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@@ -0,0 +1,11892 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Price She Paid, by David Graham Phillips + +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 Price She Paid + +Author: David Graham Phillips + +Posting Date: September 27, 2008 [EBook #457] +Release Date: March, 1996 +[This file last updated: January 31, 2011] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PRICE SHE PAID *** + + + + +Produced by Charles Keller. HTML version by Al Haines. + + + + + + + + +THE PRICE SHE PAID + + +by + +David Graham Phillips + + + +I + +HENRY GOWER was dead at sixty-one--the end of a lifelong fraud which +never had been suspected, and never would be. With the world, with his +acquaintances and neighbors, with his wife and son and daughter, he +passed as a generous, warm-hearted, good-natured man, ready at all +times to do anything to help anybody, incapable of envy or hatred or +meanness. In fact, not once in all his days had he ever thought or +done a single thing except for his own comfort. Like all intensely +selfish people who are wise, he was cheerful and amiable, because that +was the way to be healthy and happy and to have those around one +agreeable and in the mood to do what one wished them to do. He told +people, not the truth, not the unpleasant thing that might help them, +but what they wished to hear. His family lived in luxurious comfort +only because he himself was fond of luxurious comfort. His wife and his +daughter dressed fashionably and went about and entertained in the +fashionable, expensive way only because that was the sort of life that +gratified his vanity. He lived to get what he wanted; he got it every +day and every hour of a life into which no rain ever fell; he died, +honored, respected, beloved, and lamented. + +The clever trick he had played upon his fellow beings came very near to +discovery a few days after his death. His widow and her son and +daughter-in-law and daughter were in the living-room of the charming +house at Hanging Rock, near New York, alternating between sorrowings +over the dead man and plannings for the future. Said the widow: + +"If Henry had only thought what would become of us if he were taken +away!" + +"If he had saved even a small part of what he made every year from the +time he was twenty-six--for he always made a big income," said his son, +Frank. + +"But he was so generous, so soft-hearted!" exclaimed the widow. "He +could deny us nothing." + +"He couldn't bear seeing us with the slightest wish ungratified," said +Frank. + +"He was the best father that ever lived!" cried the daughter, Mildred. + +And Mrs. Gower the elder and Mrs. Gower the younger wept; and Mildred +turned away to hide the emotion distorting her face; and Frank stared +gloomily at the carpet and sighed. The hideous secret of the life of +duplicity was safe, safe forever. + +In fact, Henry Gower had often thought of the fate of his family if he +should die. In the first year of his married life, at a time when +passion for a beautiful bride was almost sweeping him into generous +thought, he had listened for upward of an hour to the eloquence of a +life insurance agent. Then the agent, misled by Gower's effusively +generous and unselfish expressions, had taken a false tack. He had +descanted upon the supreme satisfaction that would be felt by a dying +man as he reflected how his young widow would be left in affluence. He +made a vivid picture; Gower saw--saw his bride happier after his death +than she had been during his life, and attracting a swarm of admirers +by her beauty, well set off in becoming black, and by her independent +income. The generous impulse then and there shriveled to its weak and +shallow roots. With tears in his kind, clear eyes he thanked the agent +and said: + +"You have convinced me. You need say no more. I'll send for you in a +few days." + +The agent never got into his presence again. Gower lived up to his +income, secure in the knowledge that his ability as a lawyer made him +certain of plenty of money as long as he should live. But it would +show an utter lack of comprehension of his peculiar species of +character to imagine that he let himself into the secret of his own +icy-heartedness by ceasing to think of the problem of his wife and two +children without him to take care of them. On the contrary, he thought +of it every day, and planned what he would do about it--to-morrow. And +for his delay he had excellent convincing excuses. Did he not take +care of his naturally robust health? Would he not certainly outlive +his wife, who was always doctoring more or less? Frank would be able to +take care of himself; anyhow, it was not well to bring a boy up to +expectations, because every man should be self-supporting and +self-reliant. As for Mildred, why, with her beauty and her cleverness +she could not but make a brilliant marriage. Really, there was for him +no problem of an orphaned family's future; there was no reason why he +should deny himself any comfort or luxury, or his vanity any of the +titillations that come from social display. + +That one of his calculations which was the most vital and seemed the +surest proved to be worthless. It is not the weaklings who die, after +infancy and youth, but the strong, healthy men and women. The +weaklings have to look out for themselves, receive ample warning in the +disastrous obvious effects of the slightest imprudence. The robust, +even the wariest of them, even the Henry Gowers, overestimate and +overtax their strength. Gower's downfall was champagne. He could not +resist a bottle of it for dinner every night. As so often happens, the +collapse of the kidneys came without any warning that a man of powerful +constitution would deem worthy of notice. By the time the doctor began +to suspect the gravity of his trouble he was too far gone. + +Frank, candidly greedy and selfish--"Such a contrast to his father!" +everyone said--was married to the prettiest girl in Hanging Rock and +had a satisfactory law practice in New York. His income was about +fifteen thousand a year. But his wife had tastes as extravagant as his +own; and Hanging Rock is one of those suburbs of New York where gather +well-to-do middle-class people to live luxuriously and to delude each +other and themselves with the notion that they are fashionable, rich +New Yorkers who prefer to live in the country "like the English." Thus, +Henry Gower's widow and daughter could count on little help from +Frank--and they knew it. + +"You and Milly will have to move to some less expensive place than +Hanging Rock," said Frank--it was the living-room conference a few days +after the funeral. + +Mildred flushed and her eyes flashed. She opened her lips to +speak--closed them again with the angry retort unuttered. After all, +Frank was her mother's and her sole dependence. They could hope for +little from him, but nothing must be said that would give him and his +mean, selfish wife a chance to break with them and refuse to do +anything whatever. + +"And Mildred must get married," said Natalie. In Hanging Rock most of +the girls and many of the boys had given names taken from Burke's +Peerage, the Almanac de Gotha, and fashionable novels. + +Again Mildred flushed; but her eyes did not flash, neither did she open +her lips to speak. The little remark of her sister-in-law, apparently +so harmless and sensible, was in fact a poisoned arrow. For Mildred +was twenty-three, had been "out" five years, and was not even in the +way to become engaged. She and everyone had assumed from her lovely +babyhood that she would marry splendidly, would marry wealth and social +position. How could it be otherwise? Had she not beauty? Had she not +family and position? Had she not style and cleverness? Yet--five +years out and not a "serious" proposal. An impudent poor fellow with +no prospects had asked her. An impudent rich man from fashionable New +York had hung after her--and had presently abandoned whatever dark +projects he may have been concealing and had married in his own set, +"as they always do, the miserable snobs," raved Mrs. Gower, who had +been building high upon those lavish outpourings of candy, flowers, and +automobile rides. Mildred, however, had accepted the defection more +philosophically. She had had enough vanity to like the attentions of +the rich and fashionable New Yorker, enough good sense to suspect, +perhaps not definitely, what those attentions meant, but certainly what +they did not mean. Also, in the back of her head had been an intention +to refuse Stanley Baird, if by chance he should ask her. Was there any +substance to this intention, sprung from her disliking the conceited, +self-assured snob as much as she liked his wealth and station? Perhaps +not. Who can say? At any rate, may we not claim credit for our good +intentions--so long as, even through lack of opportunity, we have not +stultified them? + +With every natural advantage apparently, Mildred's failure to catch a +husband seemed to be somehow her own fault. Other girls, less endowed +than she, were marrying, were marrying fairly well. Why, then, was +Mildred lagging in the market? + +There may have been other reasons, reasons of accident--for, in the +higher class matrimonial market, few are called and fewer chosen. There +was one reason not accidental; Hanging Rock was no place for a girl so +superior as was Mildred Gower to find a fitting husband. As has been +hinted, Hanging Rock was one of those upper-middle-class colonies where +splurge and social ambition dominate the community life. In such +colonies the young men are of two classes--those beneath such a girl as +Mildred, and those who had the looks, the manners, the intelligence, +and the prospects to justify them in looking higher socially--in +looking among the very rich and really fashionable. In the Hanging +Rock sort of community, having all the snobbishness of Fifth Avenue, +Back Bay, and Rittenhouse Square, with the added torment of the +snobbishness being perpetually ungratified--in such communities, +beneath a surface reeking culture and idealistic folderol, there is a +coarse and brutal materialism, a passion for money, for luxury, for +display, that equals aristocratic societies at their worst. No one can +live for a winter, much less grow up, in such a place without becoming +saturated with sycophantry. Thus, only by some impossible combination +of chances could there have been at Hanging Rock a young man who would +have appreciated Mildred and have had the courage of his appreciation. +This combination did not happen. In Mildred's generation and set there +were only the two classes of men noted above. The men of the one of +them which could not have attracted her accepted their fate of mating +with second-choice females to whom they were themselves second choice. +The men of the other class rarely appeared at Hanging Rock functions, +hung about the rich people in New York, Newport, and on Long Island, +and would as soon have thought of taking a Hanging Rock society girl to +wife as of exchanging hundred-dollar bills for twenty-five-cent pieces. +Having attractions acceptable in the best markets, they took them +there. Hanging Rock denounced them as snobs, for Hanging Rock was +virtuously eloquent on the subject of snobbishness--we human creatures +being never so effective as when assailing in others the vice or +weakness we know from lifelong, intimate, internal association with it. +But secretly the successfully ambitious spurners of that suburban +society were approved, were envied. And Hanging Rock was most gracious +to them whenever it got the chance. + +In her five years of social life Mildred had gone only with the various +classes of fashionable people, had therefore known only the men who are +full of the poison of snobbishness. She had been born and bred in an +environment as impregnated with that poison as the air of a +kitchen-garden with onions. She knew nothing else. The secret +intention to refuse Stanley Baird, should he propose, was therefore the +more astonishing--and the more significant. From time to time in any +given environment you will find some isolated person, some personality, +with a trait wholly foreign and out of place there. Now it is a soft +voice and courteous manners in a slum; again it is a longing for a life +of freedom and equality in a member of a royal family that has known +nothing but sordid slavery for centuries. Or, in the petty +conventionality of a prosperous middle- or upper-class community you +come upon one who dreams--perhaps vaguely but still longingly--of an +existence where love and ideas shall elevate and glorify life. In +spite of her training, in spite of the teaching and example of all +about her from the moment of her opening her eyes upon the world, +Mildred Gower at twenty-three still retained something of these dream +flowers sown in the soil of her naturally good mind by some book or +play or perhaps by some casually read and soon forgotten article in +magazine or newspaper. We have the habit of thinking only weeds +produce seeds that penetrate and prosper everywhere and anywhere. The +truth is that fine plants of all kinds, vegetable, fruit, and flower of +rarest color and perfume, have this same hardiness and fecundity. Pull +away at the weeds in your garden for a while, and see if this is not +so. Though you may plant nothing, you will be amazed at the results if +you but clear a little space of its weeds--which you have been planting +and cultivating. + +Mildred--woman fashion--regarded it as a reproach upon her that she had +not yet succeeded in making the marriage everyone, including herself, +predicted for her and expected of her. On the contrary, it was the +most savage indictment possible of the marriageable and marrying men +who had met her--of their stupidity, of their short-sighted and +mean-souled calculation, of their lack of courage--the courage to take +what they, as men of flesh and blood wanted, instead of what their +snobbishness ordered. And if Stanley Baird, the nearest to a +flesh-and-blood man of any who had known her, had not been so +profoundly afraid of his fashionable mother and of his sister, the +Countess of Waring-- But he was profoundly afraid of them; so, it is +idle to speculate about him. + +What did men see when they looked at Mildred Gower? Usually, when men +look at a woman, they have a hazy, either pleasant or unpleasant, sense +of something feminine. That, and nothing more. Afterward, through +some whim or some thrust from chance they may see in her, or fancy they +see in her, the thing feminine that their souls--it is always +"soul"--most yearns after. But just at first glance, so colorless or +conventionally colored is the usual human being, the average +woman--indeed every woman but she who is exceptional--creates upon man +the mere impression of pleasant or unpleasant petticoats. In the +exceptional woman something obtrudes. She has astonishing hair, or +extraordinary eyes, or a mouth that seems to draw a man like a magnet; +or it is the allure of a peculiar smile or of a figure whose +sinuosities as she moves seem to cause a corresponding wave-disturbance +in masculine nerves. Further, the possession of one of these signal +charms usually causes all her charms to have more than ordinary +potency. The sight of the man is so bewitched by the one potent charm +that he sees the whole woman under a spell. + +Mildred Gower, of the medium height and of a slender and well-formed +figure, had a face of the kind that is called lovely; and her smile, +sweet, dreamy, revealing white and even teeth, gave her loveliness +delicate animation. She had an abundance of hair, neither light nor +dark; she had a fine clear skin. Her eyes, gray and rather serious and +well set under long straight brows, gave her a look of honesty and +intelligence. But the charm that won men, her charm of charms, was her +mouth--mobile, slightly pouted, not too narrow, of a wonderful, vividly +healthy and vital red. She had beauty, she had intelligence. But it +was impossible for a man to think of either, once his glance had been +caught by those expressive, inviting lips of hers, so young, so fresh, +with their ever-changing, ever-fascinating line expressing in a +thousand ways the passion and poetry of the kiss. + +Of all the men who had admired her and had edged away because they +feared she would bewitch them into forgetting what the world calls +"good common sense"--of all those men only one had suspected the real +reason for her physical power over men. All but Stanley Baird had +thought themselves attracted because she was so pretty or so stylish or +so clever and amusing to talk with. Baird had lived intelligently +enough to learn that feminine charm is never general, is always +specific. He knew it was Mildred Gower's lips that haunted, that +frightened ambitious men away, that sent men who knew they hadn't a +ghost of a chance with her discontentedly back to the second-choice +women who alone were available for them. Fortunately for Mildred, +Stanley Baird, too wise to flatter a woman discriminatingly, did not +tell her the secret of her fascination. If he had told her, she would +no doubt have tried to train and to use it--and so would inevitably +have lost it. + +To go on with that important conference in the sitting-room in the +handsome, roomy house of the Gowers at Hanging Rock, Frank Gower +eagerly seized upon his wife's subtly nasty remark. "I don't see why +in thunder you haven't married, Milly," said he. "You've had every +chance, these last four or five years." + +"And it'll be harder now," moaned her mother. "For it looks as though +we were going to be wretchedly poor. And poverty is so repulsive." + +"Do you think," said Mildred, "that giving me the idea that I must +marry right away will make it easier for me to marry? Everyone who +knows us knows our circumstances." She looked significantly at Frank's +wife, who had been wailing through Hanging Rock the woeful plight of +her dead father-in-law's family. The young Mrs. Gower blushed and +glanced away. "And," Mildred went on, "everyone is saying that I must +marry at once--that there's nothing else for me to do." She smiled +bitterly. "When I go into the street again I shall see nothing but +flying men. And no man would come to call unless he brought a chaperon +and a witness with him." + +"How can you be so frivolous?" reproached her mother. + +Mildred was used to being misunderstood by her mother, who had long +since been made hopelessly dull by the suffocating life she led and by +pain from her feet, which never left her at ease for a moment except +when she had them soaking in cold water. Mrs. Gower had been born with +ordinary feet, neither ugly nor pretty and entirely fit for the uses +for which nature intended feet. She had spoiled them by wearing shoes +to make them look smaller and slimmer than they were. In steady weather +she was plaintive; in changeable weather she varied between irritable +and violent. + +Said Mildred to her brother: "How much--JUST how much is there?" + +"I can't say exactly," replied her brother, who had not yet solved to +his satisfaction the moral problem of how much of the estate he ought +to allow his mother and sister and how much he ought to claim for +himself--in such a way that the claim could not be disputed. + +Mildred looked fixedly at him. He showed his uneasiness not by +glancing away, but by the appearance of a certain hard defiance in his +eyes. Said she: + +"What is the very most we can hope for?" + +A silence. Her mother broke it. "Mildred, how CAN you talk of those +things--already?" + +"I don't know," replied Mildred. "Perhaps because it's got to be done." + +This seemed to them all--and to herself--a lame excuse for such +apparent hardness of heart. Her father had always been +SENDER-HEARTED--HAD NEVER SPOKEN OF MONEY, OR ENCOURAGED HIS FAMILY IN +SPEAKING OF IT. + +A LONG AND PAINFUL SILENCE. THEN, THE WIDOW ABRUPTLY: + +"YOU'RE SURE, Frank, there's NO insurance?" + +"Father always said that you disliked the idea," replied her son; "that +you thought insurance looked like your calculating on his death." + +Under her husband's adroit prompting Mrs. Gower had discovered such a +view of insurance in her brain. She now recalled expressing it--and +regretted. But she was silenced. She tried to take her mind of the +subject of money. But, like Mildred, she could not. The thought of +imminent poverty was nagging at them like toothache. "There'll be +enough for a year or so?" she said, timidly interrogative. + +"I hope so," said Frank. + +Mildred was eying him fixedly again. Said she: "Have you found +anything at all?" + +"He had about eight thousand dollars in bank," said Frank. "But most +of it will go for the pressing debts." + +"But how did HE expect to live?" urged Mildred. + +"Yes, there must have been SOMETHING," said her mother. + +"Of course, there's his share of the unsettled and unfinished business +of the firm," admitted Frank. + +"How much will that be?" persisted Mildred. + +"I can't tell, offhand," said Frank, with virtuous reproach. "My +mind's been on--other things." + +Henry Gower's widow was not without her share of instinctive +shrewdness. Neither had she, unobservant though she was, been within +sight of her son's character for twenty-eight years without having +unconfessed, unformed misgivings concerning it. "You mustn't bother +about these things now, Frank dear," said she. "I'll get my brother to +look into it." + +"That won't be necessary," hastily said Frank. "I don't want any rival +lawyer peeping into our firm's affairs." + +"My brother Wharton is the soul of honor," said Mrs. Gower, the elder, +with dignity. "You are too young to take all the responsibility of +settling the estate. Yes, I'll send for Wharton to-morrow." + +"It'll look as though you didn't trust me," said Frank sourly. + +"We mustn't do anything to start the gossips in this town," said his +wife, assisting. + +"Then send for him yourself, Frank," said Mildred, "and give him charge +of the whole matter." + +Frank eyed her furiously. "How ashamed father would be!" exclaimed he. + +But this solemn invoking of the dead man's spirit was uneffectual. The +specter of poverty was too insistent, too terrible. Said the widow: + +"I'm sure, in the circumstances, my dear dead husband would want me to +get help from someone older and more experienced." + +And Frank, guilty of conscience and an expert in the ways of +conventional and highly moral rascality, ceased to resist. His wife, +scenting danger to their getting the share that "rightfully belongs to +the son, especially when he has been the brains of the firm for several +years," made angry and indiscreet battle for no outside interference. +The longer she talked the firmer the widow and the daughter became, not +only because she clarified suspicions that had been too hazy to take +form, but also because they disliked her intensely. The following day +Wharton Conover became unofficial administrator. He had no difficulty +in baffling Frank Gower's half-hearted and clumsy efforts to hide two +large fees due the dead man's estate. He discovered clear assets +amounting in all to sixty-three thousand dollars, most of it available +within a few months. + +"As you have the good-will of the firm and as your mother and sister +have only what can be realized in cash," said he to Frank, "no doubt +you won't insist on your third." + +"I've got to consider my wife," said Frank. "I can't do as I'd like." + +"You are going to insist on your third?" said Conover, with an accent +that made Frank quiver. + +"I can't do otherwise," said he in a dogged, shamed way. + +"Um," said Conover. "Then, on behalf of my sister and her daughter +I'll have to insist on a more detailed accounting than you have been +willing to give--and on the production of that small book bound in red +leather which disappeared from my brother-in-law's desk the afternoon +of his death." + +A wave of rage and fear surged up within Frank Gower and crashed +against the seat of his life. For days thereafter he was from time to +time seized with violent spasms of trembling; years afterward he was +attributing premature weaknesses of old age to the effects of that +moment of horror. His uncle's words came as a sudden, high shot climax +to weeks of exasperating peeping and prying and questioning, of sneer +and insinuation. Conover had been only moderately successful at the +law, had lost clients to Frank's father, had been beaten when they were +on opposite sides. He hated the father with the secret, hypocritical +hatred of the highly moral and religious man. He despised the son. It +is not often that a Christian gentleman has such an opportunity to +combine justice and revenge, to feed to bursting an ancient grudge, the +while conscious that he is but doing his duty. + +Said Frank, when he was able to speak: "You have been listening to the +lies of some treacherous clerk here." + +"Don't destroy that little book," proceeded Conover tranquilly. "We +can prove that you took it." + +Young Gower rose. "I must decline to have anything further to say to +you, sir," said he. "You will leave this office, and you will not be +admitted here again unless you come with proper papers as +administrator." + +Conover smiled with cold satisfaction and departed. There followed a +series of quarrels--between Frank and his sister, between Frank and his +mother, between Frank's wife and his mother, between Mildred and her +mother, between the mother and Conover. Mrs. Gower was suspicious of +her son; but she knew her brother for a pinchpenny, exacting the last +drop of what he regarded as his own. And she discovered that, if she +authorized him to act as administrator for her, he could--and beyond +question would--take a large share of the estate. The upshot was that +Frank paid over to his mother and sister forty-seven thousand dollars, +and his mother and her brother stopped speaking to each other. + +"I see that you have turned over all your money to mother," said Frank +to Mildred a few days after the settlement. + +"Of course," said Mildred. She was in a mood of high scorn for +sordidness--a mood induced by the spectacle of the shameful manners of +Conover, Frank, and his wife. + +"Do you think that's wise?" suggested Frank. + +"I think it's decent," said Mildred. + +"Well, I hope you'll not live to regret it," said her brother. + +Neither Mrs. Gower nor her daughter had ever had any experience in the +care of money. To both forty-seven thousand dollars seemed a +fortune--forty-seven thousand dollars in cash in the bank, ready to +issue forth and do their bidding at the mere writing of a few figures +and a signature on a piece of paper. In a sense they knew that for +many years the family's annual expenses had ranged between forty and +fifty thousand, but in the sense of actuality they knew nothing about +it--a state of affairs common enough in families where the man is in +absolute control and spends all he makes. Money always had been +forthcoming; therefore money always would be forthcoming. + +The mourning and the loss of the person who had filled and employed +their lives caused the widow and the daughter to live very quietly +during the succeeding year. They spent only half of their capital. For +reasons of selfish and far-sighted prudence which need no detailing +Frank moved away to New York within six months of his father's death +and reduced communication between himself and wife and his mother and +sister to a frigid and rapidly congealing minimum. He calculated that +by the time their capital was consumed they would have left no feeling +of claim upon him or he feeling of duty toward them. + +It was not until eighteen months after her father's death, when the +total capital was sunk to less than fifteen thousand dollars, that +Mildred awakened to the truth of their plight. A few months at most, +and they would have to give up that beautiful house which had been her +home all her life. She tried to grasp the meaning of the facts as her +intelligence presented them to her, but she could not. She had no +practical training whatever. She had been brought up as a rich man's +child, to be married to a rich man, and never to know anything of the +material details of life beyond what was necessary in managing servants +after the indifferent fashion of the usual American woman of the +comfortable classes. She had always had a maid; she could not even +dress herself properly without the maid's assistance. Life without a +maid was inconceivable; life without servants was impossible. + +She wandered through the house, through the grounds. She said to +herself again and again: "We have got to give up all this, and be +miserably poor--with not a servant, with less than the tenement people +have." But the words conveyed no meaning to her. She said to herself +again and again: "I must rouse myself. I must do something. I +must--must--must!" But she did not rouse, because there was nothing to +rouse. So far as practical life was concerned she was as devoid of +ideas as a new-born baby. + +There was but the one hope--marriage, a rich marriage. It is the habit +of men who can take care of themselves and of women who are securely +well taken care of to scorn the woman or the helpless-bred man who +marries for money or even entertains that idea. How little imagination +these scorners have! To marry for a mere living, hardly better than +one could make for oneself, assuredly does show a pitiful lack of +self-reliance, a melancholy lack of self-respect. But for men or women +all their lives used to luxury and with no ability whatever at earning +money--for such persons to marry money in order to save themselves from +the misery and shame that poverty means to them is the most natural, +the most human action conceivable. The man or the woman who says he or +she would not do it, either is a hypocrite or is talking without +thinking. You may in honesty criticize and condemn a social system that +suffers men and women to be so crudely and criminally miseducated by +being given luxury they did not earn. But to condemn the victims of +that system for acting as its logic compels is sheer folly or sheer +phariseeism. + +Would Mildred Gower have married for money? As the weeks fled, as the +bank account dwindled, she would have grasped eagerly at any rich man +who might have offered himself--no matter how repellent he might have +been. She did not want a bare living; she did not want what passes +with the mass of middle-class people for comfort. She wanted what she +had--the beautiful and spacious house, the costly and fashionable +clothing, the servants, the carriages and motors, the thousand and one +comforts, luxuries, and vanities to which she had always been used. In +the brain of a young woman of poor or only comfortably off family the +thoughts that seethed in Mildred Gower's brain would have been so many +indications of depravity. In Mildred Gower's brain they were the +natural, the inevitable, thoughts. They indicated everything as to her +training, nothing as to her character. So, when she, thinking only of +a rich marriage with no matter whom, and contrasting herself with the +fine women portrayed in the novels and plays, condemned herself as +shameless and degraded, she did herself grave injustice. + +But no rich man, whether attractive or repulsive, offered. Indeed, no +man of any kind offered. Instead, it was her mother who married. + +A widower named James Presbury, elderly, with an income of five to six +thousand a year from inherited wealth, stumbled into Hanging Rock to +live, was impressed by the style the widow Gower maintained, believed +the rumor that her husband had left her better off than was generally +thought, proposed, and was accepted. And two years and a month after +Henry Gower's death his widow became Mrs. James Presbury--and ceased to +veil from her new husband the truth as to her affairs. + +Mildred had thought that, than the family quarrels incident to settling +her father's estate, human nature could no lower descend. She was now +to be disillusioned. When a young man or a young woman blunders into a +poor marriage in trying to make a rich one, he or she is usually +withheld from immediate and frank expression by the timidity of youth. +Not so the elderly man or woman. As we grow older, no matter how +timidly conventional we are by nature, we become, through selfishness +or through indifference to the opinion of others or through impatience +of petty restraint, more and more outspoken. Old Presbury discovered +how he had tricked himself four days after the wedding. He and his +bride were at the Waldorf in New York, a-honeymooning. + +The bride had never professed to be rich. She had simply continued in +her lifelong way, had simply acted rich. She well knew the gaudy +delusions her admirer was entertaining, and she saw to it that nothing +was said or done to disturb him. She inquired into his affairs, made +sure of the substantiality of the comparatively small income he +possessed, decided to accept him as her best available chance to escape +becoming a charge upon her anything but eager and generous relatives. +She awaited the explosion with serenity. She cared not a flip for +Presbury, who was a soft and silly old fool, full of antiquated +compliments and so drearily the inferior of Henry Gower, physically and +mentally, that even she could appreciate the difference, the descent. +She rather enjoyed the prospect of a combat with him, of the end of +dissimulating her contempt. She had thought out and had put in arsenal +ready for use a variety of sneers, jeers, and insults that suggested +themselves to her as she listened and simpered and responded while he +was courting. + +Had the opportunity offered earlier than the fourth day she would have +seized it, but not until that fourth morning was she in just the right +mood. She had eaten too much dinner the night before, and had followed +it after two hours in a stuffy theater with an indigestible supper. He +liked the bedroom windows open at night; she liked them closed. After +she fell into a heavy sleep, he slipped out of bed and opened the +windows wide--to teach her by the night's happy experience that she was +entirely mistaken as to the harmfulness of fresh winter air. The +result was that she awakened with a frightful cold and a splitting +headache. And as the weather was about to change she had shooting +pains like toothache through her toes the instant she thrust them into +her shoes. The elderly groom, believing he had a rich bride, was all +solicitude and infuriating attention. She waited until he had wrought +her to the proper pitch of fury. Then she said--in reply to some +remark of his: + +"Yes, I shall rely upon you entirely. I want you to take absolute +charge of my affairs." + +The tears sprang to his eyes. His weak old mouth, rapidly falling to +pieces, twisted and twitched with emotion. "I'll try to deserve your +confidence, darling," said he. "I've had large business experience--in +the way of investing carefully, I mean. I don't think your affairs +will suffer in my hands." + +"Oh, I'm sure they'll not trouble you," said she in a sweet, sure tone +as the pains shot through her feet and her head. "You'll hardly notice +my little mite in your property." She pretended to reflect. "Let me +see--there's seven thousand left, but of course half of that is +Millie's." + +"It must be very well invested," said he. "Those seven thousand shares +must be of the very best." + +"Shares?" said she, with a gentle little laugh. "I mean dollars." + +Presbury was about to lift a cup of cafe au lait to his lips. Instead, +he turned it over into the platter of eggs and bacon. + +"We--Mildred and I," pursued his bride, "were left with only forty-odd +thousand between us. Of course, we had to live. So, naturally, +there's very little left." + +Presbury was shaking so violently that his head and arms waggled like a +jumping-jack's. He wrapped his elegant white fingers about the arms of +his chair to steady himself. In a suffocated voice he said: "Do you +mean to say that you have only seven thousand dollars in the world?" + +"Only half that," corrected she. "Oh, dear, how my head aches! Less +than half that, for there are some debts." + +She was impatient for the explosion; the agony of her feet and head +needed outlet and relief. But he disappointed her. That was one of +the situations in which one appeals in vain to the resources of +language. He shrank and sank back in his chair, his jaw dropped, and +he vented a strange, imbecile cackling laugh. It was not an expression +of philosophic mirth, of sense of the grotesqueness of an anti-climax. +It was not an expression of any emotion whatever. It was simply a +signal from a mind temporarily dethroned. + +"What are you laughing at?" she said sharply. + +His answer was a repetition of the idiotic sound. + +"What's the matter with you?" demanded she. "Please close your mouth." + +It was a timely piece of advice; for his upper and false teeth had +become partially dislodged and threatened to drop upon the shirt-bosom +gayly showing between the lapels of his dark-blue silk house-coat. He +slowly closed his mouth, moving his teeth back into place with his +tongue--a gesture that made her face twitch with rage and disgust. + +"Seven thousand dollars," he mumbled dazedly. + +"I said less than half that," retorted she sharply. + +"And I--thought you were--rich." + +A peculiar rolling of the eyes and twisting of the lips gave her the +idea that he was about to vent that repulsive sound again. "Don't you +laugh!" she cried. "I can't bear your laugh--even at its best." + +Suddenly he galvanized into fury. "This is an outrage!" he cried, +waving his useless-looking white fists. "You have swindled me--SWINDLED +me!" + +Her head stopped aching. The pains in her feet either ceased or she +forgot them. In a suspiciously calm voice she said: "What do you +mean?" + +"I mean that you are a swindler!" he shouted, banging one fist on the +table and waving the other. + +She acted as though his meaning were just dawning upon her. "Do you +mean," said she tranquilly, "that you married me for money?" + +"I mean that I thought you a substantial woman, and that I find you are +an adventuress." + +"Did you think," inquired she, "that any woman who had money would +marry YOU?" She laughed very quietly. "You ARE a fool!" + +He sat back to look at her. This mode of combat in such circumstances +puzzled him. + +"I knew that you were rich," she went on, "or you would not have dared +offer yourself to me. All my friends were amazed at my stooping to +accept you. Your father was an Irish Tammany contractor, wasn't he?--a +sort of criminal? But I simply had to marry. So I gave you my family +and position and name in exchange for your wealth--a good bargain for +you, but a poor one for me." + +These references to HIS wealth were most disconcerting, especially as +they were accompanied by remarks about his origin, of which he was so +ashamed that he had changed the spelling of his name in the effort to +clear himself of it. However, some retort was imperative. He looked at +her and said: + +"Swindler and adventuress!" + +"Don't repeat that lie," said she. "You are the adventurer--despite +the fact that you are very rich." + +"Don't say that again," cried he. "I never said or pretended I was +rich. I have about five thousand a year--and you'll not get a cent of +it, madam!" + +She knew his income, but no one would have suspected it from her +expression of horror. "What!" she gasped. "You dared to marry ME when +you were a--beggar! Me--the widow of Henry Gower! You impudent old +wreck! Why, you haven't enough to pay my servants. What are we to +live on, pray?" + +"I don't know what YOU'LL live on," replied he. "_I_ shall live as I +always have." + +"A beggar!" she exclaimed. "I--married to a beggar." She burst into +tears. "How men take advantage of a woman alone! If my son had been +near me! But there's surely some law to protect me. Yes, I'm sure +there is. Oh, I'll punish you for having deceived me." Her eyes dried +as she looked at him. "How dare you sit there? How dare you face me, +you miserable fraud!" + +Early in her acquaintance with him she had discovered that determining +factors in his character were sensitiveness about his origin and +sensitiveness about his social position. On this knowledge of his +weaknesses was securely based her confidence that she could act as she +pleased toward him. To ease her pains she proceeded to pour out her +private opinion of him--all the disagreeable things, all the insults +she had been storing up. + +She watched him as only a woman can watch a man. She saw that his rage +was not dangerous, that she was forcing him into a position where fear +of her revenging herself by disgracing him would overcome anger at the +collapse of his fatuous dreams of wealth. She did not despise him the +more deeply for sitting there, for not flying from the room or trying +to kill her or somehow compelling her to check that flow of insult. She +already despised him utterly; also, she attached small importance to +self-respect, having no knowledge of what that quality really is. + +When she grew tired, she became quiet. They sat there a long time in +silence. At last he ran up the white flag of abject surrender by +saying: + +"What'll we live on--that's what I'd like to know?" + +An eavesdropper upon the preceding violence of upward of an hour would +have assumed that at its end this pair must separate, never to see each +other again voluntarily. But that idea, even as a possibility, had not +entered the mind of either. They had lived a long time; they were +practical people. They knew from the outset that somehow they must +arrange to go on together. The alternative meant a mere pittance of +alimony for her; meant for him social ostracism and the small income +cut in half; meant for both scandal and confusion. + +Said she fretfully: "Oh, I suppose we'll get along, somehow. I don't +know anything about those things. I've always been looked after--kept +from contact with the sordid side of life." + +"That house you live in," he went on, "does it belong to you?" + +She gave him a contemptuous glance. "Of course," said she. "What low +people you must have been used to!" + +"I thought perhaps you had rented it for your bunco game," retorted he. +"The furniture, the horses, the motor--all those things--do they belong +to you?" + +"I shall leave the room if you insult me," said she. + +"Did you include them in the seven thousand dollars?" + +"The money is in the bank. It has nothing to do with our house and our +property." + +He reflected, presently said: "The horses and carriages must be sold +at once--and all those servants dismissed except perhaps two. We can +live in the house." + +She grew purple with rage. "Sell MY carriages! Discharge MY servants! +I'd like to see you try!" + +"Who's to pay for keeping up that establishment?" demanded he. + +She was silent. She saw what he had in mind. + +"If you want to keep that house and live comfortably," he went on, +"you've got to cut expenses to the bone. You see that, don't you?" + +"I can't live any way but the way I've been used to all my life," +wailed she. + +He eyed her disgustedly. Was there anything equal to a woman for folly? + +"We've got to make the most of what little we have," said he. + +"I tell you I don't know anything about those things," repeated she. +"You'll have to look after them. Mildred and I aren't like the women +you've been used to. We are ladies." + +Presbury's rage boiled over again at the mention of Mildred. "That +daughter of yours!" he cried. "What's to be done about her? I've got +no money to waste on her." + +"You miserable Tammany THING!" exclaimed she. "Don't you dare SPEAK of +my daughter except in the most respectful way." + +And once more she opened out upon him, wreaking upon him all her wrath +against fate, all the pent-up fury of two years--fury which had been +denied such fury's usual and natural expression in denunciations of the +dead bread-winner. The generous and ever-kind Henry Gower could not be +to blame for her wretched plight; and, of course, she herself could not +be to blame for it. So, until now there had been no scapegoat. +Presbury therefore received the whole burden. He, alarmed lest a +creature apparently so irrational, should in wild rage drive him away, +ruin him socially, perhaps induce a sympathetic court to award her a +large part of his income as alimony, said not a word in reply. He bade +his wrath wait. Later on, when the peril was over, when he had a firm +grip upon the situation--then he would take his revenge. + +They gave up the expensive suite at the Waldorf that very day and +returned to Hanging Rock. They alternated between silence and the +coarsest, crudest quarrelings, for neither had the intelligence to +quarrel wittily or the refinement to quarrel artistically. As soon as +they arrived at the Gower house, Mildred was dragged into the wrangle. + +"I married this terrible man for your sake," was the burden of her +mother's wail. "And he is a beggar--wants to sell off everything and +dismiss the servants." + +"You are a pair of paupers," cried the old man. "You are shameless +tricksters. Be careful how you goad me!" + +Mildred had anticipated an unhappy ending to her mother's marriage, but +she had not knowledge enough of life or of human nature to anticipate +any such horrors as now began. Every day, all day long the vulgar +fight raged. Her mother and her stepfather withdrew from each other's +presence only to think up fresh insults to fling at each other. As +soon as they were armed they hastened to give battle again. She +avoided Presbury. Her mother she could not avoid; and when her mother +was not in combat with him, she was weeping or wailing or railing to +Mildred. + +It was at Mildred's urging that her mother acquiesced in Presbury's +plans for reducing expenses within income. At first the girl, even +more ignorant than her mother of practical affairs, did not appreciate +the wisdom, not to say the necessity, of what he wished to do, but soon +she saw that he was right, that the servants must go, that the horses +and carriages and the motors must be sold. When she was convinced and +had convinced her mother, she still did not realize what the thing +really meant. Not until she no longer had a maid did she comprehend. +To a woman who has never had a maid, or who has taken on a maid as a +luxury, it will seem an exaggeration to say that Mildred felt as +helpless as a baby lying alone in a crib before it has learned to +crawl. Yet that is rather an understatement of her plight. The maid +left in the afternoon. Mildred, not without inconveniences that had in +the novelty their amusing side, contrived to dress that evening for +dinner and to get to bed; but when she awakened in the morning and was +ready to dress, the loss of Therese became a tragedy. It took the girl +nearly four hours to get herself together presentably--and then, never +had she looked so unkempt. With her hair, thick and soft, she could do +nothing. + +"What a wonderful person Therese was!" thought she. "And I always +regarded her as rather stupid." Her mother, who had not had a maid +until she was about thirty and had never become completely dependent, +fared somewhat better, though, hearing her moans, you would have +thought she was faring worse. + +Mildred's unhappiness increased from day to day, as her wardrobe fell +into confusion and disrepair. She felt that she must rise to the +situation, must teach herself, must save herself from impending +dowdiness and slovenliness. But her brain seemed to be paralyzed. She +did not know how or where to begin to learn. She often in secret gave +way to the futility of tears. + +There were now only a cook and one housemaid and a man of all work--all +three newcomers, for Presbury insisted--most wisely--that none of the +servants of the luxurious, wasteful days would be useful in the new +circumstances. He was one of those small, orderly men who have a +genius for just such situations as the one he now proceeded to grapple +with and solve. In his pleasure at managing everything about that +house, in distributing the work among the three servants, in marketing, +and, in inspecting purchases and nosing into the garbage-barrel, in +looking for dust on picture-frames and table-tops and for neglected +weeds in the garden walks--in this multitude of engrossing delights he +forgot his anger over the trick that had been played upon him. He +still fought with his wife and denounced her and met insult with +insult. But that, too, was one of his pleasures. Also, he felt that +on the whole he had done well in marrying. He had been lonely as a +bachelor, had had no one to talk with, or to quarrel with, nothing to +do. The marriage was not so expensive, as his wife had brought him a +house--and it such a one as he had always regarded as the apogee of +elegance. Living was not dear in Hanging Rock, if one understood +managing and gave time to it. And socially he was at last established. + +Soon his wife was about as contented as she had ever been in her life. +She hated and despised her husband, but quarreling with him and railing +against him gave her occupation and aim--two valuable assets toward +happiness that she had theretofore lacked. Her living--shelter, food, +clothing enough--was now secure. But the most important factor of all +in her content was the one apparently too trivial to be worthy of +record. From girlhood she could not recall a single day in which she +had not suffered from her feet. And she had been ashamed to say +anything about it--had never let anyone, even her maid, see her feet, +which were about the only unsightly part of her. None had guessed the +cause of her chronic ill-temper until Presbury, that genius for the +little, said within a week of their marriage: + +"You talk and act like a woman with chronic corns." + +He did not dream of the effect this chance thrust had upon his wife. +For the first time he had really "landed." She concealed her fright +and her shame as best she could and went on quarreling more viciously +than ever. But he presently returned to the attack. Said he: + +"Your feet hurt you. I'm sure they do. Now that I think of it, you +walk that way." + +"I suppose I deserve my fate," said she. "When a woman marries beneath +her she must expect insult and low conversation." + +"You must cure your feet," said he. "I'll not live in the house with a +person who is made fiendish by corns. I think it's only corns. I see +no signs of bunions." + +"You brute!" cried his wife, rushing from the room. + +But when they met again, he at once resumed the subject, telling her +just how she could cure herself--and he kept on telling her, she +apparently ignoring but secretly acting on his advice. He knew what he +was about, and her feet grew better, grew well--and she was happier +than she had been since girlhood when she began ruining her feet with +tight shoes. + +Six months after the marriage, Presbury and his wife were getting on +about as comfortably as it is given to average humanity to get on in +this world of incessant struggle between uncomfortable man and his +uncomfortable environment. But Mildred had become more and more +unhappy. Her mother, sometimes angrily, again reproachfully--and that +was far harder to bear--blamed her for "my miserable marriage to this +low, quarrelsome brute." Presbury let no day pass without telling her +openly that she was a beggar living off him, that she would better +marry soon or he would take drastic steps to release himself of the +burden. When he attacked her before her mother, there was a violent +quarrel from which Mildred fled to hide in her room or in the remotest +part of the garden. When he hunted her out to insult her alone, she +sat or stood with eyes down and face ghastly pale, mute, quivering. She +did not interrupt, did not try to escape. She was like the chained and +spiritless dog that crouches and takes the shower of blows from its +cruel master. + +Where could she go? Nowhere. What could she do? Nothing. In the +days of prosperity she had regarded herself as proud and high spirited. +She now wondered at herself! What had become of the pride? What of the +spirit? She avoided looking at her image in the glass--that thin, +pallid face, those circled eyes, the drawn, sick expression about the +mouth and nose. "I'm stunned," she said to herself. "I've been stunned +ever since father's death. I've never recovered--nor has mother." And +she gave way to tears--for her father, she fancied; in fact, from shame +at her weakness and helplessness. She thought--hoped--that she would +not be thus feeble and cowardly, if she were not living at home, in the +house she loved, the house where she had spent her whole life. And +such a house! Comfort and luxury and taste; every room, every corner +of the grounds, full of the tenderest and most beautiful associations. +Also, there was her position in Hanging Rock. Everywhere else she +would be a stranger and would have either no position at all or one +worse than that of the utter outsider. There, she was of the few +looked up to by the whole community. No one knew, or even suspected, +how she was degraded by her step-father. Before the world he was +courteous and considerate toward her as toward everybody. Indeed, +Presbury's natural instincts were gentle and kindly. His hatred of +Mildred and his passion for humiliating her were the result of his +conviction that he had been tricked into the marriage and his inability +to gratify his resentment upon his wife. He could not make the mother +suffer; but he could make the daughter suffer--and he did. Besides, +she was of no use to him and would presently be an expense. + +"Your money will soon be gone," he said to her. "If you paid your just +share of the expenses it would be gone now. When it is gone, what will +you do?" + +She was silent. + +"Your mother has written to your brother about you." + +Mildred lifted her head, a gleam of her former spirit in her eyes. Then +she remembered, and bent her gaze upon the ground. + +"But he, like the cur that he is, answered through a secretary that he +wished to have nothing to do with either of you." + +Mildred guessed that Frank had made the marriage an excuse. + +"Surely some of your relatives will do something for you. I have my +hands full, supporting your mother. I don't propose to have two +strapping, worthless women hanging from my neck." + +She bent her head lower, and remained silent. + +"I warn you to bestir yourself," he went on. "I give you four months. +After the first of the year you can't stay here unless you pay your +share--your third." + +No answer. + +"You hear what I say, miss?" he demanded. + +"Yes," replied she. + +"If you had any sense you wouldn't wait until your last cent was gone. +You'd go to New York now and get something to do." + +"What?" she asked--all she could trust herself to speak. + +"How should _I_ know?" retorted he furiously. "You are a stranger to +me. You've been educated, I assume. Surely there's something you can +do. You've been out six years now, and have had no success, for you're +neither married nor engaged. You can't call it success to be flattered +and sought by people who wanted invitations to this house when it was a +social center." + +He paused for response from her. None came. + +"You admit you are a failure?" he said sharply. + +"Yes," said she. + +"You must have realized it several years ago," he went on. "Instead of +allowing your mother to keep on wasting money in entertaining lavishly +here to give you a chance to marry, you should have been preparing +yourself to earn a living." A pause. "Isn't that true, miss?" + +He had a way of pronouncing the word "miss" that made it an epithet, a +sneer at her unmarried and unmarriageable state. She colored, paled, +murmured: + +"Yes." + +"Then, better late than never. You'll do well to follow my advice and +go to New York and look about you." + +"I'll--I'll think of it," stammered she. + +And she did think of it. But in all her life she had never considered +the idea of money-making. That was something for men, and for the +middle and lower classes--while Hanging Rock was regarded as most +noisomely middle class by fashionable people, it did not so regard +itself. Money-making was not for ladies. Like all her class, she was +a constant and a severe critic of the women of the lower orders who +worked for her as milliners, dressmakers, shop-attendants, cooks, +maids. But, as she now realized, it is one thing to pass upon the work +of others; it is another thing to do work oneself. She-- There was +literally nothing that she could do. Any occupation, even the most +menial, was either beyond her skill or beyond her strength, or beyond +both. + +Suddenly she recalled that she could sing. Her prostrate spirit +suddenly leaped erect. Yes, she could sing! Her voice had been praised +by experts. Her singing had been in demand at charity entertainments +where amateurs had to compete with professionals. Then down she +dropped again. She sang well enough to know how badly she sang--the +long and toilsome and expensive training that lay between her and +operatic or concert or even music-hall stage. Her voice was fine at +times. Again--most of the time--it was unreliable. No, she could not +hope to get paying employment even as a church choir-singer. Miss +Dresser who sang in the choir of the Good Shepherd for ten dollars a +Sunday, had not nearly so good a voice as she, but it was reliable. + +"There is nothing I can do--nothing!" + +All at once, with no apparent bridge across the vast chasm, her heart +went out, not in pity but in human understanding and sisterly sympathy, +to the women of the pariah class at whom, during her stops in New York, +she had sometimes gazed in wonder and horror. "Why, we and they are +only a step apart," she said to herself in amazement. "We and they are +much nearer than my maid or the cook and they!" + +And then her heart skipped a beat and her skin grew cold and a fog +swirled over her brain. If she should be cast out--if she could find +no work and no one to support her--would she-- "O my God!" she moaned. +"I must be crazy, to think such thoughts. I never could! I'd die +first--DIE!" But if anyone had pictured to her the kind of life she +was now leading--the humiliation and degradation she was meekly +enduring with no thought of flight, with an ever stronger desire to +stay on, regardless of pride and self-respect--if anyone had pictured +this to her as what she would endure, what would she have said? She +could see herself flashing scornful denial, saying that she would +rather kill herself. Yet she was living--and was not even +contemplating suicide as a way out! + +A few days after Presbury gave her warning, her mother took advantage +of his absence for his religiously observed daily constitutional to say +to her: + +"I hope you didn't think I was behind him in what he said to you about +going away?" + +Mildred had not thought so, but in her mother's guilty tone and +guiltier eyes she now read that her mother wished her to go. + +"It'd be awful for me to be left here alone with him," wailed her +mother insincerely. "Of course we've got no money, and beggars can't +be choosers. But it'd just about kill me to have you go." + +Mildred could not speak. + +"I don't know a thing about money," Mrs. Presbury went on. "Your +father always looked after everything." She had fallen into the way of +speaking of her first husband as part of some vague, remote past, +which, indeed, he had become for her. "This man"--meaning +Presbury--"has only about five thousand a year, as you know. I suppose +that's as small as he says it is. I remember our bills for one month +used to be as much or more than that." She waved her useless, pretty +hands helplessly. "I don't see HOW we are to get on, Mildred!" + +Her mother wished her to go! Her mother had fallen under the influence +of Presbury--her mother, woman-like, or rather, ladylike, was of kin to +the helpless, flabby things that float in the sea and attach themselves +to whatever they happen to lodge against. Her mother wished her to go! + +"At the same time," Mrs. Presbury went on, "I can't live without +somebody here to stand between me and him. I'd kill him or kill +myself." + +Mildred muttered some excuse and fled from the room, to lock herself in. + +But when she came forth again to descend to dinner, she had resolved +nothing, because there was nothing to resolve. When she was a child +she leaned from the nursery window one day and saw a stable-boy +drowning a rat that was in a big, oval, wire cage with a wooden bottom. +The boy pressed the cage slowly down in the vat of water. The rat, in +the very top of the cage, watched the floor sink, watched the water +rise. And as it watched it uttered a strange, shrill, feeble sound +which she could still remember distinctly and terribly. It seemed to +her now that if she were to utter any sound at all, it would be that +one. + + + +II + +ON the Monday before Thanksgiving, Presbury went up to New York to look +after one of the little speculations in Wall Street at which he was so +clever. Throughout the civilized world nowadays, and especially in and +near the great capitals of finance, there is a class of men and women +of small capital and of a character in which are combined iron +self-restraint, rabbit-like timidity, and great shrewdness, who make +often a not inconsiderable income by gambling in stocks. They buy only +when the market is advancing strongly; they sell as soon as they have +gained the scantest margin of profit. They never permit themselves to +be tempted by the most absolute certainty of larger gains. They will +let weeks, months even, go by without once risking a dollar. They wait +until they simply cannot lose. Tens of thousands every year try to +join this class. All but the few soon succumb to the hourly dazzling +temptations the big gamblers dangle before the eyes of the little +gamblers to lure them within reach of the merciless shears. + +Presbury had for many years added from one to ten thousand a year to +his income by this form of gambling, success at which is in itself +sufficient to stamp a man as infinitely little of soul. On that Monday +he, venturing for the first time in six months, returned to Hanging +Rock on the three-thirty train the richer by two hundred and fifty +dollars--as large a "killing" as he had ever made in any single day, +one large enough to elevate him to the rank of prince among the +"sure-thing snides." He said nothing about his luck to his family, but +let them attribute his unprecedented good humor to the news he brought +and announced at dinner. + +"I met an old friend in the street this afternoon," said he. "He has +invited us to take Thanksgiving dinner with him. And I think it will +be a dinner worth while--the food, I mean, and the wine. Not the +guests; for there won't be any guests but us. General Siddall is a +stranger in New York." + +"There are Siddalls in New York," said his wife; "very nice, refined +people--going in the best society." + +Presbury showed his false teeth in a genial smile; for the +old-fashioned or plate kind of false teeth they were extraordinarily +good--when exactly in place. "But not my old friend Bill Siddall," +said he. "He's next door to an outlaw. I'd not have accepted his +invitation if he had been asking us to dine in public. But this is to +be at his own house--his new house--and a very grand house it is, +judging by the photos he showed me. A regular palace! He'll not be an +outlaw long, I guess. But we must wait and see how he comes out +socially before we commit ourselves." + +"Did you accept for me, too?" asked Mrs. Presbury. + +"Certainly," said Presbury. "And for your daughter, too." + +"I can't go," said Mildred. "I'm dining with the Fassetts." + +The family no longer had a servant in constant attendance in the +dining-room. The maid of many functions also acted as butler and as +fetch-and-carry between kitchen and butler's pantry. Before speaking, +Presbury waited until this maid had withdrawn to bring the roast and +the vegetables. Then he said: + +"You are going, too, miss." This with the full infusion of insult into +the "miss." + +Mildred was silent. + +"Bill Siddall is looking for a wife," proceeded Presbury. "And he has +Heaven knows how many millions." + +"Do you think there's a chance for Milly?" cried Mrs. Presbury, who was +full of alternating hopes and fears, both wholly irrational. + +"She can have him--if she wants him," replied Presbury. "But it's only +fair to warn her that he's a stiff dose." + +"Is the money--CERTAIN?" inquired Mildred's mother with that shrewdness +whose rare occasional displays laid her open to the unjust suspicion of +feigning her habitual stupidity. + +"Yes," said Presbury amiably. "It's nothing like yours was. He's so +rich he doesn't know what to do with his income. He owns mines +scattered all over the world. And if they all failed, he's got bundles +of railway stocks and bonds, and gilt-edged trust stocks, too. And he's +a comparatively young man--hardly fifty, I should say. He pretends to +be forty." + +"It's strange I never heard of him," said Mrs. Presbury. + +"If you went to South America or South Africa or Alaska, you'd hear of +him," said Presbury. He laughed. "And I guess you'd hear some pretty +dreadful things. When I knew him twenty-five years ago he had just been +arrested for forging my father's name to a check. But he got out of +that--and it's all past and gone. Probably he hasn't committed any +worse crimes than have most of our big rich men. Bill's handicap has +been that he hadn't much education or any swell relatives. But he's a +genius at money-making." Presbury looked at Mildred with a grin. "And +he's just the husband for Mildred. She can't afford to be too +particular. Somebody's got to support her. _I_ can't and won't, and +she can't support herself." + +"You'll go--won't you, Mildred?" said her mother. "He may not be so +bad." + +"Yes, I'll go," said Mildred. Her gaze was upon the untouched food on +her plate. + +"Of course she'll go," said Presbury. "And she'll marry him if she +can. Won't you, miss?" + +He spoke in his amiably insulting way--as distinguished from the way of +savagely sneering insult he usually took with her. He expected no +reply. She surprised him. She lifted her tragic eyes and looked +fixedly at him. She said: + +"Yes, I'll go. And I'll marry him if I can." + +"I told him he could have you," said Presbury. "I explained to him +that you were a rare specimen of the perfect lady--just what he +wanted--and that you, and all your family, would be grateful to anybody +who would undertake your support." + +Mrs. Presbury flushed angrily. "You've made it perfectly useless for +her to go!" she cried. + +"Calm yourself, my love," said her husband. "I know Bill Siddall +thoroughly. I said what would help. I want to get rid of her as much +as you do--and that's saying a great deal." + +Mrs. Presbury flamed with the wrath of those who are justly accused. +"If Mildred left, I should go, too," cried she. + +"Go where?" inquired her husband. "To the poorhouse?" + +By persistent rubbing in Presbury had succeeded in making the truth +about her poverty and dependence clear to his wife. She continued to +frown and to look unutterable contempt, but he had silenced her. He +noted this with a sort of satisfaction and went on: + +"If Bill Siddall takes her, you certainly won't go there. He wouldn't +have you. He feels strongly on the subject of mothers-in-law." + +"Has he been married before?" asked Mrs. Presbury. + +"Twice," replied her husband. "His first wife died. He divorced the +second for unfaithfulness." + +Mildred saw in this painstaking recital of all the disagreeable and +repellent facts about Siddall an effort further to humiliate her by +making it apparent how desperately off she was, how she could not +refuse any offer, revolting though it might be to her pride and to her +womanly instincts. Doubtless this was in part the explanation of +Presbury's malicious candor. But an element in that candor was a +prudent preparing of the girl's mind for worse than the reality. That +he was in earnest in his profession of a desire to bring about the +match showed when he proposed that they should take rooms at a hotel in +New York, to give her a chance to dress properly for the dinner. True, +he hastened to say that the expense must be met altogether out of the +remnant of Mildred's share of her father's estate, but the idea would +not have occurred to him had he not been really planning a marriage. + +Never had Mildred looked more beautiful or more attractive than when +the three were ready to sally forth from the Manhattan Hotel on that +Thanksgiving evening. At twenty-five, a soundly healthy and vigorous +twenty-five, it is impossible for mind and nerves, however wrought +upon, to make serious inroads upon surface charms. The hope of +emancipation from her hideous slavery had been acting upon the girl +like a powerful tonic. She had gained several pounds in the three +intervening days; her face had filled out, color had come back in all +its former beauty to her lips. Perhaps there was some slight aid from +art in the extraordinary brilliancy of her eyes. + +Presbury inventoried her with a succession of grunts of satisfaction. +"Yes, he'll want you," he said. "You'll strike him as just the show +piece he needs. And he's too shrewd not to be aware that his choice is +limited." + +"You can't frighten me," said Mildred, with a radiant, coquettish +smile--for practice. "Nothing could frighten me." + +"I'm not trying," replied Presbury. "Nor will Siddall frighten you. A +woman who's after a bill-payer can stomach anything." + +"Or a man," said Mildred. + +"Oh, your mother wasn't as bad as all that," said Presbury, who never +lost an opportunity. + +Mrs. Presbury, seated beside her daughter in the cab, gave an +exclamation of rage. "My own daughter insulting me!" she said. + +"Such a thought did not enter my head," protested Mildred. "I wasn't +thinking of anyone in particular." + +"Let's not quarrel now," said Presbury, with unprecedented amiability. +"We must give Bill a spectacle of the happy family." + +The cab entered the porte-cochere of a huge palace of white stone just +off Fifth Avenue. The house was even grander than they had +anticipated. The wrought-iron fence around it had cost a small +fortune; the house itself, without reference to its contents, a large +fortune. The massive outer doors were opened by two lackeys in +cherry-colored silk and velvet livery; a butler, looking like an +English gentleman, was waiting to receive them at the top of a short +flight of marble steps between the outer and the inner entrance doors. +As Mildred ascended, she happened to note the sculpturing over the +inner entrance--a reclining nude figure of a woman, Cupids with +garlands and hymeneal torches hovering about her. + +Mildred had been in many pretentious houses in and near New York, but +this far surpassed the grandest of them. Everything was brand new, +seemed to have been only that moment placed, and was of the +costliest--statuary, carpets, armor, carved seats of stone and wood, +marble staircase rising majestically, tapestries, pictures, +drawing-room furniture. The hall was vast, but the drawing-room was +vaster. Empty, one would have said that it could not possibly be +furnished. Yet it was not only full, but crowded-chairs and sofas, +hassocks and tete-a-tetes, cabinets, tables, pictures, statues, busts, +palms, flowers, a mighty fireplace in which, behind enormous and costly +andirons, crackled enormous and costly logs. There was danger in +moving about; one could not be sure of not upsetting something, and one +felt that the least damage that could be done there would be an +appallingly expensive matter. + +Before that cavernous fireplace posed General Siddall. He was a tiny +mite of a man with a thin wiry body supporting the head of a +professional barber. His black hair was glossy and most romantically +arranged. His black mustache and imperial were waxed and +brilliantined. There was no mistaking the liberal use of dye, also. +From the rather thin, very sharp face looked a pair of small, muddy, +brown-green eyes--dull, crafty, cold, cruel. But the little man was so +insignificant and so bebarbered and betailored that one could not take +him seriously. Never had there been so new, so carefully pressed, so +perfectly fitting evening clothes; never a shirt so expensively got +together, or jeweled studs, waistcoat buttons and links so high priced. +From every part of the room, from every part of the little man's +perfumed and groomed person, every individual article seemed to be +shrieking, "The best is not too good for Bill Siddall!" + +Mildred was agreeably surprised--she was looking with fierce +determination for agreeable surprises--when the costly little man +spoke, in a quiet, pleasant voice with an elusive, attractive foreign +accent. + +"My, but this is grand--grand, General Siddall!" said Presbury in the +voice of the noisy flatterer. "Princely! Royal!" + +Mildred glanced nervously at Siddall. She feared that Presbury had +taken the wrong tone. She saw in the unpleasant eyes a glance of +gratified vanity. Said he: + +"Not so bad, not so bad. I saw the house in Paris, when I was taking a +walk one day. I went to the American ambassador and asked for the best +architect in Paris. I went to him, told him about the house--and here +it is." + +"Decorations, furniture, and all!" exclaimed Presbury. + +"No, just the house. I picked up the interiors in different parts of +Europe--had everything reproduced where I couldn't buy outright. I +want to enjoy my money while I'm still young. I didn't care what it +cost to get the proper surroundings. As I said to my architect and to +my staff of artists, I expected to be cheated, but I wanted the goods. +And I got the goods. I'll show you through the house after dinner. +It's on this same scale throughout. And they're putting me together a +country place--same sort of thing." He threw back his little shoulders +and protruded his little chest. "And the joke of it is that the whole +business isn't costing me a cent." + +"Not a cent less than half a dozen or a dozen millions," said Presbury. + +"Not so much as that--not quite," protested the delightedly sparkling +little general. "But what I meant was that, as fast as these fellows +spend, I go down-town and make. Fact is, I'm a little better off than +I was when I started in to build." + +"Well, you didn't get any of MY money," laughed Presbury. "But I +suppose pretty much everybody else in the country must have +contributed." + +General Siddall smiled. Mildred wondered whether the points of his +mustache and imperial would crack and break of, if he should touch +them. She noted that his hair was roached absurdly high above the +middle of his forehead and that he was wearing the tallest heels she +had ever seen. She calculated that, with his hair flat and his feet on +the ground, he would hardly come to her shoulder--and she was barely of +woman's medium height. She caught sight of his hands--the square, +stubby hands of a working man; the fingers permanently slightly curved +as by the handle of shovel and pick; the skin shriveled but white with +a ghastly, sickening bleached white, the nails repulsively manicured +into long white curves. "If he should touch me, I'd scream," she +thought. And then she looked at Presbury--and around her at the +evidences of enormous wealth. + +The general--she wondered where he had got that title--led her mother +in to dinner, Presbury gave her his arm. On the way he found +opportunity to mutter: + +"Lay it on thick! Flatter the fool. You can't offend him. Tell him +he's divinely handsome--a Louis Fourteen, a Napoleon. Praise +everything--napkins, tablecloth, dishes, food. Rave over the wine." + +But Mildred could not adopt this obviously excellent advice. She sat +silent and cold, while Presbury and her mother raved and drew out the +general to talk of himself--the only subject in the whole world that +seemed to him thoroughly worth while. As Mildred listened and +furtively observed, it seemed to her that this tiny fool, so obviously +pleased by these coarse and insulting flatteries, could not possibly +have had the brains to amass the vast fortune he apparently possessed. +But presently she noted that behind the personality that was pleased by +this gross fawning and bootlicking there lay--lay in wait and on +guard--another personality, one that despised these guests of his, +estimating them at their true value and using them contemptuously for +the gratification of his coarse appetites. In the glimpse she caught +of that deeper and real personality, she liked it even less than she +liked the one upon the surface. + +It was evidence of superior acumen that she saw even vaguely the real +Bill Siddall, the money-maker, beneath the General William Siddall, raw +and ignorant and vulgar--more vulgar in his refinement than the most +shocking bum at home and at ease in foul-smelling stew. Every man of +achievement hides beneath his surface--personality this second and real +man, who makes the fortune, discovers the secret of chemistry, fights +the battle, carries the election, paints the picture, commits the +frightful murder, evolves the divine sermon or poem or symphony. Thus, +when we meet a man of achievement, we invariably have a sense of +disappointment. "Why, that's not the man!" we exclaim. "There must be +some mistake." And it is, indeed, not the man. Him we are incapable of +seeing. We have only eyes for surfaces; and, not being doers of +extraordinary deeds, but mere plodders in the routines of existence, we +cannot believe that there is any more to another than there is to +ourselves. The pleasant or unpleasant surface for the conventional +relations of life is about all there is to us; therefore it is all +there is to human nature. Well, there's no help for it. In measuring +our fellow beings we can use only the measurements of our own selves; +we have no others, and if others are given to us we are as foozled as +one knowing only feet and inches who has a tape marked off in meters +and centimeters. + +It so happened that in her social excursions Mildred had never been in +any of the numerous homes of the suddenly and vastly rich of humble +origin. She was used to--and regarded as proper and elegant--the +ordinary ostentations and crudities of the rich of conventional +society. No more than you or I was she moved to ridicule or disdain by +the silliness and the tawdry vulgarity of the life of palace and +liveried lackey and empty ceremonial, by the tedious entertainments, by +the displays of costly and poisonous food. But General Siddall's +establishment presented a new phase to her--and she thought it unique +in dreadfulness and absurdity. + +The general had had a home life in his youth--in a coal-miner's cabin +near Wilkes-Barre. Ever since, he had lived in boarding-houses or +hotels. As his shrewd and rapacious mind had gathered in more and more +wealth, he had lived more and more luxuriously--but always at hotels. +He had seen little of the private life of the rich. Thus he had been +compelled to get his ideas of luxury and of ceremonial altogether from +the hotel-keepers and caterers who give the rich what the more +intelligent and informed of the rich are usually shamed by people of +taste from giving themselves at home. + +She thought the tablecloth, napkins, and gaudy gold and flowery cut +glass a little overdone, but on the whole not so bad. She had seen +such almost as grand at a few New York houses. The lace in the cloth +and in the napkins was merely a little too magnificent. It made the +table lumpy, it made the napkins unfit for use. But the way the dinner +was served! You would have said you were in a glorified palace-hotel +restaurant. You looked about for the cashier's desk; you were certain a +bill would be presented after the last course. + +The general, tinier and more grotesque than ever in the great +high-backed, richly carved armchair, surveyed the progress of the +banquet with the air of a god performing miracles of creation and +passing them in review and giving them his divine endorsement. He was +well pleased with the enthusiastic praises Presbury and his wife +lavished upon the food and drink. He would have been better pleased +had they preceded and followed every mouthful with a eulogy. He +supplemented their compliments with even more fulsome compliments, +adding details as to the origin and the cost. + +"Darcy"--this to the butler--"tell the chef that this fish is the best +yet--really exquisite." To Presbury: "I had it brought over from +France--alive, of course. We have many excellent fish, but I like a +change now and then. So I have a standing order with Prunier--he's the +big oyster- and fish-man of Paris--to send me over some things every +two weeks by special express. That way, an oyster costs about fifty +cents and a fish about five or six dollars." + +To Mrs. Presbury: "I'll have Darcy make you and Miss Presbury--excuse +me, Miss Gower--bouquets of the flowers afterward. Most of them come +from New York--and very high really first-class flowers are. I pay two +dollars apiece for my roses even at this season. And orchids--well, I +feel really extravagant when I indulge in orchids as I have this +evening. Ten dollars apiece for those. But they're worth it." + +The dinner was interminably long--upward of twenty kinds of food, no +less than five kinds of wine; enough served and spoiled to have fed and +intoxicated a dozen people at least. And upon every item of food and +drink the general had some remarks to make. He impressed it upon his +guests that this dinner was very little better than the one served to +him every night, that the increase in expense and luxury was not in +their honor, but in his own--to show them what he could do when he +wished to make a holiday. Finally the grand course was reached. Into +the dining-room, to the amazement of the guests, were rolled two great +restaurant joint wagons. Instead of being made of silver-plated nickel +or plain nickel they were of silver embossed with gold, and the large +carvers and serving-spoons and forks had gold-mounted silver handles. +When the lackeys turned back the covers there were disclosed several +truly wonderful young turkeys, fattened as if by painstaking and +skillful hand and superbly browned. + +Up to that time the rich and costly food had been sadly medium--like +the wines. But these turkeys were a genuine triumph. Even Mildred +gave them a look of interest and admiration. In a voice that made +General Siddall ecstatic Presbury cried: + +"GOD bless my soul! WHERE did you get those beauties, old man!" + +"Paris," said Siddall in a voice tremulous with pride and +self-admiration. You would have thought that he had created not merely +the turkeys, but Paris, also. "Potin sends them over to me. Potin, you +know, is the finest dealer in groceries, fruit, game, and so on in the +world. I have a standing order with him for the best of--everything +that comes in. I'd hate to tell you what my bill with Potin is every +month--he only sends it to me once a year. Really, I think I ought to +be ashamed of myself, but I reason that, if a man can afford it, he's a +fool to put anything but the best into his stomach." + +"You're right there!" mumbled Presbury. His mouth was full of turkey. +"You HAVE got a chef, General!" + +"He ought to cook well. I pay him more than most bank-presidents get. +What do you think of those joint wagons, Mrs. Presbury?" + +"They're very--interesting," replied she, a little nervous because she +suspected they were some sort of vulgar joke. + +"I knew you'd like them," said the general. "My own idea entirely. I +saw them in several restaurants abroad--only of course those they had +were just ordinary affairs, not fit to be introduced into a gentleman's +dining-room. But I took the idea and adapted it to my purposes--and +there you are!" + +"Very original, old man," said Presbury, who had been drinking too +much. "I've never seen it before, and I don't think I ever shall +again. Got the idea patented?" + +But Siddall in his soberest moment would have been slow to admit a +suspicion that any of the human race, which he regarded as on its knees +before him, was venturing to poke fun at him. Drunk as he now was, the +openest sarcasm would have been accepted as a compliment. After a +gorgeous dessert which nobody more than touched--a molded mousse of +whipped and frozen cream and strawberries--"specially sent on to me +from Florida and costing me a dollar apiece, I guess"--after this +costly wonder had disappeared fruit was served. General Siddall had +ready a long oration upon this course. He delivered it in a +disgustingly thick tone. The pineapple was an English hothouse product, +the grapes were grown by a costly process under glass in Belgium. As +for the peaches, Potin had sent those delicately blushing marvels, and +the charge for this would be "not less than a louis apiece, sir--a +louis d'or--which, as you no doubt know, is about four dollars of Uncle +Sam's money." + +The coffee--"the Queen of Holland may have it on her PRIVATE +table--MAY, I say--but I doubt if anyone else in the world gets a smell +of it except me"--the coffee and the brandy came not a moment too soon. +Presbury was becoming stupefied with indigestion; his wife was nodding +and was wearing that vague, forced, pleasant smile which stands +propriety-guard over a mind asleep; Mildred Gower felt that her nerves +would endure no more; and the general was falling into a besotted +state, spilling his wine, mumbling his words. The coffee and the brandy +revived them all somewhat. Mildred, lifting her eyes, saw by way of a +mirrored section of the enormous sideboard the English butler surveying +master and guests with slowly moving, sneering glance of ineffable +contempt. + +In the drawing-room again Mildred, requested by Siddall and ordered by +Presbury, sang a little French song and then--at the urging of +Siddall--"Annie Laurie." Siddall was wiping his eyes when she turned +around. He said to Presbury: + +"Take your wife into the conservatory to look at my orchids. I want to +say a word to your stepdaughter." + +Mildred started up nervously. She saw how drunk the general was, saw +the expression of his face that a woman has to be innocent indeed not +to understand. She was afraid to be left alone with him. Presbury came +up to her, said rapidly, in a low tone: + +"It's all right. He's got a high sense of what's due a respectable +woman of our class. He isn't as drunk as he looks and acts." + +Having said which, he took his wife by the arm and pushed her into the +adjoining conservatory. Mildred reseated herself upon the inlaid +piano-bench. The little man, his face now shiny with the sweat of +drink and emotion, drew up a chair in front of her. He sat--and he was +almost as tall sitting as standing. He said graciously: + +"Don't be afraid, my dear girl. I'm not that dangerous." + +She lifted her eyes and looked at him. She tried to conceal her +aversion; she feared she was not succeeding. But she need not have +concerned herself about that. General Siddall, after the manner of very +rich men, could not conceive of anyone being less impressed with his +superiority in any way than he himself was. For years he had heard +only flatteries of himself--his own voice singing his praises, the +fawning voices of those he hired and of those hoping to get some +financial advantage. He could not have imagined a mere woman not being +overwhelmed by the prospect of his courting her. Nor would it have +entered his head that his money would be the chief, much less the only, +consideration with her. He had long since lost all point of view, and +believed that the adulation paid his wealth was evoked by his charms of +person, mind, and manner. Those who imagine this was evidence of folly +and weak-mindedness and extraordinary vanity show how little they know +human nature. The strongest head could not remain steady, the most +accurate eyes could not retain their measuring skill, in such an +environment as always completely envelops wealth and power. And the +much-talked-of difference between those born to wealth and power and +those who rise to it from obscurity resolves itself to little more than +the difference between those born mad and those who go insane. + +Looking at the little man with the disagreeable eyes, so dull yet so +shrewd, Mildred saw that within the drunkard who could scarcely sit +straight upon the richly upholstered and carved gilt chair there was +another person, coldly sober, calmly calculating. And she realized +that it was this person with whom she was about to have the most +serious conversation of her life thus far. + +The drunkard smiled with a repulsive wiping and smacking of the thin, +sensual lips. "I suppose you know why I had you brought here this +evening?" said he. + +Mildred looked and waited. + +"I didn't intend to say anything to-night. In fact, I didn't expect to +find in you what I've been looking for. I thought that old fool of a +stepfather of yours was cracking up his goods beyond their merits. But +he wasn't. My dear, you suit me from the ground up. I've been looking +you over carefully. You were made for the place I want to fill." + +Mildred had lowered her eyes. Her face had become deathly pale. "I +feel faint," she murmured. "It is very warm here." + +"You're not sickly?" inquired the general sharply. "You look like a +good solid woman--thin but wiry. Ever been sick? I must look into your +health. That's a point on which I must be satisfied." + +A wave of anger swept through her, restoring her strength. She was +about to speak--a rebuke to his colossal impudence that he would not +soon forget. Then she remembered, and bit her lips. + +"I don't ask you to decide to-night," pursued he, hastening to explain +this concession by adding: "I don't intend to decide, myself. All I +say is that I am willing--if the goods are up to the sample." + +Mildred saw her stepfather and her mother watching from just within the +conservatory door. A movement of the portiere at the door into the +hall let her know that Darcy, the butler, was peeping and listening +there. She stood up, clenched her hands, struck them together, struck +them against her temples, crossed the room swiftly, flung herself down +upon a sofa, and burst into tears. Presbury and his wife entered. +Siddall was standing, looking after Mildred with a grin. He winked at +Presbury and said: + +"I guess we gave her too much of that wine. It's all old and stronger +than you'd think." + +"My daughter hardly touched her glasses," cried Mrs. Presbury. + +"I know that, ma'am," replied Siddall. "I watched her. If she'd done +much drinking, I'd have been done, then and there." + +"I suspect she's upset by what you've been saying, General," said +Presbury. "Wasn't it enough to upset a girl? You don't realize how +magnificent you are--how magnificent everything is here." + +"I'm sorry if I upset her," said the general, swelling and loftily +contrite. "I don t know why it is that people never seem to be able to +act natural with me." He hated those who did, regarding them as +sodden, unappreciative fools. + +Mrs. Presbury was quieting her daughter. Presbury and Siddall lighted +cigars and went into the smoking--and billiard-room across the hall. +Said Presbury: + +"I didn't deceive you, did I, General?" + +"She's entirely satisfactory," replied Siddall. "I'm going to make +careful inquiries about her character and her health. If those things +prove to be all right I'm ready to go ahead." + +"Then the thing's settled," said Presbury. "She's all that a lady +should be. And except a cold now and then she never has anything the +matter with her. She comes of good healthy stock." + +"I can't stand a sickly, ailing woman," said Siddall. "I wouldn't marry +one, and if one I married turned out to be that kind, I'd make short +work of her. When you get right down to facts, what is a woman? Why, +a body. If she ain't pretty and well, she ain't nothing. While I'm +looking up her pedigree, so to speak, I want you to get her mother to +explain to her just what kind of a man I am." + +"Certainly, certainly," said Presbury. + +"Have her told that I don't put up with foolishness. If she wants to +look at a man, let her look at me." + +"You'll have no trouble in that way," said Presbury. + +"I DID have trouble in that way," replied the general sourly. "Women +are fools--ALL women. But the principal trouble with the second Mrs. +Siddall was that she wasn't a lady born." + +"That's why I say you'll have no trouble," said Presbury. + +"Well, I want her mother to talk to her plainer than a gentleman can +talk to a young lady. I want her to understand that I am marrying so +that I can have a WIFE--cheerful, ready, and healthy. I'll not put up +with foolishness of any kind." + +"I understand," said Presbury. "You'll find that she'll meet all your +conditions." + +"Explain to her that, while I'm the easiest, most liberal-spending man +in the world when I'm getting what I want, I am just the opposite when +I'm not getting what I pay for. If I take her and if she acts right, +she'll have more of everything that women want than any woman in the +world. I'd take a pride in my wife. There isn't anything I wouldn't +spend in showing her off to advantage. And I'm willing to be liberal +with her mother, too." + +Presbury had been hoping for this. His eyes sparkled. "You're a +prince, General," he said. "A genuine prince. You know how to do +things right." + +"I flatter myself I do," said the general. "I've been up and down the +world, and I tell you most of the kings live cheap beside me. And when +I get a wife worth showing of, I'll do still better. I've got +wonderful creative ability. There isn't anything I can't and won't +buy." + +Presbury noted uneasily how cold and straight, how obviously repelled +and repelling the girl was as she yielded her fingers to Siddall at the +leave-taking. He and her mother covered the silence and ice with hot +and voluble sycophantry. They might have spared themselves the +exertion. To Siddall Mildred was at her most fascinating when she was +thus "the lady and the queen." The final impression she made upon him +was the most favorable of all. + +In the cab Mrs. Presbury talked out of the fullness of an overflowing +heart. "What a remarkable man the general is!" said she. "You've only +to look at him to realize that you're in the presence of a really +superior person. And what tact he has!--and how generous he is!--and +how beautifully he entertains! So much dignity--so much simplicity--so +much--" + +"Fiddlesticks!" interrupted Presbury. "Your daughter isn't a damn +fool, Mrs. Presbury." + +Mildred gave a short, dry laugh. + +Up flared her mother. "I mean every word I said!" cried she. "If I +hadn't admired and appreciated him, I'd certainly not have acted as I +did. _I_ couldn't stoop to such hypocrisy." + +"Fiddlesticks!" sneered Presbury. "Bill Siddall is a horror. His +house is a horror. His dinner was a horror. These loathsome rich +people! They're ruining the world--as they always have. They're +making it impossible for anyone to get good service or good food or +good furniture or good clothing or good anything. They don't know good +things, and they pay exorbitant prices for showy trash, for crude +vulgar luxury. They corrupt taste. They make everyone round them or +near them sycophants and cheats. They substitute money for +intelligence and discrimination. They degrade every fine thing in life. +Civilization is built up by brains and hard work, and along come the +rich and rot and ruin it!" + +Mildred and her mother were listening in astonishment. Said the mother: + +"I'd be ashamed to confess myself such a hypocrite." + +"And I, madam, would be ashamed to be such a hypocrite without taking a +bath of confession afterward," retorted Presbury. + +"At least you might have waited until Mildred wasn't in hearing," +snapped she. + +"I shall marry him if I can," said Mildred. + +"And blissfully happy you'll be," said Presbury. "Women, ladies--true +ladies, like you and your mother--have no sensibilities. All you ask +is luxury. If Bill Siddall were a thousand times worse than he is, his +money would buy him almost any refined, delicate lady anywhere in +Christendom." + +Mrs. Presbury laughed angrily. "YOU, talking like this--you of all +men. Is there anything YOU wouldn't stoop to for money?" + +"Do you think I laid myself open to that charge by marrying you?" said +Presbury, made cheerful despite his savage indigestion by the +opportunity for effective insult she had given him and he had promptly +seized. "I am far too gallant to agree with you. But I'm also too +gallant to contradict a lady. By the way, you must be careful in +dealing with Siddall. Rich people like to be fawned on, but not to be +slobbered on. You went entirely too far." + +Mrs. Presbury, whom indigestion had rendered stupid, could think of no +reply. So she burst into tears. "And my own daughter sitting silent +while that man insults her mother!" she sobbed. + +Mildred sat stiff and cold. + +"It'll be a week before I recover from that dinner," Presbury went on +sourly. "What a dinner! What a villainous mess! These vulgar, showy +rich! That champagne! He said it cost him six dollars a bottle, and +no doubt it did. I doubt if it ever saw France. The dealers rarely +waste genuine wine on such cattle. The wine-cellars of fine houses the +world through are the laughing-stock of connoisseurs--like their +picture-galleries and their other attempts to make money do the work of +taste. I forgot to put my pills in my bag. I'll have to hunt up an +all-night drug-store. I'd not dare go to bed without taking an +antidote for that poison." + +But Presbury had not been altogether improvident. He had hoped great +things of Bill Siddall's wine-cellar--this despite an almost unbroken +series of bitter disillusionments and disappointments in experience +with those who had the wealth to buy, if they had had the taste to +select, the fine wines he loved. So, resolving to indulge himself, he +had put into his bag his pair of gout-boots. + +This was a device of his own inventing, on which he prided himself. It +consisted of a pair of roomy doe-skin slippers reenforced with heavy +soles and provided with a set of three thin insoles to be used +according as the state of his toes made advisable. The cost of the +Presbury gout-boot had been, thanks to patient search for a cheap +cobbler, something under four dollars--this, when men paid shoe +specialists twenty, thirty, and even forty dollars a pair for +gout-boots that gave less comfort. The morning after the dinner at +which he had drunk to drown his chagrin and to give him courage and +tongue for sycophantry, he put on the boots. Without them it would have +been necessary to carry him from his room to a cab and from cab to +train. With them he was able to hobble to a street-car. He tried to +distract his mind from his sufferings by lashing away without ceasing +at his wife and his step-daughter. + +When they were once more at home, and the mother and daughter escaped +from him, the mother said: + +"I was glad to see that you put up with that wretch, and didn't answer +him back." + +"Of course," said Mildred. "He's mad to be rid of me, but if I +offended him he might snatch away this chance." + +"He would," said Mrs. Presbury. "I'm sure he would. But--" she +laughed viciously--"once you're married you can revenge yourself--and +me!" + +"I wonder," said Mildred thoughtfully. + +"Why not?" exclaimed her mother, irritated. + +"I can't make Mr. Presbury out," replied the girl. "I understand why +he's helping me to this chance, but I don't understand why he isn't +making friends with me, in the hope of getting something after I'm +married." + +Her mother saw the point, and was instantly agitated. "Perhaps he's +simply leading you on, intending to upset it all at the last minute." +She gritted her teeth. "Oh, what a wretch!" + +Mildred was not heeding. "I must have General Siddall looked up +carefully," she went on. "It may be that he isn't rich, or that he has +another wife somewhere, or that there's some other awful reason why +marrying him would be even worse than it seems." + +"Worse than it seems!" cried her mother. "How CAN you talk so, Milly! +The general seems to be an ideal husband--simply ideal! I wish _I_ had +your chance. Any sensible woman could love him." + +A strange look came into the girl's face, and her mother could not +withstand her eyes. "Don't, mother," she said quietly. "Either you +take me for a fool or you are trying to show me that you have no +self-respect. I am not deceiving myself about what I'm doing." + +Mrs. Presbury opened her lips to remonstrate, changed her mind, drew a +deep sigh. "It's frightful to be a woman," she said. + +"To be a lady, Mr. Presbury would say," suggested Mildred. + +After some discussion, they fixed upon Joseph Tilker as the best +available investigator of General Siddall. Tilker had been head clerk +for Henry Gower. He was now in for himself and had offered to look +after any legal business Mrs. Presbury might have without charging her. +He presently reported that there was not a doubt as to the wealth of +the little general. "There are all sorts of ugly stories about how he +made his money," said Tilker; "but all the great fortunes have a +scandalous history, and I doubt if Siddall's is any worse than the +others. I don't see how it well could be. Siddall has the reputation +of being a mean and cruel little tyrant. He is said to be pompous, +vain, ignorant--" + +"Indeed he's not," cried Mrs. Presbury. "He's a rough diamond, but a +natural gentleman. I've met him." + +"Well, he's rich enough, and that was all you asked me to find out," +said Tilker. "But I must warn you, Mrs. Presbury, not to have any +business or intimate personal relations with him." + +Mrs. Presbury congratulated herself on her wisdom in having come alone +to hear Tilker's report. She did not repeat any part of it to Mildred +except what he had said about the wealth. That she enlarged upon until +Mildred's patience gave out. She interrupted with a shrewd: + +"Anything else, mamma? Anything about him personally?" + +"We've got to judge him in that way for ourselves," replied Mrs. +Presbury. "You know how wickedly they lie about anyone who has +anything." + +"I should like to read a full account of General Siddall," said Mildred +reflectively; "just to satisfy my curiosity." + +Mrs. Presbury made no reply. + +Presbury had decided that it was best to make no advance, but to wait +until they heard from Siddall. He let a week, ten days, go by; then +his impatience got the better of his shrewdness. He sought admittance +to the great man at the offices of the International Metals and +Minerals Company in Cedar Street. After being subjected to varied +indignities by sundry under-strappers, he received a message from the +general through a secretary: "The general says he'll let you know when +he's ready to take up that matter. He says he hasn't got round to it +yet." Presbury apologized courteously for his intrusion and went away, +cursing under his breath. You may be sure that he made his wife and +his stepdaughter suffer for what he had been through. Two weeks more +passed--three--a month. One morning in the mail there arrived this +note--type-written upon business paper: + + +JAMES PRESBURY, Esqr.: + +DEAR SIR: + +General Siddall asks me to present his compliments and to say that he +will be pleased if you and your wife and the young lady will dine with +him at his house next Thursday the seventeenth at half-past seven sharp. + +ROBERT CHANDLESS, Secretary. + + +The only words in longhand were the two forming the name of the +secretary. Presbury laughed and tossed the note across the breakfast +table to his wife. "You see what an ignorant creature he is," said he. +"He imagines he has done the thing up in grand style. He's the sort of +man that can't be taught manners because he thinks manners, the +ordinary civilities, are for the lower orders of people. Oh, he's a +joke, is Bill Siddall--a horrible joke." + +Mrs. Presbury read and passed the letter to Mildred. She simply glanced +at it and returned it to her step-father. + +"I'm just about over that last dinner," pursued Presbury. "I'll eat +little Thursday and drink less. And I'd advise you to do the same, Mrs. +Presbury." + +He always addressed her as "Mrs. Presbury" because he had discovered +that when so addressed she always winced, and, if he put a certain tone +into his voice, she quivered. + +"That dinner aged you five years," he went on. "Besides, you drank so +much that it went to your head and made you slather him with flatteries +that irritated him. He thought you were a fool, and no one is stupid +enough to like to be flattered by a fool." + +Mrs. Presbury bridled, swallowed hard, said mildly: "We'll have to +spend the night in town again, I suppose." + +"You and your daughter may do as you like," said Presbury. "I shall +return here that night. I always catch cold in strange beds." + +"We might as well all return here," said Mildred. "I shall not wear +evening dress; that is, I'll wear a high-neck dress and a hat." + +She had just got a new hat that was peculiarly becoming to her. She +had shown Siddall herself at the best in evening attire; another sort +of costume would give him a different view of her looks, one which she +flattered herself was not less attractive. But Presbury interposed an +emphatic veto. + +"You'll wear full evening dress," said he. "Bare neck and arms for men +like Bill Siddall. They want to see what they're getting." + +Mildred flushed scarlet and her lips trembled as though she were about +to cry. In fact, her emotion was altogether shame--a shame so poignant +that even Presbury was abashed, and mumbled something apologetic. +Nevertheless she wore a low-neck dress on Thursday evening, one as +daring as the extremely daring fashions of that year permitted an +unmarried woman to wear. It seemed to her that Siddall was still more +costly and elegant-looking than before, though this may have been due +to the fact that he always created an impression that in the retrospect +of memory seemed exaggerated. It seemed impossible that anyone could +be so clean, so polished and scoured, so groomed and tailored, so +bedecked, so high-heeled and loftily coiffed. His mean little +countenance with its grotesquely waxed mustache and imperial wore an +expression of gracious benignity that assured his guests they need +anticipate no disagreeable news. + +"I owe you an apology for keeping you in suspense so long," said he. +"I'm a very busy man, with interests in all parts of the world. I keep +house--some of 'em bigger than this--open and going in six different +places. I always like to be at home wherever my business takes me." + +Mrs. Presbury rolled her eyes. "Isn't that WONDERFUL!" she exclaimed. +"What an interesting life you must lead!" + +"Oh, so--so," replied the general. "But I get awful lonesome. I'm +naturally a domestic man. I don't care for friends. They're expensive +and dangerous. A man in my position is like a king. He can't have +friends. So, if he hasn't got a family, he hasn't got noth--anything." + +"Nothing like home life," said Presbury. + +"Yes, indeed," cried Mrs. Presbury. + +The little general smiled upon Mildred, sitting pale and silent, with +eyes downcast. "Well, I don't intend to be alone much longer, if I can +help it," said he. "And I may say that I can make a woman happy if +she's the right sort--if she has sense enough to appreciate a good +husband." This last he said sternly, with more than a hint of his past +matrimonial misfortunes in his frown and in his voice. "The trouble +with a great many women is that they're fools--flighty, ungrateful +fools. If I married a woman like that, I'd make short work of her." + +"And she'd deserve it, General," said Mildred's mother earnestly. "But +you'll have no trouble if you select a lady--a girl who's been well +brought up and has respect for herself." + +"That's my opinion, ma'am," said the general. "I'm convinced that while +a man can become a gentleman, a woman's got to be born a lady or she +never is one." + +"Very true, General," cried Mrs. Presbury. "I never thought of it +before, but it's the truest thing I ever heard." + +Presbury grinned at his plate. He stole a glance at Mildred. Their +eyes met. She flushed faintly. + +"I've had a great deal of experience of women," pursued the general. +"In my boyhood days I was a ladies' man. And of course since I've had +money they've swarmed round me like bees in a clover-patch." + +"Oh, General, you're far too modest," cried Mrs. Presbury. "A man like +you wouldn't need to be afraid, if he hadn't a cent." + +"But not the kind of women I want," replied he, firmly if complacently. +"A lady needs money to keep up her position. She has to have it. On +the other hand, a man of wealth and station needs a lady to assist him +in the proper kind of life for men of his sort. So they need each +other. They've got to have each other. That's the practical, sensible +way to look at it." + +"Exactly," said Presbury. + +"And I've made up my mind to marry, and marry right away. But we'll +come back to this later on. Presbury, you're neglecting that wine." + +"I'm drinking it slowly to enjoy it better," said Presbury. + +The dinner was the same unending and expensive function that had +wearied them and upset their digestions on Thanksgiving Day. There was +too much of everything, and it was all just wrong. The general was not +quite so voluble as he had been before; his gaze was fixed most of the +time on Mildred--roving from her lovely face to her smooth, slender +shoulders and back again. As he drank and ate his gesture of slightly +smacking his thin lips seemed to include an enjoyment of the girl's +charms. And a sensitive observer might have suspected that she was not +unconscious of this and was suffering some such pain as if abhorrent +and cruel lips and teeth were actually mouthing and mumbling her. She +said not a word from sitting down at table until they rose to go into +the library for coffee. + +"Do tell me about your early life, General," Mrs. Presbury said. "Only +the other day Millie was saying she wished she could read a biography +of your romantic career." + +"Yes, it has been rather--unusual," conceded the general with swelling +chest and gently waving dollar-and-a-half-apiece cigar. + +"I do so ADMIRE a man who carves out his own fortune," Mrs. Presbury +went on--she had not obeyed her husband's injunction as to the +champagne. "It seems so wonderful to me that a man could with his own +hands just dig a fortune out of the ground." + +"He couldn't, ma'am," said the general, with gracious tolerance. "It +wasn't till I stopped the fool digging and hunting around for gold that +I began to get ahead. I threw away the pick and shovel and opened a +hotel." (There were two or three sleeping-rooms of a kind in that +"hotel," but it was rather a saloon of the species known as "doggery.") +"Yes, it was in the hotel that I got my start. The fellows that make +the money in mining countries ain't the prospectors and diggers, ma'am." + +"Really!" cried Mrs. Presbury breathlessly. "How interesting!" + +"They're fools, they are," proceeded the general. "No, the money's made +by the fellows that grub-stake the fools--give 'em supplies and send +'em out to nose around in the mountains. Then them that find anything +have to give half to the fellow that did the grub-staking. And he +looks into the claim, and if there's anything in it, why, he buys the +fool out. In mines, like everywhere else, ma'am, it ain't work, it's +brains that makes the money. No miner ever made a mining fortune--not +one. It's the brainy, foxy fellows that stay back in the camps. I +used to send out fifty and a hundred men a year. Maybe only two or +three'd turn up anything worth while. No, ma'am, I never got a dollar +ahead on my digging. All the gold I ever dug went right off for +grub--or a good time." + +"Wonderful!" exclaimed Mrs. Presbury. "I never heard of such a thing." + +"But we're not here to talk about mines," said the general, his eyes +upon Mildred. "I've been looking into matters--to get down to +business--and I've asked you here to let you know that I'm willing to +go ahead." + +Profound silence. Mildred suddenly drew in her breath with a sound so +sharp that the three others started and glanced hastily at her. But +she made no further sign. She sat still and cold and pale. + +The general, perfectly at ease, broke the silence. "I think Miss Gower +and I would get on faster alone." + +Presbury at once stood up; his wife hesitated, her eyes uneasily upon +her daughter. Presbury said: "Come on, Alice." She rose and preceded +him into the adjoining conservatory. The little general posed himself +before the huge open fire, one hand behind him, the other at the level +of his waistcoat, the big cigar between his first and second fingers. +"Well, my dear?" said he. + +Mildred somewhat hesitatingly lifted her eyes; but, once she had them +up, their gaze held steadily enough upon his--too steadily for his +comfort. He addressed himself to his cigar: + +"I'm not quite ready to say I'm willing to go the limit," said he. "We +don't exactly know each other sufficiently well as yet, do we?" + +"No," said Mildred. + +"I've been making inquiries," he went on; "that is, I had my chief +secretary make them--and he's a very thorough man, thanks to my +training. He reports everything entirely all right. I admire dignity +and reserve in a woman, and you have been very particular. Were you +engaged to Stanley Baird?" + +Mildred flushed, veiled her eyes to hide their resentful flash at this +impertinence. She debated with herself, decided that any rebuke short +of one that would anger him would be wasted upon him. "No," said she. + +"That agrees with Harding's report," said the general. "It was a mere +girlish flirtation--very dignified and proper," he hastened to add. "I +don't mean to suggest that you were at all flighty." + +"Thank you," said Mildred sweetly. + +"Are there any questions you would like to ask about me?" inquired he. + +"No," said Mildred. + +"As I understand it--from my talk with Presbury--you are willing to go +on?" + +"Yes," said Mildred. + +The general smiled genially. "I think I may say without conceit that +you will like me as you know me better. I have no bad habits--I've too +much regard for my health to over-indulge or run loose. In my boyhood +days I may have put in rather a heavy sowing of wild oats"--the general +laughed; Mildred conjured up the wintriest and faintest of echoing +smiles--"but that's all past," he went on, "and there's nothing that +could rise up to interfere with our happiness. You are fond of +children?" + +A pause, then Mildred said quite evenly, "Yes." + +"Excellent," said the general. "I'll expect you and your mother and +father to dinner Sunday night. Is that satisfactory?" + +"Yes," said Mildred. + +A longish pause. Then the general: "You seem to be a little--afraid +of me. I don't know why it is that people are always that way with +me." A halt, to give her the opportunity to say the obvious flattering +thing. Mildred said nothing, gave no sign. He went on: "It will wear +away as we know each other better. I am a simple, plain man--kind and +generous in my instincts. Of course I am dignified, and I do not like +familiarity. But I do not mean to inspire fear and awe." + +A still longer pause. "Well, everything is settled," said the general. +"We understand each other clearly?--not an engagement, nothing binding +on either side--simply a--a--an option without forfeit." And he +laughed--his laugh was a ghoulish sound, not loud but explosive and an +instant check upon demonstration of mirth from anyone else. + +"I understand," said Mildred with a glance toward the door through +which Presbury and his wife had disappeared. + +"Now, we'll join the others, and I'll show you the house"--again the +laugh--"what may be your future home--one of them." + +The four were soon started upon what was for three of them a weariful +journey despite the elevator that spared them the ascents of the +stairways. The house was an exaggerated reproduction of all the +establishments of the rich who confuse expenditure with luxury and +comfort. Bill Siddall had bought "the best of everything"; that is, +the things into which the purveyors of costly furnishings have put the +most excuses for charging. Of taste, of comfort, of discrimination, +there were few traces and these obviously accidental. "I picked out the +men acknowledged to be the best in their different lines," said the +general, "and I gave them carte blanche." + +"I see that at a glance," said Presbury. "You've done the grand thing +on the grandest possible scale." + +"I've looked into the finest of the famous places on the other side," +said the general. "All I can say is, I've had no regrets." + +"I should say not," cried Mrs. Presbury. + +With an affectation of modest hesitation--to show that he was a +gentleman with a gentleman's fine appreciation of the due of maiden +modesty--Siddall paused at the outer door of his own apartments. But +at one sentence of urging from Mrs. Presbury he opened the door and +ushered them in. And soon he was showing them everything--his Carrara +marble bathroom and bathing-pool, his bed that had been used by several +French kings, his dressing-room with its appliances of gold and +platinum and precious stones, his clothing. They had to inspect a room +full of suits, huge chiffoniers crowded with shirts and ties and +underclothes. He exhibited silk dressing-robes and pajamas, pointed out +the marks of the fashionable London and Paris makers, the monograms, +the linings of ermine and sable. "I'm very particular about everything +that touches me," explained he. "It seems to me a gentleman can't be +too particular." With a meaning glance at Mildred, "And I'd feel the +same way about my wife." + +"You hear that, Mildred?" said Presbury, with a nasty little laugh. He +had been relieving the tedium of this sight-seeing tour by +observing--and from time to time aggravating--Mildred's sufferings. + +The general released his mirth-strangling goat laugh; Mrs. Presbury +echoed it with a gale of rather wild hysterics. So well pleased was +the general with the excursion and so far did he feel advanced toward +intimacy that on the way down the majestic marble stairway he ventured +to give Mildred's arm a gentle, playful squeeze. And at the parting he +kissed her hand. Presbury had changed his mind about returning to the +country. On the way to the hotel he girded at Mildred, reviewing all +that the little general had said and done, and sneering, jeering at it. +Mildred made not a single retort until they were upstairs in the hotel. +At the door to her room she said to Presbury--said it in a quiet, cold, +terrible way: + +"If you really want me to go through with this thing, you will stop +insulting him and me. If you do it again, I'll give up--and go on the +streets before I'll marry him." + +Presbury shrugged his shoulders and went on to the other room. But he +did not begin again the next day, and from that time forth avoided +reference to the general. In fact, there was an astonishing change in +his whole demeanor. He ceased to bait his wife, became polite, even +affable. If he had conducted himself thus from the outset, he would +have got far less credit, would have made far less progress toward +winning the liking of his wife, and of her daughter, than he did in a +brief two weeks of change from petty and malignant tyrant to +good-natured, interestingly talkative old gentleman. After the manner +of human nature, Mildred and her mother, in their relief, in their +pleasure through this amazing sudden and wholly unexpected geniality, +not merely forgave but forgot all they had suffered at his hands. +Mildred was not without a suspicion of the truth that this change, +inaugurated in his own good time, was fresh evidence of his contempt +for both of them--of his feeling that he could easily make reparation +with a little kindness and decency and put himself in the way of +getting any possible benefits from the rich alliance. But though she +practically knew what was going on in his mind, she could not prevent +herself from softening toward him. + +Now followed a succession of dinners, of theater- and opera-goings, of +week-ends at the general's new country palace in the fashionable region +of Long Island. All these festivities were of the same formal and +tedious character. At all the general was the central sun with the +others dim and draggled satellites, hardly more important than the +outer rim of satellite servants. He did most of the talking; he was +the sole topic of conversation; for when he was not talking about +himself he wished to be hearing about himself. If Mildred had not been +seeing more and more plainly that other and real personality of his, +her contempt for him and for herself would have grown beyond control. +But, with him or away from him, at every instant there was the sense of +that other real William Siddall--a shadowy menace full of terror. She +dreamed of it--was startled from sleep by visions of a monstrous and +mighty distortion of the little general's grotesque exterior. "I shall +marry him if I can," she said to her self. "But--can I?" And she +feared and hoped that she could not, that courage would fail her, or +would come to her rescue, whichever it was, and that she would refuse +him. Aside from the sense of her body that cannot but be with any +woman who is beautiful, she had never theretofore been especially +physical in thought. That side of life had remained vague, as she had +never indulged in or even been strongly tempted with the things that +rouse it from its virginal sleep. But now she thought only of her body, +because that it was, and that alone, that had drawn this prospective +purchaser, and his eyes never let her forget it. She fell into the +habit of looking at herself in the glass--at her face, at her +shoulders, at her whole person, not in vanity but in a kind of wonder +or aversion. And in the visions, both the waking and the sleeping, she +reached the climax of horror when the monster touched her--with clammy, +creepy fingers, with munching lips, with the sharp ends of the mustache +or imperial. + +Said Mrs. Presbury to her husband, "I'm afraid the general will be +irritated by Mildred's unresponsiveness." + +"Don't worry," replied Presbury. "He's so crazy about himself that he +imagines the whole world is in the same state." + +"Isn't it strange that he doesn't give her presents? Never anything but +candy and flowers." + +"And he never will," said Presbury. + +"Not until they're married, I suppose." + +Presbury was silent. + +"I can't help thinking that if Milly were to rouse herself and show +some--some liking--or at least interest, it'd be wiser." + +"She's taking the best possible course," said Presbury. "Unconsciously +to both of them, she's leading him on. He thinks that's the way a lady +should act--restrained, refined." + +Mildred's attitude was simple inertia. The most positive effort she +made was avoiding saying or doing anything to displease him--no +difficult matter, as she was silent and almost lifeless when he was +near. Without any encouragement from her he gradually got a deep +respect for her--which meant that he became convinced of her coldness +and exclusiveness, of her absolute trustworthiness. Presbury was more +profoundly right than he knew. The girl pursued the only course that +made possible the success she longed for, yet dreaded and loathed. For +at the outset Siddall had not been nearly so strongly in earnest in his +matrimonial project as he had professed and had believed himself. He +wished to marry, wished to add to his possessions the admirable +show-piece and exhibition opportunity afforded by the right sort of +wife; but in the bottom of his heart he felt that such a woman as he +dreamed of did not exist in all the foolish, fickle, and shallow female +sex. This girl--so cold, so proud, beautiful yet not eager to display +her charms or to have them praised--she was the rare bird he sought. + +In a month he asked her to marry him; that is, he said: "My dear, I +find that I am ready to go the limit--if you are." And she assented. +He put his arm around her and kissed her cheek--and was delighted to +discover that the alluring embrace made no impression upon the ice of +her "purity and ladylike dignity." Up to the very last moment of the +formal courtship he held himself ready to withdraw should she reveal to +his watchfulness the slightest sign of having any "unladylike" +tendencies or feelings. She revealed no such sign, but remained +"ladylike"; and certainly, so the general reasoned, a woman who could +thus resist him, even in the license of the formal engagement, would +resist anybody. + +As soon as the engagement was formally concluded, the general hurried +on the preparations for the wedding. He opened accounts at half a dozen +shops in New York--dressmakers, milliners, dealers in fine and +fashionable clothing of every kind--and gave them orders to execute +whatever commands Miss Gower or her mother--for HER--might give them. +When he told her of this munificence and magnificence and paused for +the outburst of gratitude, he listened in vain. Mildred colored to the +roots of her hair and was silent, was seeking the courage to refuse. + +"I know that you and your people can't afford to do the thing as things +related to me must be done," he went on to say. "So I decided to just +start in a little early at what I've got to do anyhow. Not that I +blame you for your not having money, my dear. On the contrary, that's +one of your merits with me. I wouldn't marry a woman with money. It +puts the family life on a wrong basis." + +"I had planned a quiet wedding," said Mildred. "I'd much prefer it." + +"Now you can be frank with me, my dear," said the general. "I know you +ladies--how cheated you feel if you aren't married with all the frills +and fixings. So that's the way it shall be done." + +"Really," protested Mildred, "I'm absolutely frank. I wish it to be +quite quiet--in our drawing-room, with no guests." + +Siddall smiled, genial and tolerant. "Don't argue with me, my dear. I +know what you want, and I'll see that you get it. Go ahead with these +shop-people I've put at your disposal--and go as far as you like. There +isn't anything--ANYTHING--in the way of clothes that you can't +have--that you mustn't have. Mrs. General Siddall is going to be the +best-dressed woman in the world--as she is the prettiest. I haven't +opened an account for you with Tiffany's or any of those people. I'll +look out for that part of the business, myself." + +"I don't care for jewelry," said Mildred. + +"Naturally not for the kind that's been within your means heretofore," +replied he; "but you'll open your eyes when you see MY jewelry for MY +wife. All in good time, my dear. You and your mother must start right +in with the shopping; and, a week or so before the wedding, I'll send +my people down to transform the house. I may be wrong, but I rather +think that the Siddall wedding will cause some talk." + +He was not wrong. Through his confidential secretary, Harding the +thorough, the newspaper press was induced to take an interest in the +incredible extravagance Siddall was perpetrating in arranging for a +fitting wedding for General William Siddall. For many days before the +ceremony there were daily columns about him and his romantic career and +his romantic wooing of the New Jersey girl of excellent family and +social position but of comparatively modest means. The shopkeepers gave +interviews on the trousseau. The decorators and caterers detailed the +splendors and the costliness of the preparations of which they had +charge. From morning until dark a crowd hung round the house at Hanging +Rock, and on the wedding day the streets leading to it were +blocked--chiefly with people come from a distance, many of them from +New York. + +At the outset all this noise was deeply distasteful to Mildred, but +after a few days she recovered her normal point of view, forgot the +kind of man she was marrying in the excitement and exultation over her +sudden splendor and fame. So strongly did the delusion presently +become, that she was looking at the little general with anything but +unfavorable eyes. He seemed to her a quaint, fascinating, benevolent +necromancer, having miraculous powers which he was exercising in her +behalf. She even reproached herself with ingratitude in not being +wildly in love with him. Would not any other girl, in her place, have +fallen over ears in love with this marvelous man? + +However, while she could not quite convince herself that she loved, she +became convinced without effort that she was happy, that she was going +to be still happier. The excitement wrought her into a state of +exaltation and swept her through the wedding ceremony and the going +away as radiant a bride as a man would care to have. + +There is much to be said against the noisy, showy wedding. Certainly +love has rarely been known to degrade himself to the point of attending +any such. But there is something to be said for that sort of married +start--for instance, where love is neither invited nor desired, an +effort must be made to cover the painful vacancy his absence always +causes. + +The little general's insistence on a "real wedding" was most happy for +him. It probably got him his bride. + + + +III + +THE intoxication of that wedding held on long enough and strongly +enough to soften and blunt the disillusionments of the first few days +of the honeymoon. In the prospect that period had seemed, even to +Mildred's rather unsophisticated imagination, appalling beyond her +power to endure. In the fact--thanks in large part to that +intoxication--it was certainly not unendurable. A human being, even an +innocent young girl, can usually bear up under any experience to which +a human being can be subjected. The general in pajamas--of the finest +silk and of pigeon's-egg blue with a vast gorgeous monogram on the +pocket--was more grotesque, rather than more repellent, than the +general in morning or evening attire. Also he--that is, his expert +staff of providers of luxury--had arranged for the bride a series of +the most ravishing sensations in whisking her, like the heroine of an +Arabian Night's tale, from straitened circumstances to the very +paradise of luxury. + +The general's ideas on the subject of woman were old fashioned, of the +hard-shell variety. Woman was made for luxury, and luxury was made for +woman. His woman must be the most divinely easeful of the luxurious. +At all times she must be fit and ready for any and every sybaritic idea +that might enter her husband's head--and other purpose she had none. +When she was not directly engaged in ministering to his joy she must be +busy preparing herself for his next call upon her. A woman was a +luxury, was the luxury of luxuries, must have and must use to their +uttermost all capacities for gratifying his senses and his vanity. +Alone with him, she must make him constantly feel how rich and rare and +expensive a prize he had captured. When others were about, she must be +constantly making them envy and admire him for having exclusive rights +in such wonderful preserves. All this with an inflexible devotion to +the loftiest ideals of chastity. + +But the first realizations of her husband's notions as to women were +altogether pleasant. As she entered the automobile in which they went +to the private car in the special train that took them to New York and +the steamer--as she entered that new and prodigally luxurious +automobile, she had a first, keen sense of her changed position. Then +there was the superb private car--her car, since she was his wife--and +there was the beautiful suite in the magnificent steamer. And at every +instant menials thrusting attentions upon her, addressing her as if she +were a queen, revealing in their nervous tones and anxious eyes their +eagerness to please, their fear of displeasing. And on the steamer, +from New York to Cherbourg, she was never permitted to lose sight of +the material splendors that were now hers. All the servants, all the +passengers, reminded her by their looks, their tones. At Paris, in the +hotel, in the restaurants, in the shops--especially in the shops--those +snobbish instincts that are latent in the sanest and the wisest of us +were fed and fattened and pampered until her head was quite turned. +And the general began to buy jewels for her. Such jewels--ropes of +diamonds and pearls and emeralds, rings such as she had never dreamed +existed! Those shopping excursions of theirs in the Rue de la Paix +would make such a tale as your ordinary simple citizen, ignorant of the +world's resources in luxury and therefore incredulous about them, would +read with a laugh at the extravagance of the teller. + +Before the intoxication of the wedding had worn away it was re-enforced +by the intoxication of the honeymoon--not an intoxication of love's +providing, but one exceeding potent in its influence upon our weak +human brains and hearts, one from which the strongest of us, instead of +sneering at poor Mildred, would better be praying to be delivered. + +At her marriage she had a few hundred dollars left of her +patrimony--three hundred and fifty and odd, to be more exact. She +spent a little money of her own here and there--in tips, in buying +presents for her mother, in picking up trifles for her own toilet. The +day came when she looked in her purse and found two one-franc pieces, a +fifty-franc note, and a few coppers. And suddenly she sat back and +stared, her mouth open like her almost empty gold bag, which the +general had bought her on their first day in the Rue de la Paix. About +ten dollars in all the world, and the general had forgotten to +speak--or to make any arrangement, at least any arrangement of which +she was aware--about a further supply of money. + +They had been married nearly a month. He knew that she was poor. Why +hadn't he said something or, better still, DONE something? Doubtless +he had simply forgotten. But since he had forgotten for a month, might +he not continue to forget? True, he had himself been poor at one time +in his life, very poor, and that for a long time. But it had been so +many years ago that he had probably lost all sense of the meaning of +poverty. She frowned at this evidence of his lack of the finer +sensibilities--by no means the first time that lack had been +disagreeably thrust upon her. Soon she would be without money--and she +must have money--not much, as all the serious expenses were looked +after by the general, but still a little money. How could she get it? +How could she remind him of his neglect without seeming to be +indelicate? It was a difficult problem. She worked at it more and +more continuously, and irritably, and nervously, as the days went by +and her fifty-two francs dwindled to five. + +She lay awake, planning long and elaborate conversations that would +imperceptibly lead him up to where he must see what she needed without +seeing that he had been led. She carried out these ingenious +conversations. She led him along, he docilely and unsuspectingly +following. She brought him up to where it seemed to her impossible for +any human being endowed with the ordinary faculties to fail to see what +was so plainly in view. All in vain. General William Siddall gazed +placidly--and saw nothing. + +Several days of these failures, and with her funds reduced to a +fifty-centime piece and a two-sous copper she made a frontal attack. +When they went forth for the day's shopping she left her gold bag +behind. After an hour or so she said: + +"I've got to go to the Galleries Lafayette for some little things. I +shan't ask you to sacrifice yourself. I know you hate those stuffy, +smelly big shops." + +"Very well," said he. "I'll use the time in a call on my bankers." + +As they were about to separate, she taking the motor and he walking, +she made a face of charming dismay and said: "How provoking! I've +left my bag at the hotel." + +Instead of the expected prompt offer of money he said, "It'll only take +you a minute or so to drive there." + +"But it's out of the way," she replied. "I'll need only a hundred +francs or so." + +Said he: "I've an account at the Bon Marche. Go there and have the +things charged. It's much the best big shop in Paris." + +"Very well," was all she could trust herself to say. She concealed her +anger beneath a careless smile and drove away. How dense he was! Could +anything be more exasperating--or more disagreeable? What SHOULD she +do? The situation was intolerable; yet how could it be ended, except +by a humiliating direct request for money? She wondered how young +wives habitually dealt with this problem, when they happened to marry +husbands so negligent, not to say underbred, as to cause them the +awkwardness and the shame. There followed several days during which +the money idea was an obsession, nagging and grinning at her every +instant. The sight of money gave her a peculiar itching sensation. +When the little general paid for anything--always drawing out a great +sheaf of bank notes in doing it--she flushed hot and cold, her glance +fell guiltily and sought the money furtively. At last her desperation +gave birth to an inspiration. + +About her and the general, or, rather, about the general, revolved the +usual rich man's small army of satellites of various +degrees--secretaries, butlers, footmen, valets, other servants male and +female, some of them supposed to be devoted entirely to her service, +but all in fact looking ever to the little general. The members of +this company, regardless of differences of rank and pay, were banded +together in a sort of democratic fellowship, talking freely with one +another, on terms of perfect equality. She herself had, curiously, +gotten on excellent terms with this motley fraternity and found no +small relief from the strain of the general's formal dignity in talking +with them with a freedom and ease she had never before felt in the +society of underlings. The most conspicuous and most agreeable figure +in this company was Harding, the general's factotum. Why not lay the +case before Harding? He was notably sensible, and sympathetic--and +discreet. + +The following day she did so. Said she, blushing furiously: "Mr. +Harding, I find myself in a very embarrassing position. I wonder if +you can help me?" + +Harding, a young man and of one of the best blond types, said: "No +doubt I can--and I'll be glad to." + +"The fact is"-- Her voice was trembling with nervousness. She opened +the gold bag, took out the little silver pieces and the big copper +piece, extended her pink palm with them upon it--"there's all I've got +left of the money I brought with me." + +Harding gazed at the exhibit tranquilly. He was chiefly remarkable for +his perfect self-possession. Said he: "Do you wish me to cash a check +for you?" + +The stupidity of men! Tears of vexation gathered in her eyes. When +she could speak she faltered: + +"No." + +He was looking at her now--a grave, kind glance. + +She somehow felt encouraged and heartened. She went on: "I was +hoping--that--that the gen--that my husband had said something to you +and that you perhaps had not thought to say anything to me." + +Their glances met, his movingly sympathetic and understanding, hers +piteously forlorn--the look of a lovely girl, stranded and friendless +in a far strange land. Presently he said gently: + +"Yes, he told me to say something to you--if you should speak to me +about this matter." His tone caused in her heart a horrible stillness +of suspense. He went on: "He said--I give you his exact words: 'If my +wife should ask you for money, tell her my ideas on the subject.'" + +A pause. She started up, crimson, her glance darting nervously this +way and that to avoid his. "Never mind. Really, it's of no +importance. Thank you--I'll get on very well--I'm sorry to have +troubled you--" + +"Pardon me, Mrs. Siddall," he interposed, "but I think you'd best let +me finish." + +She started to protest, she tried to move toward the door. Her +strength failed her, she sat down, waited, nervously clasping and +unclasping the costly, jewel-embroidered bag. + +"He has explained to me, many times," continued Harding, "that he +believes women do not understand the value of money and ought not to be +trusted with it. He proposes to provide everything for you, every +comfort and luxury--I am using his own language, Mrs. Siddall--and he +has open accounts at the principal shops in every city where you will +go--New York, Washington, Chicago, Denver, Paris, London, Rome. He says +you are at liberty to get practically anything you please at these +shops, and he will pay the bills. He thus entirely spares you the +necessity of ever spending any money. Should you see anything you wish +at some shop where he has no account, you can have it sent collect, and +I or my assistant, Mr. Drawl, will settle for it. All he asks is that +you use discretion in this freedom. He says it would be extremely +painful to him to have to withdraw it." + +Harding had pronounced this long speech in a dry monotonous voice, like +one reading mechanically from a dull book. As Mildred listened, her +thoughts began to whirl about the central idea until she fell into a +kind of stupor. When he finished she was staring vacantly at the bag +in her lap--the bag she was holding open wide. + +Harding continued: "He also instructed me to say something about his +former--his experiences. The first Mrs. Siddall he married when he was +very young and poor. As he grew rich, she became madly extravagant. +And as they had started on a basis on which she had free access to his +money he could not check her. The result, finally, was a succession of +bitter quarrels, and they were about to divorce when she died. He made +the second Mrs. Siddall an allowance, a liberal allowance. Her follies +compelled him to withdraw it. She resorted to underhanded means to get +money from him without his knowing it. He detected the fraud. After a +series of disagreeable incidents she committed the indiscretion which +caused him to divorce her. He says that these experiences have +convinced him that--" + +"The second Mrs. Siddall," interrupted Mildred, "is she still alive?" + +Harding hesitated. "Yes," he said reluctantly. + +"Is she--poor?" asked Mildred. + +"I should prefer not to--" + +"Did the general forbid you to tell me?" + +"On the contrary, he instructed me-- But I'd rather not talk about it, +Mrs. Siddall." + +"Is she poor?" repeated Mildred. + +"Yes." + +"What became of her?" + +A long pause. Then Harding said: "She was a poor girl when the +general married her. After the divorce she lived for a while with the +man. But he had nothing. They separated. She tried various kinds of +work--and other things. Since she lost her looks-- She writes from +time to time, asking for money." + +"Which she never gets?" said Mildred. + +"Which she never gets," said Harding. "Lately she was cashier or head +waitress in a cheap restaurant in St. Louis." + +After a long silence Mildred said: "I understand. I understand." She +drew a long breath. "I shall understand better as time goes on, but I +understand fairly well now." + +"I need not tell you, Mrs. Siddall," said Harding in his gentle, +tranquil way, "that the general is the kindest and most generous of +men, but he has his own methods--as who has not?" + +Mildred had forgotten that he was there--not a difficult matter, when +he had in its perfection the secretarial manner of complete +self-effacement. Said she reflectively, like one puzzling out a +difficult problem: + +"He buys a woman, as he buys a dog or a horse. He does not give his +dog, his horse, pocket-money. Why should he give his woman +pocket-money?" + +"Will it help matters, Mrs. Siddall, to go to the other extreme and do +him a grave injustice?" + +She did not hear. At the picture presented to her mind by her own +thoughts she gave a short satirical laugh. "How stupid of me not to +have understood from the outset," said she. "Why, I've often heard of +this very thing." + +"It is more and more the custom among men of large property, I +believe," said Harding. "Perhaps, Mrs. Siddall, you would not blame +them if you were in their position. The rich men who are +careless--they ruin everybody about them, I assure you. I've seen it +again and again." + +But the young wife was absorbed in her own thoughts. Harding, feeling +her mood, did not interrupt. After a while she said: + +"I must ask you some questions. These jewels the general has been +buying--" + +Harding made a movement of embarrassment and protest. She smiled +ironically and went on: + +"One moment, please. Every time I wish to wear any of them I have to +go to him to get them. He asks me to return them when I am undressing. +He says it is safer to keep everything in his strong box. I have been +assuming that that was the only reason. I begin to suspect-- Am I +right, Mr. Harding?" + +"Really I can't say, Mrs. Siddall," said Harding. "These are not +matters to discuss with me, if you will permit me to say so." + +"Oh, yes, they are," replied she laughingly. "Aren't we all in the same +boat?--all employes of the general?" + +Harding made no reply. + +Mildred was beside herself with a kind of rage that, because outlet was +necessary and because raving against the little general would be +absolutely futile, found outlet in self-mockery and reckless sarcasm. + +"I understand about the jewels, too," she went on. "They are not mine. +Nothing is mine. Everything, including myself, belongs to him. If I +give satisfaction in the position for which I've been hired for my +board and clothes, I may continue to eat the general's food and sleep +in the general's house and wear the general's jewels and dresses and +ride in the general's traps and be waited on by the general's servants. +If I don't like my place or he doesn't like my way of filling it"--she +laughed merrily, mockingly--"out I go--into the streets--after the +second Mrs. Siddall. And the general will hire a new--" She paused, +cast about for a word in vain, appealed to the secretary, "What would +you call it, Mr. Harding?" + +Harding rose, looking at her with a very soothing tranquillity. "If I +were you, Mrs. Siddall," said he, "I should get into the auto and go +for a long drive--out to the Bois--out to Versailles--a long, long +drive. I should be gone four or five hours at least, and I should look +at the thing from all sides. Especially, I'd look at it from HIS +standpoint." + +Mildred, somewhat quieter, but still mocking, said: "If I should decide +to quit, would my expenses be paid back to where I was engaged? I +fancy not." + +Harding looked grave. "If you had had money enough to pay your own +expenses about, would you have married him?" said he. "Isn't he +paying--paying liberally, Mrs. Siddall--for ALL he gets?" + +Mildred, stung, drew herself up haughtily, gave him a look that +reminded him who she was and who he was. But Harding was not impressed. + +"You said a moment ago--truly--that we are all in the same boat," +observed he. "I put those questions to you because I honestly wish to +help you--because I wish you not to act foolishly, hastily." + +"Thank you, Mr. Harding," said Mildred coldly. And with a slight nod +she went, angry and ashamed that she had so unaccountably opened up her +secret soul, bared its ugly wounds, before a man she knew so slightly, +a man in a position but one remove from menial. However, she took his +advice--not as to trying to view the matter from all sides, for she was +convinced that there was only the one side, but as to calming herself +by a long drive alone in the woods and along quiet roads. When she +returned she was under control once more. + +She found the general impatiently awaiting her. Many packages had +come--from the jewelers, from the furriers, from a shop whose specialty +was the thinnest and most delicate of hand-made underwear. The general +loved to open and inspect finery for her--loved it more than he loved +inspecting finery for himself, because feminine finery was far more +attractive than masculine. To whet his pleasure to the keenest she +must be there to admire with him, to try on, to exhibit. As she +entered the salon where the little man was fussing about among the +packages, their glances met. She saw that Harding had told him--at +least in discreet outline--of their conversation. She also saw that if +she reopened the subject she would find herself straightway whirled out +upon a stormy sea of danger that might easily overwhelm her flimsy +boat. She silently and sullenly dropped into her place; she ministered +to the general's pleasure in packages of finery. But she did not +exclaim, or admire, or respond in any way. The honeymoon was over. Her +dream of wifehood was dissipated. + +She understood now the look she so often had seen on the faces of rich +men's poor wives driving in state in Fifth Avenue. That night, as she +inspected herself in the glass while the general's maid for her brushed +her long thick hair, she saw the beginnings of that look in her own +face. "I don't know just what I am," she said to herself. "But I do +know what I am not. I am not a wife." + +She sent away the maid, and sat there in the dressing-room before the +mirror, waiting, her glance traveling about and noting the profuse and +prodigal luxury. In the corner stood a circular rack loaded with +dressing-gowns--more than a score of exquisite combinations of silk and +lace or silk and chiffon. It so happened that there was nowhere in +sight a single article of her apparel or for her toilet that was not +bought with the general's money. No, there were some hairpins that she +had paid for herself, and a comb with widely separated teeth that she +had chanced to see in a window when she was alone one day. Anything +else? Yes, a two-franc box of pins. And that was all. Everything else +belonged to the general. In the closets, in the trunks--all the +general's, part of the trousseau he had paid for. Not an undergarment; +not an outer garment; not a hat or a pair of shoes, not a wrap, not a +pair of gloves. All, the general's. + +He was in the door of the dressing-room--the small wiry figure in +rose-silk pajamas. The mustache and imperial were carefully waxed as +always, day and night. On the little feet were high-heeled slippers. On +the head was a rose-silk Neapolitan nightcap with gay tassel. The +nightcap hid the bald spot from which the lofty toupee had been +removed. A grotesque little figure, but not grotesque to her. Through +the mask of the vain, boastful little face she saw the general watching +her, as she had seen him that afternoon when she came in--the +mysterious and terrible personality that had made the vast fortune, +that had ridden ruthlessly over friend and foe, over man and woman and +child--to the goal of its desires. + +"It's late, my dear?" said the little man. "Come to bed." + +She rose to obey--she in the general's purchases of filmy nightgown +under a pale-pink silk dressing-gown. + +He smiled with that curious noiseless mumbling and smacking of the thin +lips. She sat down again. + +"Don't keep me waiting. It's chilly," he said, advancing toward her. + +"I shall sleep in here to-night--on the couch," said she. She was +trembling with fright at her own audacity. She could see a +fifty-centime piece and a copper dancing before her eyes. She felt +horribly alone and weak, but she had no desire to retract the words +with which she had thrown down the gauntlet. + +The little general halted. The mask dropped; the man, the monster, +looked at her. "What's the matter?" said he in an ominously quiet +voice. + +"Mr. Harding delivered your message to-day," said she, and her steady +voice astonished her. "So I am going back home." + +He waited, looking steadily at her. + +"After he told me and I thought about it, I decided to submit, but just +now I saw that I couldn't. I don't know what possesses me. I don't +know what I'm going to do, or how I'm going to do it. But it's all +over between us." She said this rapidly, fluently, in a decisive way, +quite foreign to her character as she had thought it. + +"You are coming to bed, where you belong," said he quietly. + +"No," replied she, pressing herself against her chair as if force were +being used to drag her from it. She cast about for something that +would make yielding impossible. "You are--repulsive to me." + +He looked at her without change of countenance. Said he: "Come to bed. +I ask you for the last time." + +There was no anger in his voice, no menace either open or covert; +simply finality--the last word of the man who had made himself feared +and secure in the mining-camps where the equation of personal courage +is straightway applied to every situation. Mildred shivered. She +longed to yield, to stammer out some excuse and obey him. But she +could not; nor was she able to rise from her chair. She saw in his +hard eyes a look of astonishment, of curiosity as to this unaccountable +defiance in one who had seemed docile, who had apparently no +alternative but obedience. He was not so astonished at her as she was +at herself. "What is to become of me?" her terror-stricken soul was +crying. "I must do as he says--I must--yet I cannot!" And she looked at +him and sat motionless. + +He turned away, moved slowly toward the door, halted at the threshold +to give her time, was gone. A fit of trembling seized her; she leaned +forward and rested her arms upon the dressing-table or she would have +fallen from the chair to the floor. Yet, even as her fear made her +sick and weak, she knew that she would not yield. + +The cold drove her to the couch, to lie under half a dozen of the +dressing-gowns and presently to fall into a sleep of exhaustion. When +she awoke after what she thought was a few minutes of unconsciousness, +the clamor of traffic in the Rue de Rivoli startled her. She started +up, glanced at the clock on the chimneypiece. It was ten minutes past +nine! When, by all the rules governing the action of the nerves, she +ought to have passed a wakeful night she had overslept more than an +hour. Indeed, she had had the first sound and prolonged sleep that had +come to her since the honeymoon began; for until then she had slept +alone all her life and the new order had almost given her chronic +insomnia. She rang for her maid and began to dress. The maid did not +come. She rang again and again; apparently the bell was broken. She +finished dressing and went out into the huge, grandly and gaudily +furnished salon. Harding was at a carved old-gold and lacquer desk, +writing. As she entered he rose and bowed. + +"Won't you please call one of the servants?" said she. "I want my +coffee. I guess the bell in my room is broken. My maid doesn't +answer." + +"No, the bell is not broken," said Harding. + +She looked at him questioningly. + +"The general has issued an order that nothing is to be done in this +apartment, and nothing served, unless he personally authorizes it." + +Mildred paled, drew herself up in what seemed a gesture of haughtiness +but was an effort to muster her strength. To save herself from the +humiliation of a breakdown before him, she hastily retreated by the way +she had come. After perhaps a quarter of an hour she reappeared in the +salon; she was now dressed for the street. Harding looked up from his +writing, rose and bowed gravely. Said she: + +"I am going out for a walk. I'll be back in an hour or so." + +"One moment," said Harding, halting her as she was opening the door +into the public hall. "The general has issued an order that if you go +out, you are not to be allowed to return." + +Her hand fell from the knob. With flashing eyes she cried, "But that +is impossible!" + +"It is his orders," said Harding, in his usual quiet manner. "And as +he pays the bills he will be obeyed." + +She debated. Against her will, her trembling hand sought the knob +again. Against her will, her weak arm began to draw the door open. +Harding came toward her, stood before her and looked directly into her +eyes. His eyes had dread and entreaty in them, but his voice was as +always when he said: + +"You know him, Mrs. Siddall." + +"Yes," she said. + +"The reason he has got ALL he wanted--whatever he wanted--is that he +will go to any length. Every other human being, almost, has a limit, +beyond which they will not go--a physical fear or a moral fear or a +fear of public opinion. But the general--he has no limit." + +"Yes," she said. And deathly pale and almost staggering she drew open +the door and went out into the public hall. + +"For God's sake, Mrs. Siddall!" cried Harding, in great agitation. +"Come in quickly. They are watching--they will tell him! Are you mad?" + +"I think I must be," said she. "I am sick with fear. I can hardly keep +from dropping down here in a faint. Yet--" a strange look, a mingling +of abject terror and passionate defiance, gave her an aspect quite +insane--"I am going. Perhaps I, too, have no limit." + +And she went along the corridor, past a group of gaping and frightened +servants, down the stairway and out by the private entrance for the +grand apartments of the hotel in the Rue Raymond de l'Isle. She +crossed the Rue de Rivoli and entered the Tuileries Gardens. It was +only bracingly cool in the sunshine of that winter day. She seated +herself on a chair on the terrace to regain her ebbed strength. Hardly +had she sat down when the woman collector came and stood waiting for +the two sous for the chair. Mildred opened her bag, found two coins. +She gave the coppers to the woman. The other--all the money she +had--was the fifty-centime piece. + +"But the bag--I can get a good deal for that," she said aloud. + +"I beg your pardon--I didn't catch that." + +She came back to a sense of her surroundings. Stanley Baird was +standing a few feet away, smiling down at her. He was, if possible, +even more attractively dressed than in the days when he hovered about +her, hoping vague things of which he was ashamed and trying to get the +courage to put down his snobbishness and marry her because she so +exactly suited him. He was wearing a new kind of collar and tie, +striking yet in excellent quiet taste. Also, his face and figure had +filled out just enough--he had been too thin in the former days. But +he was now entered upon that period of the fearsome forties when, +unless a man amounts to something, he begins to look insignificant. He +did not amount to anything; he was therefore paling and waning as a +personality. + +"Was I thinking aloud?" said Mildred, as she gave him her hand. + +"You said something about 'getting a good deal.'" He inspected her with +the freedom of an old friend and with the thoroughness of a +connoisseur. Women who took pains with themselves and were satisfied +with the results liked Stanley Baird's knowing and appreciative way of +noting the best points in their toilets. "You're looking fine," +declared he. "It must be a pleasure to them up in the Rue de la Paix +to dress you. That's more than can be said for nine out of ten of the +women who go there. Yes, you're looking fine--and in grand health, +too. Why, you look younger than I ever saw you. Nothing like marriage +to freshen a girl up. Well, I suppose waiting round for a husband who +may or may not turn up does wear a woman down." + +"It almost killed me," laughed Mildred. "And you were largely +responsible." + +"I?" said Baird. "You didn't want me. I was too old for you." + +"No, I didn't want you," said Mildred. "But you spoiled me. I +couldn't endure the boys of my own age." + +Stanley was remembering that Mildred had married a man much older than +he. With some notion of a careless sort of tact in mind he said, "I +was betwixt and between--neither young enough nor old enough." + +"You've married, too, since we met. By the way, thank you again for +that charming remembrance. You always did have such good taste. But +why didn't you come to the wedding--you and your wife?" + +He laughed. "We were busy busting up," said he. "You hadn't heard? +It's been in the papers. She's gone back to her people. Oh, nothing +disgraceful on either side. Simply that we bored each other to death. +She was crazy about horses and dogs, and that set. I think the +stable's the place for horses--don't care to have 'em parading through +the house all the time, every room, every meal, sleeping and waking. +And dogs--the infernal brutes always have fleas. Fleas only tickled +her, but they bite me--raise welts and hills. There's your husband +now, isn't it?" + +Baird was looking up at the windows of the Continental, across the +street. Mildred's glance slowly and carelessly followed his. At one +window stood the little general, gazing abstractedly out over the +gardens. At another window Mildred saw Harding; at a third, her maid; +at a fourth, Harding's assistant, Drawl; at a fifth, three servants of +the retinue. Except the general, all were looking at her. + +"You've married a very extraordinary man," said Baird, in a correct +tone of admiration. "One of the ablest and most interesting men we've +got, _I_ think." + +"So you are free again?" said Mildred, looking at him with a queer, +cold smile. + +"Yes, and no," replied Stanley. "I hope to be entirely free. It's her +move next. I'm expecting it every day. But I'm thoroughly +respectable. Won't you and the general dine with me?" + +"Thanks, but I'm sailing for home to-morrow or next day." + +"That's interesting," said Baird, with enthusiasm. "So am I. What ship +do you go on?" + +"I don't know yet. I'm to decide this afternoon, after lunch." She +laughed. "I'm sitting here waiting for someone to ask me to lunch. +I've not had even coffee yet." + +"Lunch with me!" cried Baird. "I'll go get the general--I know him +slightly." + +"I didn't say anything about the general," said Mildred. + +Stanley smiled apologetically. "It wouldn't do for you to go about +with me--not when my missus is looking for grounds for divorce." + +"Why not?" said Mildred. "So's my husband." + +"You busted up, too? Now, that's what _I_ call jolly." And he cast a +puzzled glance up at the abstracted general. "I say, Mildred, this is +no place for either of us, is it?" + +"I'd rather be where there's food," confessed she. + +"You think it's a joke, but I assure you-- Oh, you WERE joking--about +YOUR bust-up?" + +"No, indeed," she assured him. "I walked out a while ago, and I +couldn't go back if I would--and I don't think I would if I could." + +"That's foolish. Better go back," advised he. He was preparing +hastily to decamp from so perilous a neighborhood. "One marriage is +about like another, once you get through the surface. I'm sure you'll +be better off than--back with your stepfather." + +"I've no intention of going to his house," she declared. "Oh, there's +your brother. I forgot." + +"So had I forgotten him. I'll not go there, either. In fact, I've not +thought where I'll go." + +"You seem to have done mighty little thinking before you took a very +serious step for a woman." He was uneasily eying the rigid, abstracted +little figure a story up across the way. + +"Those things aren't a question of thinking," said she absently. "I +never thought in my life--don't think I could if I tried. But when the +time came I--I walked out." She came back to herself, laughed. "I +don't understand why I'm telling you all this, especially as you're mad +with fright and wild to get away. Well, good-by, Stanley." + +He lifted his hat. "Good-by. We'll meet when we can do so without my +getting a scandal on you." He walked a few paces, turned, and came +back. "By the way, I'm sailing on the Deutschland. I thought you'd +like to know--so that you and I wouldn't by any chance cross on the +same boat." + +"Thanks," said she dryly. + +"What's the matter?" asked he, arrested, despite his anxiety to be +gone, by the sad, scornful look in her eyes. + +"Nothing. Why?" + +"You had such a--such a queer look." + +"Really? Good-by." + +In fact, she had thought--had hoped for the sake of her liking for +him--that he had come back to make the glaringly omitted offer of help +that should have come from any human being learning that a fellow being +was in the precarious position in which she had told him she was. Not +that she would have accepted any such offer. Still, she would have +liked to have heard the kindly words. She sat watching his handsome, +graceful figure, draped in the most artistically cut of long dark +overcoats, until he disappeared in the crowd in the Rue de Castiglione. +Then, without a glance up at the interested, not to say excited windows +of the general's splendid and spreading apartments, she strolled down +the gardens toward the Place Concorde. In Paris the beautiful, on a +bright and brisk day it is all but impossible to despair when one still +has left youth and health. Mildred was not happy--far from it. The +future, the immediate future, pressed its terrors upon her. But in +mitigation there was, perhaps born of youth and inexperience, a giddy +sense of relief. She had not realized how abhorrent the general +was--married life with the general. She had been resigning herself to +it, accepting it as the only thing possible, keeping it heavily draped +with her vanities of wealth and luxury--until she discovered that the +wealth and the luxury were in reality no more hers than they were her +maid's. And now she was free! + +That word free did not have its full meaning for her. She had never +known what real freedom was; women of the comfortable class--and men, +too, for that matter--usually are born into the petty slavery of +conventions at least, and know nothing else their whole lives +through--never know the joy of the thought and the act of a free mind +and a free heart. Still, she was released from a bondage that seemed +slavish even to her, and the release gave her a sensation akin to the +joy of freedom. A heavy hand that was crushing her very soul had been +lifted off--no, FLUNG off, and by herself. That thought, terrifying +though it was, also gave her a certain new and exalting self-respect. +After all, she was not a worm. She must have somewhere in her the +germs of something less contemptible than the essential character of so +many of the eminently respectable women she knew. She could picture +them in the situation in which she had found herself. What would they +have done? Why, what every instinct of her education impelled her to +do; what some latent love of freedom, some unsuspected courage of +self-respect had forbidden her to do, had withheld her from doing. + +Her thoughts and the gorgeous sunshine and her youth and health put her +in a steadily less cheerless mood as by a roundabout way she sought the +shop of the jeweler who sold the general the gold bag she had selected. +The proprietor himself was in the front part of the shop and received +"Madame la Generale" with all the honors of her husband's wealth. She +brought no experience and no natural trading talent to the enterprise +she was about to undertake; so she went directly to the main point. + +"This bag," said she, laying it upon the glass between them, "I bought +it here a short time ago." + +"I remember perfectly, madame. It is the handsomest, the most +artistic, we have sold this year." + +"I wish to sell it back to you," said she. + +"You wish to get something else and include it as part payment, madame?" + +"No, I wish to get the money for it." + +"Ah, but that is difficult. We do not often make those arrangements. +Second-hand articles--" + +"But the bag is quite new. Anyhow, it must have some value. Of course +I'd not expect the full price." + +The jeweler smiled. "The full price? Ah, madame, we should not think +of offering it again as it is. We should--" + +"No matter," interrupted Mildred. The man's expression--the normally +pleasant and agreeable countenance turned to repulsive by craft and +lying--made her eager to be gone. "What is the most you will give me?" + +"I shall have to consider--" + +"I've only a few minutes. Please do not irritate me." + +The man was studying her countenance with a desperate look. Why was +she, the bride of the monstrously rich American, why was she trying to +sell the bag? Did it mean the end of her resources? Or, were there +still huge orders to be got from her? His shrewdness, trained by +thirty years of dealing with all kinds of luxurious human beings, went +exploring in vain. He was alarmed by her frown. He began hesitatingly: + +"The jewels and the gold are only a small part of the value. The chief +value is the unique design, so elegant yet so simple. For the jewels +and the gold, perhaps two thousand francs--" + +"The purse was twelve thousand francs," interrupted she. + +"Perfectly, madame. But--" "I am in great haste. How much will you +give me?" + +"The most would be four thousand, I fear. I shall count up more +carefully, if madame will--" + +"No, four thousand will do." + +"I will send the money to madame at her hotel. The Continental, is it +not?" + +"No, I must have it at once." + +The jeweler hesitated. Mildred, flushing scarlet with shame--but he +luckily thought it anger--took up the bag and moved toward the door. + +"Pardon, madame, but certainly. Do you wish some gold or all notes?" + +"Notes," answered she. "Fifty and hundred-franc notes." + +A moment later she was in the street with the notes in a small bundle +in the bosom of her wrap. She went hurriedly up the street. As she +was about to turn the corner into the boulevard she on impulse glanced +back. An automobile had just drawn up at the jeweler's door and General +Siddall--top-hat, sable-lined overcoat, waxed mustache and imperial, +high-heeled boots, gold-mounted cane--was descending. And she knew +that he had awakened to his one oversight, and was on his way to repair +it. But she did not know that the jeweler--old and wise in human +ways--would hastily vanish with the bag and that an assistant would +come forward with assurances that madame had not been in the shop and +that, if she should come in, no business would be negotiated without +the general's express consent. She all but fainted at the narrowness +of her escape and fled round into the boulevard. She entered a taxi +and told the man to drive to Foyot's restaurant on the left bank--where +the general would never think of looking for her. + +When she had breakfasted she strolled in the Luxembourg Gardens, in +even better humor with herself and with the world. There was still +that horrid-faced future, but it was not leering into her very face. It +was nearly four thousand francs away--"and if I hadn't been so stupid, +I'd have got eight thousand, I'm sure," she said. But she was rather +proud of a stupidity about money matters. And four thousand francs, +eight hundred dollars--that was quite a good sum. + +She had an instinct that the general would do something disagreeable +about the French and English ports of departure for America. But +perhaps he would not think of the Italian ports. That night she set +out for Genoa, and three days later, in a different dress and with her +hair done as she never wore it, sailed as Miss Mary Stevens for America +on a German Mediterranean boat. + +She had taken the whole of a cabin on the quieter deck below the +promenade, paying for it nearly half of what was left of the four +thousand francs. The first three days she kept to her cabin except at +the dinner-hour, when she ventured to the deck just outside and walked +up and down for exercise. Then followed four days of nasty weather +during which she did not leave her bed. As the sea calmed, she, +wretched and reckless, had a chair put for herself under her window and +sat there, veiled and swathed and turning her face away whenever a rare +wandering passenger happened to pass along. Toward noon a man paused +before her to light a cigarette. She, forgetting for the moment her +precautions, looked at him. It chanced that he looked at her at +exactly the same instant. Their glances met. He started nervously, +moved on a few steps, returned. Said she mockingly: + +"You know you needn't speak if you don't want to, Stanley." + +"There isn't a soul on board that anybody ever knew or that ever knew +anybody," said he. "So why not?" + +"And you look horribly bored." + +"Unspeakably," replied Baird. "I've spoken to no one since I left +Paris." + +"What are you doing on this ship?" inquired she. + +"To be perfectly honest," said he, "I came this way to avoid you. I +was afraid you'd take passage on my steamer just to amuse yourself with +my nervousness. And--here you are!" + +"Amusing myself with your nervousness." + +"But I'm not nervous. There's no danger. Will you let me have a chair +put beside yours?" + +"It will be a charity on your part," said she. + +When he was comfortably settled, he explained his uneasiness. "I see +I've got to tell you," said he, "for I don't want you to think me a +shouting ass. The fact is my wife wants to get a divorce from me and +to soak me for big alimony. She's a woman who'll do anything to gain +her end, and--well, for some reason she's always been jealous of you. I +didn't care to get into trouble, or to get you into trouble." + +"I'm traveling as Mary Stevens," said Mildred. "No one knows I'm +aboard." + +"Oh, I'm sure we're quite safe. We can enjoy the rest of this voyage." + +A sea voyage not merely induces but compels a feeling of absolute +detachment from the world. To both Stanley and Mildred their +affairs--the difficulties in which they were involved on terra +firma--ceased for the time to have any reality. The universe was +nothing but a vast stretch of water under a vast stretch of sky; the +earth and the things thereof were a retrospect and a foreboding. +Without analyzing it, both he and she felt that they were free--free +from cares, from responsibilities--free to amuse themselves. And they +proceeded to enjoy themselves in the necessarily quiet and limited way +imposed by the littleness of their present world and the meagerness of +the resources. + +As neither had the kind of mind that expands in abstractions, they were +soon talking in the most intimate and personal way about +themselves--were confessing things which neither would have breathed to +anyone on land. It was the man who set the example of breaking through +the barriers of conventional restraint--perhaps of delicacy, though it +must be said that human beings are rarely so fine in their reticences +as the theory of refinement would have us believe. Said Stanley, after +the preliminaries of partial confidence and halting avowal that could +not be omitted, even at sea, by a man of "gentlemanly instinct": + +"I don't know why I shouldn't own up. I know you'll never tell +anybody. Fact is, I and my wife were never in love with each other for +a second. We married because we were in the same set and because our +incomes together gave us enough to do the thing rather well." After a +solemn pause. "I was in love with another woman--one I couldn't marry. +But I'll not go into that. As for my wife, I don't think she was in +love with anyone. She's as cold as a stone." + +Mildred smiled ironically. + +Baird saw and flushed. "At least, she was to me. I was ready to make a +sort of bluff. You see, a man feels guilty in those circumstances and +doesn't want to humiliate a woman. But she--" he laughed +unpleasantly--"she wasn't bothering about MY feelings. That's a nice, +selfish little way you ladies have." + +"She probably saw through you and hated you for playing the hypocrite +to her," said Mildred. + +"You may be right, I never thought of that," confessed he. "She +certainly had a vicious way of hammering the other woman indirectly. +Not that she ever admitted being jealous. I guess she knew. Everybody +usually knows everything." + +"And there was a great deal of talk about you and me," said Mildred +placidly. + +"I didn't say it was you," protested Stanley, reddening. + +"No matter," said Mildred. "Don't bother about that. It's all past +and gone." + +"Well, at any rate, my marriage was the mistake of my life. I'm +determined that she shan't trip me up and trim me for any alimony. And +as matters stand, she can't. She left me of her own accord." + +"Then," said Mildred thoughtfully, "if the wife leaves of her own +accord, she can't get alimony?" + +"Certainly not--not a cent." + +"I supposed so," said she. "I'm not sure I'd take it if I could get +it. Still, I suppose I would." She laughed. "What's the use of being +a hypocrite with oneself? I know I would. All I could get." + +"Then you had no LEGAL excuse for leaving?" + +"No," said she. "I--just bolted. I don't know what's to become of me. +I seem not to care, at present, but no doubt I shall as soon as we see +land again." + +"You'll go back to him," said Stanley. + +"No," replied she, without emphasis or any accent whatever. + +"Sure you will," rejoined he. "It's your living. What else can you do?" + +"That's what I must find out. Surely there's something else for a +woman besides such a married life as mine. I can't and won't go back +to my husband. And I can't and won't go to the house at Hanging Rock. +Those two things are settled." + +"You mean that?" + +"Absolutely. And I've got--less than three hundred and fifty dollars +in the whole world." + +Baird was silent. He was roused from his abstraction by gradual +consciousness of an ironical smile on the face of the girl, for she did +not look like a married woman. "You are laughing at me. Why?" +inquired he. + +"I was reading your thoughts." + +"You think you've frightened me?" + +"Naturally. Isn't a confession such as I made enough to frighten a +man? It sounded as though I were getting ready to ask alms." + +"So it did," said he. "But I wasn't thinking of it in that way. You +WILL be in a frightful fix pretty soon, won't you?" + +"It looks that way. But you need not be uneasy." + +"Oh, I want to help you. I'll do everything I can. I was trying to +think of something you could make money at. I was thinking of the +stage, but I suppose you'd balk at that. I'll admit it isn't the life +for a lady. But the same thing's true of whatever money can be made +at. If I were you, I'd go back." + +"If I were myself, I'd go back," said Mildred. "But I'm not myself." + +"You will be again, as soon as you face the situation." + +"No," said she slowly, "no, I shall never be myself again." + +"But you could have everything a woman wants. Except, of +course--perhaps-- But you never struck me as being especially +sentimental." + +"Sentiment has nothing to do with it," rejoined she. "Do you think I +could get a place on the stage?" + +"Oh, you'd have to study a while, I suppose." + +"But I can't afford that. If I could afford to study, I'd have my +voice trained." + +Baird's face lighted up with enthusiasm. "The very thing!" he cried. +"You've got a voice, a grand-opera voice. I've heard lots of people +say so, and it sounded that way to me. You must cultivate your voice." + +Mildred laughed. "Don't talk nonsense. Even I know that's nonsense. +The lessons alone would cost thousands of dollars. And how could I +live for the four or five years?" + +"You didn't let me finish," said Baird. "I was going to say that when +you get to New York you must go and have your voice passed on--by some +impartial person. If that person says it's worth cultivating, why, I'm +willing to back you--as a business proposition. I can afford to take +the risk. So, you see, it's all perfectly simple." + +He had spoken rapidly, with a covert suggestion of fear lest she would +rebuke him sharply for what she might regard as an impertinent offer. +She surprised him by looking at him calmly, reflectively, and saying: + +"Yes, you could afford it, couldn't you?" + +"I'm sure I could. And it's the sort of thing that's done every day. +Of course, no one'd know that we had made this little business +arrangement. But that's easily managed. I'd be glad if you'd let me +do it, Mildred. I'd like to feel that I was of some use in the world. +And I'd like to do something for YOU." + +By way of exceedingly cautious experiment he ventured to put ever so +slight an accent of tenderness upon the "you." He observed her +furtively but nervously. He could not get a hint of what was in her +mind. She gazed out toward the rising and falling horizon line. +Presently she said: + +"I'll think about it." + +"You must let me do it, Mildred. It's the sensible thing--and you know +me well enough to know that my friendship can be counted on." + +"I'll think about it," was all she would concede. + +They discussed the singing career all that and the succeeding days--the +possibilities, the hopes, the dangers--but the hopes a great deal more +than the dangers. He became more and more interested in her and in the +project, as her beauty shone out with the tranquillizing sea and as her +old charm of cleverness at saying things that amused him reasserted +itself. She, dubious and lukewarm at first, soon was trying to curb +her own excited optimism; but long before they sighted Sandy Hook she +was merely pretending to hang back. He felt discouraged by her parting! +"If I decide to go on, I'll write you in a few days." But he need not +have felt so. She had made up her mind to accept his offer. As for +the complications involved in such curiously intimate relations with a +man of his temperament, habits, and inclinations, she saw them very +vaguely indeed--refused to permit herself to see them any less vaguely. +Time enough to deal with complications when and as they arose; why +needlessly and foolishly annoy herself and hamper herself? Said she to +herself, "I must begin to be practical." + + + +IV + +AT the pier Mildred sent her mother a telegram, giving the train by +which she would arrive--that and nothing more. As she descended from +the parlor-car there stood Mrs. Presbury upon the platform, face +wreathed in the most joyous of welcoming smiles, not a surface trace of +the curiosity and alarm storming within. After they had kissed and +embraced with a genuine emotion which they did not try to hide, because +both suddenly became unconscious of that world whereof ordinarily they +were constantly mindful--after caresses and tears Mrs. Presbury said: + +"It's all very well to dress plain, when everyone knows you can afford +the best. But don't you think you're overdoing it a little?" + +Mildred laughed somewhat nervously. "Wait till we're safe at home," +said she. + +On the way up from the station in the carriage they chattered away in +the liveliest fashion, to make the proper impression upon any observing +Hanging-Rockers. "Luckily, Presbury's gone to town to-day," said his +wife. "But really he's quite livable--hasn't gone back to his old +ways. He doesn't know it, but he's rapidly growing deaf. He imagines +that everyone is speaking more and more indistinctly, and he has lost +interest in conversation. Then, too, he has done well in Wall Street, +and that has put him in a good humor." + +"He'll not be surprised to see me--alone," said Mildred. + +"Wait till we're home," said her mother nervously. + +At the house Mrs. Presbury carried on a foolish, false-sounding +conversation for the benefit of the servants, and finally conducted +Mildred to her bedroom and shut doors and drew portieres and glanced +into closets before saying: "Now, what IS the matter, Millie? WHERE is +your husband?" + +"In Paris, I suppose," replied Mildred. "I have left him, and I shall +never go back." + +"Presbury said you would!" cried her mother. "But I didn't believe it. +I don't believe it. I brought you up to do your duty, and I know you +will." + +This was Mildred's first opportunity for frank and plain speaking; and +that is highly conducive to frank and plain thinking. She now began to +see clearly why she had quit the general. Said she: "Mamma, to be +honest and not mince words, I've left him because there's nothing in +it." + +"Isn't he rich?" inquired her mother. "I've always had a kind of +present--" + +"Oh, he's rich, all right," interrupted the girl. "But he saw to it +that I got no benefit from that." + +"But you wrote me how he was buying you everything!" + +"So I thought. In fact he was buying ME nothing." And she went on to +explain the general's system. + +Her mother listened impatiently. She would have interrupted the long +and angry recital many times had not Mildred insisted on a full hearing +of her grievances, of the outrages that had been heaped upon her. +"And," she ended, "I suppose he's got it so arranged that he could have +me arrested as a thief for taking the gold bag." + +"Yes, it's terrible and all that," said her mother. "But I should have +thought living with me here when Presbury was carrying on so dreadfully +would have taught you something. Your case isn't an exception, any +more than mine is. That's the sort of thing we women have to put up +with from men, when we're in their power." + +"Not I," said Mildred loftily. + +"Yes, you," retorted her mother. "ANY woman. EVERY woman. Unless we +have money of our own, we all have trouble with the men about money, +sooner or later, in one way or another. And rich men!--why, it's +notorious that they're always more or less mean about money. A wife has +got to use tact. Why, I even had to use some tact with your father, +and he was as generous a man as ever lived. Tact--that's a woman's +whole life. You ought to have used tact. You'll go back to him and use +tact." + +"You don't know him, mamma!" cried Mildred. "He's a monster. He isn't +human." + +Mrs. Presbury drew a long face and said in a sad, soothing voice: "Yes, +I know, dear. Men are very, very awful, in some ways, to a nice +woman--with refined, ladylike instincts. It's a great shock to a +pure--" + +"Oh, gammon!" interrupted Mildred. "Don't be silly, mother. It isn't +worth while for one woman to talk that kind of thing to another. I +didn't fully know what I was doing when I married a man I didn't +love--a man who was almost repulsive to me. But I knew enough. And I +was getting along well enough, as any woman does, no matter what she +may say--yes, you needn't look shocked, for that's hypocrisy, and I +know it now-- But, as I was saying, I didn't begin to HATE him until +he tried to make a slave of me. A slave!" she shuddered. "He's a +monster!" + +"A little tact, and you can get everything you want," insisted her +mother. + +"I tell you, you don't know the man," cried Mildred. "By tact I suppose +you mean I could have sold things behind his back--and all that." She +laughed. "He hasn't got any back. He had it so arranged that those +cold, wicked eyes of his were always watching me. His second wife +tried 'tact.' He caught her and drove her into the streets. I'd have +had no chance to get a cent, and if I had gotten it I'd not have dared +spend it. Do you imagine I ran away from him without having THOUGHT? +If there'd been any way of staying on, any way of making things even +endurable, I'd have stayed." + +"But you've got to go back, Milly," cried her mother, in tears. + +"You mean that you can't support me?" + +"And your brother Frank--" Mrs. Presbury's eyes flashed and her rather +stout cheeks quivered. "I never thought I'd tell anybody, but I'll +tell you. I never liked your brother Frank, and he never liked me. +That sounds dreadful, doesn't it?" + +"No, mother dear," said Mildred gently. "I've learned that life isn't +at all as--as everybody pretends." + +"Indeed it isn't," said her mother. "Mothers always have favorites +among their children, and very often a mother dislikes one of her +children. Of course she hides her feeling and does her duty. But all +the same she can't help the feeling that is down in her heart. I had a +presentiment before he was born that I wouldn't like him, and sure +enough, I didn't. And he didn't like me, or his father, or any of us." + +"It would never occur to me to turn to him," said Mildred. + +"Then you see that you've got to go back to the general. You can't get +a divorce and alimony, for it was you that left him--and for no cause. +He was within his rights." + +Mildred hesitated, confessed: "I had thought of going back to him and +acting in such a way that he'd be glad to give me a divorce and an +allowance." + +"Yes, you might do that," said her mother. "A great many women do. +And, after all, haven't they a right to? A lady has got to have proper +support, and is it just to ask her to live with a man she loathes?" + +"I haven't thought of the right or wrong of it," said Mildred. "It +looks to me as though right and wrong have very little to do with life +as it's lived. They're for hypocrites--and fools." + +"Mildred!" exclaimed her mother, deeply shocked. + +Mildred was not a little shocked at her own thoughts as she inspected +them in the full light into which speech had dragged them. "Anyhow," +she went on, "I soon saw that such a plan was hopeless. He's not the +man to be trifled with. Long before I could drive him to give me a +living and let me go he would have driven me to flight or suicide." + +Her mother had now had time to reflect upon Mildred's revelations. +Aided by the impressions she herself had gotten of the little general, +she began to understand why her daughter had fled and why she would not +return. She felt that the situation was one which time alone could +solve. Said she: "Well, the best thing is for you to stay on here and +wait until he makes some move." + +"He'll have me watched--that's all he'll do," said Mildred. "When he +gets ready he'll divorce me for deserting him." + +Mrs. Presbury felt that she was right. But, concealing her +despondency, she said: "All we can do is to wait and see. You must +send for your luggage." + +"I've nothing but a large bag," said Mildred. "I checked it in the +parcel-room of the New York station." + +Mrs. Presbury was overwhelmed. How account to Hanging Rock for the +reappearance of a baggageless and husbandless bride? But she held up +bravely. With a cheerfulness that did credit to her heart and showed +how well she loved her daughter she said: "We must do the best we can. +We'll get up some story." + +"No," said Mildred. "I'm going back to New York. You can tell people +here what you please--that I've gone to rejoin him or to wait for +him--any old thing." + +"At least you'll wait and talk with Presbury," pleaded her mother. "He +is VERY sensible." + +"If he has anything to suggest," said Mildred, "he can write it. I'll +send you my address." + +"Milly," cried her mother, agitated to the depths, "where ARE you +going? WHAT are you going to do? You look so strange--not at all like +yourself." + +"I'm going to a hotel to-night--probably to a boarding-house +to-morrow," said Mildred. "In a few days I shall begin to--" she +hesitated, decided against confidence--"begin to support myself at +something or other." + +"You must be crazy!" cried her mother. "You wouldn't do anything--and +you couldn't." + +"Let's not discuss it, mamma," said the girl tranquilly. + +The mother looked at her with eyes full of the suspicion one lady +cannot but have as to the projects of another lady in such +circumstances. + +"Mildred," she said pleadingly, "you must be careful. You'll find +yourself involved in a dreadful scandal. I know you wouldn't DO +anything WRONG no matter how you were driven. But--" + +"I'll not do anything FOOLISH, mamma," interrupted the girl. "You are +thinking about men, aren't you?" + +"Men are always ready to destroy a woman," said her mother. "You must +be careful--" + +Mildred was laughing. "Oh, mamma," she cried, "do be sensible and do +give me credit for a little sense. I've got a very clear idea of what +a woman ought to do about men, and I assure you I'm not going to be +FOOLISH. And you know a woman who isn't foolish can be trusted where a +woman who's only protected by her principles would yield to the first +temptation--or hunt round for a temptation." + +"But you simply can't go to New York and live there all alone--and with +nothing!" + +"Can I stay here--for more than a few days?" + +"But maybe, after a few days--" stammered her mother. + +"You see, I've got to begin," said Mildred. "So why delay? I'd gain +nothing. I'd simply start Hanging Rock to gossiping--and start Mr. +Presbury to acting like a fiend again." + +Her mother refused to be convinced--was the firmer, perhaps, because +she saw that Mildred was unshakable in her resolve to leave +forthwith--the obviously sensible and less troublesome course. They +employed the rest of Mildred's three hours' stop in arguing--when +Mildred was not raging against the little general. Her mother was more +than willing to assist her in this denunciation, but Mildred preferred +to do it all herself. She had--perhaps by unconsciously absorbed +training from her lawyer father--an unusual degree of ability to see +both sides of a question. When she assailed her husband, she saw only +her own side; but somehow when her mother railed and raved, she began +to see another side--and the sight was not agreeable. She wished to +feel that her husband was altogether in the wrong; she did not wish to +have intruded upon her such facts as that she had sold herself to +him--quite in the customary way of ladies, but nevertheless quite +shamelessly--or that in strict justice she had done nothing for him to +entitle her to a liberal money allowance or any allowance at all. + +On the train, going back to New York, she admitted to herself that the +repulsive little general had held strictly to the terms of the +bargain--"but only a devil and one with not a single gentlemanly +instinct would insist on such a bargain." It took away much of the +shame, and all of the sting, of despising herself to feel that she was +looking still lower when she turned to despising him. + +To edge out the little general she began to think of her mother, but as +she passed in review what her mother had said and how she had said it +she saw that for all the protests and arguings her mother was more than +resigned to her departure. Mildred felt no bitterness; ever since she +could remember her mother had been a shifter of responsibility. Still, +to stare into the face of so disagreeable a fact as that one had no +place on earth to go to, no one on earth to turn to, not even one's own +mother--to stare on at that grimacing ugliness did not tend to +cheerfulness. Mildred tried to think of the future--but how could she +think of something that was nothing? She knew that she would go on, +somehow, in some direction, but by no effort of her imagination could +she picture it. She was so impressed by the necessity of considering +the future that, to rouse herself, she tried to frighten herself with +pictures of poverty and misery, of herself a derelict in the vast and +cold desert of New York--perhaps in rags, hungry, ill, but all in vain. +She did not believe it. Always she had had plenty to wear and to eat, +and comfortable surroundings. She could no more think of herself as +without those things than a living person can imagine himself dead. + +"I'm a fool," she said to herself. "I'm certain to get into all sorts +of trouble. How can it be otherwise, when I've no money, no friends, +no experience, no way of making a living--no honest way--perhaps no way +of the other kind, either?" There are many women who ecstasize their +easily tickled vanities by fancying that if they were so disposed they +need only flutter an eyelid to have men by the legion striving for +their favors, each man with a bag of gold. Mildred, inexperienced as +she was, had no such delusions. Her mind happened not to be of that +chastely licentious caste which continually revolves and fantastically +exaggerates the things of the body. + +She could not understand her own indifference about the future. She +did not realize that it was wholly due to Stanley Baird's offer. She +was imagining she was regarding that offer as something she might +possibly consider, but probably would not. She did not know that her +soul had seized upon it, had enfolded it and would on no account let it +go. It is the habit of our secret selves thus to make decisions and +await their own good time for making us acquainted with them. + +With her bag on the seat beside her she set out to find a temporary +lodging. Not until several hotels had refused her admittance on the +pretext that they were "full up" did she realize that a young woman +alone is an object of suspicion in New York. When a fourth room-clerk +expressed his polite regrets she looked him straight in the eye and +said: + +"I understand. But I can't sleep in the street. You must tell me +where I can go." + +"Well, there's the Ripon over in Seventh Avenue," said he. + +"Is it respectable?" said she. + +"Oh, it's very clean and comfortable there," said he. "They'll treat +you right." + +"Is it respectable?" said she. + +"Well, now, it doesn't LOOK queer, if that's what you mean," replied +he. "You'll do very nicely there. You can be just as quiet as you +want." + +She saw that hotel New York would not believe her respectable. So to +the Ripon she went, and was admitted without discussion. As the last +respectable clerk had said, it did not LOOK queer. But it FELT queer; +she resolved that she would go into a boarding-house the very next day. + +Here again what seemed simple proved difficult. No respectable +boarding-house would have Miss Mary Stevens. She was confident that +nothing in her dress or manner hinted mystery. Yet those sharp-eyed +landladies seemed to know at once that there was something peculiar +about her. Most of them became rude the instant they set eyes upon +her. A few--of the obviously less prosperous class--talked with her, +seemed to be listening for something which her failing to say decided +them upon all but ordering her out of the house. She, hindered by her +innocence, was slow in realizing that she could not hope for admission +to any select respectable circle, even of high-class salesladies and +clerks, unless she gave a free and clear account of herself--whence she +had come, what she was doing, how she got her money. + +Toward the end of the second day's wearisome and humiliating search she +found a house that would admit her. It was a pretentious, +well-furnished big house in Madison Avenue. The price--thirty-five +dollars a week for board, a bedroom with a folding bed in an alcove, +and a bath, was more than double what she had counted on paying, but +she discovered that decent and clean lodgings and food fit to eat were +not to be had for less. "And I simply can't live pig-fashion," said +she. "I'd be so depressed that I could do nothing. I can't live like +a wild animal, and I won't." She had some vague +notion--foreboding--that this was not the proper spirit with which to +face life. "I suppose I'm horribly foolish," reflected she, "but if I +must go down, I'll go down with my colors flying." She did not know +precisely what that phrase meant, but it sounded fine and brave and +heartened her to take the expensive lodgings. + +The landlady was a Mrs. Belloc. Mildred had not talked with her twenty +minutes before she had a feeling that this name was assumed. The +evening of her first day in the house she learned that her guess was +correct--learned it from the landlady herself. After dinner Mrs. +Belloc came into her room to cheer her up, to find out about her and to +tell her about herself. + +"Now that you've come," said she, "the house is full up--except some +little rooms at the top that I'd as lief not fill. The probabilities +are that any ladies who would take them wouldn't be refined enough to +suit those I have. There are six, not counting me, every one with a +bath and two with private parlors. And as they're all handsome, +sensible women, ladylike and steady, I think the prospects are that +they'll pay promptly and that I won't have any trouble." + +Mildred reflected upon this curious statement. It sounded innocent +enough, yet what a peculiar way to put a simple fact. + +"Of course it's none of my business how people live as long as they +keep up the respectabilities," pursued Mrs. Belloc. "It don't do to +inquire into people in New York. Most of 'em come here because they +want to live as they please." + +"No doubt," said Mildred a little nervously, for she suspected her +landlady of hitting at her, and wondered if she had come to +cross-examine her and, if the results were not satisfactory, to put her +into the street. + +"I know _I_ came for that reason," pursued Mrs. Belloc. "I was a +school-teacher up in New England until about two years ago. Did you +ever teach school?" + +"Not yet," said Mildred. "And I don't think I ever shall. I don't +know enough." + +"Oh, yes, you do. A teacher doesn't need to know much. The wages are +so poor--at least up in New England--that they don't expect you to know +anything. It's all in the books. I left because I couldn't endure the +life. Lord! how dull those little towns are! Ever live in a little +town?" + +"All my life," said Mildred. + +"Well, you'll never go back." + +"I hope not." + +"You won't. Why should you? A sensible woman with looks--especially +if she knows how to carry her clothes--can stay in New York as long as +she pleases, and live off the fat of the land." + +"That's good news," said Mildred. She began to like the landlady--not +for what she said, but for the free and frank and friendly way of the +saying--a human way, a comradely way, a live-and-let-live way. + +"I didn't escape from New England without a struggle," continued Mrs. +Belloc, who was plainly showing that she had taken a great fancy to +"Mary Stevens." + +"I suppose it was hard to save the money out of your salary," said +Mildred. + +Mrs. Belloc laughed. She was about thirty-five years old, though her +eyes and her figure were younger than that. Her mouth was pleasant +enough, but had lost some of its freshness. "Save money!" cried she. +"I'd never have succeeded that way. I'd be there yet. I had never +married--had two or three chances, but all from poor sticks looking for +someone to support them. I saw myself getting old. I was looking +years older than I do now. Talk about sea air for freshening a woman +up--it isn't in it with the air of New York. Here's the town where +women stay young. If I had come here five years ago I could almost try +for the squab class." + +"Squab class?" queried Mildred. + +"Yes, squabs. Don't you see them around everywhere?--the women dressed +like girls of sixteen to eighteen--and some of them are that, and +younger. They go hopping and laughing about--and they seem to please +the men and to have no end of a good time. Especially the oldish men. +Oh, yes, you know a squab on sight--tight skirt, low shoes and silk +stockings, cute pretty face, always laughing, hat set on rakishly and +hair done to match, and always a big purse or bag--with a yellow-back +or so in it--as a kind of a hint, I guess." + +Mildred had seen squabs. "I've envied them--in a way," said she. +"Their parents seem to let them do about as they please." + +"Their parents don't know--or don't care. Sometimes it's one, +sometimes the other. They travel in two sets. One is where they meet +young fellows of their own class--the kind they'll probably marry, +unless they happen to draw the capital prize. The other set they +travel in--well, it's the older men they meet round the swell hotels +and so on--the yellow-back men." + +"How queer!" exclaimed Mildred, before whose eyes a new world was +opening. "But how do they--these--squabs--account for the money?" + +"How do a thousand and one women in this funny town account at home for +money and things?" retorted Mrs. Belloc. "Nothing's easier. For +instance, often these squabs do--or pretend to do--a little something +in the way of work--a little canvassing or artists' model or anything +you please. That helps them to explain at home--and also to make each +of the yellow-back men think he's the only one and that he's being +almost loved for himself alone." + +Mrs. Belloc laughed. Mildred was too astonished to laugh, and too +interested--and too startled or shocked. + +"But I was telling you how _I_ got down here," continued the landlady. +"Up in my town there was an old man--about seventy-five--close as the +bark on a tree, and ugly and mean." She paused to draw a long breath +and to shake her head angrily yet triumphantly at some figure her fancy +conjured up. "Oh, he WAS a pup!--and is! Well, anyhow, I decided that +I'd marry him. So I wrote home for fifty dollars. I borrowed another +fifty here and there. I had seventy-five saved up against sickness. I +went up to Boston and laid it all out in underclothes and house +things--not showy but fine and good to look at. Then one day, when the +weather was fine and I knew the old man would be out in his buggy +driving round--I dressed myself up to beat the band. I took hours to +it--scrubbing, powdering, sacheting, perfuming, fixing the hair, fixing +my finger-nails, fixing up my feet, polishing every nail and making +them look better than most hands." + +Mildred was so interested that she was excited. What strange freak was +coming? + +"You never could guess," pursued Mrs. Belloc, complacently. "I took my +sunshade and went out, all got up to kill. And I walked along the road +until I saw the old man's buggy coming with him in it. Then I gave my +ankle a frightful wrench. My! How it hurt!" + +"What a pity!" said Mildred sympathetically. "What a shame!" + +"A pity? A shame?" cried Mrs. Belloc, laughing. "Why, my dear, I did +it a-purpose." + +"On purpose!" exclaimed Mildred. + +"Certainly. That was my game. I screamed out with pain--and the +scream was no fake, I can tell you. And I fell down by the roadside on +a nice grassy spot where no dust would get on me. Well, up comes the +old skinflint in his buggy. He climbed down and helped me get off my +slipper and stocking. I knew I had him the minute I saw his old face +looking at that foot I had fixed up so beautifully." + +"How DID you ever think of it?" exclaimed Mildred. + +"Go and teach school for ten years in a dull little town, my dear--and +look in the glass every day and see your youth fading away--and you'll +think of most anything. Well, to make a long story short, the old man +took me in the buggy to his house where he lived with his deaf, +half-blind old widowed daughter. I had to stay there three weeks. I +married him the fourth week. And just two months to a day from the +afternoon I sprained my ankle, he gave me fifty dollars a week--all +signed and sealed by a lawyer--to go away and leave him alone. I might +have stood out for more, but I was too anxious to get to New York. And +here I am!" She gazed about the well-furnished room, typical of that +almost luxurious house, with an air of triumphant satisfaction. Said +she: "I've no patience with a woman who says she can't get on. Where's +her brains?" + +Mildred was silent. Perhaps it was a feeling of what was hazily in the +younger woman's mind and a desire to answer it that led Mrs. Belloc to +say further: "I suppose there's some that would criticize my way of +getting there. But I want to know, don't all women get there by +working men? Only most of them are so stupid that they have to go on +living with the man. I think it's low to live with a man you hate." + +"Oh, I'm not criticizing anybody," said Mildred. + +"I didn't think you were," said Mrs. Belloc. "If I hadn't seen you +weren't that kind, I'd not have been so confidential. Not that I'm +secretive with anybody. I say and do what I please. Anyone who doesn't +like my way or me can take the other side of the street. I didn't come +to New York to go in society. I came here to LIVE." + +Mildred looked at her admiringly. There were things about Mrs. Belloc +that she did not admire; other things--suspected rather than known +things--that she knew she would shrink from, but she heartily admired +and profoundly envied her utter indifference to the opinion of others, +her fine independent way of walking her own path at her own gait. + +"I took this boarding-house," Mrs. Belloc went on, "because I didn't +want to be lonesome. I don't like all--or even most of--the ladies +that live here. But they're all amusing to talk with--and don't put on +airs except with their men friends. And one or two are the real +thing--good-hearted, fond of a joke, without any meanness. I tell you, +New York is a mighty fine place if you get 'in right.' Of course, if +you don't, it's h-e-l-l." (Mrs. Belloc took off its unrefined edge by +spelling it.) "But what place isn't?" she added. + +"And your husband never bothers you?" inquired Mildred. + +"And never will," replied Mrs. Belloc. "When he dies I'll come into a +little more--about a hundred and fifty a week in all. Not a fortune, +but enough with what the boarding-house brings in. I'm a pretty fair +business woman." + +"I should say so!" exclaimed Mildred. + +"You said you were Miss Stevens, didn't you?" said Mrs. Belloc--and +Mildred knew that her turn had come. + +"Yes," replied she. "But I am also a married woman." She hesitated, +reddened. "I didn't give you my married name." + +"That's your own business," said Mrs. Belloc in her easiest manner. "My +right name isn't Belloc, either. But I've dropped that other life. You +needn't feel a bit embarrassed in this house. Some of my boarders SEEM +to be married. All that have regular-appearing husbands SAY they are. +What do I care, so long as everything goes along smoothly? I don't get +excited about trifles." + +"Some day perhaps I'll tell you about myself," said Mildred. "Just at +present I--well, I seem not to be able to talk about things." + +"It's not a bad idea to keep your mouth shut, as long as your affairs +are unsettled," advised Mrs. Belloc. "I can see you've had little +experience. But you'll come out all right. Just keep cool, and don't +fret about trifles. And don't let any man make a fool of you. That's +where we women get left. We're afraid of men. We needn't be. We can +mighty easily make them afraid of us. Use the soft hand till you get +him well in your grip. Then the firm hand. Nothing coarse or cruel or +mean. But firm and self-respecting." + +Mildred was tempted to take Mrs. Belloc fully into her confidence and +get the benefit of the advice of shrewdness and experience. So strong +was the temptation, she would have yielded to it had Mrs. Belloc asked +a few tactful, penetrating questions. But Mrs. Belloc refrained, and +Mildred's timidity or delicacy induced her to postpone. The next day +she wrote Stanley Baird, giving her address and her name and asking him +to call "any afternoon at four or five." She assumed that he would +come on the following day, but the letter happened to reach him within +an hour of her mailing it, and he came that very afternoon. + +When she went down to the drawing-room to receive him, she found him +standing in the middle of the room gazing about with a quizzical +expression. As soon as the greetings were over he said: + +"You must get out of here, Mildred. This won't do." + +"Indeed I shan't," said she. "I've looked everywhere, and this is the +only comfortable place I could find--where the rates were reasonable +and where the landlady didn't have her nose in everybody's business." + +"You don't understand," said he. "This is a bird-cage. Highly gilded, +but a bird-cage." + +She had never heard the phrase, but she understood--and instantly she +knew that he was right. She colored violently, sat down abruptly. But +in a moment she recovered herself, and with fine defiance said: + +"I don't care. Mrs. Belloc is a kind-hearted woman, and it's as easy +to be respectable here as anywhere." + +"Sure," assented he. "But you've got to consider appearances to a +certain extent. You won't be able to find the right sort of a +boarding-house--one you'd be comfortable in. You've got to have a flat +of your own." + +"I can't afford it," said Mildred. "I can't afford this, even. But I +simply will not live in a shabby, mussy way." + +"That's right!" cried Stanley. "You can't do proper work in poor +surroundings. Some women could, but not your sort. But don't worry. +I'm going to see you through. I'll find a place--right away. You want +to start in at once, don't you?" + +"I've got to," said Mildred. + +"Then leave it all to me." + +"But WHAT am I to do?" + +"Sing, if you can. If not, then act. We'll have you on the stage +within a year or so. I'm sure of it. And I'll get my money back, with +interest." + +"I don't see how I can accept it," said Mildred very feebly. + +"You've got to," said Stanley. "What alternative is there? None. So +let's bother no more about it. I'll consult with those who know, find +out what the thing costs, and arrange everything. You're as helpless +as a baby, and you know it." + +Yes, Mildred knew it. + +He looked at her with an amused smile. "Come, out with it!" he cried. +"You've got something on your mind. Let's get everything straight--and +keep it that way." + +Mildred hung her head. + +"You're uneasy because I, a man, am doing this for you, a young woman? +Is that it?" + +"Yes," she confessed. + +He leaned back in his chair, crossed his legs, and spoke in a brisk, +businesslike way. "In the first place, it's got to be done, hasn't it? +And someone has got to do it? And there is no one offering but me? Am +I right?" + +She nodded. + +"Then _I_'ve got to do it, and you've GOT to let me. There's logic, if +ever there was logic. A Philadelphia lawyer couldn't knock a hole in +it. You trust me, don't you?" + +She was silent. + +"You don't trust me, then," said he cheerfully. "Well, perhaps you're +right. But you trust yourself, don't you?" + +She moved restlessly, but remained silent. + +"You are afraid I might put you in a difficult position?" + +"Something like that," she admitted, in a low, embarrassed voice. + +"You fear that I expect some return which you do not intend to give?" + +She was silent. + +"Well, I don't," said he bluntly. "So put your mind at rest. Some day +I'll tell you why I am doing this, but I want you to feel that I ask +nothing of you but my money back with interest, when you can afford to +pay." + +"I can't feel that," said she. "You're putting me in your debt--so +heavily that I'd feel I ought to pay anything you asked. But I +couldn't and wouldn't pay." + +"Unless you felt like it?" suggested he. + +"It's honest for me to warn you that I'm not likely to feel that way." + +"There is such a thing as winning a woman's love, isn't there?" said he +jestingly. It was difficult to tell when Stanley Baird was jesting and +when he was in earnest. + +"Is that what you expect?" said she gravely. + +"If I say yes?" + +She lowered her eyes and laughed in an embarrassed way. + +He was frankly amused. "You see, you feel that you're in my power. And +you are. So why not make the best of it?" A pause, then he said +abruptly and with a convincing manliness, "I think, Mildred, you can +trust me not to be a beast." + +She colored and looked at him with quick contrition. "I'm ashamed of +myself," said she. "Please forget that I said anything. I'll take +what I must, and I'll pay it back as soon as I can. And--thank you, +Stanley." The tears were in her eyes. "If I had anything worth your +taking I'd be glad to give it to you. What vain fools we women are!" + +"Aren't you, though!" laughed he. "And now it's all settled--until +you're on the stage, and free, and the money's paid back--WITH +interest. I shall charge you six per cent." + +When she first knew him she had not been in the least impressed by what +now seemed to her his finest and rarest trait, for, in those days she +had been as ignorant of the realities of human nature as one who has +never adventured his boat beyond the mouth of the peaceful land-locked +harbor is ignorant of the open sea. But in the hard years she had been +learning--not only from Presbury and General Siddall, but from the cook +and the housemaid, from every creditor, every tradesman, everyone whose +attitude socially toward her had been modified by her changed +fortunes--and whose attitude had not been changed? Thus, she was now +able to appreciate--at least in some measure--Stanley Baird's delicacy +and tact. No, not delicacy and tact, for that implied effort. His +ability to put this offer in such a way that she could accept without +serious embarrassment arose from a genuine indifference to money as +money, a habit of looking upon it simply as a means to an end. He +offered her the money precisely as he would have offered her his +superior strength if it had been necessary to cross a too deep and +swift creek. She had the sense that he felt he was doing something +even less notable than he admitted, and that he talked of it as a +valuable and rather unusual service simply because it was the habit +thus to regard such matters. + +As they talked on of "the great career" her spirits went up and up. It +was evident that he now had a new and keen interest in life, that she +was doing him a greater favor than he was doing her. He had always had +money, plenty of it, more than he could use. He now had more than +ever--for, several rich relatives had died and, after the habit of the +rich, had left everything to him, the one of all the connections who +needed it least. He had a very human aversion to spending money upon +people or things he did not like. He would have fought to the last +court an attempt by his wife to get alimony. He had a reputation with +the "charity gang" of being stingy because he would not give them so +much as the price of a bazaar ticket. Also, the impecunious spongers at +his clubs spread his fame as a "tight-wad" because he refused to let +them "stick him up" for even a round of drinks. Where many a really +stingy man yielded through weakness or fear of public opinion, he stood +firm. His one notable surrender of any kind had been his marriage; +that bitter experience had cured him of the surrendering habit for all +time. Thenceforth he did absolutely and in everything as he pleased. + +Mildred had heard that he was close about money. She had all but +forgotten it, because her own experience with him had made such a +charge seem ridiculous. She now assumed--so far as she thought about it +at all--that he was extremely generous. She did not realize what a +fine discriminating generosity his was, or how striking an evidence of +his belief in her as well as of his liking for her. + +As he rose to go he said: "You mustn't forget that our arrangement is +a secret between us. Neither of us can afford to have anyone know it." + +"There isn't anyone in the world who wouldn't misunderstand it," said +she, without the least feeling of embarrassment. + +"Just so," said he. "And I want you to live in such a way that I can +come to call. We must arrange things so that you will take your own +name--" + +"I intend to use the name Mary Stevens in my work," she interrupted. + +"But there mustn't be any concealment, any mystery to excite curiosity +and scandal--" + +This time the interruption was her expression. He turned to see what +had startled her, and saw in the doorway of the drawing-room the +grotesquely neat and stylish figure of the little general. Before +either could speak he said: + +"How d'you do, Mr. Baird? You'll pardon me if I ask you to leave me +alone with my WIFE." + +Stanley met the situation with perfect coolness. "How are you, +General?" said he. "Certainly, I was just going." He extended his +hand to Mildred, said in a correct tone of conventional friendliness, +"Then you'll let me know when you're settled?" He bowed, moved toward +the door, shook hands with the general, and passed out, giving from +start to finish a model example of a man of the world extricating +himself from an impossible situation and leaving it the better for his +having been entangled. To a man of Siddall's incessant and clumsy +self-consciousness such unaffected ease could not but be proof positive +of Mildred's innocence--unless he had overheard. And his first words +convinced her that he had not. Said he: + +"So you sent for your old admirer?" + +"I ran across him accidentally," replied Mildred. + +"I know," said the little general. "My men picked you up at the pier +and haven't lost sight of you since. It's fortunate that I've kept +myself informed, or I might have misunderstood that chap's being here." +A queer, cloudy look came into his eyes. "I must give him a warning +for safety's sake." He waved his hand in dismissal of such an +unimportant trifle as the accidental Baird. He went on, his wicked +eyes bent coldly and dully upon her: "Do you know what kind of a house +this is?" + +"Stanley Baird urged me to leave," replied she. "But I shall stay until +I find a better--and that's not easy." + +"Yes, my men have reported to me on the difficulties you've had. It +was certainly fortunate for you that I had them look after you. +Otherwise I'd never have understood your landing in this sort of a +house. You are ready to come with me?" + +"Your secretary explained that if I left the hotel it was the end." + +"He told you that by my orders." + +"So he explained," said Mildred. She seated herself, overcome by a +sudden lassitude that was accompanied not by fear, but by indifference. +"Won't you sit down? I am willing to hear what you have to say." + +The little general, about to sit, was so astonished that he +straightened and stiffened himself. "In consenting to overlook your +conduct and take you back I have gone farther than I ever intended. I +have taken into consideration your youth and inexperience." + +"But I am not going back," said Mildred. + +The little general slowly seated himself. "You have less than two +hundred and fifty dollars left," said he. + +"Really? Your spies know better than I." + +"I have seen Presbury. He assures me that in no circumstances will he +and your mother take you back." + +"They will not have the chance to refuse," said Mildred. + +"As for your brother--" + +"I have no brother," said she coldly. + +"Then you are coming back with me." + +"No," said Mildred. "I should"--she cast about for an impressive +alternative--"I should stay on here, rather." + +The little general--his neat varnished leather and be-spatted shoes +just touched the floor--examined his highly polished top-hat at several +angles. Finally he said: "You need not fear that your misconduct will +be remembered against you. I shall treat you in every way as my wife. +I shall assume that your--your flight was an impulse that you regret." + +"I shan't go back," said Mildred. "Nothing you could offer would +change me." + +"I cannot make any immediate concession on the--the matter that caused +you to go," pursued he, as if she had not spoken, "but if I see that +you have reliability and good sense, I'll agree to give you an +allowance later." + +Mildred eyed him curiously. "Why are you making these offers, these +concessions?" she said. "You think everyone in the world is a fool +except yourself. You're greatly deceived. I know that you don't mean +what you've been saying. I know that if you got me in your power +again, you would do something frightful. I've seen through that mask +you wear. I know the kind of man you are." + +"If you know that," said the general in his even slow way, monotonous, +almost lifeless, "you know you'd better come with me than stand out +against me." + +She did not let him see how this struck terror into her. She said: "No +matter what you might do to me, when I'm away from you, it would be +less than you'd do with me under your roof. At any rate, it'd seem +less." + +The general reflected, decided to change to another point: "You made a +bargain with me. You've broken it. I never let anyone break a bargain +with me without making them regret it. I'm giving you a chance to keep +your bargain." + +She was tempted to discuss, but she could not find the words, or the +strength. Besides, how futile to discuss with such a man. She sank +back in her chair wearily. "I shall never go back," she said. + +He looked at her, his face devoid of expression, but she had a sense of +malignance unutterable eying her from behind a screen. He said: "I +see you've misunderstood my generosity. You think I'm weak where you +are concerned because I've come to you instead of doing as I said and +making you come to me." He rose. "Well, my offer to you is closed. And +once more I say, you will come to me and ask to be taken back. I may +or may not take you back. It depends on how I'll feel at that time." + +Slowly, with his ludicrously pompous strut, he marched to the +drawing-room door. She had not felt like smiling, but if there had +been any such inclination it would have fled before the countenance +that turned upon her at the threshold. It was the lean, little face +with the funny toupee and needle-like mustache and imperial, but behind +it lay a personality like the dull, cold, yellow eyes of the devil-fish +ambushed in the hazy mass of dun-colored formlessness of collapsed body +and tentacles. He said: + +"You'd best be careful how you conduct yourself. You'll be under +constant observation. And any friends you make--they'd do well to +avoid you." + +He was gone. She sat without the power of motion, without the power of +thought. After a time--perhaps long, perhaps short, she did not +know--Mrs. Belloc came in and entered upon a voluble apology for the +maid's having shown "the little gentleman" into the drawing-room when +another was already there. "That maid's as green as spring corn," said +she. "Such a thing never happened in my house before. And it'll never +happen again. I do hope it didn't cause trouble." + +"It was my husband," said Mildred. "I had to see him some time." + +"He's certainly a very elegant little gentleman," said Mrs. Belloc. "I +rather like small men, myself." + +Mildred gazed at her vaguely and said, "Tell me--a rich man, a very +rich man--if he hates anyone, can he make trouble?" + +"Money can do anything in this town," replied Mrs. Belloc. "But +usually rich men are timid and stingy. If they weren't, they'd make us +all cringe. As it is, I've heard some awful stories of how men and +women who've got some powerful person down on them have been hounded." + +Mildred turned deathly sick. "I think I'll go to my room," she said, +rising uncertainly and forcing herself toward the door. + +Mrs. Belloc's curiosity could not restrain itself. "You're leaving?" +she asked. "You're going back to your husband?" + +She was startled when the girl abruptly turned on her and cried with +flashing eyes and voice strong and vibrant with passion: "Never! +Never! No matter what comes--NEVER!" + + +The rest of the day and that night she hid in her room and made no +effort to resist the terror that preyed upon her. Just as our strength +is often the source of weakness, so our weaknesses often give birth to +strength. Her terror of the little general, given full swing, shrieked +and grimaced itself into absurdity. She was ashamed of her orgy, was +laughing at it as the sun and intoxicating air of a typical New York +morning poured in upon her. She accepted Mrs. Belloc's invitation to +take a turn through the park and up Riverside Drive in a taxicab, came +back restored to her normal state of blind confidence in the future. +About noon Stanley Baird telephoned. + +"We must not see each other again for some time," said he. "I rather +suspect that you--know--who may be having you watched." + +"I'm sure of it," said she. "He warned me." + +"Don't let that disturb you," pursued Stanley. "A man--a singing +teacher--his name's Eugene Jennings--will call on you this afternoon at +three. Do exactly as he suggests. Let him do all the talking." + +She had intended to tell Baird frankly that she thought, indeed knew, +that it was highly dangerous for him to enter into her affairs in any +way, and to urge him to draw off. She felt that it was only fair to +act so toward one who had been unselfishly generous to her. But now +that the time for speaking had come, she found herself unable to speak. +Only by flatly refusing to have anything to do with his project could +she prevail upon him. To say less than that she had completely and +finally changed her mind would sound, and would be, insincere. And +that she could not say. She felt how noble it would be to say this, how +selfish, and weak, too, it was to cling to him, possibly to involve him +in disagreeable and even dangerous complications, but she had no +strength to do what she would have denounced another as base for not +doing. Instead of the lofty words that flow so freely from the lips of +stage and fiction heroines, instead of the words that any and every +reader of this history would doubtless have pronounced in the same +circumstances, she said: + +"You're quite sure you want to go on?" + +"Why not?" came instantly back over the wire. + +"He is a very, very relentless man," replied she. + +"Did he try to frighten you?" + +"I'm afraid he succeeded." + +"You're not going back on the career!" exclaimed he excitedly. "I'll +come down there and--" + +"No, no," cried she. "I was simply giving you a chance to free +yourself." She felt sure of him now. She scrambled toward the heights +of moral grandeur. "I want you to stop. I've no right to ask you to +involve yourself in my misfortunes. Stanley, you mustn't. I can't +allow it." + +"Oh, fudge!" laughed he. "Don't give me these scares. Don't +forget--Jennings at three. Good-by and good luck." + +And he rang off that she might have no chance on impulse to do herself +mischief with her generous thoughtfulness for him. She felt rather +mean, but not nearly so mean as she would have felt had she let the +opportunity go by with no generous word said. "And no doubt my +aversion for that little wretch," thought she, "makes me think him more +terrible than he is. After all, what can he do? Watch me--and discover +nothing, because there'll be nothing to discover." + +Jennings came exactly at three--came with the air of a man who wastes +no one's time and lets no one waste his time. He was a youngish man of +forty or thereabouts, with a long sharp nose, a large tight mouth, and +eyes that seemed to be looking restlessly about for money. That they +had not looked in vain seemed to be indicated by such facts as that he +came in a private brougham and that he was most carefully dressed, +apparently with the aid of a valet. + +"Miss Stevens," he said with an abrupt bow, before Mildred had a chance +to speak, "you have come to New York to take singing lessons--to +prepare yourself for the stage. And you wish a comfortable place to +live and to work." He extended his gloved hand, shook hers frigidly, +dropped it. "We shall get on--IF you work, but only if you work. I do +not waste myself upon triflers." He drew a card from his pocket. "If +you will go to see the lady whose name and address are written on this +card, I think you will find the quarters you are looking for." + +"Thank you," said Mildred. + +"Come to me--my address is on the card, also--at half-past ten on +Saturday. We will then lay out your work." + +"If you find I have a voice worth while," Mildred ventured. + +"That, of course," said Mr. Jennings curtly. "Until half-past ten on +Saturday, good day." + +Again he gave the abrupt foreign bow and, while Mildred was still +struggling with her surprise and confusion, she saw him, through the +window, driving rapidly away. Mrs. Belloc came drifting through the +room; she had the habit of looking about whenever there were new +visitors, and in her it was not irritating because her interest was +innocent and sympathetic. Said Mildred: + +"Did you see that man, Mrs. Belloc?" + +"What an extraordinary nose he had," replied she. + +"Yes, I noticed that," said Mildred. "But it was the only thing I did +notice. He is a singing teacher--Mr. Jennings." + +"Eugene Jennings?" + +"Yes, Eugene." + +"He's the best known singing teacher in New York. He gets fifteen +dollars a half-hour." + +"Then I simply can't take from him!" exclaimed Mildred, before she +thought. "That's frightful!" + +"Isn't it, though?" echoed Mrs. Belloc. "I've heard his income is +fifty thousand a year, what with lessons and coaching and odds and +ends. There's a lot of them that do well, because so many fool women +with nothing to do cultivate their voices--when they can't sing a +little bit. But he tops them all. I don't see how ANY teacher can put +fifteen dollars of value into half an hour. But I suppose he does, or +he wouldn't get it. Still, his may be just another case of New York +nerve. This is the biggest bluff town in the world, I do believe. +Here, you can get away with anything, I don't care what it is, if only +you bluff hard enough." + +As there was no reason for delay and many reasons against it, Mildred +went at once to the address on the card Jennings had left. She found +Mrs. Howell Brindley installed in a plain comfortable apartment in +Fifty-ninth Street, overlooking the park and high enough to make the +noise of the traffic endurable. A Swedish maid, prepossessingly white +and clean, ushered her into the little drawing-room, which was +furnished with more simplicity and individual taste than is usual +anywhere in New York, cursed of the mania for useless and tasteless +showiness. There were no messy draperies, no fussy statuettes, vases, +gilt boxes, and the like. Mildred awaited the entrance of Mrs. Brindley +hopefully. + +She was not disappointed. Presently in came a quietly-dressed, +frank-looking woman of a young forty--a woman who had by no means lost +her physical freshness, but had gained charm of another and more +enduring kind. As she came forward with extended but not overeager +hand, she said: + +"I was expecting you, Mrs. Siddall--that is, Miss Stevens." + +"Mr. Jennings did not say when I was to come. If I am disturbing you--" + +Mrs. Brindley hastened to assure her that her visit was quite +convenient. "I must have someone to share the expense of this +apartment with me, and I want the matter settled. Mr. Jennings has +explained about you to me, and now that I've seen you--" here she +smiled charmingly--"I am ready to say that it is for you to say." + +Mildred did not know how to begin. She looked at Mrs. Brindley with +appeal in her troubled young eyes. + +"You no doubt wish to know something about me," said Mrs. Brindley. "My +husband was a composer--a friend of Mr. Jennings. He died two years +ago. I am here in New York to teach the piano. What the lessons will +bring, with my small income, will enable me to live--if I can find +someone to help out at the expenses here. As I understand it, you are +willing to pay forty dollars a week, I to run the house, pay all the +bills, and so on--all, of course, if you wish to come here." + +Mildred made a not very successful attempt to conceal her embarrassment. + +"Perhaps you would like to look at the apartment?" suggested Mrs. +Brindley. + +"Thank you, yes," said Mildred. + +The tour of the apartment--two bedrooms, dining-room, kitchen, +sitting-room, large bath-room, drawing-room--took only a few minutes, +but Mildred and Mrs. Brindley contrived to become much better +acquainted. Said Mildred, when they were in the drawing-room again: + +"It's most attractive--just what I should like. What--how much did Mr. +Jennings say?" + +"Forty dollars a week." She colored slightly and spoke with the +nervousness of one not in the habit of discussing money matters. "I do +not see how I could make it less. That is the fair share of the--" + +"Oh, I think that is most reasonable," interrupted Mildred. "And I +wish to come." + +Mrs. Brindley gave an almost childlike sigh of relief and smiled +radiantly. "Then it's settled," said she. "I've been so nervous about +it." She looked at Mildred with friendly understanding. "I think you +and I are somewhat alike about practical things. You've not had much +experience, either, have you? I judge so from the fact that Mr. +Jennings is looking after everything for you." + +"I've had no experience at all," said Mildred. "That is why I'm +hesitating. I'm wondering if I can afford to pay so much." + +Mrs. Brindley laughed. "Mr. Jennings wished to fix it at sixty a week, +but I insisted that forty was enough," said she. + +Mildred colored high with embarrassment. How much did Mrs. Brindley +know?--or how little? She stammered: "Well, if Mr. Jennings says it +is all right, I'll come." + +"You'll let me know to-morrow? You can telephone Mr. Jennings." + +"Yes, I'll let you know to-morrow. I'm almost sure I'll come. In +fact, I'm quite sure. And--I think we shall get on well together." + +"We can help each other," said Mrs. Brindley. "I don't care for +anything in the world but music." + +"I want to be that way," said Mildred. "I shall be that way." + +"It's the only sure happiness--to care for something, for some THING," +said Mrs. Brindley. "People die, or disappoint one, or become +estranged. But when one centers on some kind of work, it gives +pleasure always--more and more pleasure." + +"I am so afraid I haven't voice enough, or of the right kind," said +Mildred. "Mr. Jennings is going to try me on Saturday. Really I've no +right to settle anything until he has given his opinion." + +Mrs. Brindley smiled with her eyes only, and Mildred wondered. + +"If he should say that I wouldn't do," she went on, "I'd not know which +way to turn." + +"But he'll not say that," said Mrs. Brindley. "You can sing, can't +you? You have sung?" + +"Oh, yes." + +"Then you'll be accepted by him. And it will take him a long time to +find out whether you'll do for a professional." + +"I'm afraid I sing very badly." + +"That will not matter. You'll sing better than at least half of +Jennings's pupils." + +"Then he doesn't take only those worth while?" + +Mrs. Brindley looked amused. "How would he live if he did that? It's +a teacher's business to teach. Learning--that's the pupil's lookout. If +teachers taught only those who could and would learn, how would they +live?" + +"Then I'll not know whether I'll do!" exclaimed Mildred. + +"You'll have to find out for yourself," said Mrs. Brindley. "No one +can tell you. Anyone's opinion might be wrong. For example, I've +known Jennings, who is a very good judge, to be wrong--both ways." +Hesitatingly: "Why not sing for me? I'd like to hear." + +"Would you tell me what you honestly thought?" said Mildred. + +Mrs. Brindley laughingly shook her head. Mildred liked her honesty. +"Then it'd be useless to sing for you," said she. "I'm not vain about +my voice. I'd simply like to make a living by it, if I could. I'll +even confess that there are many things I care for more than for music. +Does that prove that I can never sing professionally?" + +"No, indeed," Mrs. Brindley assured her. "It'd be strange if a girl of +your age cared exclusively for music. The passion comes with the work, +with progress, success. And some of the greatest--that is, the most +famous and best paid--singers never care much about music, except as a +vanity, and never understand it. A singer means a person born with a +certain shape of mouth and throat, a certain kind of vocal chords. The +rest may be natural or acquired. It's the instrument that makes the +singer, not brains or temperament." + +"Do let me sing for you," said Mildred. "I think it will help me." + +Between them they chose a little French song--"Chanson d'Antonine"--and +Mrs. Brindley insisted on her playing her own accompaniment. "I wish +to listen," said she, "and I can't if I play." + +Mildred was surprised at her own freedom from nervousness. She sang +neither better nor worse than usual--sang in the clear and pleasant +soprano which she flattered herself was not unmusical. When she +finished she said: + +"That's about as I usually sing. What do you think?" + +Mrs. Brindley reflected before she replied: "I BELIEVE it's worth +trying. If I were you, I should keep on trying, no matter what anyone +said." + +Mildred was instantly depressed. "You think Mr. Jennings may reject +me?" she asked. + +"I KNOW he will not," replied Mrs. Brindley. "Not as long as you can +pay for the lessons. But I was thinking of the real thing--of whether +you could win out as a singer." + +"And you don't think I can?" said Mildred. + +"On the contrary, I believe you can," replied Mrs. Brindley. "A singer +means so much besides singing. The singing is the smallest part of it. +You'll understand when you get to work. I couldn't explain now. But I +can say that you ought to go ahead." + +Mildred, who had her share of vanity, had hoped for some enthusiasm. +Mrs. Brindley's judicial tone was a severe blow. She felt a little +resentful, began to cast about for vanity-consoling reasons for Mrs. +Brindley's restraint. "She means well," she said to herself, "but +she's probably just a tiny bit jealous. She's not so young as she once +was, and she hasn't the faintest hope of ever being anything more than +a piano-teacher." + +Mrs. Brindley showed that she had more than an inkling of Mildred's +frame of mind by going on to say in a gentle, candid way: "I want to +help you. So I shall be careful not to encourage you to believe too +much in what you have. That would prevent you from getting what you +need. You must remember, you are no longer a drawing-room singer, but +a candidate for the profession. That's a very different thing." + +Mildred saw that she was mistaken, that Mrs. Brindley was honest and +frank and had doubtless told her the exact truth. But her vanity +remained sore. Never before had anyone said any less of her singing +than that it was wonderful, marvelous, equal to a great deal that +passed for fine in grand opera. She had known that this was +exaggeration, but she had not known how grossly exaggerated. Thus, +this her first experience of the professional attitude was galling. +Only her unusual good sense saved her from being angry with Mrs. +Brindley. And it was that same good sense that moved her presently to +try to laugh at herself. With a brave attempt to smile gayly she said: + +"You don't realize how you've taken me down. I had no idea I was so +conceited about my singing. I can't truthfully say I like your +frankness, but there's a part of me that's grateful to you for it, and +when I get over feeling hurt, I'll be grateful through and through." + +Mrs. Brindley's face lighted up beautifully. "You'll DO!" she cried. +"I'm sure you'll do. I've been waiting and watching to see how you +would take my criticism. That's the test--how they take criticism. If +they don't take it at all, they'll not go very far, no matter how +talented they are. If they take it as you've taken it, there's +hope--great hope. Now, I'm not afraid to tell you that you sang +splendidly for an amateur--that you surprised me." + +"Don't spoil it all," said Mildred. "You were right; I can't sing." + +"Not for grand opera, not for comic opera even," replied Mrs. Brindley. +"But you will sing, and sing well, in one or the other, if you work." + +"You really mean that?" said Mildred. + +"If you work intelligently and persistently," said Mrs. Brindley. +"That's a big if--as you'll discover in a year or so." + +"You'll see," said Mildred confidently. "Why, I've nothing else to do, +and no other hope." + +Mrs. Brindley's smile had a certain sadness in it. She said: + +"It's the biggest if in all this world." + + + +V + +AT Mrs. Belloc's a telephone message from Jennings was awaiting her; he +would call at a quarter-past eight and would detain Miss Stevens only a +moment. And at eight fifteen exactly he rang the bell. This time +Mildred was prepared; she refused to be disconcerted by his abrupt +manner and by his long sharp nose that seemed to warn away, to threaten +away, even to thrust away any glance seeking to investigate the rest of +his face or his personality. She looked at him candidly, calmly, and +seeingly. Seeingly. With eyes that saw as they had never seen before. +Perhaps from the death of her father, certainly from the beginning of +Siddall's courtship, Mildred had been waking up. There is a part of +our nature--the active and aggressive part--that sleeps all our lives +long or becomes atrophied if we lead lives of ease and secure +dependence. It is the important part of us, too--the part that +determines character. The thing that completed the awakening of +Mildred was her acquaintance with Mrs. Belloc. That positive and +finely-poised lady fascinated her, influenced her powerfully--gave her +just what she needed at the particular moment. The vital moments in +life are not the crises over which shallow people linger, but are the +moments where we met and absorbed the ideas that enabled us to weather +these crises. The acquaintance with Mrs. Belloc was one of those vital +moments; for, Mrs. Belloc's personality--her look and manner, what she +said and the way she said it--was a proffer to Mildred of invaluable +lessons which her awakening character eagerly absorbed. She saw +Jennings as he was. She decided that he was of common origin, that his +vanity was colossal and aquiver throughout with sensitiveness; that he +belonged to the familiar type of New-Yorker who succeeds by bluffing. +Also, she saw or felt a certain sexlessness or indifference to sex--and +this she later understood. Men whose occupation compels them +constantly to deal with women go to one extreme or the other--either +become acutely sensitive to women as women or become utterly +indifferent, unless their highly discriminated taste is appealed +to--which cannot happen often. Jennings, teaching only women because +only women spending money they had not earned and could not earn would +tolerate his terms and his methods, had, as much through necessity as +through inclination, gone to the extreme of lack of interest in all +matters of sex. One look at him and the woman who had come with the +idea of offering herself in full or part payment for lessons drooped in +instinctive discouragement. + +Jennings hastened to explain to Mildred that she need not hesitate +about closing with Mrs. Brindley. "Your lessons are arranged for," +said he. "There has been put in the Plaza Trust Company to your credit +the sum of five thousand dollars. This gives you about a hundred +dollars a week for your board and other personal expenses. If that is +not enough, you will let me know. But I estimated that it would be +enough. I do not think it wise for young women entering upon the +preparation for a serious career to have too much money." + +"It is more than enough," murmured the girl. "I know nothing about +those things, but it seems to me--" + +"You can use as little of it as you like," interrupted Jennings, rising. + +Mildred felt as though she had been caught and exposed in a +hypocritical protest. Jennings was holding out something toward her. +She took it, and he went on: + +"That's your check-book. The bank will send you statements of your +account, and will notify you when any further sums are added. Now, I +have nothing more to do with your affairs--except, of course, the +artistic side--your development as a singer. You've not forgotten your +appointment?" + +"No," said Mildred, like a primary school-child before a formidable +teacher. + +"Be prompt, please. I make no reduction for lessons wholly or partly +missed. The half-hour I shall assign to you belongs to you. If you do +not use it, that is your affair. At first you will probably be like +all women--careless about your appointments, coming with lessons +unprepared, telephoning excuses. But if you are serious you will soon +fall into the routine." "I shall try to be regular," murmured Mildred. + +Jennings apparently did not hear. "I'm on my way to the opera-house," +said he. "One of my old pupils is appearing in a new role, and she is +nervous. Good night." + +Once more that swift, quiet exit, followed almost instantaneously by +the sound of wheels rolling away. Never had she seen such rapidity of +motion without loss of dignity. "Yes, he's a fraud," she said to +herself, "but he's a good one." + +The idea of a career had now become less indefinite. It was still +without any attraction--not because of the toil it involved, for that +made small impression upon her who had never worked and had never seen +anyone work, but because a career meant cutting herself off from +everything she had been brought up to regard as fit and proper for a +lady. She was ashamed of this; she did not admit its existence even to +herself, and in her talks with Baird about the career she had professed +exactly the opposite view. Yet there it was--nor need she have been +ashamed of a feeling that is instilled into women of her class from +babyhood as part of their ladylike education. The career had not +become definite. She could not imagine herself out on a stage in some +sort of a costume, with a painted face, singing before an audience. +Still, the career was less indefinite than when it had no existence +beyond Stanley Baird's enthusiasm and her own whipped-up pretense of +enthusiasm. + +She shrank from the actual start, but at the same time was eager for +it. Inaction began to fret her nerves, and she wished to be doing +something to show her appreciation of Stanley Baird's generosity. She +telephoned Mrs. Brindley that she would come in the morning, and then +she told her landlady. + +Mrs. Belloc was more than regretful; she was distressed. Said she: +"I've taken a tremendous fancy to you, and I hate to give you up. I'd +do most anything to keep you." + +Mildred explained that her work compelled her to go. + +"That's very interesting," said Mrs. Belloc. "If I were a few years +younger, and hadn't spent all my energy in teaching school and putting +through that marriage, I'd try to get on the stage, myself. I don't +want to lose sight of you." + +"Oh, I'll come to see you from time to time." + +"No, you won't," said Mrs. Belloc practically. "No more than I'd come +to see you. Our lives lie in different directions, and in New York +that means we'll never have time to meet. But we may be thrown +together again, some time. As I've got a twenty years' lease on this +house, I guess you'll have no trouble in finding me. I suppose I could +look you up through Professor Jennings?" + +"Yes," said Mildred. Then impulsively, "Mrs. Belloc, there's a reason +why I'd like to change without anyone's knowing what has become of +me--I mean, anyone that might be--watching me." + +"I understand perfectly," said Mrs. Belloc with a ready sympathy that +made Mildred appreciate the advantages of the friendship of +unconventional, knock-about people. "Nothing could be easier. You've +got no luggage but that bag. I'll take it up to the Grand Central +Station and check it, and bring the check back here. You can send for +it when you please." + +"But what about me?" said Mildred. + +"I was coming to that. You walk out of here, say, about half an hour +after I go in the taxi. You walk through to the corner of Lexington +Avenue and Thirty-seventh Street--there aren't any cabs to be had +there. I'll be waiting in the taxi, and we'll make a dash up the East +Side and I can drop you at some quiet place in the park and go on--and +you can walk to your new address. How does that strike you?" + +Mildred expressed her admiration. The plan was carried out, as Mrs. +Belloc--a born genius at all forms of intrigue--had evolved it in +perfection on the spur of the moment. As they went up the far East +Side, Mrs. Belloc, looking back through the little rear window, saw a +taxi a few blocks behind them. "We haven't given them the slip yet," +said she, "but we will in the park." They entered the park at East +Ninetieth Street, crossed to the West Drive. Acting on Mrs. Belloc's +instructions, the motorman put on full speed--with due regard to the +occasional policeman. At a sharp turning near the Mall, when the taxi +could be seen from neither direction, he abruptly stopped. Out sprang +Mildred and disappeared behind the bushes completely screening the walk +from the drive. At once the taxi was under-way again. She, waiting +where the screen of bushes was securely thick, saw the taxi that had +followed them in the East Side flash by--in pursuit of Mrs. Belloc +alone. + +She was free--at least until some mischance uncovered her to the little +general. At Mrs. Brindley's she found a note awaiting her--a note from +Stanley Baird: + + +DEAR MILDRED: + +I'm of for the Far West, and probably shall not be in town again until +the early summer. The club forwards my mail and repeats telegrams as +marked. Go in and win, and don't hesitate to call on me if you need +me. No false pride, PLEASE! I'm getting out of the way because it's +obviously best for the present. + +STANLEY. + + +As she finished, her sense of freedom was complete. She had not +realized how uneasy she was feeling about Stanley. She did not doubt +his generosity, did not doubt that he genuinely intended to leave her +free, and she believed that his delicacy was worthy of his generosity. +Still, she was constantly fearing lest circumstances should thrust them +both--as much against his will as hers--into a position in which she +would have to choose between seeming, not to say being, ungrateful, and +playing the hypocrite, perhaps basely, with him. The little general +eluded, Stanley voluntarily removed; she was indeed free. Now she +could work with an untroubled mind, could show Mrs. Brindley that +intelligent and persistent work--her "biggest if in all the world"--was +in fact a very simple matter. + +She had not been settled at Mrs. Brindley's many hours before she +discovered that not only was she free from all hindrances, but was to +have a positive and great help. Mrs. Brindley's talent for putting +people at their ease was no mere drawing-room trick. + +She made Mildred feel immediately at home, as she had not felt at home +since her mother introduced James Presbury into their house at Hanging +Rock. Mrs. Brindley was absolutely devoid of pretenses. When Mildred +spoke to her of this quality in her she said: + +"I owe that to my husband. I was brought up like everybody else--to be +more or less of a poser and a hypocrite. In fact, I think there was +almost nothing genuine about me. My husband taught me to be myself, to +be afraid of nobody's opinion, to show myself just as I was and to let +people seek or avoid me as they saw fit. He was that sort of man +himself." + +"He must have been a remarkable man," said Mildred. + +"He was," replied Mrs. Brindley. "But not attractive--at least not to +me. Our marriage was a mistake. We quarreled whenever we were not at +work with the music. If he had not died, we should have been +divorced." She smiled merrily. "Then he would have hired me as his +musical secretary, and we'd have got on beautifully." + +Mildred was still thinking of Mrs. Brindley's freedom from pretense. +"I've never dared be myself," confessed she. "I don't know what myself +really is like. I was thinking the other day how for one reason and +another I've been a hypocrite all my life. You see, I've always been a +dependent--have always had to please someone in order to get what I +wanted." + +"You can never be yourself until you have an independent income, +however small," said Mrs. Brindley. "I've had that joy only since my +husband died. It's as well that I didn't have it sooner. One is the +better for having served an apprenticeship at self-repression and at +pretending to virtues one has not. Only those who earn their freedom +know how to use it. If I had had it ten or fifteen years ago I'd have +been an intolerable tyrant, making everyone around me unhappy and +therefore myself. The ideal world would be one where everyone was born +free and never knew anything else. Then, no one being afraid or having +to serve, everyone would have to be considerate in order to get himself +tolerated." + +"I wonder if I really ever shall be able to earn a living?" sighed +Mildred. + +"You must decide that whatever you can make shall be for you a living," +said the older woman. "I have lived on my fixed income, which is under +two thousand a year. And I am ready to do it again rather than +tolerate anything or anybody that does not suit me." + +"I shall have to be extremely careful," laughed Mildred. "I shall be a +dreadful hypocrite with you." + +Mrs. Brindley smiled; but underneath, Mildred saw--or perhaps +felt--that her new friend was indeed not one to be trifled with. She +said: + +"You and I will get on. We'll let each other alone. We have to be more +or less intimate, but we'll never be familiar." + +After a time she discovered that Mrs. Brindley's first name was +Cyrilla, but Mrs. Brindley and Miss Stevens they remained to each other +for a long time--until circumstances changed their accidental intimacy +into enduring friendship. Not to anticipate, in the course of that +same conversation Mildred said: + +"If there is anything about me--about my life--that you wish me to +explain, I shall be glad to do so." + +"I know all I wish to know," replied Cyrilla Brindley. "Your face and +your manner and your way of speaking tell me all the essentials." + +"Then you must not think it strange when I say I wish no one to know +anything about me." + +"It will be impossible for you entirely to avoid meeting people," said +Cyrilla. "You must have some simple explanation about yourself, or you +will attract attention and defeat your object." + +"Lead people to believe that I'm an orphan--perhaps of some obscure +family--who is trying to get up in the world. That is practically the +truth." + +Mrs. Brindley laughed. "Quite enough for New York," said she. "It is +not interested in facts. All the New-Yorker asks of you is, 'Can you +pay your bills and help me pay mine?'" + +Competent men are rare; but, thanks to the advantage of the male sex in +having to make the struggle for a living, they are not so rare as +competent women. Mrs. Brindley was the first competent woman Mildred +had ever known. She had spent but a few hours with her before she +began to appreciate what a bad atmosphere she had always breathed--bad +for a woman who has her way to make in the world, or indeed for any +woman not willing to be content as mere more or less shiftless, more or +less hypocritical and pretentious, dependent and parasite. Mrs. +Brindley--well bred and well educated--knew all the little matters +which Mildred had been taught to regard as the whole of a lady's +education. But Mildred saw that these trifles were but a trifling +incident in Mrs. Brindley's knowledge. She knew real things, this +woman who was a thorough-going housekeeper and who trebled her income +by giving music lessons a few hours a day to such pupils as she thought +worth the teaching. When she spoke, she always said something one of +the first things noticed by Mildred, who, being too lazy to think +except as her naturally good mind insisted on exercising itself, +usually talked simply to kill time and without any idea of getting +anywhere. But while Cyrilla--without in the least intending it--roused +her to a painful sense of her own limitations, she did not discourage +her. Mildred also began to feel that in this new atmosphere of ideas, +of work, of accomplishment, she would rapidly develop into a different +sort of person. It was extremely fortunate for her, thought she, that +she was living with such a person as Cyrilla Brindley. In the old +atmosphere, or with any taint of it, she would have been unable to +become a serious person. She would simply have dawdled along, +twaddling about "art" and seriousness and careers and sacrifice, +content with the amateur's methods and the amateur's results--and +deluding herself that she was making progress. Now--It was as +different as public school from private school--public school where the +mind is rudely stimulated, private school where it is sedulously +mollycoddled. She had come out of the hothouse into the open. + +At first she thought that Jennings was to be as great a help to her as +Cyrilla Brindley. Certainly if ever there was a man with the air of a +worker and a place with the air of a workshop, that man and that place +were Eugene Jennings and his studio in Carnegie Hall. When Mildred +entered, on that Saturday morning, at exactly half-past ten, +Jennings--in a plain if elegant house-suit--looked at her, looked at +the clock, stopped a girl in the midst of a burst of tremulous noisy +melody. + +"That will do, Miss Bristow," said he. "You have never sung it worse. +You do not improve. Another lesson like this, and we shall go back and +begin all over again." + +The girl, a fattish, "temperamental" blonde, burst into tears. + +"Kindly take that out into the hall," said Jennings coldly. "Your time +is up. We cannot waste Miss Stevens's time with your hysterics." + +Miss Bristow switched from tears to fury. "You brute! You beast!" she +shrieked, and flung herself out of the room, slamming the door after +her. Jennings took a book from a pile upon a table, opened it, and set +it on a music-stand. Evidently Miss Bristow was forgotten--indeed, had +passed out of his mind at half-past ten exactly, not to enter it again +until she should appear at ten on Monday morning. He said to Mildred: + +"Now, we'll see what you can do. Begin." + +"I'm a little nervous," said Mildred with a shy laugh. "If you don't +mind, I'd like to wait till I've got used to my surroundings." + +Jennings looked at her. The long sharp nose seemed to be rapping her +on the forehead like a woodpecker's beak on the bark of the tree. +"Begin," he said, pointing to the book. + +Mildred flushed angrily. "I shall not begin until I CAN begin," said +she. The time to show this man that he could not treat her brutally +was at the outset. + +Jennings opened the door into the hall. "Good day, Miss Stevens," he +said with his abrupt bow. + +Mildred looked at him; he looked at her. Her lip trembled, the hot +tears flooded and blinded her eyes. She went unsteadily to the +music-stand and tried to see the notes of the exercises. Jennings +closed the door and seated himself at the far end of the room. She +began--a ridiculous attempt. She stopped, gritted her teeth, began +again. Once more the result was absurd; but this time she was able to +keep on, not improving, but maintaining her initial off-key quavering. +She stopped. + +"You see," said she. "Shall I go on?" + +"Don't stop again until I tell you to, please," said he. + +She staggered and stumbled and somersaulted through two pages of +DO-RE-ME-FA-SOL-LA-SI. Then he held up his finger. + +"Enough," said he. + +Silence, an awful silence. She recalled what Mrs. Belloc had told her +about him, what Mrs. Brindley had implied. But she got no consolation. +She said timidly: + +"Really, Mr. Jennings, I can do better than that. Won't you let me try +a song?" + +"God forbid!" said he. "You can't stand. You can't breathe. You +can't open your mouth. Naturally, you can't sing." + +She dropped to a chair. + +"Take the book, and go over the same thing, sitting," said he. + +She began to remove her wraps. + +"Just as you are," he commanded. "Try to forget yourself. Try to +forget me. Try to forget what a brute I am, and what a wonderful +singer you are. Just open your mouth and throw the notes out." + +She was rosy with rage. She was reckless. She sang. At the end of +three pages he stopped her with an enthusiastic hand-clapping. "Good! +Good!" he cried. "I'll take you. I'll make a singer of you. Yes, yes, +there's something to work on." + +The door opened. A tall, thin woman with many jewels and a superb fur +wrap came gliding in. Jennings looked at the clock. The hands pointed +to eleven. Said he to Mildred: + +"Take that book with you. Practice what you've done to-day. Learn to +keep your mouth open. We'll go into that further next time." He was +holding the door open for her. As she passed out, she heard him say: + +"Ah, Mrs. Roswell. We'll go at that third song first." + +The door closed. Reviewing all that had occurred, Mildred decided that +she must revise her opinion of Jennings. A money-maker he no doubt +was. And why not? Did he not have to live? But a teacher also, and a +great teacher. Had he not destroyed her vanity at one blow, demolished +it?--yet without discouraging her. And he went straight to the bottom +of things--very different from any of the teachers she used to have +when she was posing in drawing-rooms as a person with a voice equal to +the most difficult opera, if only she weren't a lady and therefore not +forced to be a professional singing person. Yes, a great teacher--and +in deadly earnest. He would permit no trifling! How she would have to +work! + +And she went to work with an energy she would not have believed she +possessed. He instructed her minutely in how to stand, in how to +breathe, in how to open her mouth and keep it open, in how to relax her +throat and leave it relaxed. He filled every second of her half-hour; +she had never before realized how much time half an hour was, how use +could be made of every one of its eighteen hundred seconds. She went +to hear other teachers give lessons, and she understood why Jennings +could get such prices, could treat his pupils as he saw fit. She +became an extravagant admirer of him as a teacher, thought him a +genius, felt confident that he would make a great singer of her. With +the second lesson she began to progress rapidly. In a few weeks she +amazed herself. At last she was really singing. Not in a great way, +but in the beginnings of a great way. Her voice had many times the +power of her drawing-room days. Her notes were full and round, and +came without an effort. Her former ideas of what constituted facial +and vocal expression now seemed ridiculous to her. She was now singing +without making those dreadful faces which she had once thought charming +and necessary. Her lower register, always her best, was almost +perfect. Her middle register--the test part of a voice--was showing +signs of strength and steadiness and evenness. And she was fast +getting a real upper register, as distinguished from the forced and +shrieky high notes that pass as an upper register with most singers, +even opera singers. After a month of this marvelous forward march, she +sang for Mrs. Brindley--sang the same song she had essayed at their +first meeting. When she finished, Mrs. Brindley said: + +"Yes, you've done wonders. I've been noticing your improvement as you +practiced. You certainly have a very different voice and method from +those you had a month ago," and so on through about five minutes of +critical and discriminating praise. + +Mildred listened, wondering why her dissatisfaction, her irritation, +increased as Mrs. Brindley praised on and on. Beyond question Cyrilla +was sincere, and was saying even more than Mildred had hoped she would +say. Yet-- Mildred sat moodily measuring off octaves on the keyboard +of the piano. If she had been looking at her friend's face she would +have flared out in anger; for Cyrilla Brindley was taking advantage of +her abstraction to observe her with friendly sympathy and sadness. +Presently she concealed this candid expression and said: + +"You are satisfied with your progress, aren't you, Miss Stevens?" + +Mildred flared up angrily. "Certainly!" replied she. "How could I +fail to be?" + +Mrs. Brindley did not answer--perhaps because she thought no answer was +needed or expected. But to Mildred her silence somehow seemed a denial. + +"If you can only keep what you've got--and go on," said Mrs. Brindley. + +"Oh, I shall, never fear," retorted Mildred. + +"But I do fear," said Mrs. Brindley. "I think it's always well to fear +until success is actually won. And then there's the awful fear of not +being able to hold it." + +After a moment's silence Mildred, who could not hide away resentment +against one she liked, said: "Why aren't YOU satisfied, Mrs. Brindley?" + +"But I am satisfied," protested Cyrilla. "Only it makes me afraid to +see YOU so well satisfied. I've seen that often in people first +starting, and it's always dangerous. You see, my dear, you've got a +straight-away hundred miles to walk. Can't you see that it would be +possible for you to become too much elated by the way you walked the +first part of the first mile?" + +"Why do you try to discourage me?" said Mildred. + +Mrs. Brindley colored. "I do it because I want to save you from +despair a little later," said she. "But that is foolish of me. I +shall only irritate you against me. I'll not do it again. And please +don't ask my opinion. If you do, I can't help showing exactly what I +think." + +"Then you don't think I've done well?" cried Mildred. + +"Indeed you have," replied Cyrilla warmly. + +"Then I don't understand. What DO you mean?" + +"I'll tell you, and then I'll stop and you must not ask my opinion +again. We live too close together to be able to afford to criticize +each other. What I meant was this: You have done well the first part +of the great task that's before you. If you had done it any less well, +it would have been folly for you to go on." + +"That is, what I've done doesn't amount to anything? Mr. Jennings +doesn't agree with you." + +"Doubtless he's right," said Mrs. Brindley. "At any rate, we all agree +that you have shown that you have a voice." + +She said this so simply and heartily that Mildred could not but be +mollified. Mrs. Brindley changed the subject to the song Mildred had +sung, and Mildred stopped puzzling over the mystery of what she had +meant by her apparently enthusiastic words, which had yet diffused a +chill atmosphere of doubt. + +She was doing her scales so well that she became impatient of such +"tiresome child's play." And presently Jennings gave her songs, and +did not discourage her when she talked of roles, of getting seriously +at what, after all, she intended to do. Then there came a week of vile +weather, and Mildred caught a cold. She neglected it. Her voice left +her. Her tonsils swelled. She had a bad attack of ulcerated sore +throat. For nearly three weeks she could not take a single one of the +lessons, which were, nevertheless, paid for. Jennings rebuked her +sharply. + +"A singer has no right to be sick," said he. + +"You have a cold yourself," retorted she. + +"But I am not a singer. I've nothing that interferes with my work." + +"It's impossible not to take cold," said Mildred. "You are unreasonable +with me." + +He shrugged his shoulders. "Go get well," he said. + +The sore throat finally yielded to the treatment of Dr. Hicks, the +throat-specialist. His bill was seventy-five dollars. But while the +swelling in the tonsils subsided it did not depart. She could take +lessons again. Some days she sang as well as ever, and on those days +Jennings was charming. Other days she sang atrociously, and Jennings +treated her as if she were doing it deliberately. A third and worse +state was that of the days when she in the same half-hour alternately +sang well and badly. On those days Jennings acted like a lunatic. He +raved up and down the studio, all but swearing at her. At first she +was afraid of him--withered under his scorn, feared he would throw open +his door and order her out and forbid her ever to enter again. But +gradually she came to understand him--not enough to lose her fear of +him altogether, but enough to lose the fear of his giving up so +profitable a pupil. + +The truth was that Jennings, like every man who succeeds at anything in +this world, operated upon a system to which he rigidly adhered. He was +a man of small talent and knowledge, but of great, persistence and not +a little common sense. He had tried to be a singer, had failed because +his voice was small and unreliable. He had adopted teaching singing as +a means of getting a living. He had learned just enough about it to +enable him to teach the technical elements--what is set down in the +books. By observing other and older teachers he had got together a +teaching system that was as good--and as bad--as any, and this he +dubbed the Jennings Method and proceeded to exploit as the only one +worth while. When that method was worked out and perfected, he ceased +learning, ceased to give a thought to the professional side of his +profession, just as most professional men do. He would have resented a +suggestion or a new idea as an attack upon the Jennings Method. The +overwhelming majority of the human race--indeed, all but a small +handful--have this passion for stagnation, this ferocity against +change. It is in large part due to laziness; for a new idea means work +in learning it and in unlearning the old ideas that have been true +until the unwelcome advent of the new. In part also this resistance to +the new idea arises from a fear that the new idea, if tolerated, will +put one out of business, will set him adrift without any means of +support. The coachman hates the automobile, the hand-worker hates the +machine, the orthodox preacher hates the heretic, the politician hates +the reformer, the doctor hates the bacteriologist and the chemist, the +old woman hates the new--all these in varying proportions according to +the degree in which the iconoclast attacks laziness or livelihood. +Finally we all hate any and all new ideas because they seem to imply +that we, who have held the old ideas, have been ignorant and stupid in +so doing. A new idea is an attack upon the vanity of everyone who has +been a partisan of the old ideas and their established order. + +Jennings, thoroughly human in thus closing his mind to all ideas about +his profession, was equally human in that he had his mind and his +senses opened full width to ideas on how to make more money. If there +had been money in new ideas about teaching singing Jennings would not +have closed to them. But the money was all in studying and learning +how better to handle the women--they were all women who came to him for +instruction. His common sense warned him at the outset that the +obviously easygoing teacher would not long retain his pupils. On the +other hand, he saw that the really severe teacher would not retain his +pupils, either. + +Who were these pupils? In the first place, they were all ignorant, for +people who already know do not go to school to learn. They had the +universal delusion that a teacher can teach. The fact is that a +teacher is a well. Some wells are full, others almost dry. Some are +so arranged that water cannot be got from them, others have attachments +of various kinds, making the drawing of water more or less easy. But +not from the best well with the latest pump attachment can one get a +drink unless one does the drinking oneself. A teacher is rarely a +well. The pupil must not only draw the water, but also drink it, must +not only teach himself, but also learn what he teaches. Now we are all +of us born thirsty for knowledge, and nearly all of us are born both +capable of teaching ourselves and capable of learning what we teach, +that is, of retaining and assimilating it. There is such a thing as +artificially feeding the mind, just as there is such a thing as +artificially feeding the body; but while everyone knows that artificial +feeding of the body is a success only to a limited extent and for a +brief period, everyone believes that the artificial feeding of the mind +is not only the best method, but the only method. Nor does the +discovery that the mind is simply the brain, is simply a part of the +body, subject to the body's laws, seem materially to have lessened this +fatuous delusion. + +Some of Jennings's pupils--not more than two of the forty-odd were in +genuine earnest; that is, those two were educating themselves to be +professional singers, were determined so to be, had limited time and +means and endless capacity for work. Others of the forty--about +half-thought they were serious, though in fact the idea of a career was +more or less hazy. They were simply taking lessons and toiling +aimlessly along, not less aimlessly because they indulged in vague talk +and vaguer thought about a career. The rest--the other half of the +forty--were amusing themselves by taking singing lessons. It killed +time, it gave them a feeling of doing something, it gave them a +reputation of being serious people and not mere idlers, it gave them an +excuse for neglecting the domestic duties which they regarded as +degrading--probably because to do them well requires study and earnest, +hard work. The Jennings singing lesson, at fifteen dollars a +half-hour, was rather an expensive hypocrisy; but the women who used it +as a cloak for idleness as utter as the mere yawners and bridgers and +shoppers had rich husbands or fathers. + +Thus it appears that the Jennings School was a perfect microcosm, as +the scientists would say, of the human race--the serious very few, +toiling more or less successfully toward a definite goal; the many, +compelled to do something, and imagining themselves serious and +purposeful as they toiled along toward nothing in particular but the +next lesson--that is, the next day's appointed task; the utterly idle, +fancying themselves busy and important when in truth they were simply a +fraud and an expense. + +Jennings got very little from the deeply and genuinely serious. One of +them he taught free, taking promissory notes for the lessons. But he +held on to them because when they finally did teach themselves to sing +and arrived at fame, his would be part of the glory--and glory meant +more and more pupils of the paying kinds. His large income came from +the other two kinds of pupils, the larger part of it from the kind that +had no seriousness in them. His problem was how to keep all these +paying pupils and also keep his reputation as a teacher. In solving +that problem he evolved a method that was the true Jennings's method. +Not in all New York, filled as it is with people living and living well +upon the manipulation of the weaknesses of their fellow beings--not in +all New York was there an adroiter manipulator than Eugene Jennings. He +was harsh to brutality when he saw fit to be so--or, rather, when he +deemed it wise to be so. Yet never had he lost a paying pupil through +his harshness. These were fashionable women--most delicate, sensitive +ladies--at whom he swore. They wept, stayed on, advertised him as a +"wonderful serious teacher who won't stand any nonsense and doesn't +care a hang whether you stay or go--and he can teach absolutely anybody +to sing!" He knew how to be gentle without seeming to be so; he knew +how to flatter without uttering a single word that did not seem to be +reluctant praise or savage criticism; he knew how to make a lady with a +little voice work enough to make a showing that would spur her to keep +on and on with him; he knew how to encourage a rich woman with no more +song than a peacock until she would come to him three times a week for +many years--and how he did make her pay for what he suffered in +listening to the hideous squawkings and yelpings she inflicted upon him! + +Did Jennings think himself a fraud? No more than the next human being +who lives by fraud. Is there any trade or profession whose +practitioners, in the bottom of their hearts, do not think they are +living excusably and perhaps creditably? The Jennings theory was that +he was a great teacher; that there were only a very few serious and +worth-while seekers of the singing art; that in order to live and to +teach these few, he had to receive the others; that, anyhow, singing +was a fine art for anyone to have and taking singing lessons made the +worst voice a little less bad--or, at the least, singing was splendid +for the health. One of his favorite dicta was, "Every child should be +taught singing--for its health, if for nothing else." And perhaps he +was right! At any rate, he made his forty to fifty thousand a +year--and on days when he had a succession of the noisy, tuneless +squawkers, he felt that he more than earned every cent of it. + +Mildred did not penetrate far into the secret of the money-making +branch of the Jennings method. It was crude enough, too. But are not +all the frauds that fool the human race crude? Human beings both +cannot and will not look beneath surfaces. All Mildred learned was +that Jennings did not give up paying pupils. She had not confidence +enough in this discovery to put it to the test. She did not dare +disobey him or shirk--even when she was most disposed to do so. But +gradually she ceased from that intense application she had at first +brought to her work. She kept up the forms. She learned her lessons. +She did all that was asked. She seemed to be toiling as in the +beginning. In reality, she became by the middle of spring a mere +lesson-taker. Her interest in clothes and in going about revived. She +saw in the newspapers that General Siddall had taken a party of friends +on a yachting trip around the world, so she felt that she was no longer +being searched for, at least not vigorously. She became acquainted +with smart, rich West Side women, taking lessons at Jennings's. She +amused herself going about with them and with the "musical" men they +attracted--amateur and semi-professional singers and players upon +instruments. She drew Mrs. Brindley into their society. They had +little parties at the flat in Fifty-ninth Street--the most delightful +little parties imaginable--dinners and suppers, music, clever +conversations, flirtations of a harmless but fascinating kind. If +anyone had accused Mildred of neglecting her work, of forgetting her +career, she would have grown indignant, and if Mrs. Brindley had +overheard, she would have been indignant for her. Mildred worked as +much as ever. She was making excellent progress. She was doing all +that could be done. It takes time to develop a voice, to make an +opera-singer. Forcing is dangerous, when it is not downright useless. + +In May--toward the end of the month--Stanley Baird returned. Mildred, +who happened to be in unusually good voice that day, sang for him at +the Jennings studio, and he was enchanted. As the last note died away +he cried out to Jennings: + +"She's a wonder, isn't she?" + +Jennings nodded. "She's got a voice," said he. + +"She ought to go on next year." + +"Not quite that," said Jennings. "We want to get that upper register +right first. And it's a young voice--she's very young for her age. We +must be careful not to strain it." + +"Why, what's a voice for if not to sing with?" said Stanley. + +"A fine voice is a very delicate instrument," replied the teacher. He +added coldly, "You must let me judge as to what shall be done." + +"Certainly, certainly," said Stanley in haste. + +"She's had several colds this winter and spring," pursued Jennings. +"Those things are dangerous until the voice has its full growth. She +should have two months' complete rest." + +Jennings was going away for a two months' vacation. He was giving this +advice to all his pupils. + +"You're right," said Baird. "Did you hear, Mildred?" + +"But I hate to stop work," objected Mildred. "I want to be doing +something. I'm very impatient of this long wait." + +And honest she was in this protest. She had no idea of the state of +her own mind. She fancied she was still as eager as ever for the +career, as intensely interested as ever in her work. She did not dream +of the real meaning of her content with her voice as it was, of her +lack of uneasiness over the appalling fact that such voice as she had +was unreliable, came and went for no apparent reason. + +"Absolute rest for two months," declared Jennings grimly. "Not a note +until I return in August." + +Mildred gave a resigned sigh. + +There is much inveighing against hypocrisy, a vice unsightly rather +than desperately wicked. And in the excitement about it its dangerous, +even deadly near kinsman, self-deception, escapes unassailed. Seven +cardinal sins; but what of the eighth?--the parent of all the others, +the one beside which the children seem almost white? + + +During the first few weeks Mildred had been careful about spending +money. Economy she did not understand; how could she, when she had +never had a lesson in it or a valuable hint about it? So economy was +impossible. The only way in which such people can keep order in their +finances is by not spending any money at all. Mildred drew nothing, +spent nothing. This, so long as she gave her whole mind to her work. +But after the first great cold, so depressing, so subtly undermining, +she began to go about, to think of, to need and to buy clothes, to +spend money in a dozen necessary ways. After all, she was simply +borrowing the money. Presently, she would be making a career, would be +earning large sums. She would pay back everything, with interest. +Stanley meant for her to use the money. Really, she ought to use it. +How would her career be helped by her going about looking a dowd and a +frump? She had always been used to the comforts of life. If she +deprived herself of them, she would surely get into a frame of mind +where her work would suffer. No, she must lead the normal life of a +woman of her class. To work all the time--why, as Jennings said, that +took away all the freshness, made one stale and unfit. A little +distraction--always, of course, with musical people, people who talked +and thought and did music--that sort of distraction was quite as much a +part of her education as the singing lessons. Mrs. Brindley, certainly +a sensible and serious woman if ever there was one--Mrs. Brindley +believed so, and it must be so. + +After that illness and before she began to go about, she had fallen +into several fits of hideous blues, had been in despair as to the +future. As soon as she saw something of people--always the valuable, +musical sort of people--her spirits improved. And when she got a few +new dresses--very simple and inexpensive, but stylish and charming--and +the hats, too, were successful--as soon as she was freshly arrayed she +was singing better and was talking hopefully of the career again. Yes, +it was really necessary that she live as she had always been used to +living. + +When Stanley came back her account was drawn up to the last cent of the +proportionate amount. In fact, it might have been a few dollars--a +hundred or so--overdrawn. She was not sure. Still, that was a small +matter. During the summer she would spend less, and by fall she would +be far ahead again--and ready to buy fall clothes. One day he said: + +"You must be needing more money." + +"No indeed," cried she. "I've been living within the hundred a +week--or nearly. I'm afraid I'm frightfully extravagant, and--" + +"Extravagant?" laughed he. "You are afraid to borrow! Why, three or +four nights of singing will pay back all you've borrowed." + +"I suppose I WILL make a lot of money," said she. "They all tell me so. +But it doesn't seem real to me." She hastily added: "I don't mean the +career. That seems real enough. I can hardly wait to begin at the +roles. I mean the money part. You see, I never earned any money and +never really had any money of my own." + +"Well, you'll have plenty of it in two or three years," said Stanley, +confidently. "And you mustn't try to live like girls who've been +brought up to hardship. It isn't necessary, and it would only unfit +you for your work." + +"I think that's true," said she. "But I've enough--more than enough." +She gave him a nervous, shy, almost agonized look. "Please don't try +to put me under any heavier obligations than I have to be." + +"Please don't talk nonsense about obligation," retorted he. "Let's get +away from this subject. You don't seem to realize that you're doing me +a favor, that it's a privilege to be allowed to help develop such a +marvelous voice as yours. Scores of people would jump at the chance." + +"That doesn't lessen my obligation," said she. And she thought she +meant it, though, in fact, his generous and plausible statement of the +case had immediately lessened not a little her sense of obligation. + +On the whole, however, she was not sorry she had this chance to talk of +obligation. Slowly, as they saw each other from time to time, often +alone, Stanley had begun--perhaps in spite of himself and +unconsciously--to show his feeling for her. Sometimes his hand +accidentally touched hers, and he did not draw it away as quickly as he +might. And she--it was impossible for her to make any gesture, much +less say anything, that suggested sensitiveness on her part. It would +put him in an awkward position, would humiliate him most unjustly. He +fell into the habit of holding her hand longer than was necessary at +greeting or parting, of touching her caressingly, of looking at her +with the eyes of a lover instead of a friend. She did not like these +things. For some mysterious reason--from sheer perversity, she +thought--she had taken a strong physical dislike to him. Perfectly +absurd, for there was nothing intrinsically repellent about this +handsome, clean, most attractively dressed man, of the best type of +American and New-Yorker. No, only perversity could explain such a silly +notion. She was always afraid he would try to take advantage of her +delicate position--always afraid she would have to yield something, +some trifle; yet the idea of giving anything from a sense of obligation +was galling to her. His very refraining made her more nervous, the +more shrinking. If he would only commit some overt act--seize her, kiss +her, make outrageous demands--but this refraining, these touches that +might be accidental and again might be stealthy approach-- She hated +to have him shake hands with her, would have liked to draw away when +his clothing chanced to brush against hers. + +So she was glad of the talk about obligation. It set him at a +distance, immediately. He ceased to look lovingly, to indulge in the +nerve-rasping little caresses. He became carefully formal. He was +evidently eager to prove the sincerity of his protestations--too eager +perhaps, her perverse mind suggested. Still, sincere or not, he held +to all the forms of sincerity. + +Some friends of Mrs. Brindley's who were going abroad offered her their +cottage on the New Jersey coast near Seabright, and a big new +touring-car and chauffeur. She and Mildred at once gave up the plan +for a summer in the Adirondacks, the more readily as several of the men +and women they saw the most of lived within easy distance of them at +Deal Beach and Elberon. When Mildred went shopping she was lured into +buying a lot of summer things she would not have needed in the +Adirondacks--a mere matter of two hundred and fifty dollars or +thereabouts. A little additional economy in the fall would soon make +up for such a trifle, and if there is one time more than another when a +woman wishes to look well and must look well, that time is +summer--especially by the sea. + +When her monthly statement from the bank came on the first of July she +found that five thousand dollars had been deposited to her credit. She +was moved by this discovery to devote several hours--very depressed +hours they were--to her finances. She had spent a great deal more +money than she had thought; indeed, since March she had been living at +the rate of fifteen thousand a year. She tried to account for this +amazing extravagance. But she could recall no expenditure that was not +really almost, if not quite, necessary. It took a frightful lot of +money to live in New York. How DID people with small incomes manage to +get along? Whatever would have become of her if she had not had the +good luck to be able to borrow from Stanley? What would become of her +if, before she was succeeding on the stage, Stanley should die or lose +faith in her or interest in her? What would become of her! She had +been living these last few months among people who had wide-open eyes +and knew everything that was going on--and did some "going-on" +themselves, as she was now more than suspecting. There were many +women, thousands of them--among the attractive, costily dressed throngs +she saw in the carriages and autos and cabs--who would not like to have +it published how they contrived to live so luxuriously. No, they would +not like to have it published, though they cared not a fig for its +being whispered; New York too thoroughly understood how necessary +luxurious living was, and was too completely divested of the follies of +the old-fashioned, straight-laced morality, to mind little shabby +details of queer conduct in striving to keep up with the procession. +Even the married women, using their husbands--and letting their +husbands use them--did not frown on the irregularities of their sisters +less fortunately married or not able to find a permanent "leg to pull." +As for the girls--Mildred had observed strange things in the lives of +the girls she knew more or less well nowadays. In fact, all the women, +of all classes and conditions, were engaged in the same mad struggle to +get hold of money to spend upon fun and finery--a struggle matching in +recklessness and resoluteness the struggle of the men down-town for +money for the same purposes. It was curious, this double mania of the +men and the women--the mania to get money, no matter how; the instantly +succeeding mania to get rid of it, no matter how. Looking about her, +Mildred felt that she was peculiar and apart from nearly all the women +she knew. SHE got her money honorably. SHE did not degrade herself, +did not sell herself, did not wheedle or cajole or pretend in the least +degree. She had grown more liberal as her outlook on life had widened +with contact with the New York mind--no, with the mind of the whole +easy-going, luxury-mad, morality-scorning modern world. She still kept +her standard for herself high, and believed in a purity for herself +which she did not exact or expect in her friends. In this respect she +and Cyrilla Brindley were sympathetically alike. No, Mildred was +confident that in no circumstances, in NO circumstances, would she +relax her ideas of what she personally could do and could not do. Not +that she blamed, or judged at all, women who did as she would not; but +she could not, simply could not, however hard she might be driven, do +those things--though she could easily understand how other women did +them in preference to sinking down into the working class or eking out +a frowsy existence in some poor boarding-house. The temptation would +be great. Thank Heaven, it was not teasing her. She would resist it, +of course. But-- + +What if Stanley Baird should lose interest? What if, after he lost +interest, she should find herself without money, worse of than she had +been when she sold herself into slavery--highly moral and +conventionally correct slavery, but still slavery--to the little +general with the peaked pink-silk nightcap hiding the absence of the +removed toupee--and with the wonderful pink-silk pajamas, gorgeously +monogramed in violet--and the tiny feet and ugly hands--and those +loathsome needle-pointed mustaches and the hideous habit of mumbling +his tongue and smacking his lips? What if, moneyless, she should not +be able to find another Stanley or a man of the class gentleman willing +to help her generously even on ANY terms? What then? + +She was looking out over the sea, her bank-book and statements and +canceled checks in her lap. Their cottage was at the very edge of the +strand; its veranda was often damp from spray after a storm. It was +not storming as she sat there, "taking stock"; under a blue sky an +almost tranquil sea was crooning softly in the sunlight, innocent and +happy and playful as a child. She, dressed in a charming negligee and +looking forward to a merry day in the auto, with lunch and dinner at +attractive, luxurious places farther down the coast--she was stricken +with a horrible sadness, with a terror that made her heart beat wildly. + +"I must be crazy!" she said, half aloud. "I've never earned a dollar +with my voice. And for two months it has been unreliable. I'm acting +like a crazy person. What WILL become of me?" + +Just then Stanley Baird came through the pretty little house, seeking +her. "There you are!" he cried. "Do go get dressed." + +Hastily she flung a scarf over the book and papers in her lap. She had +intended to speak to him about that fresh deposit of five thousand +dollars--to refuse it, to rebuke him. Now she did not dare. + +"What's the matter?" he went on. "Headache?" + +"It was the wine at dinner last night," explained she. "I ought never +to touch red wine. It disagrees with me horribly." + +"That was filthy stuff," said he. "You must take some champagne at +lunch. That'll set you right." + +She stealthily wound the scarf about the papers. When she felt that all +were secure she rose. She was looking sweet and sad and peculiarly +beautiful. There was an exquisite sheen on her skin. She had washed +her hair that morning, and it was straying fascinatingly about her brow +and ears and neck. Baird looked at her, lowered his eyes and colored. + +"I'll not be long," she said hurriedly. + +She had to pass him in the rather narrow doorway. From her garments +shook a delicious perfume. He caught her in his arms. The blood had +flushed into his face in a torrent, swelling out the veins, giving him +a distorted and wild expression. + +"Mildred!" he cried. "Say that you love me a little! I'm so lonely +for you--so hungry for you!" + +She grew cold with fear and with repulsion. She neither yielded to his +embrace nor shook it off. She simply stood, her round smooth body hard +though corsetless. He kissed her on the throat, kissed the lace over +her bosom, crying out inarticulately. In the frenzy of his passion he +did not for a while realize her lack of response. As he felt it, his +arms relaxed, dropped away from her, fell at his side. He hung his +head. He was breathing so heavily that she glanced into the house +apprehensively, fearing someone else might hear. + +"I beg pardon," he muttered. "You were too much for me this morning. +It was your fault. You are maddening!" + +She moved on into the house. + +"Wait a minute!" he called after her. + +She halted, hesitating. + +"Come back," he said. "I've got something to say to you." + +She turned and went back to the veranda, he retreating before her and +his eyes sinking before the cold, clear blue of hers. + +"You're going up, not to come down again," he said. "You think I've +insulted you--think I've acted outrageously." + +How glad she was that he had so misread her thoughts--had not +discovered the fear, the weakness, the sudden collapse of all her +boasted confidence in her strength of character. + +"You'll never feel the same toward me again," he went fatuously on. +"You think I'm a fraud. Well, I'll admit that I am in love with +you--have been ever since the steamer--always was crazy about that +mouth of yours--and your figure, and the sound of your voice. I'll +admit I'm an utter fool about you--respect you and trust you as I never +used to think any woman deserved to be respected and trusted. I'll +even admit that I've been hoping--all sorts of things. I knew a woman +like you wouldn't let a man help her unless she loved him." + +At this her heart beat wildly and a blush of shame poured over her face +and neck. He did not see. He had not the courage to look at her--to +face that expression of the violated goddess he felt confident her face +was wearing. In love, he reasoned and felt about her like an +inexperienced boy, all his experience going for nothing. He went on: + +"I understand we can never be anything to each other until you're on +the stage and arrived. I'd not have it otherwise, if I could. For I +want YOU, and I'd never believe I had you unless you were free." + +The color was fading from her cheeks. At this it flushed deeper than +before. She must speak. Not to speak was to lie, was to play the +hypocrite. Yet speak she dared not. At least Stanley Baird was better +than Siddall. Anyhow, who was she, that had been the wife of Siddall, +to be so finicky? + +"You don't believe me?" he said miserably. "You think I'll forget +myself sometime again?" + +"I hope not," she said gently. "I believe not. I trust you, Stanley." + +And she went into the house. He looked after her, in admiration of the +sweet and pure calm of this quiet rebuke. She tried to take the same +exalted view of it herself, but she could not fool herself just then +with the familiar "good woman" fake. She knew that she had struck the +flag of self-respect. She knew what she would really have done had he +been less delicate, less in love, and more "practical." And she found +a small and poor consolation in reflecting, "I wonder how many women +there are who take high ground because it costs nothing." We are prone +to suspect everybody of any weakness we find in ourselves--and perhaps +we are not so far wrong as are those who accept without question the +noisy protestations of a world of self-deceivers. + +Thenceforth she and Stanley got on better than ever--apparently. But +though she ignored it, she knew the truth--knew her new and deep +content was due to her not having challenged his assertion that she +loved him. He, believing her honest and high minded, assumed that the +failure to challenge was a good woman's way of admitting. But with the +day of reckoning--not only with him but also with her own +self-respect--put off until that vague and remote time when she should +be a successful prima donna, she gave herself up to enjoyment. That +was a summer of rarely fine weather, particularly fine along the Jersey +coast. They--always in gay parties--motored up and down the coast and +inland. Several of the "musical" men--notably Richardson of +Elberon--had plenty of money; Stanley, stopping with his cousins, the +Frasers, on the Rumson Road, brought several of his friends, all rich +and more or less free. As every moment of Mildred's day was full and +as it was impossible not to sleep and sleep well in that ocean air, +with the surf soothing the nerves as the lullaby of a nurse soothes a +baby, she was able to put everything unpleasant out of mind. She was +resting her voice, was building up her health; therefore the career was +being steadily advanced and no time was being wasted. She felt sorry +for those who had to do unpleasant or disagreeable things in making +their careers. She told herself that she did not deserve her good +fortune in being able to advance to a brilliant career not through +hardship but over the most delightful road imaginable--amusing herself, +wearing charming and satisfactory clothes, swimming and dancing, +motoring and feasting. Without realizing it, she was strongly under +the delusion that she was herself already rich--the inevitable delusion +with a woman when she moves easily and freely and luxuriously about, +never bothered for money, always in the company of rich people. The +rich are fated to demoralize those around them. The stingy rich fill +their satellites with envy and hatred. The generous rich fill them +with the feeling that the light by which they shine and the heat with +which they are warm are not reflected light and heat but their own. + +Never had she been so happy. She even did not especially mind Donald +Keith, a friend of Stanley's and of Mrs. Brindley's, who, much too +often to suit her, made one of the party. She had tried in vain to +discover what there was in Keith that inspired such intense liking in +two people so widely different as expansive and emotional Stanley Baird +and reserved and distinctly cold Cyrilla Brindley. Keith talked +little, not only seemed not to listen well, but showed plainly, even in +tete-a-tete conversations, that his thoughts had been elsewhere. He +made no pretense of being other than he was--an indifferent man who +came because it did not especially matter to him where he was. +Sometimes his silence and his indifference annoyed Mildred; +again--thanks to her profound and reckless contentment--she was able to +forget that he was along. He seemed to be and probably was about forty +years old. His head was beautifully shaped, the line of its +profile--front, top, and back--being perfect in intellectuality, +strength and symmetry. He was rather under the medium height, about +the same height as Mildred herself. He was extremely thin and loosely +built, and his clothes seemed to hang awry, giving him an air of +slovenliness which became surprising when one noted how scrupulously +neat and clean he was. His brown hair, considerably tinged with rusty +gray, grew thinly upon that beautiful head. His skin was dry and +smooth and dead white. This, taken with the classic regularity of his +features, gave him an air of lifelessness, of one burnt out by the fire +of too much living; but whether the living had been done by Keith +himself or by his immediate ancestors appearances did not disclose. +This look of passionless, motionless repose, like classic sculpture, +was sharply and startlingly belied by a pair of really wonderful +eyes--deeply and intensely blue, brilliant, all seeing, all +comprehending, eyes that seemed never to sleep, seemed the ceaselessly +industrious servants of a brain that busied itself without pause. The +contrast between the dead white calm of his face, the listlessness of +his relaxed figure, and these vivid eyes, so intensely alive, gave to +Donald Keith's personality an uncanniness that was most disagreeable to +Mildred. + +"That's what fascinates me," said Cyrilla, when they were discussing +him one day. + +"Fascinates!" exclaimed Mildred. "He's tiresome--when he isn't rude." + +"Rude?" + +"Not actively rude but, worse still, passively rude." + +"He is the only man I've ever seen with whom I could imagine myself +falling in love," said Mrs. Brindley. + +Mildred laughed in derision. "Why, he's a dead man!" cried she. + +"You don't understand," said Cyrilla. "You've never lived with a man." +She forgot completely, as did Mildred herself, so completely had Mrs. +Siddall returned to the modes and thoughts of a girl. "At home--to +live with--you want only reposeful things. That is why the Greeks, +whose instincts were unerring, had so much reposeful statuary. One +grows weary of agitating objects. They soon seem hysterical and +shallow. The same thing's true of persons. For permanent love and +friendship you want reposeful men--calm, strong, silent. The other +kind either wear you out or wear themselves out with you." + +"You forget his eyes," put in Stanley. "Did you ever see such eyes!" + +"Yes, those eyes of his!" cried Mildred. "You certainly can't call +them reposeful, Mrs. Brindley." + +Mrs. Brindley did not seize the opportunity to convict her of +inconsistency. Said she: + +"I admit the eyes. They're the eyes of the kind of man a woman wants, +or another man wants in his friend. When Keith looks at you, you feel +that you are seeing the rarest being in the world--an absolutely +reliable person. When I think of him I think of reliable, just as when +you think of the sun you think of brightness." + +"I had no idea it was so serious as this," teased Stanley. + +"Nor had I," returned Cyrilla easily, "until I began to talk about him. +Don't tell him, Mr. Baird, or he might take advantage of me." + +The idea amused Stanley. "He doesn't care a rap about women," said he. +"I hear he has let a few care about him from time to time, but he soon +ceased to be good-natured. He hates to be bored." + +As he came just then, they had to find another subject. Mildred +observed him with more interest. She had learned to have respect for +Mrs. Brindley's judgments. But she soon gave over watching him. That +profound calm, those eyes concentrating all the life of the man like a +burning glass-- She had a disagreeable sense of being seen through, +even to her secretest thought, of being understood and measured and +weighed--and found wanting. It occurred to her for the first time that +part of the reason for her not liking him was the best of reasons--that +he did not like her. + +The first time she was left alone with him, after this discovery, she +happened to be in an audacious and talkative mood, and his lack of +response finally goaded her into saying: "WHY don't you like me?" She +cared nothing about it; she simply wished to hear what he would say--if +he could be roused into saying anything. He was sitting on the steps +leading from the veranda to the sea--was smoking a cigarette and gazing +out over the waves like a graven image, as if he had always been posed +there and always would be there, the embodiment of repose gazing in +ineffable indifference upon the embodiment of its opposite. He made no +answer. + +"I asked you why you do not like me," said she. "Did you hear?" + +"Yes," replied he. + +She waited; nothing further from him. Said she: + +"Well, give me one of your cigarettes." + +He rose, extended his case, then a light. He was never remiss in those +kinds of politeness. When she was smoking, he seated himself again and +dropped into the former attitude. She eyed him, wondering how it could +be possible that he had endured the incredible fatigues and hardships +Stanley Baird had related of him--hunting and exploring expeditions +into tropics and into frozen regions, mountain climbs, wild sea voyages +in small boats, all with no sign of being able to stand anything, yet +also with no sign of being any more disturbed than now in this seaside +laziness. Stanley had showed them a picture of him taken twenty years +and more ago when he was in college; he had looked almost the same +then--perhaps a little older. + +"Well, I am waiting," persisted she. + +She thought he was about to look at her--a thing he had never done, to +her knowledge, since they had known each other. She nerved herself to +receive the shock, with a certain flutter of expectancy, of excitement +even. But instead of looking, he settled himself in a slightly +different position and fixed his gaze upon another point in the +horizon. She noted that he had splendid hands--ideal hands for a man, +with the same suggestion of intense vitality and aliveness that flashed +from his eyes. She had not noted this before. Next she saw that he +had good feet, and that his boots were his only article of apparel that +fitted him, or rather, that looked as if made for him. + +She tossed her cigarette over the rail to the sand. He startled her by +speaking, in his unemotional way. He said: + +"Now, I like you better." + +"I don't understand," said she. + +No answer from him. The cigarette depending listlessly from his lips +seemed--as usual--uncertain whether it would stay or fall. She watched +this uncertainty with a curious, nervous interest. She was always +thinking that cigarette would fall, but it never did. Said she: + +"Why did you say you liked me less?" + +"Better," corrected he. + +"We used to have a pump in our back yard at home," laughed she. "One +toiled away at the handle, but nothing ever came. And it was a +promising-looking pump, too." + +He smiled--a slow, reluctant smile, but undeniably attractive. Said he: + +"Because you threw away your cigarette." + +"You object to women smoking?" + +"No," said he. His tone made her feel how absurd it was to suspect him +of such provincialism. + +"You object to MY smoking?" suggested she; laughing, "Pump! Pump!" + +"No," said he. + +"Then your remark meant nothing at all?" + +He was silent. + +"You are rude," said she coldly, rising to go into the house. + +He said something, what she did not hear, in her agitation. She paused +and inquired: + +"What did you say?" + +"I said, I am not rude but kind," replied he. + +"That is detestable!" cried she. "I have not liked you, but I have +been polite to you because of Stanley and Mrs. Brindley. Why should +you be insulting to me?" + +"What have I done?" inquired he, unmoved. He had risen as she rose, +but instead of facing her he was leaning against the post of the +veranda, bent upon his seaward vigil. + +"You have insinuated that your reasons for not liking me were a +reflection on me." + +"You insisted," said he. + +"You mean that they are?" demanded she furiously. She was amazed at her +wild, unaccountable rage. + +He slowly turned his head and looked at her--a glance without any +emotion whatever, simply a look that, like the beam of a powerful +searchlight, seemed to thrust through fog and darkness and to light up +everything in its path. Said he: + +"Do you wish me to tell you why I don't like you?" + +"No!" she cried hysterically. "Never mind--I don't know what I'm +saying." And she went hastily into the house. A moment later, in her +own room upstairs, she was wondering at herself. Why had she become +confused? What did he mean? What had she seen--or half seen--in the +darkness and fog within herself when he looked at her? In a passion +she cried: + +"If he would only stay away!" + + + +VI + +BUT he did not stay away. He owned and lived in a small house up on +the Rumson Road. While the house was little more than a bungalow and +had a simplicity that completely hid its rare good taste from the +average observer, its grounds were the most spacious in that +neighborhood of costly, showy houses set in grounds not much more +extensive than a city building lot. The grounds had been cleared and +drained to drive out and to keep out the obnoxious insect life, but had +been left a forest, concealing the house from the roads. Stanley Baird +was now stopping with Keith, and brought him along to the cottage by +the sea every day. + +The parties narrowed to the same four persons. Mrs. Brindley seemed +never to tire of talking to Keith--or to tire of talking about him when +the two men had left, late each night. As for Stanley, he referred +everything to Keith--the weather prospects, where they should go for +the day, what should be eaten and drunk, any point about politics or +fashion, life or literature or what not, that happened to be discussed. +And he looked upon Donald's monosyllabic reply to his inquiry as a +final judgment, ending all possibility of argument. Mildred held out +long. Then, in spite of herself, she began to yield, ceased to dislike +him, found a kind of pleasure--or, perhaps, fascinated interest--in the +nervousness his silent and indifferent presence caused her. She liked +to watch that immobile, perfect profile, neither young nor old, indeed +not suggesting age in any degree, but only experience and +knowledge--and an infinite capacity for emotion, for passion even. The +dead-white color declared it had already been lived; the brilliant, +usually averted or veiled eyes asserted present vitality, pulsing under +a calm surface. + +One day when Stanley, in the manner of one who wishes a thing settled +and settled right, said he would ask Donald Keith about it, Mildred, a +little piqued, a little amused, retorted: + +"And what will he answer? Why, simply yes or no." + +"That's all," assented Stanley. "And that's quite enough, isn't it?" + +"But how do you know he's as wise as he pretends?" + +"He doesn't pretend to be anything or to know anything. That's +precisely it." + +Mildred suddenly began to like Keith. She had never thought of this +before. Yes, it was true, he did not pretend. Not in the least, not +about anything. When you saw him, you saw at once the worst there was +to see. It was afterward that you discovered he was not slovenly, but +clean and neat, not badly but well dressed, not homely but handsome, +not sickly but soundly well, not physically weak but strong, not dull +but vividly alive, not a tiresome void but an unfathomable mystery. + +"What does he do?" she asked Mrs. Brindley. + +Cyrilla's usually positive gray eyes looked vague. She smiled. "I +never asked," said she. "I've known him nearly three years, and it +never occurred to me to ask, or to wonder. Isn't that strange? Usually +about the first inquiry we make is what a man does." + +"I'll ask Stanley," said Mildred. And she did about an hour later, +when they were in the surf together, with the other two out of earshot. +Said Stanley: + +"He's a lawyer, of course. Also, he's written a novel or two and a +book of poems. I've never read them. Somehow, I never get around to +reading." + +"Oh, he's a lawyer? That's the way he makes his living." + +"A queer kind of lawyer. He never goes to court, and his clients are +almost all other lawyers. They go to him to get him to tell them what +to do, and what not to do. He's got a big reputation among lawyers, +Fred Norman tells me, but makes comparatively little, as he either +can't or won't charge what he ought. I told him what Norman said, and +he only smiled in that queer way he has. I said: 'You make twenty or +thirty thousand a year. You ought to make ten times that.'" + +"And what did he answer?" asked Mildred. "Nothing?" + +"He said: 'I make all I want. If I took in more, I'd be bothered +getting rid of it or investing it. I can always make all I'll +want--unless I go crazy. And what could a crazy man do with money? It +doesn't cost anything to live in a lunatic asylum.'" + +Several items of interest to add to those she had collected. He could +talk brilliantly, but he preferred silence. He could make himself +attractive to women and to men, but he preferred to be detached. He +could be a great lawyer, but he preferred the quiet of obscurity. He +could be a rich man, but he preferred to be comparatively poor. + +Said Mildred: "I suppose some woman--some disappointment in love--has +killed ambition, and everything like that." + +"I don't think so," replied Baird. "The men who knew him as a boy say +he was always as he is now. He lived in the Arabian desert for two +years." + +"Why didn't he stay?" laughed Mildred. "That life would exactly suit +him." + +"It did," said Stanley. "But his father died, and he had to come home +and support his mother--until she died. That's the way his whole life +has been. He drifts in the current of circumstances. He might let +himself be blown away to-morrow to the other end of the earth and stay +away years--or never come back." + +"But how would he live?" + +"On his wits. And as well or as poorly as he cared. He's the sort of +man everyone instinctively asks advice of--me, you, his valet, the +farmer who meets him at a boundary fence, the fellow who sits nest him +in a train--anyone." + +Mildred did not merely cease to dislike him; she went farther, and +rapidly. She began to like him, to circle round that tantalizing, +indolent mystery as a deer about a queer bit of brush in the +undergrowth. She liked to watch him. She was alternately afraid to +talk before him and recklessly confidential--all with no response or +sign of interest from him. If she was silent, when they were alone +together, he was silent, too. If she talked, still he was silent. What +WAS he thinking about? What did he think of her?--that especially. + +"What ARE you thinking?" she interrupted herself to say one afternoon +as they sat together on the strand under a big sunshade. She had been +talking on and on about her career--talking conceitedly, as her subject +intoxicated her--telling him what triumphs awaited her as soon as she +should be ready to debut. As he did not answer, she repeated her +question, adding: + +"I knew you weren't listening to me, or I shouldn't have had the +courage to say the foolish things I did." + +"No, I wasn't," admitted he. + +"Why not?" + +"For the reason you gave." + +"That what I said was--just talk?" + +"Yes." + +"You don't believe I'll do those things?" + +"Do you?" + +"I've GOT to believe it," said she. "If I didn't--" She came to a full +stop. + +"If you didn't, then what?" It was the first time he had ever +flattered her with interest enough to ask her a question about herself. + +"If I didn't believe I was going to succeed--and succeed big--" she +began. After a pause, she added, "I'd not dare say it." + +"Or think it," said he. + +She colored. "What do you mean?" she asked. + +He did not reply. + +"What do you mean, Mr. Keith?" she urged. + +"You are always asking me questions to which you already know the +answer," said he. + +"You're referring to a week or so ago, when I asked you why you +disliked me?" + +No answer. No sign of having heard. No outward sign of interest in +anything, even in the cigarette drooping from the corner of his mouth. + +"Wasn't that it?" she insisted. + +"You are always asking me questions to which you already know the +answer," repeated he. + +"I am annoying you?" + +No answer. + +She laughed. "Do you want me to go away and leave you in peace with +that--law case--or whatever it is?" + +"I don't like to be alone." + +"But anyone would do?--a dog?" + +No reply. + +"You mean, a dog would be better because it doesn't ask questions to +which it knows the answer." + +No reply. + +"Well, I have a pleasant-sounding voice. As I'm saying nothing, it may +be soothing--like the sound of the waves. I've learned to take you as +you are. I rather like your pose." + +No reply. No sign that he was even tempted to rise to this bait and +protest. + +"But you don't like mine," she went on. "Yes, it is a pose. But I've +got to keep it up, and to pretend to myself that it isn't. And it +isn't altogether. I shall be a successful singer." + +"When?" said he. Actually he was listening! + +She answered: "In--about two years, I think." + +No comment. + +"You don't believe it?" + +"Do you?" A pause. "Why ask these questions you've already answered +yourself?" + +"I'll tell you why," replied she, her face suddenly flushed with +earnestness. "Because I want you to help me. You help everyone else. +Why not me?" + +"You never asked me," said he. + +"I didn't know I wanted it until just now--as I said it. But YOU must +have known, because you are so much more experienced than I--and +understand people--what's going on in their minds, deeper than they can +see." Her tone became indignant, reproachful. "Yes, you must have +known I needed your help. And you ought to have helped me, even if you +did dislike me. You've no right to dislike anyone as young as I." + +He was looking at her now, the intensely alive blue eyes sympathetic, +penetrating, understanding. It was frightful to be so thoroughly +understood--all one's weaknesses laid bare--yet it was a relief and a +joy, too--like the cruel healing knife of the surgeon. Said he: + +"I do not like kept women." + +She gasped, grew ghastly. It was a frightful insult, one for which she +was wholly unprepared. "You--believe--that?" she said slowly. + +"Another of those questions," he said. And he looked calmly away, out +over the sea, as if his interest in the conversation were at an end. + +What should she say? How deny--how convince him? For convince him she +must, and then go away and never permit him to speak to her again until +he had apologized. She said quietly: "Mr. Keith, you have insulted +me." + +"I do not like kept women, either with or without a license," said he +in the same even, indifferent way. "When you ceased to be a kept woman, +I would help you, if I could. But no one can help a kept woman." + +There was nothing to do but to rise and go away. She rose and went +toward the house. At the veranda she paused. He had not moved. She +returned. He was still inspecting the horizon, the cigarette depending +from his lips--how DID he keep it alight? She said: + +"Mr. Keith, I am sure you did not mean to insult me. What did you mean?" + +"Another of those questions," said he. + +"Honestly, I do not understand." + +"Then think. And when you have thought, you will understand." + +"But I have thought. I do not understand." + +"Then it would be useless to explain," said he. "That is one of those +vital things which, if one cannot understand them for oneself, one is +hopeless--is beyond helping." + +"You mean I am not in earnest about my career?" + +"Another of those questions. If you had not seen clearly what I meant, +you would have been really offended. You'd have gone away and not come +back." + +She saw that this was true. And, seeing, she wondered how she could +have been so stupid as not to have seen it at once. She had yet to +learn that overlooking the obvious is a universal human failing and +that seeing the obvious is the talent and the use of the superior of +earth--the few who dominate and determine the race. + +"You reproach me for not having helped you," he went on. "How does it +happen that you are uneasy in mind--so uneasy that you are quarreling +at me?" + +A light broke upon her. "You have been drawing me on, from the +beginning," she cried. "You have been helping me--making me see that I +needed help." + +"No," said he. "I've been waiting to see whether you would rouse from +your dream of grandeur." + +"YOU have been rousing me." + +"No," he said. "You've roused yourself. So you may be worth helping +or, rather, worth encouraging, for no one can HELP you but yourself." + +She looked at him pathetically. "But what shall I do?" she asked. +"I've got no money, no experience, no sense. I'm a vain, luxury-loving +fool, cursed with a--with a--is it a conscience?" + +"I hope it's something more substantial. I hope it's common sense." + +"But I have been working--honestly I have." + +"Don't begin lying to yourself again." + +"Don't be harsh with me." + +He drew in his legs, in preparation for rising--no doubt to go away. + +"I don't mean that," she cried testily. "You are not harsh with me. +It's the truth that's harsh--the truth I'm beginning to see--and feel. +I am afraid--afraid. I haven't the courage to face it." + +"Why whine?" said he. "There's nothing in that." + +"Do you think there's any hope for me?" + +"That depends," said he. + +"On what?" + +"On what you want." + +"I want to be a singer, a great singer." + +"No, there's no hope." + +She grew cold with despair. He had a way of saying a thing that gave +it the full weight of a verdict from which there was no appeal. + +"Now, if you wanted to make a living," he went on, "and if you were +determined to learn to sing as well as you could, with the idea that +you might be able to make a living--why, then there might be hope." + +"You think I can sing?" + +"I never heard you. Can you?" + +"They say I can." + +"What do YOU say?" + +"I don't know," she confessed. "I've never been able to judge. +Sometimes I think I'm singing well, and I find out afterward that I've +sung badly. Again, it's the other way." + +"Then, obviously, what's the first thing to do?" + +"To learn to judge myself," said she. "I never thought of it +before--how important that is. Do you know Jennings--Eugene Jennings?" + +"The singing teacher? No." + +"Is he a good teacher?" + +"No." + +"Why not?" + +"Because he has not taught you that you will never sing until you are +your own teacher. Because he has not taught you that singing is a +small and minor part of a career as a singer." + +"But it isn't," protested she. + +A long silence. Looking at him, she felt that he had dismissed her and +her affairs from his mind. + +"Is it?" she said, to bring him back. + +"What?" asked he vaguely. + +"You said that a singer didn't have to be able to sing." + +"Did I?" He glanced down the shore toward the house. "It feels like +lunch-time." He rose. + +"What did you mean by what you said?" + +"When you have thought about your case a while longer, we'll talk of it +again--if you wish. But until you've thought, talking is a waste of +time." + +She rose, stood staring out to sea. He was observing her, a faint +smile about his lips. He said: + +"Why bother about a career? After all, kept woman is a thoroughly +respectable occupation--or can be made so by any preacher or justice of +the peace. It's followed by many of our best women--those who pride +themselves on their high characters--and on their pride." + +"I could not belong to a man unless I cared for him," said she. "I +tried it once. I shall never do it again." + +"That sounds fine," said he. "Let's go to lunch." + +"You don't believe me?" + +"Do you?" + +She sank down upon the sand and burst into a wild passion of sobs and +tears. When her fight for self-control was over and she looked up to +apologize for her pitiful exhibition of weakness--and to note whether +she had made an impression upon his sympathies--she saw him just +entering the house, a quarter of a mile away. To anger succeeded a +mood of desperate forlornness. She fell upon herself with gloomy +ferocity. She could not sing. She had no brains. She was taking +money--a disgracefully large amount of money--from Stanley Baird under +false pretenses. How could she hope to sing when her voice could not +be relied upon? Was not her throat at that very moment slightly sore? +Was it not always going queer? She--sing! Absurd. Did Stanley Baird +suspect? Was he waiting for the time when she would gladly accept what +she must have from him, on his own terms? No, not on his terms, but on +the terms she herself would arrange--the only terms she could make. No, +Stanley believed in her absolutely--believed in her career. When he +discovered the truth, he would lose interest in her, would regard her +as a poor, worthless creature, would be eager to rid himself of her. +Instead of returning to the house, she went in the opposite direction, +made a circuit and buried herself in the woods beyond the Shrewsbury. +She was mad to get away from her own company; but the only company she +could fly to was more depressing than the solitude and the taunt and +sneer and lash of her own thoughts. It was late in the afternoon +before she nerved herself to go home. She hoped the others would have +gone off somewhere; but they were waiting for her, Stanley anxious and +Cyrilla Brindley irritated. Her eyes sought Keith. He was, as usual, +the indifferent spectator. + +"Where have you been?" cried Stanley. + +"Making up my mind," said she in the tone that forewarns of a storm. + +A brief pause. She struggled in vain against an impulse to look at +Keith. When her eyes turned in his direction he, not looking at her, +moved in his listless way toward the door. Said he: + +"The auto's waiting. Come on." + +She vacillated, yielded, began to put on the wraps Stanley was +collecting for her. It was a big touring-car, and they sat two and +two, with the chauffeur alone. Keith was beside Mildred. When they +were under way, she said: + +"Why did you stop me? Perhaps I'll never have the courage again." + +"Courage for what?" asked he. + +"To take your advice, and break off." + +"MY advice?" + +"Yes, your advice." + +"You have to clutch at and cling to somebody, don't you? You can't +bear the idea of standing up by your own strength." + +"You think I'm trying to fasten to you?" she said, with an angry laugh. + +"I know it. You admitted it. You are not satisfied with the way +things are going. You have doubts about your career. You shrink from +your only comfortable alternative, if the career winks out. You ask me +my opinion about yourself and about careers. I give it. Now, I find +you asked only that you might have someone to lean on, to accuse of +having got you into a mess, if doing what you think you ought to do +turns out as badly as you fear." + +It was the longest speech she had heard him make. She had no +inclination to dispute his analysis of her motives. "I did not realize +it," said she, "but that is probably so. But--remember how I was +brought up." + +"There's only one thing for you to do." + +"Go back to my husband? You know--about me--don't you?" + +"Yes" + +"I can't go back to him." + +"No." + +"Then--what?" she asked. + +"Go on, as now," replied he. + +"You despise me, don't you?" + +"No." + +"But you said you did." + +"Dislike and despise are not at all the same." + +"You admit that you dislike me," cried she triumphantly. He did not +answer. + +"You think me a weak, clinging creature, not able to do anything but +make pretenses." + +No answer. + +"Don't you?" she persisted. + +"Probably I have about the same opinion of you that you have of +yourself." + +"What WILL become of me?" she said. Her face lighted up with an +expression of reckless beauty. "If I could only get started I'd go to +the devil, laughing and dancing--and taking a train with me." + +"You ARE started," said he, with an amiable smile. "Keep on. But I +doubt if you'll be so well amused as you may imagine. Going to the +devil isn't as it's painted in novels by homely old maids and by men +too timid to go out of nights. A few steps farther, and your +disillusionment will begin. But there'll be no turning back. Already, +you are almost too old to make a career." + +"I'm only twenty-four. I flattered myself I looked still younger." + +"It's worse than I thought," said he. "Most of the singers, even the +second-rate ones, began at fifteen--began seriously. And you haven't +begun yet." + +"That's unjust," she protested. "I've done a little. Many great people +would think it a great deal." + +"You haven't begun yet," repeated he calmly. "You have spent a lot of +money, and have done a lot of dreaming and talking and listening to +compliments, and have taken a lot of lessons of an expensive charlatan. +But what have those things to do with a career?" + +"You've never heard me sing." + +"I do not care for singing." + +"Oh!" said she in a tone of relief. "Then you know nothing about all +this." + +"On the contrary, I know everything about a career. And we were talking +of careers, not of singing." + +"You mean that my voice is worthless because I haven't the other +elements?" + +"What else could I have meant?" said he. "You haven't the strength. +You haven't the health." + +She laughed as she straightened herself. "Do I look weak and sickly?" +cried she. + +"For the purposes of a career as a female you are strong and well," +said he. "For the purpose of a career as a singer--" He smiled and +shook his head. "A singer must have muscles like wire ropes, like a +blacksmith or a washerwoman. The other day we were climbing a hill--a +not very steep hill. You stopped five times for breath, and twice you +sat down to rest." + +She was literally hanging her head with shame. "I wasn't very well +that day," she murmured. + +"Don't deceive yourself," said he. "Don't indulge in the fatal folly +of self-excuse." + +"Go on," she said humbly. "I want to hear it all." + +"Is your throat sore to-day?" pursued he. + +She colored. "It's better," she murmured. + +"A singer with sore throat!" mocked he. "You've had a slight fogginess +of the voice all summer." + +"It's this sea air," she eagerly protested. "It affects everyone." + +"No self-excuse, please," interrupted he. "Cigarettes, champagne, all +kinds of foolish food, an impaired digestion--that's the truth, and you +know it." + +"I've got splendid digestion! I can eat anything!" she cried. "Oh, +you don't know the first thing about singing. You don't know about +temperament, about art, about all the things that singing really means." + +"We were talking of careers," said he. "A career means a person who +can be relied upon to do what is demanded of him. A singer's career +means a powerful body, perfect health, a sound digestion. Without +them, the voice will not be reliable. What you need is not singing +teachers, but teachers of athletics and of hygiene. To hear you talk +about a career is like listening to a child. You think you can become +a professional singer by paying money to a teacher. There are lawyers +and doctors and business men in all lines who think that way about +their professions--that learning a little routine of technical +knowledge makes a lawyer or a doctor or a merchant or a financier." + +"Tell me--WHAT ought I to learn?" + +"Learn to think--and to persist. Learn to concentrate. Learn to make +sacrifices. Learn to handle yourself as a great painter handles his +brush and colors. Then perhaps you'll make a career as a singer. If +not, it'll be a career as something or other." + +She was watching him with a wistful, puzzled expression. "Could I ever +do all that?" + +"Anyone could, by working away at it every day. If you gain only one +inch a day, in a year you'll have gained three hundred and sixty-five +inches. And if you gain an inch a day for a while and hold it, you +soon begin to gain a foot a day. But there's no need to worry about +that." He was gazing at her now with an expression of animation that +showed how feverishly alive he was behind that mask of calmness. "The +day's work--that's the story of success. Do the day's work +persistently, thoroughly, intelligently. Never mind about to-morrow. +Thinking of it means dreaming or despairing--both futilities. Just the +day's work." + +"I begin to understand," she said thoughtfully. "You are right. I've +done nothing. Oh, I've been a fool--more foolish even than I thought." + +A long silence, then she said, somewhat embarrassed and in a low voice, +though there was no danger of those in front of them hearing: + +"I want you to know that there has been nothing wrong--between Stanley +and me." + +"Do you wish me to put that to your credit or to your discredit?" +inquired he. + +"What do you mean?" + +"Why, you've just told me that you haven't given Stanley anything at +all for his money--that you've cheated him outright. The thing itself +is discreditable, but your tone suggests that you think I'll admire you +for it." + +"Do you mean to say that you'd think more highly of me if I were--what +most women would be in the same circumstances?" + +"I mean to say that I think the whole business is discreditable to both +of you--to his intelligence, to your character." + +"You are frank," said she, trying to hide her anger. + +"I am frank," replied he, undisturbed. He looked at her. "Why should +I not be?" + +"You know that I need you, that I don't dare resent," said she. "So +isn't it--a little cowardly?" + +"Why do you need me? Not for money, for you know you'll not get that." + +"I don't want it," cried she, agitated. "I never thought of it." + +"Yes, you've probably thought of it," replied he coolly. "But you will +not get it." + +"Well, that's settled--I'll not get it." + +"Then why do you need me? Of what use can I be to you? Only one use +in the world. To tell you the truth--the exact truth. Is not that so?" + +"Yes," she said. "That is what I want from you--what I can't get from +anyone else. No one else knows the truth--not even Mrs. Brindley, +though she's intelligent. I take back what I said about your being +cowardly. Oh, you do stab my vanity so! You mustn't mind my crying +out. I can't help it--at least, not till I get used to you." + +"Cry out," said he. "It does no harm." + +"How wonderfully you understand me!" exclaimed she. "That's why I let +you say to me anything you please." + +He was smiling peculiarly--a smile that somehow made her feel +uncomfortable. She nerved herself for some still deeper stab into her +vanity. He said, his gaze upon her and ironical: + +"I'm sorry I can't return the compliment." + +"What compliment?" asked she. + +"Can't say that you understand me. Why do you think I am doing this?" + +She colored. "Oh, no indeed, Mr. Keith," she protested, "I don't think +you are in love with me--or anything of that sort. Indeed, I do not. I +know you better than that." + +"Really?" said he, amused. "Then you are not human." + +"How can you think me so vain?" she protested. + +"Because you are so," replied he. "You are as vain--no more so, but +just as much so--as the average pretty and attractive woman brought up +as you have been. You are not obsessed by the notion that your +physical charms are all-powerful, and in that fact there is hope for +you. But you attach entirely too much importance to them. You will +find them a hindrance for a long time before they begin to be a help to +you in your career. And they will always be a temptation to you to +take the easy, stupid way of making a living--the only way open to most +women that is not positively repulsive." + +"I think it is the most repulsive," said Mildred. + +"Don't cant," replied he, unimpressed. "It's not so repulsive to your +sort of woman as manual labor--or as any kind of work that means no +leisure, no luxury and small pay." + +"I wonder," said Mildred. "I--I'm afraid you're right. But I WON'T +admit it. I don't dare." + +"That's the finest, truest thing I've ever heard you say," said Keith. + +Mildred was pleased out of all proportion to the compliment. Said she +with frank eagerness, "Then I'm not altogether hopeless?" + +"As a character, no indeed," replied he. "But as a career-- I was +about to say, you may set your mind at rest. I shall never try to +collect for my services. I am doing all this solely out of obstinacy." + +"Obstinacy?" asked the puzzled girl. + +"The impossible attracts me. That's why I've never been interested to +make a career in law or politics or those things. I care only for the +thing that can't be done. When I saw you and studied you, as I study +every new thing, I decided that you could not possibly make a career." + +"Why have you changed your mind?" she interrupted eagerly. + +"I haven't," replied he. "If I had, I should have lost interest in +you. Just as soon as you show signs of making a career, I shall lose +interest in you. I have a friend, a doctor, who will take only cases +where cure is impossible. Looking at you, it occurred to me that here +was a chance to make an experiment more interesting than any of his. +And as I have no other impossible task inviting me at present, I +decided to undertake you--if you were willing." + +"Why do you tell me this?" she asked. "To discourage me?" + +"No. Your vanity will prevent that." + +"Then why?" + +"To clear myself of all responsibility for you. You understand--I bind +myself to nothing. I am free to stop or to go on at any time." + +"And I?" said Mildred. + +"You must do exactly as I tell you." + +"But that is not fair," cried she. + +"Why not?" inquired he. "Without me you have no hope--none whatever." + +"I don't believe that," declared she. "It is not true." + +"Very well. Then we'll drop the business," said he tranquilly. "If +the time comes when you see that I'm your only hope, and if then I'm in +my present humor, we will go on." + +And he lapsed into silence from which she soon gave over trying to +rouse him. She thought of what he had said, studied him, but could +make nothing of it. She let four days go by, days of increasing unrest +and unhappiness. She could not account for herself. Donald Keith +seemed to have cast a spell over her--an evil spell. Her throat gave +her more and more trouble. She tried her voice, found that it had +vanished. She examined herself in the glass, and saw or fancied that +her looks were going--not so that others would note it, but in the +subtle ways that give the first alarm to a woman who has beauty worth +taking care of and thinks about it intelligently. She thought Mrs. +Brindley was beginning to doubt her, suspected a covert uneasiness in +Stanley. Her foundations, such as they were, seemed tottering and +ready to disintegrate. She saw her own past with clear vision for the +first time--saw how futile she had been, and why Keith believed there +was no hope for her. She made desperate efforts to stop thinking about +past and future, to absorb herself in present comfort and luxury and +opportunities for enjoyment. But Keith was always there--and to see +him was to lose all capacity for enjoyment. She was curt, almost rude +to him--had some vague idea of forcing him to stay away. Yet every +time she lost sight of him, she was in terror until she saw him again. + +She was alone on the small veranda facing the high-road. She happened +to glance toward the station; her gaze became fixed, her body rigid, +for, coming leisurely and pompously toward the house, was General +Siddall, in the full panoply of his wonderful tailoring and +haberdashery. She thought of flight, but instantly knew that flight +was useless; the little general was not there by accident. She waited, +her rigidity giving her a deceptive seeming of calm and even ease. He +entered the little yard, taking off his glossy hat and exposing the +rampant toupee. He smiled at her so slightly that the angle of the +needle-pointed mustaches and imperial was not changed. The cold, +expressionless, fishy eyes simply looked at her. + +"A delightful little house," said he, with a patronizing glance around. +"May I sit down?" + +She inclined her head. + +"And you are looking well, charming," he went on, and he seated himself +and carefully planted his neat boots side by side. "For the summer +there's nothing equal to the seashore. You are surprised to see me?" + +"I thought you were abroad," said Mildred. + +"So I was--until yesterday. I came back because my men had found you. +And I'm here because I venture to hope that you have had enough of this +foolish escapade. I hope we can come to an understanding. I've lost my +taste for wandering about. I wish to settle down--to have a home and +to stay in it. By that I mean, of course, two or three--or possibly +four--houses, according to the season." Mildred sent her glance +darting about. The little general saw and began to talk more rapidly. +"I've given considerable thought to our--our misunderstanding. I feel +that I gave too much importance to your--your-- I did not take your +youth and inexperience of the world and of married life sufficiently +into account. Also the first Mrs. Siddall was not a lady--nor the +second. A lady, a young lady, was a new experience to me. I am a +generous man. So I say frankly that I ought to have been more patient." + +"You said you would never see me again until I came to you," said +Mildred. As he was not looking at her, she watched his face. She now +saw a change--behind the mask. But he went on in an unchanged voice: + +"Were you aware that Mrs. Baird is about to sue her husband for a +separation--not for a divorce but for a separation--and name you?" + +Mildred dropped limply back in her chair. + +"That means scandal," continued Siddall, "scandal touching my name--my +honor. I may say, I do not believe what Mrs. Baird charges. My men +have had you under observation for several weeks. Also, Mrs. Brindley +is, I learn, a woman of the highest character. But the thing looks +bad--you hiding from your husband, living under an assumed name, +receiving the visits of a former admirer." + +"You are mistaken," said Mildred. "Mrs. Baird would not bring such a +false, wicked charge." + +"You are innocent, my dear," said the general. + +"You don't realize how your conduct looks. She intends to charge that +her husband has been supporting you." + +Mildred, quivering, started up, sank weakly back again. + +"But," he went on, "you will easily prove that your money is your +inheritance from your father. I assured myself of that before I +consented to come here." + +"Consented?" said Mildred. "At whose request?" + +"That of my own generosity," replied he. "But my honor had to be +reassured. When I was satisfied that you were innocent, and simply +flighty and foolish, I came. If there had been any taint upon you, of +course I could not have taken you back. As it is, I am willing--I may +say, more than willing. Mrs. Baird can be bought off and frightened +off. When she finds you have me to protect you, she will move very +cautiously, you may be sure." + +As the little man talked, Mildred saw and felt behind the mask the +thoughts, the longings of his physical infatuation for her coiling and +uncoiling and reaching tremulously out toward her like unclean, +horrible tentacles. She was drawn as far as could be back into her +chair, and her soul was shrinking within her body. + +"I am willing to make you a proper allowance, and to give you all +proper freedom," he went on. He showed his sharp white teeth in a +gracious smile. "I realize I must concede something of my +old-fashioned ideas to the modern spirit. I never thought I would, but +I didn't appreciate how fond I was of you, my dear." He mumbled his +tongue and noiselessly smacked his thin lips. "Yes, you are worth +concessions and sacrifices." + +"I am not going back," said Mildred. "Nothing you could offer me would +make any difference." She felt suddenly calm and strong. She stood. +"Please consider this final." + +"But, my dear," said the general softly, though there was a wicked +gleam behind the mask, "you forget the scandal--" + +"I forget nothing," interrupted she. "I shall not go back." + +Before he could attempt further to detain her she opened the screen +door and entered. It closed on the spring and on the spring lock. + +Donald Keith, coming in from the sea-front veranda, was just in time to +save her from falling. She pushed him fiercely away and sank down on +the sofa just within the pretty little drawing-room. She said: + +"Thank you. I didn't mean to be rude. I was only angry with myself. +I'm getting to be one of those absurd females who blubber and keel +over." + +"You're white and limp," said he. "What's the matter?" + +"General Siddall is out there." + +"Um--he's come back, has he?" said Keith. + +"And I am afraid of him--horribly afraid of him." + +"In some places and circumstances he would be a dangerous proposition," +said Keith. "But not here in the East--and not to you." + +"He would do ANYTHING. I don't know what he can do, but I am sure it +will be frightful--will destroy me." + +"You are going with him?" + +She laughed. "I loathe him. I thought I left him through fear and +anger. I was mistaken. It was loathing. And my fear of him--it's +loathing, too." + +"You mean that?" said Keith, observing her intently. "You wish to be +rid of him?" + +"What a poor opinion you have of me," said she. "Really, I don't +deserve quite that." + +"Then come with me." + +The look of terror and shrinking returned. "Where? To see him?" + +"For the last time," said Keith. "There'll be no scene." + +It was the supreme test of her confidence in him. Without hesitation, +she rose, preceded him into the hall, and advanced firmly toward the +screen door through which the little general could be seen. He was +standing at the top step, his back to them. At the sound of the +opening door he turned. + +"This is Mr. Donald Keith," said Mildred. "He wishes to speak to you." + +The general bowed; Keith bent his head. They eyed each other with the +measuring glance. Keith said in his dry, terse way: "I asked Miss +Gower to come with me because I wish her to hear what I have to say to +you." + +"You mean my wife," said the general with a gracious smile. + +"I mean Miss Gower," returned Keith. "As you know, she is not your +wife." + +Mildred uttered a cry; but the two men continued to look each at the +other, with impassive countenances. + +"Your only wife is the woman who has been in the private insane asylum +of Doctor Rivers at Pueblo, Colorado, for the past eleven years. For +about twenty years before that she was in the Delavan private asylum +near Denver. You could not divorce her under the laws of Colorado. The +divorce you got in Nevada was fraudulent." + +"That's a lie," said the general coldly. + +Keith went on, as if he had not heard: "You will not annoy this lady +again. And you will stop bribing Stanley Baird's wife to make a fool +of herself. And you will stop buying houses in the blocks where Baird +owns real estate, and moving colored families into them." + +"I tell you that about my divorce is a lie," replied Siddall. + +"I can prove it," said Keith. "And I can prove that you knew it before +you married your second wife." + +For the first time Siddall betrayed at the surface a hint of how hard +he was hit. His skin grew bright yellow; wrinkles round his eyes and +round the base of his nose sprang into sudden prominence. + +"I see you know what I mean--that attempt to falsify the record at +Carson City," said Keith. He opened the screen door for Mildred to +pass in. He followed her, and the door closed behind them. They went +into the drawing-room. He dropped into an easy chair, crossed his +legs, leaned his head back indolently--a favorite attitude of his. + +"How long have you known?" said she. Her cheeks were flushed with +excitement. + +"Oh, a good many years," replied he. "It was one of those accidental +bits of information a man runs across in knocking about. As soon as +Baird told me about you, I had the thing looked up, quietly. I was +going up to see him to-morrow--about the negroes and Mrs. Baird's suit." + +"Does Stanley know?" inquired she. + +"No," said Keith. "Not necessary. Never will be. If you like, you +can have the marriage annulled without notoriety. But that's not +necessary, either." + +After a long silence, she said: "What does this make out of me?" + +"You mean, what would be thought of you, if it were known?" inquired +he. "Well, it probably wouldn't improve your social position." + +"I am disgraced," said she, curiously rather than emotionally. + +"Would be, if it were known," corrected he, "and if you are nothing but +a woman without money looking for a husband. If you happened to be a +singer or an actress, it would add to your reputation--make you more +talked about." + +"But I am not an actress or a singer." + +"On the other hand, I should say you didn't amount to much socially. +Except in Hanging Rock, of course--if there is still a Hanging Rock. +Don't worry about your reputation. Fussing and fretting about your +social position doesn't help toward a career." + +"Naturally, you take it coolly. But you can hardly expect me to," +cried she. + +"You are taking it coolly," said he. "Then why try to work yourself up +into a fit of hysterics? The thing is of no importance--except that +you're free now--will never be bothered by Siddall again. You ought to +thank me, and forget it. Don't be one of the little people who are +forever agitating about trifles." + +Trifles! To speak of such things as trifles! And yet-- Well, what +did they actually amount to in her life? "Yes, I AM free," she said +thoughtfully. "I've got what I wanted--got it in the easiest way +possible." + +"That's better," said he approvingly. + +"And I've burnt my bridges behind me," pursued she. "There's nothing +for me now but to go ahead." + +"Which road?" inquired he carelessly. + +"The career," cried she. "There's no other for me. Of course I COULD +marry Stanley, when he's free, as he would be before very long, if I +suggested it. Yes, I could marry him." + +"Could you?" observed he. + +"Doesn't he love me?" + +"Undoubtedly." + +"Then why do you say he would not marry me?" demanded she. + +"Did I say that?" + +"You insinuated it. You suggested that there was a doubt." + +"Then, there is no doubt?" + +"Yes, there is," she cried angrily. "You won't let me enjoy the least +bit of a delusion. He might marry me if I were famous. But as I am +now-- He's an inbred snob. He can't help it. He simply couldn't +marry a woman in my position. But you're overlooking one thing--that +_I_ would not marry HIM." + +"That's unimportant, if true," said Keith. + +"You don't believe it?" + +"I don't care anything about it, my dear lady," said Keith. "Have you +got time to waste in thinking about how much I am in love with you? +What a womanly woman you are, to be sure. Your true woman, you know, +never thinks of anything but love--not how much she loves, but how much +she is loved." + +"Be careful!" she warned. "Some day you'll go too far in saying +outrageous things to me." + +"And then?" said he smilingly. + +"You care nothing for our friendship?" + +"The experiment is the only interest I have in you," replied he. + +"That is not true," said she. "You have always liked me. That's why +you looked up my hus-- General Siddall and got ready for him. That's +why you saved me to-day. You are a very tender-hearted and generous +man--and you hide it as you do everything else about yourself." + +He was looking off into space from the depths of the easy chair, a +mocking smile on his classical, impassive face. + +"What puzzles me," she went on, "is why you interest yourself in as +vain and shallow and vacillating a woman as I am. You don't care for +my looks--and that's all there is to me." + +"Don't pause to be contradicted," said he. + +She was in a fine humor now. "You might at least have said I was up to +the female average, for I am. What have they got to offer a man but +their looks? Do you know why I despise men?" + +"Do you?" + +"I do. And it's because they put up with women as much as they +do--spend so much money on them, listen to their chatter, admire their +ridiculous clothes. Oh, I understand why. I've learned that. And I +can imagine myself putting up with anything in some one man I happened +to fancy strongly. But men are foolish about the whole sex--or all of +them that have a shadow of a claim to good looks." + +"Yes, the men make fools of themselves," admitted he. "But I notice +that the men manage somehow to make the careers, and hold on to the +money and the power, while the women have to wheedle and fawn and +submit in order to get what they want from the men. There's nothing to +be said for your sex. It's been hopelessly corrupted by mine. For all +the talk about the influence of woman, what impression has your sex +made upon mine? And your sex--it has been made by mine into exactly +what we wished it to be. Take my advice, get out of your sex. Abandon +it, and make a career." + +After a while she recalled with a start the events of less than an hour +ago--events that ought to have seemed wildly exciting, arousing the +deepest and strongest emotions. Yet they had made no impression upon +her. Absolutely none. She had no horror in the thought that she had +been the victim of a bigamist; she had no elation over her release into +freedom and safety. She wondered whether this arose from utter +frivolousness or from indifference to the trifles of conventional joys, +sorrows, agitations, excitements which are the whole life of most +people--that indifference which is the cause of the general opinion +that men and women who make careers are usually hardened in the process. + +As she lay awake that night--she had got a very bad habit of lying +awake hour after hour--she suddenly came to a decision. But she did +not tell Keith for several days. She did it in this way: + +"Don't you think I'm looking better?" she asked. + +"You're sleeping again," said he. + +"Do you know why? Because my mind's at rest. I've decided to accept +your offer." + +"And my terms?" said he, apparently not interested by her announcement. + +"And your terms," assented she. "You are free to stop whenever the +whim strikes you; I must do exactly as you bid. What do you wish me to +do?" + +"Nothing at present," replied he. "I will let you know." + +She was disappointed. She had assumed that something--something new +and interesting, probably irritating, perhaps enraging, would occur at +once. His indifference, his putting off to a future time, which his +manner made seem most hazily indefinite, gave her the foolish and +collapsing sense of having broken through an open door. + + + +VII + +THE first of September they went up to town. Stanley left at once for +his annual shooting trip; Donald Keith disappeared, saying--as was his +habit--neither what he was about nor when he would be seen again. Mrs. +Brindley summoned her pupils and her musical friends. Mildred resumed +the lessons with Jennings. There was no doubt about it, she had +astonishingly improved during the summer. There had come--or, rather, +had come back--into her voice the birdlike quality, free, joyous, +spontaneous, that had not been there since her father's death and the +family's downfall. She was glad that her arrangement with Donald Keith +was of such a nature that she was really not bound to go on with it--if +he should ever come back and remind her of what she had said. Now that +Jennings was enthusiastic--giving just and deserved praise, as her own +ear and Mrs. Brindley assured her, she was angry at herself for having +tolerated Keith's frankness, his insolence, his insulting and +contemptuous denials of her ability. She was impatient to see him, +that she might put him down. She said to Jennings: + +"You think I can make a career?" + +"There isn't a doubt in my mind now," replied he. "You ought to be one +of the few great lyric sopranos within five years." + +"A man, this summer--a really unusual man in some ways--told me there +was no hope for me." + +"A singing teacher?" + +"No, a lawyer. A Mr. Keith--Donald Keith." + +"I've heard of him," said Jennings. "His mother was Rivi, the famous +coloratura of twenty years ago." + +Mildred was astounded. "He must know something about music." + +"Probably," replied Jennings. "He lived with her in Italy, I believe, +until he was almost grown. Then she died. You sang for him?" + +"No," Mildred said it hesitatingly. + +"Oh!" said Jennings, and his expression--interested, disturbed, +puzzled--made Mildred understand why she had been so reluctant to +confess. Jennings did not pursue the subject, but abruptly began the +lesson. That day and several days thereafter he put her to tests he +had never used before. She saw that he was searching for +something--for the flaw implied in the adverse verdict of the son of +Lucia Rivi. She was enormously relieved when he gave over the search +without having found the flaw. She felt that Donald Keith's verdict +had been proved false or at least faulty. Yet she was not wholly +reassured, and from time to time she suspected that Jennings had not +been, either. + +Soon the gayety of the preceding winter and spring was in full swing +again. Keith did not return, did not write, and Cyrilla Brindley +inquired and telephoned in vain. Mildred worked with enthusiasm, with +hope, presently with confidence. She hoped every day that Keith would +come; she would make him listen to her, force him to admit. She caught +a slight cold, neglected it, tried to sing it away. Her voice left her +abruptly. She went to Jennings as usual the day she found herself able +to do nothing more musical than squeak. She told him her plight. Said +he: + +"Begin! Let's hear." + +She made a few dismal attempts, stopped short, and, half laughing, half +ashamed, faced him for the lecture she knew would be forthcoming. Now, +it so happened that Jennings was in a frightful humor that day--one of +those humors in which the most prudent lose their self-control. He had +been listening to a succession of new pupils--women with money and no +voice, women who screeched and screamed and thoroughly enjoyed +themselves and angled confidently for compliments. As Jennings had an +acute musical ear, his sufferings had been frightful. He was used to +these torments, had the habit of turning the fury into which they put +him into excellent financial or disciplinary account. But on this +particular day his nerves went to pieces, and it was with Mildred that +the explosion came. When she looked at him, she was horrified to see a +face distorted and discolored by sheer rage. + +"You fool!" he shouted, storming up and down. "You fool! You can't +sing! Keith was right. You wouldn't do even for a church choir. You +can't be relied on. There's nothing behind your voice--no strength, no +endurance, no brains. No brains! Do you hear?--no brains, I say!" + +Mildred was terrified. She had seen him in tantrums before, but always +there had been a judicious reserving of part of the truth. Instead of +resenting, instead of flashing eye or quivering lips, Mildred sat down +and with white face and dazed eyes stared straight before her. Jennings +raved and roared himself out. As he came to his senses from this +debauch of truth-telling his first thought was how expensive it might +be. Thus, long before there was any outward sign that the storm had +passed, the ravings, the insults were shrewdly tempered with +qualifyings. If she kept on catching these colds, if she did not obey +his instructions, she might put off her debut for years--for three +years, for two years at least. And she would always be rowing with +managers and irritating the public--and so on and on. But the mischief +had been done. The girl did not rouse. + +"No use to go on to-day," he said gruffly--the pretense at last +rumblings of an expiring storm. + +"Nor any other day," said Mildred. + +She stood and straightened herself. Her face was beautiful rather than +lovely. Its pallor, its strong lines, the melancholy intensity of the +eyes, made her seem more the woman fully developed, less, far less, the +maturing girl. + +"Nonsense!" scolded Jennings. "But no more colds like that. They +impair the quality of the voice." + +"I have no voice," said the girl. "I see the truth." + +Jennings was inwardly cursing his insane temper. In about the kindliest +tone he had ever used with her, he said: "My dear Miss Stevens, you +are in no condition to judge to-day. Come back to-morrow. Do +something for that cold to-night. Clear out the throat--and come back +to-morrow. You will see." + +"Yes, I know those tricks," said she, with a sad little smile. "You +can make a crow seem to sing. But you told me the truth." + +"To-morrow," he cried pleasantly, giving her an encouraging pat on the +shoulder. He knew the folly of talking too much, the danger of +confirming her fears by pretending to make light of them. "A good +sleep, and to-morrow things will look brighter." + +He did not like her expression. It was not the one he was used to +seeing in those vain, "temperamental" pupils of his--the downcast +vanity that will be up again in a few hours. It was rather the +expression of one who has been finally and forever disillusioned. + +On her way home she stopped to send Keith a telegram: "I must see you +at once." + +There were several at the apartment for tea, among them Cullan, an +amateur violinist and critic on music whom she especially liked. For, +instead of the dreamy, romantic character his large brown eyes and +sensitive features suggested, he revealed in talk and actions a boyish +gayety--free, be it said, from boyish silliness--that was most +infectious. His was one of those souls that put us in the mood to +laugh at all seriousness, to forget all else in the supreme fact of the +reality of existence. He made her forget that day--forget until +Keith's answering telegram interrupted: "Next Monday afternoon." + +A week less a day away! She shrank and trembled at the prospect of +relying upon herself alone for six long days. Every prop had been +taken away from her. Even the dubious prop of the strange, +unsatisfactory Keith. For had he not failed her? She had said, "must" +and "at once"; and he had responded with three words of curt refusal. + +After dinner Stanley unexpectedly appeared. He hardly waited for the +necessary formalities of the greeting before he said to Mrs. Brindley: +"I want to see Mildred alone. I know you won't mind, Mrs. Brindley. +It's very important." He laughed nervously but cheerfully. "And in a +few minutes I'll call you in. I think I'll have something interesting +to tell you." + +Mrs. Brindley laughed. With her cigarette in one hand and her cup of +after-dinner coffee in the other, she moved toward the door, saying +gayly to Mildred: + +"I'll be in the next room. If you scream I shall hear. So don't be +alarmed." + +Stanley closed the door, turned beaming upon Mildred. Said he: "Here's +my news. My missus has got her divorce." + +Mildred started up. + +"Yes, the real thing," he assured her. "Of course I knew what was +doing. But I kept mum--didn't want to say anything to you till I could +say everything. Mildred, I'm free. We can be married to-morrow, if you +will." + +"Then you know about me?" said she, confused. + +"On the way I stopped in to see Keith. He told me about that +skunk--told me you were free, too." + +Mildred slowly sat down. Her elbows rested upon the table. There was +her bare forearm, slender and round, and her long, graceful fingers lay +against her cheek. The light from above reflected charmingly from the +soft waves and curves of her hair. "You're lovely--simply lovely!" +cried Stanley. "Mildred--darling--you WILL marry me, won't you? You +can go right on with the career, if you like. In fact, I'd rather you +would, for I'm frightfully proud of your voice. And I've changed a lot +since I became sincerely interested in you. The other sort of life and +people don't amuse me any more. Mildred, say you'll marry me. I'll +make you as happy as the days are long." + +She moved slightly. Her hand dropped to the table. + +"I guess I came down on you too suddenly," said he. "You look a bit +dazed." + +"No, I'm not dazed," replied she. + +"I'll call Mrs. Brindley in, and we'll all three talk it over." + +"Please don't," said she. "I've got to think it out for myself." + +"I know there isn't anyone else," he went on. "So, I'm sure--dead +sure, Mildred, that I can teach you to love me." + +She looked at him pleadingly. "I don't have to answer right away?" + +"Certainly not," laughed he. "But why shouldn't you? What is there +against our getting married? Nothing. And everything for it. Our +marriage will straighten out all the--the little difficulties, and you +can go ahead with the singing and not bother about money, or what +people might say, or any of those things." + +"I--I've got to think about it, Stanley," she said gently. "I want to +do the decent thing by you and by myself." + +"You're afraid I'll interfere in the career--won't want you to go on? +Mildred, I swear I'm--" + +"It isn't that," she interrupted, her color high. "The truth is--" she +faltered, came to a full stop--cried, "Oh, I can't talk about it +to-night." + +"To-morrow?" he suggested. + +"I--don't know," she stammered. "Perhaps to-morrow. But it may be two +or three days." + +Stanley looked crestfallen. "That hurts, Mildred," he said. "I was SO +full of it, so anxious to be entirely happy, and I thought you'd fall +right in with it. Something to do with money? You're horribly +sensitive about money, dear. I like that in you, of course. Not many +women would have been as square, would have taken as little--and worked +hard--and thought and cared about nothing but making good-- By Jove, +it's no wonder I'm stark crazy about YOU!" + +She was flushed and trembling. "Don't," she pleaded. "You're beating +me down into the dust. I--I'm--" She started up. "I can't talk +to-night. I might say things I'd be-- I can't talk about it. I must--" + +She pressed her lips together and fled through the hall to her own +room, to shut and lock herself in. He stared in amazement. When he +heard the distant sound of the turning key he dropped to a chair again +and laughed. Certainly women were queer creatures--always doing what +one didn't expect. Still, in the end--well, a sensible woman knew a +good chance to marry and took it. There was no doubt a good deal of +pretense in Mildred's delicacy as to money matters--but a devilish +creditable sort of pretense. He liked the ladylike, "nice" pretenses, +of women of the right sort--liked them when they fooled him, liked them +when they only half fooled him. + +Presently he knocked on the door of the little library, opened it when +permission came in Cyrilla's voice. She was reading the evening +paper--he did not see the glasses she hastily thrust into a drawer. In +that soft light she looked a scant thirty, handsome, but for his taste +too intellectual of type to be attractive--except as a friend. + +"Well," said he, as he lit a cigarette and dropped the match into the +big copper ash-bowl, "I'll bet you can't guess what I've been up to." + +"Making love to Miss Stevens," replied she. "And very foolish it is of +you. She's got a steady head in that way." + +"You're mighty right," said he heartily. "And I admire her for that +more than for anything else. I'd trust her anywhere." + +"You're paying yourself a high compliment," laughed Cyrilla. + +"How's that?" inquired he. "You're too subtle for me. I'm a bit slow." + +Mrs. Brindley decided against explaining. It was not wise to risk +raising an unjust doubt in the mind of a man who fancied that a woman +who resisted him would be adamant to every other man. "Then I've got +to guess again?" said she. + +"I've been asking her to marry me," said Stanley, who could contain it +no longer. "Mrs. B. was released from me to-day by the court in +Providence." + +"But SHE'S not free," said Cyrilla, a little severely. + +Stanley looked confused, finally said: "Yes, she is. It's a queer +story. Don't say anything. I can't explain. I know I can trust you +to keep a close mouth." + +"Minding my own business is my one supreme talent," said Cyrilla. + +"She hasn't accepted me--in so many words," pursued Baird, "but I've +hopes that it'll come out all right." + +"Naturally," commented Cyrilla dryly. + +"I know I'm not--not objectionable to her. And how I do love her!" He +settled himself at his ease. "I can't believe it's really me. I never +thought I'd marry--just for love. Did you?" + +"You're very self-indulgent," said Cyrilla. + +"You mean I'm marrying her because I can't get her any other way. +There's where you're wrong, Mrs. Brindley. I'm marrying her because I +don't want her any other way. That's why I know it's love. I didn't +think I was capable of it. Of course, I've been rather strong after +the ladies all my life. You know how it is with men." + +"I do," said Mrs. Brindley. + +"No, you don't either," retorted he. "You're one of those cold, +stand-me-off women who can't comprehend the nature of man." + +"As you please," said she. In her eyes there was a gleam that more +than suggested a possibility of some man--some man she might +fancy--seeing an amazingly different Cyrilla Brindley. + +"I may say I was daft about pretty women," continued Baird. "I never +read an item about a pretty woman in the papers, or saw a picture of a +pretty woman that I didn't wish I knew her--well. Can you imagine +that?" laughed he. + +"Commonplace," said Cyrilla. "All men are so. That's why the papers +always describe the woman as pretty and why the pictures are published." + +"Really? Yes, I suppose so." Baird looked chagrined. "Anyhow, here I +am, all for one woman. And why? I can't explain it to myself. She's +pretty, lovely, entrancing sometimes. She has charm, grace, sweetness. +She dresses well and carries herself with a kind of sweet haughtiness. +She looks as if she knew a lot--and nothing bad. Do you know, I can't +imagine her having been married to that beast! I've tried to imagine +it. I simply can't." + +"I shouldn't try if I were you," said Mrs. Brindley. + +"But I was talking about why I love her. Does this bore you?" + +"A little," laughed Cyrilla. "I'd rather hear some man talking about +MY charms. But go on. You are amusing, in a way." + +"I'll wager I am. You never thought I'd be caught? I believed I was +immune--vaccinated against it. I thought I knew all the tricks and +turns of the sex. Yet here I am!" + +"What do you think caught you?" + +"That's the mystery. It's simply that I can't do without her. +Everything she looks and says and does interests me more than anything +else in the world. And when I'm not with her I'm wishing I were and +wondering how she's looking or what she's saying or doing. You don't +think she'll refuse me?" This last with real anxiety. + +"I haven't an idea," replied Mrs. Brindley. "She's--peculiar. In some +moods she would. In others, she couldn't. And I've never been able to +settle to my satisfaction which kind of mood was the real Mary Stevens." + +"She IS queer, isn't she?" said Stanley thoughtfully. "But I've told +her she'd be free to go on with the career. Fact is, I want her to do +it." + +Mrs. Brindley's eyes twinkled. "You think it would justify you to your +set in marrying her, if she made a great hit?" + +Stanley blushed ingenuously. "I'll not deny that has something to do +with it," he admitted. "And why not?" + +"Why not, indeed?" said she. "But, after she had made the hit, you'd +want her to quit the stage and take her place in society. Isn't that +so?" + +"You ARE a keen one," exclaimed he admiringly. "But I didn't say that +to her. And you won't, will you?" + +"It's hardly necessary to ask that," said Mrs. Brindley. "Now, +suppose-- You don't mind my talking about this?" + +"What I want," replied he. "I can't talk or think anything but her." + +"Now, suppose she shouldn't make a hit. Suppose she should +fail--should not develop reliable voice enough?" + +Stanley looked frightened. "But she can't fail," he cried with +over-energy. "There's no question about her voice." + +"I understand," Mrs. Brindley hastened to say. "I was simply making +conversation with her as the subject." + +"Oh, I see." Stanley settled back. + +"Suppose she should prove not to be a great artist--what then?" +persisted Cyrilla, who was deeply interested in the intricate obscure +problem of what people really thought as distinguished from what they +professed and also from what they imagined they thought. + +"The fact that she's a great artist--that's part of her," said Baird. +"If she weren't a great singer, she wouldn't be she--don't you see?" + +"Yes, I see," said Mrs. Brindley with an ironic sadness which she +indulged openly because there was no danger of his understanding. + +"I don't exactly love her because she amounts to a lot--or is sure to," +pursued he, vaguely dissatisfied with himself. "It's just as she +doesn't care for me because I've got the means to take care of her +right, yet that's part of me--and she'd not be able to marry me if I +hadn't. Don't you see?" + +"Yes, I see," said Mrs. Brindley with more irony and less sadness. +"There's always SOME reason beside love." + +"I'd say there's always some reason FOR love," said Baird, and he felt +that he had said something brilliant--as is the habit of people of +sluggish mentality when they say a thing they do not themselves +understand. "You don't doubt that I love her?" he went on. "Why should +I ask her to marry me if I didn't?" + +"I suppose that settles it," said Cyrilla. + +"Of course it does," declared he. + +For an hour he sat there, talking on, most of it a pretty dull kind of +drivel. Mrs. Brindley listened patiently, because she liked him and +because she had nothing else to do until bedtime. At last he rose with +a long sigh and said: + +"I guess I might as well be going." + +"She'll not come in to-night again," said Cyrilla slyly. + +He laughed. "You are a good one. I'll own up, I've been staying on +partly in the hope that she'd come back. But it's been a great joy to +talk to you about her. I know you love her, too." + +"Yes, I'm extremely fond of her," said she. "I've not known many +women--many people without petty mean tricks. She's one." + +"Isn't she, though?" exclaimed he. + +"I don't mean she's perfect," said Mrs. Brindley. "I don't even mean +that she's as angelic as you think her. I'd not like her, if she were. +But she's a superior kind of human." + +She was tired of him now, and got him out speedily. As she closed the +front door upon him, Mildred's door, down the hall, opened. Her head +appeared, an inquiring look upon her face. Mrs. Brindley nodded. +Mildred, her hair done close to her head, a dressing-robe over her +nightgown and her bare feet in little slippers, came down the hall. She +coiled herself up in a big chair in the library and lit a cigarette. +She looked like a handsome young boy. + +"He told you?" she said to Mrs. Brindley. + +"Yes," replied Cyrilla. + +Silence. In all their intimate acquaintance there had never been an +approach to the confidential on either side. It was Cyrilla's notion +that confidences were a mistake, and that the more closely people were +thrown together the more resolutely they ought to keep certain barriers +between them. She and Mildred got on too admirably, liked each other +too well, for there to be any trifling with their relations--and +over-intimacy inevitably led to trifling. Mildred had restrained +herself because Mrs. Brindley had compelled it by rigid example. Often +she had longed to talk things over, to ask advice; but she had never +ventured further than generalities, and Mrs. Brindley had never +proffered advice, had never accepted opportunities to give it except in +the vaguest way. She had taught Mildred a great deal, but always by +example, by doing, never by saying what ought or ought not to be done. +Thus, such development of Mildred's character as there had been was +natural and permanent. + +"He has put me in a peculiar position," said Mildred. "Or, rather, I +have let myself drift into a peculiar position. For I think you're +right in saying that oneself is always to blame. Won't you let me talk +about it to you, please? I know you hate confidences. But I've got +to--to talk. I'd like you to advise me, if you can. But even if you +don't, it'll do me good to say things aloud." + +"Often one sees more clearly," was Cyrilla's reply--noncommittal, yet +not discouraging. + +"I'm free to marry him," Mildred went on. "That is, I'm not married. +I'd rather not explain--" + +"Don't," said Mrs. Brindley. "It's unnecessary." + +"You know that it's Stanley who has been lending me the money to live +on while I study. Well, from the beginning I've been afraid I'd find +myself in a difficult position." + +"Naturally," said Mrs. Brindley, as she paused. + +"But I've always expected it to come in another way--not about +marriage, but--" + +"I understand," said Mrs. Brindley. "You feared you'd be called on to +pay in the way women usually pay debts to men." + +Mildred nodded. "But this is worse than I expected--much worse." + +"I hadn't thought of that," said Cyrilla. "Yes, you're right. If he +had hinted the other thing, you could have pretended not to understand. +If he had suggested it, you could have made him feel cheap and mean." + +"I did," said Mildred. "He has been--really wonderful--better than +almost any man would have been--more considerate than I deserved. And +I took advantage of it." + +"A woman has to," said Cyrilla. "The fight between men and women is so +unequal." + +"I took advantage of him," repeated Mildred. "And he apologized, and +I--I went on taking the money. I didn't know what else to do. Isn't +that dreadful?" + +"Nothing to be proud of," said Cyrilla. "But a very usual transaction." + +"And then," pursued Mildred, "I discovered that I--that I'd not be able +to make a career. But still I kept on, though I've been trying to +force myself to--to show some pride and self-respect. I discovered it +only a short time ago, and it wasn't really until to-day that I was +absolutely sure." + +"You ARE sure?" + +"There's hardly a doubt," replied Mildred. "But never mind that now. +I've got to make a living at something, and while I'm learning whatever +it is, I've got to have money to live on. And I can get it only from +him. Now, he asks me to marry him. He wouldn't ask me if he didn't +think I was going to be a great singer. He doesn't know it, but I do." + +Mrs. Brindley smiled sweetly. + +"And he thinks that I love him, also. If I accept him, it will be +under doubly false pretenses. If I refuse him I've got to stop taking +the money." + +A long silence; then Mrs. Brindley said: "Women--the good ones, +too--often feel that they've a right to treat men as men treat them. I +think almost any woman would feel justified in putting off the crisis." + +"You mean, I might tell him I'd give him my answer when I was +independent and had paid back." + +Cyrilla nodded. Mildred relit her cigarette, which she had let go out. +"I had thought of that," said she. "But--I doubt if he'd tolerate it. +Also"--she laughed with the peculiar intonation that accompanies the +lifting of the veil over a deeply and carefully hidden corner of one's +secret self--"I am afraid. If I don't marry him, in a few weeks, or +months at most, he'll probably find out that I shall never be a great +singer, and then I'd not be able to marry him if I wished to." + +"He IS a temptation," said Cyrilla. "That is, his money is--and he +personally is very nice." + +"I married a man I didn't care for," pursued Mildred. "I don't want +ever to do that again. It is--even in the best circumstances--not +agreeable, not as simple as it looks to the inexperienced girls who are +always doing it." + +"Still, a woman can endure that sort of thing," said Mrs. Brindley, +"unless she happens to be in love with another man." She was observing +the unconscious Mildred narrowly, a state of inward tension and +excitement hinted in her face, but not in her voice. + +"That's just it?" said Mildred, her face carefully averted. "I--I +happen to be in love with another man." + +A spasm of pain crossed Cyrilla's face. + +"A man who cares nothing about me--and never will. He's just a +friend--so much the friend that he couldn't possibly think of me as--as +a woman, needing him and wanting him"--her eyes were on fire now, and a +soft glow had come into her cheeks--"and never daring to show it +because if I did he would fly and never let me see him again." + +Cyrilla Brindley's face was tragic as she looked at the beautiful girl, +so gracefully adjusted to the big chair. She sighed covertly. "You +are lovely," she said, "and young--above all, young." + +"This man is peculiar," replied Mildred forlornly. "Anyhow, he doesn't +want ME. He knows me for the futile, weak, worthless creature I am. He +saw through my bluff, even before I saw through it myself. If it +weren't for him, I could go ahead--do the sensible thing--do as women +usually do. But--" She came to a full stop. + +"Love is a woman's sense of honor," said Cyrilla softly. "We're +merciless and unscrupulous--anything--everything--where we don't love. +But where we do love, we'll go farther for honor than the most +honorable man. That's why we're both worse and better than men--and +seem to be so contradictory and puzzling." + +"I'd do anything for him," said Mildred. She smiled drearily. "And he +wants nothing." + +She had nothing more to say. She had talked herself out about Stanley, +and her mind was now filled with thoughts that could not be spoken. As +she rose to go to bed, she looked appealingly at Cyrilla. Then, with a +sudden and shy rush she flung her arms round her and kissed her. "Thank +you--so much," she said. "You've done me a world of good. Saying it all +out loud before YOU has made me see. I know my own mind, now." + +She did not note the pathetic tenderness of Cyrilla's face as she said, +"Good night, Mildred." But she did note the use of her first name--and +her own right first name--for the first time since they had known each +other. She embraced and kissed her again. "Good night, Cyrilla," she +said gratefully. + + +As she entered Jennings's studio the next day he looked at her; and +when Jennings looked, he saw--as must anyone who lives well by playing +upon human nature. He did not like her expression. She did not +habitually smile; her light-heartedness, her optimism, did not show +themselves in that inane way. But this seriousness of hers was of a +new kind, of the kind that bespeaks sobriety and saneness of soul. And +that kind of seriousness--the deep, inward gravity of a person whose +days of trifling with themselves and with the facts of life, and of +being trifled with, are over--would have impressed Jennings equally had +she come in laughing, had her every word been a jest. + +"No, I didn't come for a lesson--at least not the usual kind," said she. + +He was not one to yield without a struggle. Also he wished to feel his +way to the meaning of this new mood. He put her music on the rack. +"We'll begin where we--" + +"This half-hour of your time is mine, is it not?" said she quietly. +"Let's not waste any of it. Yesterday you told me that I could not +hope to make a career because my voice is unreliable. Why is it +unreliable?" + +"Because you have a delicate throat," replied he, yielding at once +where he instinctively knew he could not win. + +"Then why can I sing so well sometimes?" + +"Because your throat is in good condition some days--in perfect +condition." + +"It's the colds then--and the slight attacks of colds?" + +"Certainly." + +"If I did not catch colds--if I kept perfectly well--could I rely on my +voice?" + +"But that's impossible," said he. + +"Why?" + +"You're not strong enough." + +"Then I haven't the physical strength for a career?" + +"That--and also you are lacking in muscular development. But after +several years of lessons--" + +"If I developed my muscles--if I became strong--" + +"Most of the great singers come from the lower classes--from people who +do manual labor. They did manual labor in their youth. You girls of +the better class have to overcome that handicap." + +"But so many of the great singers are fat." + +"Yes, and under that fat you'll find great ropes of muscle--like a +blacksmith." + +"What Keith meant," she said. "I wonder-- Why do I catch cold so +easily? Why do I almost always have a slight catch in the throat? Have +you noticed that I nearly always have to clear my throat just a little?" + +Her expression held him. He hesitated, tried to evade, gave it up. +"Until that passes, you can never hope to be a thoroughly reliable +singer," said he. + +"That is, I can't hope to make a career?" + +His silence was assent. + +"But I have the voice?" + +"You have the voice." + +"An unusual voice?" + +"Yes, but not so unusual as might be thought. As a matter of fact, +there are thousands of fine voices. The trouble is in reliability. Only +a few are reliable." + +She nodded slowly and thoughtfully. "I begin to understand what Mr. +Keith meant," she said. "I begin to see what I have to do, and +how--how impossible it is." + +"By no means," declared Jennings. "If I did not think otherwise, I'd +not be giving my time to you." + +She looked at him gravely. His eyes shifted, then returned defiantly, +aggressively. She said: + +"You can't help me to what I want. So this is my last lesson--for the +present. I may come back some day--when I am ready for what you have +to give." + +"You are going to give up?" + +"Oh, no--oh, dear me, no," replied she. "I realize that you're +laughing in your sleeve as I say so, because you think I'll never get +anywhere. But you--and Mr. Keith--may be mistaken." She drew from her +muff a piece of music--the "Batti Batti," from "Don Giovanni." "If you +please," said she, "we'll spend the rest of my time in going over this. +I want to be able to sing it as well as possible." + +He looked searchingly at her. "If you wish," said he. "But I doubt if +you'll be able to sing at all." + +"On the contrary, my cold's entirely gone," replied she. "I had an +exciting evening, I doctored myself before I went to bed, and three or +four times in the night. I found, this morning, that I could sing." + +And it was so. Never had she sung better. "Like a true artist!" he +declared with an enthusiasm that had a foundation of sincerity. "You +know, Miss Stevens, you came very near to having that rarest of all +gifts--a naturally placed voice. If you hadn't had singing teachers as +a girl to make you self-conscious and to teach you wrong, you'd have +been a wonder." + +"I may get it back," said Mildred. + +"That never happens," replied he. "But I can almost do it." + +He coached her for half an hour straight ahead, sending the next pupil +into the adjoining room--an unprecedented transgression of routine. He +showed her for the first time what a teacher he could be, when he +wished. There was an astonishing difference between her first singing +of the song and her sixth and last--for they went through it carefully +five times. She thanked him and then put out her hand, saying: + +"This is a long good-by." + +"To-morrow," replied he, ignoring her hand. + +"No. My money is all gone. Besides, I have no time for amateur +trifling." + +"Your lessons are paid for until the end of the month. This is only +the nineteenth." + +"Then you are so much in." Again she put out her hand. + +He took it. "You owe me an explanation." + +She smiled mockingly. "As a friend of mine says, don't ask questions +to which you already know the answer." + +And she departed, the smile still on her charming face, but the new +seriousness beneath it. As she had anticipated, she found Stanley +Baird waiting for her in the drawing-room of the apartment. Being by +habit much interested in his own emotions and not at all in the +emotions of others, he saw only the healthful radiance the sharp +October air had put into her cheeks and eyes. Certainly, to look at +Mildred Gower was to get no impression of lack of health and strength. +Her glance wavered a little at sight of him, then the expression of +firmness came back. + +"You look like that picture you gave me a long time ago," said he. "Do +you remember it?" + +She did not. + +"It has a--different expression," he went on. "I don't think I'd have +noticed it but for Keith. I happened to show it to him one day, and he +stared at it in that way he has--you know?" + +"Yes, I know," said Mildred. She was seeing those uncanny, brilliant, +penetrating eyes, in such startling contrast to the calm, lifeless +coloring and classic chiseling of features. + +"And after a while he said, 'So, THAT'S Miss Stevens!' And I asked him +what he meant, and he took one of your later photos and put the two +side by side. To my notion the later was a lot the more attractive, for +the face was rounder and softer and didn't have a certain kind +of--well, hardness, as if you had a will and could ride rough shod. Not +that you look so frightfully unattractive." + +"I remember the picture," interrupted Mildred. "It was taken when I +was twenty--just after an illness." + +"The face WAS thin," said Stanley. "Keith called it a 'give away.'" + +"I'd like to see it," said Mildred. + +"I'll try to find it. But I'm afraid I can't. I haven't seen it since +I showed it to Keith, and when I hunted for it the other day, it didn't +turn up. I've changed valets several times in the last six months--" + +But Mildred had ceased listening. Keith had seen the picture, had +called it a "give away," had been interested in it--and the picture had +disappeared. She laughed at her own folly, yet she was glad Stanley +had given her this chance to make up a silly day-dream. She waited +until he had exhausted himself on the subject of valets, their +drunkenness, their thievish habits, their incompetence, then she said: + +"I took my last lesson from Jennings to-day." + +"What's the matter? Do you want to change? You didn't say anything +about it? Isn't he good?" + +"Good enough. But I've discovered that my voice isn't reliable, and +unless one has a reliable voice there's no chance for a grand-opera +career--or for comic opera, either." + +Stanley was straightway all agitation and protest. "Who put that notion +in your head? There's nothing in it, Mildred. Jennings is crazy about +your voice, and he knows." + +"Jennings is after the money," replied Mildred. "What I'm saying is the +truth. Stanley, our beautiful dream of a career has winked out." + +His expression was most revealing. + +"And," she went on, "I'm not going to take any more of your money--and, +of course, I'll pay back what I've borrowed when I can"--she +smiled--"which may not be very soon." + +"What's all this about, anyhow?" demanded he. "I don't see any sign of +it in your face. You wouldn't take it so coolly if it were so." + +"I don't understand why I'm not wringing my hands and weeping," replied +she. "Every few minutes I tell myself that I ought to be. But I stay +quite calm. I suppose I'm--sort of stupefied." + +"Do you really mean that you've given up?" cried he. + +"It's no use to waste the money, Stanley. I've got the voice, and +that's what deceived us all. But there's nothing BEHIND the voice. +With a great singer the greatness is in what's behind the voice, not in +the voice itself." + +"I don't believe a word of it," cried he violently. "You've been +discouraged by a little cold. Everybody has colds. Why, in this +climate the colds are always getting the Metropolitan singers down." + +"But they've got strong throats, and my throat's delicate." + +"You must go to a better climate. You ought to be abroad, anyhow. That +was part of my plan--for us to go abroad--" He stopped in confusion, +reddened, went bravely on--"and you to study there and make your debut." + +Mildred shook her head. "That's all over," said she. "I've got to +change my plans entirely." + +"You're a little depressed, that's all. For a minute you almost +convinced me. What a turn you did give me! I forgot how your voice +sounded the last time I heard it. No, you'd not be so calm, if you +didn't know everything was all right." + +Her eyes lit up with sly humor. "Perhaps I'm calm because I feel that +my future's secure as your wife. What more could a woman ask?" + +He forced an uncomfortable laugh. "Of course--of course," he said with +a painful effort to be easy and jocose. + +"I knew you'd marry me, even if I couldn't sing a note. I knew your +belief in my career had nothing to do with it." + +He hesitated, blurted out the truth. "Speaking seriously, that isn't +quite so," said he. "I've got my heart set on your making a great +tear--and I know you'll do it." + +"And if you knew I wouldn't, you'd not want to marry me?" + +"I don't say that," protested he. "How can I say how I'd feel if you +were different?" + +She nodded. "That's sensible, and it's candid," she said. She laid +her hand impulsively on his arm. "I DO like you, Stanley. You have +got such a lot of good qualities. Don't worry. I'm not going to +insist on your marrying me." + +"You don't have to do that, Mildred," said he. "I'm staring, raving +crazy about you, though I'm a damn fool to let you know it." + +"Yes, it is foolish," said she. "If you'd kept me worrying-- Still, I +guess not. But it doesn't matter. You can protest and urge all you +please, quite safely. I'm not going to marry you. Now let's talk +business." + +"Let's talk marriage," said he. "I want this thing settled. You know +you intend to marry me, Mildred. Why not say so? Why keep me gasping +on the hook?" + +They heard the front door open, and the rustling of skirts down the +hall. Mildred called: + +"Mrs. Brindley! Cyrilla!" + +An instant and Cyrilla appeared in the doorway. When she and Baird had +shaken hands, Mildred said: + +"Cyrilla, I want you to tell the exact, honest truth. Is there any hope +for a woman with a delicate throat to make a grand-opera career?" + +Cyrilla paled, looked pleadingly at Mildred. + +"Tell him," commanded Mildred. + +"Very little," said Mrs. Brindley. "But--" + +"Don't try to soften it," interrupted Mildred. "The truth, the plain +truth." + +"You've no right to draw me into this," cried Cyrilla indignantly, and +she started to leave the room. + +"I want him to know," said Mildred. "And he wants to know." + +"I refuse to be drawn into it," Cyrilla said, and disappeared. + +But Mildred saw that Stanley had been shaken. She proceeded to explain +to him at length what a singer's career meant--the hardships, the +drafts on health and strength, the absolute necessity of being +reliable, of singing true, of not disappointing audiences--what a +delicate throat meant--how delicate her throat was--how deficient she +was in the kind of physical strength needed--muscular power with +endurance back of it. When she finished he understood. + +"I'd always thought of it as an art," he said ruefully. "Why, it's +mostly health and muscles and things that have nothing to do with +music." He was dazed and offended by this uncovering of the mechanism +of the art--by the discovery of the coarse and painful toil, the +grossly physical basis, of what had seemed to him all idealism. He had +been full of the delusions of spontaneity and inspiration, like all +laymen, and all artists, too, except those of the higher ranks--those +who have fought their way up to the heights and, so, have learned that +one does not achieve them by being caught up to them gloriously in a +fiery cloud, but by doggedly and dirtily and sweatily toiling over +every inch of the cruel climb. + +He sat silent when she had finished. She waited, then said: + +"Now, you see. I release you, and I'll take no more money to waste." + +He looked at her with dumb misery that smote her heart. Then his +expression changed--to the shining, hungry eyes, the swollen veins, the +reddened countenance, the watering lips of desire. He seized her in +his arms, and in a voice trembling with passion, he cried: "You must +marry me, anyhow! I've GOT to have you, Mildred." + +If she had loved him, his expression, his impassioned voice would have +thrilled her. But she did not love him. It took all her liking for +him, and the memory of all she owed him--that unpaid debt!--to enable +her to push him away gently and to say without any show of the +repulsion she felt: + +"Stanley, you mustn't do that. And it's useless to talk of marriage. +You're generous, so you are taking pity on me. But believe me, I'll +get along somehow." + +"Pity? I tell you I love you," he cried, catching desperately at her +hands and holding them in a grip she could not break. "You've no right +to treat me like this." + +It was one of those veiled and stealthy reminders of obligation +habitually indulged in by delicate people seeking repayment of the +debt, but shunning the coarseness of direct demand. Mildred saw her +opportunity. Said she quietly: + +"You mean you want me to give myself to you in payment, or part +payment, for the money you've loaned me?" + +He released her hands and sprang up. He had meant just that, but he +had not had the courage, or the meanness, or both, to admit boldly his +own secret wish. She had calculated on this--had calculated well. +"Mildred!" he cried in a shocked voice. "YOU so lacking in delicacy as +to say such a thing!" + +"If you didn't mean that, Stanley, what DID you mean?" + +"I was appealing to our friendship--our--our love for each other." + +"Then you should have waited until I was free." + +"Good God!" he cried, "don't you see that's hopeless? Mildred, be +sensible--be merciful." + +"I shall never marry a man when he could justly suspect I did it to +live off him." + +"What an idea! It's a man's place to support a woman!" + +"I was speaking only of myself. _I_ can't do it. And it's absurd for +you and me to be talking about love and marriage when anyone can see +I'd be marrying you only because I was afraid to face poverty and a +struggle." + +Her manner calmed him somewhat. "Of course it's obvious that you've +got to have money," said he, "and that the only way you can get it is +by marriage. But there's something else, too, and in my opinion it's +the principal thing--we care for each other. Why not be sensible, +Mildred? Why not thank God that as long as you have to marry, you can +marry someone you care for." + +"Could you feel that I cared for you, if I married you now?" inquired +she. + +"Why not? I'm not so entirely lacking in self-esteem. I feel that I +must count for something." + +Mildred sat silently wondering at this phenomenon so astounding, yet a +commonplace of masculine egotism. She had no conception of this vanity +which causes the man, at whom the street woman smiles, to feel +flattered, though he knows full well what she is and her dire +necessity. She could not doubt that he was speaking the truth, yet she +could not believe that conceit could so befog common sense in a man +who, for all his slowness and shallowness, was more than ordinarily +shrewd. + +"Even if I thought I loved you," said she, "I couldn't be sure in these +circumstances that I wasn't after your money." + +"Don't worry about that," replied he. "I understand you better than +you understand yourself." + +"Let's stop talking about it," said she impatiently. "I want to explain +to you the business side of this." She took her purse from the table. +"Here are the papers." She handed him a check and a note. "I made +them out at the bank this morning. The note is for what I owe you--and +draws interest at four per cent. The check is for all the money I have +left except about four hundred dollars. I've some bills I must pay, +and also I didn't dare quite strip myself. The note may not be worth +the paper it's written on, but I hope--" + +Before she could prevent him he took the two papers, and, holding them +out of her reach, tore them to bits. + +Her eyes gleamed angrily. "I see you despise me--as much as I've +invited. But, I'll make them out again and mail them to you." + +"You're a silly child," said he gruffly. "We're going to be married." + +She eyed him with amused exasperation. "It's too absurd!" she cried. +"And if I yielded, you'd be trying to get out of it." She hesitated +whether to tell him frankly just how she felt toward him. She decided +against it, not through consideration--for a woman feels no +consideration for a man she does not love, if he has irritated her--but +through being ashamed to say harsh things to one whom she owed so much. +"It's useless for you to pretend and to plead," she went on. "I shall +not yield. You'll have to wait until I'm free and independent." + +"You'll marry me then?" + +"No," replied she, laughing. "But I'll be able to refuse you in such a +way that you'll believe." + +"But you've got to marry, Mildred, and right away." A suspicion entered +his mind and instantly gleamed in his eyes. "Are you in love with +someone else?" + +She smiled mockingly. + +"It looks as if you were," he went on, arguing with himself aloud. "For +if you weren't you'd marry me, even though you didn't like me. A woman +in your fix simply couldn't keep herself from it. Is THAT why you're +so calm?" + +"I'm not marrying anybody," said she. + +"Then what are you going to do?" + +"You'll see." + +Once more the passionate side of his nature showed--not merely +grotesque, unattractive, repellent, as in the mood of longing, but +hideous. Among men Stanley Baird passed for a man of rather arrogant +and violent temper, but that man who had seen him at his most violent +would have been amazed. The temper men show toward men bears small +resemblance either in kind or in degree to the temper of jealous +passion they show toward the woman who baffles them or arouses their +suspicions; and no man would recognize his most intimate man friend--or +himself--when in that paroxysm. Mildred had seen this mood, gleaming at +her through a mask, in General Siddall. It had made her sick with fear +and repulsion. In Stanley Baird it first astounded her, then filled +her with hate. + +"Stanley!" she gasped. + +"WHO is it?" he ground out between his teeth. And he seized her +savagely. + +"If you don't release me at once," said she calmly, "I shall call Mrs. +Brindley, and have you put out of the house. No matter if I do owe you +all that money." + +"Stop!" he cried, releasing her. "You're very clever, aren't +you?--turning that against me and making me powerless." + +"But for that, would you dare presume to touch me, to question me?" +said she. + +He lowered his gaze, stood panting with the effort to subdue his fury. + +She went back to her own room. A few hours later came a letter of +apology from him. She answered it friendlily, said she would let him +know when she could see him again, and enclosed a note and a check. + + + +VIII + +MILDRED went to bed that night proud of her strength of character. Were +there many women--was there any other woman she knew or knew about--who +in her desperate circumstances would have done what she had done? She +could have married a man who would have given her wealth and the very +best social position. She had refused him. She could have continued +to "borrow" from him the wherewithal to keep her in luxurious comfort +while she looked about at her ease for a position that meant +independence. She had thrust the temptation from her. All this from +purely high-minded motives; for other motive there could be none. She +went to sleep, confident that on the morrow she would continue to tread +the path of self-respect with unfaltering feet. But when morning came +her throat was once more slightly off--enough to make it wise to +postpone the excursion in search of a trial for musical comedy. The +excitement or the reaction from excitement--it must be the one or the +other--had resulted in weakness showing itself, naturally, at her +weakest point--that delicate throat. When life was calm and orderly, +and her mind was at peace, the trouble would pass, and she could get a +position of some kind. Not the career she had dreamed; that was +impossible. But she had voice enough for a little part, where a living +could be made; and perhaps she would presently fathom the secret of the +cause of her delicate throat and would be able to go far--possibly as +far as she had dreamed. + +The delay of a few days was irritating. She would have preferred to +push straight on, while her courage was taut. Still, the delay had one +advantage--she could prepare the details of her plan. So, instead of +going to the office of the theatrical manager--Crossley, the most +successful producer of light, musical pieces of all kinds--she went to +call on several of the girls she knew who were more or less in touch +with matters theatrical. And she found out just how to proceed toward +accomplishing a purpose which ought not to be difficult for one with +such a voice as hers and with physical charms peculiarly fitted for +stage exhibition. + +Not until Saturday was her voice at its best again. She, naturally, +decided not to go to the theatrical office on Monday, but to wait until +she had seen and talked with Keith. One more day did not matter, and +Keith might be stimulating, might even have some useful suggestions to +offer. She received him with a manner that was a version, and a most +charming version, of his own tranquil indifference. But his first +remark threw her into a panic. Said he: + +"I've only a few minutes. No, thanks, I'll not sit." + +"You needn't have bothered to come," said she coldly. + +"I always keep my engagements. Baird tells me you have given up the +arrangement you had with him. You'll probably be moving from here, as +you'll not have the money to stay on. Send me your new address, +please." He took a paper from his pocket and gave it to her. "You +will find this useful--if you are in earnest," said he. "Good-by, and +good luck. I'll hope to see you in a few weeks." + +Before she had recovered herself in the least, she was standing there +alone, the paper in her hand, her stupefied gaze upon the door through +which he had disappeared. All his movements and his speech had been of +his customary, his invariable, deliberateness; but she had the +impression of whirling and rushing haste. With a long gasping sigh she +fell to trembling all over. She sped to her room, got its door safely +closed just in time. Down she sank upon the bed, to give way to an +attack of hysterics. + +We are constantly finding ourselves putting forth the lovely flowers +and fruit of the virtues whereof the heroes and heroines of romance are +so prolific. Usually nothing occurs to disillusion us about ourselves. +But now and then fate, in unusually brutal ironic mood, forces us to +see the real reason why we did this or that virtuous, self-sacrificing +action, or blossomed forth in this or that nobility of character. +Mildred was destined now to suffer one of these savage blows of +disillusionment about self that thrust us down from the exalted moral +heights where we have been preening into humble kinship with the weak +and frail human race. She saw why she had refused Stanley, why she had +stopped "borrowing," why she had put off going to the theatrical +managers, why she had delayed moving into quarters within her +diminished and rapidly diminishing means. She had been counting on +Donald Keith. She had convinced herself that he loved her even as she +loved him. He would fling away his cold reserve, would burst into +raptures over her virtue and her courage, would ask her to marry him. +Or, if he should put off that, he would at least undertake the +responsibility of getting her started in her career. Well! He had +come; he had shown that Stanley had told him all or practically all; +and he had gone, without asking a sympathetic question or making an +encouraging remark. As indifferent as he seemed. Burnt out, cold, +heartless. She had leaned upon him; he had slipped away, leaving her to +fall painfully, and ludicrously, to the ground. She had been boasting +to herself that she was strong, that she would of her own strength +establish herself in independence. She had not dreamed that she would +be called upon to "make good." She raved against Keith, against +herself, against fate. And above the chaos and the wreck within her, +round and round, hither and yon, flapped and shied the black thought, +"What SHALL I do?" + +When she sat up and dried her eyes, she chanced to see the paper Keith +had left; with wonder at her having forgotten it and with a throb of +hope she opened and began to read his small, difficult writing: + + +A career means self-denial. Not occasional, intermittent, but steady, +constant, daily, hourly--a purpose that never relaxes. + +A career as a singer means not only the routine, the patient tedious +work, the cutting out of time-wasting people and time-wasting pleasures +that are necessary to any and all careers. It means in addition--for +such a person--sacrifices far beyond a character so undisciplined and +so corrupted by conventional life as is yours. The basis of a singing +career is health and strength. You must have great physical strength +to be able to sing operas. You must have perfect health. + +Diet and exercise. A routine life, its routine rigidly adhered to, day +in and day out, month after month, year after year. Small and +uninteresting and monotonous food, nothing to drink, and, of course, no +cigarettes. Such is the secret of a reliable voice for you who have a +"delicate throat"--which is the silly, shallow, and misleading way of +saying a delicate digestion, for sore throat always means indigestion, +never means anything else. To sing, the instrument, the absolutely +material machine, must be in perfect order. The rest is easy. + +Some singers can commit indiscretions of diet and of lack of exercise. +But not you, because you lack this natural strength. Do not be +deceived and misled by their example. + +Exercise. You must make your body strong, powerful. You have not the +muscles by nature. You must acquire them. + +The following routine of diet and exercise made one of the great +singers, and kept her great for a quarter of a century. If you adopt +it, without variation, you can make a career. If you do not, you need +not hope for anything but failure and humiliation. Within my knowledge +sixty-eight young men and young women have started in on this system. +Not one had the character to persist to success. This may suggest why, +except two who are at the very top, all of the great singers are men +and women whom nature has made powerful of body and of digestion--so +powerful that their indiscretions only occasionally make them +unreliable. + + +There Mildred stopped and flung the paper aside. She did not care even +to glance at the exercises prescribed or at the diet and the routine of +daily work. How dull and uninspired! How grossly material! Stomach! +Chewing! Exercising machines! Plodding dreary miles daily, rain or +shine! What could such things have to do with the free and glorious +career of an inspired singer? Keith was laughing at her as he hastened +away, abandoning her to her fate. + +She examined herself in the glass to make sure that the ravages of her +attack of rage and grief and despair could be effaced within a few +hours, then she wrote a note--formal yet friendly--to Stanley Baird, +informing him that she would receive him that evening. He came while +Cyrilla and Mildred were having their after, dinner coffee and +cigarettes. He was a man who took great pains with his clothes, and +got them where pains was not in vain. That evening he had arrayed +himself with unusual care, and the result was a fine, manly figure of +the well-bred New-Yorker type. Certainly Stanley had ground for his +feeling that he deserved and got liking for himself. The three sat in +the library for perhaps half an hour, then Mrs. Brindley rose to leave +the other two alone. Mildred urged her to stay--Mildred who had been +impatient of her presence when Stanley was announced. Urged her to +stay in such a tone that Cyrilla could not persist, but had to sit down +again. As the three talked on and on, Mildred continued to picture life +with Stanley--continued the vivid picturing she had begun within ten +minutes of Stanley's entering, the picturing that had caused her to +insist on Cyrilla's remaining as chaperon. A young girl can do no such +picturing as Mildred could not avoid doing. To the young girl married +life, its tete-a-tetes, its intimacies, its routine, are all a blank. +Any attempt she makes to fill in details goes far astray. But Mildred, +with Stanley there before her, could see her life as it would be. + +Toward half-past ten, Stanley said, shame-faced and pleading, "Mildred, +I should like to see you alone for just a minute before I go." + +Mildred said to Cyrilla: "No, don't move. We'll go into the +drawing-room." + +He followed her there, and when the sound of Mrs. Brindley's step in +the hall had died away, he began: "I think I understand you a little +now. I shan't insult you by returning or destroying that note or the +check. I accept your decision--unless you wish to change it." He +looked at her with eager appeal. His heart was trembling, was sick +with apprehension, with the sense of weakness, of danger and gloom +ahead. "Why shouldn't I help you, at least, Mildred?" he urged. + +Whence the courage came she knew not, but through her choking throat +she forced a positive, "No." + +"And," he went on, "I meant what I said. I love you. I'm wretched +without you. I want you to marry me, career or no career." + +Her fears were clamorous, but she forced herself to say, "I can't +change." + +"I hoped--a little--that you sent me the note to-day because you-- You +didn't?" + +"No," said Mildred. "I want us to be friends. But you must keep away." + +He bent his head. "Then I'll go 'way off somewhere. I can't bear being +here in New York and not seeing you. And when I've been away a year or +so, perhaps I'll get control of myself again." + +Going away!--to try to forget!--no doubt, to succeed in forgetting! +Then this was her last chance. + +"Must I go, Mildred? Won't you relent?" + +"I don't love you--and I never can." She was deathly white and +trembling. She lifted her eyes to begin a retreat, for her courage had +quite oozed away. He was looking at her, his face distorted with a +mingling of the passion of desire and the passion of jealousy. She +shrank, caught at the back of a chair for support, felt suddenly strong +and defiant. To be this man's plaything, to submit to his moods, to +his jealousies, to his caprices--to be his to fumble and caress, his to +have the fury of his passion wreak itself upon her with no response +from her but only repulsion and loathing--and the long dreary hours and +days and years alone with him, listening to his commonplaces, often so +tedious, forced to try to amuse him and to keep him in a good humor +because he held the purse-strings-- + +"Please go," she said. + +She was still very young, still had years and years of youth unspent. +Surely she could find something better than this. Surely life must +mean something more than this. At least it was worth a trial. + +He held out his hand. She gave him her reluctant and cold fingers. He +said something, what she did not hear, for the blood was roaring in her +ears as the room swam round. He was gone, and the next thing she +definitely knew she was at the threshold of Cyrilla's room. Cyrilla +gave her a tenderly sympathetic glance. She saw herself in a mirror and +knew why; her face was gray and drawn, and her eyes lay dully deep +within dark circles. + +"I couldn't do it," she said. "I sent for him to marry him. But I +couldn't." + +"I'm glad," said Cyrilla. "Marriage without love is a last resort. And +you're a long way from last resorts." + +"You don't think I'm crazy?" + +"I think you've won a great victory." + +"Victory!" And Mildred laughed dolefully. "If this is victory, I hope +I'll never know defeat." + +Why did Mildred refuse Stanley Baird and cut herself off from him, even +after her hopes of Donald Keith died through lack of food, real or +imaginary? It would be gratifying to offer this as a case of pure +courage and high principle, untainted of the motives which govern +ordinary human actions. But unluckily this is a biography, not a +romance, a history and not a eulogy. And Mildred Gower is a human +being, even as you and I, not a galvanized embodiment of superhuman +virtues such as you and I are pretending to be, perhaps even to +ourselves. The explanation of her strange aberration, which will be +doubted or secretly condemned by every woman of the sheltered classes +who loves her dependence and seeks to disguise it as something sweet +and fine and "womanly"--the explanation of her almost insane act of +renunciation of all that a lady holds most dear is simple enough, +puzzling though she found it. Ignorance, which accounts for so much of +the squalid failure in human life, accounts also for much if not all +the most splendid audacious achievement. Very often--very, very +often--the impossibilities are achieved by those who in their ignorance +advance not boldly but unconcernedly where a wiser man or woman would +shrink and retreat. Fortunate indeed is he or she who in a crisis is +by chance equipped with neither too little nor too much knowledge--who +knows enough to enable him to advance, but does not know enough to +appreciate how perilous, how foolhardy, how harsh and cruel, advance +will be. Mildred was in this instance thus fortunate--unfortunate, she +was presently to think it. She knew enough about loveless marriage to +shrink from it. She did not know enough about what poverty, +moneylessness, and friendlessness mean in the actuality to a woman bred +as she had been. She imagined she knew--and sick at heart her notion +of poverty made her. But imagination was only faintest foreshadowing +of actuality. If she had known, she would have yielded to the +temptation that was almost too strong for her. And if she had +yielded--what then? Not such a repulsive lot, as our comfortable +classes look at it. Plenty to eat and drink and to wear, servants and +equipages and fine houses and fine society, the envy of her gaping +kind--a comfortable life for the body, a comfortable death for mind and +heart, slowly and softly suffocated in luxury. Partly through +knowledge that strongly affected her character, which was on the whole +aspiring and sensitive beyond the average to the true and the +beautiful, partly through ignorance that veiled the future from her +none too valorous and hardy heart, she did not yield to the temptation. +And thus, instead of dying, she began to live, for what is life but +growth in experience, in strength and knowledge and capability? + +A baby enters the world screaming with pain. The first sensations of +living are agonizing. It is the same with the birth of souls, for a +soul is not really born until that day when it is offered choice +between life and death and chooses life. In Mildred Gower's case this +birth was an agony. She awoke the following morning with a dull +headache, a fainting heart, and a throat so sore that she felt a +painful catch whenever she tried to swallow. She used the spray; she +massaged her throat and neck vigorously. In vain; it was folly to +think of going where she might have to risk a trial of her voice that +day. The sun was brilliant and the air sharp without being humid or +too cold. She dressed, breakfasted, went out for a walk. The throat +grew worse, then better. She returned for luncheon, and afterward +began to think of packing, not that she had chosen a new place, but +because she wished to have some sort of a sense of action. But her +unhappiness drove her out again--to the park where the air was fine and +she could walk in comparative solitude. + +"What a silly fool I am!" thought she. "Why did I do this in the +worst, the hardest possible way? I should have held on to Stanley +until I had a position. No, I'm such a poor creature that I could never +have done it in that way. I'd simply have kept on bluffing, fooling +myself, putting off and putting of. I had to jump into the water with +nobody near to help me, or I'd never have begun to learn to swim. I +haven't begun yet. I may never learn to swim. I may drown. Yes, I +probably shall drown." + +She wandered aimlessly on--around the upper reservoir where the strong +breeze freshened her through and through and made her feel less forlorn +in spite of her chicken heart. She crossed the bridge at the lower end +and came down toward the East Drive. A taxicab rushed by, not so fast, +however, that she failed to recognize Donald Keith and Cyrilla +Brindley. They were talking so earnestly--Keith was talking, for a +wonder, and Mrs. Brindley listening--that they did not see her. She +went straight home. But as she was afoot, the journey took about half +an hour. Cyrilla was already there, in a negligee, looking as if she +had not been out of the little library for hours. She was writing a +letter. Mildred strolled in and seated herself. Cyrilla went on +writing. Mildred watched her impatiently. She wished to talk, to be +talked to, to be consoled and cheered, to hear about Donald Keith. +Would that letter never be finished? At last it was, and Cyrilla took +a book and settled herself to reading. There was a vague something in +her manner--a change, an attitude toward Mildred--that disturbed +Mildred. Or, was that notion of a change merely the offspring of her +own somber mood? Seeing that Mrs. Brindley would not begin, she broke +the silence herself. Said she awkwardly: + +"I've decided to move. In fact, I've got to move." + +Cyrilla laid down the book and regarded her tranquilly. "Of course," +said she. "I've already begun to arrange for someone else." + +Mildred choked, and the tears welled into her eyes. She had not been +mistaken; Cyrilla had changed toward her. Now that she had no +prospects for a brilliant career, now that her money was gone, Cyrilla +had begun to--to be human. No doubt, in the course of that drive, +Cyrilla had discovered that Keith had no interest in her either. +Mildred beat down her emotion and was soon able to say in a voice as +unconcerned as Cyrilla's: + +"I'll find a place to-morrow or next day, and go at once." + +"I'll be sorry to lose you," said Mrs. Brindley, "but I agree with you +that you can't get settled any too soon." + +"You don't happen to know of any cheap, good place?" said Mildred. + +"If it's cheap, I don't think it's likely to be good--in New York," +replied Cyrilla. "You'll have to put up with inconveniences--and +worse. I'd offer to help you find a place, but I think everything +self-reliant one does helps one to learn. Don't you?" + +"Yes, indeed," assented Mildred. The thing was self-evidently true; +still she began to hate Cyrilla. This cold-hearted New York! How she +would grind down her heel when she got it on the neck of New York! +Friendship, love, helpfulness--what did New York and New-Yorkers know +of these things? "Or Hanging Rock, either," reflected she. What a +cold and lonely world! + +"Have you been to see about a position?" inquired Cyrilla. + +Mildred was thrown into confusion. "I can't go--for a--day or so," she +stammered. "The changeable weather has rather upset my throat. Nothing +serious, but I want to be at my best." + +"Certainly," said Mrs. Brindley. Her direct gaze made Mildred +uncomfortable. She went on: "You're sure it's the weather?" + +"What else could it be?" demanded Mildred with a latent resentment +whose interesting origin she did not pause to inquire into. + +"Well, salad, or sauces, or desserts, or cafe au lait in the morning, +or candy, or tea," said Cyrilla. "Or it might be cigarettes, or all +those things--and thin stockings and low shoes--mightn't it?" + +Never before had she known Cyrilla to say anything meddlesome or +cattish. Said Mildred with a faint sneer, "That sounds like Mr. +Keith's crankiness." + +"It is," replied Cyrilla. "I used to think he was a crank on the +subject of singing and stomachs, and singing and ankles. But I've been +convinced, partly by him, mostly by what I've observed." + +Mildred maintained an icy silence. + +"I see you are resenting what I said," observed Cyrilla. + +"Not at all," said Mildred. "No doubt you meant well." + +"You will please remember that you asked me a question." + +So she had. But the discovery that she was clearly in the wrong, that +she had invited the disguised lecture, only aggravated her sense of +resentment against Mrs. Brindley. She spent the rest of the afternoon +in sorting and packing her belongings--and in crying. She came upon +the paper Donald Keith had left. She read it through carefully, +thoughtfully, read it to the last direction as to exercise with the +machine, the last arrangement for a daily routine of life, the last +suggestion as to diet. + +"Fortunately all that isn't necessary," said she to herself, when she +had finished. "If it were, I could never make a career. I'm not +stupid enough to be able to lead that kind of life. Why, I'd not care +to make a career, at that price. Slavery--plain slavery." + +When she went in to dinner, she saw instantly that Cyrilla too had been +crying. Cyrilla did not look old, anything but that, indeed was not +old and would not begin to be for many a year. Still, after +thirty-five or forty a woman cannot indulge a good cry without its +leaving serious traces that will show hours afterward. At sight of the +evidences of Cyrilla's grief Mildred straightway forgot her resentment. +There must have been some other cause for Cyrilla's peculiar conduct. +No matter what, since it was not hardness of heart. + +It was a sad, even a gloomy dinner. But the two women were once more +in perfect sympathy. And afterward Mildred brought the Keith paper and +asked Cyrilla's opinion. Cyrilla read slowly and without comment. At +last she said: + +"He got this from his mother, Lucia Rivi. Have you read her life?" + +"No. I've heard almost nothing about her, except that she was famous." + +"She was more than that," said Mrs. Brindley. "She was great, a great +personality. She was an almost sickly child and girl. Her first +attempts on the stage were humiliating failures. She had no health, no +endurance, nothing but a small voice of rare quality." Cyrilla held up +the paper. "This tells how she became one of the surest and most +powerful dramatic sopranos that ever lived." + +"She must have been a dull person to have been able to lead the kind of +life that's described there," said Mildred. + +"Only two kinds of persons could do it," replied Cyrilla--"a dull +person--a plodder--and a genius. Middling people--they're the kind that +fill the world, they're you and I, my dear--middling people have to +fuss with the trifles that must be sacrificed if one is to do anything +big. You call those trifles your freedom, but they're your slavery. +And by sacrificing them the Lucia Rivis buy their freedom." Cyrilla +looked at the paper with a heavy sigh. "Ah, I wish I had seen this +when I was your age. Now, it's too late." + +Said Mildred: "Would you seriously advise me to try that?" + +Cyrilla came and sat beside her and put an arm around her. "Mildred," +she said, "I've never thrust advice on you. I only dare do it now +because you ask me, and because I love you. You must try it. It's +your one chance. If you do not, you will fail. You don't believe me?" + +In a tone that was admission, Mildred said: "I don't know." + +"Keith has given you there the secret of a successful career. You'll +never read it in any book, or get it from any teacher, or from any +singer or manager or doctor. You must live like that, you must do +those things or you will fail even in musical comedy. You would fail +even as an actress, if you tried that, when you found out that the +singing was out of the question." + +Mildred was impressed. Perhaps she would have been more impressed had +she not seen Keith and Mrs. Brindley in the taxi, Keith talking +earnestly and Mrs. Brindley listening as if to an oracle. Said she: +"Perhaps I'll adopt some of the suggestions." + +Cyrilla shook her head. "It's a route to success. You must go the +whole route or not at all." + +"Don't forget that there have been other singers besides Rivi." + +"Not any that I recall who weren't naturally powerful in every way. And +how many of them break down? Mildred, please do put the silly nonsense +about nerves and temperament and inspiration and overwork and weather +and climate--put all that out of your head. Build your temple of a +career as high and graceful and delicate as you like, but build it on +the coarse, hard, solid rock, dear!" + +Mildred tried to laugh lightly. "How Mr. Keith does hypnotize people!" +cried she. + +Mrs. Brindley's cheeks burned, and her eyes lowered in acute +embarrassment. "He has a way of being splendidly and sensibly right," +said she. "And the truth is wonderfully convincing--once one sees it." +She changed the subject, and it did not come up--or, perhaps, come OUT +again--before they went to bed. The next day Mildred began the +depressing, hopeless search for a place to live that would be clean, +comfortable, and cheap. Those three adjectives describe the ideal +lodging; but it will be noted that all these are relative. In fact, +none of the three means exactly the same thing to any two members of +the human family. Mildred's notion of clean--like her notion of +comfortable--on account of her bringing up implied a large element of +luxury. As for the word "cheap," it really meant nothing at all to +her. From one standpoint everything seemed cheap; from another, +everything seemed dear; that is, too dear for a young woman with less +than five hundred dollars in the world and no substantial prospect of +getting a single dollar more--unless by hook and crook, both of which +means she was resolved not to employ. + +Never having earned so much as a single penny, the idea of anyone's +giving her anything for what she might be able to do was disturbingly +vague and unreal. On the other hand, looking about her, she saw scores +of men and women, personally known to her to be dull of conversation, +and not well mannered or well dressed or well anything, who were making +livings without overwhelming difficulty. Why not Mildred Gower? In +this view the outlook was not discouraging. "I'll no doubt go through +some discomfort, getting myself placed. But somewhere and somehow I +shall be placed--and how I shall revenge myself on Donald Keith!" His +fascination for her had not been destroyed by his humiliating lack of +belief in her, nor by his cold-hearted desertion at just the critical +moment. But his conduct had given her the incentive of rage, of stung +vanity--or wounded pride, if you prefer. She would get him back; she +would force him to admit; she would win him, if she could--and that +ought not to be difficult when she should be successful. Having won +him, then-- What then? Something superb in the way of revenge; she +would decide what, when the hour of triumph came. Meanwhile she must +search for lodgings. + +In her journeyings under the guidance of attractive advertisements and +"carefully selected" agents' lists, she found herself in front of her +first lodgings in New York--the house of Mrs. Belloc. She had often +thought of the New England school-teacher, arrived by such strange +paths at such a strange position in New York. She had started to call +on her many times, but each time had been turned aside; New York makes +it more than difficult to find time to do anything that does not have +to be done at a definite time and for a definite reason. She was worn +out with her futile trampings up and down streets, up and down stairs. +Up the stone steps she went and rang the bell. + +Yes, Mrs. Belloc was in, and would be glad to see her, if Miss Stevens +would wait in the drawing-room a few minutes. She had not seated +herself when down the stairs came the fresh, pleasantly countrified +voice of Mrs. Belloc, inviting her to ascend. As Mildred started up, +she saw at the head of the stairs the frank and cheerful face of the +lady herself. She was holding together at the neck a thin silk wrapper +whose lines strongly suggested that it was the only garment she had on. + +"Why should old friends stand on ceremony?" said Mrs. Belloc. "Come +right up. I've been taking a bath. My masseuse has just gone." Mrs. +Belloc enclosed her in a delightfully perfumed embrace, and they kissed +with enthusiasm. + +"I AM glad to see you," said Mildred, feeling all at once a thrilling +sense of at-homeness. "I didn't realize how glad I'd be till I saw +you." + +"It'd be a pretty stiff sort that wouldn't feel at home with me," +observed Mrs. Belloc. "New York usually stiffens people up. It's had +the opposite effect on me. Though I must say, I have learned to stiffen +with people I don't like--and I'll have to admit that I like fewer and +fewer. People don't wear well, do they? What IS the matter with them? +Why can't they be natural and not make themselves into rubbishy, old +scrap-bags full of fakes and pretenses? You're looking at my hair." + +They were in Mrs. Belloc's comfortable sitting-room now, and she was +smoking a cigarette and regarding Mildred with an expression of delight +that was most flattering. Said Mildred: + +"Your hair does look well. It's thicker--isn't it?" + +"Think so?" said Mrs. Belloc. "It ought to be, with all the time and +money I've spent on it. My, how New York does set a woman to repairing +and fixing up. Nothing artificial goes here. It mustn't be paint and +plumpers and pads, but the real teeth. Why, I've had four real teeth +set in as if they were rooted--and my hips toned down. You may +remember what heavy legs I had--piano-legs. Look at 'em now." Mrs. +Belloc drew the wrapper to her knee and exposed in a pale-blue silk +stocking a thin and comely calf. + +"You HAVE been busy!" said Mildred. + +"That's only a little part. I started to tell you about the hair. It +was getting gray--not in a nice, pretty way, all over, but in spots and +streaks. Nothing else makes a woman look so ragged and dingy and old +as spotted, streaky gray hair. So I had the hair-woman touch it up. +She vows it won't make my face hard. That's the trouble with dyed or +touched hair, you know. But this is a new process." + +"It's certainly a success," said Mildred. And in fact it was, and +thanks to it and the other improvements Mrs. Belloc was an attractive +and even a pretty woman, years younger than when Mildred saw her. + +"Yes, I think I've improved," said Mrs. Belloc. "Nothing to scream +about--but worth while. That's what we're alive for--to improve--isn't +it? I've no patience with people who slide back, or don't get +on--people who get less and less as they grow older. The trouble with +them is they're vain, satisfied with themselves as they are, and lazy. +Most women are too lazy to live. They'll only fix up to catch a man." + +Mildred had grown sober and thoughtful. + +"To catch a man," continued Mrs. Belloc. "And not much even for that. +I'll warrant YOU'RE getting on. Tell me about it." + +"Tell me about yourself, first," said Mildred. + +"WHY all this excitement about improving?" And she smiled significantly. + +"No, you'll have to guess again," said Mrs. Belloc. "Not a man. You +remember, I used to be crazy about gay life in New York--going out, and +men, theaters, and lobster-palaces--everything I didn't get in my home +town, everything the city means to the jays. Well, I've gotten over all +that. I'm improving, mind and body, just to keep myself interested in +life, to keep myself young and cheerful. I'm interested in myself, in +my house and in woman's suffrage. Not that the women are fit to vote. +They aren't, any more than the men. But what MAKES people? Why, +responsibility. That old scamp I married--he's dead. And I've got the +money, and everything's very comfortable with me. Just think, I didn't +have any luck till I was an old maid far gone. I'm not telling my age. +All my life it had rained bad luck--pitchforks, tines down. And why?" + +"Yes, why?" said Mildred. She did not understand how it was, but Mrs. +Belloc seemed to be saying the exact things she needed to hear. + +"I'll tell you why. Because I didn't work. Drudging along isn't work +any more than dawdling along. Work means purpose, means head. And my +luck began just as anybody's does--when I rose up and got busy. You +may say it wasn't very creditable, the way I began; but it was the best +_I_ could do. I know it isn't good morals, but I'm willing to bet that +many a man has laid the foundations of a big fine career by doing +something that wasn't at all nice or right. He had to do it, to 'get +through.' If he hadn't done it, he'd never have 'got through.' Anyhow, +whether that's so or not, everyone's got to make a fight to break into +the part of the world where living's really worth living. But I needn't +tell YOU that. You're doing it." + +"No, I'm not," replied Mildred. "I'm ashamed to say so, but I'm not. +I've been bluffing--and wasting time." + +"That's bad, that's bad," said Mrs. Belloc. "Especially, as you've got +it in you to get there. What's been the trouble? The wrong kind of +associations?" + +"Partly," said Mildred. + +Mrs. Belloc, watching her interestedly, suddenly lighted up. "Why not +come back here to live?" said she. "Now, please don't refuse till I +explain. You remember what kind of people I had here?" + +Mildred smiled. "Rather--unconventional?" + +"That's polite. Well, I've cleared 'em out. Not that I minded their +unconventionality; I liked it. It was so different from the +straight-jackets and the hypocrisy I'd been living among and hating. +But I soon found out that--well, Miss Stevens, the average human being +ought to be pretty conventional in his morals of a certain kind. If +he--or SHE--isn't, they begin to get unconventional in every way--about +paying their bills, for instance, and about drinking. I got sick and +tired of those people. So, I put 'em all out--made a sweep. And now +I've become quite as respectable as I care to be--or as is necessary. +The couples in the house are married, and they're nice people of good +families. It was Mrs. Dyckman--she's got the whole second floor front, +she and her husband and the daughter--it was Mrs. Dyckman who +interested me in the suffrage movement. You must hear her speak. And +the daughter does well at it, too--and keeps a fashionable +millinery-shop--and she's only twenty-four. Then there's Nora Blond." + +"The actress?" + +"The actress. She's the quietest, hardest-working person here. She's +got the whole first floor front. Nobody ever comes to see her, except +on Sunday afternoon. She leads the queerest life." + +"Tell me about that," said Mildred. + +"I don't know much about it," confessed Mrs. Belloc. "She's regular as +a clock--does everything on time, and at the same time. Two meals a +day--one of them a dry little breakfast she gets herself. Walks, +fencing, athletics, study." + +"What slavery!" + +"She's the happiest person I ever saw," retorted Mrs. Belloc. "Why, +she's got her work, her career. You don't look at it right, Miss +Stevens. You don't look happy. What's the matter? Isn't it because +you haven't been working right--because you've been doing these alleged +pleasant things that leave a bad taste in your mouth and weaken you? +I'll bet, if you had been working hard, you'd not be unhappy now. +Better come here to live." + +"Will you let me tell you about myself?" + +"Go right ahead. May I ask questions, where I want to know more? I do +hate to get things halfway." + +Mildred freely gave her leave, then proceeded to tell her whole story, +omitting nothing that was essential to an understanding. In conclusion +she said: "I'd like to come. You see, I've very little money. When +it's gone, I'll go, unless I make some more." + +"Yes, you must come. That Mrs. Brindley seems to be a nice woman, a +mighty nice woman. But her house, and the people that come there--they +aren't the right sort for a girl that's making a start. I can give you +a room on the top floor--in front. The young lady next to you is a +clerk in an architect's office, and a fine girl she is." + +"How much does she pay?" said Mildred. + +"Your room won't be quite as nice as hers. I put you at the top +because you can sing up there, part of the mornings and part of the +afternoons, without disturbing anybody. I don't have a general table +any more. You can take your meals in your room or at the restaurant in +the apartment-house next door. It's good and quite reasonable." + +"How much for the room?" persisted Mildred, laughing. + +"Seven dollars a week, and the use of the bath." + +Mildred finally wrung from her that the right price was twelve dollars +a week, and insisted on paying that--"until my money gets low." + +"Don't worry about that," said Mrs. Belloc. + +"You mustn't weaken me," cried Mildred. "You mustn't encourage me to +be a coward and to shirk. That's why I'm coming here." + +"I understand," said Mrs. Belloc. "I've got the New England streak of +hardness in me, though I believe that masseuse has almost ironed it out +of my face. Do I look like a New England schoolmarm?" + +Mildred could truthfully answer that there wasn't a trace of it. + +When she returned to Mrs. Brindley's--already she had ceased to think +of it as home--she announced her new plans. Mrs. Brindley said +nothing, but Mildred understood the quick tightening of the lines round +her mouth and the shifting of the eyes. She hastened to explain that +Mrs. Belloc was no longer the sort of woman or the sort of landlady she +had been a few months before. Mrs. Brindley of the older New York, +could neither understand nor believe in the people of the new and real +New York whom it molds for better or for worse so rapidly--and even +remolds again and again. But Mildred was able to satisfy her that the +house was at least not suspicious. + +"It doesn't matter where you're going," said Mrs. Brindley. "It's that +you are going. I can't bear giving you up. I had hoped that our lives +would flow on and on together." She was with difficulty controlling +her emotions. "It's these separations that age one, that take one's +life. I almost wish I hadn't met you." + +Mildred was moved, herself. Not so much as Mrs. Brindley because she +had the necessities of her career gripping her and claiming the +strongest feelings there were in her. Also, she was much the younger, +not merely in years but in experience. And separations have no real +poignancy in them for youth. + +"Yes, I know you love me," said Cyrilla, "but love doesn't mean to you +what it means to me. I'm in that middle period of life where +everything has its fullest meaning. In youth we're easily consoled and +distracted because life seems so full of possibilities, and we can't +believe friendship and love are rare, and still more rarely worth +while. In old age, when the arteries harden and the blood flows slow +and cold, we become indifferent. But between thirty-five and fifty-five +how the heart can ache!" She smiled, with trembling lips. "And how it +can rejoice!" she cried bravely. "I must not forget to mention that. +Ah, my dear, you must learn to live intensely. If I had had your +chance!" + +"Ridiculous!" laughed Mildred. "You talk like an old woman. And I +never think of you as older than myself." + +"I AM an old woman," said Cyrilla. And, with a tightening at the heart +Mildred saw, deep in the depths of her eyes, the look of old age. "I've +found that I'm too old for love--for man-and-woman love--and that means +I'm an old woman." + +Mildred felt that there was only a thin barrier of reserve between her +and some sad secret of this strange, shy, loving woman's--a barrier so +thin that she could almost hear the stifled moan of a broken heart. But +the barrier remained; it would have been impossible for Cyrilla +Brindley to talk frankly about herself. + +When Mildred came out of her room the next morning, Cyrilla had gone, +leaving a note: + + +I can't bear good-bys. Besides, we'll see each other very soon. +Forgive me for shrinking, but really I can't. + + +Before night Mildred was settled in the new place and the new room, +with no sense of strangeness. She was reproaching herself for +hardness, for not caring about Cyrilla, the best and truest friend she +had ever had. But the truth lay in quite a different direction. The +house, the surroundings, where she had lived luxuriously, dreaming her +foolish and fatuous dreams, was not the place for such a struggle as +was now upon her. And for that struggle she preferred, to sensitive, +sober, refined, impractical Cyrilla Brindley, the companionship and the +sympathy, the practical sympathy, of Agnes Belloc. No one need be +ashamed or nervous before Agnes Belloc about being poor or unsuccessful +or having to resort to shabby makeshifts or having to endure coarse +contacts. Cyrilla represented refinement, appreciation of the finished +work--luxurious and sterile appreciation and enjoyment. Agnes +represented the workshop--where all the doers of all that is done live +and work. Mildred was descending from the heights where live those who +have graduated from the lot of the human race and have lost all that +superficial or casual resemblance to that race. She was going down to +live with the race, to share in its lot. She was glad Agnes Belloc was +to be there. + +Generalizing about such a haphazard conglomerate as human nature is +highly unsatisfactory, but it may be cautiously ventured that in New +England, as in old England, there is a curiously contradictory way of +dealing with conventionality. Nowhere is conventionality more in +reverence; yet when a New-Englander, man or woman, happens to elect to +break with it, nowhere is the break so utter and so defiant. If Agnes +Belloc, cut loose from the conventions that had bound her from +childhood to well into middle life, had remained at home, no doubt she +would have spent a large part of her nights in thinking out ways of +employing her days in outraging the conventionalities before her +horrified and infuriated neighbors. But of what use in New York to +cuff and spit upon deities revered by only an insignificant class--and +only officially revered by that class? Agnes had soon seen that there +was no amusement or interest whatever in an enterprise which in her New +England home would have filled her life to the brim with excitement. +Also, she saw that she was well into that time of life where the +absence of reputation in a woman endangers her comfort, makes her +liable to be left alone--not despised and denounced, but simply avoided +and ignored. So she was telling Mildred the exact truth. She had laid +down the arms she had taken up against the social system, and had come +in--and was fighting it from the safer and wiser inside. She still +insisted that a woman had the same rights as a man; but she took care +to make it clear that she claimed those rights only for others, that +she neither exercised them nor cared for them for herself. And to make +her propaganda the more effective, she was not only circumspect +herself, but was exceedingly careful to be surrounded by circumspect +people. No one could cite her case as proof that woman would expand +liberty into license. In theory there was nothing lively that she did +not look upon at least with tolerance; in practice, more and more she +disliked seeing one of her sex do anything that might cause the world +to say "woman would abuse liberty if she had it." "Sensible people," +she now said, "do as they like. But they don't give fools a chance to +titter and chatter." + +Agnes Belloc was typical--certainly of a large and growing class in +this day--of the decay of ancient temples and the decline of the +old-fashioned idealism that made men fancy they lived nobly because +they professed and believed nobly. She had no ethical standards. She +simply met each situation as it arose and dealt with it as common sense +seemed in that particular instance to dictate. For a thousand years +genius has been striving with the human race to induce it to abandon +its superstitions and hypocrisies and to defy common sense, so +adaptable, so tolerant, so conducive to long and healthy and happy +life. Grossly materialistic, but alluringly comfortable. Whether for +good or for evil or for both good and evil, the geniuses seem in a fair +way at last to prevail over the idealists, religious and political. And +Mrs. Belloc, without in the least realizing it, was a most significant +sign of the times. + +"Your throat seems to be better to-day," said she to Mildred at +breakfast. "Those simple house-remedies I tried on you last night seem +to have done some good. Nothing like heat--hot water--and no eating. +The main thing was doing without dinner last night." + +"My nerves are quieter," advanced Mildred as the likelier explanation +of the return of the soul of music to its seat. "And my mind's at +rest." + +"Yes, that's good," said plain Agnes Belloc. "But getting the stomach +straight and keeping it straight's the main thing. My old grandmother +could eat anything and do anything. I've seen her put in a glass of +milk or a saucer of ice-cream on top of a tomato-salad. The way she +kept well was, whenever she began to feel the least bit off, she +stopped eating. Not a bite would she touch till she felt well again." + +Mildred, moved by an impulse stronger than her inclination, produced +the Keith paper. "I wish you'd read this, and tell me what you think +of it. You've got so much common sense." + +Agnes read it through to the end, began at the beginning and read it +through again. "That sounds good to me," said she. "I want to think +it over. If you don't mind I'd like to show it to Miss Blond. She +knows a lot about those things. I suppose you're going to see Mr. +Crossley to-day?--that's the musical manager's name, isn't it?" + +"I'm going at eleven. That isn't too early, is it?" + +"If I were you, I'd go as soon as I was dressed for the street. And if +you don't get to see him, wait till you do. Don't talk to +under-staffers. Always go straight for the head man. You've got +something that's worth his while. How did he get to be head man? +Because he knows a good thing the minute he sees it. The under fellows +are usually under because they are so taken up with themselves and with +impressing people how grand they are that they don't see anything else. +So, when you talk to them, you wear yourself out and waste your time." + +"There's only one thing that makes me nervous," said Mildred. "Everyone +I've ever talked with about going on the stage--everyone who has talked +candidly--has said--" + +"Yes, I know," said Mrs. Belloc, as Mildred paused to search for +smooth-sounding words in which to dress, without disguising, a +distinctly ugly idea. "I've heard that, too. I don't know whether +there's anything in it or not." She looked admiringly at Mildred, who +that morning was certainly lovely enough to tempt any man. "If there is +anything in it, why, I reckon YOU'D be up against it. That's the worst +of having men at the top in any trade and profession. A woman's got to +get her chance through some man, and if he don't choose to let her have +it, she's likely to fail." + +Mildred showed how this depressed her. + +"But don't you fret about that till you have to," advised Mrs. Belloc. +"I've a notion that, even if it's true, it may not apply to you. Where +a woman offers for a place that she can fill about as well as a hundred +other women, she's at the man's mercy; but if she knows that she's far +and away the best for the place, I don't think a man's going to stand +in his own light. Let him see that he can make money through YOU, +money he won't make if he don't get you. Then, I don't think you'll +have any trouble." + +But Mildred's depression did not decrease. "If my voice could only be +relied on!" she exclaimed. "Isn't it exasperating that I've got a +delicate throat!" + +"It's always something," said Mrs. Belloc. "One thing's about as bad +as another, and anything can be overcome." + +"No, not in my case," said Mildred. "The peculiar quality of my +voice--what makes it unusual--is due to the delicateness of my throat." + +"Maybe so," said Mrs. Belloc. + +"Of course, I can always sing--after a fashion," continued Mildred. +"But to be really valuable on the stage you've got to be able always to +sing at your best. So I'm afraid I'm in the class of those who'll suit, +one about as well as another." + +"You've got to get out of that class," said Mrs. Belloc. "The men in +that class, and the women, have to do any dirty work the boss sees fit +to give 'em--and not much pay, either. Let me tell you one thing, Miss +Stevens. If you can't get among the few at the top in the singing +game, you must look round for some game where you can hope to be among +the few. No matter WHAT it is. By using your brains and working hard, +there's something you can do better than pretty nearly anybody else can +or will do it. You find that." + +The words sank in, sank deep. Mildred, sense of her surroundings lost, +was gazing straight ahead with an expression that gave Mrs. Belloc hope +and even a certain amount of confidence. There was a distinct advance; +for, after she reflected upon all that Mildred had told her, little of +her former opinion of Mildred's chances for success had remained but a +hope detained not without difficulty. Mrs. Belloc knew the human race +unusually well for a woman--unusually well for a human being of +whatever sex or experience. She had discovered how rare is the +temperament, the combination of intelligence and tenacity, that makes +for success. She had learned that most people, judged by any standard, +were almost total failures, that most of the more or less successful +were so merely because the world had an enormous amount of important +work to be done, even though half-way, and had no one but those +half-competents to do it. As incompetence in a man would be tolerated +where it would not be in a woman, obviously a woman, to get on, must +have the real temperament of success. + +She now knew enough about Mildred to be able to "place" her in the +"lady" class--those brought up not only knowing how to do nothing with +a money value (except lawful or unlawful man-trapping), but also +trained to a sensitiveness and refinement and false shame about work +that made it exceedingly difficult if not impossible for them to learn +usefulness. She knew all Mildred's handicaps, both those the girl was +conscious of and those far heavier ones which she fatuously regarded as +advantages. How was Mildred ever to learn to dismiss and disregard +herself as the pretty woman of good social position, an object of +admiration and consideration? Mildred, in the bottom of her heart, was +regarding herself as already successful--successful at the highest a +woman can achieve or ought to aspire to achieve--was regarding her +career, however she might talk or might fancy she believed, as a mere +livelihood, a side issue. She would be perhaps more than a little +ashamed of her stage connections, should she make any, until she should +be at the very top--and how get to the top when one is working under +the handicap of shame? Above all, how was this indulgently and +shelteredly reared lady to become a working woman, living a routine +life, toiling away day in and day out, with no let up, permitting no +one and nothing to break her routine? "Really," thought Agnes Belloc, +"she ought to have married that Baird man--or stayed on with the nasty +general. I wonder why she didn't! That's the only thing that gives me +hope. There must be something in her--something that don't +appear--something she doesn't know about, herself. What is it? Maybe +it was only vanity and vacillation. Again, I don't know." + +The difficulty Mrs. Belloc labored under in her attempt to explore and +map Mildred Gower was a difficulty we all labor under in those same +enterprises. We cannot convince ourselves--in spite of experience +after experience--that a human character is never consistent and +homogeneous, is always conglomerate, that there are no two traits, +however naturally exclusive, which cannot coexist in the same +personality, that circumstance is the dominating factor in human action +and brings forward as dominant characteristics now one trait or set of +traits, consistent or inconsistent, and now another. The Alexander who +was Aristotle's model pupil was the same Alexander as the drunken +debaucher. Indeed, may it not be that the characters which play the +large parts in the comedy of life are naturally those that offer to the +shifting winds of circumstances the greatest variety of strongly +developed and contradictory qualities? For example, if it was +Mildred's latent courage rescued her from Siddall, was it not her +strong tendency to vacillation that saved her from a loveless and +mercenary marriage to Stanley Baird? Perhaps the deep underlying truth +is that all unusual people have in common the character that centers a +powerful aversion to stagnation; thus, now by their strong qualities, +now by their weaknesses, they are swept inevitably on and on and ever +on. Good to-day, bad to-morrow, good again the day after, weak in this +instance, strong in that, now brave and now cowardly, soft at one time, +hard at another, generous and the reverse by turns, they are consistent +only in that they are never at rest, but incessantly and inevitably go. + +Mildred reluctantly rose, moved toward the door with lingering step. "I +guess I'd better make a start," said she. + +"That's the talk," said Mrs. Belloc heartily. But the affectionate +glance she sent after the girl was dubious--even pitying. + + + +IX + +TWO minutes' walk through to Broadway, and she was at her destination. +There, on the other side of the way, stood the Gayety Theater, with the +offices of Mr. Clarence Crossley overlooking the intersection of the +two streets. Crossley was intrenched in the remotest of a series of +rooms, each tenanted by under-staffers of diminishing importance as you +drew way from the great man. It was next to impossible to get at +him--a cause of much sneering and dissatisfaction in theatrical +circles. Crossley, they said, was exclusive, had the swollen head, had +forgotten that only a few years before he had been a cheap little +ticket-seller grateful for a bow from any actor who had ever had his +name up. Crossley insisted that he was not a victim of folie de +grandeur, that, on the contrary, he had become less vain as he had +risen, where he could see how trivial a thing rising was and how +accidental. Said he: + +"Why do I shut myself in? Because I'm what I am--a good thing, easy +fruit. You say that men a hundred times bigger than I'll ever be don't +shut themselves up. You say that Mountain, the biggest financier in +the country, sits right out where anybody can go up to him. Yes, but +who'd dare go up to him? It's generally known that he's a cannibal, +that he kills his own food and eats it warm and raw. So he can afford +to sit in the open. If I did that, all my time and all my money would +go to the cheap-skates with hard-luck tales. I don't hide because I'm +haughty, but because I'm weak and soft." + +In appearance Mr. Crossley did not suggest his name. He was a tallish, +powerful-looking person with a smooth, handsome, audacious face, with +fine, laughing, but somehow untrustworthy eyes--at least untrustworthy +for women, though women had never profited by the warning. He dressed +in excellent taste, almost conspicuously, and the gay and expensive +details of his toilet suggested a man given over to liveliness. As a +matter of fact, this liveliness was potential rather than actual. Mr. +Crossley was always intending to resume the giddy ways of the years +before he became a great man, but was always so far behind in the +important things to be done and done at once that he was forced to put +off. However, his neckties and his shirts and his flirtations, +untrustworthy eyes kept him a reputation for being one of the worst +cases in Broadway. In vain did his achievements show that he could not +possibly have time or strength for anything but work. He looked like a +rounder; he was in a business that gave endless dazzling opportunities +for the lively life; a rounder he was, therefore. + +He was about forty. At first glance, so vivid and energetic was he, he +looked like thirty-five, but at second glance one saw the lines, the +underlying melancholy signs of strain, the heavy price he had paid for +phenomenal success won by a series of the sort of risks that make the +hair fall as autumn leaves on a windy day and make such hairs as stick +turn rapidly gray. Thus, there were many who thought Crossley was +through vanity shy of the truth by five or six years when he said forty. + +In ordinary circumstances Mildred would never have got at Crossley. +This was the first business call of her life where she had come as an +unknown and unsupported suitor. Her reception would have been such at +the hands of Crossley's insolent and ill-mannered underlings that she +would have fled in shame and confusion. It is even well within the +possibilities that she would have given up all idea of a career, would +have sent for Baird, and so on. And not one of those who, timid and +inexperienced, have suffered rude rebuff at their first advance, would +have condemned her. But it so chanced--whether by good fortune or by +ill the event was to tell--that she did not have to face a single +underling. The hall door was open. She entered. It happened that +while she was coming up in the elevator a quarrel between a motorman +and a driver had heated into a fight, into a small riot. All the +underlings had rushed out on a balcony that commanded a superb view of +the battle. The connecting doors were open; Mildred advanced from room +to room, seeking someone who would take her card to Mr. Crossley. When +she at last faced a closed door she knocked. + +"Come!" cried a pleasant voice. + +And in she went, to face Crossley himself--Crossley, the "weak and +soft," caught behind his last entrenchment with no chance to escape. +Had Mildred looked the usual sort who come looking for jobs in musical +comedy, Mr. Crossley would not have risen--not because he was snobbish, +but because, being a sensitive, high-strung person, he instinctively +adopted the manner that would put the person before him at ease. He +glanced at Mildred, rose, and thrust back forthwith the slangy, offhand +personality that was perhaps the most natural--or was it merely the +most used?--of his many personalities. It was Crossley the man of the +world, the man of the artistic world, who delighted Mildred with a +courteous bow and offer of a chair, as he said: + +"You wished to see me?" + +"If you are Mr. Crossley," said Mildred. + +"I should be tempted to say I was, if I wasn't," said he, and his +manner made it a mere pleasantry to put her at ease. + +"There was no one in the outside room, so I walked on and on until your +door stopped me." + +"You'll never know how lucky you were," said he. "They tell me those +fellows out there have shocking manners." + +"Have you time to see me now? I've come to apply for a position in +musical comedy." + +"You have not been on the stage, Miss--" + +"Gower. Mildred Gower. I've decided to use my own name." + +"I know you have not been on the stage." + +"Except as an amateur--and not even that for several years. But I've +been working at my voice." + +Crossley was studying her, as she stood talking--she had refused the +chair. He was more than favorably impressed. But the deciding element +was not Mildred's excellent figure or her charm of manner or her sweet +and lovely face. It was superstition. Just at that time Crossley had +been abruptly deserted by Estelle Howard; instead of going on with the +rehearsals of "The Full Moon," in which she was to be starred, she had +rushed away to Europe with a violinist with whom she had fallen in love +at the first rehearsal. Crossley was looking about for someone to take +her place. He had been entrenched in those offices for nearly five +years; in all that time not a single soul of the desperate crowds that +dogged him had broken through his guard. Crossley was as superstitious +as was everyone else who has to do with the stage. + +"What kind of a voice?" asked he. + +"Lyric soprano." + +"You have music there. What?" + +"'Batti Batti' and a little song in English--'The Rose and the Bee.'" + +Crossley forgot his manners, turned his back squarely upon her, thrust +his hands deep into his trousers pockets, and stared out through the +window. He presently wheeled round. She would not have thought his +eyes could be so keen. Said he: "You were studying for grand opera?" + +"Yes." + +"Why do you drop it and take up this?" + +"No money," replied she. "I've got to make my living at once." + +"Well, let's see. Come with me, please." + +They went out by a door into the hall, went back to the rear of the +building, in at an iron door, down a flight of steep iron skeleton +steps dimly lighted. Mildred had often been behind the scenes in her +amateur theatrical days; but even if she had not, she would have known +where she was. Crossley called, "Moldini! Moldini!" + +The name was caught up by other voices and repeated again and again, +more and more remotely. A moment, and a small dark man with a +superabundance of greasy dark hair appeared. "Miss Gower," said +Crossley, "this is Signor Moldini. He will play your accompaniments." +Then to the little Italian, "Piano on the stage?" + +"Yes, sir." + +To Mildred with a smile, "Will you try?" + +She bent her head. She had no voice--not for song, not for speech, not +even for a monosyllable. + +Crossley took Moldini aside where Mildred could not hear. "Mollie," +said he, "this girl crept up on me, and I've got to give her a trial. +As you see, she's a lady, and you know what they are." + +"Punk," said Moldini. + +Crossley nodded. "She seems a nice sort, so I want to let her down +easy. I'll sit back in the house, in the dark. Run her through that +'Batti Batti' thing she's got with her. If she's plainly on the fritz, +I'll light a cigarette. If I don't light up, try the other song she +has. If I still don't light up make her go through that 'Ah, were you +here, love,' from the piece. But if I light up, it means that I'm +going to light out, and that you're to get rid of her--tell her we'll +let her know if she'll leave her address. You understand?" + +"Perfectly." + +Far from being thrilled and inspired, her surroundings made her sick at +heart--the chill, the dampness, the bare walls, the dim, dreary lights, +the coarsely-painted flats-- At last she was on the threshold of her +chosen profession. What a profession for such a person as she had +always been! She stood beside Moldini, seated at the piano. She gazed +at the darkness, somewhere in whose depths Crossley was hidden. After +several false starts she sang the "Batti Batti" through, sang it +atrociously--not like a poor professional, but like a pretentious +amateur, a reversion to a manner of singing she had once had, but had +long since got rid of. She paused at the end, appalled by the silence, +by the awfulness of her own performance. + +From the darkness a slight click. If she had known!--for, it was +Crossley's match-safe. + +The sound, slight yet so clear, startled her, roused her. She called +out: "Mr. Crossley, won't you please be patient enough to let me try +that again?" + +A brief hesitation, then: "Certainly." + +Once more she began. But this time there was no hesitation. From +first to last she did it as Jennings had coached her, did it with all +the beauty and energy of her really lovely voice. As she ended, +Moldini said in a quiet but intense undertone: "Bravo! Bravo! Fresh +as a bird on a bright spring morning." And from the darkness came: +"Ah--that's better, Miss Gower. That was professional work. Now for +the other." + +Thus encouraged and with her voice well warmed, she could not but make +a success of the song that was nearer to what would be expected of her +in musical comedy. Crossley called out: "Now, the sight singing, +Moldini. I don't expect you to do this well, Miss Gower. I simply wish +to get an idea of how you'd do a piece we have in rehearsal." + +"You'll have no trouble with this," said Moldini, as he opened the +comedy song upon the rack with a contemptuous whirl. "It's the easy +showy stuff that suits the tired business man and his laced-in wife. Go +at it and yell." + +Mildred glanced through it. There was a subtle something in the +atmosphere now that put her at her ease. She read the words aloud, +laughing at their silly sentimentality, she and Moldini and Crossley +making jokes about it. Soon she said: "I'm ready." + +She sang it well. She asked them to let her try it again. And the +second time, with the words in her mind and the simple melody, she was +able to put expression into it and to indicate, with restraint, the +action. Crossley came down the aisle. + +"What do you think, Mollie?" he said to Moldini. + +"We might test her at a few rehearsals." + +Crossley meekly accepted the salutary check on his enthusiasm. "Do you +wish to try, Miss Gower?" + +Mildred was silent. She knew now the sort of piece in which she was to +appear. She had seen a few of them, those cheap and vulgar farces with +their thin music, their more than dubious-looking people. What a +come-down! What a degradation! It was as bad in its way as being the +wife of General Siddall. And she was to do this, in preference to +marrying Stanley Baird. + +"You will be paid, of course, during rehearsal; that is, as long as we +are taking your time. Fifty dollars a week is about as much as we can +afford." Crossley was watching her shrewdly, was advancing these +remarks in response to the hesitation he saw so plainly. "Of course it +isn't grand opera," he went on. "In fact, it's pretty low--almost as +low as the public taste. You see, we aren't subsidized by millionaires +who want people to think they're artistic, so we have to hustle to +separate the public from its money. But if you make a hit, you can +earn enough to put you into grand opera in fine style." + +"I never heard of anyone's graduating from here into grand opera," said +Mildred. + +"Because our stars make so much money and make it so easily. It'll be +your own fault if you don't." + +"Can't I come to just one rehearsal--to see whether I can--can do it?" +pleaded Mildred. + +Crossley, made the more eager and the more superstitious by this +unprecedented reluctance, shook his head. + +"No. You must agree to stay as long as we want you," said he. "We +can't allow ourselves to be trifled with." + +"Very well," said Mildred resignedly. "I will rehearse as long as you +want me." + +"And will stay for the run of the piece, if we want that?" said +Crossley. "You to get a hundred a week if you are put in the cast. +More, of course, if you make a hit." + +"You mean I'm to sign a contract?" cried Mildred in dismay. + +"Exactly," said Crossley. A truly amazing performance. Moldini was +not astonished, however, for he had heard the songs, and he knew +Crossley's difficulties through Estelle Howard's flight. Also, he knew +Crossley--never so "weak and soft" that he trifled with unlikely +candidates for his productions. Crossley had got up because he knew +what to do and when to do it. + +Mildred acquiesced. Before she was free to go into the street again, +she had signed a paper that bound her to rehearse for three weeks at +fifty dollars a week and to stay on at a hundred dollars a week for +forty weeks or the run of "The Full Moon," if Crossley so desired; if +he did not, she was free at the end of the rehearsals. A shrewdly +one-sided contract. But Crossley told himself he would correct it, if +she should by some remote chance be good enough for the part and should +make a hit in it. This was no mere salve to conscience, by the way. +Crossley would not be foolish enough to give a successful star just +cause for disliking and distrusting him and at the earliest opportunity +leaving him to make money for some rival manager. + +Mrs. Belloc had not gone out, had been waiting in a fever of anxiety. +When Mildred came into her sitting-room with a gloomy face and dropped +to a chair as if her last hope had abandoned her, it was all Agnes +Belloc could do to restrain her tears. Said she: + +"Don't be foolish, my dear. You couldn't expect anything to come of +your first attempt." + +"That isn't it," said Mildred. "I think I'll give it up--do something +else. Grand opera's bad enough. There were a lot of things about it +that I was fighting my distaste for." + +"I know," said Agnes. "And you'd better fight them hard. They're +unworthy of you." + +"But--musical comedy! It's--frightful!" + +"It's an honest way of making a living, and that's more than can be +said of--of some things. I suppose you're afraid you'll have to wear +tights--or some nonsense like that." + +"No, no. It's doing it at all. Such rotten music--and what a +loathsome mess!" + +Mrs. Belloc's eyes flashed. "I'm losing all patience!" she cried. "I +know you've been brought up like a fool and always surrounded by fools. +I suppose you'd rather sell yourself to some man. Do you know what's +the matter with you, at bottom? Why, you're lazy and you're a coward. +Too lazy to work. And afraid of what a lot of cheap women'll +say--women earning their board and clothes in about the lowest way such +a thing can be done. Haven't you got any self-respect?" + +Mildred rose. "Mrs. Belloc," she said angrily, "I can't permit even +you to say such things to me." + +"The shoe seems to fit," retorted Mrs. Belloc. "I never yet saw a +lady, a real, silk-and-diamonds, sit-in-the-parlor lady, who had any +self-respect. If I had my way they wouldn't get a mouthful to eat till +they had earned it. That'd be a sure cure for the lady disease. I'm +ashamed of you, Miss Stevens! And you're ashamed of yourself." + +"Yes, I am," said Mildred, with a sudden change of mood. + +"The best thing you can do is to rest till lunch-time. Then start out +after lunch and hunt a job. I'll go with you." + +"But I've got a job," said Mildred. "That's what's the matter." + +Agnes Belloc's jaw dropped and her rather heavy eyebrows shot up toward +the low sweeping line of her auburn hair. She made such a ludicrous +face that Mildred laughed outright. Said she: + +"It's quite time. Fifty a week, for three weeks of rehearsal. No +doubt _I_ can go on if I like. Nothing could be easier." + +"Crossley?" + +"Yes. He was very nice--heard me sing three pieces--and it was all +settled. I'm to begin to-morrow." + +The color rose in Agnes Belloc's face until she looked apoplectic. She +abruptly retreated to her bedroom. After a few minutes she came back, +her normal complexion restored. "I couldn't trust myself to speak," +said she. "That was the worst case of ingratitude I ever met up with. +You, getting a place at fifty dollars a week--and on your first +trial--and you come in looking as if you'd lost your money and your +reputation. What kind of a girl are you, anyway?" + +"I don't know," said Mildred. "I wish I did." + +"Well, I'm sorry you got it so easy. Now you'll have a false notion +from the start. It's always better to have a hard time getting things. +Then you appreciate them, and have learned how to hold on." + +"No trouble about holding on to this," said Mildred carelessly. + +"Please don't talk that way, child," pleaded Agnes, almost tearful. +"It's frightful to me, who've had experience, to hear you invite a +fall-down." + +Mildred disdainfully fluttered the typewritten copy of the musical +comedy. "This is child's play," said she. "The lines are beneath +contempt. As for the songs, you never heard such slop." + +"The stars in those pieces get four and five hundred, and more, a +week," said Mrs. Belloc. "Believe me, those managers don't pay out any +such sums for child's play. You look out. You're going at this wrong." + +"I shan't care if I do fail," said Mildred. + +"Do you mean that?" demanded Mrs. Belloc. + +"No, I don't," said Mildred. "Oh, I don't know what I mean." + +"I guess you're just talking," said Mrs. Belloc after a reflective +silence. "I guess a girl who goes and gets a good job, first crack out +of the box, must have a streak of shrewdness." + +"I hope so," said Mildred doubtfully. + +"I guess you'll work hard, all right. After you went out this morning, +I took that paper down to Miss Blond. She's crazy about it. She wants +to make a copy of it. I told her I'd ask you." + +"Certainly," said Mildred. "She says she'll return it the same day." + +"Tell her she can keep it as long as she likes." + +Mrs. Belloc eyed her gravely, started to speak, checked herself. +Instead, she said, "No, I shan't do that. I'll have it back in your +room by this evening. You might change your mind, and want to use it." + +"Very well," said Mildred, pointedly uninterested and ignoring Mrs. +Belloc's delicate but distinct emphasis upon "might." + +Mrs. Belloc kept a suspicious eye upon her--an eye that was not easily +deceived. The more she thought about Mildred's state of depression and +disdain the more tolerant she became. That mood was the natural and +necessary result of the girl's bringing up and mode of life. The +important thing--and the wonderful thing--was her being able to +overcome it. After a week of rehearsal she said: "I'm making the best +of it. But I don't like it, and never shall." + +"I should hope not," replied Mrs. Belloc. "You're going to the top. +I'd hate to see you contented at the bottom. Aren't you learning a +good deal that'll be useful later on?" + +"That's why I'm reconciled to it," said she. "The stage director, Mr. +Ransdell, is teaching me everything--even how to sing. He knows his +business." + +Ransdell not only knew, but also took endless pains with her. He was a +tall, thin, dark man, strikingly handsome in the distinguished way. So +distinguished looking was he that to meet him was to wonder why he had +not made a great name for himself. An extraordinary mind he certainly +had, and an insight into the reasons for things that is given only to +genius. He had failed as a composer, failed as a playwright, failed as +a singer, failed as an actor. He had been forced to take up the +profession of putting on dramatic and musical plays, a profession that +required vast knowledge and high talents and paid for them in niggardly +fashion both in money and in fame. Crossley owed to him more than to +any other single element the series of successes that had made him +rich; yet the ten thousand a year Crossley paid him was regarded as +evidence of Crossley's lavish generosity and was so. It would have +been difficult to say why a man so splendidly endowed by nature and so +tireless in improving himself was thus unsuccessful. Probably he +lacked judgment; indeed, that lack must have been the cause. He could +judge for Crossley; but not for himself, not when he had the feeling of +ultimate responsibility. + +Mildred had anticipated the most repulsive associations--men and women +of low origin and of vulgar tastes and of vulgarly loose lives. She +found herself surrounded by simple, pleasant people, undoubtedly +erratic for the most part in all their habits, but without viciousness. +And they were hard workers, all. Ransdell--for Crossley--tolerated no +nonsense. His people could live as they pleased, away from the +theater, but there they must be prompt and fit. The discipline was as +severe as that of a monastery. She saw many signs that all sorts of +things of the sort with which she wished to have no contact were going +on about her; but as she held slightly--but not at all +haughtily--aloof, she would have had to go out of her way to see enough +to scandalize her. She soon suspected that she was being treated with +extraordinary consideration. This was by Crossley's orders. But the +carrying out of their spirit as well as their letter was due to +Ransdell. Before the end of that first week she knew that there was +the personal element behind his admiration for her voice and her talent +for acting, behind his concentrating most of his attention upon her +part. He looked his love boldly whenever they were alone; he was +always trying to touch her--never in a way that she could have +resented, or felt like resenting. He was not unattractive to her, and +she was eager to learn all he had to teach, and saw no harm in helping +herself by letting him love. + +Toward the middle of the second week, when they were alone in her +dressing-room, he--with the ingenious lack of abruptness of the +experienced man at the game--took her hand, and before she was ready, +kissed her. He did not accompany these advances with an outburst of +passionate words or with any fiery lighting up of the eyes, but calmly, +smilingly, as if it were what she was expecting him to do, what he had +a right to do. + +She did not know quite how to meet this novel attack. She drew her hand +away, went on talking about the part--the changes he had suggested in +her entrance, as she sang her best solo. He discussed this with her +until they rose to leave the theater. He looked smilingly down on her, +and said with the flattering air of the satisfied connoisseur: + +"Yes, you are charming, Mildred. I can make a great artist and a great +success out of you. We need each other." + +"I certainly need you," said she gratefully. "How much you've done for +me." + +"Only the beginning," replied he. "Ah, I have such plans for you--such +plans. Crossley doesn't realize how far you can be made to go--with +the right training. Without it--" He shook his head laughingly. "But +you shall have it, my dear." And he laid his hands lightly and +caressingly upon her shoulders. + +The gesture was apparently a friendly familiarity. To resent it, even +to draw away, would put her in the attitude of the woman absurdly +exercised about the desirability and sacredness of her own charms. + +Still smiling, in that friendly, assured way, he went on: "You've been +very cold and reserved with me, my dear. Very unappreciative." + +Mildred, red and trembling, hung her head in confusion. + +"I've been at the business ten years," he went on, "and you're the +first woman I've been more than casually interested in. The pretty +ones were bores. The homely ones--I can't interest myself in a homely +woman, no matter how much talent she has. A woman must first of all +satisfy the eye. And you--" He seated himself and drew her toward +him. She, cold all over and confused in mind and almost stupefied, +resisted with all her strength; but her strength seemed to be oozing +away. She said: + +"You must not do this. You must not do this. I'm horribly +disappointed in you." + +He drew her to his lap and held her there without any apparent tax upon +his strength. He kissed her, laughingly pushing away the arms with +which she tried to shield her face. Suddenly she found strength to +wrench herself free and stood at a distance from him. She was panting a +little, was pale, was looking at him with cold anger. + +"You will please leave this room," said she. + +He lit a cigarette, crossed his legs comfortably, and looked at her +with laughing eyes. "Don't do that," he said genially. "Surely my +lessons in acting haven't been in vain. That's too obviously a pose." + +She went to the mirror, arranged her hat, and moved toward the door. He +rose and barred the way. + +"You are as sensible as you are sweet and lovely," said he. "Why +should you insist on our being bad friends?" + +"If you don't stand aside, I'll call out to the watchman." + +"I'd never have thought you were dishonest. In fact, I don't believe +it yet. You don't look like one of those ladies who wish to take +everything and give nothing." His tone and manner were most +attractive. Besides, she could not forget all he had done for her--and +all he could do for her. Said she: + +"Mr. Ransdell, if I've done anything to cause you to misunderstand, it +was unconscious. And I'm sorry. But I--" + +"Be honest," interrupted he. "Haven't I made it plain that I was +fascinated by you?" + +She could not deny it. + +"Haven't I been showing you that I was willing to do everything I could +for you?" + +"I thought you were concerned only about the success of the piece." + +"The piece be jiggered," said he. "You don't imagine YOU are necessary +to its success, do you? You, a raw, untrained girl. Don't your good +sense tell you I could find a dozen who would do, let us say, ALMOST as +well?" + +"I understand that," murmured she. + +"Perhaps you do, but I doubt it," rejoined he. "Vanity's a fast growing +weed. However, I rather expected that you would remain sane and +reasonably humble until you'd had a real success. But it seems not. +Now tell me, why should I give my time and my talent to training +you--to putting you in the way of quick and big success?" + +She was silent. + +"What did you count on giving me in return? Your thanks?" + +She colored, hung her head. + +"Wasn't I doing for you something worth while? And what had you to give +in return?" He laughed with gentle mockery. "Really, you should have +been grateful that I was willing to do so much for so little, for what +I wanted ought--if you are a sensible woman--to seem to you a trifle in +comparison with what I was doing for you. It was my part, not yours, +to think the complimentary things about you. How shallow and vain you +women are! Can't you see that the value of your charms is not in them, +but in the imagination of some man?" + +"I can't answer you," said she. "You've put it all wrong. You +oughtn't to ask payment for a favor beyond price." + +"No, I oughtn't to HAVE to ask," corrected he, in the same pleasantly +ironic way. "You ought to have been more than glad to give freely. +But, curiously, while we've been talking, I've changed my mind about +those precious jewels of yours. We'll say they're pearls, and that my +taste has suddenly changed to diamonds." He bowed mockingly. "So, +dear lady, keep your pearls." + +And he stood aside, opening the door for her. She hesitated, dazed +that she was leaving, with the feeling of the conquered, a field on +which, by all the precedents, she ought to have been victor. She +passed a troubled night, debated whether to relate her queer experience +to Mrs. Belloc, decided for silence. It drafted into service all her +reserve of courage to walk into the theater the next day and to appear +on the stage among the assembled company with her usual air. Ransdell +greeted her with his customary friendly courtesy and gave her his +attention, as always. By the time they had got through the first act, +in which her part was one of four of about equal importance, she had +recovered herself and was in the way to forget the strange stage +director's strange attack and even stranger retreat. But the situation +changed with the second act, in which she was on the stage all the time +and had the whole burden. The act as originally written had been less +generous to her; but Ransdell had taken one thing after another away +from the others and had given it to her. She made her first entrance +precisely as he had trained her to make it and began. A few seconds, +and he stopped her. + +"Please try again, Miss Gower," said he. "I'm afraid that won't do." + +She tried again; again he stopped her. She tried a third time. His +manner was all courtesy and consideration, not the shade of a change. +But she began to feel a latent hostility. Instinctively she knew that +he would no longer help her, that he would leave her to her own +resources, and judge her by how she acquitted herself. She made a +blunder of her third trial. + +"Really, Miss Gower, that will never do," said he mildly. "Let me show +you how you did it." + +He gave an imitation of her--a slight caricature. A titter ran through +the chorus. He sternly rebuked them and requested her to try again. +Her fourth attempt was her worst. He shook his head in gentle +remonstrance. "Not quite right yet," said he regretfully. "But we'll +go on." + +Not far, however. He stopped her again. Again the courteous, kindly +criticism. And so on, through the entire act. By the end of it, +Mildred's nerves were unstrung. She saw the whole game, and realized +how helpless she was. Before the end of that rehearsal, Mildred had +slipped back from promising professional into clumsy amateur, tolerable +only because of the beautiful freshness of her voice--and it was a +question whether voice alone would save her. Yet no one but Mildred +herself suspected that Ransdell had done it, had revenged himself, had +served notice on her that since she felt strong enough to stand alone +she was to have every opportunity to do so. He had said nothing +disagreeable; on the contrary, he had been most courteous, most +forbearing. + +In the third act she was worse than in the second. At the end of the +rehearsal the others, theretofore flattering and encouraging, turned +away to talk among themselves and avoided her. Ransdell, about to +leave, said: + +"Don't look so down-hearted, Miss Gower. You'll be all right +to-morrow. An off day's nothing." + +He said it loudly enough for the others to hear. Mildred's face grew +red with white streaks across it, like the prints of a lash. The +subtlest feature of his malevolence had been that, whereas on other +days he had taken her aside to criticize her, on this day he had spoken +out--gently, deprecatingly, but frankly--before the whole company. +Never had Mildred Gower been so sad and so blue as she was that day and +that night. She came to the rehearsal the following day with a sore +throat. She sang, but her voice cracked on the high notes. It was a +painful exhibition. Her fellow principals, who had been rather glad of +her set-back the day before, were full of pity and sympathy. They did +not express it; they were too kind for that. But their looks, their +drawing away from her--Mildred could have borne sneers and jeers +better. And Ransdell was SO forbearing, SO gentle. + +Her voice got better, got worse. Her acting remained mediocre to bad. +At the fifth rehearsal after the break with the stage-director, Mildred +saw Crossley seated far back in the dusk of the empty theater. It was +his first appearance at rehearsals since the middle of the first week. +As soon as he had satisfied himself that all was going well, he had +given his attention to other matters where things were not going well. +Mildred knew why he was there--and she acted and sang atrociously. +Ransdell aggravated her nervousness by ostentatiously trying to help +her, by making seemingly adroit attempts to cover her +mistakes--attempts apparently thwarted and exposed only because she was +hopelessly bad. + +In the pause between the second and third acts Ransdell went down and +sat with Crossley, and they engaged in earnest conversation. The +while, the members of the company wandered restlessly about the stage, +making feeble attempts to lift the gloom with affected cheerfulness. +Ransdell returned to the stage, went up to Mildred, who was sitting +idly turning the leaves of a part-book. + +"Miss Gower," said he, and never had his voice been so friendly as in +these regretful accents, "don't try to go on to-day. You're evidently +not yourself. Go home and rest for a few days. We'll get along with +your understudy, Miss Esmond. When Mr. Crossley wants to put you in +again, he'll send for you. You mustn't be discouraged. I know how +beginners take these things to heart. Don't fret about it. You can't +fail to succeed." + +Mildred rose and, how she never knew, crossed the stage. She stumbled +into the flats, fumbled her way to the passageway, to her +dressing-room. She felt that she must escape from that theater +quickly, or she would give way to some sort of wild attack of nerves. +She fairly ran through the streets to Mrs. Belloc's, shut herself in +her room. But instead of the relief of a storm of tears, there came a +black, hideous depression. Hour after hour she sat, almost without +motion. The afternoon waned; the early darkness came. Still she did +not move--could not move. At eight o'clock Mrs. Belloc knocked. +Mildred did not answer. Her door opened--she had forgotten to lock it. +In came Mrs. Belloc. + +"Isn't that you, sitting by the window?" she said. + +"Yes," replied Mildred. + +"I recognized the outline of your hat. Besides, who else could it be +but you? I've saved some dinner for you. I thought you were still +out." + +Mildred did not answer. + +"What's the matter?" said Agnes? "Ill? bad news?" + +"I've lost my position," said Mildred. + +A pause. Then Mrs. Belloc felt her way across the room until she was +touching the girl. "Tell me about it, dear," said she. + +In a monotonous, lifeless way Mildred told the story. It was some time +after she finished when Agnes said: + +"That's bad--bad, but it might be worse. You must go to see the +manager, Crossley." + +"Why?" said Mildred. + +"Tell him what you told me." + +Mildred's silence was dissent. + +"It can't do any harm," urged Agnes. + +"It can't do any good," replied Mildred. + +"That isn't the way to look at it." + +A long pause. Then Mildred said: "If I got a place somewhere else, +I'd meet the same thing in another form." + +"You've got to risk that." + +"Besides, I'd never have had a chance of succeeding if Mr. Ransdell +hadn't taught me and stood behind me." + +It was many minutes before Agnes Belloc said in a hesitating, +restrained voice: "They say that success--any kind of success--has its +price, and that one has to be ready to pay that price or fail." + +Again the profound silence. Into it gradually penetrated the soft, +insistent sound of the distant roar of New York--a cruel, clamorous, +devouring sound like a demand for that price of success. Said Agnes +timidly: + +"Why not go to see Mr. Ransdell." + +"He wouldn't make it up," said Mildred. "And I--I couldn't. I tried +to marry Stanley Baird for money--and I couldn't. It would be the same +way now--only more so." + +"But you've got to do something." + +"Yes, and I will." Mildred had risen abruptly, was standing at the +window. Agnes Belloc could feel her soul rearing defiantly at the city +into which she was gazing. "I will!" she replied. + +"It sounds as if you'd been pushed to where you'd turn and make a +fight," said Agnes. + +"I hope so," said Mildred. "It's high time." + +She thought out several more or less ingenious indirect routes into Mr. +Crossley's stronghold, for use in case frontal attack failed. But she +did not need them. Still, the hours she spent in planning them were by +no means wasted. No time is wasted that is spent in desperate, +concentrated thinking about any of the practical problems of life. And +Mildred Gower, as much as any other woman of her training--or lack of +training--was deficient in ability to use her mind purposefully. Most +of us let our minds act like a sheep in a pasture--go wandering hither +and yon, nibbling at whatever happens to offer. Only the superior few +deliberately select a pasture, select a line of procedure in that +pasture and keep to it, concentrating upon what is useful to us, and +that alone. So it was excellent experience for Mildred to sit down and +think connectedly and with wholly absorbed mind upon the phase of her +career most important at the moment. When she had worked out all the +plans that had promise in them she went tranquilly to sleep, a stronger +and a more determined person, for she had said with the energy that +counts: "I shall see him, somehow. If none of these schemes works, +I'll work out others. He's got to see me." + +But it was no occult "bearing down" that led him to order her admitted +the instant her card came. He liked her; he wished to see her again; +he felt that it was the decent thing, and somehow not difficult gently +but clearly to convey to her the truth. On her side she, who had +looked forward to the interview with some nervousness, was at her ease +the moment she faced him alone in that inner office. He had +extraordinary personal charm--more than Ransdell, though Ransdell had +the charm invariably found in a handsome human being with the +many-sided intellect that gives lightness of mind. Crossley was not +intellectual, not in the least. One had only to glance at him to see +that he was one of those men who reserve all their intelligence for the +practical sides of the practical thing that forms the basis of their +material career. He knew something of many things, had a wonderful +assortment of talents--could sing, could play piano or violin, could +compose, could act, could do mystifying card tricks, could order +women's clothes as discriminatingly as he could order his own--all +these things a little, but nothing much except making a success of +musical comedy and comic opera. He had an ambition, carefully +restrained in a closet of his mind, where it could not issue forth and +interfere with his business. This ambition was to be a giver of grand +opera on a superb scale. He regarded himself as a mere +money-maker--was not ashamed of this, but neither was he proud of it. +His ambition then represented a dream of a rise to something more than +business man, to friend and encourager and wet nurse to art. + +Mildred Gower had happened to set his imagination to working. The +discovery that she was one of those whose personalities rouse high +expectations only to mock them had been a severe blow to his confidence +in his own judgment. Though he pretended to believe, and had the habit +of saying that he was "weak and soft," was always being misled by his +good nature, he really believed himself an unerring judge of human +beings, and, as his success evidenced, he was not far wrong. Thus, +though convinced that Mildred was a "false alarm," his secret vanity +would not let him release his original idea. He had the tenacity that +is an important element in all successes; and tenacity become a fixed +habit has even been known to ruin in the end the very careers it has +made. + +Said Mildred, in a manner which was astonishingly unemotional and +businesslike: "I've not come to tattle and to whine, Mr. Crossley. +I've hesitated about coming at all, partly because I've an instinct +it's useless, partly because what I have to say isn't easy." + +Crossley's expression hardened. The old story!--excuses, excuses, +self-excuse--somebody else to blame. + +"If it hadn't been for Mr. Ransdell--the trouble he took with me, the +coaching he gave me--I'd have been a ridiculous failure at the very +first rehearsal. But--it is to Mr. Ransdell that my failure is due." + +"My dear Miss Gower," said Crossley, polite but cold, "I regret hearing +you say that. The fact is very different. Not until you had done +so--so unacceptably at several rehearsals that news of it reached me by +another way--not until I myself went to Mr. Ransdell about you did he +admit that there could be a possibility of a doubt of your succeeding. +I had to go to rehearsal myself and directly order him to restore Miss +Esmond and lay you off." + +Mildred was not unprepared. She received this tranquilly. "Mr. +Ransdell is a very clever man," said she with perfect good humor. "I've +no hope of convincing you, but I must tell my side." + +And clearly and simply, with no concealments through fear of disturbing +his high ideal of her ladylike delicacy, she told him the story. He +listened, seated well back in his tilted desk-chair, his gaze upon the +ceiling. When she finished he held his pose a moment, then got up and +paced the length of the office several times, his hands in his pockets. +He paused, looked keenly at her, a good-humored smile in those eyes of +his so fascinating to women because of their frank wavering of an +inconstancy it would indeed be a triumph to seize and hold. Said he: + +"And your bad throat? Did Ransdell give you a germ?" + +She colored. He had gone straight at the weak point. + +"If you'd been able to sing," he went on, "nobody could have done you +up." + +She could not gather herself together for speech. + +"Didn't you know your voice wasn't reliable when you came to me?" + +"Yes," she admitted. + +"And wasn't that the REAL reason you had given up grand opera?" pursued +he mercilessly. + +"The reason was what I told you--lack of money," replied she. "I did +not go into the reason why I lacked money. Why should I when, even on +my worst days, I could get through all my part in a musical +comedy--except songs that could be cut down or cut out? If I could +have made good at acting, would you have given me up on account of my +voice?" + +"Not if you had been good enough," he admitted. + +"Then I did not get my engagement on false pretenses?" + +"No. You are right. Still, your fall-down as a singer is the +important fact. Don't lose sight of it." + +"I shan't," said she tersely. + +His eyes were frankly laughing. "As to Ransdell--what a clever trick! +He's a remarkable man. If he weren't so shrewd in those little ways, +he might have been a great man. Same old story--just a little too +smart, and so always doing the little thing and missing the big thing. +Yes, he went gunning for you--and got you." He dropped into his chair. +He thought a moment, laughed aloud, went on: "No doubt he has worked +that same trick many a time. I've suspected it once or twice, but this +time he fooled me. He got you, Miss Gower, and I can do nothing. You +must see that I can't look after details. And I can't give up as +invaluable a man as Ransdell. If I put you back, he'd put you +out--would make the piece fail rather than let you succeed." + +Mildred was gazing somberly at the floor. + +"It's hard lines--devilish hard lines," he went on sympathetically. +"But what can I do?" + +"What can I do?" said Mildred. + +"Do as all people do who succeed--meet the conditions." + +"I'm not prepared to go as far as that, at least not yet," said she +with bitter sarcasm. "Perhaps when I'm actually starving and in rags--" + +"A very distressing future," interrupted Crossley. "But--I didn't make +the world. Don't berate me. Be sensible--and be honest, Miss Gower, +and tell me--how could I possibly protect you and continue to give +successful shows? If you can suggest any feasible way, I'll take it." + +"No, there isn't any way," replied she, rising to go. + +He rose to escort her to the hall door. "Personally, the Ransdell sort +of thing is--distasteful to me. Perhaps if I were not so busy I might +be forced by my own giddy misconduct to take less high ground. I've +observed that the best that can be said for human nature at its best is +that it is as well behaved as its real temptations permit. He was +making you, you know. You've admitted it." + +"There's no doubt about that," said Mildred. + +"Mind you, I'm not excusing him. I'm simply explaining him. If your +voice had been all right--if you could have stood to any degree the +test he put you to, the test of standing alone--you'd have defeated +him. He wouldn't have dared go on. He's too shrewd to think a real +talent can be beaten." + +The strong lines, the latent character, in Mildred's face were so +strongly in evidence that looking at her then no one would have thought +of her beauty or even of her sex, but only of the force that resists +all and overcomes all. "Yes--the voice," said she. "The voice." + +"If it's ever reliable, come to see me. Until then--" He put out his +hand. When she gave him hers, he held it in a way that gave her no +impulse to draw back. "You know the conditions of success now. You +must prepare to meet them. If you put yourself at the mercy of the +Ransdells--or any other of the petty intriguers that beset every avenue +of success--you must take the consequences, you must conciliate them as +best you can. If you don't wish to be at their mercy, you must do your +part." + +She nodded. He released her hand, opened the hall door. He said: + +"Forgive my little lecture. But I like you, and I can't help having +hope of you." He smiled charmingly, his keen, inconstant eyes dimming. +"Perhaps I hope because you're young and extremely lovely and I am +pitifully susceptible. You see, you'd better go. Every man's a +Ransdell at heart where pretty women are concerned." + +She did not leave the building. She went to the elevator and asked the +boy where she could find Signor Moldini. His office was the big room +on the third floor where voice candidates were usually tried out, three +days in the week. At the moment he was engaged. Mildred, seated in +the tiny anteroom, heard through the glass door a girl singing, or +trying to sing. It was a distressing performance, and Mildred wondered +that Moldini could be so tolerant as to hear her through. He came to +the door with her, thanked her profusely, told her he would let her +know whenever there was an opening "suited to your talents." As he +observed Mildred, he was still sighing and shaking his head over the +departed candidate. + +"Ugly and ignorant!" he groaned. "Poor creature! Poor, poor creature. +She makes three dollars a week--in a factory owned by a great +philanthropist. Three dollars a week. And she has no way to make a +cent more. Miss Gower, they talk about the sad, naughty girls who sell +themselves in the street to piece out their wages. But think, dear +young lady, how infinitely better of they are than the ugly ones who +can't piece out their wages." + +There he looked directly at her for the first time. Before she could +grasp the tragic sadness of his idea, he, with the mobility of candid +and highly sensitized natures, shifted from melancholy to gay, for in +looking at her he had caught only the charm of dress, of face, of +arrangement of hair. "What a pleasure!" he exclaimed, bursting into +smiles and seizing and kissing her gloved hands. "Voice like a bird, +face like an angel--only not TOO good, no, not TOO good. But it is so +rare--to look as one sings, to sing as one looks." + +For once, compliment, sincere compliment from one whose opinion was +worth while, gave Mildred pain. She burst out with her news: "Signor +Moldini, I've lost my place in the company. My voice has gone back on +me." + +Usually Moldini abounded in the consideration of fine natures that have +suffered deeply from lack of consideration. But he was so astounded +that he could only stare stupidly at her, smoothing his long greasy +hair with his thin brown hand. + +"It's all my fault; I don't take care of myself," she went on. "I +don't take care of my health. At least, I hope that's it." + +"Hope!" he said, suddenly angry. + +"Hope so, because if it isn't that, then I've no chance for a career," +explained she. + +He looked at her feet, pointed an uncannily long forefinger at them. +"The crossings and sidewalks are slush--and you, a singer, without +overshoes! Lunacy! Lunacy!" + +"I've never worn overshoes?" said Mildred apologetically. + +"Don't tell me! I wish not to hear. It makes me--like madness here." +He struck his low sloping brow with his palm. "What vanity! That the +feet may look well to the passing stranger, no overshoes! Rheumatism, +sore throat, colds, pneumonia. Is it not disgusting. If you were a +man I should swear in all the languages I know--which are five, +including Hungarian, and when one swears in Hungarian it is 'going +some,' as you say in America. Yes, it is going quite some." + +"I shall wear overshoes," said Mildred. + +"And indigestion--you have that?" + +"A little, I guess." + +"Much--much, I tell you!" cried Moldini, shaking the long finger at +her. "You Americans! You eat too fast and you eat too much. That is +why you are always sick, and consulting the doctors who give the +medicines that make worse, not better. Yes, you Americans are like +children. You know nothing. Sing? Americans cannot sing until they +learn that a stomach isn't a waste-basket, to toss everything into. You +have been to that throat specialist, Hicks?" + +"Ah, yes," said Mildred brightening. "He said there was nothing +organically wrong." + +"He is an ass, and a criminal. He ruins throats. He likes to cut, and +he likes to spray. He sprays those poisons that relieve colds and +paralyze the throat and cords. Americans sing? It is to laugh! They +have too many doctors; they take too many pills. Do you know what your +national emblem should be? A dollar-sign--yes. But that for all +nations. No, a pill--a pill, I tell you. You take pills?" + +"Now and then," said Mildred, laughing. "I admit I have several kinds +always on hand." + +"You see!" cried he triumphantly. "No, it is not mere art that America +needs, but more sense about eating--and to keep away from the doctors. +People full of pills, they cannot make poems and pictures, and write +operas and sing them. Throw away those pills, dear young lady, I +implore you." + +"Signor Moldini, I've come to ask you to help me." + +Instantly the Italian cleared his face of its half-humorous, +half-querulous expression. In its place came a grave and courteous +eagerness to serve her that was a pleasure, even if it was not +altogether sincere. And Mildred could not believe it sincere. Why +should he care what became of her, or be willing to put himself out for +her? + +"You told me one day that you had at one time taught singing," +continued she. + +"Until I was starved out?" replied he. "I told people the truth. If +they could not sing I said so. If they sang badly I told them why, and +it was always the upset stomach, the foolish food, and people will not +take care about food. They will eat what they please, and they say +eating is good for them, and that anyone who opposes them is a crank. +So most of my pupils left, except those I taught for nothing--and they +did not heed me, and came to nothing." + +"You showed me in ten minutes one day how to cure my worst fault. I've +sung better, more naturally ever since." + +"You could sing like the birds. You do--almost. You could be taught to +sing as freely and sweetly and naturally as a flower gives perfume. +That is YOUR divine gift, young lady song as pure and fresh as a bird's +song raining down through the leaves from the tree-top." + +"I have no money. I've got to get it, and I shall get it," continued +Mildred. "I want you to teach me--at any hour that you are free. And +I want to know how much you will charge, so that I shall know how much +to get." + +"Two dollars a lesson. Or, if you take six lessons a week, ten +dollars. Those were my terms. I could not take less." + +"It is too little," said Mildred. "The poorest kinds of teachers get +five dollars an hour--and teach nothing." + +"Two dollars, ten dollars a week," replied he. "It is the most I ever +could get. I will not take more from you." + +"It is too little," said she. "But I'll not insist--for obvious +reasons. Now, if you'll give me your home address, I'll go. When I +get the money, I'll write to you." + +"But wait!" cried he, as she rose to depart. "Why so hurried? Let us +see. Take of the wrap. Step behind the screen and loosen your corset. +Perhaps even you could take it off?" + +"Not without undressing," said Mildred. "But I can do that if it's +necessary." She laughed queerly. "From this time on I'll do ANYTHING +that's necessary." + +"No,--never mind. The dress of woman--of your kind of women. It is +not serious." He laughed grimly. "As for the other kind, their dress +is the only serious thing about them. It is a mistake to think that +women who dress badly are serious. My experience has been that they +are the most foolish of all. Fashionable dress--it is part of a +woman's tools. It shows that she is good at her business. The women +who try to dress like men, they are good neither at men's business nor +at women's." + +This, while Mildred was behind the screen, loosening her +corset--though, in fact, she wore it so loose at all times that she +inconvenienced herself simply to show her willingness to do as she was +told. When she came out, Moldini put her through a rigid physical +examination--made her breathe while he held one hand on her stomach, +the other on her back, listened at her heart, opened wide her throat +and peered down, thrust his long strong fingers deep into the muscles +of her arms, her throat, her chest, until she had difficulty in not +crying out with pain. + +"The foundation is there," was his verdict. "You have a good body, +good muscles, but flabby--a lady's muscles, not an opera singer's. And +you are stiff--not so stiff as when you first came here, but stiff for +a professional. Ah, we must go at this scientifically, thoroughly." + +"You will teach me to breathe--and how to produce my voice naturally?" + +"I will teach you nothing," replied he. "I will tell you what to do, +and you will teach yourself. You must get strong--strong in the supple +way--and then you will sing as God intended. The way to sing, dear +young lady, is to sing. Not to breathe artificially, and make faces, +and fuss with your throat, but simply to drop your mouth and throat +open and let it out!" + +Mildred produced from her hand-bag the Keith paper. "What do YOU think +of that?" she asked. + +Presently he looked up from his reading. "This part I have seen +before," said he. "It is Lucia Rivi's. Her cousin, Lotta Drusini, +showed it to me--she was a great singer also." + +"You approve of it?" + +"If you will follow that for two years, faithfully, you will be +securely great, and then you will follow it all your singing life--and +it will be long. But remember, dear young lady, I said IF you follow +it, and I said faithfully. I do not believe you can." + +"Why not?" said Mildred. + +"Because that means self-denial, colossal self-denial. You love things +to eat--yes?" + +Mildred nodded. + +"We all do," said Moldini. "And we hate routine, and we like foolish, +aimless little pleasures of all kinds." + +"And it will be two years before I can try grand opera--can make my +living?" said Mildred slowly. + +"I did not say that. I said, before you would be great. No, you can +sing, I think, in--wait." + +Moldini flung rapidly through an enormous mass of music on a large +table. "Ah, here!" he cried, and he showed her a manuscript of scales. +"Those two papers. It does not look much? Well, I have made it up, +myself. And when you can sing those two papers perfectly, you will be +a greater singer than any that ever lived." He laughed delightedly. +"Yes, it is all there--in two pages. But do not weep, dear lady, +because you will never sing them perfectly. You will do very well if-- +Always that if, remember! Now, let us see. Take this, sit in the +chair, and begin. Don't bother about me. I expect nothing. Just do +the best you can." + +Desperation, when it falls short of despair, is the best word for +achievement. Mildred's voice, especially at the outset, was far from +perfect condition. Her high notes, which had never been developed +properly, were almost bad. But she acquitted herself admirably from +the standpoint of showing what her possibilities were. And Moldini, +unkempt, almost unclean, but as natural and simple and human a soul as +ever paid the penalties of poverty and obscurity and friendlessness for +being natural and simple and human, exactly suited her peculiar +temperament. She knew that he liked her, that he believed in her; she +knew that he was as sympathetic toward her as her own self, that there +was no meanness anywhere in him. So she sang like a bird--a bird that +was not too well in soul or in body, but still a bird out in the +sunshine, with the airs of spring cheering his breast and its foliage +gladdening his eyes. He kept her at it for nearly an hour. She saw +that he was pleased, that he had thought out some plan and was bursting +to tell her, but had forbidden himself to speak of it. He said: + +"You say you have no money?" + +"No, but I shall get it." + +"You may have to pay high for it--yes?" + +She colored, but did not flinch. "At worst, it will be--unpleasant, +but that's all." + +"Wait one--two days--until you hear from me. I may--I do not say will, +but may--get it. Yes, I who have nothing." He laughed gayly. "And +we--you and I--we will divide the spoils." Gravely. "Do not +misunderstand. That was my little joke. If I get the money for you it +will be quite honorable and businesslike. So--wait, dear young lady." + +As she was going, she could not resist saying: + +"You are SURE I can sing?--IF, of course--always the if." + +"It is not to be doubted." + +"How well, do you think?" + +"You mean how many dollars a night well? You mean as well as this +great singer or that? I do not know. And you are not to compare +yourself with anyone but yourself. You will sing as well as Mildred +Gower at her best." + +For some reason her blood went tingling through her veins. If she had +dared she would have kissed him. + + + +X + +THAT same afternoon Donald Keith, arrived at the top of Mrs. Belloc's +steps, met Mildred coming out. Seeing their greeting, one would have +thought they had seen each other but a few minutes before or were +casual acquaintances. Said she: + +"I'm going for a walk." + +"Let's take the taxi," said he. + +There it stood invitingly at the curb. She felt tired. She disliked +walking. She wished to sit beside him and be whirled away--out of the +noisy part of the city, up where the air was clean and where there were +no crowds. But she had begun the regimen of Lucia Rivi. She hesitated. +What matter if she began now or put off beginning until after this one +last drive? + +"No, we will walk," said she. + +"But the streets are in frightful condition." + +She thrust out a foot covered with a new and shiny storm-rubber. + +"Let's drive to the park then. We'll walk there." + +"No. If I get into the taxi, I'll not get out. Send it away." + +When they were moving afoot up Madison Avenue, he said: "What's the +matter? This isn't like you." + +"I've come to my senses," replied she. "It may be too late, but I'm +going to see." + +"When I called on Mrs. Brindley the other day," said he, "she had your +note, saying that you were going into musical comedy with Crossley." + +"That's over," said she. "I lost my voice, and I lost my job." + +"So I heard," said he. "I know Crossley. I dropped in to see him this +morning, and he told me about a foolish, fashionable girl who made a +bluff at going on the stage--he said she had a good voice and was a +swell looker, but proved to be a regular 'four-flusher.' I recognized +you." + +"Thanks," said she dryly. + +"So, I came to see you." + +She inquired about Mrs. Brindley and then about Stanley Baird. Finding +that he was in Italy, she inquired: "Do you happen to know his +address?" + +"I'll get it and send it to you. He has taken a house at Monte Carlo +for the winter." + +"And you?" + +"I shall stay here--I think." + +"You may join him?" + +"It depends"--he looked at her--"upon you." + +He could put a wonderful amount of meaning into a slight inflection. +She struggled--not in vain--to keep from changing expression. + +"You realize now that the career is quite hopeless?" said he. + +She did not answer. + +"You do not like the stage life?" + +"No." + +"And the stage life does not like you?" + +"No." + +"Your voice lacks both strength and stability?" + +"Yes." + +"And you have found the one way by which you could get on--and you +don't like it?" + +"Crossley told you?" said she, the color flaring. + +"Your name was not mentioned. You may not believe it, but Crossley is +a gentleman." + +She walked on in silence. + +"I did not expect your failure to come so soon--or in quite that way," +he went on. "I got Mrs. Brindley to exact a promise from you that +you'd let her know about yourself. I called on Mrs. Belloc one day +when you were out, and gave her my confidence and got hers--and assured +myself that you were in good hands. Crossley's tale gave me--a shock. +I came at once." + +"Then you didn't abandon me to my fate, as I thought?" + +He smiled in his strange way. "I?--when I loved you? Hardly." + +"Then you did interest yourself in me because you cared--precisely as I +said," laughed she. + +"And I should have given you up if you had succeeded--precisely as I +said," replied he. + +"You wished me to fail?" + +"I wished you to fail. I did everything I could to help you to +succeed. I even left you absolutely alone, set you in the right +way--the only way in which anyone can win success." + +"Yes, you made me throw away the crutches and try to walk." + +"It was hard to do that. Those strains are very wearing at my time of +life." + +"You never were any younger, and you'll never be any older," laughed +she. "That's your charm--one of them." + +"Mildred, do you still care?" + +"How did you know?" inquired she mockingly. + +"You didn't try to conceal it. I'd not have ventured to say and do the +things I said and did if I hadn't felt that we cared for each other. +But, so long as you were leading that fatuous life and dreaming those +foolish dreams, I knew we could never be happy." + +"That is true--oh, SO true," replied she. + +"But now--you have tried, and that has made a woman of you. And you +have failed, and that has made you ready to be a wife--to be happy in +the quiet, private ways." + +She was silent. + +"I can make enough for us both--as much as we will need or want--as +much as you please, if you aren't too extravagant. And I can do it +easily. It's making little sums--a small income--that's hard in this +ridiculous world. Let's marry, go to California or Europe for several +months, then come back here and live like human beings." + +She was silent. Block after block they walked along, as if neither had +anything especial in mind, anything worth the trouble of speech. +Finally he said: + +"Well?" + +"I can't answer--yet," said she. "Not to-day--not till I've thought." + +She glanced quickly at him. Over his impassive face, so beautifully +regular and, to her, so fascinating, there passed a quick dark shadow, +and she knew that he was suffering. He laughed quietly, his old +careless, indifferent laugh. + +"Oh, yes, you can answer," said he. "You have answered." + +She drew in her breath sharply. + +"You have refused." + +"Why do you say that, Donald?" she pleaded. + +"To hesitate over a proposal is to refuse," said he with gentle +raillery. "A man is a fool who does not understand and sheer off when +a woman asks for time." + +"You know that I love you," she cried. + +"I also know that you love something else more. But it's finished. +Let's talk about something else." + +"Won't you let me tell you why I hesitate?" begged she. + +"It doesn't matter." + +"But it does. Yes, I do refuse, Donald. I'll never marry you until I +am independent. You said a while ago that what I've been through had +made a woman of me. Not yet. I'm only beginning. I'm still +weak--still a coward. Donald, I must and will be free." + +He looked full at her, with a strange smile in his brilliant eyes. Said +he, with obvious intent to change the subject: "Mrs. Brindley's very +unhappy that you haven't been to see her." + +"When you asked me to marry you, the only reason I almost accepted was +because I want someone to support me. I love you--yes. But it is as +one loves before one has given oneself and has lived the same life with +another. In the ordinary sense, it's love that I feel. But--do you +understand me, dearest?--in another sense, it's only the hope of love, +the belief that love will come." + +He stopped short and looked at her, his eyes alive with the stimulus of +a new and startling idea. + +"If you and I had been everything to each other, and you were saying +'Let us go on living the one life' and I were hesitating, then you'd be +right. And I couldn't hesitate, Donald. If you were mine, nothing +could make me give you up, but when it's only the hope of having you, +then pride and self-respect have a chance to be heard." + +He was ready to move on. "There's something in that," said he, lapsed +into his usual seeming of impassiveness. "But not much." + +"I never before knew you to fail to understand." + +"I understand perfectly. You care, but you don't care enough to suit +me. I haven't waited all these years before giving a woman my love, to +be content with a love seated quietly and demurely between pride and +self-respect." + +"You wouldn't marry me until I had failed," said she shrewdly. "Now +you attack me for refusing to marry you until I've succeeded." + +A slight shrug. "Proposal withdrawn," said he. "Now let's talk about +your career, your plans." + +"I'm beginning to understand myself a little," said she. "I suppose +you think that sort of personal talk is very silly and vain--and +trivial." + +"On the contrary," replied he, "it isn't absolutely necessary to +understand oneself. One is swept on in the same general direction, +anyhow. But understanding helps one to go faster and steadier." + +"It began, away back, when I was a girl--this idea of a career. I +envied men and despised women, the sort of women I knew and met with. I +didn't realize why, then. But it was because a man had a chance to be +somebody in himself and to do something, while a woman was just a--a +more or less ornamental belonging of some man's--what you want me to +become now." + +"As far as possible from my idea." + +"Don't you want me to belong to you?" + +"As I belong to you." + +"That sounds well, but it isn't what could happen. The fact is, Donald, +that I want to belong to you--want to be owned by you and to lose +myself in you. And it's that I'm fighting." + +She felt the look he was bending upon her, and glowed and colored under +it, but did not dare to turn her eyes to meet it. Said he: "Why fight +it? Why not be happy?" + +"Ah, but that's just it," cried she. "I shouldn't be happy. And I +should make you miserable. The idea of a career--the idea that's +rooted deep in me and can't ever be got out, Donald; it would torment +me. You couldn't kill it, no matter how much you loved me. I'd yield +for the time. Then, I'd go back--or, if I didn't, I'd be wretched and +make you wish you'd never seen me." + +"I understand," said he. "I don't believe it, but I understand." + +"You think I'm deceiving myself, because you saw me wasting my life, +playing the idler and the fool, pretending I was working toward a +career when I was really making myself fit for nothing but to be +Stanley Baird's mistress." + +"And you're still deceiving yourself. You won't see the truth." + +"No matter," said she. "I must go on and make a career--some kind of a +career." + +"At what?" + +"At grand opera." + +"How'll you get the money?" + +"Of Stanley, if necessary. That's why I asked his address. I shan't +ask for much. He'll not refuse." + +"A few minutes ago you were talking of self-respect." + +"As something I hoped to get. It comes with independence. I'll pay +any price to get it." + +"Any price?" said he, and never before had she seen his self-control in +danger. + +"I shan't ask Stanley until my other plans have failed." + +"What other plans?" + +"I am going to ask Mrs. Belloc for the money. She could afford to +give--to lend--the little I'd want. I'm going to ask her in such a way +that it will be as hard as possible for her to refuse. That isn't +ladylike, but--I've dropped out of the lady class." + +"And if she refuses?" + +"Then I'll go one after another to several very rich men I know, and +ask them as a business proposition." + +"Go in person," advised he with an undisguised sneer. + +"I'll raise no false hopes in them," she said. "If they choose to +delude themselves, I'll not go out of my way to undeceive them--until I +have to." + +"So THIS is Mildred Gower?" + +"You made that remark before." + +"Really?" + +"When Stanley showed you a certain photograph of me." + +"I remember. This is the same woman." + +"It's me," laughed she. "The real me. You'd not care to be married to +her?" + +"No," said he. Then, after a brief silence: "Yet, curiously, it was +that woman with whom I fell in love. No, not exactly in love, for I've +been thinking about what you said as to the difference between love in +posse and love in esse, to put it scientifically--between love as a +prospect and love as a reality." + +"And I was right," said she. "It explains why marriages go to pieces +and affairs come to grief. Those lovers mistook love's promise to come +for fulfillment. Love doesn't die. It simply fails to come--doesn't +redeem its promise." + +"That's the way it might be with us," said he. "That's the way it would +be with us," rejoined she. + +He did not answer. When they spoke again it was of indifferent +matters. An hour and a half after they started, they were at Mrs. +Belloc's again. She asked him to have tea in the restaurant next door. +He declined. He went up the steps with her, said: + +"Well, I wish you luck. Moldini is the best teacher in America." + +"How did you know Moldini was to teach me?" exclaimed she. + +He smiled, put out his hand in farewell. "Crossley told me. Good-by." + +"He told Crossley! I wonder why." She was so interested in this new +phase that she did not see his outstretched hand, or the look of bitter +irony that came into his eyes at this proof of the subordinate place +love and he had in her thoughts. + +"I'm nervous and anxious," she said apologetically. "Moldini told me he +had some scheme about getting the money. If he only could! But no +such luck for me," she added sadly. + +Keith hesitated, debated with himself, said: "You needn't worry. +Moldini got it--from Crossley. Fifty dollars a week for a year." + +"You got Crossley to do it?" + +"No. He had done it before I saw him. He had just promised Moldini +and was cursing himself as 'weak and soft.' But that means nothing. +You may be sure he did it because Moldini convinced him it was a good +speculation." + +She was radiant. She had not vanity enough where he was concerned to +believe that he deeply cared, that her joy would give him pain because +it meant forgetfulness of him. Nor was she much impressed by the +expression of his eyes. And even as she hurt him, she made him love +her the more; for he appreciated how rare was the woman who, in such +circumstances, does not feed her vanity with pity for the poor man +suffering so horribly because he is not to get her precious self. + +It flashed upon her why he had not offered to help her. "There isn't +anybody like you," said she, with no explanation of her apparent +irrelevancy. + +"Don't let Moldini see that you know," said he, with characteristic +fine thoughtfulness for others in the midst of his own unhappiness. "It +would deprive him of a great pleasure." + +He was about to go. Suddenly her eyes filled and, opening the outer +door, she drew him in. "Donald," she said, "I love you. Take me in +your arms and make me behave." + +He looked past her; his arms hung at his sides. Said he: "And +to-night I'd get a note by messenger saying that you had taken it all +back. No, the girl in the photograph--that was you. She wasn't made +to be MY wife. Or I to be her husband. I love you because you are +what you are. I should not love you if you were the ordinary woman, +the sort who marries and merges. But I'm old enough to spare +myself--and you--the consequences of what it would mean if we were +anything but strangers to each other." + +"Yes, you must keep away--altogether. If you didn't, I'd be neither +the one thing nor the other, but just a poor failure." + +"You'll not fail," said he. "I know it. It's written in your face." +He looked at her. She was not looking at him, but with eyes gazing +straight ahead was revealing that latent, inexplicable power which, +when it appeared at the surface, so strongly dominated and subordinated +her beauty and her sex. He shut his teeth together hard and glanced +away. + +"You will not fail," he repeated bitterly. "And that's the worst of +it." + +Without another word, without a handshake, he went. And she knew that, +except by chance, he would never see her again--or she him. + +Moldini, disheveled and hysterical with delight and suspense, was in +the drawing-room--had been there half an hour. At first she could +hardly force her mind to listen; but as he talked on and on, he +captured her attention and held it. + + +The next day she began with Moldini, and put the Lucia Rivi system into +force in all its more than conventual rigors. And for about a month +she worked like a devouring flame. Never had there been such energy, +such enthusiasm. Mrs. Belloc was alarmed for her health, but the Rivi +system took care of that; and presently Mrs. Belloc was moved to say, +"Well, I've often heard that hard work never harmed anyone, but I never +believed it. Now I know the truth." + +Then Mildred went to Hanging Rock to spend Saturday to Monday with her +mother. Presbury, reduced now by various infirmities--by absolute +deafness, by dimness of sight, by difficulty in walking--to where +eating was his sole remaining pleasure, or, indeed, distraction, spent +all his time in concocting dishes for himself. Mildred could not +resist--and who can when seated at table with the dish before one's +eyes and under one's nose. The Rivi regimen was suspended for the +visit. Mildred, back in New York and at work again, found that she was +apparently none the worse for her holiday, was in fact better. So she +drifted into the way of suspending the regimen for an evening now and +then--when she dined with Mrs. Brindley, or when Agnes Belloc had +something particularly good. All went well for a time. Then--a cold. +She neglected it, feeling sure it could not stay with one so soundly +healthy through and through. But it did stay; it grew worse. She +decided that she ought to take medicine for it. True, starvation was +the cure prescribed by the regimen, but Mildred could not bring herself +to two or three days of discomfort. Also, many people told her that +such a cure was foolish and even dangerous. The cold got better, got +worse, got better. But her throat became queer, and at last her voice +left her. She was ashamed to go to Moldini in such a condition. She +dropped in upon Hicks, the throat specialist. He "fixed her up" +beautifully with a few sprayings. A week--and her voice left her +again, and Hicks could not bring it back. As she left his office, it +was raining--an icy, dreary drizzle. She splashed her way home, in +about the lowest spirits she had ever known. She locked her door and +seated herself at the window and stared out, while the storm raged +within her. After an hour or two she wrote and sent Moldini a note: "I +have been making a fool of myself. I'll not come again until I am all +right. Be patient with me. I don't think this will occur again." She +first wrote "happen." She scratched it out and put "occur" in its +place. Not that Moldini would have noted the slip; simply that she +would not permit herself the satisfaction of the false and +self-excusing "happen." It had not been a "happen." It had been a +deliberate folly, a lapse to the Mildred she had buried the day she +sent Donald Keith away. When the note was on its way, she threw out +all her medicines, and broke the new spraying apparatus Hicks had +instructed her to buy. + +She went back to the Rivi regime. A week passed, and she was little +better. Two weeks, and she began to mend. But it was six weeks before +the last traces of her folly disappeared. Moldini said not a word, +gave no sign. Once more her life went on in uneventful, unbroken +routine--diet, exercise, singing--singing, exercise, diet--no +distractions except an occasional visit to the opera with Moldini, and +she was hating opera now. All her enthusiasm was gone. She simply +worked doggedly, drudged, slaved. + +When the days began to grow warm, Mrs. Belloc said: "I suppose you'll +soon be off to the country? Are you going to visit Mrs. Brindley?" + +"No," said Mildred. + +"Then come with me." + +"Thank you, but I can't do it." + +"But you've got to rest somewhere." + +"Rest?" said Mildred. "Why should I rest?" + +Mrs. Belloc started to protest, then abruptly changed. "Come to think +of it, why should you? You're in perfect health, and it'll be time +enough to rest when you 'get there.'" + +"I'm tired through and through," said Mildred, "but it isn't the kind +of tired that could be rested except by throwing up this frightful +nightmare of a career." + +"And you can't do that." + +"I won't," said Mildred, her lips compressed and her eyes narrowed. + +She and Moldini--and fat, funny little Mrs. Moldini--went to the +mountains. And she worked on. She would listen to none of the +suggestions about the dangers of keeping too steadily at it, about +working oneself into a state of staleness, about the imperative demands +of the artistic temperament for rest, change, variety. "It may be so," +she said to Mrs. Brindley. "But I've gone mad. I can no more drop this +routine than--than you could take it up and keep to it for a week." + +"I'll admit I couldn't," said Cyrilla. "And Mildred, you're making a +mistake." + +"Then I'll have to suffer for it. I must do what seems best to me." + +"But I'm sure you're wrong. I never knew anyone to act as you're +acting. Everyone rests and freshens up." + +Mildred lost patience, almost lost her temper. "You're trying to tempt +me to ruin myself," she said. "Please stop it. You say you never knew +anyone to do as I'm doing. Very well. But how many girls have you +known who have succeeded?" + +Cyrilla hesitatingly confessed that she had known none. + +"Yet you've known scores who've tried." + +"But they didn't fail because they didn't work enough. Many of them +worked too much." + +Mildred laughed. "How do you know why they failed?" said she. "You +haven't thought about it as I have. You haven't LIVED it. Cyrilla, I +served my apprenticeship at listening to nonsense about careers. I want +to have nothing to do with inspiration, and artistic temperament, and +spontaneous genius, and all the rest of the lies. Moldini and I know +what we are about. So I'm living as those who have succeeded lived and +not as those who have failed." + +Cyrilla was silenced, but not convinced. The amazing improvement in +Mildred's health, the splendid slim strength and suppleness of her +body, the new and stable glories of her voice--all these she knew +about, but they did not convince her. She believed in work, in hard +work, but to her work meant the music itself. She felt that the Rivi +system and the dirty, obscure little Moldini between them were +destroying Mildred by destroying all "temperament" in her. + +It was the old, old criticism of talent upon genius. Genius has always +won in its own time and generation all the world except talent. To +talent contemporaneous genius, genius seen at its patient, plodding +toil, seems coarse and obvious and lacking altogether in inspiration. +Talent cannot comprehend that creation is necessarily in travail and in +all manner of unloveliness. + +Mildred toiled on like a slave under the lash, and Moldini and the Rivi +system were her twin relentless drivers. She learned to rule herself +with an iron hand. She discovered the full measure of her own +deficiencies, and she determined to make herself a competent lyric +soprano, perhaps something of a dramatic soprano. She dismissed from +her mind all the "high" thoughts, all the dreams wherewith the little +people, even the little people who achieve a certain success, beguile +the tedium of their journey along the hard road. She was not working +to "interpret the thought of the great master" or to "advance the +singing art yet higher" or even to win fame and applause. She had one +object--to earn her living on the grand opera stage, and to earn it as +a prima donna because that meant the best living. She frankly told +Cyrilla that this was her object, when Cyrilla forced her one day to +talk about her aims. Cyrilla looked pained, broke a melancholy silence +to say: + +"I know you don't mean that. You are too intelligent. You sing too +well." + +"Yes, I mean just that," said Mildred. "A living." + +"At any rate, don't say it. You give such a false impression." + +"To whom? Not to Crossley, and not to Moldini, and why should I care +what any others think? They are not paying my expenses. And +regardless of what they think now, they'll be at my feet if I succeed, +and they'll put me under theirs if I don't." + +"How hard you have grown," cried Cyrilla. + +"How sensible, you mean. I've merely stopped being a self-deceiver and +a sentimentalist." + +"Believe me, my dear, you are sacrificing your character to your +ambition." + +"I never had any real character until ambition came," replied Mildred. +"The soft, vacillating, sweet and weak thing I used to have wasn't +character." + +"But, dear, you can't think it superior character to center one's whole +life about a sordid ambition." + +"Sordid?" + +"Merely to make a living." + +Mildred laughed merrily and mockingly. "You call that sordid? Then +for heaven's sake what is high? You had left you money enough to live +on, if you have to. No one left me an income. So, I'm fighting for +independence--and that means for self-respect. Is self-respect sordid, +Cyrilla!" + +And then Cyrilla understood--in part, not altogether. She lived in the +ordinary environment of flap-doodle and sweet hypocrisy and +sentimentality; and none such can more than vaguely glimpse the +realities. + +Toward the end of the summer Moldini said: + +"It's over. You have won." + +Mildred looked at him in puzzled surprise. + +"You have learned it all. You will succeed. The rest is detail." + +"But I've learned nothing as yet," protested she. + +"You have learned to teach yourself," replied the Italian. "You at +last can hear yourself sing, and you know when you sing right and when +you sing wrong, and you know how to sing right. The rest is easy. Ah, +my dear Miss Gower, you will work NOW!" + +Mildred did not understand. She was even daunted by that "You will +work NOW!" She had been thinking that to work harder was impossible. +What did he expect of her? Something she feared she could not realize. +But soon she understood--when he gave her songs, then began to teach +her a role, the part of Madame Butterfly herself. "I can help you only +a little there," he said. "You will have to go to my friend Ferreri +for roles. But we can make a beginning." + +She had indeed won. She had passed from the stage where a career is +all drudgery--the stage through which only the strong can pass without +giving up and accepting failure or small success. She had passed to +the stage where there is added pleasure to the drudgery, for, the +drudgery never ceases. And what was the pleasure? Why, more +work--always work--bringing into use not merely the routine parts of +the mind, but also the imaginative and creative faculties. She had +learned her trade--not well enough, for no superior man or woman ever +feels that he or she knows the trade well enough--but well enough to +begin to use it. + +Said Moldini: "When the great one, who has achieved and arrived, is +asked for advice by the sweet, enthusiastic young beginner, what is the +answer? Always the same: 'My dear child, don't! Go back home, and +marry and have babies.' You know why now?" + +And Mildred, looking back over the dreary drudgery that had been, and +looking forward to the drudgery yet to come, dreary enough for all the +prospects of a few flowers and a little sun--Mildred said: "Indeed I +do, maestro." + +"They think it means what you Americans call morals--as if that were +all of morality! But it doesn't mean morals; not at all. Sex and the +game of sex is all through life everywhere--in the home no less than in +the theater. In town and country, indoors and out, sunlight, +moonlight, and rain--always it goes on. And the temptations and the +struggles are no more and no less on the stage than off. No, there is +too much talk about 'morals.' The reason the great one says 'don't' is +the work." He shook his head sadly. "They do not realize, those eager +young beginners. They read the story-books and the lives of the great +successes and they hear the foolish chatter of common-place +people--those imbecile 'cultured' people who know nothing! And they +think a career is a triumphal march. What think you, Miss Gower--eh?" + +"If I had known I'd not have had the courage, or the vanity, to begin," +said she. "And if I could realize what's before me, I probably +shouldn't have the courage to go on." + +"But why not? Haven't you also learned that it's just the day's work, +doing every day the best you can?" + +"Oh, I shall go on," rejoined she. + +"Yes," said he, looking at her with awed admiration. "It is in your +face. I saw it there, the day you came--after you sang the 'Batti +Batti' the first time and failed." + +"There was nothing to me then." + +"The seed," replied he. "And I saw it was an acorn, not the seed of +one of those weak plants that spring up overnight and wither at noon. +Yes, you will win." He laughed gayly, rolled his eyes and kissed his +fingers. "And then you can afford to take a little holiday, and fall in +love. Love! Ah, it is a joyous pastime--for a holiday. Only for a +holiday, mind you. I shall be there and I shall seize you and take you +back to your art." + + +In the following winter and summer Crossley disclosed why he had been +sufficiently interested in grand opera to begin to back undeveloped +voices. Crossley was one of those men who are never so practical as +when they profess to be, and fancy themselves, impractical. He became a +grand-opera manager and organized for a season that would surpass in +interest any New York had known. Thus it came about that on a March +night Mildred made her debut. + +The opera was "Faust." As the three principal men singers were all +expensive--the tenor alone, twelve hundred a night--Crossley put in a +comparatively modestly salaried Marguerite. She was seized with a cold +at the last moment, and Crossley ventured to substitute Mildred Gower. +The Rivi system was still in force. She was ready--indeed, she was +always ready, as Rivi herself had been. And within ten minutes of her +coming forth from the wings, Mildred Gower had leaped from obscurity +into fame. It happens so, often in the story books, the newly +gloriously arrived one having been wholly unprepared, achieving by +sheer force of genius. It occurs so, occasionally, in life--never when +there is lack of preparation, never by force of unassisted genius, +never by accident. Mildred succeeded because she had got ready to +succeed. How could she have failed? + +Perhaps you read the stories in the newspapers--how she had discovered +herself possessed of a marvelous voice, how she had decided to use it +in public, how she had coached for a part, had appeared, had become one +of the world's few hundred great singers all in a single act of an +opera. You read nothing about what she went through in developing a +hopelessly uncertain and far from strong voice into one which, while +not nearly so good as thousands of voices that are tried and cast +aside, yet sufficed, with her will and her concentration back of it, to +carry her to fame--and wealth. + +That birdlike voice! So sweet and spontaneous, so true, so like the +bird that "sings of summer in full throated ease!" No wonder the +audience welcomed it with cheers on cheers. Greater voices they had +heard, but none more natural--and that was Moldini. + +He came to her dressing-room at the intermission. He stretched out his +arms, but emotion overcame him, and he dropped to a chair and sobbed +and cried and laughed. She came and put her arms round him and kissed +him. She was almost calm. The GREAT fear had seized her--Can I keep +what I have won? + +"I am a fool," cried Moldini. "I will agitate you." + +"Don't be afraid of that," said she. "I am nervous, yes, horribly +nervous. But you have taught me so that I could sing, no matter what +was happening." It was true. And her body was like iron to the touch. + +He looked at her, and though he knew her and had seen her train herself +and had helped in it, he marveled. "You are happy?" he said eagerly. +"Surely--yes, you MUST be happy." + +"More than that," answered she. "You'll have to find another word than +happiness--something bigger and stronger and deeper." + +"Now you can have your holiday," laughed he. "But"--with mock +sternness--"in moderation! He must be an incident only. With those +who win the high places, sex is an incident--a charming, necessary +incident, but only an incident. He must not spoil your career. If you +allowed that you would be like a mother who deserts her children for a +lover. He must not touch your career!" + +Mildred, giving the last touches to her costume before the glass, +glanced merrily at Moldini by way of it. "If he did touch it," said +she, "how long do you think he would last with me?" + +Moldini paused half-way in his nod of approval, was stricken with +silence and sadness. It would have been natural and proper for a man +thus to put sex beneath the career. It was necessary for anyone who +developed the strong character that compels success and holds it. But-- +The Italian could not get away from tradition; woman was made for the +pleasure of one man, not for herself and the world. + +"You don't like that, maestro?" said she, still observing him in the +glass. + +"No man would," said he, with returning cheerfulness. "It hurts man's +vanity. And no woman would, either; you rebuke their laziness and +their dependence!" + +She laughed and rushed away to fresh triumphs. + + + + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Price She Paid, by David Graham Phillips + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PRICE SHE PAID *** + +***** This file should be named 457.txt or 457.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/4/5/457/ + +Produced by Charles Keller. HTML version by Al Haines. + +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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