try again. Tell me, what was Wantage's soul +like?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, I cannot put it into words. A little, feverish, fretful soul, +shouting, all the time: I, I, I! Plotting, planning for public +attention, worldly prominence. No thoughts save those of self. An active +brain, all bent on the ego. A brain that deliberately chose the theatre +because it seems the most spectacular avenue to eminence. A magnetism +that keeps outsiders wondering whether childishness or genius lurks +behind the mask. The bacillus of restlessness is in that brain; it is +never idle, always planning a new pose for the body and the voice."</p> + +<p>"Well," urged Vanlief, "think what might have been had I not put a stop +to the thing. You don't realize the terrible anxiety I was in. You might +have ruined the man's career. However petty we, you and I, may hold +him, there are things the world expects of him; we came close to +spoiling all that. I had to act, and quickly. You may fancy the +difficulties of getting the mirror to Wantage. Oh, it is still all like +an evil dream." He lay silent a while, then resumed: "Is the mirror in +the old room?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. With the others, in the dressing-room."</p> + +<p>"Nevins looks out for it?"</p> + +<p>"As always. Though he grows old, too."</p> + +<p>Vanlief looked sharply at Orson, he suspected something behind that +phrase about Nevins. Again he urged:</p> + +<p>"Better have Nevins bring the mirror back to me."</p> + +<p>Vane hesitated. He murmured a reply that Jeannette no longer cared to +hear. The whole secret was open to her, now; she saw that the Orson Vane +she loved—she exulted now in her admission of that—was still the man +she thought him, that all his inexplicable divagations had been part of +this awful juggling with the soul that her father had found the trick +of. She realized, too, by the manner of Vane, that he had not yet given +up all thought of these experiments; he wanted one more. One more; one +more; it was the cry of the drunkard, the opium-eater, the victim of +every form of mania.</p> + +<p>It should never be, that one more trial. What her father had done, she +could do. She glided out of the room, on the heels of her quick +resolution.</p> + +<p>The two men, in their arguments, their widening discussions, did not +bring her to mind for hours. By that that time she was well on her way +to town.</p> + +<p>Her purpose was clear to her; nothing should hinder its achievement. She +must destroy the mirror. There were sciences that were better killed at +the outset. She did not enter deeply into those phases of the question, +but she had the clear determination to prevent further mischief, further +follies on the part of Vane, further chances of her father's collapse.</p> + +<p>The mirror must be destroyed. That was plain and simple.</p> + +<p>It took a tremendous ringing and knocking to bring Nevins to the door of +Vane's house.</p> + +<p>"I am Miss Vanlief," she said, "I want to see my father's mirror."</p> + +<p>"Certainly, miss, certainly." He tottered before her, chuckling and +chattering to himself. He was in the condition now when nothing +surprised him; any rascal could have led him with a word or a hint; he +was immeasurably gay at everything in the world. He reeled to the +dressing-room with an elaborate air of courtesy.</p> + +<p>"At your service, miss, there you are, miss. You walk straight on, and +there you are, miss. There's the mirror, miss, plain as pudding."</p> + +<p>She strode past him, drawing her skirt away from the horrible taint of +his breath. She knew she would find the mirror at once, curtained and +solitary sentinel before the doorway. She would simply break it with her +parasol, stab it, viciously, from behind.</p> + +<p>But, once past the portal, she gave a little cry.</p> + +<p>All the mirrors were jumbled together, all looked alike, and all faced +her, mysterious, glaringly.</p> + +<p>"Nevins," she called out, "which—which is the one?"</p> + +<p>"Ah, miss," he said, leeringly, "don't I wish I knew."</p> + +<p>No sense of possible danger to herself, only a despair at failure, came +upon Jeannette. Failure! Failure! She had meant to avert disaster, and +she had accomplished—nothing, nothing at all.</p> + +<p>She left the house almost in tears. She felt sure Vane would yield again +to the temptation of these frightful experiments. She could do nothing, +nothing. She had felt justified in attempting destruction of what was +her father's; but she could not wantonly offer all that array of mirrors +on the altar of her purpose. She stumbled along the street, suffering, +full of tears. It was with a sigh of relief that she saw a hansom and +hailed it. The cab had hardly turned a corner before Orson Vane, coming +from another direction, let himself into his house. His conference with +Vanlief had ceased at his own promise to make just one more trial of the +mirror. He could not go about the business of the life he led in town +without assuring himself the mirror was safe.</p> + +<p>He found Nevins incoherent and useless. He began to consider seriously +the advisability of discharging the man; still, he hated to do that to +an old servant, and the man might come to his senses and his duties.</p> + +<p>He spent some little time re-arranging the mirrors in his room. He was +sure there had been no intrusion since he was there himself, and he knew +Nevins well enough to know that individual's horror of facing the +mirror. He himself faced the new mirror boldly enough, sure that his own +image was the only one resting there. He knew the mirror easily, in +spite of the robbery that the wind, as he thought, had committed.</p> + +<p>Nevins, hiding in the corridor, watched him, in drunken amusement.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XIX" id="CHAPTER_XIX"></a>CHAPTER XIX.</h3> + + +<p>The sun, glittering along the avenue, shimmering on the rustling gowns +of the women and smoothing the coats of the horses, smote Orson Vane +gently; the fairness of the day flooded his soul with a tide of +well-being. In the air and on the town there seemed some subtle +radiance, some glamour of enchantment. The smell of violets was all +about him. The colors of new fashions dotted the vision like a painting +by Hassam; a haze of warmth covered the town like a kiss.</p> + +<p>His thoughts, keyed, in some strange, sweet way, to all the pleasant, +happy, pretty things in life, brought him the vision of Jeannette +Vanlief. How long, how far away seemed that day when she had been at his +side, when her voice had enveloped him in its silver echoes!</p> + +<p>As carriage after carriage passed him, he began to fancy Jeannette, in +all her roseate beauty, driving toward him. He saw the curve of her +ankle as she stepped into the carriage; he dreamed of her flower-like +attitude as she leaned to the cushions.</p> + +<p>Then the miracle happened; Jeannette, a little tired, a little pale, a +little more fragile than when last he had seen her, was coming toward +him. A smile, a gentle, tender, slightly sad—but yet so sweet, so +sweet!—a smile was on her lips. He took her hand and held it and looked +into her eyes, and the two souls in that instant kissed and became one.</p> + +<p>"This time," he said—and as he spoke all that had happened since they +had pretended, childishly, on the top of the old stage on the Avenue, +seemed to slip away, to fade, to be forgotten—"it must be a real +luncheon. You are fagged. So am I. You are like a breath of +lilies-of-the-valley. Come!"</p> + +<p>They took a table by an open window. The procession of the town nearly +touched them, so close was it. To them both it seemed, to-day, a happy, +joyous, fine procession.</p> + +<p>"Will you tell me something?" asked the girl, presently, after they had +laughed and chattered like two children for awhile.</p> + +<p>"Anything in the world."</p> + +<p>"Well, then—are you ever, ever going to face that dreadful mirror +again?"</p> + +<p>He smiled, as if there was nothing astonishing in her knowledge, her +question.</p> + +<p>"Do you want me not to?"</p> + +<p>She nodded.</p> + +<p>He put his hand across the table, on one of hers. "Jeannette," he +whispered, "I promise. Why do you care? It is not possible that you +care because, because—Jeannette, will you promise me something, too?"</p> + +<p>They have excellent waiters at the Mayfair. They can be absolutely blind +at times. This was such a time. The particular waiter who was serving +Vane's table, took a sudden, rapt interest in the procession on the +avenue.</p> + +<p>Jeanette crumbled a macaroon with her free hand.</p> + +<p>"You have my hand," she pouted.</p> + +<p>"I need it," he said. "It is a very pretty hand. And very strong. I +think it must have lifted all my ills from me to-day. I feel nothing but +kindness toward the whole world. I could kiss—the whole world."</p> + +<p>"Oh," said Jeannette, pulling her hand away a little, "you monster! You +are worse than Nero."</p> + +<p>"Do you think my kisses would be so awful, then? Or is it simply the +piggishness of me that makes you call me a monster. That's not the right +way to look at it. Think of all the dreadful people there are in the +world; think how philanthropic you must make me feel if I want to kiss +even those."</p> + +<p>"Ah, but the world is full of beautiful women."</p> + +<p>"I do not believe it," he vowed. "I do not think God had any beauty left +after he fashioned—you."</p> + +<p>He was not ashamed, not one iota of the grossness of that fable. He +really felt so. Indeed, all his life he never felt otherwise than that +toward Jeannette. And she took the shocking compliment quite serenely.</p> + +<p>"You are absurd," she said, but she looked as if she loved absurdity. +"Please, may I take my hand?"</p> + +<p>"If you will be very good and promise—"</p> + +<p>"What?"</p> + +<p>"To give me something in exchange."</p> + +<p>"Something in exchange?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. The sweetest thing in the world, the best, and the dearest. You, +dear, yourself. Oh! dearest, if I could tell you what I feel. +Speech—what a silly thing speech is! It can only hint clumsily, +futilely. If I could only tell you, for instance, how the world has +suddenly taken on brightness for me since you smiled. I feel a +tenderness to all nature. I believe at heart there is good in everyone, +don't you? To-day I seem to see nothing but good. I could find you a +lovable spot in the worst villain you might name. I suppose it is the +stream of sweetness that comes from you, dear. Why can't this hour last +forever. I want it to, oh, I want it to!"</p> + +<p>"It is," she whispered, "an hour I shall always remember."</p> + +<p>"Yes, but it must last, it can't die; it sha'n't! Jeannette, let us make +this hour last us our lives! Can't we?"</p> + +<p>"Our lives?" she whispered.</p> + +<p>"Yes, our lives. This is only the first minute of our life. We must +never part again. I seem to have been behind a cloud of doubt and +distrust until this moment. I hardly realize what has happened to me. Is +love so refining a thing as all this? Does it turn bitter into sweet, +and make all the ups and downs of the world shine like one level, +beautiful sea of tenderness? It can be nothing else, but that—my love, +our—can I say our love, Jeannette?"</p> + +<p>The sun streamed in at the window, kissing the tendrils of her hair and +bringing to their copper shimmer a yet brighter blush. The day, with all +its perfume, the splendor of its people, the riot of color of its gowns, +the pride and pomp of its statues and its fountains, flushed the most +secret rills of life.</p> + +<p>"It is a marvel of a day," said Jeannette.</p> + +<p>"A marvel? It is an impossible day; it is not a day at all—it is merely +the hour of hours, the supreme instant, the melody so sweet that it must +break or blind our hearts. You are right, dear, it is a marvelous hour. +You make me repeat myself. Can we let this hour—escape, Jeannette?"</p> + +<p>"It goes fast."</p> + +<p>"Fast—fast as the wind. Fleet as air and fair as heaven are the +instants that bring happiness to common mortals. But we must hold the +hour, cage it, leash it to our lives."</p> + +<p>"Do you think we can?"</p> + +<p>She had used the "we!" Oh yes, and she had said it; she had said it; he +sang the refrain over to himself in a swoon of bliss.</p> + +<p>"I am sure of it," he urged. "Will you try?"</p> + +<p>"You are so much the stronger," she mocked.</p> + +<p>"Oh—if it depends on me—! Try? I shall succeed! I know it. Such love +as mine cannot fail. If only you will let me try. That is all; just +that.</p> + +<p>"I wish you luck!" she smiled.</p> + +<p>"You have said it," he jubilated, "you have said it!" And then, +realizing that she had meant it all the time, he threatened her with a +look, a shake of the head—oh, you would have said he wanted to punish +her in some terrible way, some way that was filled with kisses.</p> + +<p>"Jeannette," he whispered, "I have never heard you speak my name."</p> + +<p>"A pretty name, too," she said. "I have wondered if I might not spoil it +in my pronunciation."</p> + +<p>"You beautiful bit of mockery, you," he said, "will you condescend to +repeat a little sentence after me? You will say it far more prettily +than I, but perhaps you will forgive my lack of music. I am only a man. +You—ah, you are a goddess."</p> + +<p>"For how long?" she asked. "Men marry goddesses and find them clay, +don't they?"</p> + +<p>"You are not clay, dear, you are star-dust, and flowers, and fragrance. +There is not a thought in your dear head that is in tune with mere +clay. But listen! You must say this after me: I—"</p> + +<p>"I—"</p> + +<p>"Love—"</p> + +<p>"Love—"</p> + +<p>"You—"</p> + +<p>"You—"</p> + +<p>"Jeannette—"</p> + +<p>Her lips began to frame the consonant for her own name, but at sight of +the pleading in his gaze she stilled the playfulness of her, and +finished, shyly, but oh, so sweetly.</p> + +<p>"Orson."</p> + +<p>The dear, delightful absurdities of the hour when men and women tell +each other they love, how silly, and how pathetic they must seem to the +all-seeing force that flings our destinies back and forth at its will! +Yet how fair, how ineffably fair, those moments are to their heroes and +heroines; how vastly absurd the rest of the sad, serious world seems to +such lovers, and how happy are the mortals, after all, who through +fastnesses of doubt and darkness, come to the free spaces where the +heart, in tenderness and grace, rules supreme over the intellect, and +keeps in subjection, wisdom, ignorance and all the ills men plague their +minds with!</p> + +<p>When they left the Mayfair together their precious secret was anything +but a secret. Their dream lay fair and open to the world; one must have +been very blind not to see how much these two were in love with each +other. They had gone over every incident of their friendship; they had +stirred the embers of their earliest longings; they had touched their +growing happiness at every point save where Orson's steps aside had hurt +his sweetheart's memory. Those periods both avoided. All else they made +subject for, oh, the tenderest, the most lovelorn conversation +thinkable. It was enough, if overheard, to have sickened the whole day +for any ordinary mortal.</p> + +<p>One must, to repeat, have been very stupid not to see, when they issued +upon the avenue, that they shared the secret that this world appears to +have been created to keep alive. Love clothed them like a visible +garment.</p> + +<p>Luke Moncreith could never have been called blind or stupid. He saw the +truth at once. The truth; it rushed over him like a salt, bitter, acrid +sea. He swallowed it as a drowning man swallows what overwhelms him. One +instant of terrible rage spun him as if he had been a top; he faced +about and was for making, then and there, a scene with this shamelessly +happy pair. But the futility of that struck him on the following second. +He kept his way down the avenue, emotions surging in him; he felt that +his passions were becoming visible and conspicuous; he took a turning +into one of the streets leading eastward. A sign of a wineshop flashed +across his dancing vision, and he clung to it as to an anchor or a +poison. He found a table. He wanted nothing else, only rest, rest. The +wine stood untasted on the bare wood before him. He peered, through it, +into an unfathomable mystery. This chameleon, this fellow Vane—how was +it possible that he had won this glorious, flower-like creature, +Jeannette? This man had been, as the fancy took him, a court fool, a +sporting nonentity, and a blatant mummer. And what was he now? By the +looks of him, he was, to-day—and for how long, Moncreith wondered—a +very essence of meekness and sweetness; butter would not think of +melting in his mouth. What, in the devil's name, what was this riddle! +He might have repeated that question to himself until the end of his +life if the door had not opened then and let in Nevins.</p> + +<p>Nevins ordered the strongest liquor in the place. The sideboard on +Vanthuysen Square might be empty, but Nevins had still the money. As for +the gloomy old Vane house, he really could not stand it any longer. He +toasted himself, did Nevins, and he talked to himself.</p> + +<p>"'An now," he murmured, thickly, "'ere's to the mirror. May I never see +it again as long as I 'as breath in my body and wits in me 'ead. Which," +he observed, with a fatuous grin, "aint for long. No, sir; me nerves is +that a-shake I aint good for nothin' any more. And I asks you, is it +any wonder? 'Ere's Mr. Vane, one day, pleasant as pie. Next day, comes +in, takes a look at that dratted mirror of the Perfessor's, and takes to +'igh jinks. Yes, sir, 'igh jinks, very 'igh jinks. 'As pink tea-fights +in his rooms, 'angs up pictures I wouldn't let me own father see—no, +sir, not if 'e begged me on his bended knee, I wouldn't—and wears what +you might call a tenor voice. Then—one day, while you says 'One for his +Nob' 'e's 'imself again. An' it's always the mirror this, an' the mirror +that. I must look out for it, an' it mustn't be touched, and nobody must +come in. And what's the result of it all? Me nerves is gone, and me +self-respect is gone, and I'm a poor miserable drunkard!"</p> + +<p>He gulped down some of his misery.</p> + +<p>"Join me," said a voice nearby, "in another of those things!"</p> + +<p>Nevins turned, with a swaying motion, to note Moncreith, whose hand was +pointing to the empty glass before Nevins.</p> + +<p>"You are quite right," he went on, when the other's glass had been +filled again, "Mr. Vane's conduct has been most scandalous of late. You +say he has a mirror?"</p> + +<p>All circumspection had long since passed from Nevins. He was simply an +individual with a grievance. The many episodes that, in his filmy mind, +seemed to center about that mirror, shifted and twisted in him to where +they forced utterance. He began to talk, circuitously, wildly, rapidly, +of the many things that rankled in him. He told all he knew, all he had +observed. From out of the mass of inane, not pertinent ramblings, +Moncreith caught a glimmer of the facts.</p> + +<p>What a terrible power this must be that was in Orson Vane's possession! +Moncreith shuddered at the thought. Why, the man might turn himself, in +all but externals—and what, after all, was the husk, the shell, the +body?—into the finest wit, the most lovable hero of his time; he might +fare about the world wrecking now this, now that, happiness; he might +win—perhaps he actually had, even now, won Jeannette Vanlief? If he +had, if—perhaps there was yet time! There was need for sharp, desperate +action.</p> + +<p>He plunged out of the place and toward Vanthuysen Square. Then he +remembered that he could not get in. He aroused Nevins from his brutish +doze. He dragged him over the intervening space. Nevins gave him the +key, and dropped into one of the hall chairs. Moncreith leaped upstairs, +and entered the room where the mirror stood, white, silent, stately.</p> + +<p>He contemplated everything for a time. He conjured up the picture he had +been able to piece together from the rambling monologues of Nevins. He +wondered whether to simply smash in the mirrors—he would destroy them +all, to make sure—by taking a chair-leg to them, or whether he would +carefully pour some acid over them.</p> + +<p>The simpler plan appealed most to him. It was the quickest, the most +thorough. He took a little wooden chair that stood by an ebon +escritoire, swung it high in the air and brought it with a shattering +crash upon the face of the Professor's mirror.</p> + +<p>But there was more than a mere crash. A deadly, sickening, stifling fume +arose from the space the clinking glass unbared; a flame burst out, +leaped at Moncreith and seized him. The deadly white smoke flowed +through the room; flame followed flame, curtains, hangings, screens +went, one after the other, to feed the ravenous beast that Moncreith's +blow had liberated. The room was presently a seething furnace that +rattled in the cage of the walls and windows. Moncreith lay, choked with +the horrid smoke, on the floor. The flames licked at him again and +again; finally one took him on the tip of its tongue, twisted him about, +and shriveled him to black, charred shapelessness.</p> + +<p>The windows fell, finally, out upon the street below. The fire sneaked +downward, laughing and leaping.</p> + +<p>When the firemen came to save Orson Vane's house, they found a grinning, +sodden creature in the hall.</p> + +<p>It was Nevins. "That settles the mirror!" was all he kept repeating.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XX" id="CHAPTER_XX"></a>CHAPTER XX.</h3> + + +<p>The Professor shivered a little when Jeannette came to him with her +budget of wonderful news. She told him of her engagement. He patted her +head, and blessed her and wished her happiness. Then she told him of her +visit to Vane's house. It was at that he shivered.</p> + +<p>He wondered if Vane had taken her image from that fatal glass. If he +had, how, he wondered, would this experiment end? Surely it could not +have happened; Jeannette was quite herself; there was no visible +diminution of charm, of vitality.</p> + +<p>When Vane arrived, presently, the Professor questioned him. The answer +brought the Professor wonder, but he did not count it altogether a +calamity. There could be no doubt that Orson Vane was now wearing +Jeannette's sweet and beautiful soul as a halo round his own. Well, +mused Vanlief, if anything should happen to Jeannette one can always—</p> + +<p>"Oh, father!"</p> + +<p>Jeannette burst into the room with the morning paper from town. "Orson's +house is burnt to the ground. And who do you think is suspected? Luke +Moncreith! They found his body. Read it!"</p> + +<p>The Professor took the report and scanned it. There could be no doubt; +the mirror, the work of his life, was gone. He could never fashion one +like it. Never—Yet—He looked at the two young people at the window, +whither they had turned together, each with an arm about the other.</p> + +<p>"What a marvel of a day!" Jeannette was saying.</p> + +<p>"The days will all be marvels for us," said Orson.</p> + +<p>"The days, I think, must have souls, just as we have. Some days seem to +have such dark, such bitter thoughts.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I think you are right. There are days that strike one as having +souls; others that seem quite soulless. Beautiful, empty shells, some of +them; others, dim, yet tender, full of graciousness."</p> + +<p>"Orson!"</p> + +<p>"Sweetheart!"</p> + +<p>"Do you know how wonderfully you are changed? Do you know you once +talked bitterly, as one who was full of disappointments and +disenchantments?"</p> + +<p>"You have set me, dear, in a garden of enchantment from which I mean +never to escape. The garden is your heart."</p> + +<p>Something glistened in the Professor's eyes as he listened. "God, in +his infinite wisdom," he said, in a reverent whisper, "gave her so much +of grace; she had enough for both!"</p> + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /> +<p class="caption"><a name="Contents" id="Contents"></a>Contents</p> +<p> +<a href="#CHAPTER_I">CHAPTER I.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_II">CHAPTER II.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_III">CHAPTER III.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_IV">CHAPTER IV.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_V">CHAPTER V.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_VI">CHAPTER VI.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_VII">CHAPTER VII.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">CHAPTER VIII.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_IX">CHAPTER IX.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_X">CHAPTER X.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XI">CHAPTER XI.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XII">CHAPTER XII.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XIII">CHAPTER XIII.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XIV">CHAPTER XIV.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XV">CHAPTER XV.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XVI">CHAPTER XVI.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XVII">CHAPTER XVII</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XVIII">CHAPTER XVIII.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XIX">CHAPTER XIX.</a><br /> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XX">CHAPTER XX.</a><br /> +</p> + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Imitator, by Percival Pollard + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE IMITATOR *** + +***** This file should be named 39724-h.htm or 39724-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/9/7/2/39724/ + +Produced by Don Wills and Marc D'Hooghe at +http://www.freeliterature.org (Images generously made +available by the Hathi Trust) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Imitator + +Author: Percival Pollard + +Release Date: May 18, 2012 [EBook #39724] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE IMITATOR *** + + + + +Produced by Don Wills and Marc D'Hooghe at +http://www.freeliterature.org (Images generously made +available by the Hathi Trust) + + + + + +THE IMITATOR + +A NOVEL + +By + +PERCIVAL POLLARD + +SAINT LOUIS + +WILLIAM MARION REEDY + +1901 + + + + +CHAPTER I. + + +"The thing is already on the wane," said young Orson Vane, making a wry +face over the entree, and sniffing at his glass, "and, if you ask me, I +think the general digestion of society will be the better for it." + +"Yes, there is nothing, after all, so tedious as the sham variety of a +table d'hote. Though it certainly wasn't the fare one came to this hole +for." + +Luke Moncreith turned his eyes, as he said that, over the place they sat +in, smiling at it with somewhat melancholy contempt. Its sanded floor, +its boisterously exposed wine-barrels, the meaningless vivacity of its +Hungarian orchestra, evidently stirred him no more. + +"No; that was the last detail. It was the notion of dining below stairs, +as the servants do. It had, for a time, the charm of an imitation. +Nothing is so delightful as to imitate others; yet to be mistaken for +them is always dreadful. Of course, nobody would mistake us here for +servants." + +The company, motley as it was, could not logically have come under any +such suspicion. Though it was dining in a cellar, on a sanded floor, +amid externals that were illegitimate offsprings of a _Studenten Kneipe_ +and a crew of Christy minstrels, it still had, in the main, the air of +being recruited from the smart world. At every other table there were +people whom not to know was to argue oneself unknown. These persons +obviously treated the place, and their being there, as an elaborate +effort at gaiety; the others, the people who were plainly there for the +first time, took it with the bewildered manner of those whom each new +experience leaves mentally exhausted. The touch of rusticity, here and +there, did not suffice to spoil the sartorial sparkle of the smart +majority. The champagne that the sophisticated were wise enough to +oppose to the Magyar vintages sparkled into veins that ran beautifully +blue under skin that held curves the most aristocratic, tints the most +shell-like. Tinkling laughter, vocative of insincerity, rang between the +restless passion of the violins. + +"When it is not below stairs," continued Vane, "it is up on the roof. +One might think we were a society without houses of our own. It is, I +suppose, the human craving for opposites. When we have stored our +sideboards with the finest glass you can get in Vienna or Carlsbad, we +turn our backs on it and go to drinking from pewter in a cellar. We pay +abominable wages to have servants who shall be noiseless, and then go to +places where the service is as guttural as a wilderness of monkeys. +Fortunately, these fancies do not last. Presently, I dare say, it will +be the fashion to dine at home. That will make us feel quite like the +original Puritans." He laughed, and took his glass of wine at a gulp. +"The fact of the matter is that variety has become the vice of life. We +have not, as a society, any inner steadfastness of soul; we depend upon +externals, and the externals pall with fearful speed. Think of seeing in +the mirror the face of the same butler for more than thirty days!" He +shuddered and shook his head. + +"We are a restless lot," sighed the other, "but why discompose yourself +about it? Thank your stars you have nothing more important to worry +over!" + +"My dear Luke, there is nothing more important than the attitude of +society at large. It is the only thing one should allow oneself to +discuss. To consider one's individual life is to be guilty of as bad +form as to wear anything that is conspicuous. Society admires us chiefly +only as we sink ourselves in it. If we let the note of personality rise, +our social position is sure to suffer. Imitation is the keynote of +smartness. The rank and file imitate the leaders consciously, and the +leaders unconsciously imitate the average. We frequent cellars, and +roofs, and such places, because in doing so we imagine we are imitating +the days of the Hanging Gardens and the Catacombs. We abhor the bohemian +taint, but we are willing to give a champagne and chicken imitation of +it. We do not really care for music and musicians, but we give excellent +imitations of doing so. At present we are giving the most lifelike +imitation of being passionately fond of outdoor life; I suppose England +feels flattered. I am afraid I have forgotten whose the first +fashionable divorce in our world was; it is far easier to remember the +names of the people who have never been divorced; at any rate those +pioneers ought to feel proud of the hugeness of their following. We have +adopted a vulgarity from Chicago and made it a fashionable institution; +divorce used to be a shuttlecock for the comic papers, and now it makes +the bulk of the social register." + +Moncreith tapped his friend on the arm. "Drop it, Orson, drop it!" he +said. "I know this is a beastly bad dinner, but you shouldn't let it +make you maudlin. You know you don't really believe half you're saying. +Drop it, I say. These infernal poses make me ill." He attacked the +morsel of game on his plate with a zest that was beautiful to behold. +"If you go on in that biliously philosophic strain of yours, I shall +crunch this bird until I hear nothing but the grinding of bones. It is +really not a bad bit of quail. It is so small, and the casserole so +large, that you need an English setter to mark it, but once you've got +it,"--he wiped his lips with a flip of his napkin, "it's really worth +the search. Try it, and cheer up. The woman in rose, over there, under +the pseudo-palm, looks at you every time she sips her champagne; I have +no doubt she is calculating how untrue you could be to her. I suppose +your gloom strikes her as poetic; it strikes me as very absurd. You +really haven't a care in the world, and you sit here spouting +insincerity at a wasteful rate. If there's anything really and truly the +matter--tell me!" + +Orson Vane dropped, as if it had been a mask, the ironical smile his +lips had worn. "You want sincerity," he said, "well, then I shall be +sincere. Sincerity makes wrinkles, but it is the privilege of our +friends to make us old before our time. Sincerely, then, Luke, I am +very, very tired." + +"A fashionable imitation," mocked Moncreith. + +"No; a personal aversion, to myself, to the world I live in. I wish the +dear old governor hadn't been such a fine fellow; if he had been of the +newer generation of fathers I suppose I wouldn't have had an ideal to +bless myself with." + +Moncreith interrupted. + +"Good Lord, Luke, did you say ideals? I swear I never knew it was as bad +as that." He beckoned to the waiter and ordered a Dominican. "It is so +ideal a liquor that when you have tasted it you crave only for +brutalities. Poor Orson! Ideals!" He sighed elaborately. + +"If you imitate my manner of a while ago, I shall not say what I was +going to say. If I am to be sincere, so must you." He took the scarlet +drink the man set before him, and let it gurgle gently down his throat. +"It smacks of sin and I scent lies in it. I wish I had not taken it. It +is hard to be sincere after a drink that stirs the imagination. But I +shall try. And you are not to interrupt any more than you can help. If +we both shed the outer skin we wear for society, I believe we are +neither of us such bad sorts. That is just what I am getting at: I am +not quite bad enough to be blind to my own futility. Here I am, Luke, +young, decently looking, with money, position, and bodily health, and +yet I am cursed with thought of my own futility. When people have said +who I am, they have said it all; I have done nothing: I merely am. I +know others would sell their souls to be what I am; but it does not +content me. I have spent years considering my way. The arts have called +to me, but they have not held me. All arts are imitative, except music, +and music is not human enough for me; no people are so unhuman as +musical people, and no art is so entirely a creation of a self-centred +inventor. There can be no such thing as realism in music; the voices of +Nature can never be equalled on any humanly devised instruments or +notes. Painting and sculpture are mere imitations of what nature does +far better. When you see a beautiful woman as God made her you do not +care whether the Greeks colored their statues or not. Any average sunset +stamps the painted imitation as absurd. These arts, in fact, can never +be really great, since they are man's feeble efforts to copy God's +finest creations; between them and the ideal there must always be the +same distance as between man and his Creator. Then there is the art of +literature. It has the widest scope of them all. Whether it is imitative +or creative depends on the temperament of the individual; some men set +down what they see and hear, others invent a world of their own and busy +themselves with it. I believe it is the most human of the arts. Its +devotees not infrequently set themselves the task of discovering just +how their fellows think and live; they try to attune their souls to +other souls; they strive for an understanding of the larger humanity. +They--" + +Moncreith interrupted with a gesture. + +"Orson, you're not going to turn novelist? Don't tell me that! Your +enthusiasms fill me with melancholy forebodings." + +"Not at all. But, as you know, I've seen much of this sort of thing +lately. In the first place I had my own temperamental leanings; in the +next place, you'll remember, we've had a season or two lately when +clever people have been the rage. To invite painters and singers and +writers to one's house has been the smart thing to do. We have had the +spectacle of a society, that goes through a flippant imitation of +living, engaged in being polite to people who imitate at second hand, in +song, and color, and story. Some smart people have even taken to those +arts, thus imitating the professional imitators. As far as the smart +point of view goes, I couldn't do anything better than go in for the +studio, or novelistic business. The dull people whom smartness has +rubbed to a thin polish would conspire in calling me clever. Is there +anything more dreadful than being called clever?" + +"Nothing. It is the most damning adjective in the language. Whenever I +hear that a person is clever I am sure he will never amount to much. +There is only one word that approaches it in deadly significance. That +is 'rising.' I have known men whom the puffs have referred to as 'a +rising man' for twenty years. Can you imagine anything more dismal than +being called constantly by the same epithet? The very amiability in the +general opinion, permitting 'clever' and 'rising' to remain unalterable, +shows that the wearer of these terms is hopeless; a strong man would +have made enemies. I am glad you are wise enough to resist the +temptation of the Muses. Society's blessing would never console you for +anything short of a triumph. The triumphs are fearfully few; the clever +people--well, this cellar's full of them. There's Abbott Moore, for +instance." + +"You're right; there he is. He's a case in point. One of the best cases; +a man who has really, in the worldly sense, succeeded tremendously. His +system of give and take is one of the most lovely schemes imaginable; we +all know that. When a mining millionaire with marriageable daughters +comes to town his first hostage to the smart set is to order a palace +near Central Park and to give Abbott Moore the contract for the +decorations. In return Abbott Moore asks the millionaire's womenfolk to +one of his studio carnivals. That section of the smart set which keeps +itself constantly poised on the border between smart and tart is awfully +keen on Abbott Moore's studio affairs. It has never forgotten the famous +episode when he served a tart within a tart, and it is still expecting +him to outdo that feat. To be seen at one of these affairs, especially +if you have millions, is to have got in the point of the wedge. I call +it a fair exchange; the millionaire gets his foot just inside the magic +portal; Moore gets a slice of the millions. All the world counts Moore a +success from every point of view, the smart, the professional, the +financial. Yet that isn't my notion of a full life. It's only a replica +of the very thing I'm tired of, my own life." + +"Your life, my dear fellow, is generally considered a most enviable +article." + +"Of course. I suppose it does have a glamour for the unobserving. Yet, +at the best, what am I?" + +Moncreith laughed. "Another Dominican!" he said to the waiter. "The +liqueur," he said, "may enable me to rise to my subject." He smiled at +Vane over the glass, when it was brought to him, drained it under closed +eyes, and then settled himself well back into his chair. + + + + +CHAPTER II. + + +"I will tell you what you are," began Moncreith, "to I the eye of the +average beholder. Here, in the most splendid town of the western world, +at the turning of two centuries, you are possessed of youth, health and +wealth. That really tells the tale. Never in the history of the world +have youth and health and wealth meant so much as they do now. These +three open the gates to all the earthly paradise. Your forbears did +their duty by you so admirably that you wear a distinguished name +without any sacrifice to poverty. You are good to look at. You are a +young man of fashion. If you chose you could lead the mode; you have the +instincts of a beau, though neither the severe suppression of Brummell +nor the obtrusive splendor of D'Aurevilly would suit you. Our age seems +to have come to too high an average in man's apparel to permit of any +single dictator; to be singled out is to be lowered. Yet there can be no +denying that you have often, unwittingly, set the fashion in waistcoats +and cravats. That aping has not hurt you, because the others never gave +their raiment the fine note of personal distinction that you wear. You +are a favorite in the clubs; people never go out when you come in; you +listen to the most stupid talk with the most graceful air imaginable; +that is one of the sure roads to popularity in clubdom. When it is the +fashion to be artistic, you can be so as easily as the others; when +sport is the watchword your fine physique forbids you no achievement. +You play tennis and golf and polo quite well enough to make women split +their gloves in applause, and not too well to make men sneer at you for +a 'pro.' When you are riding to hounds in Virginia you are never far +from the kill, and there is no automobilist whom the Newport villagers +are happier to fine for fast driving. You are equally at home in a +cotillon and on the deck of a racing yacht. You could marry whenever you +liked. Your character is unspotted either by the excessive vice that +shocks the mob, or the excessive virtue that tires the smart. You have +means, manners and manner. Finally, you have the two cardinal qualities +of smartness, levity and tolerance." He paused, and gave a smile of +satisfaction. "There, do you like the portrait?" + +"It is abominable," said Vane, "it is what I see in my most awful +dreams. And the horror of it is that it is so frightfully true. I am +merely one of the figures in the elaborate masquerade we call society. I +make no progress in life; I learn nothing except new fashions and +foibles. I am weary of the masquerade and the masks. Life in the smart +world is a game with masks; one shuffles them as one does cards. As for +me, I want to throw the whole pack into the fire. Everyone wears these +masks; nobody ever penetrates to the real soul behind the make-up." + +"It is a game you play perfectly. One should hesitate long about giving +up anything that one has brought to perfection. These others dabble and +squabble in what you call the secondary imitations of life; you, at any +rate, are giving your imitation at first hand." + +"Yes, but it no longer satisfies me. Listen, Luke. You must promise not +to laugh and not to frown. It will seem absurd to you; yet I am terribly +in earnest about it. When first I came out of college I went in for +science. When I gave it up, it was because I found it was leading me +away from the human interest. There is the butterfly I want to chase; +the human interest. I attempted all the arts; not one of them took me +far on my way. My failure, Luke, is an ironic sentence upon the vaunted +knowledge of the world." + +"Your failure? My dear Orson; come to the point. What do you mean by the +human interest?" + +"I mean that neither scientist nor scholar has yet shown the way to one +man's understanding of another's soul. The surgeon can take a body and +dissect its every fraction, arguing and proving each function of it. The +painter tries, with feeble success, to reach what he calls the spirit of +his subject. So does the author. He tries to put himself into the place +of each of his characters; he aims, always, for the nearest possible +approach to the lifelike. And, above all the others, there is the actor. +In this, as in its other qualities, the art of acting is the crudest, +the most obvious of them all; yet, in certain moments, it comes nearest +to the ideal. The actor in his mere self is--well, we all know the story +of the famous player being met by this greeting: 'And what art thou +to-night?' But he goes behind a door and he can come forth in a series +of selves. A trick or so with paint; a change of wig; a twist of the +face-muscles, and we have the same man appearing as _Napoleon_, as +_Richelieu_, as _Falstaff_. The thing is external, of course. Whether +there shall be anything more than the mere bodily mask depends upon the +actor's intelligence and his imagination. The supreme artist so +succeeds, by virtue of much study, much skill in imitating what he has +conceived to be the soul of his subject, in almost giving us a lifelike +portrait. And yet, and yet--it is not the real thing; the real soul of +his subject is as much a mystery to that actor as it is to you or me. +That is what I mean when I say that science fails us at the most +important point of all; the soul of my neighbor is as profound a mystery +to me as the soul of a man that lived a thousand years ago. I can know +your face, Luke, your clothes, your voice, the outward mask you wear; +but--can I reach the secrets of your soul? No. And if we cannot know how +others feel and think, how can we say we know the world? Bah! The world +is a realm of shadows in which all walk blindly. We touch hands every +day, but our souls are hidden in a veil that has not been passed since +God made the universe." + +"You cry for the moon," said Moncreith. "You long for the unspeakable. +Is it not terrible enough to know your neighbor's face, his voice, his +coat, without burdening yourself with knowledge of his inner self? It is +merely an egoistic curiosity, my dear Orson; you cannot prove that the +human interest, as you term it, would benefit by the extension in wisdom +you want." + +"Oh, you are wrong, you are wrong. The whole world of science undergoes +revolution, once you gain the point I speak of. Doctors will have the +mind as well as the body to diagnose; lovers will read each others +hearts as well as their voices; lies will become impossible, or, at +least, futile; oh--it would be a better world altogether. At any rate, +until this avenue of knowledge is opened to me, I shall call all the +rest a failure. I imitate; you imitate; we imitate; that is the +conjugation of life. When I think of the hopelessness of the thing,--do +you wonder I grow bitter? I want communion with real beings, and I meet +only masks. I tell you, Luke, it is abominable, this wall that stands +between each individual and the rest of the world. How can I love my +neighbor if I do not understand him? How can I understand him if I +cannot think his thoughts, dream his dreams, spell out his soul's +secrets?" + +Moncreith smiled at his friend, and let his eyes wander a trifle +ironically about his figure. "One would not think, to look at you, that +you were possessed of a mania, an itch! If you take my advice you will +content yourself with living life as you find it. It is really a very +decent world. It has good meat and drink in it, and some sweet women, +and a strong man or two. Most of us are quite ignorant of the fact that +we are merely engaged in incomplete imitations of life, or that there is +a Chinese wall between us and the others; the chances are we are all the +happier for our innocence. Consider, for instance, that rosy little face +behind us--you can see it perfectly in that mirror--can you deny that it +looks all happiness and innocence?" + +Vane looked, and presently sighed a little. The face of the girl, as he +found it in the glass, was the color of roses lying on a pool of clear +water. It was one of those faces that one scarce knows whether to think +finer in profile or in full view; the features were small, the hair +glistened with a tint of that burnish the moon sometimes wears on summer +nights, and the figure was a mere fillip to the imagination. A cluster +of lilies of the valley lay upon her hair; they seemed like countless +little cups pouring frost upon a copper glow. All about her radiated an +ineffable gentleness, a tenderness; she made all the other folk about +her seem garish and ugly and cruel. One wondered what she did in that +gallery. + +"To the outer eye," said Vane, as he sighed, "she is certainly a flower, +a thing of daintiness and delight. But--do you suppose I believe it, for +a moment? I have no doubt she is merely one of those creatures whom God +has made for the destruction of our dreams; her mind is probably as +corrupt as her body seems fair. She is perhaps--" + +He stopped, for the face in the mirror had its eyes thrown suddenly in +his direction. The eyes, in that reflex fashion, met, and something akin +to a smile, oh, an ever so wistful, wonderful a smile, crept upon the +lips and the eyes of the girl, while to the man there came only a sudden +silence. + +"She is," continued Vane, in another voice altogether, and as if he were +thinking of distant affairs, "very beautiful." + +The girl's eyes, meanwhile, had shifted towards Moncreith. He felt the +radiance of them and looked, too, and the girl's beauty came upon him +with a quick, personal force that was like pain. Vane's spoken +approbation of her angered him; he hardly knew why; for the first time +in his life he thought he could hate the man beside him. + +The girl turned her head a little, put up her hand and so hid her face +from both young men, or there is no telling what sudden excuse the two +might not have seized for open enmity. It sounds fantastic, perhaps, but +there are more enmities sown in a single glance from a woman's eyes +than a Machiavelli could build up by ever so devilish devices. Neither +of the two, in this case, could have said just what they felt, or why. +Moncreith thought, vaguely enough perhaps, that it was a sin for so fair +a flower to waste even a look upon a fellow so shorn of faith as was +Orson Vane. As for Vane-- + +Vane brought his hand upon the table so that the glasses rocked. + +"Oh," he exclaimed, "if one could only be sure! If one could see past +the mask! What would I not give to believe in beauty when I see it, to +trust to appearances! Oh, for the ability to put myself in the place of +another, to know life from another plane than my own, to--" + +But here he was interrupted. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + + +"The secret you are seeking," said the man who had put his hand on Orson +Vane's shoulder, "is mine." + +Vane's eyes widened slightly, roving the stranger up and down. He was a +man of six feet in height, of striking, white-haired beauty, of the type +made familiar to us by pictures of the Old Guard under Napoleon. Here +was still the Imperial under the strong chin, the white mustache over +the shapely lips; the high, clear forehead; the long, thin hands, where +veins showed blue, and the nails were rosy. The head was bowed forward +of the shoulders; the man, now old, had once been inches taller. You +looked, on the spur of first noting him, for the sword and the epaulets, +or, at least, for the ribbon of an order. But his clothes were quite +plain, nor had his voice any touch of the military. + +"I overheard a part of your conversation," the stranger went on, "not +intentionally, yet unavoidably. I had either to move or to listen. And +you see the place is so full that moving was out of the question. Did +you mean what you were saying?" + +"About the--" + +"The Chinese wall," said the stranger. + +"Every word of it," said Vane. + +"If the chance to penetrate another's soul came to you, would you take +it?" + +"At once." + +Moncreith laughed aloud. "Where are we?" he said, "in Aladdin's cave? +What rubbish!" And he shook himself, as if to disturb a bad dream. He +was on the point of reaching for his hat, when he saw the face of the +girl in the mirror once more; the sight of it stayed him. He smiled to +himself, and waited for the curious conversation between Vane and the +stranger to continue. + +"My name," the stranger was observing, taking a card from an _etui_, +"may possibly be known to you?" + +Vane bent his head to the table, read, and looked at the white-haired +man with a quick access of interest. + +"I am honored," he said. "My name is Orson Vane." + +"Oh," said the other, "I knew that. I do not study the human interest in +mere theory; I delight in the tangible. That is why I presume upon +you"--he waved his hand gracefully--"thus." + +"You must join us," said Vane; "there is plenty of room at this table." + +"No; I must--if your friend will pardon me--see you alone. Will you come +to my place?" + +He spoke as youthfully as if he were of Vane's own age. + +Vane considered a second or so, and then sprang to his feet. + +"Yes," he said, "I will come. Good-night, Luke. Stay on; enjoy yourself. +Shall I see you to-morrow? Good-night!" + +They went out together, the young man and the one with the white hair. +One glance into the mirror flashed from Orson's eyes as he turned to go; +it brought him a memory of a burnished halo on a fragile, rosy, beauty. +He sighed to himself, wishing he could reach the truth behind the robe +of beauty, and, with that sigh, turned with a sort of fierceness upon +his companion. + +"Well," said Vane, "well?" + +They were passing through a most motley thoroughfare. Barrel-organs +dotted the asphalt; Italian and Sicilian poverty elbowed the poverty of +Russian and Polish Jews. The shops bore signs in Italian, Hebrew, +French--in anything but English. The Elevated roared above the music and +the chatter; the cool gloom of lower Broadway seemed far away. + +"Patience," said the old man, "patience, Mr. Vane. Look about you! How +much of the heart of this humanity that reeks all about us do we know? +Think,--think of your Chinese wall! Oh--how strange, how very strange +that I should have come upon you to-night, when, in despair of ever +finding my man, I had gone for distraction to a place where, I thought, +philosophy nor science were but little welcome." + +"My dear Professor," urged Vane finally, when they were come to a +stiller region, where many churches, some parks and ivy-sheltered houses +gave an air of age and sobriety and history, "I have no more patience +left. Did I not know your name for what it is I would not have followed +you. Even now I hardly know whether your name and your title suffice. If +it is an adventure, very well. But I have no more patience for +mysteries." + +"Not even when you are about to penetrate the greatest mystery of all? +Oh, youth, youth! Well, we have still a little distance to go. I shall +employ it to impress upon you that I, Professor Vanlief, am not +over-fond of the title of Professor. It has, here in America, a taint of +the charlatan. But it came to me, this title, in a place where only +honors were implied. I was, indeed, a fellow student with many of whom +the world has since heard; Bismarck was one of them. I have eaten smoked +goose with him in Pommern. You see, I am very old, very old. I have +spent my life solving a riddle. It is the same riddle that has balked +you, my young friend. But I have striven for the solution; you have +merely wailed against the riddle's existence." + +Vane felt a flush of shame. + +"True," he murmured, "true. I never went further into any art, any +science, than to find its shortcomings." + +"Yet even that," resumed the Professor, "is something. You are, at any +rate, the only man for my purpose." + +"Your purpose?" + +"Yes. It is the same as yours. You are to be the instrument; I furnish +the power. You are to be able to feel, to think, as others do." + +"Oh!" muttered Vane, "impossible." Now that his wish was called possible +of fulfilment, he shrank a little from it. He followed the Professor up +a long flight of curving steps, through dim halls, to where a bluish +light flickered. As they passed this feeble glow it flared suddenly into +a brilliant jet of flame; a door swung open, revealing a somewhat bare +chamber fitted up partly as a study, partly as a laboratory. The door +closed behind them silently. + +"Mere trickery," said the Professor, "the sort of thing that the knaves +of science fool the world with. Will you sit down? Here is where I have +worked for--for more years than you have lived, Mr. Vane. Here is where +I have succeeded. In pursuit of this success I have spent my life and +nearly all the fortune that my family made in generations gone. I have +this house, and my daughter, and my science. The world spins madly all +about me, in this splendid town; here, in this stillness, I have worked +to make that world richer than I found it. Will you help me?" + +Vane had flung himself upon a wicker couch. He watched his host +striding up and down the room with a fervor that had nothing of senility +in it. The look of earnestness upon that fine old face was magnetic. +Vane's mistrust vanished at sight of it. + +"If you will trust me," he answered. He saw himself as the beneficiary, +his host as the giver of a great gift. + +"I trust you. I heard enough, to-night, to believe you sincere in +wishing to see life from another soul than your own. But you must +promise to obey my instructions to the letter." + +"I promise." + +A sense of farce caught Vane. "And now," he said, "what is it? A powder +I must swallow, or a trance you pass me into, or what?" + +The professor shook his head gravely. "It is none of those things. It is +much simpler. I should not wonder but that the ancients knew it. But +human life is so much more complex now; the experiences you will gain +will be larger than they could ever have been in other ages. Do you +realize what I am about to give you? The power to take upon you the soul +of another, just as an actor puts on the outer mask of another! And I +ask for no reward. Simply the joy of seeing my process active; and +afterwards, perhaps, to give my secret to the world. But you are to +enjoy it alone, first. Of course--there may be risks. Do you take +them?" + +"I do," said Vane. + +He could hear the whistling of steamers out in the harbor, and the noise +of the great town came to him faintly. All that seemed strangely remote. +His whole intelligence was centered upon his host, upon the sparsely +furnished room, and the secret whose solution he thought himself +approaching. He was, for almost the first time in his life, intense in +the mere act of existence; he was conscious of no imitation of others; +his analysis of self was sunk in an eagerness, a tenseness of +purposeness hitherto unfelt. + +The professor went to a far, dark corner of the room, and rolled thence +a tall, sheeted thing that might have been a painting, or an easel. He +held it tenderly; his least motion with it revealed solicitude. When it +was immediately in front of where Vane reclined, Vanlief loosed his hold +of the thing, and began pacing up and down the room. + +"The question of mirrors," he began, after what seemed to Vane an age, +"has never, I suppose, interested you." + +"On the contrary," said Vane, "I have had Italy searched for the finest +of its cheval-glasses. In my dressing-room are several that would give +even a man of your fine height, sir, a complete reflection of every +detail, from a shoe-lace to an eyebrow. It is not altogether vanity; but +I never could do justice to my toilette before a mirror that showed me +only a shoulder, or a waist, or a foot, at a time; I want the +full-length portrait or nothing. I like to see myself as others will +see me; not in piece-meal. The Florentines made lovely mirrors." + +"They did." Vanlief smiled sweetly. "Yet I have made a better." He paced +the floor again, and then resumed speech. "I am glad you like tall +mirrors. You will have learned how careful one must be of them. One more +or less in your dressing-room will not matter, eh?" + +"I have an excellent man," said Vane. "There has not been a broken +mirror in my house for years. He looks after them as if they were his +own." + +"Ah, better and better." + +Vane interrupted the Professor's silence with, "It is a mirror, then?" + +"Yes," said Vanlief, nodding at the sheeted mirror, "it is a mirror. +Have you ever thought of the wonderfulness of mirrors? What wonder, and +yet what simplicity! To think that I--I, a simple, plodding old man of +science--should be the only one to have come upon the magic of a +mirror!" His talk took the note of monologue. He was pacing, pacing, +pacing; smiling at Vane now and then, and fingering the covered mirror +with loving touch as he passed near it. "Have you ever, as a child, +looked into a mirror in the twilight, and seen there another face beside +your own? Have you never thought that to the mirror were revealed more +things than the human eye can note? Have you heard of the old, old +folk-superstitions; of the bride that may not see herself in a mirror +without tragedy touching her; of the Warwickshire mirror that must be +covered in a house of death, lest the corpse be seen in it; of the +future that some magic mirrors could reveal? Fanciful tales, all of +them; yet they have their germ of truth, and for my present discovery I +owe them something." He drew the sheet from the mirror, and revealed +another veil of gauze resting upon the glass, as, in some houses, the +most prized pictures are sometimes doubly covered. "You see; it is just +a mirror, a full-length mirror. But, oh, my dear Vane, the wonderfulness +of this mirror! I have only to look into this mirror; to veil it; and +then, when next you glance into it, if it be within the hour, my soul, +my spirit, my very self, passes from the face of the mirror to you! That +is the whole secret, or at least, the manifestation of it! Do you wish +to be the President, to think his thoughts, feel as he feels, dream as +he dreams? He has only to look into this mirror, and you have only to +take from it, as one plucks a lily from the pool, the spiritual image he +has left there! Think of it, Vane, think of it! Is this not seeing life? +Is this not riddling the secret of existence? To reach the innermost +depths of another's spirit; to put on his soul, as others can put on +your clothes, if you left them on a chair,--is this not a stupendous +thing?" In his fever and fervor the professor had exhausted his +strength; he flung himself into a chair. Vane saw the old man's eyes +glowing and his chest throbbing with passion; he hardly knew whether +the whole scene was real or a something imposed upon his senses by a +species of hypnotism. He passed his hand before his forehead; he shook +his head. Yet nothing changed. Vanlief, in the chair, still quaking with +excitement; the mirror, veiled and immobile. + +For a time the room stood silent, save for Vanlief's heavy breathing. + +"Of course," he resumed presently, in a quieter tone, "you cannot be +expected to believe, until you have tried. But trial is the easiest +thing in the world. I can teach you the mere externals to be observed in +five minutes. One trial will convince you. After that,--my dear Vane, +you have the gamut of humanity to go. You can be another man every day. +No secret of any human heart will be a secret to you. All wisdom can be +gained by you; all knowledge, all thought, can be yours. Oh, Orson Vane, +I wonder if you realize your fortune! Or--is it possible that you +withdraw?" + +Vane got up resolutely. + +"No," he said, "I have faith--at last. I am with you, heart and soul. +Life seems splendid to me, for the first time. When can I have the +mirror taken to my house?" + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + + +Vane's dressing-room was a tasteful chamber, cool and light. Its walls, +its furniture, and its hangings told of a wide range of interest. There +was nowhere any obvious bias; the aesthetic was no more insistent than +the sporting. Orson Vane loved red-haired women as Henner painted them, +and he played the aristocratic waltzes of Chopin; but he also valued the +cruel breaking-bit that he had brought home from Texas, and read the +racing-column in the newspaper quite as carefully as he did the doings +of his society. Some hint of this diversity of tastes showed in this, +the most intimate room of his early mornings. There were some of those +ruddy British prints that are now almost depressingly conventional with +men of sporting habits; signed photographs of more or less prominent and +personable personages were scattered pell-mell. All the chairs and +lounges were of wicker; so much so that some of the men who hobnobbed +with Vane declared that a visit to his dressing-room was as good as a +yachting cruise. + +The morning was no longer young. On the avenue the advance guard of the +fashionable assault upon the shopping district was already astir. The +languorous heat that reflects from the town's asphalt was gaining in +power momentarily. + +Orson Vane, fresh from a chilling, invigorating bath, a Japanese robe of +exquisite coolness his only covering, sat regarding an addition to his +furniture. It had come while he slept. It was proof that the adventure +of the night had not been a mere figment of his dreams. + +He touched a bell. To the man who answered the call, he said: + +"Nevins, I have bought a new mirror. You are to observe a few simple +rules in regard to this mirror. In the first place, to avoid confusion, +it is always to be called the New Mirror. Is that plain? + +"Quite so, sir." + +"I may have orders to give about it, or notes to send, or things of that +sort, and I want no mistakes made. In the next place, the cord that +uncovers the mirror is never to be pulled, never to be touched, save at +my express order. Not--under any circumstances. I do not wish the mirror +used. Have you any curiosity left, Nevins? + +"None, sir." + +"So much the better. In Lord Keswick's time, I think, you still had a +touch of that vice, curiosity. Your meddling got you into something of a +scrape. Do you remember?" + +"Oh, sir," said the man, with a little gesture of shame and pain, "you +didn't need reminding me. Have I ever forgotten your saving me from that +foolishness?" + +"You're right, Nevins; I think I can trust you. But this is a greater +trust than any of the others. A great deal depends; mark that; a very +great deal. It is not an ordinary mirror, this one; not one of the +others compares with it; it is the gem of my collection. Not a breath is +to touch it, save as I command." + +"I'll see to it, sir." + +"Any callers, Nevins?" + +"Mr. Moncreith, sir, looked in, but left no word. And the postman." + +"No duns, Nevins?" + +"Not in person, sir." + +"Dear me! Is my position on the wane? When a man is no longer dunned his +credit is either too good or too bad; or else his social position is +declining." He picked up the tray with the letters, ran his eye over +them quickly, and said, "Thank the stars; they still dun me by post. +There should be a law against it; yet it is as sweet to one's vanity as +an angry letter from a woman. Nevins, is the day dull or garish?" + +"It's what I should call bright, sir." + +"Then you may lay out some gloomy clothes for me. I would not add to the +heat wittingly. And, Nevins!" + +"Yes sir." + +"If anyone calls before I breakfast, unless it happens to be Professor +Vanlief,--Vanlief, Nevins, of the Vanliefs of New Amsterdam--say I am +indisposed." + +He dressed himself leisurely, thinking of the wonderful adventures into +living that lay before him. He rehearsed the simple instructions that +Vanlief had given him the night before. It was all utterly simple. As +one looked into the mirror, the spirit of that one lay on the surface, +waiting for the next person that glanced that way. There followed a +complete exodus of the spirit from the one body into the other. The +recipient was himself plus the soul of the other. The exodus left that +other in a state something like physical collapse. There would be, for +the recipient of the new personality, a sense of double consciousness; +the mind would be like a palimpsest, the one will and the one habit +imposed upon the other. The fact that the person whose spirit passed +from him upon the magic mirror was left more or less a wreck was cause +for using the experiment charily, as the Professor took pains to warn +Orson. There was a certain risk. The mirror might be broken; one could +never tell. It would be better to pick one's subjects wisely, always +with a definite purpose. This man might be used to teach that side of +life; that man another. It was not a thing to toy with. It was to be +played with as little as human life itself. Vivisection was a pastime to +this; this implicated the spirit, the other only the body. + +Consideration of the new avenues opening for his intelligence had +already begun to alter Vane's outlook on life. Persons who remarked him, +a little later, strolling the avenue, wondered at the brilliance of his +look. He seemed suddenly sprayed with a new youth, a new enthusiasm. It +was not, as some of his conversations of that morning proved, an utter +lapse into optimism on his part; but it was an exchange of the mere +passive side of pessimism for its healthier, more buoyant side. He was +able to smile to himself as he met the various human marionettes of the +avenue; the persons whose names you would be sure to read every Sunday +in the society columns, and who seemed, consequently, out of place in +any more aristocratic air. He bowed to the newest beauty, he waved a +hand to the most perennial of the faded beaux. The vociferous attire of +the actors, who idled conspicuously before the shop-windows, caused him +inward shouts of laughter; a day or so ago the same sight would have +embittered his hour for him. + +At Twenty-third street something possessed him to patronize one of the +Sicilian flower-sellers. The man had, happily, not importuned him; he +merely held his wares, and waited, mutely. Orson put a sprig of +lily-of-the-valley into his coat. + +Before he left his rooms he had spent an hour or so writing curt notes +to the smartest addresses in town. All his invitations were declined by +him; a trip to Cairo, he had written, would keep him from town for some +time. He took this ruse because he felt that the complications of his +coming experiment might be awkward; it was as well to pave the way. +Certainly he could not hope to fulfil his social obligations in the time +to come. An impression that he was abroad was the best way out of the +dilemma. The riddance from fashionable duties added to his gaiety; he +felt like a school-boy on holiday. + +It was in this mood that he saw, on the other side of the avenue, a +figure that sent a flush to his skin. There was no mistaking that +wonderful hair; in the bright morning it shone with a glow a trifle less +garish than under the electric light, but it was the same, the same. To +make assurance surer, there, just under the hat--a hat that no mere male +could have expressed in phrases, a thing of gauze and shimmer--lay a +spray of lilies-of-the-valley. The gown--Vane knew at a glance that it +was a beautiful gown and a happy one, though as different as possible +from the filmy thing she had worn when first he saw her, in the mirror, +at night. + +At first unconsciously, and then with quite brazen intent, he found +himself keeping pace, on his side of the street, with the girl opposite. +He knew not what emotion possessed him; no hint of anything despicable +came to him; he had forgotten himself utterly, and he was merely +following some sweet, blind impulse. Orson Vane was a man who had +tasted the froth and dregs of his town no less thoroughly than other +men; there were few sensations, few emotions, he had not tried. Almost +the only sort of woman he did not know was The woman. In the year of his +majority he had made a summer of it on the Sound in his steam yacht, and +his enemies declared that all the harbors he had anchored in were left +empty of both champagne and virtue. Yet not even his bitterest enemy had +ever accused him of anything vulgar, brazen, coarse, conspicuous. + +Luke Moncreith was a friend of Vane's, there was no reason for doubting +that. But even he experienced a little shock when he met Vane, was +unseen of him, and was then conscious, in a quick turn of the head, that +Vane's eyes, his entire vitality, were upon a woman's figure across the +avenue. + +"The population of the Bowery, of Forty-second street, and of the +Tenderloin," said Moncreith to himself, "have a name for that sort of +thing." He clicked his tongue upon his teeth once or twice. "Poor Orson! +Is it the beginning of the end? Last night he seemed a little mad. Poor +Orson!" Then, with furtive shame at his bad manners, he turned about and +watched the two. Even at that distance the sunlight glowed like a caress +upon the hair of her whom Orson followed. "The girl," exclaimed +Moncreith, "the girl of the mirror." He came to a halt before a +photographer's window, the angle of which gave him a view of several +blocks behind. + +Orson Vane, in the meanwhile, was as if there was but one thing in life +for him: a meeting with this radiant creature with the lilies. Once he +thought he caught a sidelong glance of hers; a little smile even hovered +an instant upon her lips; yet, at that distance, he could not be sure. +None of the horrible things occurred to him as possibilities; that she +might be an adventuress, or a mere masquerading shop-girl, or an adroit +soubrette. No tangible intention came to the young man; he had not made +it clear to himself whether he would keep on, and on, and on, until she +came to her own door; whether he would accost her; whether he would +leave all to chance; or whether he would fashion circumstances to his +end. + +The girl turned into a little bookshop that, as it happened, was one of +Vane's familiar haunts. It was a place where one could always find the +new French and German things, and where the shopman was not a mere +instrument for selling whatever rubbish publishers chose to shoot at the +public. When Vane entered he found this shopman, who nodded smilingly at +him, busy with a bearded German. The girl stood at a little table, +passing her slim fingers lovingly over the titles of the books that lay +there. It was evident that she had no wish for advice from the assistant +who hovered in the background. She did not so much as glance at him. +Her eyes were all for her friends in print. She did look up, the veriest +trifle, it is true, when Orson came in; it was so swift, so shy a look +that he, in a mist of emotions, could not have sworn to it. As for him, +a boyish boldness took him to the other side of the table at which she +stood; he bent over the books, and his hands almost touched her fingers. +In that little, quiet nook, he became, all of a moment, once more a +youth of twenty; he felt the first shy stirrings of tenderness, of +worship. The names of the volumes swam for him in a mere haze. He saw +nothing save only the little figure before him, the shimmer of rose upon +her face passing into the ruddier shimmer of her hair; the perfume of +her lilies and some yet subtler scent, redolent of fairest linen, most +fragile laces and the utterest purity, came over him like a glow. + +And then the marvel, the miracle of her voice! + +"Oh, Mr. Vane," he heard her saying, "do help me!" Their eyes met and he +was conscious of a bewildering beauty in hers; it was with quite an +effort that he did not, then and there, do something absurd and stupid. +His hesitation, his astonishment, cost him a second or so; before he +caught his composure again, she was explaining, sweetly, plaintively, +"Help me to make up my mind. About a book." + +"Why did you add that?" he asked, his wits sharp now, and his voice +still a little unsteady. "There are so many other things I would like to +help you in. A book? What sort of a book? One of those stories where +the men are all eight feet high, and wear medals, and the women are all +models for Gibson? Or one of those aristocratic things where nobody is +less than a prince, except the inevitable American, who is a newspaper +man and an abomination? Or is it, by any chance," he paused, and dropped +his voice, as if he were approaching a dreadful disclosure, "poetry?" + +She shook her head. The lilies in her hair nodded, and her smile came up +like a radiance in that dark little corner. And, oh, the music in her +laugh! It blew ennui away as effectually as a storm whirls away a leaf. + +"No," she said, "it is none of those things. I told you I had not made +up my mind." + +"It is a thing you should never attempt. Making up the mind is a +temptation only the bravest of us can resist. One should always delegate +the task to someone else." + +The girl frowned gently. "If it is the fashion to talk like that," she +said, "I do not want to be in the fashion." + +He took the rebuke with a laugh. "It is hard," he pleaded, "to keep out +of the fashion. Everything we do is a fashion of one sort or another." +He glanced at her wonderful hat, at the gown that held her so closely, +so tenderly. "I am sure you are in the fashion," he said. + +"If Mr. Orson Vane tells me so, I must believe it," she answered. "But I +wear only what suits me; if the fashion does not suit me, I avoid the +fashion." + +"But you cannot avoid beauty," he urged, "and to be fair is always the +fashion." + +She turned her eyes to him full of reproach. They said, as plainly as +anything, "How crude! How stupidly obvious!" As if she had really +spoken, he went on, in plain embarassment: + +"I beg your pardon. I--I am very silly this morning. Something has gone +to my head. I really don't think I'd better advise you about anything to +read. I--" + +"Oh," she interrupted, already full of forgiveness, since it was not in +her nature to be cruel for more than a moment at a time, "but you must. +I am really desperate. All I ask is that you do not urge a fashionable +book, a book of the day, or a book that should be in the library of +every lady. I am afraid of those books. They are like the bores one +turns a corner to avoid." + +"You make advice harder and harder. Is it possible you really want a +book to read, rather than to talk about?" + +"I really do," she admitted, "I told you I had no thought about the +fashion." + +"You are like a figure from the Middle Ages," he said, "with your notion +about books." + +"Am I so very wrinkled?" she asked. She put her hand to her veil, with a +gesture of solicitous inquiry. "To be young," she sighed, with a pout, +"and yet to seem old. I am quite a tragedy." + +"A goddess," he murmured, "but not of tragedy." He laughed sharply, and +took a book from the table, using it to keep his eyes from the witchery +of her as he continued: "Don't you see why I'm talking such nonsense? If +it meant prolonging the glimpse of you, there's no end, simply no end, +to the rubbish I could talk!" + +"And no beginning," she put in, "to your sincerity." + +"Oh, I don't know. One still has fits and starts of it! There's no +telling what might not be done; it might come back to one, like +childishness in old age." He put down the book, and looked at her in +something like appeal. "There is such a thing as a sincerity one is +ashamed of, that one hides, and disguises, and that the world refuses to +see. The world? The world always means an individual. In this case the +world is--" + +"The world is yours, like _Monte Cristo_," she interposed, "how +embarassed you must feel. The responsibility must be enervating! I have +always thought the clever thing for _Monte Cristo_ to have done was to +lose the world; to hide it where nobody could find it again." She tapped +her boot with her parasol, charmingly impatient. "I suppose," she +sighed, "I shall have to ask that stupid clerk for a book, after all. He +looks as if he would far rather sell them by weight." + +"No, no, I couldn't allow that. Consider me all eagerness to aid you. Is +it to be love, or ghosts, or laughter?" + +"Love and laughter go well together," she said. "I want a book I can +love and laugh with, not at." + +"I know," he nodded. "The tear that makes the smile come after. You want +something charming, something sweet, something that will taste +pleasantly no matter how often you read it. A trifle, and yet--a +treasure. Such a book as, I dare say, every writer dreams of doing once +in his life; the sort of book that should be bound in rose-leaves. And +you expect me to betray a treasure like that to you? And my reward? But +no, I beg your pardon; I have my reward now, and here, and the debt is +still mine. I can merely put you in the way of a printed page; while +you--" He stopped, roving for the right word. His eyes spoke what his +voice could not find. He finished, lamely, and yet aptly enough, +"You--are you." + +"I don't believe," she declared, with the most arch elevation of the +darkest eyebrows, "that you know one book from another. You are an +impostor. You are sparring for time. I have given you too much time as +it is. I am going." She picked up her skirts with one slim hand, turned +on a tiny heel, and looked over her shoulder with an air, a +mischievousness, that made Orson ache, yes, simply ache with curiosity +about her. He put out a hand in expostulation. + +"Please," he pleaded, "please don't go. I have found the book. I really +have. But you must take my word for it. You mustn't open it till you are +at home." He handed it to the clerk to be wrapped up. "And now," he went +on, "won't you tell me something? I--upon my honor, I can't think where +we met?" + +"One hardly expects Mr. Orson Vane to remember all the young women in +society," she smiled. "Besides, if I must confess: I am only just what +society calls 'out.' I have seen Mr. Orson Vane: but he has not seen me. +Mr. Vane is a leader; I am--" She shrugged her shoulder, raised her +eyebrows, pursed up her mouth, oh, to a complete gesture that was the +prettiest, most bewildering finish to any sentence ever uttered. + +"Oh," said Orson, "but you are mistaken. I have seen you. No longer ago +than last night. In--" + +"In a mirror," she laughed. Then she grew suddenly quite solemn. "Oh, +you mustn't think I didn't know who you were. It was all very rash of +me, and very improper, my speaking to you, just now, but--" + +"It was very sweet," he interposed. + +"But," she went on, not heeding his remark at all, "I knew you so well +by sight, and I had really been introduced to you once,--one of a bevy +of debutantes, merely an item in a chorus--and, besides, my father--" + +"Your father?" repeated Orson, jogging his memory, "you don't mean to +say--" + +"My father is Augustus Vanlief," she said. + +He took a little time to digest the news. The clerk handed him the book +and the change. He saw, now, whence that charm, that grace, that beauty +came; he recalled that the late Mrs. Vanlief had been one of the +Waddells; there was no better blood in the country. With the name, too, +there came the thought of the wonderful revelations that were presently +to come to him, thanks to this girl's father. A sort of dizziness +touched him: he felt a quick conflict between the wish to worship this +girl, and the wish to probe deeper into life. It was with a very real +effort that he brushed the charm of her from him, and relapsed, again, +into the man who meant to know more of human life than had ever been +known before. + +He took out a silver pencil and held it poised above the book. + +"This book," he said, "is for you, you know, not for your father. Your +father and I are to be great friends but--I want to be friends, also, +with--" he looked a smiling appeal, "with--whom?" + +"With Miss Vanlief," she replied, mockingly. "My other name? I hate it; +really I do. Perhaps my father will tell you." + +She had given him the tip of her fingers, her gown had swung perfume as +it followed her, and she was out and away before he could do more than +give her the book, bow her good-bye, and stand in amaze at her +impetuousness, her verve. The thought smote him that, on the night +before, he had seen her, in the mirror, and spurned the notion of her +being other than a sham, a mockery. How did he know, even now, that she +was other than that? Yet, what had happened to him that he had been able +so long to stay under her charm, to believe in her, to wish for her, to +feel that she was hardly mortal, but some strange, sweet, splendid +dream? Was he the same man who, only a few hours ago, had held himself +shorn of all the primal emotions? He beat these questionings back and +forth in his mind; now doubting himself, now doubting this girl. Surely +she had not, in that dining-room, been sitting with her father? Would he +not have seen them together? Perhaps she was with some of her family's +womenfolk? Yes; now he remembered; she had been at a table with several +other ladies, all elderly. He wished he knew the name one might call +her, if ... if.... + +Luke Moncreith came into the shop. Orson caught a shadow of a frown on +the other's face. Moncreith's voice was sharp and bitter when he spoke. + +"Been buying the shop?" he asked. + +"No," said Orson, in some wonder. "Only one book." + +"Hope you'll like it," said the other, with a manner that meant the very +opposite. + +"I? Oh, I read it ages ago. It was for somebody else. You seem very +curious about it?" + +"I am. You aren't usually the man to dawdle in bookshops." + +"Dawdle?" Orson turned on the other sharply. "What the deuce do you +mean? Are you my keeper, or what? If I choose to, I can _live_ in this +shop, can't I?" + +"Oh, Lord, yes! Looks odd, just the same, you trailing in here after a +petticoat, and hanging around for--" he pulled out his watch,--"for a +good half hour." + +Orson burst out in a sort of clenched breath of rage. He kept the +phrases down with difficulty. "Better choose your words," he said. "I +don't like your words, and your watch be damned. Since when have my--my +friends taken to timing my actions? It's a blessing I'm going abroad." + +He turned and walked out of the shop, fiercely, swiftly. As the fresh +air struck his face, he put his hand to it, and shook his head, +wonderingly. "What's the matter with Moncreith? With me?" He thought of +the title of the book he had just given away. "Are we all as mad as +that?" he asked himself. + +The title was "March Hares." + + + + +CHAPTER V. + + +A young man so prominent in the town as Orson Vane had naturally a very +large list of acquaintances. He knew, in the fashionable phrase, +"everybody," and "everybody" knew him. His acquaintances ranged beyond +the world of fashion; the theatre, the turf, and many other regions had +denizens who knew Orson Vane and held him in esteem. He had always lived +a careful, well-mannered life; his name had never been in the newspapers +save in the inescapable columns touching society. + +When he was ready to proceed with the experiment of the mirror, the +largeness of his social register was at once a pleasure and a pain. +There were so many, so many! It was evident that he must use the types +most promising in eccentricity; he must adventure forth in company with +the strangest souls, not the mere ordinary ones. + +Sitting in the twilight of his rooms one day, it occurred to him that he +was now ripe for his first decision. Whose soul should he seize? That +was the question. He had spent a week or so perfecting plans, stalling +off awkward episodes, schooling his servants. There was no telling what +might not happen. + +He picked up a newspaper. A name caught his eye; he gave a little laugh. + +"The very man!" he told himself, "the very man. Society's court fool; it +will be worth something to know what lies under his cap and bells." + +He scrawled a note, enclosed it, and rang for Nevins. + +"Have that taken, at once, to Mr. Reginald Hart. And then, presently, +have a hansom called and let it wait nearby." + +"Reggie will be sure to come," he said, when alone. "I've told him there +was a pretty woman here." + +He felt a nervous restlessness. He paced his room, fingering the frames +of his prints, trying the cord of his new mirror, adjusting the blinds +of the windows. He tingled with mental and physical expectation. He +wondered whether nothing, after all, would be the result. How insane it +was to expect any such thing to happen as Vanlief had vapored of! This +was the twentieth century rather than the tenth; miracles never +happened. Yet how fervently he wished for one! To feel the soul of +another superimposing itself upon his own; to know that he had committed +the grandest larceny under heaven, the theft of a soul, and to gain, +thereby, complete insight into the spiritual machinery of another +mortal! + +Nevins returned, within a little time, bringing word that Mr. Hart had +been found at home, and would call directly. + +Vane pushed the new mirror to a position where it would face the door. +He told Nevins not to enter the room after Mr. Hart; to let him enter, +and let the curtain fall behind him. + +He took up a position by a window and waited. The minutes seemed heavy +as lead. The air was unnaturally still. + +At last he heard Nevins, in gentle monosyllables. Another voice, high +almost to falsetto, clashed against the stillness. + +Then the curtain swung back. + +Reginald Hart, whom all the smart world never called other than Reggie +Hart, stood for a moment in the curtain-way, the mirror barring his +path. He caught his image there to the full, the effeminate, full face, +the narrow-waisted coat, the unpleasantly womanish hips. He put out his +right hand, as if groping in the dark. Then he said, shrilly, +stammeringly. + +"Vane! Oh, Vane, where the de--" + +He sank almost to his knees. Vane stepping forward, caught him by the +shoulder and put him into an arm-chair. Hart sat there, his head hunched +between his shoulders. + +"Silly thing to do, Vane, old chappy. Beastly sorry for this--stunt of +mine. Too many tea-parties lately, Vane, too much dancing, too much--" +his voice went off into a sigh. "Better get a cab," he said, limply. + +He had quite forgotten why he had come: he was simply in collapse, +mentally and physically. Vane, trembling with excitement and delight, +walked up to the mirror from behind and sent the veil upon its face +again. Then he had Nevins summon the cab. He watched Hart tottering out, +upon Nevins' shoulder, with a dry, forced smile. + +So it was real! He could hardly believe it. In seconds, in the merest +flash, his visitor had faded like a flower whose root is plucked. The +man had come in, full of vitality, quite, in fact, himself; he had gone +out a mere husk, a shell. + +But there was still the climax ahead. Had he courage for it, now that it +loomed imminent? Should he send for Hart and have him pick up his soul +where he had dropped it? Or should he, stern in his first purpose, fit +that soul upon his own, as one fits a glove upon the hand? There was yet +time. It depended only upon whether Hart or himself faced the mirror +when the veil was off. + +He cut his knot of indecision sharply, with a stride to the mirror, a +jerk at the cord and a steady gaze into the clear pool of light, +darkened only by his own reflection. + + * * * * * + +Strain his eyes as he would, he could feel no change, not the faintest +stir of added emotion. He let the curtain drop upon the mirror +listlessly. + +Walking to his window-seat again, he was suddenly struck by his image in +one of the other glasses. He was really very well shaped; he felt a wish +to strip to the buff; it was rather a shame to clothe limbs as fine as +those. He was quite sure there were friends of his who would appreciate +photographs of himself, in some picturesque costume that would hide as +little as possible. It was an age since he had any pictures taken. He +called for Nevins. His voice struck Nevins as having a taint of tenor in +it. + +"Nevins," he said, "have the photographer call to-morrow, like a good +man, won't you? You know, the chap, I forget his name, who does all the +smart young women. I'll be glad to do the fellow a service; do him no +end of good to have his name on pictures of me. I'm thinking of +something a bit startling for the Cutter's costume ball, Nevins, so have +the man from Madame Boyer's come for instructions. And see if you can +find me some perfume at the chemist's; something heavy, Nevins. The +perfumes at once, that's a dear man. I want them in my pillows tonight." + +When the man was gone, his master went to the sideboard, opened it, and +gave a gentle sigh of disappointment. + +"Careless of me," he murmured, "to have no Red Ribbon in the place. How +can any gentleman afford to be without it? Dear, dear, if any of the +girls and boys had caught me without it. Another thing I must tell +Nevins. Nothing but whisky! Abominably vulgar stuff! Can't think, +really, 'pon honor I can't, how I ever came to lay any of it in. And no +cigarettes in the place. Goodness me! What sweet cigarettes those are +Mrs. Barrett Weston always has! Wonder if that woman will ask me to her +cottage this summer." + +He strolled to the window, yawned, stretched out his arms, drawing his +hands towards him at the end of his gesture. He inspected the fingers +minutely. They needed manicuring. He began to put down a little list of +things to be done. He strolled over to the tabouret where invitations +lay scattered all about. That dear Mrs. Sclatersby was giving a +studio-dance; she was depending on him for a novel feature. Perhaps if +he did a little skirt-dance. Yes; the notion pleased him. He would sit +down, at once, and write a hint to a newspaper man who would be sure to +make a sensation of this skirt-dance. + +That done, he heard Nevins knocking. + +"Oh," he murmured, "the perfumes. So sweet!" He buried his nose in a +handful of the sachet-bags. He sprayed some Maria Farina on his +forehead. Perfumes, he considered, were worth worship just as much as +jewels or music. The more sinful a perfume seemed, the more stimulating +it was to the imagination. Some perfumes were like drawings by +Beardsley. + +He looked at the walls. He really must get some Beardsleys put up. There +was nothing like a Beardsley for jogging a sluggish fancy; if you wanted +to see everything that milliners and dressmakers existed by hiding, all +you had to do was to sup sufficiently on Beardsley. He thought of +inventing a Beardsley cocktail; if he could find a mixture that would +make the brain quite pagan, he would certainly give it that name. + +His mind roved to the feud between the Montagues and Capulets of the +town. It was one of those modern feuds, made up of little social +frictions, infinitesimal jealousies, magnified by a malicious press into +a national calamity. It was a feud, he told himself, that he would have +to mend. It would mean, for him, the lustre from both houses. And there +was nothing, in the smart world, like plenty of lustre. There were +several sorts of lustre: that of money, of birth, and of public honors. +Personally, he cared little for the origin of his lustre; so it put him +in the very forefront of smartness he asked for nothing more. Of course, +his own position was quite impeccable. The smart world might narrow year +by year; the Newport set, and the Millionaire set, and the Knickerbocker +set--they might all dwindle to one small world of smartness; yet nothing +that could happen could keep out an Orson Vane. The name struck him, as +it shaped itself in his mind, a trifle odd. An Orson Vane? Yes, of +course, of course. For that matter, who had presumed to doubt the +position of a Vane? He asked himself that, with a sort of defiance. An +Orson Vane, an Orson Vane? He repeated the syllables over and over, in a +whisper at first, and then aloud, until the shrillness of his tone gave +him a positive start. + +He rang the bell for Nevins. + +"Nevins," he said, and something in him fought against his speech, "tell +me, that's a good man,--is there anything, anything wrong with--me?" + +"Nothing sir," said Nevins stolidly. + +Orson Vane gave a sort of gasp as the man withdrew. It had come to him +suddenly; the under-self was struggling beneath the borrowed self. He +was Orson Vane, but he was also another. + +Who? What other? + +He gave a little shrill laugh as he remembered. Reggie Hart,--that was +it,--Reggie Hart. + +He sat down to undress for sleep. He slipped into bed as daintily as a +woman, nestling to the perfumed pillows. + +Nevins, in his part of the house, sat shaking his head. "If he hadn't +given me warning," he told himself, "I'd have sent for a doctor." + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + + +The smart world received the change in Orson Vane with no immediate +wonder. Wonder is, at the outset, a vulgarity; to let nothing astonish +you is part of a smart education. A good many of the smartest hostesses +in town were glad that Vane had emerged from his erstwhile air of +aristocratic aloofness; he took, with them, the place that Reggie Hart's +continuing illness left vacant. + +In the regions where Vane had been actually intimate whispers began to +go about, it is true, and it was with no little difficulty that an +occasional story about him was kept out of the gossipy pages of the +papers. Vane was constantly busy seeking notoriety. His attentions to +several of the younger matrons were conspicuous. Yet he was so much of a +stimulating force, in a society where passivity was the rule, that he +was welcome everywhere. + +He had become the court fool of the smart set. + +To him, the position held nothing degrading. It was, he argued, a +reflection on smart society, rather on himself, that, to be prominent in +it, one must needs wear cap and bells. Moreover his position allowed +him, now and then, the utterance of grim truths that would not have +been listened to from anyone not wearing the jester's license. + +At the now famous dinner given by Mrs. Sclatersby, Orson Vane seized a +lull in the conversation, by remarking, in his ladylike lisp: + +"My dear Mrs. Sclatersby, I have such a charming idea. I am thinking of +syndicating myself." + +Mrs. Sclatersby put up her lorgnettes and smiled encouragement at Orson. +"It sounds Wall Streety," she said, "you're not going to desert us, are +you?" + +"Oh, nothing so dreadful. It would be an entirely smart syndicate, you +know; a syndicate of which you would be a member. I sometimes think, you +know, that I do not distribute myself to the best advantage. There have +been little jealousies, now and then, have there not?" He looked, in a +bird-like, perky way, at Mrs. Barrett Weston, and the only Mrs. Carlos. +"I have been unable to be in two places at once. Now a syndicate--a +syndicate could arrange things so that there would be no +disappointments, no clashings of engagements, no waste of opportunity. + +"How clever you always are," said a lady at Orson's right. She had +chameleon hair, and her poise was that of a soubrette. The theatre was +tremendously popular as a society model that season. Orson blew a kiss +at her, and went on with his speech. + +"Actors do it, you know. Painters have done it. Inventors do it. Why +not I?" He paused to nibble an olive. "To contribute to the gaiety of +our little world is, after all, the one thing worth while. Think how few +picturesque people we have! Eccentricity is terribly lacking in the +town. We have no Whistler; Mansfield is rather a dull imitation. Of +course there is George Francis Train; but he is a trifle, a trifle too +much of the larger world, don't you think?" + +"I never saw the man in my life," asserted the hostess. + +"Exactly," said Orson, "he makes himself too cheap. It keeps us from +seeing him. But Whistler; think of Whistler, in New York! He would wear +a French hat, fight duels every day, lampoon a critic every hour, and +paint nocturnes on the Fifth avenue pavement! He would make Diana fall +from the Tower in sheer envy. He would go through the Astoria with +monocle and mockery, and smile blue peacock smiles at Mr. Blashfield and +Mr. Simmons. He would etch himself upon the town. We would never let him +go again. We need that sort of thing. Our ambitions and our patience are +cosmopolitan; but we lack the public characters to properly give fire +and color to our streets. Now I--" + +He let his eyes wander about the room, a delicate smile of invitation on +his lips. + +"Don't you think," said one of the ladies, "that you are quite--quite +bohemian enough?" + +Orson shuddered obviously. "My dear lady," he urged, "it is a dreadful +thing to be bohemian. It is no longer smart. If I am considered the one, +I cannot possibly be the other. There is, to be sure, a polite +imitation; but it is quite an art to imitate the thing with just +sufficient indolence. But I really wish you would think the thing over, +Mrs. Sclatersby. I know nobody who would do the thing better than I. Our +men are mostly too fond of fashion, and too afraid of fancy. One must +not be ashamed of being called foolish. Whistler uses butterflies; +somebody else used sunflowers and green carnations; I should +use--lilies, I think, lilies-of-the-valley. Emblematic of the pure folly +of my pose, you know. One must do something like that, you see, to gain +smart applause; impossible hats and improbable hair, except in the case +of actresses, are quite extinct." + +A Polish orchestra that had been hitherto unsuccessful against the +shrill monologue of Orson, and the occasional laughter of the ladies, +now sent out a sudden, fierce stream of melody. It was evident that they +did not mean to take the insult of a large wage without offering some +stormy moments in exchange. The diners assumed a patient air, eating in +an abstracted manner, as if their stomachs were the only members of +their bodies left unstunned by the music. The assemblage wore, in its +furtive gluttony, an air of being in a plot of the most delicious +danger. Some rather dowdy anecdotes went about in whispers, and several +of the ladies made passionate efforts to blush. Orson Vane took a sip of +some apricotine, explaining to his neighbor that he took it for the +color; it was the color of verses by Verlaine. She had never heard of +the man. Ah; then of course Mallarme, and Symons and Francis Saltus were +her gods? No; she said she liked Madame Louise; hers were by far the +most fragile hats purchasable; what was the use of a hat if it was not +fragile; to wear one twice was a crime, and to give one away unless it +was decently crushed was an indiscretion. Orson quite agreed with her. +To his other neighbor he confided that he was thinking of writing a +book. It would be something entirely in the key of blue. He was busy +explaining its future virtues, when an indiscreet lull came in the +orchestral tornado. + +"I mean to bring the pink of youth to the sallowest old age," he was +saying, "and every page is to be as dangerous as a Bowery cocktail." + +Then the storm howled forth again. Everyone talked to his or her +neighbor at top voice. Now and then pauses in the music left fag ends of +conversation struggling about the room. + +"The decadents are simply the people who refuse to write twaddle for the +magazines...." + +"The way to make a name in the world is to own a soap factory and ape +William Morris on the side...." + +"I can always tell when it is Spring by looking at the haberdashers' +windows. To watch shirts and ties blooming is so much nicer than flowers +and those smelly things...." + +"The pleasantest things in the world all begin with a P. Powders, +patches and poses--what should we do without them?..." + +This sort of thing came out at loose ends now and then. Suddenly the +music ceased altogether. The diners all looked as if they had been +caught in a crime. The lights went out in the room, and there were +little smothered shrieks. After an interval, a rosy glow lit up the +conservatory beyond the palms; a little stage showed in the distance. +Some notorious people from the music-halls began to do songs and dances, +and offer comic monologues. The diners fell into a sort of lethargy. +They did not even notice that Orson Vane's chair was empty. + +Vane was in a little boudoir lent him by the hostess. His nostrils +dilated with the perfume of her that he felt everywhere. He sank into a +silk-covered chair, before which he had arranged a full-length mirror, +and several smaller glasses, with candles glowing all about him. He was +conscious of a cloying sense of happiness over his physical perfections. +He stripped garment after garment from him with a care, a gentleness +that argued his belief that haste was a foe to beauty. He stretched +himself at full length, in epicurean enjoyment of himself. The flame of +life, he told himself, burnt the more steadily the less we wrapped it +up. If we could only return to the pagan life! And yet--what charm there +was in dress! The body had, after all, a monotony, a sameness; the +tenderest of its curves, the rosiest of its surfaces, must pall. But the +infinite variety of clothes! The delight of letting the most delicate +tints of gauze caress the flesh, while to the world only the soberest +stuffs were exposed! The rustle of fresh linen, the perfume that one +could filter through the layers of one's attire! + +Orson Vane closed his eyes, lazily, musingly. At that moment his proper +soul was quite in subjection; the ecstasy in the usurping soul was +all-powerful. + +He was thinking of what the cheval-glass in that little room must have +seen. + +It would be unspeakably fine to be a mirror. + +The little crystal clock ticking on the dressing-table tinkled an hour. +It brought him from his reveries with a start. He began gliding into +some shining, silken things of umber tints; they fitted him to the skin. + +He was a falconer. + +It was a costume to strike pale the idlers at a bathing beach. There was +not a crease, not a fold anywhere. A leathern thong upon a wrist, a +feathered cap upon his head, were almost the only points that rose away +from the body as God had fashioned it. Satisfaction filled him as he +surveyed himself. But there was more to do. Above this costume he put +the dress of a Spanish Queen. When he lifted the massively brocaded +train, there showed the most exquisitely chiseled ankles, the promise of +the most alluring legs. The corsage hinted a bust of the most soothing +softness. He spent fully ten minutes in happy admiration of his images +in the mirrors. + +When he proceeded to the conservatory, it was by a secret corridor. The +diners were wearily watching a Frenchwoman who sang with her gloves, +which were black and always on the point of falling down. She was very +pathetic; she was trying to sing rag-time melodies because some idiot +had told her the Newport set preferred that music. A smart young woman +had danced a dance of her own invention; everyone agreed, as they did +about the man who paints with his toes, that, considering her smartness +in the fashionable world, it was not so much a wonder that she danced so +well, as that she danced at all. They were quite sure the professional +managers would offer her the most lavish sums; she would be quite as +much of an attraction as the foreign peer who was trying to be a +gentleman, where they are most needed, on the stage. + +At a sign from Orson, the lights went out again, as the Frenchwoman +finished her song. Several of the guests began to talk scandal in the +dark; there are few occupations more fascinating than talking scandal in +the dark. The question of whether it was better to be a millionaire or +a fashionable and divorced beauty was beginning to agitate several +people into almost violent argument, when the lights flared to the full. + +The chorus of little "Ohs" and "Ahs," of rapid whispered comment, and of +discreetly patted gloves, was quite fervid for so smart an assemblage. +Except in the rarest cases, to gush is as fatal, in the smart world, as +to be intolerant. There is a smart avenue between fervor and frowning; +when you can find that avenue unconsciously, in the dark, as it were, +you have little more to learn in the code of smartness. + +Mrs. Sclatersby herself murmured, quite audibly: + +"How sweet the dear boy looks!" + +Her clan took the word up, and for a time the sibilance of it was like a +hiss in the room. A man or two in the company growled out something that +his fairer neighbor seemed unwilling to hear. These basso profundo +sounds, if one could formulate them into words at all, seemed more like +"Disgusting fool!" or "Sickening!" than anything else. But the company +had very few men in it; in this, as in many other respects, the room +resembled smart society itself. The smart world is engineered and +peopled chiefly by the feminine element. The male sex lends to it only +its more feminine side. + +It is almost unnecessary to describe the picture that Orson Vane +presented on that little stage. His beauty as "Isabella, Queen of +Spain," has long since become public property; none of his later efforts +in suppression of the many photographs that were taken, shortly after +the Sclatersby dinner, have succeeded in quite expunging the portraits. +At that time he gave the sittings willingly. He felt that these +photographs represented the highest notch in his fame, the completest +image of his ability to be as beautiful as the most beautiful woman. + +Shame or nervousness was not part of Orson Vane's personality that +night. He sat there, in the skillfully arranged scheme of lights, with +his whole body attuned only to accurate impersonation of the character +he represented. He got up. His motion, as he passed across the stage, +was so utterly feminine, so made of the swaying, undulating grace that +usually implies the woman; the gesture with his fan was so finically +alluring; the poise of his head above his bared shoulders so +coquettish,--that the women watching him almost held their breaths in +admiration. + +It was, you see, the most adroit flattery that a man could pay the +entire sex of womankind. + +Then the music, a little way off, began to strum a cachuca. The tempo +increased; when finally the pace was something infectious, Orson Vane +began a dance that remains, to this day, an episode in the annals of the +smart. The vigor of his poses, the charm of his skirt-manipulation, +carried the appreciation of his friends by storm. Some of the ladies +really had hard work to keep from rushing to the stage and kissing the +young man then and there. When we are emotional, we Americans--to what +lengths will we not go! + +But the surprises were not yet over. A dash of darkness stayed the +music; a swishing and a flapping came from the stage; then the lights. +Vane stood, in statue position, as a falconer. You could almost, under +the umber silk, see the rippling of his veins. + +Only a second he stood so, but it was a second of triumph. The company +was so agape with wonder, that there was no sound from it until the +music and the bare stage, following a brief period of blackness, +recalled it to its senses. Then it urged Mrs. Sclatersby to grant a +great favor. + +Mr. Vane must be persuaded not take off his falconer's costume; to +mingle, for what little time remained, with the company without resuming +his more conventional attire. + +Vane smiled when the message came to him. He nodded his head. Then he +sent for the Sclatersby butler. + +"Plenty of Red Ribbon!" he said to that person. + +"Plenty, sir." + +"Make a note of your commissions; a cheque in the morning." + +Then he mingled again with his fellow-guests, and there was much +toasting, and the bonds all loosened a little, and the sparkle came up +out of the glasses into the cheeks of the women. The other men, one by +one, took their way out. + +Women crushed one another to touch the hero of the evening. Jealousies +shot savage glances about. Every increase in this emulation increased +the love that Orson Vane felt for himself. He caressed a hand here, a +lock there, with a king's condescension. If he felt a kiss upon his +hand, he smiled a splendid, slightly wearied smile. If he had hot eyes +turned on him, burning so fiercely as to spell out passion boldly, he +returned, with his own glances, the most ineffable promises. + +There have been many things written and said about that curious affair +at the Sclatersbys, but for the entire history of it--well, there are +reasons why you will never be able to trace it. Orson Vane is perhaps +the only one who might tell some of the details; and he, as you will +find presently, has utterly forgotten that night. + +"Time we went home, girls," said Vane, at last, disengaging himself +gently from a number of warm hands, and putting away, as he moved into +freedom, more than one beautiful pair of shoulders. He needed the fresh +air; he was really quite worn out. But he still had a madcap notion left +in him; he still had a trump to play. + +"A pair of hose," he called out, "a pair of hose, with diamond-studded +garters, to the one who will play 'follow' to my 'leader!'" + +And the end of that dare-devil scamper did not come until the whole +throng reached Madison Square. + +Vane plunged to the knees in the fountain. + +That chilled the chase. But one would not be denied. Hers was a dark +type of beauty that needed magnolias and the moon and the South to frame +it properly. She lifted her skirts with a little tinkling laugh, and ran +to where Orson stood, splashing her way bravely through the water. + +Vane looked at her and took her hand. + +"I envy the prize I offered," he said to her. + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + + +Dawn found Orson Vane nodding in a hansom. He had told the man to drive +to Claremont. The Palisades were just getting the first rosy streaks the +sun was putting forth. The Hudson still lay with a light mist on it. The +ascent to Claremont, in sunshine so clustered with beauty, was now +deserted. A few carts belonging to the city were dragging along +sleepily. Harlem was at the hour when the dregs of one day still taint +the morn of the next one. + +Vane was drowsy. He felt the need of a fillip. He did not like to think +of getting back to his rooms and taking a nap. It was still too early, +it seemed, for anything to eat or drink. He spied the Fort Lee ferry, +and with it a notion came to him. The cabman was willing. In a few +minutes he was aboard the ferry, and the cooler air that sweeps the +Hudson was laving him. On the Jersey side he found a sleepy innkeeper +who patched up a breakfast for him. He had, fortunately, some smokable +cigars in his clothes. The day was well on when he reached the New York +side of the river again, and gave "The Park!" as the cabman's orders. + +His body now restored to energy again, his mind recounted the successes +of the night. He really had nothing much to wish for. The men envied him +to the point of hatred; the women adored him. He was the pet of the +smartest people. He was shrewd enough, too, to be petted for a +consideration; his adroitness in sales of Red Ribbon added comfortably +to his income. He took pride in this, as if there had ever been a time, +for several generations, when the name of Vane had not stood good for a +million or so. + +The Park was not well tenanted. Some robust members of the smart set +were cantering about the bridle paths, and now and then a carriage +turned a corner; but the people who preferred the Park for its own sake +to the Park of the afternoon drive were, evidently, but few. Vane felt +quite neglected; he was still able to count the number of times that he +had bowed to familiars. The deserted state of the Park somewhat +discounted the tonic effects of its morning freshness. Nature was +nothing unless it was a background for man. The country was a place from +which you could come to town. Still--there was really nothing better to +do, this fine morning. He rather dreaded the thought of his rooms after +the brilliance of the night. + +His meditations ceased at approach of a girlish figure on horseback, a +groom at a discreet distance behind. + +It was Miss Vanlief. + +He saw that she saw him, yet he saw no welcome in her eyes. He rapped +for the hansom to stop; got out, and waved his hat elaborately at the +young woman. She, in sheer politeness, had reined in her horse. + +"A sweet day," he minced, "and jolly luck my meeting you! Thought it was +rather dull in the old Park, till you turned up. Sweet animal you're +on." He looked up with that air that, the night before, had been so +bewitching. Somehow, as the girl eyed him, he felt haggard. She was not +smiling, not the least little bit. + +"I have read about the affair at Mrs. Sclatersby's," she said. + +"Really? Dreadful hurry these newspapers are always in, to be sure. It +was really a great lark." + +"It must have been," was her icy retort. She beckoned to the groom. +"That--that sheet," she ordered, sharply, holding out one gauntleted +hand. The groom gave her the folded newspaper. She began to read from +it, in a bitter monotone: + +"The antics of Mr. Orson Vane," she read, "for some time the subject of +comment in society, have now reached the point where they deserve the +censure of publicity. His doings at a certain fashionable dinner of last +night were the subject of outspoken disgust at the prominent clubs +later. Now that the case is openly discussed, it may be repeated that a +prominent publication recently had occasion to refuse print to a +distinctly questionable photograph of this young man, submitted, it is +alleged, by himself. In the more staid social circles, one wonders how +much longer Mrs. Carlos and the other leaders of the smartest set will +continue to countenance such behavior." + +Vane, as she read, was enjoying every inch of her. What freshness, what +grace! What a Lady Godiva she would have made! + +"Sweet of you to take such interest," he observed, as she handed the +paper to the groom. "Malice, you know, sheer malice. Dare say I forgot +to give that paper some news that I gave the others; they take that sort +of thing so bitterly, you know. As for the photo--it was really awfully +cunning. I'll send you one. Oh, must you go? I'm so cut up! Charming +chat we've had, I'm sure." + +She had given her horse a cut with the whip, had sent Vane a stare of +the most open contempt, and was now off and away. Vane stood staring +after her. "Very nice little filly," he murmured. "Very!" + +Then he gave his house number to the cabman. + +Turning into Park avenue, at Thirty-Ninth street, the horse slipped on +the asphalt. The hansom spun on one wheel, and then crashed against a +lamp-post. Vane was almost stunned, though there was no mark on him +anywhere. He felt himself all over, but he could feel not as much as a +lump. But his head ached horribly; he felt queerly incapable of thought. +Whatever it was that had happened to him, it had stunned something in +him. What that something was he did not realize even as he told Nevins, +who opened the door to him in some alarm: + +"Send the cab over to Mr. Reginald Hart's. Say I must--do you hear, +Nevins?--I must have him here within the hour--if he has to come in a +chair!" + +Not even when he let the veil glide from the new mirror did he +understand what part of him was stunned. He moved about in a sort of +half wakefulness. The time he spent before Hart's arrival was all a +stupor, spent on a couch, with eyes closed. + +Hart came in feebly, leaning on a stick. + +"Funny thing of you to do," he piped, "sending for me like this. What +the--" He straightened himself in front of the new mirror, and, for an +instant, swayed limply there. Then his stick took an upward swing, and +he minced across the room vigorously. "Why, Vane," he said, "not ill, +are you? Jove, you know, I've had a siege, myself. Feel nice and fit +this minute, though. Shouldn't wonder if the effort to get here had done +me good. What was the thing you wanted me for?" + +Vane shook his head, feebly. "Upon my word, Hart, I don't know. I had an +accident; cab crushed me; I was a little off my head, I think. All a +mistake." + +"Sorry, I'm sure," lisped Hart, "hope it won't be anything real. I tell +you I feel quite out of things. All the other way with you, eh! Hear +you're no end of a choice thing with the _cafe au lait_ gang. Well, +adios!" + +Vane lay quite still after the other had gone. When he spoke, it was to +say, to the emptiness of the room, but nodding to where Hart had last +stood: + +"What a worm! What an utter worm!" + +The voice was once more the voice of Orson Vane. + +As realization of that came to him, he spoke again, so loud that Nevins, +without, heard it. + +"Thank God," he said. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + + +The time that had passed since he began the experiment with the +Professor's mirror now filled Vane with horror. The life that had seemed +so splendid, so triumphant to him a short while ago, now presented +itself to him as despicable, mean, hateful. Now that he had safely +ousted the soul of Reginald Hart he loathed the things that, under the +dominance of that soul, he had done. The quick feeling of success that +he had expected from his adventure into the realm of the mind was not +his at all; his emotions were mixed, and in that mixture hatred of +himself was uppermost. It was true: he had succeeded. The thoughts, the +deeds of another man had become his thoughts, his deeds. The entire +point of view had been, for the time, changed. But, where he had +expected to keep the outland spirit in subjection, it was the reverse +that had happened; the usurping soul had been in positive dominance; he +had been carried along relentlessly by the desires and the reflections +of that other. + +The fact that he knew, now, to the very letter, the mind that animated +that fellow, Reginald Hart, was small consolation to him. The odium of +that reputation was inescapably his, Orson Vane's. Oh, the things he had +said,--and thought,--and done! He had not expected that any man's mind +could be so horrible as that. He thought of the visitation he had +conjured upon himself, and so thinking, shuddered. How was he ever to +elude the contempt that his masquerade, if he could call it so, would +bring him? + +Above all, that scene with Miss Vanlief came back to him with a bitter +pang. What did it profit him, now, to fathom the foul depths of Reginald +Hart's mind concerning any ever so girlish creature? It was he, Orson +Vane, for all that it was possible to explain to the contrary, who had +phrased Miss Vanlief's beauty in such abominable terms. + +Consternation sat on his face like a cloud. He could think of no way out +of the dark alley into which he had put himself. + +Each public appearance of his now had its tortures. Men who had +respected him now avoided him; women to whom he had once condescended +were now on an aggravating plane of intimacy. Sometimes he could almost +feel himself being pointed out on the street. + +The mental and physical reaction was beginning to trace itself on his +face. He feared his Florentine mirrors now almost as much as the +Professor's. The blithe poise had left him. He brooded a good deal. His +insight into another nature than his own filled him with a sense of +distaste for the human trend toward evil. + +He spent some weeks away from town, merely to pick up his health again. +His strength returned a little, but the joy of life came back but +tardily. + +On his first day in town he met Moncreith. There was an ominous wrinkle +gathering in the other's forehead, but Vane braved all chance of a +rebuff. + +"Luke," he said, "don't you know I've been ill? You can't think how ill +I've been. Do you remember I told you I was going abroad? I've been +abroad, mentally; I have, Luke, really I have. It's like a bad dream to +me. You know what I mean." + +Moncreith found his friend rather pathetic. At their last meeting he had +been hot in jealousy of Orson. Now he could afford to pity him. He had +made Jeannette Vanlief's acquaintance, and he stood quite well with her. +He had made up his mind to stand yet better; he was, in fact, in love +with her. He was quite sure that Vane had quite put himself out of that +race. So he took the other's hand, and walked amicably to the Town and +Country Club with him. + +"You have been doing strange things," he ventured. + +"Strange," echoed Vane, "strange isn't the word! Ghastly, +horrible--awful things I've been doing. I wish I could explain. But +it--it isn't my secret, Luke. All I can say is: I was ill. I am, I hope, +quite well again." + +It seemed an age since he had spent an hour or so in his favorite club. +The air of the members was unmistakably frosty. The conversation shrank +audibly. He was glad when Moncreith found a secluded corner and bore him +to it. But he was not a bright companion; his own thoughts were too +depressing to allow of his presenting a sparkling surface to the world. +They talked in mere snatches, in curt syllables. + +"I've seen a good deal of Miss Vanlief," said Moncreith, with conscious +triumph. + +"Oh," said Vane, with a start, "Miss Vanlief? So you know her? Is +she--is she well?" + +"Quite. I see her almost every day." + +"Fortunate man!" sighed Vane. He was a little weary of life. He wanted +to tell somebody what his dreams about Miss Vanlief were; he wanted to +cry out loud, "She is the dearest, sweetest girl in the world!" merely +to efface, in his own mind, the alien thought of her that had come to +him weeks ago. Moncreith did not seem the one to utter this cry to. +Moncreith was too engrossed in his own success. He could bear +Moncreith's company no longer, not just then. He muttered lame words; he +stumbled out to the avenue. + +Some echo of an instinct turned his steps to the little bookshop. + +It was quite empty of customers. He passed his fingers over the back of +books that he thought Miss Vanlief might have handled. It was an absurd +whim, a childish trick. Yet it soothed him perceptibly. Our nerves +control our bodies and our nerves are slaves of our imaginations. + +He was turning to go, when his eye fell on a parcel lying on the +counter. It was addressed to "Miss Jeannette Vanlief." + +"Jeannette, Jeannette!" he said the name over to himself time and again. +It brought the image of her before him more plainly than ever. The +sunset glint in her hair, the roses and lilies of her skin, the melody +in her voice! The charm with which she had first met him, in that very +shop. It all came to him keenly. The more remote the possibility of his +gaining her seemed, the more he hugged the thought of her. He admitted +to himself now, all the more since his excursion into an abominable side +of human nature, that she was the most unspoilt creature in his world. A +girl with that face, that hair, that wit, was sure to be of a charm that +could never lose its flavor; the allurement of her was a thing that +could never die. + +Nothing but thoughts of this girl came to him on the way to his rooms. +Once in his own place, he felt that his reflections on Miss Vanlief had +served him as a tonic. He felt an energy once more, a vigor, a desire +for action. In that mood he turned fiercely upon some of the drawings on +his walls. He called Nevins, and had a heap made of the things that now +filled him with loathing. + +"All of the Beardsleys must come down," he ordered. "No; not all. The +portrait of Mantegna may stay. That has nobility; the others have the +genius of hidden evil. They take too much of the trapping from our +horrible human nature. The funeral procession by Willette may hang; his +Montmartre things are trivially indecent. Heine and his grotesqueries +may stay in jail for all I care. Leave one or two of Thoeny's blue +dragoons. Leandre's crowned heads will do me no harm; I can see past +their cruelties. But take the Gibsons away; they are relegated to the +matinee girl. What is to be done with them? Really, Nevins, don't worry +me about such things. Sell them, give them, lose them: I don't care. +There's only one man in the world who'd really adore them, and he--" he +clenched his hands as he thought of Hart,--"he is a worm, a worm that +dieth and yet corrupts everything about him." + +He sat down, when this clearance was over, and wrote a rather long +letter to Professor Vanlief. He told as much as he could bring himself +to tell of the result of the experiment. He begged the Professor, +knowing the circumstances as no other did, to do what was possible to +reinstate him, Vane, in the esteem of Miss Vanlief. As to whether he +meant to go on with further experiments; he had not yet made up his +mind. There were consequences, obligations, following on this clear +reading of other men's souls, that he had not counted upon. + + + + +CHAPTER IX. + + +To cotton-batting and similar unromantic staples the great house of R.S. +Neargood & Co. first owed the prosperity that later developed into +world-wide fame. It was success in cotton-batting that enabled the firm +to make those speculations that eventually placed millions to its +credit, and familiarized the Bourse and Threadneedle Street with its +name. + +What ever else can be said of cotton-batting, however, it is hardly a +topic of smart conversation. So in smart circles there was never any +mention of cotton-batting when the name of Neargood came up. Instead, it +was customary to refer to them as "the people, you know, who built the +Equator Palace for the Tropical Government, and all that sort of thing." +A certain vagueness is indispensable to polite talk. + +Yet not even this detail of politics and finance counted most in the +smart world. The name of Neargood might never have been heard of in that +world if it had not been for the beautiful daughters of the house of +Neargood. There is nothing, nowadays, like having handsome daughters. +You may have made your millions in pig, or your thousands in whisky, +but, in the eyes of the complaisant present, the curse dies with the +debut of a beautiful daughter. It is true that the smart sometimes make +an absurd distinction between the older generation and the new; +sometimes a barrier is raised for the daughter that checks the mother; +but caprice was ever one of the qualities of smartness. + +Through two seasons the beautiful Misses Neargood--Mary and +Alice--reigned as belles. They were both good to look at, tall, stately, +with distinct profiles. There was not much to choose, so to put it, +between them. Mary was the handsomer; Alice the cleverer. Through two +seasons the society reporters, on the newspapers that are yellow as well +as those that make one blue, exhausted the well of journalese in +chronicling the doings of these two young women. + +The climax of descriptive eloquence was reached on the occasion of the +double wedding of Mary and Alice Neargood. + +Mary changed the name of Neargood for that of Spalding-Wentworth; Alice +became Mrs. Van Fenno. + +Up to this time--as far, at least, as was observable--these two sisters +had dwelt together in unity. Never had the spirits of envy or +uncharitableness entered them. But after marriage there came to each of +them that stormy petrel of Unhappiness, Ambition. + +As a composer of several songs and light operas. Van Fenno was fairly +well known. Spalding-Wentworth was known as a man of Western wealth, of +Western blue blood, and of prominence in the smart set. For some time +the worldly successes of the Van Fennos did not disturb Mrs. +Spalding-Wentworth at all. Her husband was smart, since he moved with +the smart; he and his hyphen were the leaders in a great many famous +ways, notably in fashion and in golf. From the smart point of view the +Van Fennos were not in the hunt with the other family. + +Mrs. Van Fenno chafed and churned a little in silence, but hope did not +die in her. She made up her mind to be as prominent as her sister or +perish in the attempt. + +She did not have to perish. Things took a turn, as they will even in the +smart world, and there came a time when it was fashionable to be +intellectual. The smart set turned from the distractions of dinners and +divorces to the allurements of the arts. Music, painting and literature +became the idols of the hour. With that bland, heedless facility that +distinguishes To-day, the men and women of fashion became quickly versed +in the patter of the Muses. + +The Van Fennos became the rage. Everybody talked of his music and her +charm. Where the reporters had once used space in describing +Spalding-Wentworth's leadership in a cotillon or conduct of a coach, +they were now required to spill ink in enumeration of "those present" +at Mrs. Van Fenno's "musical afternoons." + +Wherefore there was a cloud on the fair brow of Mary Wentworth. Her +intimates were privileged to call her that. Ordinary mortals, omitting +the hyphen, would have been frozen with a look. + +When there is a cloud on the wife's brow it bodes ill for the husband. +The follies of a married man should be dealt with leniently; they are +mostly of his wife's inspiration. One day the cloud cleared from Mary +Wentworth's brow. She was sitting at breakfast with her husband. + +"Why, Clarence," she exclaimed, with a suddenness that made him drop his +toast, "there's literature!" + +"Where?" said Clarence, anxiously. "Where?" He looked about, eager to +please. + +"Stupid," said his wife. "I mean--why shouldn't we, that is, you--" She +looked at him, sure that he would understand without her putting the +thing into syllables. "Yes," she repeated, "literature is the thing. +There it is, as easy, as easy--" + +"Hasn't it always been there?" asked her dear, dense husband. A woman +may brood over a thing, you see, for months, and the man will not get so +much as a suspicion. + +She went on as if he had never spoken. "Literature is the easiest. +Clarence, you must write novels!" + +He buttered himself another slice of toast. + +"Certainly, my dear," he nodded, with a pleasant smile. "Quite as you +please." + +It was in this way that the Spalding-Wentworth novels were incited. The +art of writing badly is, unfortunately, very easy. In painting and in +music some knowledge of technic is absolutely necessary, but in +literature the art of writing counts last, and technic is rarely +applauded. The fact remains that the smart set thought the +Spalding-Wentworth novels were "so clever!" Mrs. Van Fenno was utterly +crushed. Mary Wentworth informed an eager world that her husband's next +novel would be illustrated with caricatures by herself; she had +developed quite a trick in that direction. Now and again her husband +refused to bother his head with ambitions, and devoted himself entirely +to red coats and white balls. Mrs. Wentworth's only device at such times +was to take desperately to golf herself. She really played well; if she +had only had staying power, courage, she might have gone far. But, if +she could not win cups, she could look very charming on the clubhouse +lawn. One really does not expect more from even a queen. + +It did not disturb Mrs. Wentworth at all to know that, where he was best +known, her husband's artistic efforts were considered merely a joke. She +knew that everyone had some mask or other to hold up to the world; and +she knew there was nothing to fear from a brute of a man or two. In her +heart she agreed with them; she knew her husband was a large, kindly, +clumsy creature; a useful, powerful person, who needed guidance. + +Kindly and clumsy--Clarence Spalding-Wentworth had title to those two +adjectives: there was no denying that. It was his kindliness that moved +him, after a busy day at a metropolitan golf tournament, toward Orson +Vane's house. He had heard stories of Vane's illness; they had been at +college together; he wanted to see him, to have a chat, a smoke, a good, +chummy hour or two. + +It was his clumsiness that brought about the incident that came to have +such memorable consequences. Nevins told him Mr. Vane was out; Wentworth +thought he would go in and have a look at Vane's rooms, anyway; sit +down, perhaps, and write him a note. Nevins had swung the curtain to +behind him when Wentworth's heel caught in the wrapping around the new +mirror. + +He looked into the pool of glass blankly. + +"Funny thing to cover up a mirror like that!" he told himself. He flung +the stuff over the frame carelessly. It merely hung by a thread. Almost +any passing wind would be sure to lift it off. + +"Wonder where he keeps his smokes?" he hummed to himself, striding up +and down, like a good natured mammoth. + +He found some cigars began puffing at one with an audible satisfaction, +and at last let himself down to an ebony escritoire that he could have +smashed with one hand. He wrote a scrawl; waited again, whistled, looked +out of the window, picked up a book, peered at the pictures, and then, +with a puff of regret, strode out. + +As he passed the Professor's mirror the current of air he made swept the +curtain from the glass and left it exposed. + + + + +CHAPTER X. + + +At about the time that Wentworth was scrawling his note in Vane's rooms +a slender young woman, dressed in a grey that shimmered like the +winter-sea in sunlight, wearing a hat that had the air of having lit +upon her hair for the moment only,--merely to give the world an +instant's glance at the gracious combination that woman's beauty and +man's millinery could effect--was coming out from one of those huge +bazaars where you can buy almost everything in the world except the +things you want. As she reached the doors, a young man, entering, +brushed her arm; his sleeve caught her portemonnaie. He stooped for it, +offered it hastily, and then--and not until then, gave a little "Oh!" +of--what was it, joy? or mere wonder, or both? + +"Oh," he repeated, "I can't go in--now. It's--it's ages since I could +say two words to you. 'Good-morning!' and 'How do you do?' has been the +limit of our talk. Besides, you have a parcel. It weighs, at the very +least, an ounce. I could never think of letting you tire yourself so." +He took the flimsy mite from her, and ranged his steps to hers. + +It was true, what he had said about their brief encounters. Do what she +would to forget that morning in the Park, and the weeks before it, +Jeannette Vanlief had not quite succeeded. Not even the calm +dissertations of her father, the arguments pointing to the unfathomable +freakishness of human nature, had altogether ousted her aversion to +Orson Vane. It was an aversion made the more keen because it came on the +heels of a strong liking. She had been prepared to like this young man. +Something about him had drawn her; and then had come the something that +had simply flung her away. Yet, to-day, he seemed to be the Orson Vane +that she had been prepared to like. + +She remembered some of the strange things her father had been talking +about. She noted, as Orson spoke, that the false tenor note was gone out +of his voice. But she was still a little fluttered; she could not quite +trust herself, or him. + +"But I am only going to the car," she declared. "It will hardly be worth +while. I mustn't take you out of your way." + +"I see," he regretted, "you've not forgotten. I can't explain; I was--I +think I was a little mad. Perhaps it is in the family. But--I wish you +would imagine, for to-day, that we had only just known each other a very +little while, that we had been in that little bookshop only a day or so +ago, that you had read the book, and we had met again, and--." He was +looking at her with a glow in his eyes, a tenderness--! Her eyes met his +for only an instant, but they fathomed, in that instant, that there was +only homage, and worship, and--and something that she dared not spell, +even to her soul--in them. That burning greed that she had seen in the +Park was not there. + +She smiled, wistfully, hesitatingly. Yet it was enough for him to cling +to; it buoyed his mood to higher courage. + +"Let us pretend," he went on, "that there are no streetcars in the town. +Let us be primitive; let us play we are going to take a peep-show from +the top of the Avenue stage! Oh--please! It gets you just as near, you +know; and if you like we can go on, and on, and do it all over again. +Think of the tops of the hats and bonnets one sees from the roof! It's +such a delightful picture of the avenue; you see all the little +marionettes going like beads along the string. And then, think of the +danger of the climb to the roof! It is like the Alps. You never know, +until you are there, whether you will arrive in one piece or in several. +Come," he laughed, for she was now really smiling, openly, sweetly, "let +us be good children, come in from Westchester County, to see the big +city." + +"Perhaps," she ventured, "we will make it the fashion. And that would +spoil it for so many of the plainer people." + +"Oh," and he waved his hand, "after us--the daily papers! Let us +pretend--I beg your pardon, let me pretend--youth, and high spirits, +and the intention to enjoy to-day." + +A rattling and a scraping on the asphalt warned them of an approaching +stage, and after a scramble, that had its shy pleasures for both, they +found themselves on the top of the old relic. + +"It is a bit of the Middle Ages," said Orson, "look at those horses! +Aren't they delightfully slender? And the paint! Do you notice the +paint? And the stories those plush seats down below us could tell! Think +of the misers and the millionaires, the dowagers and the drabs, that +have let these old stages bump them over Murray Hill! You can't have +that feeling about a street-car, not one of the electric ones, at any +rate. Do you know the story of the New Yorker who was trying to sleep in +a first-class compartment on a French railway? There was a collision, +and he was pitched ten feet onto a coal-heap. He said he thought he was +at home and he was getting off the stage at Forty-Second street." + +They were passing through the most frequented part of the avenue. Noted +singers and famous players passed them; old beaux and fresh belles; +political notabilities and kings of corruption. A famous leader of +cotillions, a beauty whose profile vied with her Boston terriers for +being her chief distinction, and a noted polo-player came upon the scene +and vanished again. Vane and his companion gave, from time to time, +little nods to right and left. Their friends stared at them a little, +but that caused them no sorrow. Automobiles rushed by. They looked down +upon them, lofty in their ruined tower. + +"As a show," said Vane, "it is admirably arranged. It moves with a +beautiful precision. There is nothing hurried about it; the illusion of +life is nearly complete. Some of them, I suppose, really are alive?" + +"I am not sure," she answered, gravely. "Sometimes I think they merely +move because there is a button being pressed somewhere; a button we +cannot see, and that they spend their lives hiding from us." + +"I dare say you are right. In the words of Fay Templeton, 'I've been +there and I know.' I have made my little detours: but the lane had, +thank fortune, a turning." + +She saw through his playfulness, and her eyes went up to his in a +sympathy--oh, it made him reel for sweetness. + +"I am glad," she said, simply. + +"But we are getting serious again," he remonstrated, "that would never +do. Have we not sworn to be children? Let us pretend--let us pretend!" +He looked at the grey roofs, the spires oozing from the hill to the sky. +He looked at the grey dream beside him: so grey, so fair, so crowned +with the hue of the sun before the world had made him so brazen. "Let us +pretend," he went on, after a sigh, "that we are bound for the open +road, and that we are to come to an inn, and that we will order +something to eat. We--" + +"Oh," she laughed, "you men, you men! Always something to eat!" + +"You see, we are of coarse stuff; we cannot sup on star-dust, and dine +on bubbles. But--this is only to pretend! An imaginary meal is sometimes +so much more fun than a real one. At a real one, you see, I would have +to try to eat, and I could not spend the whole time looking at you, and +watching the sunshine on your hair, and the lilies--" He caught his +breath sharply, with a little clicking noise. "Dear God," he whispered, +"the lilies again! And I had never seen them until now." + +"You are going to be absurd," she said, though her voice was hardly a +rebuke. + +"And wouldn't I have excuse," he asked, "for all the absurdities in the +world! I want to be as absurd as I can; I want to think that there's +nothing in the world any uglier than--you." + +"And will you dine off that thought?" + +"Oh, no; that is merely one of the condiments. I keep that in reach, +while the other things come and go. I tell you: how would it be if we +began with a bisque of crab? The tenderest pink, you know, and not the +ghost of any spice that you can distinguish; a beautiful, creamy blend." + +"You make it sound delicious," she admitted. + +"We take it slowly, you know, religiously. The conversation is mostly +with the eyes. Dinner conversation is so often just as vapid as +dinner-music! The only point in favor of dinner-music is that we are +usually spared the sight of it. There is no truth more abused than the +one that music must be heard and not seen. When I am king I mean to +forbid any singing or playing of instruments within sight of the public; +it spoils all the pleasure of the music when one sees the uglinesses in +its execution." + +"But people would not thank you if you kept the sight of Paderewski or +De Pachmann from them." + +"They might not thank me at first, but they would learn gratitude in the +end, A contortionist is quite as oppressive a sight as an automaton. No; +I repeat, performers of music should never, never be visible. It is a +blow in the face of the art of music; it puts it on the plane of the +theatre. What persons of culture want to do is to listen, to listen, to +listen; to shut the eyes, and weave fancies about the strains as they +come from an unseen corner. Is there not always a subtle charm about +music floating over a distance? That is a case in point; that same charm +should always be preserved. The pianist, the soloist of any sort, as +well as the orchestra, or the band--except in the case of the regimental +band, in battle or in review, where actual spectacle, and visible +encouragement are the intention--should never be seen. There should +always be a screen, a curtain, between us and the players. It would make +the trick of music criticism harder, but it would still leave us the +real judges. Take out of music criticism the part that covers fingering, +throat manipulation, pedaling, and the like, and what have you left? +These fellows judge what they see more than what they hear. To give a +proper judgment of the music that comes from the unseen; that is the +only test of criticism. There can be no tricks, no paddings." + +"But the opera?" wondered the girl. + +"The opera? Oh, the opera is, at best, a contradiction in terms. But I +do not waive my theory for the sake of opera. It should be seen as +little as any other form of music. The audience, supplied with the story +of the dramatic action, should follow the incidents by ear, not by eye. +That would be the true test of dramatic writing in music. We would, +moreover, be spared the absurdity of watching singers with beautiful +voices make themselves ridiculous by clumsy actions. As to comic +opera--the music's appeal would suffer no tarnish from the merely +physical fascination of the star or the chorus ... I know the thought is +radical; it seems impossible to imagine a piano recital without long +hair, electric fingers, or visible melancholia; opera with only the +box-holders as appeals to the eye seems too good to be true; but--I +assure you it would emancipate music from all that now makes it the +most vicious of the arts. Painters do not expect us to watch them +painting, nor does the average breed of authors--I except the Manx--like +to be seen writing. Yet the musician--take away the visible part of his +art, and he is shorn of his self-esteem. I assure you I admire actors +much more than musicians; actors are frankly exponents of nothing that +requires genius, while musicians pretend to have an art that is over and +above the art of the composer.... Music--" + +"Do you realize," interrupted the girl, with a laugh that was melody +itself, "that you are feasting me upon dinner-music without dinner. It +must be ages since we began that imaginary feast. But now, I am quite +sure we are at the black coffee. And I have been able to notice nothing +except your ardor in debate. You were as eager as if you were being +contradicted." + +"You see," he said, "it only proves my point. Dinner-music is an +abomination. It takes the taste of the food away. While I was playing, +you admit, you tasted nothing between the soup and the coffee. Whereas, +in point of fact--" + +"Or fancy?" + +"As you please. At any rate--the menu was really something out of the +common. There were some delightful wines. A sherry that the innkeeper +had bought of a bankrupt nobleman; so would run his fable for the +occasion, and we would believe it, because, in cases of that sort, it +takes a very bad wine to make one pooh-pooh its pedigree. A Madeira that +had been hidden in a cellar since 1812. We would believe that, every +word of it, because we would know that there was really no Madeira in +all the world; and we must choose between insulting our stomachs or our +intelligence. And then the coffee. It would come in the tiniest, most +transparent, most fragile--" + +"Yes," she laughed, "I dare say. As transparent and as fragile as the +entire fabric of our repast, I have no doubt. But--pity me, do!--I shall +have to leave the beautiful banquet about where you have put it, in the +air. I have a ticking conscience here that says--" + +"Oh, hide it," he supplicated, "hide it. Watches are nothing but +mechanisms that are jealous of happiness; whenever there is a happy hour +a watch tries to end it. When I am king I shall prohibit the manufacture +and sale of watches. The fact that they may be carried about so easily +is one of their chief vices; one never knows nowadays from what corner a +woman will not bring one; they carry them on their wrists, their +parasols, their waists, their shoulders. Can you be so cruel as to let +that little golden monster spoil me my hour of happiness--" + +"But I would have to be cruel one way or the other. You see, my father +will wonder what has become of me. He expects me to dinner." + +"Ah, well," he admitted soberly, if a little sadly, "we must not keep +him waiting. You must tell the Professor where we have been, and what we +said, and how silly I was, and--Heigho, I wish I could tell you how the +little hour with you has buoyed me up. Your presence seems to stir my +possibilities for good. I wish I could see you oftener. I feel like the +provincial who says good-bye with a: 'May I come 'round this evening?' +as a rider." + +"A doubtful compliment, if I make you rustic," she said. "But I have +something on this evening; an appointment with a man. The most beautiful +man in the world, and the best, and the kindest--" + +"His name?" he cried, with elaborate pretense of melodrama, for he saw +that she was full of whimsies. + +"Professor Vanlief," she curtsied. + +They were walking, by now, in the shade of the afternoon sun. Vane saw a +stage approaching them, one that would take him back to the lower town. +She saw it, too, and his intention. She shook hands with him, and took +time to say, softly: + +"Do you never ride in the Park any more?" + +"Oh," he said, "tell me when. To-morrow morning? At McGowan's Pass? At +ten? Oh, how I wish that stage was not coming so fast!" + +In their confusion, and their joyous sense of having the same absurd +thought in common, they both laughed at the notion of a Fifth avenue +stage ever being too fast. Yet this one, and Time, sped so swiftly that +Vane could only shake hands hastily with his fair companion, look at her +worshipfully, and jump upon the clattering vehicle. + +He would never have believed that so ramshackle a conveyance could have +harbored so many dreams as had been his that day. + +That thought was his companion all the way home. That, and efforts to +define his feelings toward Miss Vanlief. Was it love? What else could it +be! And if it was, was he ready, for her, to give up those ambitions of +still further sounding hitherto unexplored avenues of the human mind? +Was this fragile bit of grace and glamour to come between him and the +chance of opening a new field to science? Had he not the opportunity to +become famous, or, at the very least, to become omnipotent in reading +the hearts, the souls, of men? Were not the possibilities of the +Professor's discovery unlimited? Was it not easy by means of that mirror +in his rooms, for any chief of police in the world to read the guilt or +innocence of every accused man? Yet, on the other hand, would marriage +interfere? Yes; it would. One could not serve two such goddesses as +woman and science. He would have to make up his mind, to decide. + +But, in the meanwhile, there was plenty of time. Surely, for the +present, he could be happy in the thought of the morrow, of the ride +they were to take in the Park, of the cantering, the chattering +together, the chance to see the morning wind spin the twists of gold +about her cheeks and bring the sparkle to her eyes. + +He let himself into his house without disturbing any of the servants. He +passed into his room. He lifted the curtain of the doorway with one +hand, and with the other turned the button that lighted the room. As the +globes filled with light they showed him his image in the new mirror. + +He reeled against the wall with the surprise of the thing. He noted the +mirror's curtain in a heap at the foot of the frame. Perhaps, after all, +it had been merely the wind. + +He summoned Nevins. The curtain he replaced on the staring face of the +mirror. Whence the thought came from, he did not know, but it occurred +to him that the scene was like a scene from a novel. + +"Nevins," he asked, "was anyone in my rooms?" + +"Mr. Spalding-Wentworth, sir." + +Orson Vane laughed,--a loud, gusty, trumpeting laugh. + +He understood. But he understood, also, that the accident that had +brought the soul of Spalding-Wentworth into his keeping had decreed, +also, that the dominance should not be, as on a former time, with the +usurper. + +He knew that the soul of Spalding-Wentworth, to which he gave the refuge +of his own body, was a small soul. + +Yet even little souls have their spheres of influence. + + + + +CHAPTER XI. + + +It was a morning such as the wild flowers, out in the suburban meadows, +must have thought fit for a birthday party. As for the town, it lost, +under that keen air and gentle sun, whatever of garish and unhealthy +glamour it had displayed the night before. + +"The morning," Orson Vane had once declared, in a moment of revelation, +"is God's, and the night is man's." He was speaking, of course, of the +town. In the severe selectiveness that had grown upon him after much +rout and riot through other lands, he pretended that the town was the +only spot on the map. Certainly this particular morning seemed to bear +out something of this saying; it swept away the smoke and the taint, the +fever and the flush of the night before; the visions of limelights and +glittering crystals and enmillioned vice fled before the gust of ozone +that came pouring into the streets. Before night, to be sure, man would +have asserted himself once more; the pomp and pageant of the primrose +path would have ousted, with its artificial charm, the clean, sweet +freshness of the morning. + +The grim houses on upper Fifth avenue put on semblance of life +reluctantly that morning. Houses take on the air of their inmates; these +houses wore their best manner only under artificial lights. Surly grooms +and housemaids went muttering and stumbling about the areas. Sad-faced +wheelmen flashed over the asphalt, cursing the sprinkling carts. It was +not too early for the time-honored preoccupation of the butcher cart, +which consists of turning corners as if the world's end was coming. +Pallid clubmen strode furtively in the growing sunshine. To them, as to +the whole town, the sun and its friend, the breeze, came as a tonic and +a cure. + +So strange a thing is the soul of man that Orson Vane, riding towards +the Park that morning, caught only vague, fleeting impressions of the +actual beauty of the day. He simply wondered, every foot of the way to +McGowan's Pass, whether Miss Vanlief played golf. The first thing he +said to her after they had exchanged greetings, was: + +"Of course you golf?" + +She looked at him in alarm. There was something--something, but what was +it?--in his voice, in his eye. She had expected a reference to the day +before, to their infantile escapade on the roof of the coach. Instead, +this banale, this stupid, this stereotyped phrase! Her flowerlike face +clouded; she gave her mare the whip. + +"No," she called out, "I cannot bear the game." His horse caught the +pace with difficulty; the groom was left far out of sight, beyond a +corner. But the diversion had not touched Vane's trend of thought at +all. + +"Oh," he assured her, when the horses were at an amble again, "it's one +of those things one has to do. Some things have to be done, you know; +society won't stand for anything less, you know, oh, no. I have to play +golf, you know; part of my reputation." + +"I didn't know," she faltered. She tried to remember when Orson Vane had +ever been seen on either the expert or the duffer list at the golf +matches. + +"Oh, yes; people expect it of me. If I don't play I have to arrange +tournaments. Handicapping is great fun; ever try it? No? You should. +Makes one feel quite like a judge at sessions. Oh, there's nothing like +golf. Not this year, at least. Next year it may be something else. I may +have to take to polo or tennis. One is expected to show the way, you +know; a man in my position--" He looked at her with a kind of 'bland, +blunt, clumsy egoism, that made her wonder where was the Orson Vane of +yesterday. This riddle began to sadden her. Perhaps it was true, as she +had heard somewhere, that the man was mentally unbalanced; that he had +his--well, his bad days. She sighed. She had looked forward to this ride +in the Park; she admitted that to herself. Not in a whole afternoon +spent with Luke Moncreith had she felt such happy childishness stirring +in her as yesterday, in the hour with Orson Vane. And now--She sighed. + +The hum of an approaching automobile reached them, the glittering +vehicle proclaiming its progress in that purring stage whisper that is +still the inalienable right of even the newest "bubble" machine. The +coat worn by the smart young person on the seat would have shocked the +unenlightened, for that sparkling, tingling morning it struck the exact +harmonious note of artifice. + +Orson Vane bowed. It was "the" Miss Carlos. Just as there is only one +Mrs. Carlos, so there is only one Miss Carlos. + +"She plays a decent game," said Vane to his companion. + +"Of life?" + +"No; golf." He looked at her in amazement. Life! What was life compared +to golf? Life? For most people it was, at best, a foozle. Nearly +everybody pressed; very few followed through, and the bunkers--good +Lord, the bunkers! + +"I'm thinking of writing a golfing novel," began Orson, after an +interval in which he managed to wonder whether one couldn't play golf +from horseback. + +"Oh," said Miss Vanlief wearily, "how does one set about it!" + +He was quite unaware of her weariness. He chirped his answer with blind +enthusiasm. + +"It's very easy," he declared. "There are always a lot of women, you +know, who are aching to do things in that line. You give them the +prestige of your name, that's all. One of them writes the thing; you +simply keep them from foozling the phrases now and then. Another +illustrates it." + +"And does anyone buy it?" + +"Oh, all the smart people do. It's one of those things one is supposed +to do. There's no particular reason or sense in it; but smart people +expect one another to read things like that. The newspapers get quite +silly over such books. Then, after novels, I think, I shall take to +having them done over for the stage? Don't you think a golfing comedy, +with a sprinkling of profanity and Scotch whiskey, would be all the +rage?" + +Jeannette Vanlief reined in her mare. She looked at Orson Vane; looked +him, as much as she could, through and through. Was it all a stupid +jest? She could find nothing but dense earnestness in her face, in his +eyes. Oh, the riddle was too tiresome, too hopeless. It was simply not +the same man at all! She gave it up, gave him up. + +"Do you mind," she said, "if I ride home now? I'm tired." + +It should have been a blow in the face, but Orson Vane never so much as +noticed it. + +"Tired?" he repeated. "Oh; all right. We'll turn about. Rather go back +alone? Oh, all right. Wish you'd learn to play golf; you really must!" +And upon that he let her canter away, the groom following, some little +wonder on his impassive front. + +As for Jeannette Vanlief she burst into her father's room a little +later, and then into tears. + +"And I wanted to love him!" she wailed presently, from out her confusion +and her distress. + +The Professor was patting her hair, and wondering what in all the world +was the matter. At her speech, he thought he saw a light. + +"And why not?" he asked, soothingly, "He seems quite estimable. He was +here only a moment ago?" + +"Who was here?" she asked in bewilderment. + +"Mr. Moncreith." + +At that she laughed. The storm was over, the sunshine peeped out again. + +"You dear, blind comfort, you!" she said, "What do I care if a thousand +Moncreiths--" + +"Then it's Orson Vane," said the Professor, not so blind after all. +"Well, dear, and what has he been doing now?" + +He listened to her rather rambling, rather spasmodic recital; listened +and grew moody, though he could scarce keep away some little mirth. He +saw through these masquerades, of course. Who else, if not he? Poor +Jeannette! So she had set her happy little heart upon that young man? A +young man who, to serve both their ends, was playing chameleon. A young +man who was mining greater secrets from the deeps of the human soul than +had ever been mined before. A wonderful young man, but--would that make +for Jeannette's happiness? At any rate he, the Professor, would have to +keep an eye open for Vane's doings. There was no knowing what strange +ways these borrowed souls might lead to. He wondered who it was that, +this time, had been rifled of his soul. + +Wonder did not long remain the adjuncts of the Professor and his +daughter only. The whole world of society began to wonder, as time went +on, at the new activities of Orson Vane. Wonder ceased, presently, and +there was passive acceptance of him in his new role. Fashions, after +all, are changed so often in the more external things, that the smart +set would not take it as a surprising innovation if some people took to +changing their souls to suit the social breeze. + +Orson Vane took a definite place in the world of fashion that season. He +became the arbiter of golf; he gave little putting contests for women +and children; he looked after the putting greens of a number of smart +clubs with as much care as a woman gives her favorite embroideries. He +took to the study of the Turkish language. There were rumors that he +meant to become the Minister to Turkey. He traveled a great deal, and he +published a book called "The Land of the Fez." Another little brochure +bearing his name was "The Caddy; His Ailments and Diseases." It was +rumored that he was busy in dramatization of his novel, "Five Loaves and +Two Fishes!" When Storman Pasha made his memorable visit to the States +it was Orson Vane who became his guide and friend. A jovial club of +newspaper roysterers poked fun at him by nominating him for Mayor. He +went through it all with a bland humorlessness and stubborn dignity that +nothing could affront. His indomitable energy, his intense seriousness +about everything, kept smart society unalterably loyal. He led its +cotillions, arranged its more sober functions, and was a household word +with the outsiders that reach society only through the printed page. His +novels--whether they were his own or done for him hardly matters--were +just dull enough to offend nobody. The most indolent dweller in Vanity +Fair could affect his books without the least mental exertion. The lives +of our fashionables are too full, too replete with a multitude of +interests and excitements, to allow of the concentration proper for the +reading of scintillating dialogue, or brilliant observations. Orson Vane +appeared to gauge his public admirably; he predominated in the outdoor +life, in golf, in yachting, in coaching, yet he did not allow anyone +else to dispute the region of the intellect, of indoors, with him. He +shone, with a severe dimness, in both fields. + +Jeannette Vanlief, meanwhile, lost much of the sparkle she had hitherto +worn. She drooped perceptibly. The courtship of Luke Moncreith left her +listless; he persevered on the strength of his own ambition rather than +her encouragement. His daughter's looks at last began seriously to worry +Professor Vanlief. Something ought to be done. But what? It was +apparently Orson Vane's intention to keep that borrowed soul with him +for a long time. In the meanwhile Jeannette.... The Professor, the more +he considered the matter, felt the more strongly that just as he was the +one who had given Vane this power, so had he the right, if need be, to +interfere. The need was urgent. The masquerade must be put an end to. + +His resolve finally taken, Professor Vanlief paid a visit to Orson +Vane's house. Vane was, as he had hoped, not at home. He +cross-questioned Nevins. + +The man was only too willing to admit that his master's actions were +queer. But Mr. Vane had given him warning to that effect; he must have +felt it coming on. It was a malady, no doubt. For his part he thought it +was something that Mr. Vane would wish to cure rather than endure. He +didn't pretend to understand his master of late, but-- + +The Professor put a period to the man's volubility with some effort. + +"I want you," he urged, "to jog your memory a little. Never mind the +symptoms. Give me straightforward answers. Now--did you touch the new +mirror, leaving it uncovered, at any time within the past few weeks?" + +"Oh," was the answer, "the new mirror, is it! I knows well the uncanny +thing was sure to make trouble for me. But I gives you my word, as I +hopes to be saved, that I've never so much as brushed the dust off it, +much less taken the curtain off. It's fearsome, is that mirror, I'm +thinking. It's--" + +"Then think back," pressed the Professor, again stemming the tide of the +other's talk relentlessly, "think back: was anyone, ever, at any time, +alone in Mr. Vane's rooms? Think, think!" + +"I disremember," stammered Nevins. "I think not--Oh, wait! It was a long +time ago, but I think a gentleman wrote Mr. Vane a note once, and I, +having work in the other rooms, let him be undisturbed. But I told the +master about it, the minute he came in, sir. He was not the least vexed, +sir. Oh, I'm easy in my mind about that time." + +"Yes, yes,--but the gentleman's name!" The Professor shook the man's +shoulder quite roughly. + +"His name? Oh, it was just Mr. Spalding-Wentworth, sir, that was all." + +The Professor sat down with a laugh. Spalding-Wentworth! He laughed +again. + +Nevins had the air of one aggrieved. "Mr. Vane laughed, too, I remember, +when I told him. Just the minute I told him, sir, he laughed. I've +puzzled over it, time and again, why--" + +The Professor left Nevins puzzling. There was no time to be lost. He +remembered now that Spalding-Wentworth had for some time been ailing. +The world, in its devotion to Orson Vane, had forgotten, almost, that +such a person as Spalding-Wentworth had ever existed. To be forgotten +one has only to disappear. Dead men's shoes are filled nowhere so +quickly as in Vanity Fair; though, to be paradoxic, for the most part +they are high-heeled slippers. + +It took some little time, some work, to arrange what the Professor had +decided must be done. He went about his plans with care and skill. He +suborned Nevins easily enough, using, chiefly, the plain truth. Nevins, +with the superstition of his class, was willing to believe far greater +mysteries than the Professor half hinted at. By Nevins' aid it happened +that Orson Vane slept, one night, face to face with the polished surface +of the new mirror. In the morning it was curtained as usual. + +That morning Augustus Vanlief called at the Wentworth house. He asked +for Mrs. Wentworth. He went to his point at once. + +"You know who I am, I dare say, Mrs. Wentworth. You love your husband, I +am sure; you will pardon my intrusion when I tell you that perhaps I can +do something the best thing of all--for him. It is, in its way, a +matter of life and death. Do the doctors give you any hope?" + +Mrs. Wentworth, her beauty now tired and touched by traces of spoilt +ambition, made a listless motion with her hands. + +"I don't know why I should tell you," she said, "or why I should not. +They tell me vague things, the doctors do, but I don't believe they know +what is the matter." + +"Do you?" + +"I?" she looked at Vanlief, and found a challenge in his regard. "It +seems," she admitted, "as if--I hardly like to say it,--but it seems as +if there was no soul in him any more. He is a shell, a husk. The life in +him seems purely muscular. It is very depressing. Why do you think you +can do anything for Clarence, Professor? I did not know your researches +took you into medicine?" + +"Ah, but you admit this is not a matter for medicine, but for the mind. +Will you allow me an experiment madame? I give you my word of honor, my +honor and my reputation, that there is no risk, and there may +be--perhaps, an entire restoration. There is--a certain operation that I +wish to try--" + +"An operation? The most eminent doctors have told me such a thing would +be useless. We might as well leave my poor husband clear of the knife, +Professor." + +"Oh, it is no operation, in that sense. Nothing surgical. I can hardly +explain; professional secrets are involved. If you did not know that I +am but a plodding old man of science--if I were an unknown charlatan--I +would not ask you to put faith in me. But--I give you my word, my +promise, that if you will let Mr. Wentworth come with me in my brougham +I will return with him within the hour. He will be either as he is now, +or--as he once was." + +"As he once was--!" Mrs. Wentworth repeated the phrase, and the thought +brought her a keen moment of anguish that left a visible impress on her +features. "Ah," she sighed, "if I could only think such a thing +possible!" She brooded in silence a moment or two. Then she spoke. + +"Very well. You will find him in the library. Prim, show the gentleman +to the library. If you can persuade him, Professor--" She smiled +bitterly. "But then, anybody can persuade him nowadays." She turned to +some embroidery as if to dismiss the subject, to show that she was +resigned even to hopeless experiments. The very fact that she was plying +the needle rather than the social sceptre was gauge of her descent from +the heights. As a matter of fact Vanlief found Wentworth amenable +enough. Wentworth was reading Marie Corelli. His mind was as empty as +that. Nothing could better define his utter lapse from intelligence. He +put the book down reluctantly as the Professor came in. He listened +without much enthusiasm. A drive? Why not? He hadn't driven much of +late, but if it was something that would please the Professor. He +remembered, through a mist, that he had known Vanlief when he himself +was a boy; his father had often spoken of Vanlief with respect. Nothing +further in the way of mental exertion came to him. He followed Vanlief +as a dog follows whoso speaks kindly to it. + +The conversation between the two, in the brougham, would hardly tend to +the general entertainment. It was a thing of shreds and patches. It led +nowhither. + +The brougham stopped at the door of Orson Vane's house. Nevins let them +in, whispering an assuring confidence to the professor. As they reached +the door of the dressing-room Vanlief pushed Wentworth ahead of him, and +bade him enter. He kept behind him, letting the other's body screen him +from the staring mirror. + +Wentworth looked at himself. A hand traveled slowly up to his forehead. + +"By Jove!" he said, hesitatingly, "I never put the curtain back, after +all." And he covered up the mirror. "Curious thing," he went on, with +energy vitalizing each word, "what possessed me to come here just now, +when I know for a fact that they're playing the Inter-State Golf +championships to-day. Dashed if I know why I didn't go!" He walked out, +plainly puzzled, clumsily heedless of Vanlief and Nevins, but--himself +once more. + +Orson Vane, at just that time, was on the links of the Fifeshire Golf +Club. He was wearing a little red coat with yellow facings. He was in +the act of stooping on a green, to look along the line of his putt, when +he got to his feet in a hurried, bewildered way. He threw his putter +down on the green. He blushed all over, shaming the tint of his scarlet +coat. + +"What a foolish game for a grown-up man!" he blurted out, and strode off +the grounds. + +The bystanders were aghast. They could not find words. Orson Vane, the +very prophet of golf, to throw it over in that fashion! It was +inexplicable! The episode was simply maddening. + +But it was remarked that the decline of golf on this side of the water +dated from that very day. + + + + +CHAPTER XII. + + +Orson Vane was taking lunch with Professor Vanlief. Jeannette, learning +of Vane's coming, had absented herself. + +"It is true," Vane was saying, "that I can assert what no other man has +asserted before,--that I know the exact mental machinery of two human +beings. Yes; that is quite true. But--" + +"I promised nothing more," remarked Vanlief. + +"No. That is true, too. I have lived the lives of others; I have given +their thoughts a dwelling. But I am none the happier for that." + +"Oh," admitted Vanlief, "wisdom does not guarantee happiness...." He +drummed with his fine, long fingers, upon the table-cloth. Vane, +watching him, noted the almost transparent quality of his skin. Under +that admirable mask of military uprightness there was an aging, a fading +process going on, that no keen observer could miss. "It is the pursuit, +not the capture of wisdom, that brings happiness. Wisdom is too often +only a bubble that bursts when you touch it." + +"Perhaps that is it. At any rate I know that I do not love my neighbor +any more because I have fathomed some of his thoughts. Moreover, +Professor, has it occurred to you that your discovery, your secret, +carries elements of danger with it? Take my own experiments; there might +have been tragic results; whole lives might have been ruined. In one +case I was nearly the victim of a tragedy myself; I might have become, +for all time, the dreadful creature I was giving house-room to. In the +other, there was no more than a farce possible; the visiting spirit was, +after all, in subjection to my own. I think you will have to simplify +the details of your marvelous secret. It works a little clumsily, a +little--" + +"Oh," the Professor put in, "I am perfecting the process. I spend my +days and my nights in elaborating the details. I mean to have it in the +simplest, most unmistakable perfection before I hand it over to the +human race." + +"Sometimes I think," mused Vane, "that your boon will be a doubtful one. +I can see no good to be gained. My whole point of view is changing. I +ached for such a chance of wisdom once; now that it has come to me I am +sad because the things I have learned are so horrible, so silly. I had +not thought there were such souls in the world; or not, at any rate, in +the immediate world about me." + +"Oh," the Professor went on, steadfastly, "there will be many benefits +in the plan. Doctors will be able to go at once to the root of any +ailments that have their seat in the brain. Witnesses cab be made to +testify the truth. Oh--there are ever so many possibilities." + +"As many for evil as for good. Second-rate artists could steal the +ideas, the inventions of others. No inventor, no scientist, would be +sure of keeping his secrets. The thing would be a weapon in the hands of +the unscrupulous." + +"Ah, well," smiled Vanlief, "so far I have not made my discovery public, +have I? It is a thing I must consider very carefully. As you say, there +are arguments on either side. But you must bear in mind that you are +somewhat embittered. It was your own fault; you chose the subject +wittingly. If you were to read a really beautiful mind, you might turn +to the other extreme; you might urge me to lose no time in giving the +world my secret. The wise way is between the two; I must go forward with +my plans, prepared for either course. I may take it to my grave with me, +or I may give it to the world; but, so far, it is still a little +incomplete; it is not ripe for general distribution. Instead of the one +magic mirror there must be myriads of them. There are stupendous +opportunities. All that you have told me of your own experiences in +these experiments has proved my skill to have been wisely employed; your +success was beyond my hopes. Do you think you will go on?" + +Orson Vane did not answer at once. It was something he had been asking +himself; he was not yet sure of the answer. + +"I haven't made up my mind," he replied. "So far I have hardly been +repaid for my time and the vital force employed. I almost feel toward +these experiments as toward a vice that refines the mind while +coarsening the frame. That is the story of the most terrible vices, I +think; they corrode the body while gilding the brain. But this much I +know; if I use your mirror again it will not be to borrow a merely smart +soul; I mean to go to some other sphere of life. That one is too +contracted." + +"Strange," said the Professor, "that you should have said that. +Jeannette pretends she thinks that, too. I cannot get her to take her +proper position in the world. She is a little elusive. But then, to be +sure, she is not, just now, at her best." + +"She is not ill?" asked Vane, with a guilty start. + +"Nothing tangible. But not--herself...." + +Vane observed that he wished he might have found her in; he feared he +had offended her; he hoped the Professor would use his kind offices +again to soften the young lady's feelings toward him. Then he got up to +go. + +Strolling along the avenue he noted certain aspects of the town with an +appreciation that he had not always given them. He had seen these things +from so many other points of view of late; had been in sympathy with +them, had made up a fraction of their more grotesque element; that to +see them clearly with his own eyes had a sort of novelty. The life of +to-day, as it appeared on the smartest surfaces, was, he reflected, a +colorful if somewhat soulless picture.... + +The young men sit in the clubs and in the summer casinos, smoking and +wondering what the new mode in trousers is to be; an acquaintance goes +by; he has a hat that is not quite correct, and his friends comment on +it yawningly; he has not the faintest notion of polite English, but +nobody cares; a man who has written great things walks by, but he wears +a creased coat, and the young men in the smoking-room sniff at him. In +the drags and the yachts the women and the girls sit in radiance and gay +colors and arrogant unconsciousness of position and power; they talk of +golfing and fashion and mustachios; Mrs. Blank is going a hot pace and +Mrs. Landthus is a thoroughbred; adjectives in the newest sporting slang +fly about blindingly; the language is a curious argot, as distinct as +the tortuous lingo of the Bowery. A coach goes rattling by, the horses +throwing their heads in air, and their feet longing for the Westchester +roads. The whip discusses bull-terriers; the people behind him are +declaring that the only thing you can possibly find in the Waldorf rooms +is an impossible lot of people. The complexions of all these people, +intellectually presentable in many ways, and fashionable in yet more +modes, are high in health. They look happy, prosperous and +satisfied.... + +Yes, there was a superficial fairness to the picture, Vane admitted. If +only, if only, he had not chosen to look under the surface! Now that he +had seen the world with other eyes, its fairness could rarely seem the +same to him. + +A sturdy beggar approached him, with a whine that proved him an +admirable actor. But Vane could not find it in him to reflect that if +there is one thing more than another that lends distinction to a town it +is an abundance of beggars. + +He wondered how it would be to annex this healthy impostor's mite of a +soul. But no; there could be little wisdom gained there. + +He made, finally, for the Town and Country Club, and tried to immerse +himself in the conversation that sped about. The talked turned to the +eminent actor, Arthur Wantage. The subject of that man's alleged +eccentricities invariably brought out a flood of the town's stalest +anecdotes. Vane, listening in a lazy mood, made up his mind to see +Wantage play that night. It would be a distraction. It would show him, +once again, the present limit in one human being's portraiture of +another; he would see the highest point to which external imitation +could be brought; he could contrast it with the heights to which he +himself had ascended. + +It would be a chance for him to consider Wantage, for the first time in +his life, as a merely second-rate actor. This player was an adept only +in the making the shell, the husk, seem lifelike; since he could not +read the character, how could he go deeper? + +The opportunities the theatre held for him suddenly loomed vast before +Vane. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII. + + +The fact that Arthur Wantage was to be seen and heard, nightly, in a +brilliant comedy by the author of "Pious Aeneas," was not so much the +attraction that drew people to his theatre, as was the fact that he had +not yet, that season, delivered himself of a curtain speech. His curtain +speeches were wont to be insults delivered in an elaborately honeyed +manner; he took the pose of considering his audiences with contempt; he +admired himself far more for his condescension in playing to them than +he respected his audiences for having the taste to admire him. + +The comedy in which he was now appearing was the perfection of paradox. +It pretended to be frivolous and was really philosophic. The kernel of +real wisdom was behind the elaborately poised mask of wit. A delightful +impertinence and exaggeration informed every line of the dialogue. The +pose of inimitable, candid egoism showed under every situation. The play +was typical of the author as well as of the player. It veiled, as thinly +as possible, a deal of irony at the expense of the play going public; it +took some of that public's dearest foibles and riddled them to shreds. + +It was currently reported that the only excuse for comparatively +amicable relations between Wantage and O'Deigh, who had written this +comedy, was the fact of there being an ocean between them. Even at that +Wantage found it difficult to suffer the many praises he heard bestowed, +not upon himself but O'Deigh. He had burst out in spleen at this +adulation, once, in the hearing of an intimate. + +"My dear Arthur," said the other, "you strike me as very ungrateful. For +my part, when I see your theatre crowded nightly, when I see how your +exchequer fills steadily, it occurs to me that you should go down on +your knees every night, and thank God that O'Deigh has done you such a +stunning play." + +"Oh," was Wantage's grudging answer, "I do, you know I do. But I also +say: Oh, God, why did it have to be by O'Deigh?" + +The secret of his hatred for O'Deigh was the secret of his hatred for +all dramatists. He was a curious compound of egoism, childishness and +shrewdness. Part of his shrewdness--or was it his childishness?--showed +in his aversion to paying authors' royalties. He always tried to +re-write all the plays he accepted; if the playwrights objected there +was sure to be a row of some sort. When he could find no writers willing +to make him a present of plays, for the sake, as he put it, of having it +done by as eminent an actor as himself, and in so beautiful a theatre, +he was in the habit of announcing that he would forsake the theatre, and +turn critic. He pretended that the world--the public, the press, even +the minor players--were in league against him. There was a conspiracy to +drive him from the theatre; the riff-raff resented that a man of genius +should be so successful. They lied about him; he was sure they lied; for +stories, of preposterous import, came to him; he vowed he never read the +newspapers--never. As for London--oh, he could spin you the most +fascinating yarn of the cabal that had dampened his London triumph. He +mentioned, with a world of meaning in his tone, the name of the other +great player of the time; he insinuated that to have him, Wantage, +succeed in London, had not been to that other player's mind; so the +wires had been pulled; oh, it was all very well done. He laughed at the +reminiscence,--a brave, bluff laugh, that told you he could afford to +let such petty jealousies amuse him. + +The riddle of Arthur Wantage's character had never yet been read. There +were those who averred he was never doing anything but acting, not in +the most intimate moments of his life; some called him a keen +moneymaker, retaining the mummer's pose off the stage for the mere +effect of it on the press and the public. What the man's really honest, +unrehearsed thoughts were,--or if he ever had such--no man could say. To +many earnest students of life this puzzle had presented itself. It +began to present itself, now, to Orson Vane. + +This, surely, was a secret worth the reading. Here were, so to say, two +masks to lift at once. This man, Arthur Wantage, who came out before the +curtain now as this, now as that, character of fancy or history, what +shred of vital, individual personality had he retained through all these +changings? The enthusiasm of discovery, of adventure came upon Vane with +a sharpness that he had not felt since the day he had mocked the +futility of human science because it could not unlock other men's +brains. + +The horseshoe-shaped space that held the audience glittered with babble +and beauty as Orson Vane took his seat in the stalls. The presence of +the smart set gave the theatre a very garland of charm, of grace, and of +beauty's bud and blossom. The stalls were radiant, and full of polite +chatter. The boxes wore an air of dignified twilight,--a twilight of +goddesses. The least garish of the goddesses, yet the one holding the +subtlest sway, was Jeanette Vanlief. She sat, in the shadow of an upper +box, with her father and Luke Moncreith. On her pale face the veins +showed, now and then; the flush of rose came to it like a surprise--like +the birth of a new world. She radiated no obvious, blatant fascination. +Her hands slim and white; her voice firm and low; her eyes of a hue like +that of bronze, streaked like the tiger-lilies; her profile sharp as a +cameo's; the nose, with its finely-chiseled nostrils, curved in Roman +mode; the mouth, thin and of the faintest possible red, slightly +drooping. And then, her hair! It held, again, a spray of lilies of the +valley; the artificial lights discovered in the waves and the curls of +it the most unexpected shades, the most mercurial tints. The slight +touch of melancholy that hovered over her merely enhanced her charm. +Moncreith told himself that he would go to the uttermost ends of evil to +win this woman. He had come, the afternoon of that day, through the most +dangerous stream in the world, the stream of loveliness that flows over +certain portions of the town at certain fashionable hours. It is a +stream the eddies of which are of lace and silk; its pools are the blue +of eye and the rose of mouth; its cataracts are skirts that swirl and +whisper and sing of ivory outlines and velvet shadows. Yet, as he looked +at Jeannette Vanlief, all that fascinating, dangerous stream lost its +enticement for him; he saw her as a dream too high for comparison with +the mere earthiness of the town. He felt, with a grim resolution, that +nothing human should come between him and Jeannette. + +Orson Vane, from his chair, paid scant attention to his fellow +spectators. He was intent upon the dish that O'Deigh and Wantage had +prepared for his delectation. He felt a delicious interest in every +line, every situation. He had made up his mind that he would go to the +root of the mystery that men called Arthur Wantage. Whether that mask +concealed a real, high intelligence, or a mere, cunning, monkeylike +facility in imitation--his was to be the solution of that question. +Wrapped up in that thought he never so much as glanced toward the box +where his friends sat. + +At the end of the first act Vane strolled out into the lobby. He nodded +hither and thither, but he felt no desire for nearer converse. A hand on +his shoulder brought him face to face with Professor Vanlief. He was +asked to come up to the box. He listened, gravely, to the Professor's +words, and thanked him. So Moncreith was smitten? He smiled in a kindly +way; he understood, now, the many brusqueries of his friend. That day, +long ago, when he had been so inexplicable in the little bookshop; the +many other occasions, since then, when Luke had been rude and bitter. A +man in love was never to be reckoned on. He wished Luke all the luck in +the world. It struck him but faintly that he himself had once longed for +that sweet daughter of Augustus Vanlief's; he told himself that it was a +dream he must put away. He was a mariner bent on many deep-sea voyages +and many hazards of fate; it would be unfair to ask any woman to share +in any such life. His life would be devoted to furthering the +Professor's discoveries; he meant to be an adventurer into the regions +of the human soul; it was a land whither none could follow. + +Perhaps, if he had seen Jeannette, he might have felt no such +resignation. His mood was so tense in its devotion to the puzzle +presented by the player, Wantage, that the news brought him by Vanlief +did not suffice to rouse him. He had a field of his own; that other one +he was content to leave to Moncreith. + +Moncreith, in the meanwhile, was making the most of the opportunity the +Professor, in the kindness of his heart, had given him. The orchestra +was playing a Puccini potpourri. It rose feebly against the prattle and +the chatter and the hissing of the human voices. Moncreith, at first, +found only the most obvious words. + +"A trifle bitter, the play," he said, "rather like a sneer, don't you +think?" + +"Well," granted Jeannette, indolently, "I suppose it is not called +'Voltaire' for nothing. And there are moods that such a play might +suit." + +"No doubt. But--do you think one can be bitter, when one loves?" + +The girl looked up in wonder. She blushed. The melancholy did not leave +her face. "Bitter? Love?" she echoed. "They spell the same thing." + +"Oh," he urged, "the play has made you morbid. As for me, I have heard +nothing, seen nothing, but you. The bitterness of the play has skimmed +by me, that is all; I have been in too sweet a dream to let those people +on the stage--" + +"How Wantage would rage if he heard you," said the girl. She felt what +was coming, and she meant to fence as well as she could to avoid it. + +"Wantage? Bother Wantage!" He leaned down to her, and whispered, +"Jeannette!" + +The flush on her cheek deepened, but she did not stir. It was as if she +had not heard. She shut her eyes. All her weapons dropped at once. She +knew it had to come; she knew, too, that, in this crisis, her heart +stood plainly legible to her. Moncreith's name was not there. + +"Jeannette," Moncreith went on, in his vibrant whisper, "don't you guess +what dream I have been living in for so long? Don't you know that it is +you, you, you--" He faltered, his emotions outstriding his words. "It is +you," he finished, "that spell happiness for me. I--oh, is there no +other, less crude way of putting it?--I love you, Jeannette! And you?" + +He waited. The chattering and light laughter in the stalls and +throughout the house seemed to lull into a mere hushed murmur, like the +fluttering and twittering of a thousand birds. Moncreith, in his tense +expectation, had heed only for the face of the girl beside him. He did +not see, in the aisle below, Orson Vane, sauntering to his seat. He did +not follow the direction of Jeannette Vanlief's eyes, the instant before +she turned, and answered. + +"I wish you had not spoken. I can't say anything--anything that you +would like. Please, please--" She shook her head, in evident distress. + +"Ah," he burst out, "then it is true, after all, what I have feared. It +is true that you prefer that--that--" + +She stayed him with a quick look. + +"I did not say I preferred anyone. I simply said that you must consider +the question closed. I am sorry, oh, so sorry. I wish a man and a woman +could ever be friends, in this world, without risking either love or +hate." + +"All the same," he muttered, fiercely, "I believe you prefer that +fellow--" + +"Orson Vane's downstairs," said the Professor entering the box at that +moment. + +"That damned chameleon!" So Moncreith closed, under his breath, his just +interrupted speech. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV. + + +A little before the end of that performance of "Voltaire," Orson Vane +made his way to Arthur Wantage's dressing-room. They had, in their +character of men in some position of eminence in different phases of the +town's life, a slight acquaintance. They met, now and then, at the +Mummers' Club. Vane's position put him above possibility of affront by +Wantage in even the most arrogant and mannerless of the latter's moods. + +Vane's invitation to a little supper, a little chat, and a little smoke, +just for the duet of them, brought forth Wantage's most winning smile of +acquiescence. + +"Delighted, dear chap," he vowed. He could be, when he chose, the most +winning of mortals. He was, during the drive to Vane's house, an +admirable companion. He told stories, he made polite rejoinders, he was +all glitter and graciousness. But it was when he was seated to an +appetizing little supper that he became most splendid. + +"My dear Vane," he said, lifting a glass to the light, "you should write +me a play. I am sure you could do it. These fellows who are in the mere +business of it,--well, they are really impossible. They are so vulgar, +so dreadful to do business with. I hate business, I am a child in such +affairs; everyone cheats me. I mean to have none but gentlemen on my +business staff next season. The others grate on me, Vane, they grate. +And if I could only gather a company of actors who were also +gentlemen--Oh, I assure you, one cannot believe what things I endure. +The stupidity of actors!" He pronounced the word as if it were accented +on the last syllable. He raised his eyes to heaven as he faltered in +description of the stupidities he had to contend with. + +"Write a play?" said Orson, "I fear that would be out of my line. I +merely live, you know; I do not describe." + +"Oh, I think you would be just the man. You would give me a play that +society would like. You would make no mistakes of taste. And think, my +dear fellow, just think of the prestige my performance would give you. +It would be the making of you. You would be launched. You would need no +other recommendation. When you approach any of these manager fellows all +you have to do is to say, 'Wantage is doing a play of mine.' That is a +hallmark; it means success for a young man." + +"Perhaps. But I have no ambitions in that way. How do you like my +Bonnheimer?" + +"H'm--not bad, Vane, not bad. But you should taste my St. Innesse. It is +a '74. I got it from the cellars of the Duke of Arran. You know Merrill, +the wine-merchant on Broadway? Shrewd fellow! Always keeps me in mind; +whenever he sees a sale of a good cellar on the other side, he puts in a +bid; knows he can always depend on Wantage taking the bouquet of it off +his hands. You must take dinner with me some night, and try that St. +Innesse. Ex-President Richards told me, the other evening, that it was +the mellowest vintage he had tasted in years. You know Richards? Oh, you +should, you should!" + +Vane listened, quietly amused. The vanity, the egoism of this player +were so obvious, so transparent, so blatant. He wondered, more than +ever, what was under that mask of arrogance and conceit. The perfect +frankness of the conceit made it almost admirable. + +"You know," Wantage remarked presently, "I'm really playing truant, +taking supper with you. I ought to be studying." + +"A new play?" + +"No. My curtain speech for to-morrow night. It's the last night of the +season, and they expect it of me, you know. I've vowed, time and again, +I would never make another curtain-speech in my life, but they will have +them, they will have them!" He sighed, in submission to his fate. Then +he returned to a previous thought. "I wish, though," he said, "that I +could persuade you to do a play for me. Think it over! Think of the name +it would give you. Or you might try managing me. Eh, how does that +strike you? Such a relief to me if I could deal with a gentleman. You +have no idea--the cads there are in the theatre! They resent my being a +man who tries to prove a little better educated than themselves. They +hate me because I am college-bred, you know; they prefer actors who +never read. How many books do you think I read before I attempted +_Voltaire_? A little library, I tell you. And then the days I spent in +noting the portraits! I traveled France in my search. For the actor who +takes historic characters there cannot be too many documents. +Imagination alone is not enough. And then the labor of making the play +presentable; I wish you could see the thing as it first came to me! You +would think a man like O'Deigh would have taken into consideration the +actor? But no; the play, as O'Deigh left it, might have been for a stock +company. _Frederick the Great_ was as fine a part as my own. Oh, they +are numbskulls. And the rehearsals! Actors are sheep, simply sheep. The +papers say I am a brute at rehearsals. My dear Vane, I swear to you that +if Nero were in my place he would massacre all the minor actors in the +land. And they expect the salaries of intelligent persons!" + +Vane, listening, wondered why Wantage, under such an avalanche of +irritations, continued such life. Gradually it dawned on him that all +this fume and fret was merely part of the man's mummery; it was his +appeal to the sympathy of his audience; his argument against the +reputation his occasional exhibitions of rage and waywardness had given +him. + +Vane's desire to penetrate the surface of this conscious imitator, this +fellow who slipped off this character to assume that, grew keener and +keener. Where, under all this crust of alien form and action, was the +individual, human thought and feeling? Or was there any left? Had the +constant corrosion of simulated emotions burnt out all the original +character of the mind? + +Vane could not sufficiently hasten the end for which he had invited +Wantage. + +"You are," he said presently, as a lull in the other's monologue allowed +him an opening, "something of an amateur of tapestry, of pictures, of +bijouterie. I have a little thing or two, in my dressing-room, that I +wish you would give me an opinion on." + +They took their cigarettes into the adjoining dressing-room. Wantage +went, at once, to the mirrors. + +"Ah, Florence, I see." He frowned, in critical judgment; he went humming +about the room, singing little German phrases to the pictures, snatches +of chansonettes to the tapestries. He was very enjoyable as a spectacle, +Vane told himself. He tiptoed over the room, now in the mode of his +earliest success, "The King of Dandies," now in the half limping style +of his "Rigoletto." + +"You should have seen the Flemish things I had!" he declared. That was +his usual way of noting the belongings of others; they reminded him of +his own superior specimens. "I sold them for a song, at auction. Don't +you think one tires of one's surroundings, after a time? People go to +the hills and the seashore, because they tire of town. I have the same +feeling about pictures, and furniture, and bric-a-brac. After a time, +they tire me. I have to get rid of them. I sell them at auction. People +are always glad to bid for something that has belonged to Arthur +Wantage. But everything goes for a song. Oh, it is ruinous, ruinous." He +peered, and pirouetted about the corners. "Ah," he exclaimed, "and here +is something covered up! A portrait? Something rare?" He posed in front +of it, affecting the most devouring curiosity. + +"A sort of portrait," said Vane, touching the cord at back of the +mirror. + +"Ah," said Wantage, gazing, "you are right. A sort of portrait." And he +laughed, feebly, feebly. "That Bonnheimer," he muttered, "a deuce of a +wine!" He clutched at a chair, reeling into it. + +Vane, passing to the mirror's face, took what image it turned to him, +and then, leisurely, replaced the curtain. + +He surveyed the figure in the chair for a moment or so. Then he called +Nevins. "Nevins," he said, "where the devil are you? Never where you're +wanted. What does one pay servants outrageous wages for! They conspire +to cheat one, they all do. Nevins!" Nevins appeared, wide-eyed at this +outburst. He was prepared for many queer exhibitions on the part of his +master, but this--this, to a faithful servant! He stood silent, +expectant, reproachful. + +"Nevins," his master commanded, "have this--this actor put to bed. Use +the library; make the two couches serve. He'll stay here for twenty-four +hours; you understand, twenty-four hours. You will take care of him. The +wine was badly corked, to-night, Nevins. You grow worse every day. You +are in league to drive me distracted. It is an outrage. Why do you stand +there, and shake, in that absurd fashion? It makes me quite nervous. Do +go away, Nevins, go away!" + + + + +CHAPTER XV. + + +The papers of that period are all agreed that the eminent actor, Arthur +Wantage, was never seen to more advantage than on the last night of that +particular season. His _Voltaire_ had never been a more brilliant +impersonation. The irony, the cruelty of the character had rarely come +out more effectively; the ingenuity of the dialogue was displayed at its +best. + +Yet, as a matter of fact, Arthur Wantage, all that day and evening, was +in Orson Vane's house, subject to a curious mental and spiritual aphasia +that afterwards became a puzzle to many famous physicians. + +The _Voltaire_ was Orson Vane. + +It was the final triumph of Professor Vanlief's thaumaturgy. Vane was +now in possession of the entire mental vitality sufficient for playing +the part of the evening; the lines, the every pose, came to him +spontaneously, as if he were machinery moving at another's guidance. The +detail of entering the theatre unobserved had been easy; it was dusk and +he was muffled to the eyes. Afterwards, it was merely a matter of +pigment and paints. His fingers found the use of the colors and powders +as easily as his mind held the words to be spoken. There was not a +soul, in the company, in the audience, that did not not find the +_Voltaire_ of that night the _Voltaire_ of the entire season. + +Above the mere current of his speeches and his displayed emotions Orson +Vane found a tide of exaltation bearing him on to a triumphant feeling +of contempt for his audience. These sheep, these herdlings, these +creatures of the fashion, how fine it was to fling into their faces the +bitter taunts of a _Voltaire_, to see them take them smilingly, +indulgently. They paid him his price, and he hated them for it. He felt +that they did not really understand the half of the play's delicate +finesse; he felt their appreciation was a sham, a pose, a bit of mummery +even more contemptible than his own, since they paid to pose, while he, +at least, had the satisfaction of their money. + +The curtain-fall found him aglow with the splendor of his success. The +two personalties in him joined in a fever of triumph. He, Orson Vane, +had been _Voltaire_; he would yet be all the other geniuses of history. +He would prove himself the greatest of them all, since he could simulate +them all. A certain vein of petty cunning ran under the major emotion; +Orson Vane laughed to think how he had despoiled Arthur Wantage of his +very temperament, his art, his spirit. This same cunning admonished, +too, the prompt return of Wantage's person, after the night was over, to +the Wantage residence. + +The commotion "in front" brought Orson to a sense of the immediate +moment. The cries for a speech came over a crackling of hand-claps. He +waited for several minutes. It was not well to be too complaisant with +one's public. Then he gave the signal to the man at the curtain, and +moved past him, to the narrow space behind the lights. He bowed. It had +the very air of irony, had that bow. It does not seem humanly possible +to express irony in a curving in the spine, a declension of the head, a +certain pose of the hands, but Vane succeeded, just as Wantage had so +often succeeded, in giving that impression. The bow over, he turned to +withdraw. Let them wait, let them chafe I Commuters were missing the +last trains for the night? So much the better! They would not forget him +so easily. + +When he finally condescended to stride before the curtain again, it was +a lift of the eyebrows, a little gesture, an air that said, quite +plainly: Really, it is very annoying of you. If I were not very gracious +indeed I should refuse to come out again. I do so, I assure you, under +protest. + +He gave a little, delicate cough, he lifted his eyes. At that the house +became still, utterly still. + +He began without any vocative at all. + +"The actor," he said, "who wins the applause of so distinguished a +company is exceedingly fortunate. The applause of such a very +distinguished company--" he succeeded in emphasizing his phrase to the +point where it became a subtle insult--"is very sweet to the actor. It +reconciles him to what he must take to be a breach of true art, the +introduction of his own person on the scene where he has appeared as an +impersonator of character. Some actors are expected to make speeches +after their exertions should be over. I am one of those poor actors. In +the name of myself, a poor actor, and the poor actors in my company, I +must thank this distinguished body of ladies and gentlemen for the +patience with which they have listened to Mr. O'Deigh's little trifle. +It is, of course, merely a trifle, _pour passer le temps_. Next season, +I hope, I may give you a really serious production. Mr. O'Deigh cables +me that he is happy such distinguished persons in such a critical town +have applauded his little effort. I am sure ever so many of you would +rather be at home than listening to the apologies of a poor actor. For I +feel I must apologize for presenting so inconsiderable a trifle. A mere +summer night's amusement. I have played it as a sort of rest for myself, +as preparation for larger productions. If I have amused you, I am +pleased. The actors' province is to please. The poor actor thanks you." + +He bowed, and the bewildered company who had heard him to the end, +clapped their hands a little. The newspaper men smiled at one another; +they had been there before. The old question of "Why does he do it?" no +longer stirred in them. They were used to Wantage's vagaries. + +The newspapers of the following day had Wantage's speech in full. The +critics wrote editorials on the necessity for curbing this player's +arrogance. The public was astonished to find that it had been insulted, +but it took the press' word for it. Wantage had made that sort of thing +the convention; it was the fashion to call these curtain speeches an +insult, yet to invoke them as eagerly as possible. The widespread +advertising that accrued to Wantage from this episode enabled his +manager to obtain, in his bookings for the following season, an even +higher percentage than usual. To that extent Orson Vane's imitation of +an imitator benefited his subject. In other respects it left Wantage a +mere walking automaton. + +It was fortunate that the closing time for Wantage's theatre was now on. +There was no hitch in Vane's plan of transporting Wantage to his home +quarters; the servants at the Wantage establishment found nothing +unusual in their master having been away for a day and a night; he was +too frequently in the habit, when his house displeased him in some +detail, to stay at hotels for weeks and months at a time; his household +was ready for any vagary. Indisposition was nothing new with him, +either; in reality and affectation these lapses from well-being were not +infrequent with the great player. The doctor told him he needed +rest--rest and sea-air; there was nothing to worry over; he had been +working too hard, that was all. + +So the shell of what had been Wantage proceeded to a watering-place, +while the kernel, now a part of Orson Vane, proceeded to astonish the +town with its doings and sayings. + +Practice had now enabled Vane to control, with a certain amount of +consciousness, whatsoever alien spirit he took to himself. Vigorous and +alert as was the mumming temperament he was now in possession of, he yet +contrived to exert a species of dominance over it; he submitted to it in +the mode, the expression of his character, yet in the main-spring of his +action he had it in subjection. He had reached, too, a plane from which +he was able, more than on any of the other occasions, to enjoy the +masquerade he knew himself taking part in. He realized, with a +contemptuous irony, that he was playing the part of one who played many +parts. The actor in him seemed, intellectually, merely a personified +palimpsest; the mind was receptive, ready to echo all it heard, keen to +reproduce traits and tricks of other characters. + +He held in himself, to be brief, a mirror that reflected whatever +crossed its face; the base of that mirror itself was as characterless, +as colorless, as the mere metal and glass. Superficialities were caught +with a skill that was astonishing; little tricks of manner and speech +were reproduced to the very dot upon the i; yet, under all the raiment +of other men's merely material attributes, there was no change of soul +at all; no transformation touched the little ego-screaming soul of the +actor. + +The superficial, in the meanwhile, was enough to make the town gossip +not a little about the newest diversions of Orson Vane. He talked, now, +of nothing but the theatre and the arts allied to it. He purposed doing +some little comedies at Newport in the course of the summer that was now +beginning. He eyed all the smart women of his acquaintance with an air +that implied either, "I wonder whether you could be cast for a girl I +must make love to," or, "You would be passable in _Prince Hal_ attire." +At home, to his servants, Vane was abominable. When the dreadful +champagne, that some impulse possessed him to buy of a Broadway +swindler, proved as flat as the Gowanus, his language to Nevins was +quite contemptible. "What," he shrieked, "do I pay you for? Tell me +that! This splendid wine spoiled, spoiled, utterly unfit for a gentleman +to drink, and all by your negligence. It is enough to turn one's mind. +It is an outrage. A splendid wine. And now--look at it!" As a conclusion +he threw the stuff in Nevins' face. Nevins made no answer at all. He +wiped the sour mess from his coat with the same air of apology that he +would have used had he spilt a glass himself. But his emotions were none +the less. They caused him, in the privacy of the servants' quarters, to +do what he had not done in years, to drop his h's. "It's the 'ost's +place," said Nevins, mournfully, "to entertain his guests, and not +bully the butler." Which, as a maxim, was valid enough, save that, in +this special case, the guests had come to look upon Vane's treatment of +the servants as part of the entertainment a dinner with him would +provide. + +Another distress that fell to the lot of poor Nevins was the fact that +his master was become averse to the paying of bills. The profanity fell +upon Nevins from both the duns and the dunned. + +"The man from Basser's, Mr. Vane, sir," Nevins would announce, timidly. +"Can't get him to go away at all, sir." + +"Basser's, Basser's? Oh--that tailor fellow. An impudent creature, to +plague me so, when I do him the honor of wearing his coats; they fit +very badly, but I put up with that because I want to help the fellow on. +And what is my reward? He pesters me, pesters me. Tell him--tell him +anything, Nevins. Only do leave me alone; I am very busy, very nervous. +I am going to write a comedy for myself. I have some water-colors to +paint for Mrs. Carlos; I have a ride in the Park, and ever so many other +things to do to-day, and you bother me with pestiferous tailors. Nevins, +you are, you are--" + +But Nevins quietly bowed himself out before he learned what new thing he +was in his master's eyes. + +A malady--for it surely is no less than a malady--for attempting cutting +speeches at any time and place possessed Vane. Shortsightedness was +another quality now obvious in him. He knew you to-day, to-morrow he +looked at you with the most unseeing eyes. His voice was the most +prominent organ in whatever room or club he happened to be; when he +spoke none else could be intelligible. When he knew himself observed, +though alone, he hummed little snatches to himself. His gait took on a +mincing step. There was not a moment, not a pose of his that had not its +forethought, its deliberation, its premeditated effect. + +The gradual increase in the publicity that was part of the penalty of +being in the smart world had made approachment between the stage and +society easier than ever before. Orson Vane's bias toward the theatre +did not displease the modish. Rumors as to this and that heroine of a +romantic divorce having theatric intentions became frequent. The gowns +of actresses were copied by the smart quite as much as the smart set's +gowns were copied by actresses. The intellectual factor had never been +very prominent in the social attitude toward the stage; it was now +frankly admitted that good-looking men and handsome dresses were as much +as one went to the theatre for. Theatrical people had a wonderful claim +upon the printer's ink of the continent; society was not averse to +borrowing as much of that claim as was possible. Compliments were +exchanged with amiable frequence; smart people married stage favorites, +and the stage looked to the smart for its recruits. + +Orson Vane could not have shown his devotion to the mummeries of the +stage at a better time. He gained, rather than lost, prestige. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI. + + +It was the fashionable bathing hour at the most exclusive summer resort +on the Atlantic coast. The sand in front of the Surf Club was dotted +with gaudy tents and umbrellas. Persons whom not to know was to be +unknowable were picturesquely distributed about the club verandahs in +wicker chairs and lounges. The eye of an artist would have been +distracted by the beauties that were suggested in the half-lifted skirts +of this beauty, and revealed in the bathing-suit of that one. The little +waves that came politely rippling up the slope of sand seemed to know +what was expected of them; they were in nowise rude. They may have +longed to ruffle this or that bit of feminine frippery, but they +refrained. They may have ached to drown out Orson Vane's voice as he +said "good morning" to everybody in and out of the water; but they +permitted themselves no such luxury. + +Orson Vane was a beautiful picture as he entered the water. His suit was +immaculate; a belt prevented the least wrinkle in his jersey; a rakish +sombrero gave his head a sort of halo. He poised a cigarette in one +hand, keeping himself afloat with the other. He bowed obsequiously to +all the pretty women; he invited all the rich ones to tea and toast--"We +always have a little tea and toast at my cottage on Sundays, you know; +you'll meet only nice-looking people, really; we have a jolly time." +Most of the men he was unable to see; the sunlight on the water did make +such a glare. + +On the raft Orson Vane found the only Mrs. Carlos. + +"If it were not for you, Mrs. Carlos," he assured her, "the ocean would +be quite unfashionable." + +Mrs. Carlos smiled amiably. Speeches of that sort were part of the +tribute the world was expected to pay her. She asked him if the yachts +in the harbor were not too pretty for anything. + +"No," said Vane, "no. Most melancholy sight. Bring up the wickedness of +man, whenever I look at them. I bought a yacht you know, early in the +summer. Liked her looks, made an offer, bought her. A swindle, Mrs. +Carlos, an utter swindle. A disgraceful hulk. And now I can't sell her. +And my cook is a rascal. Oh--don't mention yachts! And my private car, +Mrs. Carlos, you cannot imagine the trials I endure over that! The +railroads overcharge me, and the mob comes pottering about with those +beastly cameras. Really, you know, I am thinking of living abroad. The +theatre is better supported in Europe. I am thinking of devoting my life +to the theatre altogether. It is the one true passion. It shows people +how life should be lived; it is at once a school of morals and +comportment." He peered into the water near the raft. Then he plunged +prettily into the sea. "I see that dear little Imogene," he told Mrs. +Carlos, as he swam off. Imogene was the little heiress of the house of +Carlos; a mere schoolgirl. It was one of Vane's most deliberate appeals +for public admiration, this worship of the society of children. He +gamboled with all the tots and blossoms he could find. He knew them all +by name; they dispelled his shortsightedness marvelously. + +After a proper interval Vane appeared, in the coolest of flannels, on +the verandah of the Club. He bowed to all the women, whether he knew +them or not; he peered under the largest picture hats with an air that +said "What sweet creature is hidden here?" as plainly as words. + +Someone asked him why he had not been to the Casino the night before. + +"Oh," he sighed, "I was fearfully busy." + +"Busy?" The word came in a tone of reproach. A suspicion of any sort of +toil will brand one more hopelessly in the smart set of America than in +any other; one may pretend an occupation but one may not profess it in +actuality. + +"Oh, terribly busy," said Vane. "I am writing a comedy. I have decided +that we must make authorship smarter than it has been. I shall sacrifice +myself in that attempt. You've noticed that not one writing-chap in a +million knows anything about our little world except what is not true? +Yes; it's unmistakable. An entirely false impression of us is given to +the world at large. The real picture of us must come from one of +ourselves." + +"And you will try it?" + +"Yes. I shall do my very best. When it is finished I want you all to +play parts in it. We must do something for the arts, you know. Why not +the arts, as well as tailors and milliners? By the way, I want you all +to come to my little lantern-dance to-night, on the _Beaurivage_. It is +something quite novel. You must all come disguised as flowers. There +will be no lights but Chinese lanterns. I shall have launches ready for +you at the Casino landing. My cook is quite sober to-day, and the yacht +is as presentable as if she were not an arrant fraud. I mean to have a +dance that shall fit the history of society in America. For that reason +the newspapers must know nothing about it. There can be no history where +there are newspapers. I shall invite nobody who knows how to write; I am +the only one whose taste I can trust. Some people write to live, and +some live to write, and the worst class of all are merely dying to +write. They are all barred to-night. We must try and break all the +conventions. Conventions are like the strolling players: made to be +broke." + +He rattled on in this way, with painful efforts at brilliance, for quite +a time. His hearers really considered it brilliance and listened +patiently. Summer was not their season for intellectual exertion; it +might be a virtue in others, in themselves it would have been a mistake. + +The lantern-dance on Orson Vane's _Beaurivage_ was, as everyone will +remember, an event of exceeding picturesqueness. Mrs. Sclatersby +appeared as a carnation; Mrs. Carlos as a rose. Some of the younger and +divinely figured women appeared as various blossoms that necessitated +imitation of part of Rosalind's costume under the trees. The slender, +tapering stem of one white lily, fragrant and delicious, lingered long +in the memories of the men who were there. + +A sensation was caused by the arrival of Mrs. Barrett Weston. She came +in a scow, seated on her automobile. A shriek of delight from the +company greeted her. The weary minds of the elect were really tickled by +this conceit. The automobile was arranged to imitate a crysanthemum. +Just before she alighted Mrs. Barrett Weston touched a hidden lever and +the automobile began to grind out a rag-time tune. + +A stranger, approaching the _Beaurivage_ at that moment, might have +fancied himself in the politest ward of the most insane of asylums. But +Orson Vane found it all most delightful. It was the affair of the +season. + +"Look," he cried, in the midst of a game of leapfrog in which a number +of the younger guests had plunged with desperate glee, "there is the +moon. How pitably weak she seems, against this brilliance here! It bears +out the theory that art is always finer than nature, and that the +theatre is more picturesque than life. Look at what we are doing, this +moment! We are imitating pleasure. And will you show me any unconscious +pleasure that is so delightful as this?" + +By the time people had begun to feel a polite hunger Vane had completed +his scheme of having several unwieldy barges brought alongside the +_Beaurivage_. There were two of the clumsy but roomy decks on either +side of the slender, shapely yacht. Over this now quite wide space the +tables were arranged. While the supper went on, Orson Vane did a little +monologue of his own. Nobody paid any attention, but everyone applauded. + +"What a scene for a comedy," he explained, proudly surveying the picture +of the gaiety before him, "what a delicious scene! It is almost real. I +must write a play around it. I have quite made up my mind to devote my +life to the theatre. It is the only real life. It touches the emotions +at all points; it is not isolated in one narrow field of personality. +Have I your permission to put you all in my play? How sweet of you! I +shall have a scene where we all race in automobiles. We will be quite +like dear little children who have their donkey-races. But I think +automobiles are so much more intelligent than donkeys, don't you? And +they have such profound voices! Have you ever noticed the intonation of +the automobiles here? That one of Mrs. Barrett Weston has a delicate +tenor; it is always singing love-songs as if it were tired of life. Then +we have bassos, and baritones, and repulsive falsettos. My automobile +has a voice like a phonograph. When it bubbles along the avenue I can +hear, as plainly as anything, that it is imitating one of the other +automobiles. Some automobiles, I suppose, have the true instinct for the +theatre. Have you noticed how theatric some of the things are, how they +contrive to run away just when everyone is looking?" + +"Just like horses," murmured one of his listeners. + +"Oh, no; I wouldn't say that. Horses have a merely natural intelligence; +it is nothing like the splendidly artificial reasoning of the +automobile. The poor horse, I really pity him! He has nothing before him +but polo. But how thankful he should be to polo. He was a broncho with +disreputable manners; now he is a polo-pony with a neat tail. In time, I +dare say, the horse can learn some of the higher civilization of the +automobile, just as society may still manage to be as intelligent as the +theatre." + +The conclusion of that entertainment marked the height of Orson Vane's +peculiar fame. The radical newspapers caught echoes of it and invented +what they could not transcribe. The young men who owned newspapers had +not been invited by Orson Vane, because, in spite of his theatric mania, +he had no illusions about the decency of metropolitan journalism. He +avowed that the theatre might be a trifle highflavored, but it had, at +the least, nothing of the hypocrisy that smothers the town in lies +to-day and reads it a sermon to-morrow. The most conspicuous of these +newspaper owners went into something like convulsions over what he +called the degeneracy of our society. Himself most lamentably in a state +of table-d'hotage, this young man trumpeted forth the most bitter +editorials against Orson Vane and his doings. He frothed with +anarchistic ravings. Finally, since the world will always listen if you +only make noise loud enough and long enough, the general public began to +believe that Vane was really a dreadful person. He was a leader in the +smart set; he stood for the entire family. His taste for the theater +would debauch all society. His egoisms would spoil what little of the +natural was left in the regions of Vanity Fair. So went the chatter of +the man-on-the-street, that mighty power, whom the most insignificant of +little men-behind-the-pen can move at will. + +One may be ever so immersed in affairs that are not of the world and its +superficial doings, yet it is almost impossible to escape some faint +echo of what the world is chattering about. Professor Vanlief, who had +betaken himself and Jeanette, for the summer, to a little place in the +mountains, was finally routed out of his peace by the rumors concerning +Orson Vane. The give and take of conversation, even at a little +farm-house in the hills, does not long leave any prominent subject +untouched. So Augustus Vanlief one morning bought all the morning +papers. + +He found more than he had wanted. The editorials against the doings of +the smart set, the reports of the sermons preached against their +goings-on, were especially pregnant that morning. + +In another part of the paper he found a line or two, however, that +brought him sharply to a sense of necessary action. The lines were +these: + + "Mr. Arthur Wantage is still seriously ill at Framley + Lodge. Unless a decided turn for the better takes place + very shortly, it is doubtful if he can undertake his + starring season at the usual time this year." + +Augustus Vanlief saw what no other mortal could have guessed. He saw the +connection between those two newspaper items, the one about Vane and the +one about Wantage. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + +Professor Vanlief lost no time in inventing an excuse for his immediate +departure. Jeannette would be well looked after. He got a few +necessaries together and started for Framley Lodge. After some delay he +obtained an interview with the distinguished patient. + +"Try," urged Vanlief, "to tell me when this illness came upon you. Was +it after your curtain-speech at the end of last season?" + +Wantage looked with blank and futile eyes. "Curtain-speech? I made +none." + +"Oh, yes. Try to remember! It made a stir, did that speech of yours. Try +to think what happened that day!" + +"I made no speech. I remember nothing. I am Wantage, I think. Wantage. I +used to act, did I not?" He laughed, feebly. It was melancholy to watch +him. He could eat and drink and sleep; he had the intelligence of an +echo. Each thought of his needed a stimulant. + +Vanlief persisted, in spite of melancholy rebuffs. There was so much at +stake. This man's whole career was at stake. And, if matters were not +mended soon, the evil would be under way; the harm would have begun. It +meant loss, actual loss now, and one could scarcely compute how much +ruin afterwards. And he, Vanlief, would be the secret agent of this +ruin! Oh, it was monstrous! Something must be done. Yet, he could do +nothing until he was sure. To meddle, without absolute certainty, would +be criminal. + +"What do you remember before you fell ill?" he repeated. + +"Oh, leave me alone!" said Wantage. "Isn't the doctor bad enough, +without you. I tell you I remember nothing. I was well, and now I am +ill. Perhaps it was something Orson Vane gave me at supper that night, I +don't remember--" + +"At supper? Vane?" The Professor leaped at the words. + +"Yes. I said so, didn't I? I had supper in his rooms, and then--" + +But Vanlief was gone. He had no time for the amenities now. His age +seemed to leave him as his purpose warmed, and his goal neared. All the +fine military bearing came out again. The people who traveled with him +that day took him for nothing less than a distinguished General. + +At the end of the day he reached Vane's town house. Nevins was all alone +there; all the other servants were on the _Beaurivage_. The man looked +worn and aged. He trembled visibly when he walked; his nerves were +gone, and he had the taint of spirits on him. + +"Mr. Vanlief, sir," he whined, "it'll be the death of me, will this +place. First he buys a yacht, sir, like I buy a 'at, if you please; and +now I'm to sell the furniture and all the antics. These antics, sir, as +the master 'as collected all over the world, sir. It goes to me 'eart." + +Vanlief, even in his desperate mood, could not keep his smile back. +"Sell the antiques, eh? Well, they'll fetch plenty, I've no doubt. But +if I were you I wouldn't hurry; Mr. Vane may change his mind, you know." + +"Ah," nodded Nevins, brightening, "that's true, sir. You're right; I'll +wait the least bit. It's never too soon to do what you don't want to, +eh, sir? And I gives you my word, as a man that's 'ad places with the +nobility, sir, that the last year's been a sad drain on me system. What +with swearing, sir, and letters I wouldn't read to my father confessor, +sir, Mr. Vane's simply not the man he was at all. Of course, if he says +to sell the furniture, out it goes! But, like as not, he'll come in here +some line day and ask where I've got all his trappings. And then I'll +show him his own letter, and he'll say he never wrote it. Oh, it's a bad +life I've led of late, sir. Never knowing when I could call my soul my +own." + +The phrase struck the Professor with a sort of chill. It was true; if +his discovery went forth upon the world, no man would, in very truth, +know when he could call his soul his own. It would be at the mercy of +every poacher. But he could not, just now, afford reflections of such +wide scope; there was a nearer, more immediate duty. + +"Nevins," he said, "I came about that mirror of mine." + +"Yes, sir. I'm glad of that, sir; uncommon glad. You'll betaking it +away, sir? It's bad luck I've 'ad since that bit of plate come in the +house." + +"You're right. I mean to take it away. But only for a time. Seeing Mr. +Vane's thinking of selling up, perhaps it's just as well if I have this +out of the way for a time, eh? Might avoid any confusion. I set store by +that mirror, Nevins; I'd not like it sold by mistake." + +"Well, sir, if you sets more store by it than the master, I'd like to +see it done, sir. The master's made me life a burden about that there +glass. I've 'ad to watch it like a cat watches a mouse. I don't know now +whether I'd rightly let you take it or not." He scratched his head, and +looked in some quandary. + +"Nonsense, Nevins. You know it's mine as well as you know your own name. +Didn't you fetch it over from my house in the first place, and didn't +you pack it and wrap it under my very eyes?" + +"True, sir; I did. My memory's a bit shaky, sir, these days. You may do +as you like with your own, I'll never dispute that. But Mr. Vane's +orders was mighty strict about the plaguey thing. I wish I may never +see it again. It's been, 'Nevins, let nobody disturb the new mirror!' +and 'Nevins, did anyone touch the new mirror while I was gone?' and +'Nevins, was the window open near the new mirror?' until I fair feel +sick at the sight of it." + +"No doubt," said the professor, impatiently. "Then you'll oblige me by +wrapping it up for shipping purposes as soon as ever you can. I'm going +to take it away with me at once. I suppose there's no chance of Mr. Vane +dropping in here before I bring the glass back, but, if he does, tell +him you acted under my orders." + +"A good riddance," muttered Nevins, losing no time over his task of +covering and securing the mirror. "I'll pray it never comes this way +again," he remarked. + +The professor, after seeing that all danger of injury to the mirror's +exposed parts was over, walked nervously up and down the rooms. He would +have to carry his plan through with force of arms, with sheer +impertinence and energy of purpose. It was an interference in two lives +that he had in view. Had he any right to that? But was he not, after +all, to blame for the fact of the curious transfusion of soul that had +left one man a mental wreck, and stimulated the other's forces to a +course of life out of all character with the strivings of his real soul? +If he had not tempted Orson Vane to these experiments, Arthur Wantage +would never be drooping in the shadow of collapse, and in danger of +losing his proper place in the roll of prosperity. Vanlief shuddered at +thought of what an unscrupulous man might not do with this discovery of +his; what lives might be ruined, what successes built on fraud and +theft? Fraud and theft? Those words were foul enough in the material +things of life; but how much more horrid would they be when they covered +the spiritual realm. To steal a purse, in the old dramatic phrase, was a +petty thing; but to steal a soul--Professor Vanlief found himself +launched into a whirlpool of doubt and confusion. + +He had opened a new, vast region of mental science. He had enabled one +man to pass the wall with which nature had hedged the unforeseen forces +of humanity. Was he to learn that, in opening this new avenue of psychic +activity, he had gone counter to the eternal Scheme of Things, and let +in no divine light, but rather the fierce glare of diabolism? + +His thoughts traversed argument upon argument while Nevins completed his +work. He heard the man's voice, finally, with an actual relief, a +gladness at being recalled to the daring and doing that lay before him. + +When the Professor was gone, a wagon bearing away the precious mirror, +Nevins poured himself out a notably stiff glass of Five-Star. + +"Here's hoping," he toasted the silent room, "the silly thing gets +smashed into everlasting smithereens!" + +And he drowned any fears he might have had to the contrary. This +particular species of time-killing was now a daily matter with Nevins; +the incessant strain upon his nerves of some months past had finally +brought him to the pitch where he had only one haven of refuge left. + +The Professor sped over the miles to Framley Lodge. He took little +thought about meals or sleep. The excitement was marking him deeply; but +he paid no heed to, or was unaware of, that. Arrived at the Lodge a +campaign of bribery and corruption began. Servant after servant had to +be suborned. Nothing but the well-known fame and name of Augustus +Vanlief enabled him, even with his desperate expenditures of tips, to +avert the suspicion that he had some deadly, some covertly inimical end +in view. One does not, at this age of the world, burst into another +man's house and order that man's servants about, without coming under +suspicion, to put it mildly. Fortunately Vanlief encountered, just as +his plot seemed shattering against the rigor of the household +arrangements, the doctor who was in attendance on Wantage. The man +happened to be on the staff of the University where Vanlief held a +chair. He held the older man in the greatest respect; he listened to his +rapid talk with all the patience in the world. He looked astonished, +even uncomprehending, but he shook his shoulders up and down a few times +with complaisance. "There seems no possible harm," he assented. + +"Don't ask me to believe in the curative possibilities, Professor; +but--there can be no harm, that I see. He is not to be unduly excited. A +mirror, you say? You don't think vanity can send a man from illness to +health, do you? Not even an actor can be as vain as that, surely. +However, I shall tell the attendants to see that the thing is done as +quietly as possible. I trust you, you see, to let nothing detrimental +happen. I have to get over to the Port of Pines. I shall give the +orders. Goodbye. I wish I could see the result of your little--h'm, +notion--but I dare say to-morrow will be soon enough." + +And he smiled the somewhat condescending smile of the successful +practitioner who fancies he is addressing a campaigner whose usefulness +is passing. + +The setting up of the professor's mirror, so as to face Wantage's +sickbed, took no little time, no little care, no little exertion. When +it was in place, the professor tiptoed to the actor's side. + +"Well," queried Wantage, "what is it? Medicine? Lord, I thought I'd +taken all there was in the world. Where is it?" + +"No," said the professor, "not medicine. I am going to ask you to look +quite hard at that curtain by the foot of the bed for a moment. I have +something I think may interest you and--" + +As the actor's eyes, in mere physical obedience to the other's +suggestion, took the desired direction, Vanlief tugged at a cord that +rolled the curtain aside, revealing the mirror, which gave Wantage back +the somewhat haggard apparition of himself. + +A few seconds went by in silence. Then Wantage frowned sharply. + +"Gad," he exclaimed, vigorously and petulantly, "what a beastly bad bit +of make-up!" + +The voice was the voice of the man whom the town had a thousand times +applauded as "The King of the Dandies." + +An exceedingly bad quarter of an hour followed for Vanlief. Wantage, now +in full possession of all his mental faculties, abused the Professor up +hill and down dale. What was he doing there? What business had that +mirror there? What good was a covered-up mirror? Where were the +servants? The doctor had given orders? The doctor was a fool. Only the +mere physical infirmity consequent upon being bedridden for so long +prevented Wantage from becoming violent in his rage. Vanlief, sharp as +was his sense of relief at the success of his venture, was yet more +relieved when his bribes finally got his mirror and himself out of the +Lodge. The incident had its humors, but he was too tired, too enervated, +to enjoy them. The very moment of Wantage's recovery of his soul had its +note of ironic comedy; the succeeding vituperation from the restored +actor; Vanlief's own meekness; the marvel and rapacity of the +servants--all these were abrim with chances for merriment. But Vanlief +found himself, for, perhaps, the first time in his life, too old to +enjoy the happy interpretations of life. Into all his rejoicings over +the outcome of this affair there crept the constant doubts, the +ceaseless questionings, as to whether he had discovered a mine of wisdom +and benefit, or a mere addition to man's chances for evil. + +His return journey, his delivery of the mirror into Nevins' unwilling +care, were accomplished by him in a species of daze. + +He had hardly counted upon the danger of his discovery. Was he still +young enough to contend with them? + +Nevins almost flung the mirror to its accustomed place. He unwrapped it +spitefully. When he left the room, the curtain of the glass was flapping +in the wind. Nevins heard the sound quite distinctly; he went to the +sideboard and poured out a brimming potion. + +"I 'opes the wind'll play the Old 'Arry with it," he smiled to himself. +He smiled often that night; he went to bed smiling. His was the cheerful +mode of intoxication. + +Augustus Vanlief reached the cottage in the hills a sheer wreck. He had +left it a hale figure of a man who had ever kept himself keyed up to the +best; now he was old, shaking, trembling in nerves and muscles. + +Jeannette rushed toward him and put her arms around him. She looked her +loving, silent wonder into his weary eyes. + +"Sleep, dear, sleep," said this old, tired man of science, "first let me +sleep." + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII. + + +Orson Vane, scintillating theatrically by the sea, was in a fine rage +when Nevins ceased to answer his telegrams. Telegrams struck Vane as the +most dramatic of epistles; there was always a certain pictorial effect +in tearing open the envelope, in imagining the hushed expectation of an +audience. A letter--pooh! A letter might be anything from a bill to a +billet. But a telegram! Those little slips of paper struck immediate +terror, or joy, or despair, or confusion; they hit hard, and swiftly. +Certainly he had been hitting Nevins hard enough of late. He had +peppered him with telegrams about the furniture, about the pictures; he +had forbidden one day what he had ordered the day before. It never +occurred to him that Nevins might seek escape from these torments. Yet +that was what Nevins had done. He had tippled himself into a condition +where he signed sweetly for each telegram and put it in the hall-rack. +They made a beautiful, yellow festoon on the mahogany background. + +"Those," Nevins told himself, "is for a gentleman as is far too busy to +notice little things like telegrams." + +Nevins watched that yellow border growing daily with fresh delight. + +He could keep on accepting telegrams just as long as the sideboard held +its strength. Each new arrival from the Western Union drove him to more +glee and more spirits--of the kind one can buy bottled. + +At last Orson Vane felt some alarm creeping through his armor of +dramatic pose. Could Nevins have come to any harm? It was very annoying, +but he would have to go to town for a day or so. That seemed +unavoidable. Just as he had made up his mind to it, he happened to slip +on a bit of lemon-peel. At once he fell into a towering rage. He cursed +the entire service on the _Beaurivage_ up hill and down dale. You could +hear him all over the harbor. It was the voice of a profane Voltaire. + +That night, at the Casino, his rage found vent in action. He sold the +_Beaurivage_ as hastily as he had bought her. + +He left for town, by morning, full of bitterness at the world's +conspiracy to cheat him. He felt that for a careless deck-hand to leave +lemon-peel on the deck of the Beaurivage was nothing less than part of +the world-wide cabal against his peace of mind. + +He reached his town-house in a towering passion, all the accumulated +ill-temper of the last few days bubbling in him. He flung the housedoor +wide, stamped through the halls. "Nevins!" he shouted, "Nevins!" + +Nothing stirred in the house. He entered room after room. Passing into +his dressing-room he almost tore the hanging from its rod. A gust of air +struck him from the wide-open window. Before he proceeded another step +this gust, that his opening of the curtain had produced, lifted the veil +from the mirror facing him. The veil swung up gently, revealed the +glass, and dropped again. + +Then he realized the figure of Nevins on a couch. He walked up to him. +The smell of spirits met him at once. + +"Poor Nevins!" he muttered. + +Then he fell to further realizations. + +The whole history of his three experiments unfolded itself before him. +What, after them all, had he gained? What, save the knowledge of the +littleness of the motives controlling those lives? This actor, this man +the world thought great, whose soul he had held in usurpation, up to a +little while ago, what was he? A very batch of vanities, a mountain of +egoisms. Had there been, in any of the thoughts, the moods he had +experienced from out the mental repertoire of that player, anything +indicative of nobility, of large benevolence, of sweet and light in the +finest human sense? Nothing, nothing. The ambition to imitate the +obvious points of human action and conduct, to the end that one be +called a character-actor; the striving for an echoed fame rightly +belonging to the supreme names of history; a yearning for the stimulus +of immediate acclamation--these things were not worth gaining. To have +experienced them was to have caught nothing beneficial. + +Orson Vane began to consider himself with contempt. Upon himself must +fall the odium of what the souls he had borrowed had induced in him. The +littleness he had fathomed, the depths of character to which he had +sunk, all left their petty brands on him. He had penetrated the barriers +of other men's minds, but what had it profited him? As a ship becalmed +in foul waters takes on barnacles, so had he brought forth, from the +realm of alien springs and motives he had made his own, a dreadful +incrustation of painful conjectures on the supremacy of evil in the +world. + +It needed only a glance at the man, Nevins, to force home the +destructiveness born of these incursions into other lives. That +trembling, cowering thing had been, before Orson Vane's departure from +the limitations of his own temperament, a decent, self-respecting +fellow. While now-- + +Vane paced about the house in bitter unrest. In the outer hall he +noticed the yellow envelopes bordering the coat-rack. He took one of +them down, opened it, and smiled. "Poor Nevins!" he murmured. The next +moment a lad from the Telegraph office appeared in the doorway. Vane +went forward himself; there was no use disturbing Nevins. + +The wire had followed him on from the _Beaurivage_, or rather from the +man to whom he had sold her. It was from Augustus Vanlief. Its brevity +was like a blow in the face. + +"Am ill," it said, "must see you." + +It was still possible, that very hour, to get an express to the +Professor's mountain retreat. There was nothing to prevent immediate +departure. Nothing--except Nevins. The man really must exercise more +care about that mirror. He was safely out of all his experiments now, +but the thing was dangerous none the less; if it had been his own +property, he would have known how to deal with it. But it was the +Professor's secret, the discovery of a lifetime. For elaborate +precautions, or even for hiding the thing in some closet, there was no +time. He could only rouse Nevins as energetically as possible to a sense +of his previous defection from duty; gently and quite kindly he +admonished him to take every care of the new mirror in the time coming. +Nevins listened to him wide-eyed; his senses were still too much agog +for him to realize whence this change of voice and manner had come to +his master. It was merely another page in the chapter of bewilderment +that piled upon him. He bowed his promise to be careful, he assented to +a number of things he could not fathom, and when Vane was gone he +cleared the momentary trouble in his mind by an ardent drink. The liquor +brought him a most humorous notion, and one that he felt sure would +relieve him of all further anxieties on the score of the new mirror. He +approached the back of it, tore the curtain from its face, wheeled it to +the centre of the room, and placed all the other cheval-glasses close +by. Throughout this he had wit enough, or fear enough--for his memory +brought him just enough picture of Orson's own handling of this mirror +to inspire a certain awe of the front of the thing--never to pass in +face of the mirror. When he had the mirrors grouped in close ranks, he +spun about on his heels quickly, as if seized with the devout frenzy of +a dervish. He fell, finally, in a daze of dizziness and liquor. Yet he +had cunning enough left. He crept out of the room on his stomach, like a +snake with fiery breath. He knew that the angle at which the mirrors +were tilted would keep him, belly to the carpet, out of range. Then he +reeled, shouting, into the corridors. + +He had accomplished his desire. He no longer knew one mirror from the +other. + +Orson Vane, in the meanwhile, was being rushed to the mountains. It was +with a new shock of shame that he saw the ravages illness was making on +the fine face of Vanlief. This, too, was one of the items in the +profit-and-loss column of his experiments. Yet this burden was, +perhaps, a shared one. + +"Ah," said Vanlief, with a quick breath of gladness, "thank God!" He +knew, the instant Vane spoke, that it was Orson Vane himself who had +come; he knew that there was no more doubt as to the success of his own +recent headlong journeyings. They had prostrated him; but--they had won. +Yet there was no knowing how far this illness might go; it was still +imperative to come to final, frank conclusions with the partner in his +secret. + +The instant that Vane had been announced Jeannette Vanlief had left her +father's side. She withdrew to the adjoining room, where only a curtain +concealed her; the doors had all been taken down for the summer. She did +not wish to meet Orson Vane. Over her real feelings for him had come a +cloud of doubts and distastes. She had never admitted to herself, +openly, that she loved him; she tried to persuade herself that his +notorious vagaries had put him beyond her pale. She was determined, now, +to be an unseen ear to what might pass between Orson and her father. It +was not a nice thing to do, but, for all she knew, her father's very +life was at stake. What dire influence might Vane not have over her +father? She suspected there was some bond between them; in her father's +weakened state it seemed her duty to watch over him with every devotion +and alertness. + +Yet, for a long time, the purport of the conversation quite eluded her. + +"I have not gone the gamut of humanity," said Orson, "but I have almost, +it seems to me, gone the gamut of my own courage." + +Vanlief nodded. He, too, understood. Consequences! Consequences! How the +consequences of this world do spoil the castles one builds in it! +Castles in the air may be as pretty as you please, but they are sure to +obstruct some other mortal's view of the sky. + +"If I were younger," sighed Vanlief, "if I were only younger." + +They did not yet, either of them, dare to be open, brutal, forthright. + +"I could declare, I suppose," Vanlief went on, "that it was somewhat +your own fault. You chose your victims badly. You have, I presume, been +disenchanted. You found little that was beautiful, many things that were +despicable. The spectacles you borrowed have all turned out smoky. Yet, +consider--there are sure to be just as many rosy spectacles as dark ones +in the world." + +"No doubt," assented Vane, though without enthusiasm, "but there are +still--the consequences. There is still the chance that I could never +repay the soul I take on loan; still the horror of being left to face +the rest of my days with a cuckoo in my brain. Mind, I have no +reproaches, none at all. You overstated nothing. I have felt, have +thought, have done as other men have felt and thought and done; their +very inner secret souls have been completely in my keeping. The +experiment has been a triumph. Yet it leaves me joyless." + +"It has made me old," said Vanlief, simply. "Ah," he repeated, "if only +I were younger!" + +"The strain," he began again, "of putting an end to your last experiment +has told on me. I overdid it. Such emotion, and such physical tension, +is more than I should have attempted. I begin to fear I may not last +very long. And in that case I think I shall have to take my secret with +me. Orson, it comes to this; I am too old to perfect this marvelous +thing to the point where it will be safe for humanity at large. It is +still unsafe,--you will agree to that. You might wreck your own life and +that of others. The chances are one in a thousand of your ever finding a +human being whom God has so graciously endowed with the divine spirit as +to be able to lose part of it without collapse. I have hoped and hoped, +that such a thing would happen; then there would be two perfectly even, +exactly tempered creatures; even if, upon that transfusion, the mirror +disappeared, there would be no unhappiness as a reproach. But we have +found nothing like that. You have embittered yourself; the glimpses of +other souls you have had have almost stripped you of your belief in an +eternal Good." + +"You mean to send for the mirror?" + +"It would be better, wiser. If I live, it will still be here. If I die, +it must be destroyed. In any event--" + +At the actual approach of this conclusion to his experiments Orson Vane +felt a sense of coming loss. With all the dangers, all the loom of +possible disaster, he was not yet rid of the awful fascination of this +soul-snatching he had been engaged in. + +"Perhaps," he argued, "my next experiment might find the one in a +thousand you spoke of." + +"I think you had better not try again. Tell me, what was Wantage's soul +like?" + +"Oh, I cannot put it into words. A little, feverish, fretful soul, +shouting, all the time: I, I, I! Plotting, planning for public +attention, worldly prominence. No thoughts save those of self. An active +brain, all bent on the ego. A brain that deliberately chose the theatre +because it seems the most spectacular avenue to eminence. A magnetism +that keeps outsiders wondering whether childishness or genius lurks +behind the mask. The bacillus of restlessness is in that brain; it is +never idle, always planning a new pose for the body and the voice." + +"Well," urged Vanlief, "think what might have been had I not put a stop +to the thing. You don't realize the terrible anxiety I was in. You might +have ruined the man's career. However petty we, you and I, may hold +him, there are things the world expects of him; we came close to +spoiling all that. I had to act, and quickly. You may fancy the +difficulties of getting the mirror to Wantage. Oh, it is still all like +an evil dream." He lay silent a while, then resumed: "Is the mirror in +the old room?" + +"Yes. With the others, in the dressing-room." + +"Nevins looks out for it?" + +"As always. Though he grows old, too." + +Vanlief looked sharply at Orson, he suspected something behind that +phrase about Nevins. Again he urged: + +"Better have Nevins bring the mirror back to me." + +Vane hesitated. He murmured a reply that Jeannette no longer cared to +hear. The whole secret was open to her, now; she saw that the Orson Vane +she loved--she exulted now in her admission of that--was still the man +she thought him, that all his inexplicable divagations had been part of +this awful juggling with the soul that her father had found the trick +of. She realized, too, by the manner of Vane, that he had not yet given +up all thought of these experiments; he wanted one more. One more; one +more; it was the cry of the drunkard, the opium-eater, the victim of +every form of mania. + +It should never be, that one more trial. What her father had done, she +could do. She glided out of the room, on the heels of her quick +resolution. + +The two men, in their arguments, their widening discussions, did not +bring her to mind for hours. By that that time she was well on her way +to town. + +Her purpose was clear to her; nothing should hinder its achievement. She +must destroy the mirror. There were sciences that were better killed at +the outset. She did not enter deeply into those phases of the question, +but she had the clear determination to prevent further mischief, further +follies on the part of Vane, further chances of her father's collapse. + +The mirror must be destroyed. That was plain and simple. + +It took a tremendous ringing and knocking to bring Nevins to the door of +Vane's house. + +"I am Miss Vanlief," she said, "I want to see my father's mirror." + +"Certainly, miss, certainly." He tottered before her, chuckling and +chattering to himself. He was in the condition now when nothing +surprised him; any rascal could have led him with a word or a hint; he +was immeasurably gay at everything in the world. He reeled to the +dressing-room with an elaborate air of courtesy. + +"At your service, miss, there you are, miss. You walk straight on, and +there you are, miss. There's the mirror, miss, plain as pudding." + +She strode past him, drawing her skirt away from the horrible taint of +his breath. She knew she would find the mirror at once, curtained and +solitary sentinel before the doorway. She would simply break it with her +parasol, stab it, viciously, from behind. + +But, once past the portal, she gave a little cry. + +All the mirrors were jumbled together, all looked alike, and all faced +her, mysterious, glaringly. + +"Nevins," she called out, "which--which is the one?" + +"Ah, miss," he said, leeringly, "don't I wish I knew." + +No sense of possible danger to herself, only a despair at failure, came +upon Jeannette. Failure! Failure! She had meant to avert disaster, and +she had accomplished--nothing, nothing at all. + +She left the house almost in tears. She felt sure Vane would yield again +to the temptation of these frightful experiments. She could do nothing, +nothing. She had felt justified in attempting destruction of what was +her father's; but she could not wantonly offer all that array of mirrors +on the altar of her purpose. She stumbled along the street, suffering, +full of tears. It was with a sigh of relief that she saw a hansom and +hailed it. The cab had hardly turned a corner before Orson Vane, coming +from another direction, let himself into his house. His conference with +Vanlief had ceased at his own promise to make just one more trial of the +mirror. He could not go about the business of the life he led in town +without assuring himself the mirror was safe. + +He found Nevins incoherent and useless. He began to consider seriously +the advisability of discharging the man; still, he hated to do that to +an old servant, and the man might come to his senses and his duties. + +He spent some little time re-arranging the mirrors in his room. He was +sure there had been no intrusion since he was there himself, and he knew +Nevins well enough to know that individual's horror of facing the +mirror. He himself faced the new mirror boldly enough, sure that his own +image was the only one resting there. He knew the mirror easily, in +spite of the robbery that the wind, as he thought, had committed. + +Nevins, hiding in the corridor, watched him, in drunken amusement. + + + + +CHAPTER XIX. + + +The sun, glittering along the avenue, shimmering on the rustling gowns +of the women and smoothing the coats of the horses, smote Orson Vane +gently; the fairness of the day flooded his soul with a tide of +well-being. In the air and on the town there seemed some subtle +radiance, some glamour of enchantment. The smell of violets was all +about him. The colors of new fashions dotted the vision like a painting +by Hassam; a haze of warmth covered the town like a kiss. + +His thoughts, keyed, in some strange, sweet way, to all the pleasant, +happy, pretty things in life, brought him the vision of Jeannette +Vanlief. How long, how far away seemed that day when she had been at his +side, when her voice had enveloped him in its silver echoes! + +As carriage after carriage passed him, he began to fancy Jeannette, in +all her roseate beauty, driving toward him. He saw the curve of her +ankle as she stepped into the carriage; he dreamed of her flower-like +attitude as she leaned to the cushions. + +Then the miracle happened; Jeannette, a little tired, a little pale, a +little more fragile than when last he had seen her, was coming toward +him. A smile, a gentle, tender, slightly sad--but yet so sweet, so +sweet!--a smile was on her lips. He took her hand and held it and looked +into her eyes, and the two souls in that instant kissed and became one. + +"This time," he said--and as he spoke all that had happened since they +had pretended, childishly, on the top of the old stage on the Avenue, +seemed to slip away, to fade, to be forgotten--"it must be a real +luncheon. You are fagged. So am I. You are like a breath of +lilies-of-the-valley. Come!" + +They took a table by an open window. The procession of the town nearly +touched them, so close was it. To them both it seemed, to-day, a happy, +joyous, fine procession. + +"Will you tell me something?" asked the girl, presently, after they had +laughed and chattered like two children for awhile. + +"Anything in the world." + +"Well, then--are you ever, ever going to face that dreadful mirror +again?" + +He smiled, as if there was nothing astonishing in her knowledge, her +question. + +"Do you want me not to?" + +She nodded. + +He put his hand across the table, on one of hers. "Jeannette," he +whispered, "I promise. Why do you care? It is not possible that you +care because, because--Jeannette, will you promise me something, too?" + +They have excellent waiters at the Mayfair. They can be absolutely blind +at times. This was such a time. The particular waiter who was serving +Vane's table, took a sudden, rapt interest in the procession on the +avenue. + +Jeanette crumbled a macaroon with her free hand. + +"You have my hand," she pouted. + +"I need it," he said. "It is a very pretty hand. And very strong. I +think it must have lifted all my ills from me to-day. I feel nothing but +kindness toward the whole world. I could kiss--the whole world." + +"Oh," said Jeannette, pulling her hand away a little, "you monster! You +are worse than Nero." + +"Do you think my kisses would be so awful, then? Or is it simply the +piggishness of me that makes you call me a monster. That's not the right +way to look at it. Think of all the dreadful people there are in the +world; think how philanthropic you must make me feel if I want to kiss +even those." + +"Ah, but the world is full of beautiful women." + +"I do not believe it," he vowed. "I do not think God had any beauty left +after he fashioned--you." + +He was not ashamed, not one iota of the grossness of that fable. He +really felt so. Indeed, all his life he never felt otherwise than that +toward Jeannette. And she took the shocking compliment quite serenely. + +"You are absurd," she said, but she looked as if she loved absurdity. +"Please, may I take my hand?" + +"If you will be very good and promise--" + +"What?" + +"To give me something in exchange." + +"Something in exchange?" + +"Yes. The sweetest thing in the world, the best, and the dearest. You, +dear, yourself. Oh! dearest, if I could tell you what I feel. +Speech--what a silly thing speech is! It can only hint clumsily, +futilely. If I could only tell you, for instance, how the world has +suddenly taken on brightness for me since you smiled. I feel a +tenderness to all nature. I believe at heart there is good in everyone, +don't you? To-day I seem to see nothing but good. I could find you a +lovable spot in the worst villain you might name. I suppose it is the +stream of sweetness that comes from you, dear. Why can't this hour last +forever. I want it to, oh, I want it to!" + +"It is," she whispered, "an hour I shall always remember." + +"Yes, but it must last, it can't die; it sha'n't! Jeannette, let us make +this hour last us our lives! Can't we?" + +"Our lives?" she whispered. + +"Yes, our lives. This is only the first minute of our life. We must +never part again. I seem to have been behind a cloud of doubt and +distrust until this moment. I hardly realize what has happened to me. Is +love so refining a thing as all this? Does it turn bitter into sweet, +and make all the ups and downs of the world shine like one level, +beautiful sea of tenderness? It can be nothing else, but that--my love, +our--can I say our love, Jeannette?" + +The sun streamed in at the window, kissing the tendrils of her hair and +bringing to their copper shimmer a yet brighter blush. The day, with all +its perfume, the splendor of its people, the riot of color of its gowns, +the pride and pomp of its statues and its fountains, flushed the most +secret rills of life. + +"It is a marvel of a day," said Jeannette. + +"A marvel? It is an impossible day; it is not a day at all--it is merely +the hour of hours, the supreme instant, the melody so sweet that it must +break or blind our hearts. You are right, dear, it is a marvelous hour. +You make me repeat myself. Can we let this hour--escape, Jeannette?" + +"It goes fast." + +"Fast--fast as the wind. Fleet as air and fair as heaven are the +instants that bring happiness to common mortals. But we must hold the +hour, cage it, leash it to our lives." + +"Do you think we can?" + +She had used the "we!" Oh yes, and she had said it; she had said it; he +sang the refrain over to himself in a swoon of bliss. + +"I am sure of it," he urged. "Will you try?" + +"You are so much the stronger," she mocked. + +"Oh--if it depends on me--! Try? I shall succeed! I know it. Such love +as mine cannot fail. If only you will let me try. That is all; just +that. + +"I wish you luck!" she smiled. + +"You have said it," he jubilated, "you have said it!" And then, +realizing that she had meant it all the time, he threatened her with a +look, a shake of the head--oh, you would have said he wanted to punish +her in some terrible way, some way that was filled with kisses. + +"Jeannette," he whispered, "I have never heard you speak my name." + +"A pretty name, too," she said. "I have wondered if I might not spoil it +in my pronunciation." + +"You beautiful bit of mockery, you," he said, "will you condescend to +repeat a little sentence after me? You will say it far more prettily +than I, but perhaps you will forgive my lack of music. I am only a man. +You--ah, you are a goddess." + +"For how long?" she asked. "Men marry goddesses and find them clay, +don't they?" + +"You are not clay, dear, you are star-dust, and flowers, and fragrance. +There is not a thought in your dear head that is in tune with mere +clay. But listen! You must say this after me: I--" + +"I--" + +"Love--" + +"Love--" + +"You--" + +"You--" + +"Jeannette--" + +Her lips began to frame the consonant for her own name, but at sight of +the pleading in his gaze she stilled the playfulness of her, and +finished, shyly, but oh, so sweetly. + +"Orson." + +The dear, delightful absurdities of the hour when men and women tell +each other they love, how silly, and how pathetic they must seem to the +all-seeing force that flings our destinies back and forth at its will! +Yet how fair, how ineffably fair, those moments are to their heroes and +heroines; how vastly absurd the rest of the sad, serious world seems to +such lovers, and how happy are the mortals, after all, who through +fastnesses of doubt and darkness, come to the free spaces where the +heart, in tenderness and grace, rules supreme over the intellect, and +keeps in subjection, wisdom, ignorance and all the ills men plague their +minds with! + +When they left the Mayfair together their precious secret was anything +but a secret. Their dream lay fair and open to the world; one must have +been very blind not to see how much these two were in love with each +other. They had gone over every incident of their friendship; they had +stirred the embers of their earliest longings; they had touched their +growing happiness at every point save where Orson's steps aside had hurt +his sweetheart's memory. Those periods both avoided. All else they made +subject for, oh, the tenderest, the most lovelorn conversation +thinkable. It was enough, if overheard, to have sickened the whole day +for any ordinary mortal. + +One must, to repeat, have been very stupid not to see, when they issued +upon the avenue, that they shared the secret that this world appears to +have been created to keep alive. Love clothed them like a visible +garment. + +Luke Moncreith could never have been called blind or stupid. He saw the +truth at once. The truth; it rushed over him like a salt, bitter, acrid +sea. He swallowed it as a drowning man swallows what overwhelms him. One +instant of terrible rage spun him as if he had been a top; he faced +about and was for making, then and there, a scene with this shamelessly +happy pair. But the futility of that struck him on the following second. +He kept his way down the avenue, emotions surging in him; he felt that +his passions were becoming visible and conspicuous; he took a turning +into one of the streets leading eastward. A sign of a wineshop flashed +across his dancing vision, and he clung to it as to an anchor or a +poison. He found a table. He wanted nothing else, only rest, rest. The +wine stood untasted on the bare wood before him. He peered, through it, +into an unfathomable mystery. This chameleon, this fellow Vane--how was +it possible that he had won this glorious, flower-like creature, +Jeannette? This man had been, as the fancy took him, a court fool, a +sporting nonentity, and a blatant mummer. And what was he now? By the +looks of him, he was, to-day--and for how long, Moncreith wondered--a +very essence of meekness and sweetness; butter would not think of +melting in his mouth. What, in the devil's name, what was this riddle! +He might have repeated that question to himself until the end of his +life if the door had not opened then and let in Nevins. + +Nevins ordered the strongest liquor in the place. The sideboard on +Vanthuysen Square might be empty, but Nevins had still the money. As for +the gloomy old Vane house, he really could not stand it any longer. He +toasted himself, did Nevins, and he talked to himself. + +"'An now," he murmured, thickly, "'ere's to the mirror. May I never see +it again as long as I 'as breath in my body and wits in me 'ead. Which," +he observed, with a fatuous grin, "aint for long. No, sir; me nerves is +that a-shake I aint good for nothin' any more. And I asks you, is it +any wonder? 'Ere's Mr. Vane, one day, pleasant as pie. Next day, comes +in, takes a look at that dratted mirror of the Perfessor's, and takes to +'igh jinks. Yes, sir, 'igh jinks, very 'igh jinks. 'As pink tea-fights +in his rooms, 'angs up pictures I wouldn't let me own father see--no, +sir, not if 'e begged me on his bended knee, I wouldn't--and wears what +you might call a tenor voice. Then--one day, while you says 'One for his +Nob' 'e's 'imself again. An' it's always the mirror this, an' the mirror +that. I must look out for it, an' it mustn't be touched, and nobody must +come in. And what's the result of it all? Me nerves is gone, and me +self-respect is gone, and I'm a poor miserable drunkard!" + +He gulped down some of his misery. + +"Join me," said a voice nearby, "in another of those things!" + +Nevins turned, with a swaying motion, to note Moncreith, whose hand was +pointing to the empty glass before Nevins. + +"You are quite right," he went on, when the other's glass had been +filled again, "Mr. Vane's conduct has been most scandalous of late. You +say he has a mirror?" + +All circumspection had long since passed from Nevins. He was simply an +individual with a grievance. The many episodes that, in his filmy mind, +seemed to center about that mirror, shifted and twisted in him to where +they forced utterance. He began to talk, circuitously, wildly, rapidly, +of the many things that rankled in him. He told all he knew, all he had +observed. From out of the mass of inane, not pertinent ramblings, +Moncreith caught a glimmer of the facts. + +What a terrible power this must be that was in Orson Vane's possession! +Moncreith shuddered at the thought. Why, the man might turn himself, in +all but externals--and what, after all, was the husk, the shell, the +body?--into the finest wit, the most lovable hero of his time; he might +fare about the world wrecking now this, now that, happiness; he might +win--perhaps he actually had, even now, won Jeannette Vanlief? If he +had, if--perhaps there was yet time! There was need for sharp, desperate +action. + +He plunged out of the place and toward Vanthuysen Square. Then he +remembered that he could not get in. He aroused Nevins from his brutish +doze. He dragged him over the intervening space. Nevins gave him the +key, and dropped into one of the hall chairs. Moncreith leaped upstairs, +and entered the room where the mirror stood, white, silent, stately. + +He contemplated everything for a time. He conjured up the picture he had +been able to piece together from the rambling monologues of Nevins. He +wondered whether to simply smash in the mirrors--he would destroy them +all, to make sure--by taking a chair-leg to them, or whether he would +carefully pour some acid over them. + +The simpler plan appealed most to him. It was the quickest, the most +thorough. He took a little wooden chair that stood by an ebon +escritoire, swung it high in the air and brought it with a shattering +crash upon the face of the Professor's mirror. + +But there was more than a mere crash. A deadly, sickening, stifling fume +arose from the space the clinking glass unbared; a flame burst out, +leaped at Moncreith and seized him. The deadly white smoke flowed +through the room; flame followed flame, curtains, hangings, screens +went, one after the other, to feed the ravenous beast that Moncreith's +blow had liberated. The room was presently a seething furnace that +rattled in the cage of the walls and windows. Moncreith lay, choked with +the horrid smoke, on the floor. The flames licked at him again and +again; finally one took him on the tip of its tongue, twisted him about, +and shriveled him to black, charred shapelessness. + +The windows fell, finally, out upon the street below. The fire sneaked +downward, laughing and leaping. + +When the firemen came to save Orson Vane's house, they found a grinning, +sodden creature in the hall. + +It was Nevins. "That settles the mirror!" was all he kept repeating. + + + + +CHAPTER XX. + + +The Professor shivered a little when Jeannette came to him with her +budget of wonderful news. She told him of her engagement. He patted her +head, and blessed her and wished her happiness. Then she told him of her +visit to Vane's house. It was at that he shivered. + +He wondered if Vane had taken her image from that fatal glass. If he +had, how, he wondered, would this experiment end? Surely it could not +have happened; Jeannette was quite herself; there was no visible +diminution of charm, of vitality. + +When Vane arrived, presently, the Professor questioned him. The answer +brought the Professor wonder, but he did not count it altogether a +calamity. There could be no doubt that Orson Vane was now wearing +Jeannette's sweet and beautiful soul as a halo round his own. Well, +mused Vanlief, if anything should happen to Jeannette one can always-- + +"Oh, father!" + +Jeannette burst into the room with the morning paper from town. "Orson's +house is burnt to the ground. And who do you think is suspected? Luke +Moncreith! They found his body. Read it!" + +The Professor took the report and scanned it. There could be no doubt; +the mirror, the work of his life, was gone. He could never fashion one +like it. Never--Yet--He looked at the two young people at the window, +whither they had turned together, each with an arm about the other. + +"What a marvel of a day!" Jeannette was saying. + +"The days will all be marvels for us," said Orson. + +"The days, I think, must have souls, just as we have. Some days seem to +have such dark, such bitter thoughts. + +"Yes, I think you are right. There are days that strike one as having +souls; others that seem quite soulless. Beautiful, empty shells, some of +them; others, dim, yet tender, full of graciousness." + +"Orson!" + +"Sweetheart!" + +"Do you know how wonderfully you are changed? Do you know you once +talked bitterly, as one who was full of disappointments and +disenchantments?" + +"You have set me, dear, in a garden of enchantment from which I mean +never to escape. The garden is your heart." + +Something glistened in the Professor's eyes as he listened. "God, in +his infinite wisdom," he said, in a reverent whisper, "gave her so much +of grace; she had enough for both!" + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Imitator, by Percival Pollard + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE IMITATOR *** + +***** This file should be named 39724.txt or 39724.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/9/7/2/39724/ + +Produced by Don Wills and Marc D'Hooghe at +http://www.freeliterature.org (Images generously made +available by the Hathi Trust) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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