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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Many Kingdoms, by Elizabeth Jordan
+#2 in our series by Elizabeth Jordan
+
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+Title: Many Kingdoms
+
+Author: Elizabeth Jordan
+
+Release Date: June, 2004 [EBook #5953]
+[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
+[This file was first posted on September 29, 2002]
+
+Edition: 10
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MANY KINGDOMS ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Charles Franks
+and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team.
+
+
+
+
+
+MANY KINGDOMS
+
+BY
+
+ELIZABETH JORDAN
+
+AUTHOR OF
+"May Iverson--Her Book"
+"Tales of the Cloister"
+"Tales of Destiny"
+Etc. Etc.
+
+... _"The state of man,
+Like to a little kingdom, suffers then
+The nature of an insurrection."_
+
+--SHAKESPEARE.
+
+MCMVIII
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+CHAP.
+
+I.    VARICK'S LADY O' DREAMS
+II.   THE EXORCISM OF LILY BELL
+III.  HER LAST DAY
+IV.   THE SIMPLE LIFE OF GENEVIEVE MAUD
+V.    HIS BOY
+VI.   THE COMMUNITY'S SUNBEAM
+VII.  IN MEMORY OF HANNAH'S LAUGH
+VIII. THE QUEST OF AUNT NANCY
+IX.   THE HENRY SMITHS' HONEYMOON
+X.    THE CASE OF KATRINA
+XI.   BART HARRINGTON, GENIUS
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+VARICK'S LADY O' DREAMS
+
+
+Varick laid down the book with which he had beguiled an hour of the
+night, turned off the electric light in the shaded globe that hung
+above his head, pulled the sheets a little nearer his chin, reversed
+his pillow that he might rest his cheek more gratefully on the cooler
+linen, stretched, yawned, and composed himself to slumber with an
+absolutely untroubled conscience.
+
+He was an eminently practical and almost rudely healthy young man,
+with an unreflecting belief in the existence of things he had seen,
+and considerable doubt concerning those which he had not seen. In his
+heart he regarded sentiment as the expression of a flabby nature in a
+feeble body. Once or twice he had casually redressing-case, with its
+array of silver toilet articles, the solid front of his chiffonnier,
+the carved arms of his favorite lounging-chair, even the etchings and
+prints on the walls. Suddenly, as he looked at these familiar objects,
+a light haze fell over them, giving him for an instant the impression
+that a gauze curtain had been dropped between them and his eyes. They
+slowly melted away, and in their place he saw the streets of a tiny
+village in some foreign country which he did not know. A moment later,
+in what seemed at the time a perfectly natural transition from his bed
+in an Adirondack club-house, he was walking up the streets of the
+little town, in correct tourist attire, looking in vain for a familiar
+landmark, and with a strange sinking of the heart. How he got there,
+or why he was there, was equally incomprehensible to him. It was high
+noon of a warm summer day, and the red roofs of the old buildings
+seemed to glow in the heat. Before him, at the end of the street down
+which he was walking, was a public square where marketing was going on
+in the open. It was crowded with men and women in picturesque peasant
+costumes he did not recognize, though he had travelled a great deal.
+As he drew nearer he heard them speaking, but discovered that their
+tongue was as unknown to him as their garb. He knew French, German,
+and Italian well; he had, in addition, a smattering of Spanish, and
+was familiar with the accents of Slavic tongues. But this babel that
+met his ears was something new. Taken in connection with the rest of
+the experience, the discovery sent a cold chill down the spinal column
+of Mr. Lawrence Varick. For the first time in his debonair life he was
+afraid, and admitted it inwardly, with a sudden whitening of the lips.
+
+"It's so infernally queer," he told himself, uneasily. "If I could
+remember how I got here, or if I knew anything about the place--"
+
+"Have you classified them?" asked a voice at his elbow. It was
+feminine, contralto, and exquisitely modulated. The words were
+English, but spoken with a slight foreign accent. With a leap of the
+heart Varick turned and looked at the speaker.
+
+She was young, he saw at once--twenty-two, twenty-three, possibly
+twenty-four. He inclined to the last theory as he observed her perfect
+poise and self-possession. She was exquisitely dressed; he realized
+that despite the dimness of masculine perception on such points, and,
+much more clearly, saw that she was beautiful. She was small, and the
+eyes she raised to his were large and deeply brown, with long black
+lashes that matched in color the wavy hair under her coquettish hat.
+As he stared at her, with surprise, relief, and admiration struggling
+in his boyishly handsome face, she smiled, and in that instant the
+phlegmatic young man experienced a new sensation. His own white teeth
+flashed as he smiled back at her. Then he remembered that it was
+necessary to reply to her question.
+
+"I--I--beg your pardon," he stammered, "a--a thousand times. But to
+tell you the truth, I'm--I'm horribly confused this morning. I--I
+don't seem, somehow, to place myself yet. And I can't understand what
+these people say. So, when you spoke English it was such a relief--"
+
+He stopped suddenly and turned a rich crimson. It had occurred to him
+that this incoherent statement was not quite the one to win interest
+and admiration from a strange and exceedingly attractive woman. What
+would she think of him? Perhaps that he was intoxicated, or insane.
+Varick's imagination, never lively, distinguished itself during the
+next few seconds by the stirring possibilities it presented to his
+mind. He grew redder, which was very unfortunate, and shuffled
+miserably from one foot to the other, until he noticed that she was
+looking at him with a glance that was entirely dignified yet very
+friendly. It had an oddly sympathetic quality in it as well. His
+spirits rose a trifle.
+
+"You must think me an awful duffer," he murmured, contritely. "I'm not
+always like this, I assure you."
+
+"I know," she assented. "I understand. Walk on with me. Possibly I may
+be able to help you."
+
+He bowed assent and the two walked toward the crowded square.
+
+"You're awfully good," he said, feeling reassured, yet still boyish
+and embarrassed. "I don't want to be a nuisance, but if you'll just
+put me right, somehow--start me on a path that will lead me home--"
+
+The entire idiocy of this struck him. He stopped again, then burst
+into his contagious, youthful laughter, in which she instantly joined.
+The mellow contralto and the clear tenor formed a soft and pleasant
+duet, but Varick noticed that not a head in the crowd around them
+turned their way, nor did an eye of all the peasant throng give them a
+glance. He spoke of this to his companion as they continued their
+walk.
+
+"The most surprising thing to me in all this--unusualness," he said,
+"is the cool manner in which these beggars ignore us. You know how
+such people gape, usually; but not a soul among all these people seems
+to know we're here."
+
+She looked at him with a gentle amusement and sympathy in her brown
+eyes.
+
+"That is not surprising," she said, quietly. "For, you know, we are
+not here--really."
+
+Varick stopped for the second time and stared at her, with a
+repetition of that new and annoying sinking in the region of his
+heart. Her words were certainly disconcerting, but she herself was
+delightfully human and most reassuringly natural. She had walked on,
+and he tried to fall into her mood as he overtook her.
+
+"Where are we, then?" he asked, with a short and not especially
+mirthful laugh.
+
+Her smooth brow wrinkled for a moment.
+
+"I do not know," she said, frankly. "That is, I do not know this
+place, where we _think_ we are, though I have been here before, and
+the experience does not frighten me now. But I know where we _really_
+are. You are asleep somewhere in America, and I--but oh, my dear, my
+dear, you're going to wake!"
+
+The clock that was somewhere struck three. Varick, sitting up in his
+bed with eyes staring into the darkness, saw again his familiar room,
+the dim light, the silver, the dressing-case, the pictures. He sprang
+to the door opening into the hall, and tried it. It was bolted, as he
+had left it. So was the other door leading into his sitting-room. The
+darkness around him still seemed full of the refrain of the words he
+had just heard--where?
+
+_"Oh, my dear, my dear, you're going to wake!"_ And her eyes--her
+smile--
+
+Varick got into bed again, in a somewhat dazed condition, with a
+tremor running through it. Very slowly he straightened himself out,
+very slowly he pulled up the bedclothes. Then he swore solemnly into
+the obscurity of the room.
+
+"Well, of--all--the--dreams!" he commented, helplessly.
+
+As the months passed, after Varick got back to town and into the whirl
+of city life, he recalled his dream, frequently at first, then more
+rarely, and finally not at all. It was almost a year later when, one
+night, lying half awake, he saw again the fine, transparent, screen-
+like veil enshroud the objects in his bedroom. It was winter, and a
+great log was burning in the large fireplace. He had tried to choke
+the flames with ashes before he went to bed, but the wood had blazed
+up again and he had lain quiet, awaiting slumber and blinking
+indifferently at the light. His bedroom overlooked Fifth Avenue. There
+was a large club-house just opposite his house, and cabs and carriages
+still came and went. Varick heard the slam of carriage doors, the
+click of horses' hoofs on the wet asphalt, and congratulated himself
+on the common-sense which had inspired him to go to bed at eleven
+instead of joining the festive throng across the street. He had
+dutifully spent the morning in his father's offices, and then, with a
+warming sense of virtue, had run out of town for a late luncheon and a
+trial of hunters. To-night he was pleasantly tired, but not drowsy.
+When the curtain fell before his surroundings, and he saw them melting
+imperceptibly into others quite foreign to them, he at once recalled
+the similar experience of the year before. With a little quickening of
+his steady heart-beats, he awaited developments.
+
+Yes, here was the old town, with its red roofs, its quaint
+architecture, its crowded, narrow, picturesque streets. But this time
+they seemed almost deserted, and the whole effect of the place was
+bleak and dreary. The leaves had dropped from the trees, the flowers
+had faded, the vines that covered the cottage walls were brown and
+bare. He was pleasantly conscious of the warmth of a sable-lined coat
+he had brought from Russia two years before. He thrust his gloved
+hands deep into its capacious pockets and walked on, his eyes turning
+to right and left as he went. At intervals he saw a bulky masculine
+figure, queerly dressed, turn a corner or enter a house. Once or twice
+one came his way and passed him, but no one looked at him or spoke.
+For a moment Varick was tempted to knock at one of the inhospitably
+closed doors and ask for information and directions, but something--he
+did not know what--restrained him.
+
+When she appeared it was as suddenly as she had come before, with no
+warning, no approach. She was at his elbow--a bewitching thing of furs
+and feminine beauty, French millinery and cordiality. She held out her
+small hand with a fine _camaraderie_.
+
+"Is it not nice?" she asked at once. "I was afraid I should arrive
+first and have to wait alone. I would not have liked that."
+
+He held her hand close, looking down at her from his great height, his
+gray eyes shining into hers.
+
+"Then you knew--you were coming?" he asked, slowly.
+
+"Not until the moment before I came. But when I saw the curtain fall--
+"
+
+"You saw that, too? A thin, gauzy thing, like a transparency?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+He relapsed into silence for a moment, as he unconsciously adapted his
+stride to hers, and they walked on together as naturally as if it were
+an every-day occurrence.
+
+"What do you make of it all?" he at length asked.
+
+She shrugged her shoulders with a little foreign gesture which seemed
+to him, even then, very characteristic.
+
+"I do not know. It frightened me--a little--at first. Now it does not,
+for it always ends and I awake--at home."
+
+"Where is that?"
+
+She hesitated.
+
+"I may not tell you," she said, slowly. "I do not quite know why, but
+I may not. Possibly you may know some time. You, I think, are an
+American."
+
+He stared hard at her, his smooth face taking on a strangely solemn
+expression.
+
+"You mean to say," he persisted, "that this is all a dream--that you
+and I, instead of being here, are really asleep somewhere, on
+different continents?"
+
+She nodded.
+
+"We are asleep," she said, "on different continents, as you say.
+Whether we are dreaming or whether our two souls are taking a little
+excursion through space--oh, who shall say? Who can question the
+wonderful things which happen in this most wonderful world? I have
+ceased to question, but I have also ceased to fear."
+
+He made no reply. Somewhere, in the back of his head, lay fear--a very
+definite, paralyzing fear--that something was wrong with him or with
+her or with them both. Instead of being in the neutral border-land of
+dreams, had he not perhaps passed the tragic line dividing the normal
+mind from the insane? She seemed to read his thoughts, and her manner
+became more gentle, almost tender.
+
+"Is it so very dreadful?" she asked, softly. "We are together, you
+know, my friend. Would it not be worse to wander about alone?"
+
+With a great effort he pulled himself together.
+
+"Infinitely," he said, with gratifying conviction. "And you're--you're
+a trump, you know. I'm ashamed of acting like such a boor. If you'll
+bear with me I'll try from now on to be more like a man and less like
+a fretful ghost."
+
+She clapped her hands.
+
+"Capital!" she cried. "I knew you would--what is the word?--oh yes--
+_adapt_ yourself. And it is only for a little while. You will wake
+very soon. But you ought to enjoy it while it lasts. There are many
+amusing things about it all."
+
+Varick reflected grimly that it was the "amusing things" which
+occasioned his perturbation, but he kept his reflection to himself and
+smiled down at her sunnily.
+
+"For example," she continued, "as we really do not exist here, and as
+we are not visible to these people, we cannot do anything that will
+affect them in any way or attract their attention. Look at that!"
+
+They were passing a small house whose front door, opening on the
+street, stood ajar. Within they could see a stout woman standing at a
+tub and washing busily, and a little girl pouring hot water from a
+quaint kettle into a large pan full of soiled blue dishes. The pan
+stood near the edge of a wooden table, and the little girl was perched
+on a stool just high enough to bring her on a level with her work.
+
+"You are, I am sure, a fine athlete," murmured the woman. "Or else
+your looks belie you," she added, with a roguish upward glance. "Yet
+with all your strength you cannot push that pan of dishes off the
+table."
+
+Without a word, Varick passed through the doorway, strode into the
+house and up to the table. She followed him closely. He attempted to
+seize the pan in his powerful hands--and, to his horror, discovered
+that they held nothing. The pan remained on the table and the child
+was now unconcernedly washing the blue dishes, humming a little folk-
+song as she worked. As if to add to the irony of the situation, the
+small laborer quietly lifted the pan and moved it to a position she
+thought more convenient. This was the last touch. With a stifled
+murmur of intense exasperation, Varick put forth all his strength in a
+supreme effort. The pan fell, the water and broken blue dishes
+covering the floor. He sprang back and stood aghast, gazing at the
+havoc he had wrought.
+
+"Oh, dear! oh, dear!" murmured the voice at his side. "I never dreamed
+you could do it, or I would not have suggested it. Oh, oh, the poor
+little darling!"
+
+For the stout woman at the tub had hastily dropped her work, crossed
+the room, and was soundly chastising the unhappy infant who she
+supposed was responsible for the mischief. Varick caught her arm.
+
+"Oh, I say," he cried, "this won't do at all! She didn't do it; it was
+all my fault. I'll pay for the things. Here--here--"
+
+He fumbled in his pockets as he spoke and pulled out several gold
+pieces. But the fat arm of the old woman offered no resistance to his
+grasp, and the gold pieces did not exist for her. It was evident that
+she saw neither him nor them, nor the woman with him. With an
+unsparing hand she spanked the child, whose voice rose in shrill
+lamentations. Varick and his companion in guilt crept out of the room
+with a sense of great helplessness upon them, and he breathed a long
+breath of relief at finding himself--in bed, with a cold February sun
+shining in through his windows, and the faithful Parker at his side
+with the quieting announcement that his bath was ready.
+
+One of Varick's boon companions in camp and hunting excursions was a
+distinguished New York specialist in nervous diseases. A day or two
+later Varick found it convenient to drop into this man's office and,
+quite casually, tell him the story of his dreams, giving it various
+light touches that he fondly imagined concealed the anxiety that lay
+beneath the recital. "Recurrent dreams," he then learned, were a very
+common human experience and not deserving of much attention.
+
+"Don't think about it," said his friend. "Of course, if you worry over
+it, you'll be dreaming it all the time. Send this 'personally
+conducted tour' to me if you don't like it. I don't mind meeting
+pretty women who are 'dreams,' whether in the flesh or out of it."
+
+As time went on and the dream did not return, Varick decided that he
+would not mind, either. He thought of her a great deal; he even longed
+for her. Eventually he deliberately tried to induce the dream by going
+to bed early, putting himself in the proper mental attitude, as he
+conceived it, and staring wide-eyed into his dimly lighted room. But
+only once in eighteen months was he even partly successful. Then he
+saw the haze, saw the familiar streets, saw her far, far ahead of him,
+and hurrying onward, saw her turn a sharp corner, caught one backward
+look from her dear brown eyes as she vanished--and awoke! He gave much
+thought to that look in the months which followed. He was a modest
+youth, singularly unconscious of his own charms; but the eloquent
+glance had conveyed to him a sense of longing--of more than longing.
+
+Quite an interval elapsed before she came again. There was, first of
+all, the inevitable filmy effect, but, in the vision that succeeded
+it, instead of finding himself in the little town, he was in the
+depths of a great old forest, and in horrible agony. Some accident had
+occurred--he did not know what. He only knew that he was shot,
+suffering, dying! He groaned, and even as he writhed in a spasm of
+pain he saw her sitting on the sward beside him. He turned glazed eyes
+on her. Her brown ones looked back into his with a great love and pity
+in their depths.
+
+"Oh, my dear," she whispered, "I know it seems terribly hard to you.
+And because you think you suffer, it is almost as hard for you as if
+you did. But you are not really hurt, you know. You are not suffering.
+It is all in the dream. You are sound asleep, far, far away."
+
+He forced a sardonic laugh from his stiff throat.
+
+"Not this time," he managed to articulate. "Whatever the others may
+have been, this is no dream. This is the real thing--and death!"
+
+She smoothed the hair back from his damp brow with a beautiful,
+caressing touch. He felt her fingers tremble.
+
+"No," she said. "It is a dream, and almost over."
+
+"Then will you stay with me," he gasped, "to the end?"
+
+"Yes," she promised. "Try to bear it just a moment longer. Courage,
+dear heart! for already you are waking--you are waking--_you--are--
+awake!_"
+
+He was, and it was daylight, and around him were the familiar objects
+of his own room. He wiped his forehead, which was cold and wet. He
+felt utterly exhausted.
+
+"Stay with me to the end!"
+
+If she only would! If he could find her--find her in this warm, human
+world, away from that ghastly border-land where they two met. For in
+that hour he knew he loved--what? A woman or a ghost? A creature of
+this world or a fantasy of the night? Wherever she was, whatever she
+was, he loved her and he wanted her. And in that hour of his agony her
+eyes had told that she loved and wanted him.
+
+It was eight months before they met again. Varick's friends thought
+him changed, and quite possibly he was. The insouciant boy of twenty-
+eight had become a man, a sympathetic, serious, thoughtful man, still
+given to sports and outdoor life, but more than all devoted to a
+search which had taken him to no end of out-of-the-way European towns.
+He was sleeping in one of these one night (not _the_ one, alas!--he
+had not found that) when the veil, now so warmly welcome, fell for the
+fourth time.
+
+He was in an exquisite Italian garden, a place all perfume and May
+breezes and flooding sunshine and overarching blue sky. As he entered
+it he saw her coming to meet him, and he went forward to greet her
+with his pulses bounding and a light in his eyes which no eyes but
+hers had ever seen there. Even in that supreme moment the wonderfully
+_real_ atmosphere of it all impressed him. He heard a dry twig crack
+under his foot as he walked, and he recognized the different perfumes
+of the flowers around him--the heavy sweetness of a few belated orange
+blossoms, the delicate breath of the oleander, the reminiscent perfume
+of the rose. Then their hands met and their eyes, and each drew a long
+breath, and neither spoke for a moment. When Varick found words they
+were very commonplace.
+
+"Oh, my love, my love!" he said. And she, listening to them with
+sudden tears in her brown eyes, seemed to find in them the utmost
+eloquence of the human tongue.
+
+"It has been so long, so long!" he gasped. "I began to think I was
+never to see you again."
+
+They drifted side by side along a winding, rose-hedged path, past an
+old sun-dial, past a triumphant peacock strutting before his mild
+little mate, past a fountain whose spray flung out to them a welcome.
+She led the way with the accustomed step of one who knew and loved the
+place. They came to a marble seat, half hidden by a tangle of vines
+and scarlet blossoms, and sheltered by overhanging oleander branches;
+there she sat down and moved her skirts aside that he might sit close
+to her. Her brown eyes, raised now to his hungry gray ones, looked at
+him with the softened brilliance he had sometimes seen in those of a
+happy child.
+
+"Should you have missed me," she asked, softly, "if you had never seen
+me again? Should you have been sorry?"
+
+He drew a long breath.
+
+"I love you," he said. "Whatever you are, wherever you come from,
+whatever all this means, I love you. I don't understand anything else,
+but I know that. It's the one sure thing, the one real thing, in all
+this tangle."
+
+Without a word she put her hand in his. He could feel distinctly its
+cool, soft, exquisite texture. With an exclamation of delight he drew
+her toward him, but she held herself away, the expression of her
+beautiful face softening the effect of the recoil.
+
+"Not yet, dear," she said, gently. "We must be very careful. You do
+not understand. If you do anything abrupt or sudden you will wake--and
+then we shall be parted again, who knows for how long!"
+
+There were tears in her eyes as she spoke. Seeing them, he buried his
+face in his hands and groaned, while the sense of his utter
+helplessness rolled over him like a flood.
+
+"God!" he broke out, with sudden fierceness. "What devil's trick is
+this? It's not a dream. It can't be a dream. Here we are, two human
+beings in a human world--I'll swear it. Smell that oleander. Listen to
+that bird sing. Hear the trickle of that fountain. And yet you tell me
+that we are asleep!"
+
+She laid her head in the curve of her arm, resting on the ivy-covered
+back of the low seat. Bending over her, he saw that her cheeks were
+wet. The sight made him desperate.
+
+"Don't!" he cried, hoarsely. "Don't do that! Tell me what is expected
+of me. Whatever it is, no matter how hard it is, or how long it takes,
+I'll do it."
+
+She did not reply, but she made a quick little gesture with the hand
+nearest him. It signified hopelessness, almost despair. Darkness began
+to fall, and an early moon hung pale in the heavens. Somewhere in the
+thick bushes near them a nightingale began to sing. To Varick's
+excited fancy there was a heart-breaking pathos in the soft notes.
+They seemed to have been together, he and she, for a long time--for
+hours. He bent his head till it touched hers.
+
+"But you love me?" he asked. She moved a little and wiped her eyes
+with an absurdly tiny, lace-edged square of linen. One corner, he
+noticed, bore an embroidered coronet.
+
+"Yes," she said, very quietly, "I love you."
+
+Her tone as she spoke expressed such entire hopelessness that the full
+sense of her words did not at once come to him. When it did, slowly,
+sweetly, she was speaking again.
+
+"But oh, dearest, dearest!" she broke out, "why do we love? To what
+can love lead us--two poor shadows in a dream world, in which alone we
+can meet?"
+
+He was silent. There seemed, somehow, nothing that he could say,
+though later he thought of many words with which he might have filled
+that throbbing silence. The dusk deepened around them. Off in the
+thicket the nightingale still warbled passionately, and now the stars
+began to come out over their heads, pale as yet against the warm blue
+of the heavens. Varick, sitting stiffly on the old marble bench,
+became conscious of an odd dizziness, and set his teeth with a sudden
+determination to show no evidence of it. She had risen and was moving
+about among the rose-bushes just behind them. Almost before he missed
+her she had returned, holding in her hand a beautiful salmon-hued
+rose, with a flame-colored, crumply heart. He had never before seen
+one like it. As she held it near him it exhaled an exquisitely
+reminiscent perfume--a perfume which seemed to breathe of old joys,
+old memories, and loves of long ago.
+
+"Is it not beautiful?" she said. "It is called the _Toinnette_. Take
+it, dear, and keep it--for memory." Then, as he took it from her, her
+eyes widened in a sudden anguish of dread and comprehension.
+
+"Oh, you're leaving me!" she said. "You're waking. Dearest, dearest,
+stay with me!"
+
+The words and the look that accompanied them galvanized him into
+sudden action. He sprang to his feet, caught her in his arms, held her
+there, crushed her there, kissing her eyes, her hair, her exquisitely
+soft mouth.
+
+"I will not leave you!" he raved. "I swear I won't! I defy the devil
+that's back of this! I swear--" But she, too, was speaking now, and
+her words came to his ears as from a long, long distance, sobbingly,
+with a catch in the breath, but distinct.
+
+"Alas!" she cried, "you have ruined everything! You have ruined
+everything! You will never see me again. Dearest, dearest--"
+
+He awoke. His heart was thumping to suffocation, and he lay exhausted
+on his pillow. It was a dark morning, and a cold rain beat dismally
+against the window-panes. Gone were the Dream Woman, the Italian
+garden, the song of the nightingale, the perfume of flowers. How
+definite that perfume had been! He could smell it yet, all around him.
+It was like--what was it like? He became suddenly conscious of an
+unusual sensation in his hand, lying on the bedspread. He glanced at
+it and then sat up with a sudden jerk that almost threw him off his
+balance. In his upturned palm was a rose--a salmon-colored rose,
+slightly crushed, but fresh and fragrant, with a flame-colored,
+crumply heart. Varick stared at it, shut his eyes, opened them, and
+stared again. It was still there, and, with the discovery that it was,
+Varick became conscious of a prickling of the scalp, a chill along the
+spine. His brown face whitened.
+
+"Well, by all the gods!" he gasped. "How did that thing get here?"
+
+No one ever told him. Possibly no one could except the Dream Woman,
+and her he never saw again; so the mystery was unfathomable. He put
+the rose between the leaves of the Bible his mother had given him when
+he went to college, and which he had not opened since until that
+morning; and the rose became dry and faded as the years passed, quite
+as any other rose would have done.
+
+Varick paid a second and quite casual visit to his medical friend, who
+scoffed at him rudely and urged him to go on a long hunting trip. He
+went, and was singularly successful, and came back with considerable
+big game and a rich, brown complexion. When the doctor asked him
+whether he still awoke from his innocent slumbers to find his little
+hands full of pretty flowers, Varick swore naturally and healthfully,
+turned very red, and playfully thumped the medical man between the
+shoulders with a force that sent that gentleman's eye-glasses off his
+nose. But, notwithstanding all these reassuring incidents, Varick has
+never married; and he remains deeply interested as to the source of
+that rose. He would be very grateful to any one who could tell him
+where the thing came from. The nearest he ever came to this was when a
+man who knew a good deal about flowers once inspected the faded rose,
+at Varick's request, and listened to the description of how it looked
+when fresh.
+
+"Why, yes," he said, "I know that variety. It grows in Italy, but I
+don't think it's known here. They call it the _Toinnette!_"
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+THE EXORCISM OF LILY BELL
+
+
+It is quite possible that not even Raymond Mortimer Prescott himself
+could have told definitely the day or the hour when Lily Bell first
+came into his life; and as Raymond Mortimer Prescott was not only the
+sole person privileged to enjoy Miss Bell's society, but was also the
+sole person who had been permitted to gaze upon her charms at all, it
+would seem that inquiries directed elsewhere were destined to prove
+fruitless. Raymond himself, moreover, was not communicative; he had
+the reserve of an only child whose early efforts at conversation had
+been discouraged by parents selfishly absorbed in "grown-up"
+interests, and whose home was too remote from other country homes to
+attract playmates.
+
+His mother was a nervous invalid, and almost in infancy Raymond had
+grasped the fact that his absence seemed to be of more definite
+benefit to her than any other remedy for neurasthenia. His father was
+a busy man, absent from home for weeks at a time, and bearing this
+exile with a jovial cheerfulness which did not always characterize his
+moods when he deigned to join the family circle. Occasionally the
+elder Prescott experienced a twinge of conscience when he looked at
+his son, ten years of age now, the possessor of a superbly healthy
+body and presumably of the social aspirations of growing Americans. In
+such moments of illumination the father reflected uneasily that "the
+little beggar must have a beastly lonesome time of it"; then,
+surveying the little beggar's choice company of pets, gazing upon the
+dam he had built with his own busy hands, inspecting approvingly his
+prowess in the swimming-hole and with his fish-rods, even noting, in
+his conscientious appraisal of his heir's assets, the self-assertive
+quality of the freckles on his nose and the sunburn on the whole of
+his visage, this perfunctory American parent easily decided that
+nothing need be changed for another year or two. It was impossible
+even for a scrupulous conscience to make a youthful martyr of Raymond
+Mortimer. Not the most rabid New England brand could compass that, and
+certainly Raymond Mortimer Prescott, Sr., had no such possession. The
+housekeeper, Miss Greene, a former trained nurse who had charge of the
+boy in infancy, looked after his clothes and his meals.
+Notwithstanding his steadfast elusiveness, she had also succeeded in
+making him master of extremely elementary knowledge of letters and
+figures. Beyond this he was arrogantly ignorant, even to the point of
+being ignorant of his ignorance. He had his dogs, his rods and tackle,
+his tool-house, unlimited fresh air, sunshine, and perfect health; in
+addition he had Lily Bell.
+
+How long he may have enjoyed the pleasure of this young person's
+company unobserved by his elders is a matter of surmise; it may well
+have been a long time, for family curiosity never concerned itself
+with Raymond Mortimer unless he was annoyingly obtrusive or
+disobedient. But the first domestic records of her arrival, kept
+naturally enough by Miss Greene, whose lonely spinster heart was the
+boy's domestic refuge, went back to a day in June when he was five. He
+was in his nursery and she in an adjoining room, the communicating
+door of which was open. She had heard him in the nursery talking to
+himself, as she supposed, for a long time. At last his voice took on a
+note of childish irritation, and she distinctly heard his words.
+
+"But it won't be right that way," he was saying, earnestly. "Don't you
+see it won't be right that way? There won't be nothing to hold up the
+top."
+
+There was a long silence, in the midst of which Miss Greene stole
+cautiously to the nursery door and looked in. The boy was on his knees
+on the floor, an ambitious structure of blocks before him, which he
+had evidently drawn back to contemplate. His eyes were turned from it,
+however, and his head was bent a little to the left. He wore a look of
+great attention and annoyance. He seemed to be listening to a
+prolonged argument.
+
+"All right," he said, at last. "I'll do it. But it ain't right, and
+you'll be sorry when you see it fall." He hurriedly rearranged the
+block structure, adding to the tremulously soaring tower on the left
+side. True to his prediction, it fell with a crash, destroying other
+parts of the edifice in its downfall. The boy turned on his unseen
+companion a face in which triumph and disgust were equally blended.
+"There, now!" he taunted; "didn't I tell you so, Lily Bell? But you
+never will b'lieve what I say--jes like girls!"
+
+Miss Greene hurriedly withdrew, lifting to the ceiling eyes of awed
+surprise. For some reason which she was subsequently unable to
+explain, she asked the boy no questions; but she watched him more
+closely after this, and discovered that, however remote the date of
+Miss Bell's first appearance, she was now firmly established as a
+daily guest--an honored one whose influence, though mild, was almost
+boundless, and whose gentle behests were usually unhesitatingly
+obeyed. Occasionally, as in the instance of the blocks, Raymond
+Mortimer combated them; once or twice he disobeyed them. But on the
+second of these occasions he drooped mournfully through the day,
+bearing the look of one adrift in the universe; and the observant Miss
+Greene noted that the following day was a strenuous one, occupied with
+eager fulfilment of the unexpressed wishes of Lily Bell, who had
+evidently returned to his side. Again and again the child did things
+he most obviously would have preferred not to do. The housekeeper
+looked on with deep but silent interest until she heard him say, for
+perhaps the tenth time, "Well, I don't like it, but I will if you
+really want me to." Then she spoke, but so casually that the boy,
+absorbed in his play, felt nothing unusual in the question.
+
+"Whom are you talking to, Raymond?" she asked, as she rounded the heel
+of the stocking she was knitting. He replied abstractedly, without
+raising his eyes from the work he was doing.
+
+"To Lily Bell," he said.
+
+Miss Greene knitted in silence for a moment. Then, "Where is she?" she
+asked.
+
+"Why, she's here!" said the child. "Right beside me!"
+
+Miss Greene hesitated and took the plunge. "I don't see her," she
+remarked, still casually.
+
+This time the boy raised his head and looked at her. There was in his
+face the slight impatience of one who deals with an inferior
+understanding.
+
+"'Course you don't," he said, carelessly. "You can't. No one can't see
+Lily Bell but 'cept me."
+
+Miss Greene felt snubbed, but persevered.
+
+"She doesn't seem to be playing very nicely to-day," she hazarded.
+
+He gave her a worried look.
+
+"She isn't," he conceded, "not very. 'Most always she's very, very
+nice, but she's kind of cross to-day. I guess p'r'aps," he speculated,
+frankly, "you're 'sturbing her by talking so much."
+
+Miss Greene accepted the subtle hint and remained silent. From that
+time, however, Raymond Mortimer counted on her acceptance of Lily Bell
+as a recognized personality, and referred to her freely.
+
+"Lily Bell wants us to go on a picnic to-morrow," he announced, one
+day when he was six. "She says let's go on the island under the willow
+an' have egg-san'wiches an' ginger-ale for lunch."
+
+Miss Greene carried out the programme cheerfully, for the child made
+singularly few requests. Thomas, the gardener, was to row them over,
+and Miss Greene, a stout person who moved with difficulty, seated
+herself in the stem of the boat with a sigh of relief, and drew
+Raymond Mortimer down beside her. He wriggled out of her grasp and
+struggled to his feet, his stout legs apart, his brown eyes
+determined.
+
+"You can't sit there, please, Miss Greene," he said, almost austerely.
+"Lily Bell wants to sit there with me. You can take the other seat."
+
+For once the good-natured Miss Greene rebelled.
+
+"I'll do no such thing," she announced, firmly, "flopping round and
+upsetting the boat and perhaps drowning us all. You and your Lily Bell
+can sit together in the middle and let me be."
+
+An expression of hope flitted across the child's face. "Will that do,
+Lily Bell?" he asked, eagerly. The reply was evidently unfavorable,
+for his jaw fell and he flushed. "She says it won't," he announced,
+miserably. "I'm awful sorry, Miss Greene, but we'll have to 'sturb
+you."
+
+If Miss Lily Bell had been in the habit of making such demands, the
+housekeeper would have continued to rebel. As it was, she had grave
+doubts of the wisdom of establishing such a dangerous precedent as
+compliance with the absurd request. But Raymond Mortimer's distress
+was so genuine, and the pleasure of the picnic so obviously rested on
+her surrender, that she made it, albeit slowly and with groans and
+dismal predictions. The boy's face beamed as he thanked her.
+
+"I was so 'fraid Lily Bell would be cross," he confided to her, as he
+sat sedately on his half of the stern-seat. "But she's all right, an'
+we're going to have a lovely time."
+
+That prediction was justified by events, for the occasion was a
+brilliant one, and Lily Bell's share in it so persistent and
+convincing that at times Miss Greene actually found herself sharing in
+the delusion of the little girl's presence. Her good-natured yielding
+in the matter of the seat, moreover, had evidently commended her to
+Miss Bell's good graces, and that young person brought out the
+choicest assortment of her best manners to do honor to the grown-up
+guest.
+
+"Lily Bell wants you to have this seat, Miss Greene, 'cause it's in
+the shade an' has a nice back," said Raymond, delightedly, almost as
+soon as they had reached the island; and Miss Greene flopped into it
+with a sigh of content in the realization that Miss Bell did not
+intend to usurp all the choice spots, as her persistence earlier in
+the day might possibly have suggested to a suspicious mind. There,
+alternately reading and dozing, she incidentally listened to the flow
+of conversation poured forth by her small charge, varied only by
+occasional offerings to her, usually suggested by Miss Bell and
+ranging from the minnow he had succeeded in catching with a worm and a
+bent pin to the choicest tidbits of the luncheon. There were two
+glasses for the ginger-ale. Miss Greene had one and Lily Bell the
+other. Raymond Mortimer gallantly drank from the bottle.
+
+"Why don't you use Lily Bell's glass?" was Miss Greene's very natural
+inquiry. It would seem, indeed, that two such congenial souls would
+have welcomed the closer union this suggestion invited, but Raymond
+Mortimer promptly dispelled that illusion.
+
+"She doesn't want to," he responded, gloomily.
+
+In other details, however, Miss Lily Bell was of an engaging sweetness
+and of a yielding disposition of the utmost correctness. Again and
+again Raymond Mortimer succeeded in convincing her, by the force and
+eloquence of his arguments, of the superiority of his ideas on fort
+building, fishing, and other occupations which filled the day. Miss
+Greene's heart yearned over the boy as he came to her during the mid-
+day heat and cuddled down comfortably by her side, heavy-eyed and
+tired after his exertions.
+
+"Where's Lily Bell?" she asked, brushing his damp hair off his
+forehead and wondering whether she was also privileged to enjoy the
+unseen presence of the guest of honor.
+
+"She's back there under the tree takin' a nap," murmured the boy,
+drowsily, indicating the exact spot with a grimy little hand. "She
+tol' me to come an' stay with you for a while."
+
+Miss Greene smiled, deeply touched by this sweet mingling of coyness
+and thoughtfulness on the maiden's part.
+
+"What does Lily Bell call you?" she asked, with interest. The boy
+snuggled down on the grass beside her and rested his head comfortably
+in her lap.
+
+"She knows my name's Raymond Mortimer," he said, sleepily, "but she
+calls me 'Bill' for short." Then, more sleepily, "I asked her to," he
+added. In another moment his eyelids had dropped and he too was in the
+Land of Nod, whither Lily Bell had happily preceded him.
+
+During the next four years Miss Greene was privileged to spend many
+days in the society of Miss Lily Bell, and the acquaintance between
+them ripened into a pleasant friendship. To her great satisfaction she
+found Miss Bell's name one to conjure with in those moments of
+friction which are unavoidable in the relations of old and young.
+
+"I don't think Lily Bell would like that," she began to say,
+tentatively, when differences of opinion as to his conduct came up
+between Raymond and herself. "I think _she_ likes a gentlemanly boy."
+
+Unless her young charge was in a very obstinate mood the reminder
+usually prevailed, and it was of immense value in overcoming the early
+prejudice of the small boy against soap and water.
+
+"Isn't Lily Bell clean?" she had inquired one day when he was eight
+and the necessity of the daily tubbing was again being emphasized to
+him.
+
+Raymond conceded that she was.
+
+"When she first comes she is," he added. "'Course she gets dirty when
+we play. Why, sometimes she gets awful dirty!"
+
+The excellent and wise woman saw her opportunity, and promptly grasped
+it.
+
+"Ah," she exclaimed, "that's the point. I want you to start out clean
+and to go to bed clean. If you'll promise me to take a tub before you
+dress in the morning, and another before you go to bed at night, I
+don't care how dirty you get in the mean time."
+
+This happy compromise effected, she was moved to ask more particularly
+how Miss Lily Bell looked. She recalled now that she had never heard
+her described. Raymond Mortimer, she discovered, was no better than
+the rest of his sex when it came to a description of feminine features
+and apparel, but on two points his testimony was absolute. Lily Bell
+had curls and she wore pantalettes. The last word was not in his
+vocabulary, and it was some time before he succeeded in conveying the
+correct impression to Miss Greene's mind.
+
+"Don't you remember the little girls in mamma's old Godey books?" he
+asked, at last, very anxiously, seeing that his early imperfect
+description had led to an apparent oscillation of Miss Greene's
+imagination between the paper ruffle of a lamb-chop and a frilly
+sunbonnet. "They have slippers an' 'lastic bands an' scallopy funnels
+coming down under their skirts. Well"--this with a long-drawn sigh of
+relief as she beamed into acquiescence--"that's how Lily Bell looks!"
+
+Long before this the family had accepted Lily Bell as a part of the
+domestic circle, finding her a fairly trustworthy and convenient
+playmate for the boy. Not always, of course; for it was very
+inconvenient to leave a vacant seat beside Raymond Mortimer when they
+went driving, but this had to be done or Raymond stayed at home rather
+than desert his cherished Lily. It was long before his father forgot
+the noble rebuke administered by his son on one occasion when the
+elder Prescott, thoughtlessly ignoring the presence of Miss Bell,
+sought to terminate the argument by sitting down by the boy's side.
+The shrieks of that youth, usually so self-contained, rent the ambient
+air.
+
+"Father, _father!_" he howled, literally dancing up and down in his
+anguish, "you're sitting on Lily Bell!" Then, at the height of the
+uproar, he stopped short, an expression of overwhelming relief
+covering his face. "Oh no, you ain't, either," he cried, ecstatically.
+"She jumped out. But she won't go now, so neither will I"; and he
+promptly joined his imaginary playmate in the road. Pausing there, he
+gave his abashed parent a glance of indescribable reproach and a
+helpful hint on etiquette.
+
+"Don't you know," he asked, stonily, "that gentlemen don't _never_ sit
+on ladies?" Striding gloomily back to the house, presumably close by
+the side of the outraged maiden, he left his convulsed parent to
+survive as best he could the deprivation of their presence. This Mr.
+Prescott did with reluctance. He was beginning to find the society of
+his son and Lily Bell both interesting and exhilarating. He showed, in
+fact, a surprising understanding of and sympathy with "the love-
+affair," as he called it. "The poor little beggar had to have
+something," he said, indulgently, "and an imaginary play-mate is as
+safe as anything I know." Therefore he referred to Miss Bell
+respectfully in conversation with his son, and, save on the tragic
+occasion just chronicled, treated her with distinguished
+consideration.
+
+His wife's acceptance of the situation was less felicitous. Mrs.
+Prescott, whose utter lack of a sense of humor had long saddened her
+domestic circle, suddenly felt the birth of one now that was even more
+saddening, and the cause of it was Lily Bell. She referred to that
+young person wholly without respect, and was convulsed by foolish
+laughter when her son soberly replied. The boy resented this attitude
+--first sullenly, then fiercely.
+
+"She acts as if there _wasn't_ really any Lily Bell," he confided to
+his father, in a moment of such emotion. "I don't think that's nice or
+p'lite, an' it hurts Lily Bell's feelings."
+
+"That's bad," said the father, soberly. "We mustn't have that. I'll
+speak to your mother."
+
+He did subsequently, and to such good effect that the expression of
+Mrs. Prescott's amusement was temporarily checked. But Raymond
+Mortimer's confidence was temporarily blighted, and he kept his little
+friend and his mother as far apart as possible. Rarely after that did
+Lily Bell seek the invalid's room with the boy, though she frequently
+accompanied him to his father's library when that gentleman was home
+and, presumably, listened with awe to their inspiring conversation.
+Mr. Prescott had begun to talk to his boy "as man to man," as he once
+put it, and the phrase had so delighted the boy, now ten, that his
+father freely gave him the innocent gratification of listening to it
+often. Moreover, it helped in certain conversations where questions of
+morals came up. As the small son of an irate father, Raymond Mortimer
+might not have been much impressed by the parental theory that
+watermelons must not be stolen from the patches of their only
+neighbor, a crusty old bachelor. As a man of the world, however,
+listening to the views of one wiser and more experienced, he was made
+to see that helping one's self to the melons of another is really not
+the sort of thing a decent chap can do. Lily Bell, too, held the elder
+man's opinion.
+
+"She says she doesn't like it, either," the boy confided to his father
+with an admiring sigh. "She never would go with me, you know. My!"--
+this with a heavier sigh--"I'm 'fraid if I do all the things you an'
+Lily Bell want me to I'll be awful good!"
+
+His father sought to reassure him on this point, but he himself was
+beginning to cherish a lurking fear of a different character. Was
+longer continuance of this dream companionship really wise? So far, if
+it had influenced the boy at all, it had been for good. But he was
+growing older; he was almost eleven. Was it not time that this
+imaginary child friend should be eliminated in favor of--of what? The
+father's mind came up against the question and recoiled, blankly. Not
+exercise, not outdoor pursuits, not pets, for Raymond Mortimer had all
+these and more. His little girl friend had not made him a milksop. He
+was an active, energetic, live, healthy-minded boy, with all a boy's
+normal interests. When he built kennels for his dogs and made hutches
+for his rabbits, Lily Bell stood by, it is true, but her friendly
+supervision but added to the vigor and excellence of his work. Indeed,
+Lily, despite her pantalettes, seemed to have a sporty vein in her.
+Still, the father reflected uneasily, it could lead to no good--this
+continued abnormal development of the imagination. For Lily Bell was
+as real to the boy at ten as she had been at six.
+
+What could be done? With what entering wedge could one begin to
+dislodge this persistent presence? If one sent the boy away, Lily
+Bell, of course, would go, too. If one brought--if--one--brought--
+
+Mr. Prescott jumped to his feet and slapped his knee with enthusiasm.
+He had solved his problem, and the solution was exceedingly simple.
+What, indeed, but another little girl! A real little girl, a flesh-
+and-blood little girl, a jolly, active little girl, who, as Mr.
+Prescott inelegantly put it to himself, "would make Lily Bell, with
+her ringlets and her pantalettes, look like thirty cents." Surely in
+the circle of their friends and relatives there must be a little girl
+who could be borrowed and introduced--oh, casually and with infinite
+tact!--into their menage for a few months. Mr. Prescott, well pleased
+with himself, winked a Machiavellian wink and sought his wife,
+ostensibly to consult her, but in reality to inform her that he had
+made up his mind, and that it would be her happy privilege to attend
+to the trivial details of carrying out his plan.
+
+In exactly three weeks Margaret Hamilton Perry was established in the
+Prescott homestead for a visit of indefinite length, and in precisely
+three hours after her arrival Margaret Hamilton had annexed the
+Prescott homestead and its inmates and all the things appertaining
+thereto and made them her own. She was the most eager and adorable of
+small, fat girls--alive from the crown of her curly head to the soles
+of her sensible little spring-heeled shoes. As Mr. Prescott
+subsequently remarked in a moment of extreme self-appreciation, if she
+had been made to order she couldn't have filled the bill better. Born
+and bred in the city, the country was to her a mine of unexplored
+delights. The shyness of Raymond Mortimer, suddenly confronted by this
+new personality and the immediate need of entertaining it, gave way
+before the enthusiasm of the little girl over his pets, his favorite
+haunts, the works of his hands--everything in which he had a share.
+Clinging to his hand in a rapturous panic as they visited the animals,
+she expatiated on the privileges of those happy beings who lived
+always amid such delights.
+
+"I wish I didn't ever have to go away again," she ended, wistfully.
+
+"I wish you didn't, either," said Raymond, gallantly, and then was
+shocked at himself. Was this loyalty to Lily Bell? The reflection gave
+a tinge of coldness to his next utterance. When Margaret Hamilton,
+cheered by the tribute, asked, confidently, "May I play with you lots
+and help you to make things?" the boy's response lagged.
+
+"Yes," he said, finally, "if Lily Bell will let you."
+
+"Who's Lily Bell?"
+
+"She--why, she's the girl I play with! Everybody knows Lily Bell!"
+
+"Oh!"
+
+Some of the brightness was gone from the eager face.
+
+"Will she like me?" she asked, at last.
+
+"I don't know--I guess--p'r'aps so."
+
+"Will I like her?"
+
+"I don't know. You can't see her, you know."
+
+"Can't see her? Why can't I see her? Doesn't she come here, ever?"
+
+"Oh yes, she's here all the time, but--" The boy squirmed. For the
+first time in his short life he was--_was_ he--ashamed of Lily Bell?
+No; not that. Never that! He held his small head high, and his lips
+set; but he was a boy, after all, and his voice, to cover the
+embarrassment, took on a tone of lofty superiority.
+
+"Nobody ever does see her but me," he asserted. "They'd like to, but
+they don't."
+
+"Why don't they?"
+
+Verily, this was a persistent child. The boy was in for complete
+surrender, and he made it.
+
+"She ain't a little girl like you," he explained, briefly. "She
+doesn't have any home, and I don't know where she comes from--heaven,
+maybe," he hazarded, desperately, as a sort of "When in doubt, play
+trumps." "But she comes, an' no one but me sees her, an' we play."
+
+"Huh!" This without enthusiasm from Margaret Hamilton Perry. She eyed
+him remotely for a moment. Then, with an effort at understanding, she
+spoke again.
+
+"I shouldn't think that would be very much fun," she said, candidly.
+"Just pretendin' there's a little girl when there ain't! I should
+think it would be lots nicer--" She hesitated, a sense of delicacy
+restraining her from making the point she so obviously had in mind.
+
+"Anyhow," she added, handsomely, "I'll like her an' play with her if
+you do."
+
+Raymond Mortimer was relieved but doubtful. Memories of the extreme
+contrariness of Lily Bell on occasion overcame him.
+
+"If she'll let you," he repeated, doggedly.
+
+Margaret Hamilton stared at him and her eyes grew big.
+
+"Won't you let me, if she doesn't?" she gasped. "Why--why--" The
+situation overcame her. The big, brown eyes filled suddenly. A small
+gingham back rippling with fat sobs was presented to Raymond Mortimer.
+In him was born immediately man's antipathy to woman's tears.
+
+"Oh, say," he begged, "don't cry; please don't." He approached the
+gingham back and touched it tentatively. "She will let you play with
+us," he urged. And then, moved to entire recklessness as the sobs
+continued, "_I'll make her!"_ he promised. The gingham back stopped
+heaving; a wet face was turned toward him, and a rainbow arched their
+little heaven as Margaret Hamilton smiled. Her first triumph was
+complete.
+
+It is to be regretted that Lily Bell did not at once lend herself to
+the fulfilment of this agreeable understanding. True, she appeared
+daily, as of yore, and Margaret Hamilton was permitted to enter her
+presence and join her games, but the exactions of Lily Bell became
+hourly more annoying. It was evident that Raymond Mortimer felt them
+as such, for his anguished blushes testified to the fact when he
+repeated them to the victim.
+
+"She wants you to go away off and sit down, so's you can't hear what
+we're saying," he said to Margaret Hamilton one day. "I don't think
+it's very p'lite of her, but she says you must."
+
+This brief criticism of Lily Bell, the first the boy had ever uttered,
+cheered the little girl in her exile. "Never mind," she said. "I don't
+care--much. I know it isn't your fault." For by this time she, too,
+was under the influence of the spell of convincing reality which
+Raymond Mortimer succeeded in throwing over his imaginary friend.
+
+"She does things Ray wouldn't do," she once confided to Miss Greene.
+"I mean," hastily, as she suddenly realized her own words--"I mean she
+makes him think--he thinks she thinks--Oh, I don't know how to 'splain
+it to you!" And Margaret Hamilton hastily abandoned so complicated a
+problem. In reality she was meeting it with a wisdom far beyond her
+years. The boy was in the grip of an obsession. Margaret Hamilton
+would have been sadly puzzled by the words, but in her wise little
+head lay the idea they convey.
+
+"He thinks she really is here, an' he thinks he's got to be nice to
+her because they're such ve-ry old fren's," she told herself. "But she
+isn't very nice lately, an' she makes him cross, so maybe by-an'-by
+he'll get tired an' make her act better; or maybe--"
+
+But that last "maybe" was too daring to have a place even in the very
+furthest back part of a little girl's mind.
+
+She lent herself with easy good-nature to Lily Bell's exactions. She
+had no fondness for that young person, and she let it be seen that she
+had none, but she was courteous, as to a fellow-guest.
+
+"Pooh! I don't mind," was her usual comment on Miss Bell's behests;
+and this cheerful acceptance threw into strong relief the dark shadows
+of Lily Bell's perversity. Once or twice she proposed a holiday.
+
+"Couldn't we go off somewhere, just by ourselves, for a picnic," she
+hazarded, one morning--"an' not ask Lily Bell?"
+
+It was a bold suggestion, but the conduct of Miss Bell had been
+especially reprehensible the day before, and even the dauntless spirit
+of Margaret Hamilton was sore with the strife.
+
+"Wouldn't you like a--a rest, too?" she added, insinuatingly.
+Apparently the boy would, for without comment he made the preparations
+for the day, and soon he and the child were seated side by side in the
+boat in which the old gardener rowed them over to their beloved
+island.
+
+It was a perfect day. Nothing was said about Lily Bell, and her
+presence threw no cloud on those hours of sunshine. Seated adoringly
+by the boy's side, Margaret Hamilton became initiated into the
+mysteries of bait and fishing, and the lad's respect for his companion
+increased visibly when he discovered that she could not only bait his
+hooks for him, but could string the fish, lay the festive board for
+luncheon, and set it forth. This was a playmate worth while. Raymond
+Mortimer, long a slave to the exactions of Lily Bell, for whom he had
+thanklessly fetched and carried, relaxed easily into the comfort of
+man's more congenial sphere, and permitted himself to be waited on by
+woman.
+
+In such and other ways the month of August passed. Margaret Hamilton,
+like the happy-hearted child she was, sang through the summer days and
+knitted more closely around her the hearts of her companions.
+
+With the almost uncanny wisdom characteristic of her, she refrained
+from discussing Lily Bell with the other members of the family.
+Possibly she took her cue from Raymond Mortimer, who himself spoke of
+her less and less as the weeks passed; but quite probably it was part
+of an instinct which forbids one to discuss the failings of one's
+friends. Lily Bell was to Margaret Hamilton a blot on the boy's
+scutcheon. She would not point it out even to him, actively as her
+practical little soul revolted against his self-deception. Once,
+however, in a rare moment of candor, she unbosomed herself to Mr.
+Prescott.
+
+"I don't like her very well," she said, referring, of course, to Lily
+Bell. "She's so silly! I hate to pretend an' pretend an' do things we
+don't want to do when we could have such good times just by
+ourselves."
+
+She buried her nose in his waistcoat as she spoke and sniffed rather
+dismally. It had been a trying day. Lily Bell had been much _en
+evidence_, and her presence had weighed perceptibly upon the spirits
+of the two children.
+
+"Can't you get rid of her?" suggested the man, shamelessly. "A real
+meat little girl like you ought to do away with a dream kid--an
+imaginary girl--don't you think?"
+
+Margaret Hamilton raised her head and looked long into the eyes that
+looked back at her. The man nodded solemnly.
+
+"I'd try if I were you," he said. "I'd try mighty hard. You don't want
+her around. She's spoiling everything. Besides," he added, half to
+himself, "it's time the boy got over his nonsense."
+
+Margaret Hamilton reflected, her small face brightening.
+
+"Are you very, very sure it wouldn't be wicked?" she asked, hopefully.
+
+"Yep. Perfectly sure. Go in and win!"
+
+Greatly cheered by this official sanction, Margaret Hamilton the
+following day made her second suggestion of a day _a deux_.
+
+"All by ourselves," she repeated, firmly. "An' not Lily Bell, 'cos
+she'd spoil it. An' you row me to the island. Don't let's take
+Thomas."
+
+This was distinctly wrong. The children were not allowed to take the
+boat save under Thomas's careful eye; but, as has been pointed out,
+Margaret Hamilton had her faults. Raymond Mortimer struggled weakly in
+the gulf of temptation, then succumbed and went under.
+
+"All right," he said, largely, "I will. We'll have lunch, too, and
+p'r'aps I'll build a fire."
+
+"We'll play we're cave-dwellers," contributed Margaret Hamilton, whose
+invention always exceeded his own, and whose imagination had recently
+been stimulated by Miss Greene, who occasionally read aloud to the
+children. "You hunt an' get the food an' bring it home, an' I'll cook
+it. You be the big, brave man an' I'll be your--your mate," she
+concluded, quoting freely from the latest interesting volume to which
+she had lent an ear.
+
+The picture appealed to Raymond Mortimer. With a manly stride he
+approached the boat, helped her in, loosened it from its moorings, and
+cast off. His brow dark with care, he loftily ordered her to steer,
+and spoke no more until they had safely made their landing.
+
+Alone on their desert island, the two children faithfully carried out
+the programme of the day. With dry branches gathered by his mate the
+intrepid male soon made a fire, and retreating hurriedly to a point
+comfortably distant from it, they gazed upon their work. Fishing and
+the cleaning and cooking of their catch filled the morning; and if,
+indeed, the cleaning is something the mind would mercifully pass over,
+those chiefly concerned were satisfied and ate with prodigious
+appetite.
+
+"It's awful funny," said Raymond Mortimer, comfortably, as they
+reposed under a tree after their repast, "but when Lily Bell an' I
+used to come here--"
+
+He stopped and gazed apprehensively behind him, as if fearful that the
+unbidden guest was even now within hearing. Apparently reassured, he
+resumed: "When Lily Bell an' I used to come we 'most always went to
+sleep after awhile. I--we--got kind of tired talking, I guess. But
+when you an' I talk I don't get tired."
+
+Margaret Hamilton flushed with delight, but an excess of maidenly
+modesty overcame her at the same moment.
+
+"Why don't you?" she inquired, coyly.
+
+"'Cos I like you better."
+
+Margaret Hamilton gasped, sputtered, looked around her. Everything was
+in its place; there had been no submarine upheaval. The boy was there
+and he had said this thing, the full meaning of which burst suddenly
+upon her. Rising to her feet, she hurled herself upon him with the
+impetuosity of her intense nature.
+
+"Do you really?" she gasped and gurgled. "Do you? Oh, do you? Oh, Ray,
+I'm so glad!"
+
+And she kissed him!
+
+Disengaging himself with dignity from the clinging embrace of the
+maiden, the outraged youth rose to his feet.
+
+"Don't you ever do that again, Margaret Hamilton Perry," he said,
+slowly, and with awful sternness. "Don't you ever. Lily Bell never,
+never did such a thing!"
+
+She retreated, but unabashed.
+
+"It's 'cause I was so glad," she said, happily. "Real girls always do;
+they're like that. But I won't any more. You like me best, just the
+same, don't you?" she inquired, anxiously.
+
+He came cautiously nearer.
+
+"Yes, I do," he said, coldly, "but don't you try that any more, or I
+won't!"
+
+Then they talked of cave-dwellers, and of the pleasant warmth of an
+open-air fire on an August day, and of marvellous things they would do
+during the coming weeks. And the absorption of their conversation was
+such that when the faithful Thomas, having rowed after them,
+stealthily approached and smote the boy upon the back, they yelled in
+startled unison.
+
+That no rancor lingered in the mind of Raymond Mortimer toward the
+too-demonstrative Margaret Hamilton was proved by the careless remark
+he made to his father when, some days later, that gentleman uttered a
+jocund inquiry as to the health of Lily Bell.
+
+His son stared at him for an instant, as one who seeks to recall the
+snows of yester-year.
+
+"Oh," he said, at last, "I haven't seen her for a long time. She
+doesn't come round now."
+
+Then, as his father grinned widely over these melancholy tidings, the
+son flushed crimson.
+
+"Well, I don't care," he said, hotly. "It's all your fault. Didn't you
+tell me I had to 'muse Margaret? Didn't you? Well--I am. I ain't got
+time for two. An', anyhow," he concluded, with Adamitic instinct,
+"Lily Bell stopped coming herself!"
+
+The exorcism of Lily Bell was complete. Unlike more substantial Lily
+Bells of larger growth, she had known how to make her disappearance
+coincide with a wish to that effect on the part of her gentleman
+friend.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+HER LAST DAY
+
+
+For some time--possibly an hour or more--she sat perfectly still,
+staring at a wavering line made on the floor by a stray sunbeam which
+had forced its way through the window of her hotel sitting-room. At
+first she looked unseeingly, with the dull, introspective gaze of the
+melancholic. Then she began to notice the thing, and to fear it, and
+to watch for outlines of a quivering human face, and to tremble a
+little. Surely there had been a face--she thought vaguely, and
+puckered her brow in an effort to remember. It was half an hour before
+she realized what it was, and the passing of fifteen minutes more had
+been ticked off by a clock on the table near her when she lifted her
+glance enough to follow the beam along the floor, up the wall, to the
+pane where it had entered. She rose suddenly. It was long since she
+had made a consciously voluntary movement, and she knew this. She drew
+a deep breath as she stood up, and almost on the instant she
+experienced a life-giving sensation of poise and freedom. The weight
+fell from her feet, the blackness in which she had lived for weeks
+unwrapped itself from around her like a departing fog, her lax muscles
+tightened. She groped her way to the window and stood there for a
+moment, resting her cheek against the cool pane and gazing up at the
+sky. Presently her eyes dropped to the level of a distant water-line,
+and she saw the river and the trees that fringed its distant bank, and
+the swiftly moving boats on its surface.
+
+She was better. She knew all that this meant, how much and how little.
+For an interval, long or short, as it should happen to be, she was
+again a rational human being. She abruptly swerved around from the
+window and swept the room with her eyes, recognizing it as the one she
+was occupying before she "went under," as she put it to herself, and
+trying, from association with the familiar objects around her, to form
+some idea of the length of this attack.
+
+At the beginning of her breakdown the intervals between intelligent
+consciousness and insanity had been long. She was herself, or was able
+to keep herself fairly in hand, the greater part of the time, and
+chaos, when it came, lasted only for a few days or weeks. Recently
+this condition had been reversed. She had lost knowledge of time, but
+she felt that centuries must have passed since those last flying,
+blessed hours when she knew herself at least for what she was. She
+grasped now at her returning reason, with a desperate, shuddering
+little moan, which she quickly stifled. Some one must be near, she
+remembered, on guard: her nurse, or a hotel maid if the nurse was
+taking one of her infrequent outings. Whoever was in charge of her
+must be in the next room, for the door was open between the two. The
+nurse would welcome her return, the patient reflected. It was her
+habit--a singularly pathetic habit, the nurse had found it--to refer
+always to her attacks as "absences," and to temporary recovery as
+"returns."
+
+She moved toward the open door and then stopped, feeling suddenly that
+she was not yet ready to talk to any one, even the nurse, for whom she
+had a casually friendly feeling based on dependence and continued
+association. She wished to think--dear God, to be able to think
+again!--and there seemed so much thinking to be done and so little
+time in which to do it. Her heart dropped a beat as she realized that.
+On how much time could she safely count, she wondered. A week? A few
+days? It had never been less than a week, until the last episode. She
+turned from the thought of that with a sick shudder, but memory
+dragged it up and ruthlessly held it before her--the hour, the moment,
+the very place she was sitting when it occurred. She had been talking
+to a friend, who unconsciously said something that annoyed and excited
+her. She saw now that friend's face growing dim before her eyes--at
+first puzzled, then frightened, then writhing and twisting into
+hideous shapes, she thought, until in her horror she had struck at it.
+She must not think of that, she knew, as she set her teeth and pulled
+herself up short. She had a will of extraordinary strength, her
+physicians and nurses had conceded, and she resolved that it should
+serve her now. With grim determination she pieced together the patches
+of memory left to her. She had had three days then--three short days.
+She dared not count on even that much respite now, though she might
+possibly have it and more. But one day--surely Providence would let
+her have one day--one _last_ day. Her friends and the specialists had
+begun to talk of asylums. She had heard whispers of them before she
+succumbed to this last attack; and though her memory of what occurred
+in it was mercifully vague, she dimly recalled struggles and the
+shrieks of some one in agony--her own shrieks, she knew now, though
+she had not known it then. It all meant that she was getting worse and
+more "difficult." It all meant chronic invalidism, constant care,
+eventual confinement.
+
+Her brain was now abnormally clear, supernaturally active. It worked
+with an eager deference, as if striving to atone for the periods when
+it failed her. The little clock struck ten. It was early--she had a
+long day before her, a beautiful spring day; for she noticed now the
+tender green of the leaves and the youth of the grass. How interesting
+it would be, she reflected, idly, to go out into the free, busy world
+and mingle with human beings, and walk the city streets and come into
+touch with life and the living. She would go, she would spend the day
+that way; but, alas! the nurse would go, too--cool, kind,
+professional, alert, quietly watchful. If she could in any way elude
+her and go alone. ...
+
+Her eyes narrowed and took on a look of cunning as she turned them
+sidewise toward the open door. As stealthily as a cat she crept to it
+and looked in. On a divan in the farthest corner the nurse lay
+stretched in a deep sleep, whose unpremeditatedness was shown by the
+book which lay on the floor, dropped, evidently, from her suddenly
+relaxed fingers. The patient retreated as noiselessly as she had
+advanced, and, going to a mantel-mirror in her sitting-room, turned on
+her reflection there a long and frightened look. She saw a woman of
+thirty-five, thin, pale, haggard, high-bred. Her hair had been
+arranged in accordance with the nurse's conception of comfort and
+economy of time, and though her gown was perfect in its fit and
+tailor-made severity, the lace at her neck and in the sleeves of her
+silk waist was not wholly fresh. Her lips curled as she looked. This
+was she, Alice Stansbury, the wreck of a woman who had once had health
+and beauty and wealth and position. The last two were in a degree left
+to her, but what difference did it make how she looked, she asked
+herself, harshly. Even as the thought came, however, she took off her
+waist and sewed clean lace cuffs on the sleeves, replacing the collar
+with a fresh one. Then she took down her hair and rearranged it,
+rapidly but with care. It was a simple matter to change her slippers
+for walking-boots, and to find her hat and coat and gloves in their
+old places. Miss Manuel, the nurse, _was_ reliable, she told herself
+again as she put them on, feeling a moment's gratitude to the woman
+for trying to keep her "up," even during her "absences," to something
+approaching the standard a gentlewoman's birth and breeding demanded.
+Her money, or at least a large part of it, for she did not stop to
+count it, she found in the despatch-box where she had put it on their
+arrival in New York, and the key was with others on a ring in the
+private drawer of her writing-desk. Hurriedly she selected several
+large bills and put them into a silver purse, pressing it deep into
+the pocket of her walking-skirt with some vague fear that she might
+lose it. Then she replaced the box and locked the desk, dropping the
+key in her pocket. Her movements were extraordinarily swift and
+noiseless. In twenty minutes from the time she had looked in on the
+nurse she was ready for the street.
+
+A second glance into the inner room showed her that Miss Manuel was
+still sleeping. She regarded her distrustfully for an instant, and on
+a sudden impulse sat down at her desk and wrote a message on a sheet
+of the hotel paper.
+
+"I am going out for the day. _I will return to-night._ Do nothing,
+consult no one. I am quite able to take care of myself. Don't make a
+sensation for the newspapers! ALICE STANSBURY."
+
+"That last sentence will quiet her," she reflected, with cool
+satisfaction, as she pinned the note to the side of the mirror. "She
+won't care to advertise far and wide that she has temporarily mislaid
+a patient!"
+
+The most difficult thing of all remained to be done. The outer door of
+her own room was locked and the key was missing. To leave the
+apartment she must pass through the room where Miss Manuel lay asleep.
+She held her breath, but crossed in safety, though Miss Manuel stirred
+and murmured something, as if subconsciously warned of danger. Miss
+Stansbury closed the door noiselessly behind her and stood silent for
+a moment in the hall, glancing about her and planning the wisest
+method of getting away. She knew better than to enter any of the hotel
+elevators. While there was no certainty that she would be detained if
+she did, there had been a great deal of interest in her when she
+arrived at the hotel, and there was every chance that some employe
+might think it a wise precaution to ask her nurse a question or two
+after she departed. Then Miss Manuel would be hot upon her trail, and
+her day would be spoiled. She crept cautiously along the rear halls,
+keeping out of sight on each floor when the elevators were passing,
+and meeting only strangers and one preoccupied porter. Her rooms were
+on the fifth floor, but she descended the four flights of stairs in
+safety, and, going triumphantly out of the rear entrance of the hotel,
+found herself in the quiet street on which it opened. The great
+building was on a corner, and as she crossed its threshold she saw a
+trolley-car passing along the avenue at her right. On a quick impulse
+she signalled. When it stopped she entered and seated herself in a
+corner, surveying her fellow-passengers with seeming unconcern, though
+her breath came fast. She was safe; she was off! She decided to ride
+on until she made her plans and knew in more detail what should be
+done with this gift of the gods, a day that was all her own.
+
+It had been a long time since she had been alone, she suddenly
+remembered. There had been outings, of course, and shopping
+expeditions and the like, but always Miss Manuel or one of her kind
+had been at her elbow--sometimes professionally cheerful, sometimes
+professionally grave, but at all times professionally watchful. The
+woman exulted fiercely in her new-found liberty. She had hours before
+her--free, glorious hours. She would use them, fill them, squander
+them in a prodigal spending, following every impulse, indulging every
+desire, for they were hers and they were her last. In the depths of
+her brain lay a resolution as silent, as deadly, as a coiled serpent
+waiting to strike. She would enter no asylums, she would endure no
+more "absences," she would have no more supervision, no more
+consultations, no more half-concealed fear of friends, no more pity
+from strangers. There was a way of escaping all this forever, and she
+knew it and would take it, though it led across the dim threshold over
+which she could never return.
+
+The car hummed as it sped along. At a distance she saw an entrance to
+Central Park, and from the inside the branches of trees seemed to wave
+a salute to her in honor of her freedom. She signalled to the
+conductor and left the car, retracing her steps until she entered the
+Park. She was far up-town, near the northern end of it, and the paths,
+warm in the spring sunshine, were almost deserted. For a while she
+strolled idly about, her senses revelling in the freshness and beauty
+around her, in the green vistas that opened to right and left, and the
+soft breeze that fanned her face. Children, riding tricycles or
+rolling hoops, raced past her; and once, after she had walked almost
+an hour, a small boy of four slipped his hand into her gloved one and
+trotted beside her for a moment, to the open scandal of his nurse. She
+smiled down at him, pleased by the touch of his little fingers. When
+he left, as abruptly as he had joined her, and in response to a
+stentorian Irish summons from the rear, she felt a rather surprising
+degree of regret. The momentary contact had given her a pleasant sense
+of companionship; for the first time it came to her that it would be
+better to have a sharer of this day of days--no hireling, no
+scientific-eyed caretaker, but a little child or a friend, some one,
+any one, whom she liked and who liked her, and who, like the little
+boy, did not know the truth about her.
+
+Her spirits dropped as suddenly as they had risen, and she felt tired
+and disappointed. Almost unconsciously she dropped on a bench to rest,
+her eyes still following the figure of the child, now almost out of
+sight around a distant bend. The bench was off the path, and she had
+been too preoccupied when she sat down to notice that it had another
+occupant; but as the figure of her little friend vanished and she
+turned her eyes away with a sigh, she found herself looking into those
+of a man. He was very young, hardly more than a boy, and he occupied
+the far end of the seat, one arm thrown across the back of it, his
+knees crossed, and his body so turned that he faced her. The thing she
+saw in his eyes held her own fastened to them, at first in surprise,
+then in sudden comprehension. It was hunger. With a long look she took
+him in--the pinched pallor of his smooth, handsome young face, the
+feverish brightness of his gray eyes, the shabbiness of his well-made,
+well-fitting clothes, even the rent in the side of one of his patent-
+leather shoes. His linen was clean, and his cuffs were fastened with
+cheap black links; she reflected instinctively that he had pawned
+those whose place they obviously filled, and then her mind returned at
+once to her first discovery, that he was hungry. There was no
+mistaking it. She had never seen hunger in a face before, but she
+recognized it now. He had taken off his hat and dropped it on the
+bench beside him. His brown hair was short and wavy, and one lock on
+his left temple was white. He had been writing a note, or possibly an
+advertisement for work, with a stub of lead-pencil on a scrap of paper
+resting on his knee, and now he suddenly raised his eyes--either in an
+abstracted search for the right word or because her appearance had
+startled him.
+
+Without hesitation she spoke to him.
+
+"Pardon me," she said, impersonally. "May I ask you some questions?"
+
+He looked at her, and the understanding of his situation revealed in
+her glance brought the blood to his face. He straightened himself, his
+lips parting for a reply, but she gave him no time to speak.
+
+"I am a stranger here," she continued, "and New York is not always
+kind to strangers. You seem to be unhappy, too. I wonder if we cannot
+help each other."
+
+He smiled with an unyouthful bitterness.
+
+"I'm afraid I'm not much use--to myself or any one else," he answered,
+with hard deliberation. Then his face underwent a change as he looked
+at hers and read in it, inexperienced as he was, some of the tragic
+writing of Fate's inexorable hand. His voice showed his altered mood.
+
+"Of course," he added, quickly, "if there's really anything I can do.
+I know the town well enough. Perhaps I can help you if you want to get
+anywhere. What is it you would like?"
+
+Her face, under the sudden idea which came to her, could hardly be
+said to brighten, but it changed, becoming less of a mask, more human.
+She felt a thrill of unaccustomed interest, less in him than in the
+plan which he unconsciously suggested. Here at last was something to
+do. Here was a companion who did not know her. He was watching her
+closely now, and it came to him for the first time, with a sense of
+surprise, that this strange woman who had spoken to him was not old,
+and was even attractive.
+
+"I think you can help me, if you will," she went on, quietly. "As I
+have said, I am a stranger in New York. I have never seen anything of
+it except the streets I passed through this morning between the Park
+and my hotel. But I've always wanted to see it, and to-day is my first
+and only opportunity, for I am going away to-night."
+
+He surveyed her thoughtfully. The shadow had returned to his face, and
+it was plain that under his air of courteous interest stirred the
+self-despair she had surprised in her first look at him.
+
+"Of course I can make out a sight-seer's list for you," he said, when
+she stopped, "and I will, with pleasure. I think you'd better drop
+into the Metropolitan Art Galleries while you're in the Park. I'll
+write the other places in their street order going down-town, so you
+won't waste time doubling on your tracks. Have you a bit of paper?"
+
+He began to fumble in his own pockets as he spoke, but vaguely, as one
+who knows the search is vain. She shook her head.
+
+"No," she told him, "and I don't want one. That isn't my idea at all--
+a list of places to look up all alone and a dismal round of dreary
+sight-seeing. What I would like"--she smiled almost demurely--"is a
+'personally conducted' tour. Are you very busy?"
+
+He flushed again and looked at her, this time with a veiled suspicion
+in his glance. She met it with such calm appreciation that it changed
+to one of surprised doubt. She knew perfectly what was passing in his
+mind, and it caused her no more concern than the puzzled silence of a
+child who has heard a new word. She went on as complacently as if he
+were the little boy who had walked beside her a few moments before.
+
+"In Paris and London," she remarked, "one can engage a guide, a
+gentleman, for a day at a fixed price. Probably there are such guides
+here in New York, if I knew where they were to be found and had the
+time to look for them. You are much younger than I am. You might
+almost be my son! Moreover, you will not mind my saying that I fancied
+you were unemployed and possibly were looking for employment. You can
+hardly help seeing the definite connection in all this."
+
+His eyes met hers for a moment and then dropped. He blushed boyishly.
+
+"I see you're trying to help me," he murmured, apologetically.
+
+She went on as if she had not heard him.
+
+"Let me employ you for the day. I need amusement, interest,
+occupation--more than you can imagine. I am in the same mood, as far
+as desolation and discouragement go, that you are in. I must be about,
+seeing people and diverting my mind. We can each supply the other with
+one thing that we need. I have money. To earn a little of that
+professionally, by a humane service, should really appeal to you."
+
+Something in her voice as she uttered the last words made him turn
+toward her again. As he looked, his young face softened. She waited in
+silence for what he would say.
+
+He sat up and straightened his shoulders with a quick gesture.
+
+"You are right," he said, "but I'm awfully afraid you'll get the worst
+of it. I'm not an ornamental escort for a lady, as you see." He looked
+at his broken shoe, and then at her. Her expression showed entire
+indifference to the point he had raised.
+
+"We will consider it settled," she said. "You will take my purse and
+pay our joint expenses. I think," she went on, as she handed it to
+him, "we'll omit the Metropolitan. After miles of the Louvre and the
+Luxembourg and the Vatican, I don't seem to crave miles of that.
+Suppose we take a cab and drive round. I want to see the streets, and
+the crowds, and the different types of men and women, and the slums. I
+used to be interested in Settlement work, long ago."
+
+"Pardon me," he said. "You have won your case. I will serve you to the
+best of my ability. But as a preliminary I insist on counting the
+money in this purse, and on your seeing that my accounts are all
+right."
+
+"Do as you like about that," she replied, indifferently, but her
+glance rested on him with a glint of approval.
+
+He deliberately counted the bills. "There are three hundred and forty
+dollars," he said, replacing them.
+
+She nodded absently. She had sunk into a momentary reverie, from which
+he did not arouse her until she suddenly looked at her watch. "Why,
+it's after twelve!" she exclaimed, with more animation than she had
+yet shown. "We'll go to Delmonico's or Sherry's for luncheon, and make
+our programme while we're there."
+
+He started, and leaned forward, fixing his eyes on her, but she did
+not meet them. She replaced her watch in her belt with a successful
+assumption of abstraction, but she was full of doubt as to how he
+would take this first proposition. The next instant the bench trembled
+under the force with which he had dropped back on it.
+
+"God!" he cried, hoarsely, "it's all a put-up job to feed me because
+you suspect I'm hungry! No, you don't even suspect--you _know_ I'm
+hungry!"
+
+She put her hand on his arm, and the gesture silenced him.
+
+"Be quiet," she said. "Suppose you are hungry? What of it? Is it a
+disgrace to be hungry? Men and women deliberately cultivate the
+condition! Come," she ended, as she rose abruptly, "keep to your
+bargain. We both need our luncheon."
+
+He replaced the purse in the inside-pocket of his coat, and rose. They
+walked a few moments without a word. She noticed how well he carried
+himself and how muscular and athletic his figure appeared even in its
+shabby clothes. As they strolled toward the nearest exit she talked of
+the Park, and asked him a few matter-of-fact questions, to which he
+replied with growing animation. "I can't give you figures and
+statistics, I'm afraid," he added, smiling.
+
+She shook her head. "It would be sad if you could," she said. "Give me
+anything but information. As for statistics, I've a constitutional
+distaste for them. Where can we find a cab?"
+
+"We won't find a cab," he explained, with an authoritative
+independence which somehow appealed to her. "We'll take this trolley-
+car and ride to within a short walk of Delmonico's. After luncheon
+we'll find cabs at every turn."
+
+He helped her into a car as he spoke, and paid their fare from her
+purse, flushing as he had to change a five-dollar note to do so. The
+simple act emphasized for him, as no words could have done, his
+peculiar relation to this strange woman, whom he had never seen until
+half an hour ago. Balancing the purse in his hand, he glanced at her,
+taking in almost unconsciously the tragic droop of her lips, the
+prematurely gray locks in her dark hair, and the unchanging gloom of
+her brown eyes.
+
+"How do you know I won't drop off the car at some corner and abscond
+with this?" he asked, in a low voice.
+
+She looked at him calmly.
+
+"I think I know you will not. But if you did it would hurt me."
+
+"Would it spoil your day?"
+
+"Yes," she conceded, "it would spoil my day."
+
+"Well," he announced, judiciously, "you shall not have to reproach me
+with anything of that kind. Your day shall be a success if I can make
+it so."
+
+His manner was more than gentle. His mood was one of gratitude and
+pleasant expectation. He was getting to know her and was sorry for
+her--possibly because she trusted him and was sorry for him. She was
+not the companion he would have chosen for a day's outing, and it was
+doubtful if she would be any too cheerful; but he would serve her
+loyally, wherever this queer adventure led, and he was young enough to
+appreciate its possibilities. Inwardly she was amused by his little
+affectation of experience, of ripe age addressing youth, but it was so
+unconsciously done, so unconquerably youthful, that it added to the
+interest he had aroused in her. She liked, too, his freshness and
+boyish beauty, and his habit of asserting his sense of honor above
+everything. Above all things, she liked his ignorance of her. To him,
+she was merely a woman like other women; there was a satisfaction to
+her in that thought as deep as it was indescribable. The only other
+occupants of the car were a messenger-boy, lost to his surroundings in
+a paper-covered novel, and a commercial traveller whose brow was
+corrugated by mental strain over a notebook.
+
+"There are some things I would like to do in New York," she confided.
+"We will do them now--lunch at Delmonico's, go sight-seeing all the
+afternoon, dine at Sherry's, and go to the theatre this evening. Which
+is the best play in town?"
+
+"Well--er--that, you know, depends on what you like," hazarded the
+boy, sagely. "Do you prefer comedy, tragedy, or melodrama?"
+
+She reflected.
+
+"Something light," she decided; "something airy and effervescent--with
+no problems or even thoughts in it."
+
+His eyes twinkled as he smiled at her. If these were her tastes, she
+was getting on, he reflected, and the vista of the long day before him
+offered attractions.
+
+"'Peter Pan'!" he exclaimed. "That's all those things. I've not seen
+it, but I've read the criticisms, and I know a fellow who has gone
+five times."
+
+"Testimony enough," agreed his companion. "We'll go to 'Peter Pan.'
+Now tell me something about yourself."
+
+"Is that in the bond?"
+
+"No. That would be a gift."
+
+"I'd--I'd rather not, if you don't mind."
+
+He indulged in his inevitable painful blush as he spoke, but she
+stared at him without pity and with a sudden hauteur which gave him a
+glimpse of another side of her complex nature. This woman who picked
+up strange youths in the street and spent the day with them was
+obviously accustomed to unquestioning deference from others. He edged
+away from her, firm but unhappy.
+
+"You're right," she said, at last. "We'll add a clause to our compact
+and play we're disembodied spirits. Neither of us will ask the other a
+personal question."
+
+"Agreed, and thank you. It's not that I wouldn't be flattered, you
+know, by your interest, and all that," he went on, awkwardly. "It's
+only because it's such a beastly harrowing recital and shows me up in
+such--such an inefficient light. It would depress you, and it couldn't
+do me any good. The things about myself are what I want to get away
+from--for a while."
+
+They were soon at Delmonico's, and she followed him into the main
+dining-room, where she selected a table at a window looking out on the
+Avenue. The head waiter glanced at him, hesitated, surveyed her, and
+showed that he was indeed a good servant who knew his own. He hovered
+over them with deepening interest as they scanned the menu.
+
+The boy smiled at his companion, trying not to notice the smell of the
+food around them, nor the horrible sinking sensation which overwhelmed
+him at intervals. A sickening fear swept over him that he would faint
+before luncheon came--faint on a lady's hands, and from starvation at
+that! He plunged into conversation with reckless vivacity.
+
+When the waiter came with the oysters she set the example of eating
+them at once. Her companion followed it in leisurely fashion. She told
+herself that he was a thoroughbred, and that she had not been mistaken
+in him, but she would almost have preferred to see him eat wolfishly.
+His restraint got on her nerves. She could not eat, though she made a
+pretence of it. When he had eaten his soup with the same careful
+deliberation, a little color came into his face. She observed this,
+and her tension relaxed.
+
+"The last time I was here," he said, absently, "was two years ago. One
+of the fellows at New Haven had a birthday, and we celebrated it in
+the corner room just above this. It was a pretty lively dinner. We
+kept it up from seven o'clock until two in the morning, and then we
+all went out on the Avenue and sat down in the middle of the street,
+where it was cool, to smoke and talk it over. That was Davidson's
+idea. It annoyed the cabmen and policemen horribly. They have such
+ready tempers and such torpid minds."
+
+The recital and the picture it called up amused her.
+
+"What else did you do?" she asked, with interest.
+
+"I'm afraid I don't remember much of it," he confessed. "I know we
+were pretty silly; but I do remember how foolish the head waiter
+looked when Davidson insisted on kissing him good-bye in the hall out
+there, and cried because he didn't know when he'd see him again. Of
+course you can't see how funny that was, because you don't know
+Davidson. He was the most dignified chap at college, and hated gush
+more than any one I ever knew."
+
+He drank the last of his black coffee with a sigh of content, and blew
+a last ring from the cigar she had insisted that he should smoke.
+
+"Don't you think," he hazarded, "that it would be jolly to drive up
+and down Broadway and Fifth Avenue for an hour or two? If you want
+crowds, they're there; and if you see anything worth closer
+inspection, we can get out and look at it."
+
+She agreed, and he paid the bill, tipping the waiter discriminatingly.
+
+As their hansom threaded its way through the crowded street she rarely
+smiled, but her sombre eyes took in everything, and she "said things,"
+as the boy put it, which he recalled and quoted years afterward.
+Incidentally she talked of herself, though always without giving him a
+clew as to who she was and where she came from. Several times, as a
+face in the passing throng caught her interest, she outlined for him
+in a few terse words the character of its possessor. He was
+interested, but he must have unconsciously suggested a certain
+unbelief in her intuition, for once she stopped speaking and looked at
+him sharply.
+
+"You think I don't know," she said, "but I do. We always know, until
+we kill the gift with conventionalities. We're born with an intuitive
+knowledge of character. Savages have it, and animals, and babies. We
+lose it as we advance in civilization, for then we distrust our
+impressions and force our likes and dislikes to follow the dictates of
+policy. I've worked hard to keep and develop my insight, and behold my
+reward! I recognized you at the first glance as the perfect companion
+of a day."
+
+The boy's face flamed with pleasure.
+
+"Then it is a success?"
+
+"It is a success. But it's also five o'clock. What next?"
+
+"Then it's been a success?" he repeated, dreamily--"so far, I mean.
+We've done so little in one way, but I'm awfully glad you've liked it.
+We'll drop into Sherry's now for a cup of tea and a buttered English
+muffin and the beautiful ladies and the Hungarian Band. Then, instead
+of dining there, suppose we go to some gayer, more typical New York
+place--one of the big Broadway restaurants? That will show you another
+'phase,' as you say; and the cooking is almost as good."
+
+She agreed at once. "I think I'd like that," she said. "I want as much
+variety as I can get."
+
+He leaned toward her impressively over the little table in the tea-
+room, recalling her unexpected tribute to the "perfect companion," and
+feeling all at once surprisingly well acquainted with her.
+
+"What a pity you've got to go away tonight!" he murmured, ingenuously.
+"There's so much left to do."
+
+For an instant, as memory rolled over her, her heart stopped beating.
+He observed her change of expression and looked at her with a
+sympathetic question in his gray eyes.
+
+"Can't you change your plans?" he suggested, hopefully. "Must you go?"
+
+"No, they're not that kind of plans. I must go."
+
+As she spoke her face had the colorlessness and the immobility he had
+seen in it during the first moments it was turned toward him in the
+morning, and her features suddenly looked old and drawn. Under the
+revelation of a trouble greater than he could understand, the boy
+dropped his eyes.
+
+"By Jove!" he thought, suddenly, "she's got something the matter with
+her." He wondered what it was, and the idea flashed over him that it
+might be an incurable disease. Only the year before he had heard a
+friend receive his death-warrant in a specialist's office, and the
+memory of the experience remained with him. He was so deep in these
+reflections that for a moment he forgot to speak, and she in her turn
+sat silent.
+
+"I'm sorry," he then said, awkwardly. Then, rightly divining the
+quickest way to divert her thoughts, he suggested that they should
+drive again before dinner, for an hour or two, to get the effect of
+the twilight and the early lights on Broadway.
+
+She agreed at once, as she had agreed to most of his suggestions, and
+her face when she looked at him was serene again, but he was not
+wholly reassured. In silence he followed her to the cab.
+
+Over their dinner that night in the glittering Broadway restaurant,
+with the swinging music of French and German waltzes in their ears,
+she relaxed again from the impersonal attitude she had observed during
+the greater part of the day. She looked at him more as if she saw him,
+he told himself, but he could not flatter himself that the change was
+due to any deepening of her interest in him. It was merely that she
+knew him better, and that their long hours of sight-seeing had
+verified her judgment of him.
+
+Their talk swept over the world. He realized that she had lived much
+abroad and had known many interesting men and women. From casual
+remarks she dropped he learned that she was an orphan, unmarried, with
+no close ties, and that her home was not near New York. This, when the
+next day, after a dazed reading of the morning newspapers, he summed
+up his knowledge of her, was all he could recall--the garnered drift-
+wood of a talk that had extended over twelve hours.
+
+"You look," he said once, glancing critically at her, "as if you had
+lived for centuries and had learned all the lessons life could teach."
+
+She shook her head. "I have lived for centuries, so far as that goes,"
+she said, "but of all the lessons I've really learned only one."
+
+"And that is?"
+
+"How little it all amounts to."
+
+Again, as he studied her, he experienced an unpleasant little tremor.
+He felt at the same time an odd conviction that this woman had played
+a part all day, and that now, through fatigue and depression, she was
+tiring of her role and would cast it away, showing herself to him as
+she was. For some reason he did not want this. The face behind the
+mask, of which he was beginning to get a glimpse at intervals, was a
+face he feared he would not like. He shrank from it as a child shrinks
+from what it does not understand.
+
+Much to his relief, she threw off the dark mood that seemed to
+threaten her, and at the play she was more human than she had been
+yet.
+
+"Ah, that first act," she said, as the curtain fell on Peter Pan's
+flight through the window with the Darling Children--"that delicious
+first act! Of course Barrie can't keep it up--no one could. But the
+humor of it and the tenderness and the naivete! Only a grown-up with
+the heart of a child could really appreciate it."
+
+"And you are that?" he asked, daringly. He knew she was not.
+
+"Only for this half-hour," she smiled. "I may get critical at any
+moment and entirely out of touch."
+
+She did not, however, and watching her indulgent appreciation of the
+little boys in Never Never Land, he unconsciously reflected that,
+after all, this must be the real woman. That other personality, some
+sudden disheartening side of which he got from time to time, was not
+his new friend who laughed like a young girl over the crocodile with
+the clock inside, and showed a sudden swift moisture in her brown eyes
+when the actress pleaded for the dying fairy. When the curtain fell on
+the last act, leaving Peter Pan alone with his twinkling fairy friends
+in his little home high among the trees, Alice Stansbury turned to her
+companion with the sudden change of expression he had learned to
+dread. The pupils of her eyes were strangely dilated, and she was
+evidently laboring under some suppressed excitement. She spoke to him
+curtly and coolly.
+
+"We'll have a Welsh rabbit somewhere," she said, "and then I'll go--
+back." He was struck by this use of the word, and by the tone of her
+voice as she said it. "Back," he repeated, mentally--"back to
+something mighty unpleasant, I'll wager."
+
+At the restaurant she ate nothing and said little. All the snap and
+sparkle had gone out of the day and out of their companionship as
+well. Even the music was mournful, as if in tacit sympathy, and the
+faces of the diners around them looked tired and old. When they left
+the dining-room they stood together for an instant in the vestibule
+opening into the street. No one was near them, and they were for the
+moment beyond the reach of curious eyes. She cast one quick look
+around to be sure of this, and then, going close to him, she put both
+her hands on his shoulders. As she stood thus he realized for the
+first time how tall she was. Her eyes were almost on a level with his
+own.
+
+"You're a dear boy," she said, quickly, and a little breathlessly.
+"You have made the day perfect, and I thank you. We shall not meet
+again, but I'd like to feel that you won't forget me, and I want you
+to tell me your first name."
+
+He put his hands over hers.
+
+"It's Philip," he said, simply, "and as for forgetting, you may be
+very sure I won't. This isn't the kind of thing one forgets, and
+you're not the kind of woman."
+
+As he spoke the grip of her hands on his shoulders tightened, and she
+leaned forward and kissed him on the mouth. Under the suddenness and
+the surprise of it his senses whirled, but even in the chaos of the
+moment he was conscious of two conflicting impressions--the first, an
+odd disappointment in her, his friend; the second, an absurd
+resentment against the singular remoteness of those cool, soft lips
+that for an instant brushed his own. She gave him no chance to speak.
+
+"I've left my gloves on the table," she said, crisply. "Get them."
+
+He went without a word. When he returned the vestibule was deserted.
+With a swift intuition of the truth he opened the door and rushed out
+into the street. She was not there, nor the cabman whom he had
+instructed to wait for them. She had slipped away, as she intended to
+do, and the kiss she had given him had been a farewell. He was left
+standing looking stupidly up and down the street, with her gloves in
+his hand and her purse, as he now remembered, in his pocket. Well, he
+could advertise that the next morning, in such a way that she could
+reclaim it without seeing him again if she wished. He could even seal
+it in an envelope and leave it at the _Herald_ office, to be given to
+any one who would describe it. He walked slowly down Broadway and
+turned into the side street which held the house and the unattractive
+hall bedroom he called home. He felt "let down," as he would have put
+it, and horribly lonely and depressed. She was such a good sort, he
+reflected, and it was such a big pity she wouldn't let him see her
+again. He knew somehow that he never would. She was not a woman that
+changed her mind about things. Jove! but the whole experience had been
+interesting; and that kiss--that kiss he had been cad enough to
+misunderstand for an instant. ... The deepest blush of the day
+scorched his face as he recalled it.
+
+Miss Stansbury arrived at the front entrance of her hotel at the same
+moment, and tersely instructed the driver to collect his fare at the
+desk. She entered the hall with him, and walked indifferently past the
+night clerk, answering with a nod the tacit question of that youth as
+he glanced from her to the cabman. She was not unconscious of the
+suppressed excitement in his manner nor of the elevator boy's relief
+as he joyfully greeted her appearance in his car. What did it matter?
+What did anything matter now? Her day was over.
+
+Miss Manuel, already informed of her arrival by a hurried telephone
+message from the office, was waiting for her at the door of their
+apartment. She burst into tears as she put her arms around her patient
+and kissed her and led her inside.
+
+"Oh, my dear, how _could_ you?" she cried, reproachfully. "Think of
+the agonies I've been through. It's almost twelve o'clock."
+
+The other woman did not look at her, nor did she return the caress.
+She walked into the room and sat down at her desk, with a strange
+appearance of haste, at which the nurse marvelled. Without waiting to
+take off her hat or coat, she seized a pen and paper and wrote these
+lines, marking them plainly:
+
+PERSONAL
+
+FOR INSERTION IN TO-MORROW'S "HERALD"
+
+_PHILIP.--The purse was purposely left with you. Its contents are
+yours._
+
+She put this in an envelope and directed it to the _Herald_
+Advertising Department. Then, for the first time, she spoke to the
+nurse, balancing the envelope absently in her hand as she talked, and
+not looking once at the other's face. Her tones were level and
+monotonous, almost as if she were repeating a lesson.
+
+"You need not have worried," she said, answering at last the nurse's
+first words. "I've had what I've wanted for years--a whole day to
+myself. I've done what I wanted to do. It's been worth while. But,"
+she added, more slowly, "you needn't ask me about it, for I shall not
+tell you anything. Ring for a messenger, please. I want this taken to
+the _Herald_ office at once; give him the money to pay for it."
+
+In silence Miss Manuel obeyed. When the boy came she went into the
+hall to hand the envelope to him, glancing at the address as she did
+so. The instant she crossed the threshold Alice Stansbury slipped into
+the next room and opened a window looking down into a court. As she
+did so she whimpered like a frightened child.
+
+"I must do it," she whispered. "I must--I must--now--now--now! If I
+wait, I won't--dare."
+
+When the nurse entered the room there was only the open window to tell
+her what had happened. Panting, she leaned out and looked down with
+starting eyes. Far below, on the asphalt floor of the court, was a
+dark mass which moved once and then lay still.
+
+The little clock on the table in the inner room struck twelve. Out in
+the hall the messenger whistled softly as he waited for the elevator.
+Hearing these familiar sounds, the nurse cast off the paralysis which
+had held her, and the silent corridor of the great hotel echoed her
+useless call for help.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+THE SIMPLE LIFE OF GENEVIEVE MAUD
+
+
+Genevieve Maud reclined in a geranium-bed in an attitude of unstudied
+ease. On her fat body was a white dress, round her waist was a wide,
+blue sash, perched on one side of her head was a flaunting blue bow,
+and in her heart was bitterness. It was dimly comforting to lie down
+in all this finery, but it did not really help much. She brooded
+darkly upon her wrongs. They were numerous, and her cherubic little
+face took on additional gloom as she summed them up. First, she had
+been requested to be good--a suggestion always unwelcome to the
+haughty soul of Genevieve Maud, and doubly so this morning when she
+saw no alternative but to obey it. Secondly, there was no one to play
+with--a situation depressing to any companionable being, and
+grindingly so to one who considered all men her peers, all women her
+unquestioning slaves, and all animals grateful ministers to her needs
+in lowlier fields of delight.
+
+These delusions, it must be admitted, had been fostered during the
+four short but eventful years of Genevieve Maud's life. Her method of
+approach had been singularly compelling; old and young paused not to
+argue, but freely stripped themselves of adornments she fancied, and
+animals, from the kitten she carried round by one ear to the great St.
+Bernard she half strangled in recurring moments of endearment, bore
+with her adoringly, and humbly followed the trail of cake she left
+behind her when she tired of them and trotted off in search of fresh
+attractions. These were usually numerous; and had they been rarer, the
+ingenuity of Genevieve Maud would have been equal to the test. There
+were no social distinctions in her individual world. But one short
+year ago she had followed a hand-organ man and a monkey to a point
+safely distant from too-observant relatives and servants; there,
+beside the chattering monkey, she had sung and danced and scrambled
+for pennies and shaken a tambourine, and generally conducted herself
+like a _debutante_ maenad.
+
+That had been a glorious day. She recalled it now smoulderingly,
+resentfully. Different, indeed, was the tragic present. No one to play
+with--that was bad enough. But there were still worse conditions. She
+was not even allowed to play by herself! Rover had been banished to a
+neighbor's, the kitten had been lent generously to the Joyce children,
+her human playmates had been warned off the premises, and Genevieve
+Maud had been urged to be a dear little girl and keep very, very quiet
+because mamma was sick. As if this was not enough, fate drove its
+relentless knife and gave it a final twist. Far back in a corner of
+the garden where she lay, almost hidden by the drooping branches of an
+old willow, sat her two sisters, Helen Adeline and Grace Margaret,
+highly superior beings of a stately dignity even beyond their ripe
+ages of eleven and nine years. They were too old to play with little
+girls, as they had frequently mentioned to Genevieve Maud, but they
+were not wholly beyond the power of her spell, and there had been
+occasions when they had so far forgotten themselves as to descend to
+her level and enjoy doll tea-parties and similar infantile pleasures.
+To-day, however, they were of a remoteness. Their plump backs were
+turned to her, their heads were close together, and on the soft
+afternoon breeze that floated over the garden were borne sibilant
+whispers. They were telling each other secrets--secrets from which
+Genevieve Maud, by reason of her tender years, was irrevocably shut
+out.
+
+Genevieve Maud sat up suddenly in the flower-bed as the full horror of
+this truth burst upon her, and then briskly entered into action
+designed to transform the peace and quiet of the scene. Her small, fat
+face turned purple, her big, brown eyes shut tight, her round mouth
+opened, and from the tiny aperture came a succession of shrieks which
+would have lulled a siren into abashed silence. The effect of this
+demonstration, rarely long delayed, was instantaneous now. A white-
+capped nurse came to an up-stairs window and shook her head warningly;
+the two small sisters rose and scurried across the lawn; a neighbor
+came to the hedge and clapped her hands softly, clucking mystic
+monosyllables supposed to be of a soothing nature; neighboring
+children within hearing assumed half-holiday expressions and started
+with a rush to the side of the blatant afflicted one. Surveying all
+this through half-shut eyes and hearing the steady tramp of the
+oncoming relief corps, an expression of triumphant content rested for
+an instant of Genevieve Maud's face. Then she tied it up again into
+knots of even more disfiguring pattern, took another long breath, and
+apparently made an earnest effort to attract the attention of citizens
+of the next township. "I'm tired!" was the message Genevieve Maud sent
+to a sympathetic world on the wings of this megaphonic roar.
+
+The trained nurse, who had rushed down-stairs and into the garden, now
+reached her side and drastically checked Genevieve Maud's histrionism
+by spreading a spacious palm over the wide little mouth. With her
+other hand she hoisted Genevieve Maud from the flower-bed and escorted
+her to neutral ground on the lawn.
+
+"'Tired!'" repeated the irate nurse, as the uproar subsided to
+gurgles. "Heavens! I should think you would be, after that!" Helen
+Adeline and Grace Margaret arrived simultaneously, and the older child
+took the situation and the infant in hand with her best imitation of
+her mother's manner.
+
+"I am so sorry you were disturbed, Miss Wynne," she said, "and poor
+mamma, too. We will take care of Genevieve Maud, and she won't cry any
+more. We were just making some plans for her future," she ended,
+loftily.
+
+The mouth of Genevieve Maud, stretched for another yell, was arrested
+in its distension. Her small ears opened wide. Was she, after all, in
+the secret? It would seem so, for the nurse, seemingly satisfied, left
+the three children alone and went back to her patient, while Helen
+Adeline at once led her small sister to the choice retreat under the
+willow.
+
+"We are going to talk to you, Genevieve Maud," she began, "ve-ry
+seriously, and we want you to pay 'tention and try to understand."
+This much was easy. Mamma usually opened her impressive addresses in
+such fashion.
+
+"'Pay 'tention and try to understand," echoed Genevieve Maud, and
+grinned in joyful interest.
+
+"Yes, really try," repeated Helen Adeline, firmly. Then, rather
+impatiently, and as one bearing with the painful limitations of the
+young, she went on:
+
+"You're so little, Maudie, you see, you don't know; and you won't know
+even if we tell you. But you are a spoiled child; every one says so,
+and mamma said the other day that something should be done. She's
+sick, so she can't do it, but we can. We've got to take care of you,
+anyhow, so this is a good time. Now what it really is, is a kind of
+game. Gracie and I will play it, and you are going to--to--well, you
+are going to be the game."
+
+Genevieve Maud nodded solemnly, well satisfied. She was in it, anyhow.
+What mattered the petty details? "'Going to be the game,'" she echoed,
+as was her invariable custom, with the air of uttering an original
+thought.
+
+Helen Adeline went on impressively.
+
+"It's called the simple life," she said, "and grown-up folks are
+playing it now. I heard the minister an' mamma talking about it las'
+week for hours an' hours an' hours. They give up pomps an' vanerties,
+the minister says, an' they mus'n't have luxuries, an' they mus' live
+like nature an' save their souls. They can't save their souls when
+they have pomps an' vanerties. We thought we'd try it with you first,
+an' then if we like it--er--if it's nice, I mean, p'r'aps Grace an' I
+will, too. But mamma is sick, an' you've had too many things an' too
+much 'tention, so it's a good time for you to lead the simple life an'
+do without things."
+
+Genevieve Maud, gazing into her sister's face with big, interested
+eyes, was vaguely, subconsciously aware that the new game might halt
+this side of perfect content; but she was of an experimental turn and
+refrained from expressing any scepticism until she knew what was
+coming. In the mean time the eyes of her sister Grace Margaret had
+roamed disapprovingly over Genevieve Maud's white dress, the blue sash
+that begirded her middle, the rampant bow on her hair. Katie had put
+on all these things conscientiously, and had then joyfully freed her
+mind from the burden of thought of the child for the rest of the
+afternoon.
+
+"Don't you think," Grace Margaret asked Helen Adeline, tentatively,
+"sashes an' bows is pomps?"
+
+Helen Adeline gave the speaker a stolid, unexpressive glance. She
+acquiesced.
+
+"Let's take 'em off," went on the younger and more practical spirit.
+"Then we won't never have to tie 'em for her, either, when they get
+loose."
+
+They stripped Genevieve Maud, first of the sash and bows, then of the
+white gown, next of her soft undergarments, finally, as zeal waxed,
+even of her shoes and stockings. She stood before them clad in
+innocence and full of joyful expectation.
+
+"All these fine clothes is pomps an' vanerties," remarked Helen
+Adeline, firmly. "The minister said so when he was talking with mamma
+'bout the simple life, an' Gracie and I listened. It was very
+interestin'."
+
+She surveyed the innocent nudity of her little sister, "naked but not
+ashamed," with a speculative glance.
+
+"Katie will be glad, won't she?" she reflected, aloud. "She says
+there's too much washing. Now she won't have to do any more for you.
+Don't you feel better an' happier without those pomps?" she asked
+Genevieve Maud.
+
+That young person was already rolling on the grass, thrusting her
+little toes into the cool earth, exulting in her new-found sartorial
+emancipation. If this was the "new game," the new game was a winner.
+Grace Margaret, gazing doubtfully at her, was dimly conscious of an
+effect of incompleteness.
+
+"I think she ought to have a hat," she murmured, at last. Helen
+Adeline was good-naturedly acquiescent.
+
+"All right," she answered, cheerfully, "but not a pompy one. Papa's
+big straw will do." They found it and put it on the infant, whose eyes
+and face were thereby fortunately shaded from the hot glare of the
+August sun. Almost before it was on her head she had slipped away and
+was running in and out of the shrubbery, her white body flashing among
+the leaves.
+
+"We'll have our luncheon here," announced Helen Adeline, firmly, "an'
+I'll bring it out to save Katie trouble. Maudie can't have rich food,
+of course, 'cos she's livin' the simple life. We'll give her bread off
+a tin plate."
+
+Grace Margaret looked startled.
+
+"We haven't got any tin plate," she objected.
+
+"Rover has."
+
+Grace Margaret's eyes dropped suddenly, then rose and met her
+sister's. An unwilling admiration crept into them.
+
+"How will Maudie learn nice table manners?" she protested, feebly.
+"Mamma says she must, you know."
+
+"Folks don't have nice table manners when they're livin' simple
+lives," announced Helen Adeline, loftily. "They just eat. I guess we
+won't give her knives an' forks an' spoons, either."
+
+Grace Margaret battled with temptation and weakly succumbed.
+
+"Let's give her some of the rice pudding, though," she suggested. "It
+will be such fun to see her eat it, 'specially if it's very creamy!"
+
+Of further details of that luncheon all three children thereafter
+declined to speak. To Genevieve Maud the only point worthy of mention
+was that she had what the others had. This compromise effected, the
+manner of eating it was to her a detail of indescribable unimportance.
+What were knives, forks, spoons, or their lack, to Genevieve Maud? The
+tin plate was merely a gratifying novelty, and that she had been in
+close communion with rice pudding was eloquently testified by the
+samples of that delicacy which clung affectionately to her features
+and her fat person during the afternoon.
+
+While they ate, Helen Adeline's active mind had been busy. She
+generously gave her sisters the benefit of its working without delay.
+
+"She mus'n't have any money," she observed, thoughtfully, following
+with unseeing eyes the final careful polish the small tongue of
+Genevieve Maud was giving Rover's borrowed plate. "No one has money in
+the simple life, so we mus' take her bank an' get all the money out
+an'--"
+
+"Spend it!" suggested Grace Margaret, rapturously, with her second
+inspiration. Helen Adeline reflected. The temptation was great, but at
+the back of her wise little head lay a dim foreboding as to the
+possible consequences.
+
+"No," she finally decided, consistently. "I guess it mus' be given to
+the poor. We'll break the bank an' take it out, an' Maudie can give it
+to the poor all by herself. Then if any one scolds, _she_ did it!
+You'll enjoy that kind an' noble act, won't you, Maudie?" she added,
+in her stateliest grown-up manner.
+
+Maudie decided that she would, and promptly corroborated Helen
+Adeline's impression. The soft August breeze fanned her body, the
+grass was cool and fresh under her feet, and her little stomach looked
+as if modelled from a football by her ample luncheon. She was to be
+the central figure in the distribution of her wealth, and wisdom
+beyond her own would burden itself with the insignificant details.
+Genevieve Maud, getting together the material for large and slushy mud
+pies, sang blithely to herself, and found the simple life its own
+reward.
+
+"We'll leave her with her dolls," continued Helen Adeline, "an' we'll
+hunt up deservin' poor. Then we'll bring 'em here an' Maudie can give
+'em all she has. But first"--her little sharp eyes rested
+discontentedly upon Genevieve Maud's family--six dolls reposing in a
+blissful row in a pansy-bed--"first we mus' remove _those_ pomps an'
+vanerties."
+
+Grace gasped.
+
+"Take away the dolls?" she ejaculated, dizzily.
+
+"No, not edzactly. Jus' take off all their clothes. Don't you think it
+looks silly for them to have clothes on when Maudie hasn't any?"
+
+Grace Margaret agreed that it did, and at once the mistake was
+rectified, the clothing was added to the heap of Genevieve Maud's
+garments, and a pleasing effect of harmony reigned. The little girls
+regarded it with innocent satisfaction.
+
+"I s'pose we couldn't really take her dolls," reflected Helen Adeline,
+aloud. "She'd make an awful fuss, an' she's so good an' quiet now it's
+a pity to start her off. But her toys _mus'_ go. They're very
+expensive, an' they're pomps an' vanerties, I know. So we'll take 'em
+with us an' give 'em to poor children."
+
+"You think of lots of things, don't you?" gurgled Grace Margaret, with
+warm admiration. Her sister accepted the tribute modestly, as no more
+than her due. Leaving Genevieve Maud happy with her mud pies and her
+stripped dolls, the two sought the nursery and there made a
+discriminating collection of her choicest treasures. Her Noah's Ark,
+her picture-books, her colored balls and blocks, her woolly lambs that
+moved on wheels, her miniature croquet set, all fell into their
+ruthless young hands and, as a crowning crime, were dumped into the
+little go-cart that was the very apple of Genevieve Maud's round eyes.
+It squeaked under its burden as the children drew it carefully along
+the hall. They carried it down-stairs with exaggerated caution, but
+Genevieve Maud saw it from afar, and, deeply moved by their
+thoughtfulness, approached with gurgles of selfish appreciation. The
+conspirators exchanged glances of despair. It was the intrepid spirit
+of Helen Adeline that coped with the distressing situation. Sitting
+down before her victim, she took Maudie's reluctant hands in hers and
+gazed deep into her eyes as mamma was wont to gaze into hers on the
+various occasions when serious talks became necessary.
+
+"Now, Genevieve Maud," she began, "you mus' listen an' you mus' mind,
+or you can't play. Ain't you havin' a good time? If you don't want to
+do what we say, we'll put your clothes right straight on again an'
+leave you in the midst of your pomps an' vanerties: an' then--what'll
+become of your soul?" She paused impressively to allow this vital
+question to make its full appeal. Genevieve Maud writhed and squirmed.
+
+"But," continued Helen Adeline, solemnly, "if you do jus' as we say,
+we'll let you play some more." The larger issue was temporarily lost
+sight of this time, but the one presented seemed to appeal vividly to
+Genevieve Maud.
+
+"Let Genevieve Maud play some more," she wheedled.
+
+"And will you do everything we say?"
+
+"Do everything you say," promised Genevieve Maud, recklessly.
+
+"Very well,"--this with a fidelity in its imitation to her mother's
+manner which would have convulsed that admirable and long-suffering
+woman could she have heard it. "An' first of all we mus' give away
+your toys to poor children."
+
+The mouth of Genevieve Maud opened. Helen Adeline held up a warning
+hand, and it shut.
+
+"They're _pomps_," repeated the older sister, positively, "an' we'll
+bring you simple toys if poor children will exchange with us."
+
+This was at least extenuating. Genevieve Maud hesitated and sniffed.
+In the matter of being stripped, toys were more important than
+clothes.
+
+"If you don't, you know, you can't play," Grace Margaret reminded her.
+
+"Awright," remarked Genevieve Maud, briefly. "Give toys to poor
+chil'ren."
+
+They hurriedly left her before her noble purpose could do so, and
+Genevieve Maud, left to her own resources, made unctuous mud pies and
+fed them to her family. Grace Margaret and Helen Adeline returned in
+triumph within the hour and laid at the feet of their small victim
+modest offerings consisting of one armless rubber doll, one dirty and
+badly torn picture-book, and one top, broken.
+
+"These is simple," declared Helen Adeline, with truth, "an' the poor
+Murphy children has your pomps, Maudie. Are you glad?"
+
+Genevieve Maud, surveying doubtfully the nondescript collection before
+her, murmured without visible enthusiasm something which was
+interpreted as meaning that she was glad. As a matter of fact, the
+charm of the simple life was not borne in upon her compellingly. The
+top she accepted until she discovered that it would not go. The rubber
+doll she declined to touch until Grace Margaret suggested that it had
+been in a hospital and had had its arms amputated like Mrs. Clark's
+son Charlie. Deeply moved by the pathos of this tragic fate, Genevieve
+Maud added the rubber doll to her aristocratic family, whose members
+seemed to shrink aside as it fell among them. The picture-book she
+declined to touch at all.
+
+"It's dirty," she remarked, with an air of finality which effectually
+closed the discussion. By this time she was not herself an especially
+effective monument of cleanliness. The rice pudding and the mud pies
+had combined to produce a somewhat bizarre effect, and the dirt she
+had casually gathered from the paths, the flower-beds, and the hedges
+enlivened but did not improve the ensemble.
+
+"She ought to be washed pretty soon," suggested Grace, surveying her
+critically; but to this tacit criticism Helen Adeline promptly took
+exception.
+
+"They don't have to, so much," she objected, "when it's the simple
+life. That's one of the nice things."
+
+With this decision Genevieve Maud was well content. Her tender years
+forbade hair-splitting and subtle distinctions; the term "accumulated
+dirt" or "old dirt" had no significance for her. She could not have
+told why she rejected the Murphy child's thoroughly grimed picture-
+book, yet herself rolled happily about in a thin coating of mud and
+dust, but she did both instinctively.
+
+Her attention was pleasantly distracted by subdued cries from the
+street beyond the garden hedge. Three Italian women, all old, stood
+there gesticulating freely and signalling to the children, and a small
+ragged boy on crutches hovered nervously near them. Helen Adeline
+jumped to her feet with a sudden exclamation.
+
+"It's the poor!" she said, excitedly. "For your money, Genevieve Maud.
+I told them to come. Get the bank, Gracie, an' she mus' give it all
+away!"
+
+Grace departed promptly on her errand, but there was some delay in
+opening the bank when she returned--an interval filled pleasantly by
+the visitors with interested scrutiny of the shameless Genevieve Maud,
+whose airy unconsciousness of her unconventional appearance uniquely
+attested her youth. When the money finally came, rolling out in
+pennies, five-cent pieces, and rare dimes, the look of good-natured
+wonder in the old black eyes peering wolfishly over the hedge changed
+quickly to one of keen cupidity, but the children saw nothing of this.
+Helen Adeline divided the money as evenly as she could into four
+little heaps.
+
+"It's all she has," she explained, grandly, "so she's got to give it
+all to you, 'cos riches is pomps an' ruins souls. Give it, Genevieve
+Maud," she continued, magnanimously surrendering the centre of the
+stage to the novice in the simple life.
+
+Genevieve Maud handed it over with a fat and dirty little paw, and the
+women and the lame boy took it uncritically, with words of thanks and
+even with friendly smiles. Strangely enough, there was no quarrelling
+among themselves over the distribution of the spoils. For one golden
+moment they were touched and softened by the gift of the baby hand
+that gave its all so generously. Then the wisdom of a speedy
+disappearance struck them and they faded away, leaving the quiet
+street again deserted. Helen Adeline drew a long breath as the bright
+gleam of their kerchiefs disappeared around a corner.
+
+"That's nice," she exclaimed, contentedly. "Now what else can we make
+her do?"
+
+The two pair of eyes rested meditatively on the unconscious little
+sister, again lost to her surroundings in the construction of her
+twenty-third mud pie. Not even the surrender of her fortune beguiled
+her from this unleavened joy of the simple life. "We've made her do
+'mos' everything, I guess," admitted Grace Margaret, with evident
+reluctance. It appeared so, indeed. Stripped of her clothing, her
+money and her toys, it would seem that little in the way of earthly
+possessions was left to Genevieve Maud; but even as they looked again,
+Grace Margaret had another inspiration.
+
+"Don't they work when they have simple lives?" she asked, abruptly.
+"'Course they work."
+
+"Then let's have Genevieve Maud do our work."
+
+There was silence for a moment--silence filled with the soul-
+satisfying enjoyment of a noble conception.
+
+"Grace Margaret Davenport," said Helen, solemnly, "you're a smart
+girl!" She exhaled a happy sigh, and added: "'Course we'll let her!
+She mus' work. She can water the geraniums for you an' the pansies for
+me, an' gather up the croquet things for me an' take them in, an' fill
+Rover's water-basin, an' get seed for the birds, an' pick up all the
+paper an' leaves on the lawn."
+
+It is to be deplored that the active and even strenuous life thus
+outlined did not for the moment appeal to Genevieve Maud when they
+brought its attractions to her attention. The afternoon was fading,
+and Genevieve Maud was beginning to fade, too; her little feet were
+tired, and her fat legs seemed to curve more in her weariness of well-
+doing; but the awful threat of being left out of the game still held,
+and she struggled bravely with her task, while the two arch-
+conspirators reposed languidly and surveyed her efforts from beneath
+the willow-tree.
+
+"It'll be her bedtime pretty soon," suggested Helen Adeline, the
+suspicion of a guilty conscience lurking in the remark. "She can have
+her bread and milk like she always does--that's simple 'nuff. But do
+you think she ought to sleep in that handsome brass crib?"
+
+Grace Margaret did not think so, but she was sadly puzzled to find a
+substitute.
+
+"Mamma won't let her sleep anywhere else, either," she pointed out.
+
+"Mamma won't know."
+
+"Annie or Katie will know--p'r'aps."
+
+The "p'r'aps" was tentative. Annie and Katie had taken full advantage
+of the liberty attending the illness of their mistress, and their
+policy with the children was one of masterly inactivity. So long as
+the little girls were quiet they were presumably good, and hence, to a
+surety, undisturbed. Still, it is hardly possible that even their
+carelessness would fail to take account of Genevieve Maud's unoccupied
+bed, if unoccupied it proved to be.
+
+"An' cert'inly papa will know."
+
+Helen Adeline's last hope died with this sudden reminder. She sighed.
+Of course papa would come to kiss his chicks good-night, but that was
+hours hence. Much could be done in those hours. Her problem was
+suddenly simplified, for even as she bent her brows and pondered,
+Grace Margaret called her attention to an alluring picture behind her.
+Under the shelter of a blossoming white hydrangea lay Genevieve Maud
+fast asleep. It was a dirty and an exhausted Genevieve Maud, worn with
+the heat and toil of the day, scratched by bush and brier, but
+wonderfully appealing in her helplessness--so appealing, that Helen
+Adeline's heart yearned over her. She conquered the momentary
+weakness.
+
+"_I_ think," she suggested, casually, "she ought to sleep in the
+barn."
+
+Grace Margaret gasped.
+
+"It ain't a simple life sleepin' in lovely gardens," continued the
+authority, with simple but thrilling conviction. "An'--wasn't the
+Infant Jesus born in barns?"
+
+Grace Margaret essayed a faint protest.
+
+"Papa won't like it," she began, feebly.
+
+"He won't know. 'Course we won't let her _stay_ there! But just a
+little while, to make it finish right--the way it ought to be."
+
+The holding up of such lofty ideals of consistency conquered Grace
+Margaret--so thoroughly, in fact, that she helped to carry the
+sleeping Genevieve Maud not only to the barn, but even, in a glorious
+inspiration, to Rover's kennel--a roomy habitation and beautifully
+clean. The pair deposited the still sleeping innocent there and
+stepped back to survey the effect. Helen Adeline drew a long breath of
+satisfaction. "Well," she said, with the content of an artist
+surveying the perfect work, "if that ain't simple lives, I don't know
+what is!"
+
+They stole out of the place and into the house. The shadows lengthened
+on the floor of the big barn, and the voices of the children in the
+street beyond grew fainter and finally died away.
+
+Lights began to twinkle in neighboring windows. Rover, returning from
+his friendly visit, sought his home, approached its entrance
+confidently, and retreated with a low growl. The baby slept on, and
+the dog, finally recognizing his playmate, stretched himself before
+the entrance of his kennel and loyally mounted guard, with a puzzled
+look in his faithful brown eyes. The older children, lost in agreeable
+conversation and the attractions of baked apples and milk toast,
+wholly forgot Genevieve Maud and the flying hours.
+
+It was almost dark when their father came home and, after a visit to
+the bedside of his wife, looked to the welfare of his children. The
+expression on the faces of the two older ones as they suddenly grasped
+the fact of his presence explained in part the absence of the third.
+Mr. Davenport had enjoyed the advantages of eleven years of daily
+association with his daughter Helen Adeline.
+
+"Where is she?" he asked, briefly, with a slight prickling of the
+scalp.
+
+In solemn procession, in their night-gowns, they led him to her side;
+and the peace of the perfumed night as they passed through the garden
+was broken with explanations and mutual recriminations and expressions
+of unavailing regret. Rover rose as they approached and looked up into
+his master's eyes, wagging his tail in eager welcome.
+
+"Here she is," he seemed to say. "It's all right. _I_ looked after
+her."
+
+The father's eyes grew dim as he patted the dog's fine head and lifted
+the naked body of his youngest daughter in his arms. Her little body
+was cold, and she shivered as she awoke and looked at him. Then she
+gazed down into the conscience-stricken faces of her sisters and
+memory returned. It drew from her one of her rare spontaneous remarks.
+
+"Don't yike simple yives," announced Genevieve Maud, with considerable
+firmness. "Don't yant to play any more."
+
+"You shall not, my babykins," promised her father, huskily. "No more
+simple life for Genevieve Maud, you may be sure."
+
+Later, after the hot bath and the supper which both her father and the
+trained nurse had supervised, Genevieve Maud was tucked cozily away in
+the little brass crib which had earlier drawn out the stern
+disapproval of her sisters. Her round face shone with cold cream. A
+silver mug, full of milk, stood beside her crib, on her suggestion
+that she might become "firsty" during the night. Finding the occasion
+one of unlimited indulgence and concession, she had demanded and
+secured the privilege of wearing her best night-gown--one resplendent
+with a large pink bow. In her hand she clasped a fat cookie.
+
+Helen Adeline and Grace Margaret surveyed this sybaritic scene from
+the outer darkness of the hall.
+
+"Look at her poor, perishin' body full of comforts," sighed Helen
+Adeline, dismally. Then, with concentrated bitterness, "I s'pose we'll
+never dare to even _think_ 'bout her soul again!"
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+HIS BOY
+
+
+Captain Arthur Hamilton, of the ----th Infantry, moved on his narrow
+cot, groaned partly from irritation and partly from pain, muttered a
+few inaudible words, and looked with strong disapproval toward the
+opening of the hospital tent in which he lay. Through it came the soft
+breezes of the Cuban night, a glimpse of brilliantly starred horizon-
+line, and the cheerful voice of Private Kelly, raised in song. The
+words came distinctly to the helpless officer's reluctant ears.
+
+"'Oh, Liza, de-ar Liza,'" carolled Kelly, in buoyant response to the
+beauty of the evening.
+
+Captain Hamilton muttered again as he suppressed a seductive desire to
+throw something at the Irishman's head, silhouetted against the sky as
+he limped past the entrance. Six weeks had elapsed since the battle of
+San Juan, in which Hamilton and Kelly had been among the many
+grievously hurt. Kelly, witness this needless service of song, was
+already convalescent. He could wander from tent to tent in well-
+meaning but futile efforts to cheer less fortunate mates. Baker was
+around again, too, Hamilton remembered, and Barnard and Hallenbeck and
+Lee, and--oh, hosts of others. He ran over their names as he had done
+countless times before in the long days and nights which had passed
+since he had been "out of it all," as he put it to himself. He alone,
+of his fellow officers in the regiment, still lay chained to his
+wretched cot, a very log of helplessness, in which a fiery spirit
+flamed and consumed. His was not a nature that took gracefully to
+inactivity; and of late it had been borne in upon him with a cold,
+sickening sense of fear, new, like his helplessness, that inactivity
+must be his portion for a long, long time to come. At first the
+thought had touched his consciousness only at wide intervals, but now
+it was becoming a constant, lurking horror, always with him, or just
+within reach, ready to spring.
+
+He was "out of it all," not for weeks or even for months, but very
+possibly for all time. The doctor's reticence told him this; so did
+his own sick heart; so did the dutiful cheerfulness of his men and his
+brother officers. They overdid it, he realized, and the efforts they
+so conscientiously made showed how deep their sympathy must be, and
+how tragic the cause of it. His lips twisted sardonically as he
+remembered their optimistic predictions of his immediate recovery and
+the tributes they paid to his courage in the field. It was true he had
+distinguished himself in action (by chance, he assured himself and
+them), and he had figured as a hero in the subsequent reports of the
+battle. But the other fellows would hardly have bothered to have a
+trifle like that mentioned, he told himself, if the little glowing
+badge of fame he carried off the field had not been now his sole
+possession. He had given more than his life for it. He had sacrificed
+his career, his place in the active ranks, his perfect, athletic body.
+His life would have been a simple gift in comparison. Why couldn't it
+have been taken? he wondered for the hundredth time. Why could not he,
+like others, have died gloriously and been laid away with the flag
+wrapped round him? But that, he reflected, bitterly, would have been
+too much luck. Instead, he must drag on and on and on, of no use to
+himself or to any one else.
+
+Again and again he contemplated the dreary outlook, checking off
+mentally the details of the past, the depressing experiences to come,
+the hopelessness of it all; and as his mind swung wearily round the
+small circle he despised himself for the futility of the whole mental
+process, and for his inability to fix his thoughts on things other
+than his own misfortune. A man paralyzed; a thing dead from the waist
+down--that was what he had become. He groaned again as the realization
+gnawed at his soul, and at the sound a white-capped nurse rose from a
+table where she had been sitting and came to his bedside with a smile
+of professional cheerfulness. She had a tired, worn face, and faded
+blue eyes, which looked as if they had seen too much of human
+suffering. But an indomitable spirit gazed out of them, and spoke,
+too, in her alert step and in the fine poise of her head and
+shoulders.
+
+"Your mail has come," she told him, "and there seem to be some nice
+letters--fat ones. One, from Russia, has a gold crown on the envelope.
+Perhaps I had better leave you alone while you read it."
+
+Hamilton smiled grimly as he held out a languid hand. He liked Miss
+Foster. She was a good sort, and she had stood by the boys nobly
+through the awful days after the fight. He liked her humor, too,
+though he sometimes had suspicions as to its spontaneity. Then his eye
+fell on the top envelope of the little package she had given him, and
+at the sight of the handwriting he caught his breath, and the blood
+rushed suddenly to his face. He closed his eyes for a moment in an
+effort to pull himself together. Did he still care, after ten years,
+and like that! But possibly, very probably, it was merely a
+manifestation of his wretched weakness, which could not endure even a
+pleasant surprise without these absurd physical effects. He
+remembered, with a more cheerful grin, that he had hardly thought of
+her at all during the past year. Preparations for war and his small
+part in them had absorbed him heart and soul. He opened the letter
+without further self-analysis, and read with deepening interest the
+closely written lines on the thin foreign paper, whose left-hand
+corner held a duplicate of the gold crown on the envelope.
+
+"DEAR OLD FRIEND,--You have forgotten me, no doubt, in all these
+years. Ten, is it not? But I have not forgotten you, nor my other
+friends in America, exile though I am and oblivious though I may have
+seemed. I do not know quite why I have not come home for a visit long
+before this. Indeed, I have planned to do so from year to year, but a
+full life and many varied interests have deferred the journey one way
+or another. I have three boys--nine, seven, and five--and it would be
+difficult to bring them with me and impossible to leave them behind.
+So, you see--
+
+"But my heart often longs for my native land, and in one tower of this
+old castle I have a great room full of souvenirs of home. It is the
+spot I love best in my new country. Here I read my mail and write my
+letters and follow American news in the newspapers friends send me.
+Here, with my boys tumbling over each other before the fireplace, I
+read of the ascent of San Juan Hill, and of you, my friend, and your
+splendid courage, and your injury.
+
+"No doubt by the time this letter reaches you you will be well again,
+and in no need of my sympathy. But you will let me tell you how proud
+of you I am.
+
+"I read the newspaper accounts to my boys, who were greatly interested
+and impressed when they learned that mamma knew the hero. I was much
+amused by the youngest, Charlie--too small, I thought, to understand
+it all. But he stood before me with his hands on my knees and his big
+brown eyes on my face; and when I finished reading he asked many
+questions about the war and about you. He is the most American of my
+children, and loves to hear of his mother's country. After the others
+had gone he cuddled down in my lap and demanded the 'story' repeated
+in full; and when I described again the magnificent way in which you
+saved your men, he said, firmly, 'I am _his_ boy.'
+
+"I thought you might be interested in this unsought, spontaneous
+tribute, and my purpose in writing is to pass it on to you--though I
+admit it has taken me a long time to get 'round to it!
+
+"You will forgive this rambling letter, and you will believe me, now
+as ever,
+
+"Sincerely your friend,
+
+"MARGARET CHALLONER VALDRONOVNA."
+
+Hamilton slowly refolded the letter and returned it to its envelope,
+letting the solace of its sweet friendliness sink into his sore heart
+the while. She had not wholly forgotten him, then, this beautiful
+woman he had loved and who had given him a gracious and charming
+_camaraderie_ in return for the devotion of his life. He had not been
+senseless enough to misconstrue her feeling, so he had never spoken;
+and she, after two brilliant Washington seasons, had married a great
+Russian noble and sailed away without suspecting, he felt sure, what
+she was to him. He had recovered, as men do, but he had not loved
+again, nor had he married. He wondered if she knew. Very probably; for
+the newspapers which devoted so much space to his achievements had
+added detailed biographical sketches, over which he had winced from
+instinctive distaste of such intimate discussion of his personal
+affairs. The earlier reports (evidently the ones she had read) had
+published misleading accounts of his injuries. They were serious, but
+not dangerous, according to these authorities. It was only recently
+that rumors of his true condition had begun to creep into print. The
+Princess had not read these. Hamilton was glad of that.
+
+He recalled dreamily the different passages of her letter, the
+remainder of his mail lying neglected on his bed. That boy--her boy--
+_his_ boy. He smiled to himself, at first with amusement, then with a
+sudden tenderness that pleasantly softened his stern lips. He was weak
+enough, frightened enough, lonely enough, to grasp with an actual
+pitiful throb of the heart this tiny hand stretched out to him across
+the sea. He liked that boy--_his_ boy. He must be a fine fellow. He
+wondered idly how he looked. "Three boys--nine, seven, five"--yes,
+Charlie was five and had great brown eyes. Like his mother's, the
+stricken man remembered. She had brown eyes--and such brown eyes. Such
+kind, friendly, womanly brown eyes--true mirrors of the strong soul
+that looked from them. Something hot and wet stung the surface of
+Hamilton's cheek. He touched it unsuspectingly, and then swore alone
+in deep, frank self-disgust.
+
+"Well, of all the sentimental idiots!" he muttered. "My nerves are in
+a nice way, when I bawl like a baby because some one sends me a
+friendly letter. Guess I'll answer it."
+
+Miss Foster brought him pen, ink, and paper, and he began, writing
+with some difficulty, as he lay flat on his back.
+
+"MY DEAR PRINCESS,--Your letter has just reached me, and you cannot, I
+am sure, imagine the cheer and comfort it brought. I am still
+lingering unwillingly on the sick-list, but there is some talk now of
+shipping me north on the _Relief_ next week, when I hope to give a
+better account of myself. In the mean time, and after, I shall think
+much of you and the boys, especially of the youngest and his
+flattering adoption of me. I am already insufferably proud of that,
+and rather sentimental as well, as you will see by the fact that I
+want his photograph! Will you send it to me, in care of the Morton
+Trust Company, New York? I do not yet know just where I shall be.
+
+"There is a pleasant revelation of well-being and happiness between
+the lines of your letter. Believe me, I rejoice in both.
+
+"Faithfully yours,
+
+"ARTHUR HAMILTON."
+
+As he read it over the letter seemed curt and unsatisfactory, but he
+was already exhausted and had not the strength to make another effort.
+So he wearily sealed and addressed it, and gave it to Miss Foster for
+the next mail. Her tired eyes widened a little as she artlessly read
+the inscription.
+
+During the seemingly endless days and nights that followed, Hamilton
+battled manfully but despairingly with his sick soul. Wherever he
+looked there was blackness, lightened once or twice, and for an
+instant only, by a sudden passing memory of a little child. It would
+be too much to say that the memory comforted him. Nothing could do
+that, yet. All he dared hope for was for the strength to go through
+his ordeal with something approaching manliness and dignity. The
+visits of his friends were a strain to him, as well as to them, and it
+was sadly easy to see how the sense of his hopeless case depressed
+them. He could imagine the long breath they drew as they left his tent
+and found themselves again in the rich, warm, healthy world. He did
+not blame them. In their places, he would no doubt have felt just the
+same. But he was inevitably driven more and more into himself, and in
+his dogged efforts to get away from self-centred thought he turned
+with a sturdy determination to fancies about remote things, and
+especially to imaginings of the boy--the little fellow who loved him,
+and who, thank God, was not as yet "sorry for him!" Oddly enough, the
+mother seemed to have taken her place in the background of Hamilton's
+thoughts. It was her son who appealed to him--the innocent man-child,
+half American, half Russian, entering so happily and unconsciously on
+the enhanced uncertainties of life in the tragic land of his birth.
+
+During the trying, stormy voyage north on the great hospital ship,
+Hamilton had strange, half-waking visions of a curly headed lad with
+brown eyes, tumbling over a bear-skin rug in front of a great
+fireplace, or standing at his mother's knee looking into her face as
+she talked of America and of an American soldier. He began to fancy
+that the vision held at bay the other crowding horrors which lay in
+wait. If he could keep his mind on that he was safe. He was glad the
+mother and son could not, in their turn, picture him--as he was.
+
+When the photographs arrived, soon after he reached New York, the
+helpless officer opened the bulky package with eager ringers. There
+were two "cabinets," both of the child. One showed him at the tender
+age of two, a plump, dimpled, beautiful baby, airily clad in an
+embroidered towel. The second was apparently quite recent. A five-
+year-old boy, in black velvet and a bewildering expanse of lace
+collar, looked straight out of the picture with tragic dark eyes,
+whose direct glance was so like his mother's that ten years seemed
+suddenly obliterated as Hamilton returned their gaze. With these was a
+little letter on a child's note-paper, in printed characters which
+reeled drunkenly down the page from left to right. Hamilton read it
+with a chuckle.
+
+"DEAR CAPTAIN HAMILTON,--I love you very much. I love you becos you
+fought in the war. I have your picture. I have put a candle befront of
+your picture. The candle is burning. I love you very much. Your boy,
+
+"CHARLIE."
+
+Accompanying this epistolary masterpiece was a brief note from the
+writer's mother, explaining that the "picture" of Captain Hamilton, of
+whose possession her infant boasted, had been cut from an illustrated
+newspaper and pasted on stiff card-board in gratification of the
+child's whim.
+
+"He insists on burning a candle before it," she wrote, "evidently from
+some dim association with tapers and altars and the rest. As it is all
+a new manifestation of his character, we are indulging him freely.
+Certainly it can do him no harm to love and admire a brave man.
+Besides, to have a candle burned for you! Is not that a new flutter of
+glory?"
+
+Hamilton, still in the grasp of a dumb depression he would voice to no
+one, was a little amused and more touched. In his hideous loneliness
+and terror the pretty incident, one he would have smiled at and
+forgotten a year ago, took on an interest out of all proportion to its
+importance. He felt a sudden, unaccountable sense of pleasant
+companionship. The child became a loved personality--the one human,
+close, vital thing in a world over which there seemed to hang a thick
+black fog through which Hamilton vaguely, wretchedly groped. He
+himself did not know why the child interested him so keenly, nor did
+he try to analyze the fact. He was merely grateful for it, and for the
+other fact that he cherished no sentimental feeling for the boy's
+mother. That had passed out of his life as everything else had
+seemingly passed which belonged to the old order of things. He had
+always been a calm, reserved, self-absorbed, unemotional type of man,
+glorying a little, perhaps, in his lack of dependence on human kind.
+In his need he had turned to his fellows and turned in vain. Now that
+a precious thing had come to him unsought, he did not intend to lose
+it.
+
+Through his physicians he pulled various journalistic wires, resulting
+in the suppression, in the newspapers, of the hopeless facts of his
+case. He did not intend, he decided, to have his boy think of him as
+tied to an invalid's couch. Then, knowing something of human nature,
+and of the evanescent character of childish fancies, he ordered
+shipped to Russia a variety of American mechanical toys, calculated to
+swell the proud bosom of the small boy who received them. This
+shameless bid for continued favor met with immediate success. An
+ecstatic, incoherent little shriek of delight came from the land of
+the czar in the form of another letter; and the candle, which quite
+possibly would have burned low or even gone out, blazed up cheerily
+again.
+
+That was the beginning of an intercourse which interested and diverted
+Hamilton for months. He spared no pains to adapt his letters to the
+interest and comprehension of his small correspondent, and he derived
+a quite incredible amount of satisfaction from the childish scrawls
+which came to him in reply. They were wholly babyish documents, about
+the donkey, the nurse, the toys, and games of the small boy's daily
+life. Usually they were written in his own printed letters. Sometimes
+they were dictated to his mother, who faithfully reported every
+weighty word that fell from the infant's lips. But always they were
+full of the hero-worship of the little child for the big, strong,
+American fighting-man; and in every letter, sometimes in the
+beginning, sometimes at the end, occasionally in both places, as the
+enthusiasm of the writer waxed, was the satisfying assurance, "_I am
+your boy._" Hamilton's eyes raced over the little pages till he found
+that line, and there rested contentedly.
+
+As the months passed, the healing influence of time wrought its
+effects. Hamilton, shut in though he was, adapted himself to the
+narrow world of an invalid's room and its few interests. With the
+wealth he had fortunately inherited he brought to his side leading
+specialists who might possibly help him, and went through alternate
+ecstatic hopes and abysmal fears as the great men came and departed.
+Very quietly, too, he helped others less fortunate, financially, than
+himself. The nurses and physicians in the hospital where he lay
+learned to like and admire him, and other patients, convalescents or
+newcomers who were able to move about, sought his cheerful rooms and
+brought into them a whiff of the outside world. Through it all,
+winding in and out of the neutral-colored weeks like a scarlet thread
+of life and hope, came the childish letters from Russia, and each week
+a thick letter went back, artfully designed to keep alive the love and
+interest of an imaginative little boy.
+
+At the end of six months young Charles fell from his donkey and broke
+his left arm, but this trivial incident was not allowed to interfere
+with the gratifying regularity with which his letters arrived. It was,
+however, interesting, as throwing a high light on the place his
+American hero held in the child's fancy. His mother touched on this in
+her letter describing the accident.
+
+"The arm had to be set at once," she wrote, "and of course it was very
+painful. But I told Charlie you would be greatly disappointed if your
+boy were not brave and did not obey the doctor. He saw the force of
+this immediately, and did not shed a tear, though his dear little face
+was white and drawn with pain."
+
+Master Charlie himself discussed the same pleasant incident in the
+first letter he dictated after the episode.
+
+"I did not cry," he mentioned, with natural satisfaction. "Mamma
+cried, and Sonya cried. Men do not cry. Do they? You did not cry when
+you were hurt, did you? I am going to be just like you."
+
+Hamilton laughed over the letter, his pale cheek flushing a little at
+the same time. He _had_ cried, once or twice; he recalled it now with
+shame. He must try to do better, remembering that he loomed large as a
+heroic model for the young.
+
+He was still reading the little letter when Dr. Van Buren, his
+classmate at the Point, his one intimate since then, and his physician
+now, entered the room, greeted him curtly, and stood at the window for
+a moment, drumming his fingers fiercely against the pane. Hamilton
+knew the symptoms; Van Buren was nervous and worried about something.
+He dropped the small envelope into his lap and looked up.
+
+"Well?" he said, tersely.
+
+Van Buren did not answer for a moment. Then he turned, crossed the
+room abruptly, and sat down near the reclining-chair in which the
+officer spent his days. The physician's face was strained and pale.
+His glance, usually direct, shifted and fell under his friend's
+inquiring gaze.
+
+"Well?" repeated the latter, compellingly. "I suppose you fellows have
+been talking me over again. What's the outcome?"
+
+Van Buren cleared his throat.
+
+"Yes, we--we have, old man," he began, rather huskily--"in there, you
+know." He indicated the direction of the consulting-room as he spoke.
+"We don't like the recent symptoms."
+
+Unconsciously, Hamilton straightened his shoulders.
+
+"Out with it. Don't mince matters, Frank. Do you think life is so
+precious a thing to me that I can't part with it if I've got to?"
+
+Van Buren writhed in his chair.
+
+"It isn't that," he said, "life or death. It's wor--I mean, it's
+different. It's--it's these." He laid his hand on the officer's
+helpless legs, stretched out stiffly under a gay red afghan. "God!" he
+broke out, suddenly, "I don't know how you'll take it, old chap; and
+there's no sense in trying to break a thing like this gently. We're
+afraid--we think--they'll--have to come off!"
+
+Under the shock of it Hamilton set his teeth.
+
+"Why?" he asked, quietly.
+
+"Because--well, because they're no good. They're dead. They're a
+constant menace to you. A scratch or injury of any kind--they've got
+to go--that's all, Arthur. But we've been talking it over and we can
+fix you up so you can get about and be much better off than you are
+now." He leaned forward as he spoke, and his words came quickly and
+eagerly. The worst was over; he was ready to picture the other side.
+Hamilton stopped him with a gesture.
+
+"Suppose I decline to let them go?" he asked, grimly.
+
+Van Buren stared at him.
+
+"You can't!" he stammered.
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"Because--why, because your life depends on their coming off!"
+
+Hamilton's lips set.
+
+"My _life!_" he repeated. "My precious, glad, young life! So full of
+happiness! So useful!" He dropped the savagely bitter tone suddenly.
+"No, Frank," he said, quietly, "I won't go through life as the half of
+a man. I'll let the thing take its course; or if that will be too slow
+and too--horrible, I'll help the hobbling beast on its way. I think
+I'd be justified. It's too much to ask--you know it--to be hoisted
+through life as a remnant."
+
+Van Buren rose, moved his chair nearer to Hamilton's, and sat down
+close to his friend's side. All nervousness had left him. He was again
+cool, scientific, professional; but with it all there was the deep
+sympathy and understanding of a friend.
+
+"No, you won't," he said, firmly; "you won't do anything of the kind,
+and I'll tell you why you won't. Because it isn't in your make-up to
+play the coward. That's why. You've got to go through with it and take
+what comes, and do it all like the strong chap you are. If you think
+there won't be anything left in life, you are mistaken. You can be of
+a lot of use; you can do a lot of good. You will have time and
+inclination and money. You will be able to get around, not as quickly,
+but as surely. With a good man-servant you'll be entirely independent
+of drafts on charity or pity. Money has some beautiful uses. If you
+were a poor devil who hadn't a cent in the world and would be
+dependent on the grudging service of others, I should wish you to
+accept and bear, perhaps, but I could not urge you to. Now, your life
+is helpful to others. You can give and aid and bless. You can be a
+greater hero than the man who went up San Juan Hill, and there are
+those who will feel it."
+
+"That is, my money is needed, and because I've got it I should drag
+out years of misery while I spread little financial poultices on other
+people's ills," returned Hamilton. "No, thanks; it's not enough good.
+They can have the money just the same. That can be amputated with
+profit to all concerned. I'll leave it to hospitals and homes for the
+helpless, especially for fractional humanity--needy remnants. But I
+decline absolutely, once and for all, to accept the noble future you
+have outlined. I grant you it would be heroic. But have you ever heard
+of great heroism with no stimulus to arouse it?"
+
+He raised his hand as he spoke, and brought it down with a gesture of
+finality. As it fell, it dropped on the little letter. Mechanically,
+his fingers closed on it.
+
+His boy! His brave little boy who had not flinched or cried, because
+he meant to be just like Captain Hamilton. What would _he_ think when
+the truth came to him years hence, as it must do. What would she think
+now, the mother who was glad that her son should "love and admire a
+brave man"? The small missive was a stimulus.
+
+Hamilton turned to Van Buren again, checking with a little shake of
+the head the impetuous speech that rushed to that gentleman's lips.
+
+"Just wait one moment," he said, thoughtfully. He leaned back and shut
+his eyes, and as he did so the familiar scene of months past came
+suddenly before them--the quaint old foreign room, the great fireplace
+with its blazing logs, the mother, the curly haired boy. His life had
+been a lonely one, always, Hamilton reflected. Few, pathetically few,
+so far as he knew, would be affected by its continuance or its end.
+But the _manner_ of its end--that was a different matter. That might
+touch individuals far and wide by its tragic example to other
+desperate souls. Still, he was not their keeper. As for Charlie--
+
+Ah, _Charlie!_ Charlie, with his childish but utter hero-worship;
+Charlie, with his lighted candle; Charlie, with his small-boy love and
+trust--Charlie would be told some little story and Charlie would soon
+forget. But--what would Charlie think of him some day when the truth
+was out--Charlie who at five could set his teeth and bear pain
+stoically because his hero did! Because he was "His Boy!" Hamilton's
+mind returned to that problem again and again and lingered there. No,
+he could not disappoint Charlie. Besides, Van Buren was right. There
+was work, creditable work to do. And to be plucky, even if only to
+keep a brave little chap's ideal intact, to maintain its helpful
+activity, was something worthy of a stanch man. Would he wish his boy
+to go under when the strain against the right thing was crushing?
+
+He laid the letter down gently, deliberately, turned to his friend,
+and smiled as Van Buren had not seen him smile since their ingenuous
+boyhood days. There was that sweetness in the smile which homage to
+woman makes us dub "feminine," and something of it, too, in the way he
+laid his hand on his chum's shoulder.
+
+"All right, old sawbones," he said, slowly. "You may do whatever has
+to be done. I'll face the music. Unbuilding one man may build up
+another."
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+THE COMMUNITY'S SUNBEAM
+
+
+Miss Clarkson looked at the small boy, and the small boy looked back
+at Miss Clarkson with round, unwinking eyes. In the woman's glance
+were sympathy and a puzzled wonder; the child's gaze expressed only a
+calm and complete detachment. Subtly, but unmistakably, he succeeded
+in conveying the impression that he regarded this human object before
+him because it was in his line of vision, but that he found no
+interest in it, nor good reason for assuming an interest he did not
+feel: that if, indeed, he was conscious of any emotion at all, it was
+in the nature of a vaguely dawning desire that the object should
+remove itself, should cease to shut off the view from the one window
+of the tenement room that was his home. But it really did not matter
+much. Already, in his seven years of life, the small boy had decided
+that nothing really mattered much, and his dark, grim little face,
+with its deep-cut, unchildish lines, bore witness to the unwavering
+strength of this conviction. If the object preferred to stay--He
+settled himself more firmly on the rickety chair he occupied, crossed
+his feet with infinite care, and continued to regard the object with
+eyes that held the invariable expression with which they met the
+incidents of life, whether these incidents were the receiving of a
+banana from Miss Clarkson's hands, or, as had happened half an hour
+before, the spectacle of his dead mother being carried down-stairs.
+
+It was not a stupid look; it was at once intent, unsympathetic,
+impersonal. Under it, now, its object experienced a moment of actual
+embarrassment. Miss Clarkson was not accustomed to the indifferent
+gaze of human eyes, and in her philanthropic work among the tenements
+she had been somewhat conspicuously successful with children. They
+seemed always to like her, to accept her; and if her undoubted charm
+of face, of dress, and of smile failed to win them, Miss Clarkson was
+not above resorting to the aid of little gifts, of toys, even to the
+pernicious power of pennies. She did good, but she did it in her own
+way. She was young, she was rich, she was independent. She helped the
+poor because she pitied them, and wished to aid them, but her methods
+were unique, and were followed none the less serenely when, as
+frequently happened, they conflicted with all the accepted notions of
+organized philanthropy.
+
+She had come to this room almost daily, Miss Clarkson remembered,
+since she had discovered the destitute Russian woman and her child
+there a month ago. The mother was dying of consumption; the child was
+neglected and hungry--yet both had an unmistakable air of birth, of
+breeding; and the mother's French was as perfect as the exquisitely
+finished manner that drew from Anne Clarkson, in the wretched tenement
+room, her utmost deference and courtesy. The child, too, had glints of
+polish. Punctiliously he opened doors, placed chairs, bowed;
+punctiliously he stood when the lady stood, sat when the lady sat, met
+her requests for small services with composure and appreciation. And
+(here was the rub) each time she came, bringing in her generous wake
+the comforts that lightened his mother's dreary journey into another
+world, he received her with the air of one courteously greeting a
+stranger, or, at best, of one seeking an elusive memory as one surveys
+a half-familiar face.
+
+Doggedly Anne Clarkson had persisted in her attentions to them both.
+The mother was grateful--there was no doubt of that. Under the
+ministrations of the nurse Miss Clarkson supplied, under the influence
+of food, of medicines, and of care, she brightened out of the apathy
+in which her new friend had found her. But to the last she retained
+something of her son's unresponsiveness, and an uncommunicativeness
+which tagged his as hereditary. She never spoke of herself, of her
+friends, or of her home. She made no last requests, left no last
+messages. Once, as she looked at her boy, her eyeballs exuded a film
+of moisture. Miss Clarkson interpreted this phenomenon rightly, and
+quietly said:
+
+"I will see that he is well cared for." The sick woman gave her a long
+look, and then nodded.
+
+"You will," she answered. "You are not of those who promise and do not
+perform. You are very good--you have been very good to us. Your reward
+should come. It does not always come to those who are good, but it
+should come to you. You should marry and have children, and leave this
+terrible country, and be happy."
+
+The words impressed Miss Clarkson, because, as she reminded herself
+now, they were almost the last her protegee uttered. She considered
+them excessively unmodern, and strongly out of place on the lips of
+one whose romance had ended in disillusionment.
+
+Well, it was over. The mother was gone. But the child remained, and
+his future--his immediate future, at least--must be decided here and
+now. With a restless movement Anne Clarkson leaned toward him. In her
+abstraction she had shifted her glance from him for a few moments, and
+he had taken advantage of the interval to survey dispassionately the
+toes of the new shoes she had given to him. He glanced up now, and met
+her look with the singular unresponsiveness which seemed his note.
+
+"We're going away, Ivan," she said, speaking with that artificial
+cheerfulness practised so universally upon the helpless and the young.
+"Mother has gone, you know, and we can't stay here any more. We're
+going to the country, to a beautiful place where there are flowers,
+and birds, and dogs, and other little boys and girls. So get your cap,
+dear."
+
+Ivan looked unimpressed, but he rose with instant obedience and
+crossed the room to its solitary closet. His little figure looked very
+trim in the new suit she had bought for him; she noticed how well he
+carried himself. His preparations for departure were humorously
+simple. He took his cap from its peg, put it on his head, and opened
+the door for her to precede him in the utter abandonment of his
+"home." Earlier in the day Miss Clarkson had presented to pleased
+neighbors the furniture and clothing of the dead woman, taking the
+precaution to have it fumigated in an empty room in the building. On
+the same impulse she had given to an old bedridden Irishwoman a few
+little articles that had soothed the Russian's last days: a small
+night-lamp, a bed-tray, and the like. Ivan's outfit, consisting solely
+of the things she herself had given him, had been packed in his
+mother's one small foreign trunk, whose contents until then, Miss
+Clarkson, observed, was an ikon, quaintly framed. Of letters, of
+souvenirs, of any clue of any kind to the identity of mother and son,
+there was none. She felt sure that the names they had given her were
+assumed.
+
+Stiffly erect, Ivan waited beside the open door. Miss Clarkson gave a
+methodical last look around the dismantled room, and walked out of it,
+the child following. At the top of the stairs she turned her head
+sharply, a sudden curiosity uppermost in her mind. Was he glancing
+back? she wondered. Was he showing any emotion? Did he feel any? He
+seemed so horribly mature--he _must_ understand something of what this
+departure meant. Did he, by chance, need comforting? But Ivan was
+close by her side, his sombre black eyes looking straight before him,
+his new shoes creaking freshly as he descended the rickety steps. Miss
+Clarkson sighed. If only he were pretty, she reflected. There were
+always sentimental women ready and willing to adopt a handsome child.
+But even Ivan's mother would have declared him not pretty. He was
+merely small, and dark, and foreign, and reserved, and horribly self-
+contained. His black hair was perfectly straight, his lips made a
+straight line in his face. He had no dimples, no curls, none of the
+appealing graces and charms of childhood. He was seven--seven decades,
+she almost thought, with a sudden throb of pity for him. But he had
+one quality of childhood--helplessness. To that, at least, the
+Community to which she had finally decided to intrust him would surely
+respond. She took his small hand in hers as they reached the street,
+and after an instinctive movement of withdrawal, like the startled
+fluttering of a bird, he suffered it to remain there. Together they
+walked to the nearest corner, and stood awaiting the coming of a
+trolley-car, the heat of an August sun blazing upon them, the stifling
+odors of the tenement quarter filling their nostrils. Rude, half-naked
+little boys jeered at them, and made invidious remarks about Ivan's
+new clothes; a small girl smiled shyly at him; a wretched yellow dog
+snapped at his heels. To these varying attentions the child gave the
+same quietly observant glance, a glance without rancor as without
+interest. Miss Clarkson experienced a sense of utter helplessness as
+she watched him.
+
+"Did you know the little girl, Ivan?" she asked, in English.
+
+"Yes, madam."
+
+"Do you like her?"
+
+"No, madam."
+
+"Why not? She seemed a nice little girl."
+
+There was no response. She tried again.
+
+"Are you tired, dear?"
+
+"No, madam."
+
+"Are you glad you are going into the country and away from the hot,
+dirty city?"
+
+"No, madam."
+
+"Would you rather stay here?"
+
+"No, madam."
+
+The quality of the negative was the same in all.
+
+Miss Clarkson gave him up. When they entered the car she sank into a
+depressed silence, which endured until they reached the Grand Central
+Station. There, after she had sent off several telegrams and bought
+their tickets, and established herself and her charge comfortably side
+by side on the end seat in a drawing-room car, she again essayed
+sprightly conversation adapted to the understanding of the young.
+
+"Do you know the country, Ivan?" she asked, ingratiatingly. "Have you
+ever been there to see the grass and the cows and the blue skies?"
+
+"No, madam."
+
+"You will like them very much. All little boys and girls like the
+country, and are very happy there."
+
+"Yes, madam."
+
+"Do you like to play?"
+
+"No, madam."
+
+"Do you like to--to--look at picture-books?"
+
+"No, madam."
+
+"What do you like to do?"
+
+There was no reply. Miss Clarkson groaned inwardly. Was he only a
+little monosyllabic machine? The infant regarded with calm eyes the
+sweep of the New York landscape across which the train was passing.
+His patron opened the new novel with which she had happily provided
+herself, plunged into its pages, and let herself rest by forgetting
+him for a while. He sat by her side motionless, observant, continuing
+to exude infinite patience.
+
+"He ought to be planted on the Egyptian sands," reflected Miss
+Clarkson once, as she glanced at him. "He'd make a dear little brother
+to the Sphinx." She stopped a train-boy passing through the car and
+bought him a small box of chocolates, which he ate uninterruptedly,
+somewhat as the tiny hand of a clock marks the seconds. Later she
+presented him with a copy of a picture-paper. He surveyed its
+illustrations with studious intentness for five minutes, and then laid
+the paper on the seat beside him. Miss Clarkson again fled to
+sanctuary in her novel, wondering how long pure negation could enlist
+interest.
+
+At the small station where they left the train the tension of the
+situation was slightly lessened. A plump little woman, with a round
+pink face, keen, very direct blue eyes, and live gray hair, deftly
+tooled a fat pony up to the asphalt, and greeted them with cheerful
+informality.
+
+"Get in," she said, briskly, after a brief handshake with Miss
+Clarkson. "There's plenty of room in the phaeton. We pack five in
+sometimes. I was sorely tempted to bring two of the children; they
+begged to come to meet the new boy; but it seemed best not to rush him
+in the beginning, don't you know, so I left Josephine squalling behind
+the wood-pile, and Augustus Adolphus strangling manfully on a glass of
+lemonade intended to comfort him."
+
+She laughed as she spoke, but her blue eyes surveyed the boy
+appraisingly as she tucked him into the space between herself and Miss
+Clarkson. He had stood cap in hand during the meeting between the
+ladies; now he replaced his cap upon his head, fixed his black eyes on
+the restless tail of the fat pony, and remained submerged under the
+encroaching summer garments of both women. Mrs. Eltner, presiding
+genius of the Lotus Brotherhood Colony, exchanged an eloquent glance
+with Miss Clarkson as she started the pony along the winding ribbon of
+the country road. The New-Yorker's heart lightened. She had infinite
+faith in the plump, capable hands that held the reins; she believed
+them equal to anything, even to the perplexing task of guiding the
+infant career of Ivanovitch. Mrs. Eltner prattled on.
+
+"Well," she quoted, in answer to Miss Clarkson's question, "they are
+so well that Fraulein von Hoffman is in despair over them. She has
+some new theories she's anxious to try when they're ill, but
+throughout the year she hasn't had one chance. Every blessed child is
+flamboyantly robust. Goodness! Why shouldn't they be? In the sunshine
+from eight in the morning until six at night. They have their lessons
+in a little roofed summer-house in the open air, their meals in
+another, and they almost sleep in the open air. There are ten of them
+now--counting your boy"--she nodded toward the unconscious Ivan--"four
+girls and six boys. None of the parents interferes with them. They
+sleep in the dormitory with Fraulein, she teaches them a few hours a
+day, and the rest of the time we leave them alone. Fraulein assures me
+that the influence on their developing souls is wonderful." Mrs.
+Eltner laughed comfortably. "It's all an experiment," she went on,
+more seriously. "Who can tell how it will end? But one thing is
+certain: we have taken these poor waifs from the New York streets, and
+we have at least made them healthy and happy to begin with. The rest
+must come later."
+
+"An achievement," agreed Miss Clarkson. "I hope you will be as
+successful with my small charge. He is not healthy, and I doubt if he
+has ever known a moment of happiness. Possibly he can never take it
+in. I don't know--he puzzles me."
+
+Her friend nodded, and they drove on in silence. It was almost sunset
+when the fat pony turned into an open gate leading to a big white
+colonial house, whose wide verandas held hammocks, easy-chairs, and
+one fat little girl asleep on a door-mat. On the sweeping lawn before
+the house an old man lounged comfortably in a garden-chair, surveying
+with quiet approval the efforts of a pretty girl in a wide sunbonnet
+who was weeding a flower-bed near him. Through the open window of a
+distant room came the sound of a piano. At the left of the house a
+solitary peacock strutted, his spreading tail alive in the sun's last
+rays. The effect of the place was deliriously "homey." With eyes
+slightly distended, Ivan surveyed the monstrous fowl, turning his head
+to follow its progress as the phaeton rolled around the drive and
+stopped before the wide front door. The two women again exchanged
+glances.
+
+"Absolutely the first evidence of human interest," remarked Miss
+Clarkson, with hushed solemnity. The other smiled with quiet
+confidence. "It will come," she predicted; "it will come all right. We
+do wonders with them here."
+
+As they entered the wide hall a picturesque group disintegrated
+suddenly. A slender German woman, tall, gray-haired, slightly bent,
+detached herself from an encircling mass of childish hands and arms
+and legs, gave a hurried greeting to Miss Clarkson, of whom she rather
+disapproved, and turned eyes alight with interest on the new claimant
+for her ministrations. Cap in hand, Ivan looked up at her. Mrs. Eltner
+introduced them briefly.
+
+"Your new little boy, Fraulein," she said, "Ivan Ivanovitch. He speaks
+English and French and Russian. He is going to love his new teacher
+and his new little friends, and be very happy here."
+
+Fraulein von Hoffman bent down and kissed the chilling surface of
+Ivan's pale cheek.
+
+"But yes," she cried, "of a certainty he shall be happy. We are all
+happy here--all, all. He shall have his place, his lessons, his little
+duties--but, ach, he is so young! He is the youngest of us. Still, he
+must have his duty." She checked her rapid English for a courteous
+explanation to Miss Clarkson.
+
+"Each has his duties," she told that lady, while the line of children
+lent polite interest to her words, drinking them in, apparently, with
+open mouths. "Each of us must be useful to the community in some way,
+however small. That is our principle. Yes. Little Josephine waters
+every day the flowers in the dining-room, and they bloom gratefully
+for little Josephine--ach, how they bloom! Augustus Adolphus keeps the
+wood-box filled. It is Henry's task to water the garden plants, and
+Henry never forgets. So, too, it is with the others. But Ivan--Ivan is
+very young. He is but seven, you say. Yes, yes, what shall one do at
+seven?"
+
+Her rapid, broken English ceased again as she surveyed the child, her
+blond brows knit in deep reflection. Then her thin face lit suddenly.
+
+"Ach," she cried, enthusiastically, "an inspiration I have! He is too
+young to work as yet, this little Ivan, but he shall have his task,
+like the rest. He shall be our little sunbeam. He shall laugh and play
+and make us happy."
+
+With a common hysterical impulse Miss Clarkson and Mrs. Eltner turned
+their heads to avoid each other's eyes, the former making a desperate
+effort at self-control as she gazed severely through a window near
+her. It was not funny, this thing, she reminded herself sternly; it
+was too ghastly to be funny, but there was no question that the
+selection of Ivan Ivanovitch as the joyous, all-pervasive sunbeam of
+the community at Locust Hall was slightly incongruous. When she could
+trust herself she glanced at him. He stood as he had stood before, his
+small, old, unchildish face turned up to the German, his black eyes
+fixed unwaveringly upon her gray ones. Under the glance Fraulein's
+expression changed. For an instant there was a look of bewilderment on
+her face, of a doubt of the wisdom of her choice of a mission for this
+unusual new-comer, but it disappeared as quickly as it had come. With
+recovered serenity she addressed him and those around him.
+
+"But he need not begin to-night," she added, kindly, "not when he is
+tired. He shall eat, he shall rest, he shall sleep. Then to-morrow he
+shall take his place among us and be the little sunbeam. Yes, yes--
+think how far the sunbeam has to travel!" she murmured,
+inspirationally.
+
+Miss Clarkson knelt down before the boy and gathered him into her
+arms. The act was spontaneous and sincere, but as she did it she
+realized that in the eyes of the German, and even in those of Mrs.
+Eltner, it seemed theatrical. It was one of the things Fraulein von
+Hoffman disapproved in her--this tendency to moments of emotion.
+
+"Good-night, Ivan," she said. "I am going to stay until morning, so I
+shall see you then. Sleep well. I am sure you will be a happy little
+boy in this pleasant home."
+
+The unfathomable eyes of Ivan Ivanovitch looked back into hers.
+
+"Good-night, madam," he said, quietly. Then, as she was about to turn
+away, his small face took on for an instant the dawn of an expression.
+"Good-night, madam," he said again, more faintly.
+
+Slight as the change had been, Miss Clarkson caught it. She swayed
+toward him.
+
+"Are you homesick, Ivan?" she asked, caressingly, almost lovingly.
+"Would you like me to take you up-stairs and put you to bed?"
+
+Fraulein von Hoffman broke in upon her speech.
+
+"But they shall all go!" she cried. "It is their time. He will not be
+alone. Josephine shall take him by the hand; Augustus Adolphus shall
+lead the way. It will be a little procession--ach, yes! And he shall
+have his supper in the nursery."
+
+A chubby, confident little girl of nine detached herself from the
+group near them and grasped the hand of Ivan Ivanovitch firmly within
+her own. He regarded her stoically for an instant; then his eyes
+returned to Miss Clarkson's, who had risen, and was watching him
+closely. There was a faint flicker in them as he replied to her
+question.
+
+"No, madam," he said, gravely. "Thank you, madam. Good-night, madam."
+
+He bowed deeply, drawing the reluctant figure of the startled
+Josephine into the salute as he did so. A sturdy German boy of eleven,
+with snapping brown eyes, placed himself before the children, his feet
+beating time, his head very high. "Forward, march!" he cried, in
+clear, boyish tones. The triumphant Josephine obeyed the command,
+dragging her charge after her. Thus convoyed, one companion leading,
+another pulling, the rest following with many happy giggles, Ivan
+Ivanovitch marched up-stairs to bed. His life as the community's
+sunbeam had begun.
+
+The next morning Fraulein von Hoffman met Miss Clarkson in the hall,
+and turned upon her the regard of a worried gray eye. Miss Clarkson
+returned the look, her heart sinking as she did so.
+
+"It is that child," the German began. "He is of an interest--and ach,
+ja! of a discouragement," she added, with a gusty sigh. "Already I can
+see it--what it will be. He speaks not; he plays not. He gazes always
+from the window, and when one speaks, he says, 'Yes, madam'--only
+that. This morning I looked to see him bright and happy, but it is not
+so. Is it that his little heart breaks for his mother? Is it--that he
+is always thus?"
+
+Miss Clarkson shook her head and then nodded, forming thereby
+unconsciously the sign of the cross. The combination seemed to answer
+the German's questions. Fraulein von Hoffman nodded also, slowly, and
+with comprehension.
+
+"I don't know what you can do with him," said the American, frankly.
+"He's like that all the time. I asked his mother, and she admitted it.
+I brought him here because I hoped the other children might brighten
+him up, and I knew you could arouse him if any one could."
+
+The tribute, rare from Miss Clarkson, cheered Fraulein von Hoffman.
+Her face cleared. She began to regain her self-confidence.
+
+"Ach, well," she said, comfortably, "we will see. We will do our best
+--yes, of a certainty. And we will see." She strolled away after this
+oracular utterance, and Miss Clarkson went to breakfast. Thus neither
+witnessed a scene taking place at that moment on the lawn near the
+front veranda. Standing there with his back against a pillar,
+surrounded by the other children of the community, was Ivan
+Ivanovitch. In the foreground, facing him, stood Augustus Adolphus,
+addressing the new-comer in firm accents, and emphasizing his remarks
+by waving a grimy forefinger before Ivan Ivanovitch's uninterested
+face. The high, positive tones of Augustus Adolphus filled the air.
+
+"Well, then, why don't you do it?" he was asking, fiercely. "You _got_
+to do it! You _have_ to! Fraulein says so. The rest of us has to do
+ours. I filled my wood-boxes already, and Josie watered the flowers.
+We did it early so we could watch you being a sunbeam, and now you
+ain't being one. Why ain't you? You _got_ to! Why don't you begin?"
+The continued unresponsiveness of Ivan Ivanovitch irritated him at
+this point, and he turned excitedly to the others for support.
+
+"'Ain't he got to?" he cried. "'Ain't he got to be a sunbeam? Fraulein
+said he should begin this morning. Well, then, why don't he begin?"
+
+A childish buzz of corroboration answered him. It was plain that the
+assignment of Ivan's mission, publicly made as it had been the night
+before, had deeply impressed the children of the community. They
+closed around the two boys. The small Josephine laid a propelling hand
+upon Ivan's shoulder and tried to push him forward, with a vague idea
+of thus accelerating his task.
+
+"Begin now," she suggested, encouragingly. "Do it, and have it over.
+That's the way I do."
+
+In response to this maiden appeal the lips of Ivan Ivanovitch parted.
+
+"I do not know how to do it," he announced, distinctly. "How shall I
+do it?"
+
+Augustus Adolphus broke in again. "Aw, say, go on," he urged. "You
+_got_ to do it! Why _don't_ you, then?"
+
+Ivan Ivanovitch turned upon him an eye in which the habitual
+expression of patience was merely intensified.
+
+"I do not know how to do it," he said again, speaking slowly and
+painstakingly. "You tell me how; then I will do it."
+
+Under the force of this counter-charge, Augustus Adolphus fell back.
+
+"I--I--don't know, neither," he muttered, feebly. "I thought you knew.
+You _got_ to know, 'cause you got to do it."
+
+The eyes of the small Russian swept the little group, and lingered on
+the round face of Josephine.
+
+"You tell me," he said to her. "Then I will do it."
+
+Josephine rose to the occasion.
+
+"Why, why," she began, doubtfully, "_I_ know what it is. You be a
+sunbeam, you know. I know what a sunbeam is. It's a little piece of
+the sun. It is long and bright. It comes through the window and falls
+on the floor. Sometimes it falls on us. Sometimes it falls on
+flowers."
+
+Offered this choice, Ivan at once expressed his preference.
+
+"I will fall on flowers," he announced, with decision.
+
+The brown eyes of Augustus Adolphus glittered as he suddenly grasped
+the possibilities of the situation.
+
+"No, you won't, neither!" he cried, excitedly. "You got to do it
+_all!_ You better begin now. You can fall through that window; it's
+open." He indicated, as he spoke, a low French window leading from the
+living-room on to the broad veranda. "He's got to!" he cried, again.
+"'Ain't he got to?" With a unanimous cry the meeting declared that he
+had got to. Some of the children knew better; others did not; but all
+knew Augustus Adolphus Schmidtt.
+
+Without a word, Ivan turned, walked up the steps of the veranda,
+entered the wide hall, swung to the left, crossed the living-room,
+approached the window, and fell out, head first. There was something
+deeply impressive in the silence and swiftness of his action,
+something deliriously stimulating to the spectators in the thud of his
+small body on the unyielding wood. A long sigh of happiness was
+exhaled by the group of children. Certainly this was a new duty--a
+strange one, but worthy, no doubt, since it emanated from Fraulein,
+and beyond question interesting as a spectacle. Augustus Adolphus
+resolved in that instant to attend to his personal tasks at an early
+hour each day, that he might have uninterrupted leisure for getting
+new falls out of Ivan's. That infant had now found his feet, and was
+methodically brushing the dust from his clothes. There was a rapidly
+developing lump over one eye, but his expression remained unchanged.
+Josephine approached him with happy gurgles. Her heart was filled with
+womanly sympathy, but her soul remained undaunted. She was of the
+Spartan stuff that sends sons to the war, and holds a reception for
+them if they return--from victory--on their shields. She cooed in
+conscious imitation of Fraulein's best manner. "Now, you can fall on
+flowers."
+
+Her victim followed her unresistingly to the spot she indicated, and,
+having arrived, cast himself violently upon a bed of blazing
+nasturtiums. The enthusiastic and approving group of children closed
+around him as he rose. Even Augustus Adolphus, as he surveyed the
+wreck that remained, yielded to Ivan's loyal devotion to his role the
+tribute of an envious sigh.
+
+"Now you can fall on us," he suggested, joyfully. Before the words had
+left his innocent lips, Ivan had made his choice. The next instant the
+air was full of arms, legs, caps, and hair.
+
+"Lemme go!" shrieked Augustus Adolphus, battling wildly with the
+unsuspected and terrible force that had suddenly assailed him. "Lemme
+go, I tell you!"
+
+The reply of Ivan came through set teeth as he planted one heel firmly
+in the left ear of the recumbent youth. "I have to fall on you," he
+explained, mildly, suiting the action to the word. "First I fall on
+you; then I let you go."
+
+There was no question in the minds of the spectators that this was the
+most brilliant and successfully performed of the strange and
+interesting tasks of Ivan. They clustered around to tell him so, while
+Augustus Adolphus sought the dormitory for needed repairs. One of the
+rules of the community was that the children should settle their
+little disputes among themselves. Fortunately, perhaps, for Augustus
+Adolphus he found the dormitory empty, and was able to remove from his
+person the most obvious evidences of one hoisted by his own petard. In
+the mean time Ivan Ivanovitch was experiencing a new sensation--the
+pleasurable emotion caused by the praise of one's kind. But he did not
+show that it was pleasant--he merely gazed and listened.
+
+"I think your new duties is nice," Josephine informed him, as she
+gazed upon him with eyes humid with approval. "You have to do it every
+day," she added, gluttonously.
+
+Ivan assented, but in his heart there lay a doubt. Seeking for light,
+he approached Fraulein von Hoffman that afternoon as she dozed and
+knitted under a sheltering tree.
+
+He stopped before her and fixed her with his serious gaze.
+
+"Does a sunbeam fall through windows?" he inquired, politely.
+
+Fraulein von Hoffman regarded him with a drowsy lack of interest.
+
+"But yes, surely, sometimes," she admitted.
+
+"Does it fall always through the window--every day?"
+
+"But yes, surely, if it is in the right place."
+
+The community's sunbeam sighed.
+
+"Does it fall on flowers and on boys and girls?" he persisted.
+
+"But yes, it falls on everything that is near."
+
+A look of pained surprise dawned upon the features of Ivan Ivanovitch.
+
+"Always?" he asked, quickly. "Always--it falls on _everything_ that is
+near?"
+
+Fraulein von Hoffman placidly counted her stitches, confirming with a
+sigh her suspicion that in dozing she had dropped three.
+
+"Not always," she murmured, absently. "But no. Only when the sun is
+shining."
+
+Ivan carried this gleam of comfort with him when he went away, and it
+is very possible that he longed for a darkened world. But if, indeed,
+his daily task was difficult, as it frequently proved to be as the
+days passed, there were compensations--in the school games, in the
+companionships of his new friends, in the kindness of those around
+him. Even Augustus Adolphus was good to him at times. Unquestioningly,
+inscrutably, Ivan absorbed atmosphere, and did his share of the
+community's work as he saw it.
+
+The theories of the community were consistently carried out. In the
+summer, after their few hours of study, the children were left to
+themselves. Together they worked out the problems of their little
+world; together they discussed, often with an uncanny insight, the
+grown-ups around them. Sometimes the tasks of the others were
+forgotten; frequently, in the stress of work and play, Augustus
+Adolphus's wood-box remained unfulfilled; Josephine's flowers were
+unwatered. But the mission of Ivan as a busy and strenuous sunbeam was
+regularly and consistently carried out--all the children saw to that.
+Regularly, that is, save on dark days. Here he drew the line.
+
+"Fraulein says it only falls on things when the sun shines," he
+explained, tersely, and he fulfilled his mission accordingly. Fraulein
+wondered where he had accumulated the choice collection of bumps and
+bruises that adorned his person; but he never told, and apparently
+nobody else knew. Mrs. Eltner marvelled darkly over the destruction of
+her favorite nasturtium-bed. Daily the stifled howls of Augustus
+Adolphus continued to rend the ambient air when the sunbeam fell on
+him; but he forbore to complain, suffering heroically this unpleasant
+feature of the programme, that the rest might not be curtailed. Once,
+indeed, he had rebelled.
+
+"Why don't you fall on some one else?" he had demanded, sulkily. "You
+don't have to fall on me all the time."
+
+The reply of the sunbeam was convincing in its simple truth.
+
+"I do," he explained. "Fraulein has said so. It must fall always on
+the same place if it is there."
+
+Augustus Adolphus was silenced. He was indeed there, always. It was
+unfortunate, but seemed inevitable, that he should contribute his
+share to the daily entertainment so deeply enjoyed by all.
+
+It was, very appropriately, at Thanksgiving-time that Ivan's mission
+as an active sunbeam ended. He was engaged in his usual profound
+meditation in the presence of Miss Clarkson, who had come to see him,
+and who was at the moment digesting the information she had received,
+that not once in his months at Locust Hall had he been seen to smile.
+True, he seemed well and contented. His thin little figure was fast
+taking on plumpness; he was brown, bright-eyed. Studying him, Miss
+Clarkson observed a small bruise on his chin, another on his
+intellectual brow.
+
+"How did you get those, Ivan?" she asked.
+
+For some reason Ivan suddenly decided to tell her.
+
+"I fell through the window. This one I got yesterday"--he touched it--
+"this one I got Monday; this one I got last week." He revealed another
+that she had not discovered, lurking behind his left ear.
+
+"But surely you didn't fall through the window as often as that!"
+gasped Miss Clarkson. The small boy surveyed her wearily.
+
+"But yes," he murmured, in unconscious imitation of Praulein. "I must
+fall through the window every day when the sun shines."
+
+Miss Clarkson held him off at arm's-length and stared at him.
+
+"In Heaven's name, _why?_" she demanded.
+
+Ivan explained patiently. Miss Clarkson listened, asked a few
+questions, gave way to a moment of uncontrollable emotion. Then she
+called together the other children, and again heard the story. It came
+disjointedly from each in turn, but most fluently, most picturesquely,
+most convincingly, from the lips of Augustus Adolphus Schmidtt and the
+fair Josephine. When they had finished their artless recital, Miss
+Clarkson sought Fraulein von Hoffman. That afternoon, beside the big
+open fire in the children's winter play-room, Fraulein von Hoffman
+addressed her young charges in words brief but pointed, and as she
+talked the mission of Ivan at Locust Hall took on a new significance,
+clear to the dullest mind.
+
+"You were very cruel to Ivan--ach, most cruel! And he is not to fall
+any more, anywhere, on anything, you understand," explained the
+German, clearly. "He has no tasks any more. He is but to be happy, and
+you should love him and take care of him, because he is so small. That
+is all."
+
+Ivan exhaled a sigh of deep contentment. Then he looked around him.
+The great logs on the andirons were blazing merrily. In the hands of
+Josephine a corn-popper waved above them, the corn inside burning
+unobserved as she lent her ears to Fraulein's earnest words. Ten
+apples, suspended on strings, swung from the mantel, spinning slowly
+as they roasted. It was a restful and agreeable scene to the eyes of
+little Ivan.
+
+Josephine felt called upon to defend her friends.
+
+"We didn't mean to be cruel," she explained, earnestly, answering the
+one of Fraulein's charges which had most impressed her. "We love Ivan.
+We love him lots. We like to see him to be a sunbeam, an' we thought
+he liked to be one. He never said he didn't."
+
+The faces of his little companions were all around him. Ivan surveyed
+them in turn. They loved him--lots. Had not Josephine just said so?
+And only yesterday Augustus Adolphus had played marbles with him. It
+was very good to be loved, to have a home, and not to be a little
+sunbeam any longer. Then his eyes met those of Miss Clarkson, fixed
+upon him sympathetically.
+
+"Would you like to go away, Ivan?" she asked, quietly. "Would you be
+happier somewhere else?"
+
+The eyes of Ivan widened with sudden fear. To have this and to lose
+it!--now, if ever, he must speak! "Oh _no_," he cried, earnestly; "no,
+_no_, madam!"
+
+Reassured, she smiled at him, and as she did so something in her look,
+in the atmosphere, in the moment, opened the boy's closed heart. He
+drew a long breath and smiled back at her--a shy, hesitant,
+unaccustomed smile, but one very charming on his serious little face.
+Miss Clarkson's heart leaped in sudden triumph. It was his first
+smile, and it was for her.
+
+"I like it here," he said. "I like it very much, madam."
+
+Miss Clarkson had moments of wisdom.
+
+"Then you shall stay, my boy," she said. "You shall stay as long as
+you wish. But, remember, you must not be a sunbeam any more."
+
+Ivan responded in one word--a simple, effective word, much used by his
+associates in response to pleasing announcements of holidays and
+vacations, but thus far a stranger on his lips. He threw back his head
+and straightened his shoulders.
+
+"Hurray!" he cried, with deep fervor. This was enough for Augustus
+Adolphus and the fair Josephine. "Hurray!" they shrieked, in jubilant
+duet--"Hurray! Hurray!"
+
+The others joined in. "Hur-ray!" cried the nine small companions of
+Ivan. He looked at them for a moment, his thin mouth twitching. They
+were glad, too, then, that he was to stay! He walked straight to Miss
+Clarkson, buried his face in her lap, and burst into tears. For a
+moment she held him close, smoothing his black head with a tender
+hand. Almost immediately he straightened himself and returned to the
+side of Josephine, shy, shamefaced, but smiling again--a new Ivan.
+
+"What did you cry for?" demanded that young lady, obtusely. "Because
+you feel bad?"
+
+Augustus Adolphus replied for his friend, with an insight beyond his
+years.
+
+"You let him alone," he said, severely. "He don't never cry when he
+feels bad; _he_ only cries when he feels good!"
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+IN MEMORY OF HANNAH'S LAUGH
+
+
+His name was "'Rastus Calhoun Breckenridge," he announced the morning
+that he began his new duties as janitor of the Adelaide apartments,
+and he at once gave the tenants to understand that no liberties were
+to be taken with it. He preferred it _all_ when he was addressed in
+ordinary conversation, he explained to them, but he had no objections
+to the title, "Mistah Breckenridge," when they felt hurried. This
+interested every inmate of the Adelaide, and for a few days amazingly
+amused several, who gave play to their fancy in the use of
+abbreviations which struck them as humorous. Their jokes lost point,
+subsequently, when it was discovered that on no occasion did "Mistah
+Breckenridge" respond to their calls nor meet their demands--whereas
+his service to all others was swift, expert, phenomenally perfect.
+Thereafter the jokers forswore indulgence of their sense of humor and
+addressed the janitor at full length and with fuller deference, to
+reap their reward with those whose apartments were warm, whose
+reasonable requests were met, whose halls were clean, and whose door-
+knobs shone even as the rare smile of "Mistah Breckenridge" himself.
+
+It required no unusual powers of observation to discover that as a
+janitor the new man was the rare and perfect specimen who keeps alive
+in a chilly world the tender plant of faith. Long before the sun was
+up his busy mop and broom were heard in the land, and the slip-slap of
+his carpet slippers, flopping along the halls as he made his nightly
+round, was the lullaby of dissipated souls who "retired" at eleven.
+Results followed with gratifying promptness. Apartments long empty
+were soon rented, and envious neighbors came to gaze in awe upon the
+Adelaide and its presiding genius, beholding in it the fine essence of
+New England neatness and in him a small, thin, nervous, insignificant-
+looking "colored gemman," who gazed past the sides of their faces with
+cold aloofness. Often, neighbors, passing the impressive entrance,
+heard from the lower regions of the building the sound of a high
+chuckle, deepening rapidly to a contralto gurgle, and then broadening
+out into a long, rich, velvety laugh as smooth as a flowing stream. No
+one could hear that laugh unmoved. It rippled, it lilted, it died
+away, and rolled forth again until the most _blase_ listener smiled in
+sympathy, and children in the streets haw-hawed in mindless glee. It
+was the laugh of Hannah--_Mrs._ 'Rastus Calhoun Breckenridge, as her
+husband was careful to explain; and he once so far forgot his dignity
+as to add, expansively, "We got de stifkit dat prove hit, Hannah an'
+me. We got mah'd, _real_ mah'd, by a pahson."
+
+Hannah--stout, indolent, good-looking, good-natured, large enough to
+make two small persons like her husband--chuckled and gurgled into her
+fruity laugh.
+
+"Dat's de mos' pahtickler man," she volunteered, artlessly. Then,
+seeing with wifely insight the first traces of gloom on her lord's
+brow, she winked, trembled like a jelly-fish in a fresh convulsion of
+her exhaustless mine of mirth, and disappeared into the lower regions,
+to which, it was said, her husband devoted much more housewifely care
+than she did. Usually he cooked his meals--and hers. Invariably he
+scrubbed and swept the floors.
+
+Not infrequently he washed and ironed. But whatever he did and
+whatever he was, the ripple of his wife's easy laughter followed him
+like the wave in the wake of a puffing tug; and as he listened, the
+weazened face of "Mistah Breckenridge" took on the expression of a
+small dog who hears his master's footsteps at the end of a dragging
+day.
+
+The strenuousness of life left 'Rastus little time for the society of
+his wife, but occasionally on a Sunday afternoon a rainbow-hued
+apparition appeared at the entrance of the Adelaide, which, being
+resolved into its elements, was recognized as "Mistah" and Mrs.
+Breckenridge attired for a walk. Richly red were the hats of Hannah,
+brilliantly blue her gown, glaringly yellow her new kid gloves. Like a
+rubber-tired automobile she rolled along the street, while, not a bad
+second--immaculate, silent, spatted, creased, silk-hatted, gloved, and
+lavender-tied--pattered her small husband. He rarely spoke and never
+laughed; but there was no evidence that Hannah missed these
+attentions; if she did, there were numerous compensations, one of
+which she confided to the cook of the newly married Browns, on the
+first floor.
+
+"'Rastus suttinly do pay mah bills," she murmured, appreciatively. And
+then, with her unctuous laugh, "An' ah suttinly does keep dat man busy
+at hit!"
+
+Quite possibly it was this and his other occupations which for a long
+time made "Mistah Breckemidge" seemingly oblivious of a situation
+which deeply impressed many others. It was the frequent presence in
+his home of another "colored gemman"--large, brilliantly attired,
+loud-voiced, and cheerful--who called upon Hannah three or four times
+a week and whiled away many hours in her stimulating society.
+Occasionally her husband found him there, but if the fact annoyed him
+he gave no evidence of it. It was observed, too, that the manner of
+the visitor was gingerly deferential toward his host; he evidently
+desired no trouble with "Mistah Breckenridge." Occasionally he took
+Hannah for a walk; several times he brought her simple offerings of
+chickens and melons, heartening her to their consumption by
+participating in the same. One evening he presented her with a rhine
+stone belt-buckle. The next morning "Mistah Breckenridge" sought young
+Haddon Brown, the newly married, who happened to be a lawyer as well
+as a happy groom. Without preface or apology, 'Rastus came to the
+point. He wished a divorce from Hannah. He wished it to be procured as
+cheaply as possible, but economy was not to interfere with its being
+riveted as strongly as the law permitted. He had his facts neatly
+tabulated. There was no emotion on his little black face. At the door,
+after young Brown had promised to do what he could for him, "Mistah
+Breckenridge" paused.
+
+"Git it jes' as quick as yuh kin, Mistah Brown," he suggested, "foh ef
+yuh don't, I'se feared Hannah ain't a-gwine tuh stay tell hit comes.
+Hannah am mighty sudden sometimes in huh ways." With this final
+tribute to his spouse, he shut the door quietly and departed.
+
+In due time Haddon Brown handed "Mistah Breckenridge" the documentary
+evidence of his freedom, and immediately on its receipt Hannah rose,
+donned her most radiant attire, shook out a few farewell peals of
+laughter, and departed, closely followed by the friend of the family,
+beautiful in patent-leather shoes, new gray spats, and a tie to match.
+Left alone, 'Rastus rearranged his household possessions, watered the
+geraniums blooming in his basement windows, scrubbed, washed, answered
+bells as scrupulously as of yore, and each night, when the work of the
+day was done, donned his best clothes, oiled his crinkly hair, and
+departed, returning in time for his usual inspection of the halls at
+eleven o'clock.
+
+At the end of one month he set a fresh geranium in the window,
+purchased a generous supply of provisions, went forth attired like
+Solomon, and came back holding in one hand the hand of a blushing
+bride, and in the other the "stifkit," signed by the negro minister
+who had just married them.
+
+No two human beings could have been more unlike than the former and
+the present Mrs. 'Rastus Calhoun Breckenridge. The bride was tall,
+thin, chocolate-colored, serious, and hard-working. She toiled as
+steadily and as indefatigably as her husband, and to the most cynical
+observer it was plain that she loved him and valued him even at his
+worth. She cooked appetizing meals for him, to which he did full
+justice; she mended his old clothes and saw to it that he bought new
+ones; she saved his money; and at the end of the year she presented
+him with a small, fat, black son, over which 'Rastus hung in pathetic
+wonder.
+
+He himself had begun to grow stout. He put on more flesh as three
+additional years passed. He seemed well-fed, happy, and prosperous. He
+had money in the bank. His wages had been twice increased, and one
+Christmas the enthusiastic tenants of the Adelaide had solemnly
+presented him with a watch, with his name and the value of his
+services inscribed in the case. His little boy flourished, his silent
+wife still adored him. The world seemed good to 'Rastus.
+
+One day a dirty note was put into his hand by a small black youth he
+had never seen before. It was brief but pointed:
+
+"I am sik. Com to Sharty Hospitl. He ain't duin nuthen fer me.
+HANNAH."
+
+"Mistah Breckenridge" carefully placed the note in his pocket, put his
+hat on his head, and went to the Charity Hospital. It was not hard to
+find Hannah. She had not been there long, but the doctors and nurses
+liked her and seemed to have been expecting him.
+
+"She's the life of the place," said one of them. "She's got a lot of
+pluck, too, and laughs when we hurt her. She thinks she's going to get
+well, but she isn't."
+
+The little round face of 'Rastus changed expression.
+
+"She gwine tuh die?" he asked, quickly.
+
+"Sure," was the terse reply.
+
+"How--how soon?"
+
+The doctor hesitated. "In about a month, I think," he said, finally.
+
+'Rastus carried the memory of the words into the ward where she lay,
+and then felt a quick sense of reaction. Die? Why, this was the old-
+time Hannah, the Hannah of his youth, the Hannah he had married. She
+was thinner, but the lines had smoothed out of her face and her big
+black eyes looked up at him as confidingly as the eyes of a baby. She
+laughed, too, a little--a ghost of the old, fat, comfortable chuckle;
+but there was nothing of death nor even of suffering about Hannah that
+day. Her spirit was not yet overthrown.
+
+"Ahm awful glad tuh see yuh, honey," she said. "Ah knew yuh'd cum."
+
+'Rastus sat down on the wooden chair beside her and fixed his little
+black eyes unwinkingly upon her face. In his hands he held his hat,
+which he twisted nervously between his knees at first, but finally
+forgetfully dropped on the floor as his embarrassment passed. Propped
+up on her pillows, Hannah chatted incessantly, telling him the small
+details of her hospital life and such few facts of her illness as she
+had been permitted to know.
+
+"I ain' got no pain," she assured him--"des now, I mean. Bimeby hit'll
+cum, like hit do ebery aftahnoon, but doctah he come, too, an' he git
+de better ub hit, ebery time. He sure am good to me, dat man!"
+
+Her white teeth flashed in a smile as she talked, but the eyes she
+kept on the man's face had a curious look of wonder in them.
+
+"Yuh look well, honey," she said, finally, "an' yit yuh doan look
+well. How come dat? You-all ain' got nuffin' tuh trouble yuh, is yuh?"
+
+'Rastus hurriedly assured her that he had not. He did not mention his
+wife nor child, of whose existence she was, of course, perfectly
+aware; but he dilated on the glories of his position, the size of his
+income, and the gift of the watch. He pulled the last from his pocket
+as he spoke of it, and she wagged her head proudly over it and
+shamelessly boasted to the nurse who happened to come to her side.
+
+"Dey give dat to mah husban'," she said. Then she mentioned casually,
+with all her old naivete, "Leaseways, he wuz mah husban' oncet."
+
+"Mistah Breckenridge" ignored this little incident. His mind was on
+practical things.
+
+"Yuh got all yuh want, Hannah?" he asked. "'Caze ahm gwine tuh git hit
+foh yuh ef yuh ain't."
+
+Hannah, who seemed prepared for this inquiry, responded to it with
+much promptness. She needed a wrapper, she said, and some cologne, and
+three new night-gowns, and "a lil chicking." 'Rastus wrote down each
+item painstakingly and somewhat ostentatiously in a hand suited to
+unruled paper. Then he bowed to the nurse, touched Hannah's hand with
+his sinewy little paw, and trotted out with an air of vast importance.
+
+For several weeks the Adelaide was almost neglected, and puzzled
+tenants sought the janitor in vain. He was rarely home, but Dinah,
+dark-browed, sullen, red-lidded, and with a look of suffering on her
+plain face, responded to their demands and did, so far as she could,
+her husband's work and her own. She made no explanation of his
+absence, and the last one which would have been accepted was the
+truth--that day after day "Mistah Breckenridge" sat by the bedside of
+Hannah, talking to her, cheering her, nursing her, feeding her with
+the fruit he had brought her. He had almost superseded the nurse; and
+the doctors, watching the pair, let them do much as they pleased, on
+the dreary theory that nothing Hannah did could hurt her now.
+Sometimes she had hours of severe pain, during which he remained with
+her, holding her hand, soothing her, and lifting her still great bulk
+in his thin arms with unexpected strength. In her better hours she
+talked to him, telling him stories about the other patients, anecdotes
+of nurses and doctors, and mimicking several luckless victims to the
+life.
+
+It was six weeks before Hannah died, very suddenly, and in one of her
+paroxysms of suffering. 'Rastus was with her at the end, as he had
+been during the hard weeks preceding it. When he realized that all was
+over, he left the room, sought an undertaker, had a brief but pregnant
+interview with him, and then disappeared from the hospital and from
+the city as well. Where he went no one knew, though Dinah, wellnigh
+frantic, strove distractedly to learn. On the morning of Hannah's
+funeral he returned and assumed a leading part in that melancholy
+procession, long after referred to as "de mos' scrumptuous bury-in'"
+in colored circles. Nothing had been omitted that she would have
+wished. Tall plumes nodded on the hearse, many carriages gathered in
+the mourners, and close behind the silver-trimmed coffin which held
+all that was left of Hannah. "Mistah Breckenridge" walked with leaden
+steps, his small face drawn with grief. Subsequently he drew most of
+his savings from the bank to pay the bills, and, having paid them,
+returned once more to his anxious family and the monotonous routine of
+life at the Adelaide.
+
+Dinah welcomed him coldly, and went about her duties with her head
+high. She said no word of reproach, and it was not until several weeks
+had passed that it was borne in upon her that 'Rastus remained
+oblivious not only to her just wifely resentment, but to most other
+things and emotions in life as well. He did his work, but he ate
+little and slept less, and the flesh of his prosperous years seemed to
+drop from him even as the startled beholder gazed. In despair Dinah
+sought Haddon Brown and laid the case before him.
+
+"Dat man am suttinly gwine lose his min'," she sobbed, "ef he keep on
+like he doin'. Den what gwine become of me and dat in'cen' chile!"
+
+Young Brown casually and unostentatiously looked 'Rastus over, and was
+not satisfied with the survey. The janitor's lips were drawn, his eyes
+were glassy, his clothes hung loosely on his shrunken little figure.
+He did his work as a manikin wound up for the purpose might have done
+it. There was no spring, no energy, no snap. Mr. Brown waited a
+fortnight, expecting some change. None coming, one Sunday morning he
+urged 'Rastus to go with him on a fishing trip, carry bait, fish if he
+wanted to, and make himself generally useful. With unrelieved gloom
+"Mistah Breckenridge" accepted the invitation, and the two left the
+city behind them, and sought the peace of wood and stream and broad,
+overarching sky.
+
+When he had found the shaded nook that seemed most promising, young
+Brown baited his hook, dropped it into the water, and gave himself up
+to pleasant reveries in which poor "Mistah Breckenridge" had no part.
+He had good-naturedly brought him out here for rest and change and
+sport and pure air, he told himself, but it was hardly to be expected
+that he should do more. He yawned, dozed, and surveyed his line
+without curiosity; beside him sat "Mistah Breckenridge," every muscle
+of him tense, and a light in his eyes that was not nice to see.
+
+The spot they had chosen was a not infrequented one in the Bronx
+woods, and at intervals the sound of human voices came to them and the
+light colors of a woman's gown showed through the trees. Suddenly a
+laugh was borne to their ears--a woman's laugh; light, happy,
+irrepressible. Young Brown opened one eye. It sounded like the laugh
+of a nice girl. He looked lazily in the direction whence it came. Then
+close by his side he heard a thud, a groan. His companion had pitched
+full length on the ground, and lay there crying with great, gasping
+sobs, and tearing up the grasses by the roots. Brown gazed aghast,
+startled, sympathetic, understanding dimly, yet repelled by this
+unmasculine outburst. He began to speak, but changed his mind and
+waited, his eyes again on the bobbing cork of his line.
+
+"Mistah Breckenridge" cried a long time--a very long time, indeed, it
+seemed to young Brown, ill at ease and wholly unused to such
+demonstrations. Then he sat up, pulled himself together, and turned a
+distorted face toward the young man who had been so good a friend to
+him.
+
+"You-all know, Mr. Brown, ah sure is ashamed," he said, quietly, "but
+ah feel bettah, an' ah guess hit done me good. Ah felt like ah could
+kill someone when we come yeah, but ah feel differnt now."
+
+His voice trailed into silence. He restlessly pulled up dandelions and
+blades of grass around him, but his face had relaxed and he seemed
+calm. Haddon Brown murmured something about a nervous strain, but the
+other did not seem to hear him.
+
+"Hit wuz dat lady laffin'," he said, suddenly. "You-all know how mah
+Hannah use tuh laff. Mah gracious! Yuh could heah dat woman a mile!
+An' yuh know," he proceeded, slowly, "hit done me lots o' good, Mistah
+Brown, des to heah huh. Ahm a silen' man, an' ah doan laff much, but
+ah liked hit in Hannah, ah suttinly did--mighty well. Hit des made dis
+mo'nful ole wurl' seem a chee'ful place--hit did indeed."
+
+Brown said nothing. There was nothing in his mind that quite fitted
+the occasion. "Mistah Breckenridge" ripped a few more dandelions off
+their stems and went on.
+
+"W'y, when dat woman lef me--when mah Hannah went away--ah use tuh go
+aftah night to de place whah she lived, jes' to heah huh laff again.
+Ah'd stan' out in d' dahk, an' ah'd see huh shadow on de cu'tin, an'
+den ah'd heah huh laff an' laff lak she always done, an' den--ah'd
+come home! Ah done dat all dese yeahs sense mah Hannah lef me. Dinah's
+all right. Ah ain' complainin' none 'bout Dinah. Ah mah'd huh caze ah
+wuz lonesome, an' she suttinly bin a good wife to me. Ahm goin' to wuk
+foh huh tell ah git back all the money ah spent on Hannah. Hit wus
+Dinah's money, too. But"--he burst out again with a sudden long wail--
+"ah jes' doan see how ahm goin' tuh keep on livin in a worl' whah dey
+ain't no Hannah!"
+
+His grief gathered force as he gave it rein. He hurled himself down on
+the ground again and tore at the grasses with his thin black hands.
+"Oh, ah want, ah want, _ah want tuh heah mah Hannah laff again!_" he
+cried, frenziedly.
+
+A fish nibbled at the bait on Brown's hook, changed his mind, flirted
+his fins, and swam away--a proof of the proverb about second thoughts.
+A bird in the branches of the tree above the two men burst into
+ecstatic song. But neither heard him. "Mistah Breckenridge" had buried
+his black face in the cool grass, his hot tears falling fast upon it.
+Beside him young Brown, brought face to face with elemental
+conditions, sat silent and thought hard.
+
+
+
+
+VIII
+
+THE QUEST OF AUNT NANCY
+
+
+It was in a stuffy compartment of a night train approaching Paris that
+Jessica and I were privileged to look upon Aunt Nancy for the first
+time. Her obvious age would soon have attracted our attention, no
+doubt, and certainly the gallantry with which she carried her eighty
+years could not long have escaped the observation of two such earnest
+students of humanity as we believed ourselves to be. But the
+characteristic in her which at once caught my eye was her expression--
+a look of such keen alertness, such intense vitality, that even in the
+mental stagnation that accompanies night travel I wondered what, in
+her surroundings, could explain it.
+
+The dingy carriage in which we sat was vaguely illuminated by an oil
+lamp, the insufficient rays of which brought out effective high lights
+on the bald head of one audibly slumbering German on our side of the
+compartment, and on the heavy face of a stout Frenchwoman who sat
+opposite him, next to the old lady upon whom I was concentrating my
+attention. The latter, obviously an American, the two foreigners, and
+ourselves, were the sole occupants of the compartment; and certainly
+in the appearance of none of her four fellow-passengers was there
+justification of the wide-awake intentness of the kind old eyes that
+now beamed on us through heavy, steel-rimmed spectacles. Pensively, as
+befitted the weary wanderer, I marvelled. How could she look so alive,
+so wide awake, so energetic, at one o'clock in the morning?
+
+The bald-headed man slept on. The stout woman removed a shell comb
+from her back hair and composed herself for deeper slumber. Jessica
+presented to my lambent gaze a visage which besought unspoken
+sympathy, and mutely breathed a protest against travel in general and
+this phase of it in particular. Jessica in the "still small hours" was
+never really gay. It was dimly comforting to one of my companionable
+nature to turn from her to the little old woman opposite me. In figure
+and dress she might have posed for one of Leech's drawings of ancient
+dames, so quaintly prim was she, so precise in their folds were her
+little black mantle and her simple black gown, so effective a frame to
+her wrinkled face was the wide black bonnet she wore. On her hands,
+demurely crossed in her lap, were black lace mitts. Moreover, she was
+enveloped, so to speak, in a dim aroma of peppermint, the source of
+which was even then slightly distending one faded cheek. Irrepressibly
+I smiled at her, and at once a long-drawn sigh of pleasure floated
+across to me. In spontaneous good-fellowship she leaned forward.
+
+"It's a real comfortable journey, ain't it?" she whispered, so
+evidently torn between a passionate desire to talk and consideration
+for the sleepers that my heart went out to her.
+
+"Well, if you mean this especial journey--" I hesitated.
+
+"Yes, I do," she insisted. "The seats are real comfortable. Everything
+is." She threw out her mittened hands with a gesture that seemed to
+emphasize a demand for approval. "I wouldn't change a single thing.
+Some say it's hot; I don't think 'tis. I wouldn't mind, though, if
+'twas. We're gettin' a nice draught."
+
+I looked through the open window at the French landscape, bathed in
+the glory of an August moon.
+
+"That, at least, is very satisfactory," I admitted, cheerfully.
+
+She looked a little blank as she glanced around, and a queer
+expression of responsibility settled over her features, blurring their
+brightness like a veil.
+
+"I see," she said, slowly. "You mean France. Yes, 'tis nice, an'
+they's certainly a great deal to see in it." She hesitated a moment,
+and then went on more rapidly. "You know," she continued, in her high-
+keyed, sibilant whisper, "it's some different with me from what 'tis
+with you. You can speak French. I heard you talkin' to the conductor.
+An' I suppose you've been here often, an' like it. But this is the
+first time _I've_ come over to Europe. I've always meant to, sometime,
+but things ain't been just so's I _could_ come. Now't I'm here, I
+can't stay long, an' I must say I feel kind of homesick. There's so
+much to see it jest makes my head swim. I come for a purpose--a
+purpose of my own--but now't I'm here, I want to do my duty an' see
+things. I declare," she added, shamefacedly, "I most hate to go to
+sleep nights, I'm so afraid I'll miss something an' hear about it when
+I git back."
+
+I asked a conventional question, which evoked a detailed report of her
+journeyings. By this time Jessica had opened one eye; the two
+foreigners slept on peacefully. She had landed at Naples, the old lady
+told me; and from her subsequent remarks I gathered that she had found
+the Italians as a people deficient in the admirable qualities of
+cleanliness and modesty. She lamented, also, an over-preponderance of
+art galleries, and the surprising slowness of the natives to grasp
+intelligent remarks made in the English tongue. Aside from these
+failings, however, she had found Italy somewhat interesting, and she
+mentioned especially the grotto at Capri and the ascent of Vesuvius.
+She added, casually, that few of her fellow-tourists had made this
+latter excursion, as it was just after the severest eruptions, and the
+air had been full of dust and cinders. Jessica opened the other eye. I
+began to experience vivid interest in the conversation.
+
+Rome, she further revealed, meant to her the Campagna and the
+Catacombs. On the former she had taken walks, and in the very bowels
+of the latter she had seemingly burrowed for days, following some
+mysterious purpose of her own. Her favorite time for a promenade on
+the Campagna, and one she paused to recommend to me, was at dusk, the
+place then being quiet and peaceful, owing to the fact that tourists,
+foolishly fearing the fever, kept away from it after sunset.
+
+At this point Jessica sat up, arranged a pillow comfortably behind her
+back, and gave her undivided attention to the monologue. At last she
+put a question. Was the lady travelling alone? The lady hastened to
+explain that she was not.
+
+"My, no," she said, briskly. "I'm a tourist--that's what they call
+'em, you know, when they're with a man. They's eighteen in our party,
+and the man that is takin' us is Mr. James George Jackson. He's real
+nice. He's in one of the other cars on this train, an' they's three
+gentlemen with him that belong to us, too. All the rest stayed in
+Paris because they was tired. You see," she added, explanatorily, "we
+done Lourdes in two days, an' we took it off our time in Paris. We
+ain't got much time in Paris, anyhow, so we went an' come back at
+night. I s'pose the rest thought it might be tryin' in the heat, so
+they stayed behind an' went to Fontingblow yesterday an' up the Seen
+to-day. But I saw the Black Forest when we was in Germany, an' the
+Rhine, too, an' some of us walked from Binjen to Cooblens, so's we
+could git the view real well. So I thought I'd let the French river
+an' forest go, an' see Lourdes instead."
+
+Jessica interrupted here.
+
+"I beg your pardon," she asked, earnestly, "but--have you really been
+travelling two nights and sight-seeing two days in that fearful crush
+at Lourdes without any sleep?"
+
+Our new friend nodded slowly, as one to whose attention the matter had
+just been directed. "Why, yes, that's so," she conceded. "But I ain't
+a bit tired. Old folks don't need much sleep, you know, an' I'm pretty
+old. I was eighty-one last June."
+
+Jessica dropped her pillow and sat up very straight, a slight flush
+upon her face. Our new friend prattled on until the lights of Paris
+appeared in the distance, and Jessica and I began to collect the
+impressive array of impedimenta with which we had thoughtfully
+multiplied the discomfort of travel. As we pulled down packages of
+rugs and tightened various straps the bright eyes of the little old
+woman watched us unswervingly through her spectacles. Grasping firmly
+a stout and serviceable umbrella, she was ready to disembark. If she
+had brought any baggage with her, which I doubted, it was evidently in
+the fostering care of Mr. James George Jackson.
+
+"What hotel are you goin' to?" she asked, suddenly. "I know a real
+good one."
+
+I told her it was the St. James et D'Albany, and her wrinkled face
+grew radiant.
+
+"Well, now, I declare," she cried, heartily, "ain't that nice! That's
+jest where we're stayin', an' I'm as comfor'ble as I can be. I got a
+room with a window that looks right into the Twilry Gardens. Mr.
+Jackson says that I must have the best they is, because I'm the
+oldest. 'Age before beauty,' he says, an' none of the other ladies
+minds a bit. They certainly are good to me. Of course, I don't say 't
+I wouldn't like a more relishin' breakfast, because I would; an' I
+ain't got used to that waiter man comin' right into my room with his
+trays before I'm out of my bed, an' I never expect to. But _'tis_ a
+good hotel, an' the lady that runs it is real nice, if she _is_
+French."
+
+The train swung into the great station as she spoke, and a round,
+perspiring, and very grimy masculine face presented itself at the door
+of our compartment.
+
+"Well, Aunt Nancy," said the owner of this, with a sprightly effort at
+cheerfulness, "you alive yet? The rest of us are dead. You come right
+along with me now, and I'll whisk you up to the hotel in a cab. And if
+you take my advice, you'll go to bed and stay there for two days,
+after this experience."
+
+He tucked the old lady under his arm as he spoke, and she trotted off
+with him in high good-humor, turning several times to nod and smile at
+us as she departed.
+
+At eight o'clock the following morning I was awakened by Jessica, who
+stood at my bedside light-heartedly reminding me of my self-imposed
+duty of going early to the station to attend to the luggage, which we
+had omitted to do the night before. My replies to this suggestion,
+while they held Jessica's awe-struck attention for five minutes, would
+be of no interest here. Bitterly I rose, reluctantly and yawningly I
+dressed. At nine I stood at the entrance of our hotel signalling
+sleepily for a cab, and wilting already under the heat of the August
+sun. While I waited, a tourist coach drew up at the curb. It was
+gorgeous with red paint and conspicuous with large signs bearing the
+lettering "A VERSAILLES." The driver remained on the box. The guide,
+evidently there by appointment and sharply on time, leaped to the
+sidewalk, glanced at his watch, snapped the case shut with a satisfied
+nod, and stood with his eyes on the hotel entrance. One tiny black
+figure came forth, greeted him with a blithe "Bongjure," and
+intrepidly began the perilous ascent of the ladder he hastened to
+place against the side of the coach for her convenience. It was Aunt
+Nancy, dressed as she had been the night before, but immaculately
+neat, and reflecting in her face the brightness of the morning. I
+greeted her, and in her glad surprise at seeing me again she remained
+suspended between earth and heaven to talk to me, incidentally
+revealing the whole of two serviceable gaiters, the tiny ruffle of an
+alpaca petticoat, and a long, flat section of gray-striped cotton
+hose.
+
+"Well, well," she beamed. "Ain't this nice? Yes, I'm goin'. The rest
+ain't ready yet, but I've been awake sence five, so I thought I'd come
+right down an' watch the coach fill up. The men ain't goin'--they're
+so tired, poor dears. Onri, my waiter, says every last one of 'em is
+in bed yit. But some of the ladies that went up the Seen yesterday is
+comin', so I guess we'll have a real nice party. We're goin' to see
+the palace an' the Treenon first, an' then I'm goin' to the fair in
+the village. Mr. Jackson says a French fair is real interestin', but
+he ain't goin'. He said last night he had a great deal of work to do
+in his room to-day, an' he guessed we wouldn't none of us see him till
+dinner. Do you know"--she lowered her voice mysteriously and cast an
+apprehensive eye about her as she went on--"Onri says Mr. Jackson's
+asleep this very minute, an' it's most nine o'clock in the mornin'!"
+
+These startling revelations were checked by the appearance of two of
+her fellow-tourists, and I seized the opportunity afforded by this
+interruption to depart upon my uncongenial task.
+
+We did not see Aunt Nancy again until the morning of our third day in
+Paris, when I ran across her in the galleries of the Luxembourg. She
+was settled comfortably in a bright-red upholstered seat near the main
+entrance, and on her wrinkled face was an expression of perfect peace.
+
+"Well, I'm glad to see you resting at last," was my greeting.
+
+"Yes, I'm restin'," she conceded. "I always do in the art galleries,"
+she added, simply, as I sat down beside her. "They've got the
+comfort'blest chairs here of any, I think, though they was some nice
+ones in Florence, too; an' in one of the places in Rome they was a
+long seat where you could 'most lay down. I took a real nice nap
+there. You see," she continued, smoothing an imaginary wrinkle out of
+one lace mitt, "I don't know much about pictures, _anyway_, but I come
+right along with the others, an' when I git here I jest set down an'
+rest till they git through lookin' at 'em. I don't know what's
+Michelangelo an' what _ain't_, an' 't seems to me it's too late to
+find out now."
+
+Jessica appeared at this moment, and further revelations were checked
+by greetings, followed almost immediately by our reluctant departure
+to keep an appointment. Before we left, however, we learned that the
+day at Versailles had been followed by an evening "at one of them
+French kafes where women sing," and that fourteen hours of sight-
+seeing in Paris itself had dispelled the threatened ennui of the
+second day.
+
+Late that evening Mr. James George Jackson tottered to the side of
+Jessica in the corridor of the Hotel D'Albany and addressed her,
+wiping his brow as he did so.
+
+"It's the old lady," he said--"Aunt Nancy Wheeler, you know. She asked
+me to ask you two ladies if you wouldn't like to join us in a drive
+this evening. She wants to see how Paris looks at night, an' I've got
+to show her."
+
+He swayed languidly against a pillar when we had accepted the
+invitation, and groaned in reply to Jessica's tribute to the old
+lady's activity.
+
+"She's active all right," he remarked, grimly. "If there's anything
+left of _me_ after she gets through, it'll be because I've inherited an
+iron constitution from my mother. She's worn out every other man in
+the party weeks ago. The worst of it is that I don't know why she does
+it. She really doesn't care about anything; I'm sure of that. But
+she's got some object; so she goes from early morn till dewy eve, and
+of course some one's got to go with her; we can't let her wander
+around alone. Besides, what I'm afraid of is that she'll go all to
+pieces some day--like the deacon's one-horse shay, you know, and there
+won't be anything left but a little heap of alpaca clothes and
+congress gaiters. She's worn out six pair of gaiters since we
+started," he added, with a wail. "I know, because I've had to buy
+them. _She_ hasn't had time." He shook his head mournfully as he
+wandered away.
+
+Jessica and I bade Aunt Nancy an affecting farewell that night, as we
+were leaving Paris the next day. For several weeks we heard no more of
+her, but in Scotland we crossed her trail again. The Highlands were
+full of rumors of an intrepid old dame who had "done" the lakes and
+the Trossachs as apparently they had never been done before. Was she
+an American? She was. Eighty years old, dressed in black, with a big
+bonnet, steel-rimmed spectacles, and gaiters? All was correct but the
+gaiters. Seemingly the gaiter supply had been exhausted by the
+constant demand. She wore shoes with heavy soles and, our informant
+added, happily, gray, striped stockings. From the rumors of her
+achievements on land and water, Jessica and I glanced apprehensively
+over the surface of Scotland, fearing to see it strewn with exhausted
+boatmen, guides, and drivers; but apparently all her victims had
+survived, though they bore as a souvenir of their experience with her
+a haggard and hunted look which Jessica declared she could detect from
+the top seat of the loftiest coach.
+
+Drifting down through Ireland we heard another echo of Aunt Nancy. She
+had ridden on horseback through the Gap of Dunloe, no difficult feat
+in itself, and one achieved daily during Kallarney's tourist season by
+old ladies of various countries and creeds. In Aunt Nancy's case,
+however, it appeared that she had been able to enjoy that variety
+which is so gratifying a feature of human experience. Notwithstanding
+the fact that she had never been on the back of a horse in her life,
+she unerringly selected the freshest and most frolicsome of the Irish
+ponies as her mount. It appears further that she was finally lifted to
+the saddle of this animal as the result of a distinct understanding
+between Mr. James George Jackson and her guide that the latter
+gentleman was not only to accompany the lady every foot of the route,
+but was meantime to cling valiantly to the bridle with both hands.
+Unfortunately, this arrangement, so deeply satisfying to all, was not
+ratified by the mettlesome Irish pony; the result being that, after
+the guide had been swept off his feet by a sudden and unexpected lift
+of the animal's forelegs, Aunt Nancy and the pony continued the
+excursion alone. Judging from the terse words of one of the observers,
+it must have been an exciting spectacle while it lasted, though it
+passed all too rapidly beyond the line of the beholder's longing
+vision.
+
+"Ye c'u'dn't tell," remarked this gentleman, sadly, in relating the
+accident, "which was the harse an' which the auld lady, an' which the
+Gap of Dunloe!"
+
+Excited pursuers did not "catch 'em," as they were urged to do by the
+frenzied Mr. Jackson, but they were rewarded by finding various
+portions of Aunt Nancy's wearing apparel scattered along the trail.
+Items: one black bonnet, one cape, one handkerchief, one pair of
+steel-rimmed spectacles. Apparently only those garments securely
+fastened in place, such as shoes and lace mitts, had survived the
+experience. Apparently, also, Aunt Nancy had made in almost unbroken
+silence her exciting mountain ride. The exception seemingly occurred
+somewhere in the Dark Valley, where a mountain woman, seeing her fly
+by, had thoughtlessly urged her to stop and buy a glass of goat's
+milk. The woman's memory of the encounter was slightly vague, it
+having ended so abruptly, but she retained the impression that Aunt
+Nancy had expressed an unusual degree of regret at being unable to
+accept her invitation.
+
+"'Twasn't till thin I saw the poor harse was crazy wid fright, an' the
+auld lady's close blowin' over his eyes," added the mountain woman,
+sympathetically. "An' I couldn't do nathin', becuz, begorra, whin I
+lifted me v'ice to call me big bye, the auld woman an' the harse was
+half-way down the valley."
+
+Fortunately, five or six miles of this stimulating pace had a
+blighting effect on the wild Hibernian spirits of the pony, with the
+result that he and his rider ambled at a most sedate gait into the
+space where the row-boats were waiting their passengers for Ross
+Castle, and where the remaining members of the party were expected to
+meet. The remaining members of the party, for obvious reasons, were
+not yet there; and the long delay before their arrival gave Aunt Nancy
+time to replace the missing articles of her apparel with garments
+borrowed from the woman at the refreshment booth, and to eat a hearty
+luncheon. Thus refreshed, she was ready for the fourteen-mile journey
+in a row-boat to Ross Castle, which was the next item on the programme
+of the day; and she made it that afternoon, notwithstanding the almost
+hysterical expostulations of Mr. James George Jackson.
+
+It was not until we sailed for America that we looked again into Aunt
+Nancy's dauntless eyes. She was the first passenger we saw when we
+reached the deck of the Columbia, and her joy in the encounter was as
+deep as our own. We chatted for a moment, and then she darted off to
+greet various members of her party from whom side excursions had
+temporarily separated her.
+
+The sea was slumberously calm, bathed in hazy autumnal sunshine.
+Light-hearted men and women in white linen and pale flannel costumes
+strolled about the decks explaining to one another what good sailors
+they were, and how they hoped the sea would not remain monotonously
+smooth.
+
+"One wants a little life and swing on a ship," explained one fat,
+blond man on whose face we were even then looking, though we knew it
+not, for the last time in seven sad days. To a unit the passengers
+poured into the dining-saloon at the first call for luncheon. To a
+unit they consumed everything on the bill of fare. All was peace and
+appetite.
+
+That afternoon the sea roused herself drowsily, turned over, and
+yawned. The blue waves of the morning were gone. In their place were
+huge, oily, black swells, which lazily lifted the _Columbia_, held her
+suspended for a long minute, and then with slow, shuddering reluctance
+let her down, down, down. An interesting young Scotchman who was
+sitting by Jessica's side on deck stopped suddenly in the midst of an
+impassioned tribute to the character of Robert Brace, looked in her
+face for an instant with eyes full of a horrible fear, and hastily
+joined a stout German in a spirited foot-race to the nearest
+companionway. A High-church English divine, who had met me half an
+hour before and had hastened to spare me future heartaches by
+explaining at once that he was married, rose abruptly from his chair
+beside me and wobbled uncertainly to the deck-rail, where he hung
+suspended in an attitude of pathetic resignation. Thus recalled to the
+grim realities of life, Jessica and I looked up and down the deck. It
+was deserted--deserted save for a little black figure that trotted
+rapidly past us, clutching occasionally at the empty air for support
+as she was hurled from one side to the other of the glistening deck,
+but cheerful, undaunted, and happy.
+
+"I got to have some exercise," panted Aunt Nancy, as she reclined for
+an instant in my lap, where a lurch of the ship had deposited her; "so
+I'm takin' a little walk." She was still walking when Jessica and I
+retreated hurriedly to our cabin.
+
+The days that followed are too sad to be described by the most
+sympathetic pen. The sea, moved to her uttermost depths as she had not
+been in twenty-five years, resented fiercely the presence of the
+Columbia on her disturbed bosom. Madly she cast her from her; with
+feline treachery she drew her back again, and sought to tear apart her
+mighty timbers. Groaningly, agonizingly, pluckily, the Columbia bore
+all--and revenged herself on her passengers. She stood on her head,
+and sent them, so to speak, into her prow. She rose up on her stern,
+and scattered them aft. She stood still and shuddered. She lay down on
+her left side until she had imperilled the heart action of every
+person on board; she rolled over on her right side and started briskly
+toward the bottom of the sea. She recovered herself, leaped up and
+down a few times to prove that she was still intact, and did it all
+over again. Meanwhile the passengers, locked below and sternly
+commanded to keep to their cabins, held fast to the sides of their
+berths and prayed fervently for death.
+
+Neither Jessica nor I was actively ill, but Jessica's indifference to
+food and social intercourse was marked in the extreme. Stretched on
+her back in the berth opposite my own, she lay day and night with
+closed eyes and forbidding demeanor, rousing herself only long enough
+to repel fiercely any suggestion that she take nourishment. Also, she
+furnished me with one life-long memory. From sheer ennui I ordered and
+devoured at noon on the third day a large portion of steamed peach
+dumpling, with hard sauce. The look which Jessica cast first upon this
+dish and then upon me will always, I think, remain the dominant
+feature of my most troubled dreams.
+
+During this time I had not forgotten Aunt Nancy, though I am sure
+Jessica had. Her cabin, however, while on the same deck as our own,
+was at the other end of the ship, and I had grave doubts of my ability
+to cover safely the distance between. Finally I attempted it, and,
+aside from the slight incidents of blacking one eye in an unexpected
+diversion to the rail, and subsequently being hurled violently against
+the back of an axe nailed to the wall, I made the passage in safety.
+Aunt Nancy was not in her cabin, but a hollow groan from the upper
+berth betrayed the fact that her room-mate was. From this lady I was
+unfortunately unable to extract any information. She seemed to feel
+that I was mercifully sent to chloroform her out of existence, and her
+disappointment over my failure to play this Samaritan role was so
+bitter that I was forced to withdraw lest she should utter things
+unbefitting a gentlewoman.
+
+Down the long corridor, as I groped my way back, something blew toward
+me like a wraith from the sea. It wore a gray, woolly bathrobe, a tiny
+wisp of white hair fastened precariously with one hair-pin, and a pair
+of knitted bedroom slippers. It was Aunt Nancy, and we executed then
+and there an intricate pas de deux in our common efforts to meet.
+Finally the Columbia ceased her individual evolutions long enough to
+enable us to grasp the passage-rail.
+
+"I've been in your cabin," I explained, above the roar of wave and
+wind, as we stood facing each other. "I was afraid you were ill."
+
+Aunt Nancy looked almost pained at such a suspicion.
+
+"My, no," she disavowed, hastily; "but there's them that is," she
+conceded. "I've been to see--let me see--thirty of 'em to-day--men an'
+women both. Poor Mr. Jackson's about the worst. I never SEE such a
+sick man. I got this cracked ice for him," she added, looking down at
+the glass she was clasping to her bosom with her free hand. "I'd 'a'
+looked in on you," she added, kindly, "if I hadn't been so busy, but I
+heard you wa'n't neither of you sick."
+
+I explained with some effort that I felt comfortable as long as I lay
+still, but that as soon as I was on my feet, the motion--We parted
+hurriedly.
+
+On the morning of the sixth day Jessica turned over in her berth,
+removed from her spine a fork which had seemingly been there all the
+week, regarded it with strong disfavor, and announced briefly that she
+was going above. We went. The decks were still wet, and the steamer-
+chairs were securely lashed in place. The sky was gray and lowering,
+but the sea had sulkily subsided, showing its continued resentment of
+the whole experience only in the upheaval of an occasional wave which
+broke over the ship-rail and perished at our feet. As the hours
+passed, pale wraiths appeared at the companionways, supported one
+another feebly to the nearest chairs, sank into them, and veiled their
+faces from one another's gaze. They seemed the ghosts of the happy men
+and women who had come on board the Columbia six long days ago.
+Languidly as the hours passed they revived and confided to one another
+the simple record of the voyage. No, they had not been ill. It was,
+indeed, singular how few of them had been disturbed by the voyage,
+though they had all noticed that it was rough. But they had been
+injured by being knocked about or thrown from their berths, or they
+had been caring for friends or relatives who were ill. Several of them
+paused at my side on their way to and from their cabins to indulge in
+these artless confidences. It remained, however, for Aunt Nancy to
+make the most interesting of all.
+
+She came along the deck about five in the afternoon and dropped with
+serene satisfaction into the empty steamer-chair at my right. She was
+fully dressed in the inevitable black, even to her wide bonnet. With a
+sigh of pleasure she folded her mittened hands and began to talk.
+
+"It's been real interestin'," she said. "I must say I'm 'most sorry to
+have it over. I want to go to Europe again in two years; I ain't
+really enjoyed this trip very much; but when I come again I think I'll
+like it better, now that I know it. But of course at my age one can't
+really be sure one can come again."
+
+She sank into silence for a moment, looking down at the mittened hands
+in her lap. Then her face brightened, and she turned to me again with
+her old, alert eagerness of expression.
+
+"I dunno why I shouldn't come, though," she added, cheerfully. "I'm
+real well. Before I left home I was some worried. I didn't seem to be
+as strong as I used to be. That's why I come--to build up my health
+an' git strong. Lots of folks has wondered why I come, I guess, an'
+that was it, though I ain't told no one till now. I guess I did
+improve, too, for the stewardess told me with her own lips only this
+mornin' that she thought I was a healthy woman. But of course," she
+added, with lowly humility, "I can't do what I did when I was young."
+
+I was speechless. The Columbia paused on the top of a wave, hesitated
+a moment, and sailed unsteadily onward. With eyes filled with a solemn
+content, Aunt Nancy gazed out over the cold, wet sea.
+
+
+
+
+IX
+
+THE HENRY SMITHS' HONEYMOON
+
+
+When Jacob West suggested to Henry Smith that the latter's honeymoon
+should be spent in New York, Mr. Smith's ruddy countenance paled at
+the audacity of the words, and Miss Maria Tuttle, his fiancee, gasped
+audibly for breath. Unconsciously they clasped hands, as if better to
+meet together the rude shock of the moment; and seated side by side on
+the rustic bench which adorned the small veranda of the Tuttle
+homestead, they gazed helplessly at the speaker. Slowly and with the
+stiffness of age Jacob sat down on the steps below them and looked up
+at their startled faces with a twinkle in his dim old eyes. His
+enjoyment of the moment was intense.
+
+"Why not?" he demanded, cajolingly and argumentatively. "Ain't yeh old
+enough t' have a good time? Ain't yeh waited long enough? Ain't yeh"--
+he turned directly to Maria--"bin nursin' yer poor mother fer six
+years past an' wearin' yerself out, an' ain't yeh bin sewin' day an'
+night fer three months, ever sence she died, t' git ready t' marry
+Henry?" He drew a long breath of gratification over the respectful
+silence which greeted these adroit points, and went on with hortatory
+sympathy. "Yeh bin a good daughter, Maria. They ain't no better in
+Clayton Centre. Yeh deserve th' best they is. Now be good t' yerself
+an' Henry. Let him take yeh to New York an' give yeh a good time on
+the weddin' tower."
+
+Miss Tuttle blushed faintly. She was forty-five, and looked ten years
+older. She was a tired, worn out, faded little woman, drained of her
+youth and vitality by the hourly exactions of the fault-finding
+invalid mother whom she had so recently laid away in the church-yard
+with unselfish filial tears. But there was something attractive in the
+sweet patience of her thin face, and the look in her brown eyes as she
+turned them on her faithful middle-aged lover was one of the trump
+cards her sex has played since Eve first used it as she accompanied
+Adam to the gate out of paradise. In her embarrassment she laughed a
+little, consciously.
+
+"Mebbe Henry don't want to go," she began. "He ain't said nothing
+about New York."
+
+Henry whirled abruptly till he faced her on the rustic seat.
+
+"Go! You bet I want to go!" he ejaculated, with fervor. "Don't I just--
+you bet I do. Say, Maria"--he fumbled nervously with the thin hand he
+still held in his own--"say, let's go."
+
+Jacob West cackled delightedly. "That's the talk!" he cried, his thin,
+high tones taking on a shriller note in his excitement. "You jest do
+it, Henry! You make her! Neither of yeh'll be sorry, I swan!"
+
+They sat silent, reflecting, and the old fellow rose slowly and
+painfully, instinctive delicacy telling him that, having done his
+part, it behooved him to leave them alone to solve for themselves the
+question he had raised. It was hard to go, but he went, chuckling
+reminiscently as he recalled the excited look on their faces and
+pictured the lively debate which would follow his departure.
+
+It was a warm October evening, and the little village lay silent under
+the early stars. A light wind sang a droning lullaby in the grove of
+pines back of the Tuttle home, and a few belated birds twittered
+sleepily in near-by trees. Unconsciously Maria voiced the subtle charm
+of the hour when she spoke.
+
+"I dunno, Henry," she said, lingeringly--"I dunno's I feel to go.
+Seems like we ought to be content to stay right here, where it's so
+quiet an' restful."
+
+Her eyes roamed lovingly down the garden paths, lingering on trees and
+shrubs planted by Tuttle hands now a part of earth themselves. "I'm so
+glad you're comin' here," she sighed, happily. "I don't b'lieve you
+know yet how glad I am, Henry--not t' leave the old place."
+
+He waived the discussion of this side interest, already settled
+between them.
+
+"It'll be jest as nice when we come back from New York," he argued,
+logically, "an' jest as quiet."
+
+The feminine intellect beside him took another tack on the sea of
+uncertainty with which old Jacob had surrounded it.
+
+"Mebbe we can't afford it," she hazarded. "Prices is very high in New
+York, Henry. Joseph Hadley's daughter went there four years ago with
+her aunt, and she told me with her own lips they had to pay a dollar a
+day for their room at the hotel, without no meals. The hotel man
+wanted seventy-five cents apiece for dinner, so they paid it once a
+day an' the rest of the time they went into lunch-rooms an' had milk
+an' crackers. But with one dollar for the room, and another dollar 'n'
+a half for dinner, an' the crackers an' milk besides, they spent 'most
+twenty dollars the very first week. They had to come right straight
+home, 'n' they'd meant to stay two weeks."
+
+Henry Smith's strong jaw set rather obstinately.
+
+"I guess we won't have to come home till we git ready," he remarked,
+easily, "an' I guess we'll git our three meals a day, too. I don't see
+myself eatin' no milk an' crackers, nor you, neither. I guess I 'ain't
+bin savin' all these years, with a good carpenter business, without
+gittin' somethin' ahead. Say, 'Ria"--it was he who blushed now, his
+round face close to hers--"yeh can have anything yeh want. I'm that
+glad t' git yeh at last, I'd spend all I have!"
+
+Her thin hand responded for an instant to the pressure of his and then
+coyly withdrew itself. She had few words at any time and none in
+moments of emotion, but he knew her and was satisfied.
+
+"You've bin so good, Henry," she said, at last; "you've bin awful
+patient all these years. Fur's I'm concerned, I'd as lief stay here's
+anywhere, but if you want to go t' New York, I--I--want to do what yeh
+say."
+
+"Then we'll go," he said, quietly; and the great question was settled.
+
+When Mr. and Mrs. Henry Smith arrived in New York on the evening of
+their wedding-day, it is doubtful which of them was the more dazed and
+frightened by the bustle and confusion at the Grand Central station.
+Maria had at least the support of her husband's nearness to sustain
+her, and the comparative peace of mind of the one who, though facing
+untoward conditions, is without personal responsibility; but Henry
+experienced, in addition to his self-distrust, a sickening fear of
+failure in her presence. He was conscious of two dominant thoughts.
+Whatever happened, he must take care of his wife and spurn the
+advances of agreeable strangers. Also he and she must be transported
+by hack to the hotel they had chosen, without parting with the savings
+of years for the ride. He had heard of the extortions of cabmen. He
+bargained fiercely with a too-zealous independent who had already
+grasped his hand-bag and was leading the way to his cab, past the more
+inexpensive cabs supplied by the railroad company.
+
+"You don't git one cent more'n two dollars for taking us, I can tell
+you that," announced Henry Smith, firmly but breathlessly, as he
+climbed clumsily into the cab after his wife. The hotel was in the
+fifties, and the cabman had intended to charge a dollar for the ride.
+He promptly protested against Mr. Smith's offer, however, inquiring
+anxiously if the gentleman wished an honest cabman's family to go
+supperless to bed. It appeared that the gentleman was indifferent to
+the fate of the cabman's family.
+
+"You'll do it for two dollars or you'll let us git out," was his final
+word. As one overcome by superior force, the cabman yielded, climbed
+sulkily to his perch, and, bestowing a large, comprehensive wink upon
+the by-standers, started for the hotel his fare had indicated. Mr.
+Smith's spirits rose. Obviously, in this triumph he had demonstrated
+his fitness to cope with all the other grinding monopolies of New
+York. He smiled proudly at his wife as they drove toward Broadway, and
+his confidence grew as he discovered that he recognized the Times
+Building at the first glance and could also recognize the Hotel Astor
+by its resemblance to the picture of it in the Clayton Centre Weekly.
+At one point in their progress up-town the cab was caught in a crush
+of vehicles and Mrs. Henry Smith was privileged, for the first time in
+her life, to listen to the untrammelled conversation of New York
+cabmen on an occasion when they set their moral shoulders against
+congested traffic, knowing that it helps THEM, at all events. She
+shuddered and clung to Henry's arm. It was all too plain that they
+were in the vortex of godlessness, but even as the realization of this
+was borne to her on the winged speech of the driver, Mrs. Smith was
+conscious of an inward thrill. It was awful, but it was life--not life
+as lived in Clayton Centre, but certainly a life that already gained
+in excitement and interest from that fact. Unconsciously craning her
+thin neck farther out of the cab window, she drank in with a fearful
+joy the roar and excitement of Broadway, the shouts of drivers, the
+clang of trolley-cars. Her faded eyes gleamed as she saw the brilliant
+lights of the great thoroughfare whose illuminated signs met her
+glance at every turn.
+
+Arrived at the hotel, the cabman accepted the two dollars, dumped the
+bride's trunk on the sidewalk, and drove off with an alacrity designed
+to prevent any further discussion of rates. Mr. Smith surrendered his
+hand-bag to the bell-boy who was reaching out impatient hands for it,
+grasped his wife's arm, and, following his small guide, walked firmly
+into the presence of the hotel clerk. It was a trying moment for him
+as he dragged that aloof personality down to his level, but details
+were arranged with surprising ease, barring so strange a lack of
+sympathy. As soon as he had expressed his few and simple wishes he
+found himself and his wife being guided to a lift, and with wonderful
+simplicity put in possession of a comfortable room on the third floor.
+Here the shades were drawn down, a pitcher of ice-water was hospitably
+placed on the stand, and a cheery fire was started on the small
+hearth. Over this last extravagance the bride faintly demurred, but
+Henry silenced her with his simple grandeur of insistence. It was a
+cool November evening, and he had noticed that she shivered in her
+thin wrap as they drove up-town.
+
+"I jest intend makin' yeh comfortable," he announced, masterfully.
+
+It was something of an ordeal to go down to dinner half an hour later,
+but they met it bravely, walking stiffly into the crowded dining-room,
+and looking to neither the right nor the left as they followed the
+headwaiter to their places. The discovery that they had exclusive
+possession of a small table was a matter of joyful surprise to them
+both, on which they freely commented. The daintiness of the linen, the
+gleam of silver, the perfection of the service, and the soft glow of
+candles under silk shades, filled their simple country souls with awe.
+It suggested unconjectured expense with a tang of wickedness as well.
+Off in an alcove, screened by palms, an orchestra played with
+considerate softness. Mr. Smith smiled a large, expansive smile and
+leaned back in his chair. The moment was perfect. His apprehensions
+were over for the time. Maria was with him, she was his, and he was
+giving her all this. Could an Astor or a Vanderbilt offer more to the
+woman of his heart? Henry Smith looked at the plush and gilding about
+him, and read his answer.
+
+He experienced a rude awakening. A silent waiter stood beside him,
+offering for his inspection an elaborate menu. The letters danced
+before his eyes as Henry looked at them. What did they mean, anyhow,
+and how did one pick out what one wanted, he wondered. Or, perchance,
+was one expected gracefully to consume everything? His momentary self-
+sufficiency died on the instant, and sickening fears of making a
+mistake before Maria's eyes again overcame him. A great longing filled
+him to appear to advantage, to do the thing properly, whatever it was.
+On a sudden inspiration he leaned toward the waiter.
+
+"Say," he said, confidentially, "you jest bring us two good dinners--
+the best of everything you've got--and I'll make it all right with
+yeh." He surveyed the waiter's face anxiously as he spoke, his own
+clearing as it remained quietly respectful.
+
+"Very well, sir; certainly, sir," said the servant, promptly. "Oysters
+first, sir, I suppose, and a little green-turtle soup; a bit of fish,
+perhaps--we've some very nice sole in to-day, sir; a bird--the
+partridge and grouse are excellent, sir; a salad, and an ice. Any
+wine, sir? No, sir? Yes, sir." He was gone, and Mr. Smith wiped his
+perspiring brow. Maria was gazing at him with simple love and trust.
+
+"I declare, Henry," she murmured, "you do it all just 's if you'd be'n
+doin' it every day of your life. Where'd you learn?"
+
+Mr. Smith made a vague gesture repudiating the charge, but his face
+shone and he sat straighter in his chair. He dared not boast, for he
+knew there were crucial moments coming, but so far there had been no
+catastrophes and his courage grew with each achievement. When Maria
+looked doubtfully at her oysters, and, joyfully recognizing them,
+wondered audibly why they were not made into a stew instead of being
+presented in this semi-nude condition, he was able, after a piercing
+glance at near-by tables, to set her right with easy authority.
+
+"They eat 'em this way in New York," he said, swallowing one himself
+and endeavoring, with indifferent success, to look as if he liked it.
+Maria followed his example, rather gingerly and not as one who
+ventures on a new joy. Her interest remained equally vague when the
+soup and fish successively appeared. When the partridge was served,
+however, with bread sauce and French pease and currant jelly, the
+gratifying experience of finally "having something really on the
+plate" moved her to alert appreciation, and she proceeded to eat her
+dinner with an expression of artless and whole-souled relief. She was
+able to point out to Henry, as a bit of prandial small-talk, that the
+orchestra was playing "Nancy Brown"--a classic ditty whose notes had
+reached even Clayton Centre. It was at this stimulating point of the
+dinner, also, that she felt privileged for the first time to remove
+her gloves, glance at the other tables and the clothes of the women,
+and talk freely to her husband. Hitherto she had "conversed" under
+pressure.
+
+The waiter, offering her a second helping of jelly, saw, shining in
+her hair, several grains of rice. The discovery exhilarated but did
+not surprise him. His mien was one of fatherly interest five minutes
+later as he presented a small bottle for Mr. Smith's inspection.
+
+"Champagne, sir," he murmured. "Not too dry for the lady's taste, sir.
+Thought you'd like a glass--special occasion, sir--"
+
+His eloquence died away under the startled look in the bride's eyes,
+but the groom met his happy suggestion with warm approval.
+
+"Jest the thing," he said, heartily. "It'll do you good, Maria.
+Doctors give it when people ain't well, so you can take it 'thout any
+fear. 'N' I guess you're feelin' pretty well, ain't you?" he grinned,
+broadly, over this flash of humor.
+
+He motioned to the waiter to fill her glass, and that worthy did so
+and retired behind her to give his courteous attention to the effect.
+
+They drank their champagne, and a faint color came to Maria's pale
+cheeks. It was really a nice place, this hotel, she decided, and the
+furnishing of this room was such as palaces might cope with in vain.
+She had heard of their glories; now she could guess what those glories
+were. The voices of other guests chatting around her mingled with the
+music; Clayton Centre seemed very remote. At last she was seeing life.
+
+She felt no embarrassment as they left the table. They strolled slowly
+down the dining-room and out into the palm-lined corridor on whose
+plush chairs handsome men and beautifully dressed women sat and
+chatted with surprising volubility and ease. Intrepidly the newcomers
+seated themselves side by side where they could listen to the music
+and watch the strange beings in this strange world. They were out of
+it all, and even in the exhilaration of the moment they knew it; but
+their aloofness from others added to the charm of the evening by
+drawing them closer together. They gloried in the joint occupation of
+their little island of happiness. For a long time they sat there, for
+Maria could not be torn away. The music, the costumes and beauty of
+the women, the delicate perfumes, the frequent ringing of bells, the
+hurrying back and forth of bell-boys and hotel servants, were
+indescribably fascinating to her.
+
+The next morning Mr. Smith, sternly recalling himself to the material
+side of life, had a brief but pregnant chat with the clerk. He and his
+wife wished to stay a few days at the hotel, he intimated, but it
+would be advisable, before making their plans, to go somewhat into the
+question of expense. How much, for instance, was their dinner last
+night. He had signed a check, but his memory was hazy as to the
+amount. His brain reeled when the clerk, having looked it up, gave him
+the figures--$10.85.
+
+"Good Lord!" gasped Mr. Henry Smith. "I guess we'd better go back to-
+day ef it's goin' to be THAT much!"
+
+He was too limp mentally to follow for a time the clerks remarks, but
+light gradually broke upon him. He could henceforth take table d'hote
+meals, paying sixty cents each for breakfast and luncheon for himself
+and his wife, and one dollar each for their dinner. That would be only
+four dollars and forty cents a day for all meals--and would make the
+hotel bills much less than if one ordered by card, unless one was--er
+--familiar with the prices. It was much less trouble, too. Mr. Smith
+grasped the point and expansively shook the clerk's hand. His relief
+was so great that he urged that youth to have a cigar, and the youth
+in return volunteered information as to points of interest to
+strangers in New York.
+
+"Better do the town to-day," he suggested. "Just go round and get a
+general view--Broadway, Fifth Avenue, the shops, and all that. Then
+to-night you'd better go to the play. I think you'd enjoy 'The White
+Cat' as much as anything."
+
+Armed with definite information as to the most direct route to
+Broadway, Mr. Smith sought his bride. He found her in the corridor,
+watching the people come and go, her thin face flushed and animated.
+
+"Oh, Henry," she cried, eagerly, "I declare I'm having the most
+interestin' time! Those folks over there--you know, the ones that has
+the room next to ours--ain't spoke to each other sence breakfast. Do
+you think they've quarrelled, the poor dears?"
+
+He gave but perfunctory attention to "the poor dears," his duties as
+prospective cicerone filling his thoughts. Maria's face fell as he
+outlined their plans for the day.
+
+"Well, if you feel to go, Henry," she said, doubtfully, "but it's SO
+interestin' here. I feel 's if I knew all these folks. I wish we could
+stay here this mornin', anyhow, 'n' not git out in those dreadful
+crowded streets jest yet."
+
+He sat down beside her with a promptness which evoked a startled
+shriek from an absorbed young person reading near them.
+
+"Then we'll stay right here," he announced, kindly. "We're here, 'Ria,
+to do jest what you want, an' we're goin' to do it."
+
+She gave him an adoring look, and under its radiance Mr. Smith
+promptly forgot the small claims of Broadway. Siberia with Maria in it
+would have blossomed like the rose for Henry Smith, and the wide,
+cheerful corridors of the Berkeley were far removed from Siberia's
+atmosphere. Side by side and blissfully happy, they whiled the morning
+hours away. After luncheon Henry again tentatively touched on sight-
+seeing.
+
+"'Tain't far," he said. He consulted the slip of directions the clerk
+had given him, and went on expansively, "We take the cross-town line
+at Fifty-ninth Street, transfer to a Broadway car--"
+
+Maria shivered. "My, Henry," she quavered, "that sounds dreadful
+mixed. I'm afraid we'll get lost."
+
+Henry's own soul was full of dark forebodings, and he inwardly
+welcomed the respite her words gave him.
+
+"Well, then, don't let's go," he said, easily, "till to-morrow,
+anyhow. We got plenty o' time. We'll stay here, an' to-night we'll go
+to see a play."
+
+Like the morning, the afternoon passed sweetly. Henry made the
+discovery that the hotel cafe at the right of the reception-room was a
+popular resort for men guests of the hotel, and his researches into
+their pleasures led to an introduction to a Manhattan cocktail. He
+returned to Maria's side an ardent convert to her theory that the
+hotel was the pleasantest place in New York. Subsequently, as he
+sampled a Martini, one or two men chatted with him for a moment,
+giving him a delightful sense of easy association with his peers.
+Maria, in the mean time, had formed a pleasing acquaintance with the
+parlor maid, and had talked freely to several little children. It was
+with reluctance that they tore themselves away from the corridor long
+enough to go in to dinner.
+
+The table d'hote dinner, served in another room, was much less
+elaborate than the banquet of the night before, but neither of them
+realized the difference. Good in itself, to them it was perfection,
+and Maria recognized almost as old friends familiar faces of fellow
+hotel guests at the tables around her. When the question of the
+theatre came up she was distinctly chilling.
+
+"We'll go if you want to, Henry," she said, "but the band's goin' to
+play all evening, an' the maid said some of the young folks has got up
+a dance in the little ball-room. Wouldn't you like to see it?"
+
+Henry decided that he would. He had, in fact, no rabid wish to see a
+play, and the prospect of piloting Maria safely to the centre of the
+town and home was definitely strenuous. He drank another cocktail
+after dinner, smoked a cigar with a Western travelling man, exchanged
+sage views on politics with that gentleman, and happily spent the
+remainder of the evening by his Maria's side, watching the whirling
+young things in the small ball-room. The happiest of them were sad,
+indeed, compared with Henry Smith.
+
+The next morning the cheerful voice of the clerk greeted him as he
+came from the dining-room.
+
+"Where to-day, Mr. Smith?" inquired that affable youth. "How about the
+Horse Show? You surely ought to look in on that." He wrote on a card
+explicit directions for arriving at the scene of this diversion, and
+Mr. Smith, gratefully accepting it, hastened to his bride's side. He
+found her full of another project.
+
+"Oh, Henry," she cried, "they's going to be a lecture here in the
+hotel this mornin', by a lady that's been to Japan. All the money she
+gets for tickets will go to the poor. I guess she'll ask as much as
+twenty-five cents apiece, but I think we better go."
+
+Sustained by a cocktail, and strengthened by the presence of his
+Maria, Mr. Smith attended the lecture, cheerfully paying two dollars
+for the privilege, but refraining from dampening his wife's joy by
+mentioning the fact. In the afternoon he broached the Horse Show.
+Maria's face paled. To her it meant an exaggerated county fair, with
+its attendant fatigue.
+
+"You go, Henry," she urged. "You jest go an' enjoy yourself. I feel
+too tired--I really do. I'd rather stay home--here--an' rest. We don't
+really have to do nothing we don't want to, do we?"
+
+Honest Henry Smith, whose working-day in Clayton Centre began at five
+in the morning and ended at six at night, and whose evenings were
+usually spent in the sleep of utter exhaustion, found himself relaxing
+deliciously under her words. It was good, very good, to rest, and to
+know they didn't HAVE to do things unless they wished.
+
+"I won't, neither, go alone," he announced. "I ain't anxious to go.
+I'd ruther stay here with you. We'll go some other time."
+
+The white-capped maid smiled as she passed them; the palms nodded as
+to old friends. The seductive charms of the Berkeley corridors again
+wrapped them round.
+
+"Going to see some of the pictures to-day?" asked the clerk, on the
+third morning, cheerfully doing his duty by the strangers as he
+conceived it. "Better go to Central Park first and the Metropolitan
+Museum, then to the private exhibitions. Here's the list. Take a
+cross-town car to Fifth Avenue, and a 'bus to Eighty-first Street, and
+after the Park a Fifth Avenue 'bus will drop you at the other places."
+
+Apprehension settled over Henry Smith, rudely disturbing his lotos-
+eater's sense of being. He felt almost annoyed by this well-meaning
+but indefatigable young man who seemed to think folks should be
+gadding all the time. His manner was unresponsive as he took the
+addresses.
+
+"I'll see what my wife says," he remarked, indifferently.
+
+His wife said what he believed and hoped she would say.
+
+"We ain't goin' home till to-morrow afternoon," she observed, "an' we
+can see Central Park to-morrow mornin' if we want to. They's a woman
+here that does up hair for fifty cents, an' I thought if yeh didn't
+mind, Henry, I'd have her do mine--"
+
+Henry urged her to carry out this happy inspiration. "She can't make
+yeh look any nicer, though," he added, gallantly. Then, as Maria
+surrendered herself and their room to the hairdresser's ministrations,
+he visited the bar, chatted with his friend the clerk, and smoked a
+good cigar. Afterward he selected a comfortable chair in the corridor
+where he was to meet Maria, stretched his long legs, dozed, and found
+it good to be alive.
+
+A befrizzled Maria, whose scant hair stood out in startling Marcel
+waves, confronted him at luncheon-time. A sudden inspiration shook him
+to his depths.
+
+"Don't you want to go down-town and have your picture took?" he urged.
+"Let's have ours done together."
+
+Maria was proof against even this lure. She had a better idea.
+
+"They's a photograph man right here in the hotel," she chirped,
+joyously. "He's next to the flower-shop, an' we can go right in
+through that little narrow hall."
+
+They went, subsequently carrying home with them as their choicest
+treasure the cabinet photograph for which they had posed side by side,
+with the excitement of New York life shining in their honest eyes. In
+the evening the clerk suggested a concert.
+
+"It's a fine one, at Carnegie Hall, right near here," he urged,
+cheerfully, "and Sembrich is to sing, with the Symphony Orchestra. You
+can get in for fifty cents if you don't mind sitting in the gallery.
+You really ought to go, Mrs. Smith; you would enjoy it."
+
+Mrs. Smith turned upon him an anxious eye.
+
+"How far did you say 'twas?" she asked, warily.
+
+"Oh, not ten minutes' ride. You take the car here at the corner--"
+
+But the mention of the car blighted the budding purpose in Maria's
+soul.
+
+"I feel real tired," she said, quickly, "but if my husband wants to
+go--"
+
+Her husband loudly disavowed any such aspiration.
+
+"We got a long journey before us to-morrow," he said, "an' I guess we
+better rest."
+
+They rested in the Berkeley corridor, amid the familiar sights and
+scenes. The following morning found them equally disinclined for
+sight-seeing. Seated in their favorite chairs, they watched the
+throngs of happy people who came and went around them. Henry had added
+to the list of his acquaintances two more travelling men and the boy
+at the news-counter. His wife had heard in detail the sad story of her
+chambermaid's life, and a few facts and surmises about fellow-guests
+at the hotel.
+
+Maria drew a long sigh when, after they had paid their bill the next
+day and bade farewell to the clerk and other new friends, they climbed
+into the cab which was to take them to the station.
+
+"My, but it was interestin'!" she said, softly; adding, with entire
+conviction, "Henry, I 'ain't never had such a good time in my hull
+life! I really 'ain't!"
+
+"Neither have I," avowed Henry, truthfully. "Wasn't it jest bully!"
+
+On the train a sudden thought occurred to Mrs. Smith.
+
+"Henry," she began, uneasily, "s'pose any one asks what we've SEEN in
+New York. What'll we tell 'em? You know, somehow we didn't seem t' git
+time t' see much."
+
+Henry Smith was equal to the emergency.
+
+"We'll say we seen so much we can't remember it," he said,
+shamelessly. "Don't you worry one bit about that, Maria Smith. I've
+always heard that weddin' couples don't never really see nothin' on
+their weddin' towers, anyhow--they gad an' gad, an' it don't do no
+good. We was wiser not to try!"
+
+
+
+
+ X
+
+THE CASE OF KATRINA
+
+
+My memory of Katrina goes back to the morning when, at the tender age
+of ten, she was violently precipitated into our classroom. The motive
+power, we subsequently learned, was her brother Jacob, slightly older
+than Katrina, whose nervous system had abruptly refused the ordeal of
+accompanying her into the presence of the teacher. Pushing the door
+ajar until the opening was just large enough to admit her, he thrust
+her through, following her fat figure for a second with one anxious
+eye and breathing audibly in his excitement. The next instant the
+cheerful clatter of his hob-nailed boots echoed down the hall,
+followed by a whoop of relief as he emerged upon the playground.
+
+It was Katrina's bearing as she stood, thus rudely projected into our
+lives, endeavoring to recover her equilibrium, and with thirty pairs
+of eyes fixed unswervingly upon her, that won my heart and Jessica's.
+Owing to a fervid determination of our teacher to keep us well in
+view, we sat in the front row, directly facing her. Having, even in
+our extreme youth, a constitutional distaste to missing anything, we
+undoubtedly stared at Katrina longer and harder than any of the
+others. We smiled, too, largely and with the innocent abandon of
+childhood; and Katrina smiled back at us as if she also tasted a
+subtle flavor of the joke, lost to cruder palates. Then she shifted
+her tiny school-bag from one hand to the other, swept the room with a
+thoughtful glance, and catching sight of frantic gestures I was
+making, obeyed them by walking casually to an empty seat across from
+my own, where she sat down with deepening dimples and an air of
+finality.
+
+Several moments subsequently our teacher, Miss Merrill, aroused
+herself from the trance into which she apparently had been thrown by
+the expeditiousness with which this incident was accomplished, and
+coming to Katrina's side, ratified the arrangement, incidentally
+learning the new pupil's name and receiving from her hand a card,
+written by the principal and assigning her to our special grade. But
+long before these insignificant details were completed, Jessica and I
+had emptied Katrina's bag, arranged her books in her desk, lent her a
+pencil she lacked, indicated to her the boy most to be scorned and
+shunned, given her in pantomime the exact standing of Miss Merrill in
+the regard of her pupils, and accepted in turn the temporary loan of
+the spruce-gum with which she had happily provided herself. At recess
+the acquaintance thus auspiciously begun ripened into a warm
+friendship, and on the way home from school that night we made a
+covenant of eternal loyalty and love, and told one another the stories
+of our lives.
+
+Jessica's and mine were distressingly matter-of-fact. We were both
+supplied with the usual complement of parents, brothers, and sisters,
+and, barring the melancholy condition that none of them, of course,
+understood our complex natures, we had nothing unusual to chronicle.
+But Katrina's recital was of an interest. She was, to begin with, an
+orphan, living with two brothers and an old uncle in a large and
+gloomy house we had often noticed as it stood with its faded back
+turned coldly to Evans Avenue. Seemingly her pleasures and friends
+were few. Once a month she went to the cemetery to put flowers on her
+father's and mother's graves. Katrina herself seemed uncertain as to
+whether this pilgrimage properly belonged in the field of pleasure or
+the stern path of duty; but Jessica and I classified it at once, and
+dropped an easy tear. We hoped her uncle was grim and stern, and did
+not give her enough to eat. This, we felt, would have made the
+melancholy picture of Katrina's condition most satisfyingly complete.
+But when we sought eagerly for such details, Katrina, with shameless
+indifference to dramatic possibilities, painted for us an unromantic,
+matter-of-fact old German, kind to her when he remembered her
+existence, but submerged in his library and in scientific research. We
+further learned that they ate five meals a day at Katrina's home, with
+"coffee" and numerous accompaniments in between. Moreover, Katrina's
+school-bag bulged at the sides with German cakes of various shapes and
+composition. Our stern disapproval of these was tempered in time by
+the fact that she freely shared them with us. We were not surprised to
+discover also, though these revelations came later, that the old
+house-keeper had difficulty in keeping buttons on the child's frocks,
+and that Katrina was addicted to surreptitious consumption of large
+cucumber pickles behind her geography in school hours. These were
+small faults of an otherwise beautiful nature, and stimulating to our
+youthful fancy in the possibilities they suggested. Unquestioningly we
+accepted Katrina as a being to be loved, pitied, and spared the ruder
+shocks of life. Lovingly we sharpened her pencils, cheerfully we
+covered her books, unenthusiastically but patiently we wrote her
+compositions; for Katrina's mind worked slowly, and literature was
+obviously not her forte. In return, Katrina blossomed and existed and
+shed on us the radiance of a smile which illumined the dim school-room
+even as her optimistic theories of life leavened our infant pessimism.
+
+Time swept us on, out of childhood school-rooms into the dignified
+shades of the academy, and Katrina developed from a fat little girl
+with yellow braids into a plump young person with a rather ordinary
+complexion, some taste in dress, and a really angelic smile. As a
+possible explanation of her lack of interest in intellectual pursuits,
+she explained to us that she continued to attend school only because
+her uncle suggested nothing else. Whatever the reason, we were glad to
+have her there; and though we still did most of her work, and she
+carefully refrained from burdening her mind with academic knowledge,
+the tie between us was strengthened, if anything, by the fact. Jessica
+and I were already convinced that more was being put into us than two
+small heads could hold. It was a grateful as well as a friendly task
+to pass the surplus on to Katrina.
+
+When we were seventeen, Jessica and I were told that we were to be
+sent East to college, and Katrina's uncle, first stimulating thought
+by pushing his spectacles back upon his brow, decided that she was
+already sufficiently burdened by education, and that the useful arts
+of the _Hausfrau_ should engage her attention forthwith. She should
+keep house for him and her brothers, he announced, until she carried
+out her proper mission in life by marrying and having babies. With
+this oracular utterance he closed further discussion by burying
+himself once more in his library, while Katrina came to tell us his
+decision.
+
+She had looked forward to the pleasing social aspects of college life,
+so she seemed slightly disappointed, did Katrina, and the end of her
+nose held certain high lights. But aside from this evidence of sorrow
+she made no protest against the peremptory masculine shaping of her
+future. Stricken to the heart, Jessica and I stormed, begged,
+implored, wept. Katrina opposed to our eloquence the impassive front
+of a pink sofa-cushion.
+
+"My uncle says it," she sighed, and was silent.
+
+Jessica and I were not the natures to remain inactive at such a
+crisis. We appealed to her brothers, who promptly declined to express
+any opinion in the matter beyond a general conviction that their uncle
+was right in all things. Baffled, we proceeded to beard the uncle in
+his den. We found him wearing worn carpet slippers, a faded dressing-
+gown, a serene expression, and an air of absorption in science which
+did not materially lift at our approach. He listened to us patiently,
+however, greeting our impassioned climaxes with long-drawn "ach so's,"
+which Jessica subsequently confided to me brought to birth in her the
+first murderous impulse of a hitherto blameless life. Once we
+experienced high hopes, when Jessica, whose conscience had seemingly
+not accompanied us to the conference, dwelt feelingly on Katrina's
+unusual intellectual achievements at the academy. Her uncle grew very
+grave at this, and his "ach so's" rolled about in the bare old library
+like echoes of distant thunder.
+
+"Ach, that is bad," he sighed; "I did not think it; I was careless. I
+should have taken her away sooner, is it not so? But she will quickly
+forget--yes, yes." His face cleared. "It will do her no harm," he went
+on. "It is not good that the women know too much. _Kirche, Kinder, und
+Kuchen_--that is best for them. Ach, yes."
+
+There being obviously little to gain by prolonging this painful
+discussion, Jessica and I bore our outraged sensibilities to the
+calming atmosphere of our homes. And in due time, our trunks being
+packed and our farewells said, we departed to apply our thirsty lips
+to the fountain of knowledge flowing at the Eastern college, leaving
+Katrina to embark upon her domestic career.
+
+Time and distance, we reminded Katrina, could be bridged by letters,
+and Katrina responded nobly to the hint. She wrote every day at first,
+and we consumed most of our waking hours in inditing our replies.
+There seemed, indeed, little else to engage our attention in a
+community which was experiencing great difficulty in recalling our
+names and was in heathen darkness as to our brilliant achievements at
+the academy. As time passed, however, we grew more busy. For a few
+months the necessity of asserting our individuality to an extent which
+would at least prevent our being trodden upon in the halls engaged our
+attention, and after that a conscientious imitation of loved ones in
+the Junior class occupied much time.
+
+The great news of Katrina's engagement fanned into a fierce flame the
+warm embers of our friendship. Oh, joy, oh romance, oh, young, young
+love! We wrote Katrina forty pages of congratulations, and Katrina
+coyly but fully replied. We could almost see her rosy blushes as she
+bent over the pages of her long letters to us. Her future lord was a
+German, a professor in the Lutheran college in our native city, and,
+it seemed, though Katrina dwelt but lightly on the fact, somewhat past
+the first fine flush of youth. So much Katrina naively conveyed to us,
+with the further information that the wedding was to be early in
+February, because Professor von Heller, the happy bridegroom, seemed
+unaccountably to be in haste, and had bought a home, to which he was
+anxious to take her.
+
+There was much in all this to arouse our girlish enthusiasm; the
+charms of our beloved Juniors paled into temporary insignificance as
+we followed Katrina's love-affair. We could not go home for the
+wedding, for reasons which seemed sufficient to the faculty, and this
+was a bitter blow. But we spent more than we could afford on the
+wedding-present we sent Katrina, and we still occupied most of our
+waking hours writing to her.
+
+The wedding, according to Katrina's account, was in the nature of a
+brilliant social function. She found time during her honeymoon to
+write us lengthy accounts of its splendors. She obviously had taken
+considerable satisfaction in the presence of the entire faculty of
+Professor von Heller's college and in the effect of her gown, which
+was of white satin, with orange-blossoms. She also sent us a box of
+her wedding-cake, some of which we ate and upon the rest of which we
+conscientiously slumbered, experiencing horrible nightmares. Then, as
+the weeks passed, her letters became less frequent, and we, in turn,
+whirling in the maelstrom of spring examinations, gave to her paradise
+the tribute of an occasional envious thought and respected her happy
+silence.
+
+When we went home for our summer vacation our first caller, most
+properly, was Katrina. She was a subdued, rather chastened Katrina,
+whose thoughtful, slightly puzzled expression might have suggested to
+maturer minds that some, at least, of the vaunted joys of domestic
+life had thus far escaped her. She urged us to come to her at once--
+the next day, in fact--and we accepted her invitation with the
+alacrity it deserved. We could not dine with her, we explained, as
+Jessica's sister had thoughtlessly made another engagement for us; but
+we would come at two and remain until after five, unbosoming ourselves
+of the year's experiences in a long talk and listening to the wisdom
+that flowed from Katrina's lips.
+
+The next day was very beautiful, and Jessica and I, casting off a
+haunting suspicion of our individual unimportance which we had not
+quite succeeded in leaving behind us at college, expanded joyfully,
+and lent ourselves to the charms of a sunlit world. The Lutheran fount
+of knowledge was on the edge of the city, and Katrina's home was a
+short distance beyond it. It was quite a country place, this home,
+over the big, bare lawn of which an iron dog fiercely mounted guard. A
+weather-beaten house confronted us, with a cold, forbidding
+expression. We felt chilled as we opened the gate, but Katrina
+presented herself at the first click of its latch, and her welcome was
+so hospitable and eager that our temporary constraint vanished.
+Simultaneously we fell upon her neck; loudly we assured her of our
+envious delight; noisily we trooped into her hall. As we entered it, a
+large, cheerful room confronted us. Through its open door we could see
+soft, leather-covered easy-chairs and big windows overlooking distant
+hills. Jessica started toward this, but Katrina checked her with a
+gentle touch.
+
+"Not there," she said, gravely; "that is my husband's study, and he
+may come in any moment. _This_ is our sitting-room."
+
+She opened another door as she spoke, and we followed her dazedly
+across the threshold into a space which, properly utilized, might have
+made a comfortable single sleeping-room. It was quite seven feet by
+nine and had one window, looking out on a dingy barn. The painted
+floor was partly covered by a rug. Katrina's zither stood stiffly in a
+corner, three chairs backed themselves sternly against the wall.
+Katrina indicated two of these, and dropped on the third with her
+radiant smile.
+
+"We use this as the sitting-room," she remarked, casually, "because my
+husband needs plenty of light and space when he works. Oh, my dear
+girls!" she broke out; "you don't know how glad I am to see you! Tell
+me everything that has happened since we met--all about college and
+your friends there."
+
+As she spoke, there was the sound of heavy footsteps in the hall,
+followed by the noisy opening and shutting of a door. The pushing
+about of chairs in the next room and the drop of a heavy body into one
+of them suggested that the professor was at home and in his study.
+Katrina corroborated this surmise.
+
+"My husband," she murmured, with a little blush. "He is early to-day."
+
+The words were drowned by a roar.
+
+"Katrina," bellowed a bass voice of startling depth, "bring my
+slippers!"
+
+Katrina rose on the instant.
+
+"You will excuse me?" she said, hastily. "Talk till I come back."
+
+We did not talk, having some abysmal suspicion that if we talked we
+might say something. I gazed steadily at a little German picture on
+the wall--one I had given our hostess years before--and Jessica hummed
+a college-song under her breath. We heard Katrina's feet fly up-
+stairs, down again, and into the study. Almost immediately she
+returned to us, her cheeks pink from her exertions.
+
+"Now," she began, "I want to hear all about it--the nicest teachers,
+the chums who have taken my place."
+
+The voice in the next room boomed out again.
+
+"Ka-tri-na!" it bellowed. "My pipe! It is up-stairs."
+
+Katrina departed for the pipe. Jessica and I indulged in the luxury of
+a long, comprehending gaze into the depths of each other's eyes.
+Katrina returned, and we all talked at once; for five minutes
+reminiscences and confidences flowed with the freedom of a mountain
+stream after a thaw.
+
+"Ka-tri-na!"
+
+Katrina sat still. She was listening to the end of Jessica's best
+story, but one willing foot went forward tentatively.
+
+"Ka-tri-na!" Katrina should have heard that call though she lay with
+folded hands beside her mother 'neath the church-yard mould.
+
+"Katrina, get me Haeckel's _Wonders of Life!_"
+
+Katrina got it, by the simple and effective process of going into the
+room where the professor sat and taking it from its shelf. We heard
+the soft murmur of her voice, fallowed by the rumble of his. When she
+returned to us, Jessica finished her story in the chastened spirit
+which follows such an interruption, and there were ten minutes of
+talk. We forgot the bare little room; old memories softly enfolded us;
+the Katrina we knew and loved dominated the situation.
+
+"Ka-tri-na!"
+
+Katrina's soft lips were not smiling now, but she rose at once, and
+with a murmured apology left the room. We heard the suggestion of the
+rest of her task as she closed the door.
+
+"Where is that box of pens I got last week?"
+
+Apparently their lurking-place was a distant one; Katrina's absence
+was long. When she returned, she volunteered to show us the house. We
+surmised that her desire was to get away from the sound of that
+summoning voice, and even as we rose we realized the futility of such
+an effort.
+
+The dining-room, into which she led us for cake and tea, was almost
+comfortable. Its furniture, dark, serviceable oak, was a gift, Katrina
+told us, from her uncle. Twice as she served the tea she responded to
+a summons from the professor's study. Once he desired a handkerchief,
+and the second time he wished an important letter posted at once. His
+wife went out to the rural box which adorned the fence in front of the
+house and cast the envelope into its yawning mouth. Returning, she
+showed us her kitchen, an immaculate spot, the floor of which was
+evidently scrubbed by her own hands, for she mentioned that she
+employed no servant.
+
+"Hans thinks we do not need one," she added, simply.
+
+To the right of the dining-room was a fine, bright, cheerful room,
+full of shelves on which stood innumerable jars and bottles of evil
+odor.
+
+"My husband's laboratory," announced Katrina, proudly. "He has to have
+light and air."
+
+Up-stairs there was a bedroom containing a huge double bed; a
+companion room off this was evidently used by the professor as a
+dressing-room and store-room. His clothes and several startling German
+trunks filled it. There were other rooms, but not one of them
+contained a rug or a piece of furniture. Slowly, convincingly, the
+knowledge entered our sentimental little hearts that Katrina's sole
+refuge for herself and her friends was the tiny, so-called "sitting-
+room" down-stairs. She continued to show us about with housewifely
+pride. So far as we could see, her unconsciousness of her wrongs was
+complete. She was wholly untouched by self-pity.
+
+"Do you mean to say--" began Jessica, warmly, and then suddenly
+realized that she herself could not say it. It was as well, for there
+was no opportunity. Even as Katrina was beginning to explain that her
+husband did not think it necessary to complete the furnishing of the
+house for a year or two, he summoned her to his side by a megaphonic
+demand for water to thin his ink. His impatience for this overcame his
+obvious aversion to exertion, and he came into the hall to take it
+from her hand as we descended the stairs. She introduced him to us,
+and he bowed gravely and with considerable dignity. He had a massive
+head, with iron-gray, curling hair, and near-sighted eyes, which
+peered at us vaguely through large, steel-rimmed spectacles. He
+surveyed us, not unpleasantly, but wholly without interest, nodded
+again, partly to himself and partly to us, as if our appearance had
+confirmed some dark surmise of his own, took the water from Katrina's
+hand, grunted an acknowledgment, and retreated to his fastness in the
+study. He had not spoken one articulate word. Even Katrina, smiling
+her untroubled smile, seemed to feel that something in the situation
+demanded a word of comment.
+
+"He is not at ease with girls," she murmured, gently. "He has taught
+only boys, and he does not understand women; but he has a kind heart."
+
+Jessica and I ruminated thoughtfully upon this tribute as we went
+away. We had learned through the innocent prattle of our hostess's
+busy tongue that she desired a garden, but that Hans thought it a
+waste of time; that she had suggested open plumbing, and that Hans
+declined to go to the expense; that she saw little of her brothers
+nowadays, as Hans did not approve of them; that her old friends came
+to see her rarely since her marriage, as, for some reason
+unaccountable to Katrina, they seemed not to like her husband. We
+waited until we were out of sight of the house, and then seated
+ourselves gloomily on a wayside rock under a sheltering tree. A robin,
+perched on a branch above our heads, burst into mocking song. The sun
+still shone; I wondered how it could.
+
+"Well, of all the selfish beasts and unmanageable brutes!" Jessica
+began, hotly. Jessica's language was frequently too strong for
+elegance, and even at this exciting moment my sense of duty forced me
+to call the fact to her attention. I moreover, essayed judicious
+weighing of the situation as the most effective means of cooling her
+off.
+
+"If the secret of happiness is work, as most authorities agree," I
+reminded Jessica, "Professor von Heller's wife ought to be the
+happiest bride in this country."
+
+Jessica turned one disgusted glance upon me, rose with dignity, and
+moved haughtily down the road to a street-car which was bumping its
+way toward us on its somewhat uneven track.
+
+"Oh, well, if you are going to be funny over a tragedy in which one of
+your dearest friends is a victim," she observed, icily, "we will not
+discuss the matter. But I, for one, have learned a lesson: I know
+_now_ what matrimony is."
+
+I had a dim sense that even this experience, interesting and educative
+though it was, could not be fairly regarded as a post-graduate course
+in matrimonial knowledge, and I ventured to say so.
+
+Jessica set her teeth and declined to discuss the matter further,
+resolutely turning the conversation to the neutral topic of a cat-bird
+which was mewing plaintively in a hedge behind us. Late that night,
+however, she awoke me from my innocent slumbers with a request for
+knowledge as to the correct spelling of _irrevocable_ and
+_disillusionment_. She was at her desk, writing hard, with her brows
+knit into an elaborate pattern of cross-stitching. I knew the moment I
+looked upon her set young face that the missive was to Arthur Townsend
+Jennings, the brother of a classmate, whose letter urging her to "wait
+five years" for him Jessica had received only that morning. It was
+quite evident, even to the drowsiest observation, that Jessica was not
+promising to wait.
+
+Jessica's pessimism on the subject of matrimony dated from that hour,
+and grew with each day that followed. Coldly, even as she had turned
+from the plea of Arthur Townsend Jennings, did she turn from all other
+suitors. She grew steadily in charm and beauty, and her opportunities
+to break hearts were, from the susceptible nature of man, of an almost
+startling frequency. Jessica grasped each one with what seemed even to
+my loyal eyes diabolical glee. She was an avenging Nemesis, hot on the
+trail of man. Grave professors, Harvard, Yale, and Princeton Juniors
+and Seniors, loyal boy friends of her youth who came in manhood to lay
+their hearts at her feet--all of these and more Jessica sent forth
+from her presence, a long, stricken procession. "I know _now_ what
+matrimony is," was Jessica's battle-cry. If, in a thoughtless partisan
+spirit, I sought to say a good word for one of her victims, pointing
+out his material advantages or his spiritual graces, or both, Jessica
+turned upon me with a stern reminder. "Have you forgotten Katrina?"
+she would ask. As I had not forgotten Katrina, the question usually
+silenced me.
+
+For myself, I must admit, Jessica's Spartan spirit had its effect as
+an example. Left alone to work out the problem according to my
+elemental processes, I might possibly have arrived at the conclusion
+that Katrina's domestic infelicity, assuming that it existed, need not
+necessarily spread a sombre pall over the entire institution of
+matrimony. But Jessica's was a dominant personality, and I was easily
+influenced. In my humble way I followed her example; and though,
+lacking her beauty and magnetism, the havoc I wrought was vastly less
+than hers, I nevertheless succeeded in temporarily blighting the lives
+of two middle-aged professors, one widower in the dry-goods line, and
+the editor of a yellow newspaper. This last, I must admit, my heart
+yearned over. I earnestly desired to pluck him from the burning, so to
+speak, and assist him to find the higher nature of which he had
+apparently entirely lost sight. There was something singularly
+pleasing to me in the personality of this gentleman, but Jessica would
+have none of him. I finally agreed to be a maiden aunt to him, and,
+this happy compromise effected, I was privileged to see him
+frequently. If at any time I faltered, quoting him too often on the
+political problems of the day, or thoughtlessly rereading his letters
+in Jessica's presence, she reminded me of Katrina. I sighed, and
+resumed the mantle, so to speak, of the maiden aunt. Unlike Katrina, I
+never had been good at running errands, and now, in my early thirties,
+I was taking on stoutness: it was plain that the risk of matrimony was
+indeed too great.
+
+For we had been growing older, Jessica and I, and many things more or
+less agreeable had happened to us. We had been graduated with high
+honors, we had spent four years abroad in supplementary study, and we
+had then returned to the congenial task of bringing education up to
+date in our native land. We taught, and taught successfully; and our
+girls went forth and married, or studied or taught, and came back to
+show us their babies or their theses, according to the character of
+their productiveness. We fell into the routine of academic life.
+Occasionally, at longer intervals as the years passed, an intrepid
+man, brushing aside the warnings of his anxious friends, presented
+himself for the favor of Jessica, and was sternly sent to join the
+long line of his predecessors. Life was full, life in its way was
+interesting, but it must be admitted that life was sometimes rather
+lonely. My editor, loyal soul that he was, wrote regularly, and came
+to see me twice a year. Professor Herbert Adams, a victim long at
+Jessica's feet, made sporadic departures from that position, and then
+humbly returned. These two alone were left us. Jessica acquired three
+gray hairs and a permanent crease in her intellectual brow.
+
+During all these changing scenes we had not seen Katrina. Under no
+circumstances, after that first melancholy visit, would we willingly
+have seen her again. At long intervals we heard from her. We knew
+there were three fat babies, whose infant charms, hitherto
+unparalleled, were caricatured in snapshots sent us by their proud
+mother. Jessica looked at these, groaned, and dropped them into the
+dark corners of our study. Our visits home were rare, and there had
+been no time in any of them for a second call at the home of Professor
+von Heller. Seven years after our return from Europe, however, Jessica
+decided that she needed a rest and a summer in her native air.
+Moreover, she had just given Professor Adams his final _conge_, and he
+had left her in high dudgeon. I sapiently inferred that Jessica had
+found the experience something of a strain. As Jessica acted as
+expeditiously in other matters as in blighting lives, I need hardly
+add that we were transported to our home town with gratifying
+despatch. We had stepped from the train at the end of our journey
+before a satisfactory excuse for remaining behind had occurred to me,
+and it was obviously of little avail to mention it then. Twenty-four
+hours after the newspapers had chronicled the exciting news of our
+arrival, Katrina called on us.
+
+We gasped as we looked at her. Was this, indeed, Katrina--this rosy,
+robust, glowing, radiant German with shining eyes and with vitality
+flowing from her like the current of an electric battery? I looked at
+Jessica's faded complexion, the tired lines in her face, the white
+threads in her dark hair, and my heart contracted suddenly. I knew how
+I looked--vastly more tired, more faded than Jessica, for I had
+started from a point nearer to these undesirable goals. We three were
+about the same age. There were six months at the most between us. Who
+would believe it to look at us together?
+
+Katrina seized us in turn, and kissed us on both cheeks. To me there
+was something life-giving in the grasp of her strong, firm hands, in
+the touch of her cool, soft lips. She insisted that we come to see her
+and at once. When would we come? We had no excuse now, she pointed
+out, and if we needed a rest, the farm--her home--was the best place
+in the world for rest. With a faint access of hope I heard her. The
+farm? Had she, then, moved? No, she was still in the same place,
+Katrina explained, but the city had lurched off in another direction,
+leaving her and Hans and the children undisturbed in their peaceful
+pastoral life.
+
+"Ka-tri-na!"
+
+I almost jumped, but it was only a memory, helped on by my vivid
+fancy. I had tried to picture the peaceful pastoral life, but all that
+responded was the echo of that distant summons. Jessica, however, was
+explaining that we would come--soon, very soon--next week--yes,
+Tuesday, of course. Jessica subsequently inquired of me, with the
+strong resentment of the person who is in the wrong, how I expected
+her to get us out of it. It was something that had to be done.
+Obviously, she said, it was one of those things to do and have done
+with.
+
+She discoursed languidly about Katrina in the interval between the
+promise and the visit.
+
+"Well! Of course she's well," drawled Jessica. "She's the kind that
+wouldn't know it if she wasn't well. For the rest, she's phlegmatic,
+has no aspirations, and evidently no sensitiveness. All she asks is to
+wait on that man and his children, and from our glimpse of Hans we can
+safely surmise that he is still gratifying that simple aspiration.
+Heavens! don't let's talk about it! It's too horrible!"
+
+Tuesday came, and we made our second visit to Katrina's--fourteen
+years to a month from the time of our first. Again the weather was
+perfect, but the years and professional cares had done their fatal
+work, and our lagging spirits refused to respond to the jocund call of
+the day. Again we approached, with an absurd shrinking, the bleak old
+house. The bleak old house was not there; nay, it was there, but
+transformed. It was painted red. Blossoming vines clambered over it;
+French windows descended to meet its wide verandas; striped awnings
+sheltered its rooms from the July sun. The lawns, sloping down to a
+close-clipped hedge, were green and velvety. The iron dog was gone. A
+great hammock swung in the corner of the veranda, and in it tumbled a
+fat, pink child and a kitten. The fat child proved that all was not a
+dream. It was Katrina reborn--the Katrina of that first day in school,
+twenty years and more ago. Rather unsteadily we walked up the gravel
+path, rather uncertainly we rang the bell. A white-capped maid ushered
+us in. Yes, Frau von Heller was at home and expecting the ladies.
+Would the ladies be gracious enough to enter? The ladies would. The
+ladies entered.
+
+The partition between two of the rooms had been taken down and the
+entire floor made over. There was a wide hall, with a great living-
+room at the right. As we approached it we heard the gurgle of a baby's
+laugh, Katrina's answering ripple, and the murmur of a bass voice
+buzzing like a cheerful bumblebee. Our footsteps were deadened by the
+thick carpet, and our entrance did not disturb for a moment the
+pleasing family tableau on which we gazed. The professor was standing
+with his baby in his arms, his profile toward the door, facing his
+wife, who was laughing up at him. The infant had grasped a handful of
+his father's wavy gray hair and was making an earnest and gratifyingly
+successful effort to drag it out by the roots. Von Heller's face,
+certainly ten years younger than when we saw it last, was alight with
+pride in this precocious offspring. Seeing us, he tossed the baby on
+his shoulder, holding it there with one accustomed arm, and came to
+meet us, his wife close by his side. They reached us together, but it
+was the professor who gave us our welcome. This time he needed no
+introduction.
+
+"My wife's friends, Miss Lawrence and Miss Gifford, is it not?" He
+smiled, extending his big hand to each of us in turn, and giving our
+hands a grip the cordiality of which made us wince. "It is a pleasure.
+But you will excuse this young man, is it not?" He lowered the baby to
+his breast as he spoke, while his wife fell upon our necks in
+hospitable greeting. "He has no manners, this young man," added the
+father, sadly, when Katrina had thus expressed her rapture in our
+arrival. "He would yell if I put him down, and he has lungs--ach, but
+he has lungs!"
+
+He busied himself drawing forth chairs for us, apparently quite
+unhampered by his small burden. We contemplated the baby and said
+fitting things. He had cheeks like beefsteaks and eyes that stuck out
+of his head with what appeared to be joyful interest in his
+surroundings Katrina exclaimed over a sudden discovery:
+
+"But you haven't taken off your hats!" she cried. "Hans, give the baby
+to Gretchen and take my friends' wraps and hats up to the guest-room.
+I don't want Miss Lawrence to climb stairs."
+
+The professor obediently summoned the nurse, dropped the baby,
+burdened himself with our garments, and ambled off with the tread of a
+peaceful elephant. When he returned, with the eager look of a
+retriever waiting for another stick, his wife promptly met his hopes.
+
+"Arrange the easy-chair for Miss Lawrence, dear," she said,
+comfortably, "and put an ottoman under her feet. I want her to rest
+while she is here."
+
+The professor did it, while we gazed. He also inquired feelingly as to
+the state of Jessica's health, showed a sympathy almost human in her
+replies, and placed a pillow behind her back. Subsequently, during
+that call, he did these things:
+
+He answered the telephone half a dozen times, faithfully repeating to
+his wife the messages of her various friends, and carrying hers back,
+as she declined to be torn from us long enough to talk to them
+herself.
+
+He rounded up the remaining two children and presented them for our
+inspection, straightening his son's shoulders with an experienced
+hand, and tying with consummate skill the bow on his little girl's
+hair.
+
+He went to the stable and ordered the family carriage, that we might
+drive later in the afternoon.
+
+He searched for and found the morning newspaper, thoughtlessly dropped
+in the waste-paper basket by the maid, and he read aloud to us a
+paragraph to which Katrina had referred chronicling the achievements
+of a classmate of ours. He brought to Katrina, at different times and
+from remote parts of the house, one white shawl, six photographs of
+the children, an essay written by their son, aged ten, two books, a
+bib to meet a sudden need of the baby, and Katrina's address-book. He
+did these things, and he did them cheerfully, and with the
+unmistakable ease of frequent repetition. I glanced at Jessica. The
+expressions of incredulity and amazement to which she had freely
+yielded during the first half-hour of our call had given way to a look
+of deep reflection.
+
+Subsequently Katrina showed us her home. The room that had been the
+professor's study was now part of the large general living-room. The
+laboratory was now Katrina's personal sitting-room. Through its French
+windows we saw Katrina's garden blossoming like the rose. Jessica
+asked the present location of the professor's study and laboratory.
+She subsequently admitted to me that she should not have done it, but
+that to leave the house without the information would have been a
+physical and moral impossibility. Katrina looked at her vaguely, as
+one seeking to recall a fleeting moment of the long-dead past; but the
+professor responded with gratified alacrity.
+
+"But you shall see them!" he cried. "Surely, yes;" and like a jovial
+school-boy he led us up to the third floor. There, indeed, was his
+study--a hall bedroom, much crowded by his desk and easy-chair; and
+off it, in a closet, were his beloved bottles and chemicals. I felt a
+throb of sympathy for the professor, but he was evidently blissfully
+ignorant of any reason for such a sentiment.
+
+"The _Mutterchen_ and the babies need the rest," he smiled,
+complacently. "They must not climb too many stairs--no;" and he led
+the way back to comfort with unconsciousness of the painful contrast
+between past and present conditions that made Jessica and me carefully
+refrain from meeting each other's eyes. The children, when they espied
+him upon our return, uttered shrieks of joy. The baby sprang to his
+arms, the little boy swarmed up his leg. The picture of Professor von
+Heller as a perfectly trained husband and father was complete.
+
+In silence, after our prolonged farewells, Jessica and I left the
+house. In silence we entered the trolley-car; in silence we rode home.
+At last I voiced a sudden suspicion.
+
+"Do you think," I asked, hopefully, "that it was all a--a--well, that
+she persuaded him to do it just this once, for our edification?"
+
+Jessica shook her head.
+
+"I thought so, at first," she conceded, slowly. "That in itself would
+have been a miracle--one I'd never believe if I hadn't seen it with
+these eyes. But everything disproves the theory. Do you think she
+could have trained those children to advance and retreat like a Casino
+ballet? On the contrary, it's evident that they literally live on him.
+They've worn the creases off his trousers! Didn't you notice where the
+creases left off and the sliding-place of the babies began?"
+
+I reluctantly admitted that this detail had escaped my observation.
+Jessica sighed.
+
+"Incredible as it is," she summed up, "it's all true. It's the real
+thing."
+
+"It opens quite a vista," I observed, thoughtfully. "If you would like
+Professor Adams's present address, I can give it to you. He is in the
+Adirondacks with his sister Mollie, and I had a letter from her this
+morning."
+
+Jessica looked at me and urged me not to be vulgar. Her thoughtful
+expression did not lift.
+
+"If Katrina can do _that_ with _that_ man," I murmured, reflectively,
+as we entered the house, "I really believe you could work wonders with
+Adams. He would probably do the cooking and marketing--"
+
+"If you're so impressed," remarked Jessica, in incisive tones, "I
+wonder you don't yield to the prayers and tears of your editor man."
+
+My reply made Jessica sink into a hall chair which was fortunately at
+hand.
+
+"I am going to," I said, placidly. And I did.
+
+Jessica's nature being less womanly and yielding than mine, her
+surrender was a matter of longer time. In the interval I quite forgot
+her unimportant affairs, being wholly absorbed in the really
+extraordinary values of my own. Two weeks before the reopening of
+college, my reformed yellow journalist, who had come West to spend his
+brief vacation with me, was seated by my side one evening studying the
+admirable effect of a ring he had just placed on my finger. It is
+singular how fraught with human interest such moments can be, and
+Edward and I failed to hear Jessica as she opened the door. She looked
+over our heads as she spoke to me, Her face was rather red, but her
+voice and manner expressed a degree of indifference which I am
+convinced no human being has ever really felt on any subject.
+
+"Did you say that you could give me Mollie Adams's address?" asked
+Jessica.
+
+
+
+
+XI
+
+BART HARRINGTON, GENIUS
+
+
+The assistant Sunday editor of the New York "Searchlight" was busy.
+This was not an unusual condition, but it frequently included
+unusually irritating features. His superior, Wilson, the Sunday
+editor, was a gentleman with a high brow and a large salary, who,
+having won a reputation as "a Napoleon of Journalism," had
+successfully cultivated a distaste for what he called "details." His
+specialty was the making of suggestions in editorial council, in
+cheery expectation that they would be carried out by his associates--
+an expectation so rarely realized that Mr. Wilson's visage had almost
+a habit of hurt wonder. "Details" continued to absorb the activity of
+the Sunday "Searchlight" office, and Maxwell, the assistant editor,
+attended to them all, murmuring bitterly against his chief as he
+labored.
+
+On this special morning, moreover, he was receiving telephoned
+bulletins of the gradual disintegration of his biggest "special,"
+scheduled for the coming Sunday edition, which was to tell with
+sympathetic amplitude of a beautiful French maiden who had drowned
+herself because some young man no longer loved her. The active
+reporter assigned to the case had telephoned first his discovery that
+the girl never had a lover, but cheerily suggested that this explained
+her suicide as well as the earlier theory, and wasn't so hackneyed,
+sagely adding that he would get the story anyhow. Subsequently he had
+rung up the office to report, with no slight disgust, that there was
+no suicide to explain, as the girl was not dead. She had merely gone
+to visit friends in the country, and the people in the house, missing
+her, had decided that the peaceful waters of the Hudson--
+
+Maxwell hung up the receiver with a few crisp remarks addressed to
+space, and absorbed in awestruck silence by a young woman at the other
+end of the room who eased her type-writing labor by pausing to hear
+them fully. It was at this inauspicious moment that the card of Mr.
+Bart Harrington was brought in by an office boy. Maxwell surveyed it
+with strong disfavor.
+
+"Who is he?" he asked, regarding the office boy severely.
+
+The office boy avowed deprecatingly that he didn't know.
+
+"He 'ain't never been here before," he submitted, in extenuation. "He
+says he's got a Sunday story,"
+
+Maxwell resigned himself to the waste of five minutes of precious
+time.
+
+"Show 'm in," he commanded, testily. He sat down at his desk and
+turned toward the door an expression that reminded callers of the
+value of time and the brevity of life. Mr. Harrington, who had
+followed the boy through the door with conviction of these two things,
+dropped into a chair beside the editor's desk and surveyed Maxwell
+with a smile so young, so trustful, and withal so engaging, that
+unconsciously the stern features of that functionary relaxed.
+Nevertheless, he was not jarred out of his routine.
+
+"Got your story with you, Mr. Harrington?" he asked, briskly, holding
+out his hand for the manuscript. "If you'll leave it, I'll read--"
+Harrington interrupted him with an impressive shake of his head. Then
+he settled back in his chair, crossed one leg comfortably over the
+other, plunged his hands deep in the pockets of his very shabby
+overcoat, and continued to regard the editor with his singularly
+boyish, dimpling smile. With one swift glance Maxwell took him in,
+from the broken boot on the foot he was gently swinging to and fro to
+the thick, curly locks on his handsome head. He had a complexion like
+a girl's, a dimple in each cheek, and a jaw like a bull-dog's. He was
+all of six feet tall, and his badly made clothes could not wholly
+conceal the perfect lines of his figure. He was about twenty-two years
+old, Maxwell decided, and, notwithstanding his dimples, his
+complexion, his youth, and his smile, he conveyed a vivid impression
+of masculinity and strength. He was wholly self-possessed, and his
+manner suggested that the business which had brought him where he was
+was of such urgent value and importance that the busy world itself
+might well hush its noisy activities long enough to hear of it. To his
+own great surprise, Maxwell waited until his caller was prepared to
+speak.
+
+Harrington shook his head again slowly. Then he tapped his forehead
+with the second finger of his right hand.
+
+"I have it heah," he said, slowly, referring evidently to the brow he
+had indicated, and speaking with a slight drawl and the strongly
+marked accent of the Southern mountaineer. "I 'lowed I wouldn't write
+it till I knew you-all wanted it. I'd like to tell it. Then if--"
+
+Maxwell nodded, and glanced at his watch.
+
+"Fire away," he said, elegantly. "But be as quick as you can, please.
+This is closing day and every minute counts."
+
+Harrington smiled his ingenuous smile. It was a wistful smile--not a
+happy one--but it seemed, somehow, to illumine the office. Maxwell
+reflected irritably that there was something unusually likable about
+the fellow, but he wished he'd hurry up and get out. From force of
+habit his fingers grasped a blue pencil on his desk, and he began to
+fumble nervously among the manuscripts that lay before him. Harrington
+settled back more firmly in his chair, and the swinging of his torn
+boot was accelerated a trifle, but his voice when he spoke was full of
+quiet confidence.
+
+"It's a good thing, suh," he said, "and I can tell you-all about it in
+a sentence. I'm goin' to commit suicide to-day, an' I agree to write
+the experience foh you, up to the last minute, if you-all will have me
+buried decently. I don't cayah to be shovelled into the Pottah's
+Field."
+
+Maxwell dropped the blue pencil and wheeled to look at him. Then his
+face hardened.
+
+"It's a pretty bad joke," he said, "or a bum sort of bid for charity.
+In either case you can't waste any more of my--"
+
+But Harrington had sprung to his feet, his blond young face black with
+passion.
+
+"Damn you!" he hissed, thrusting his head down close to the other's
+and clinching his fists. "How dahe you-all say I lie o' ask charity?
+I'd see you-all in hell befoah I'd take a cent of youah damned money.
+'Ain't you got brains enough in youah haid to see that I've got to the
+end of mah rope?"
+
+Maxwell was a clever man, educated in the world's university. He knew
+truth when he met it, and he knew human nature.
+
+"Sit down," he said, quietly, "and tell me about it. I'm sorry I spoke
+as I did, but you must admit that your proposition was rather
+startling."
+
+Harrington sat down, still breathing hard in his excitement, but
+evidently making a resolute effort to control himself.
+
+"That's why I brought it heah," he said, answering the other's last
+words, "You-all like stahtlin' things, don't you? That's what you
+print. I'm offerin' you a straight bahgain, suh--a business
+proposition. If you-all don't want it, say so."
+
+Maxwell smiled in his turn, but there was nothing ironic in the smile,
+nor in the look he turned on his fellow-man.
+
+"It's not quite as simple as you seem to think," he explained, gently.
+"But tell me more about it. What led to this decision? What makes you
+think suicide is the only way out of your troubles? That's a part of
+the story, you know. Let me have that first, in a few words.
+
+"It can be told, suh, in three," said the Southerner. His smile had
+returned. His voice was the cool voice of one who discussed abstract
+things. "I'm a failyuh. This wold 'ain't no use foh failyuhs. I've
+given myself all the time and chances I dese'ved, but I cayn't win
+out, so I've got to _git_ out. The's no one to ca'e. I've no kin, no
+ons dependin' on me in any way. As foh me, I'm ti'ed; life ain't wuth
+the effo't."
+
+Maxwell regarded him.
+
+"You don't look like a quitter," he said, thoughtfully.
+
+The boy's face blazed again, but he kept his temper.
+
+"To quit means to give somethin' up," he said, doggedly. "I ain't
+givin' anythin' up. I 'ain't got anythin' to give up. Life without
+wo'k, o' interest, o' fren's, o' ambition, o' love--that ain't livin'!
+If you-all evah tried it, you'd know. I 'ain't been so chee'ful in
+yeahs as I've been sence I made up my mind to 'quit,' as you-all call
+it."
+
+"You've got health, haven't you?" demanded Maxwell. "Yes."
+
+Maxwell brought his hand down on the desk with an air of finality.
+
+"Then you've got everything. Do you mean to tell me that a fellow like
+you can't earn enough to support himself? If you do, you're talking
+rot."
+
+Harrington took this with his wide, guileless grin. He was not
+offended now, for he felt the friendly interest and sympathy under the
+other's words. His voice when he replied was gentler.
+
+"I ain't sayin' I can't keep body an' soul together, foh maybe I can,"
+he conceded. "But I'm sayin' _that_ ain't _life_. I'm sayin' I ain't
+been fitted fo' wo'k. I 'ain't been educated. I've lived in a log-
+cabin down in the Virginia mountains all man life. I left thah six
+weeks ago, after mah mother died. She was the last of ouah family but
+me. I 'ain't never been to school. She taught me to read in the Bible,
+an' to write. I 'ain't nevah read anotheh book except the Bible and
+Mistah Shakespeah's poems, an' Mistah Pluta'ch's _Lives of Great Men_.
+I know them by hea't. I don't know whe' she got them o' whe' she came
+from. She was different from othah mountain women. I've been No'th six
+weeks, and I've tried ha'd to find a place whah I could fit in, but
+th' ain't none. Men must be trained fuh wo'k; I ain't trained. I
+cayn't go back, foh the's no one thah, an' I hate the mountains."
+
+Maxwell's reply was brief and to the point.
+
+"Think you could learn to run our elevator without killing us all?" he
+inquired. "Well, you've got to. You've been talking awful guff, you
+know. Now you're going to work, right here. We need a new man. The one
+we have has been drunk three days. You're going to run the elevator
+and get fifteen dollars a week to begin with. Here's your first week's
+salary in advance. I'll arrange about the job with the superintendent.
+I'll give you some books, and you can educate yourself. When you're
+above elevator work we'll give you something better. You'll probably
+have my job inside of a year," he ended, jocosely.
+
+The hand of the mountaineer stretched out to him trembled as Maxwell
+grasped it.
+
+"You ah the only white man I've found in the No'th," said the
+Southerner, breathlessly. "I'll make good, as they say up heah. But I
+don't know how I can thank you."
+
+"Don't try," said Maxwell, brusquely. "Be here at eight in the
+morning. By nine there will be a few callers I may want you to throw
+down the shaft."
+
+Thus began the connection between the _Searchlight_ and Bart
+Harrington, subsequently its most popular employe. Before the week was
+over all the reporters and most of the editors had casually sought
+from Maxwell some details concerning his protege, but had received
+few. Harrington was a new man, and he came from the Virginia
+mountains, and was most obliging and altogether engaging. This was all
+the information acquired even by the indefatigable Miss Mollie Merk,
+whose success in extracting from individuals information it was their
+dearest desire to conceal had made her a star member of the
+_Searchlight's_ staff. It was to Miss Merk, however, that Harrington
+announced his first important discovery. Leaning across her desk one
+evening after his successor had taken the "car," the new elevator man
+touched a subject much upon his mind.
+
+"I got wet the othah day," he began, conversationally, "an' mah
+landlady let me go to the kitchen to dry mah clothes. I obse'ved as I
+sat by huh stove that the lid of the wash boilah kept liftin' up, all
+by itself, an' then I saw 'twas raised by the steam of the hot watah
+inside. I kep' thinkin' 'bout it, an' it seems to me thah's an idea
+thah, a soht of ene'gy, you know, that might be used in big ways. I
+mus' think it out."
+
+Mollie Merk looked at him, vague memories of one James Watts stirring
+uneasily in her brain.
+
+"There's a good deal written about steam," she said, sympathetically.
+"I'll bring you a book on it."
+
+She did, for Harrington was already high in her regard; and quite
+possibly the volume killed in that youth's aspiring soul the germ of a
+beautiful hope. But he was to the fore very soon with a discovery of
+equal weight. This time his confidant was Maxwell.
+
+"Why is it," he asked that busy citizen one evening, "that when I get
+in the bathtub the water rises highah? Ain't the' some principle the'
+that is impo'tant? As I think it ovah--"
+
+Maxwell hurriedly assured him that there was, and the volume on steam
+was followed by a treatise on specific gravity, which gave Mr.
+Harrington food for reflection for several days. Nevertheless, the
+discovery that others had been before him did not depress him in the
+least. He gave the Sunday editor an insight into his views on one
+occasion when that gentleman was able to convince him that Isaac
+Newton and not Bart Harrington had discovered the law of gravitation
+while watching an apple fall from a tree.
+
+"I obse'ved it, too, suh," argued Harrington, sturdily, defending his
+position as a scientific discoverer. "Of co'se I see the fo'ce of
+you'h rema'k that the othah man was _first_. That is unfo'tunate foh
+me. But does it affect the value of _my_ discovery? It does not, suh."
+
+"There's a good deal in it," Wilson conceded to Maxwell, after he had
+delightedly repeated this conversation. "Of course, the fellow has an
+unusual mind. It's a pity he's always a few hundred years behind the
+time, but, as he hints, that needn't dim our admiration for the
+quality of his brain fibre."
+
+Maxwell laughed uneasily.
+
+"I can't make up my mind," he admitted, in his turn, "whether he's a
+genius or a plain fool. He lost his dinner last night explaining to me
+how the power of Niagara could be applied to practical uses. He was
+horribly depressed when I told him it not only could be, but was. I
+let him talk, though, to see what his ideas were, and they were very
+practical."
+
+"I call that mighty encouraging," said the chief, optimistically.
+"He's getting down to modern times. After he has discovered the
+telephone and telegraph and cable and wireless telegraphy he may
+tackle telepathy and give us something new."
+
+But Harrington indulged in an unexplained digression at this point. He
+discovered literature and became acquainted with the works of one
+Charles Dickens, of whose genius he made himself the sounding trumpet-
+call for the ears of an indifferent world.
+
+"The's a book called _David Coppe'field_," he confided to Maxwell one
+night when he had lingered for a chat with his benefactor. "It's
+great, suh. You should read it sometime, Mistah Maxwell; you would
+appreciate its wo'th." He outlined the plot then and there, and
+Maxwell good-naturedly listened, finding his compensation in the
+enthusiast's original comments on character and situation. This,
+however, established a bad precedent, and Maxwell was subsequently
+obliged to hear a careful synopsis of _Little Dorrit, Old Curiosity
+Shop,_ and _Oliver Twist_, in quick succession, followed by the
+somewhat painful recitation of most of Gray's _Elegy in a Country
+Churchyard_--for Harrington was now entering the daisied field of
+poetry.
+
+It was at this point that Maxwell felt himself constrained to give his
+protege a few words of advice, the city editor having objected to an
+enforced hearing of the plot of _Ivanhoe_, and Mollie Merk having
+admitted that she had climbed six flights of stairs twice a day for a
+week in preference to hearing the final eighteen stanzas of _Paradise
+Lost_.
+
+Maxwell explained the situation to his friend as gently as he could
+one morning when Harrington had interrupted a talk between himself and
+a distinguished Western editor who was spending a few days in New
+York.
+
+"You see, old man," he ended, kindly, "this is a big, new world to
+you, but the rest of us have been living in it all our lives. We've
+taken in these things you're discovering--or we've had them driven
+into us at school. So--er--they're not new, and while we appreciate
+them we haven't got time to go over them all again. When you get up to
+modern fiction--the things people are reading to-day--"
+
+With one expressive gesture of the hand Mr. Harrington demolished
+modern fiction.
+
+"_I_ 'ain't got time foh that, Mistah Maxwell," he said, respectfully.
+"I read one, and I regret to say, suh, that it was too much. I have
+looked into othe's, but I go no fu'thah. I have tried to open to you
+gentlemen the great wo'ks I have discove'ed, an' youah reply is that
+you-all have read them, suh. I am surprised. Do you give one glance at
+a picture an' nevah look again? Do you listen once to music, o' must
+it be something new and mode'n ev'ry time? Last night I heard the
+composition of a musician named Beethoven, who, I have learned, has
+been dead foh yeahs. Yet people still listen to his notes. Why don't
+they read these books of Mistah Dickens and Mistah Scott and Mistah
+Shakespeah?"
+
+Maxwell murmured feebly that a few did. A fitting response to
+Harrington's arraignment somehow eluded him, and before he had found
+the words he wanted an unexpected interruption came from the Western
+editor, who had been listening to the conversation with almost painful
+interest.
+
+"Mr. Harrington," he asked, abruptly, "can you write?"
+
+Harrington looked surprised and boyishly injured.
+
+"Yes, suh," he replied, stiffly. "I can read and write."
+
+"Oh, of course, of course," explained the other, hastily. "I don't
+mean that. Can you write for the press? Have you tried to write
+anything for other people to read?"
+
+Harrington's characteristic smile flashed forth.
+
+"I have submitted sev'al ahticles to Mistah Maxwell," he said, with
+some dignity, "but thus far I have not been fo'tunate enough---"
+
+Maxwell drew a little package of manuscripts from a pigeon-hole in his
+desk and handed them to the visitor without a word. They spoke for
+themselves. The latter glanced through them, frowning. Maxwell
+returned to his work. Harrington waited. At last the Westerner handed
+the papers back to his Eastern colleague, shaking his head as he did
+so.
+
+"These won't do at all," he said, decidedly, "but they confirm my
+impression that this man can write something worth while." He
+addressed himself to Maxwell now, discussing Harrington as
+impersonally as if he were absent, but from time to time his keen eyes
+returned to the Southerner's face.
+
+"Here's a man," he began, didactically, "who is hundreds of years
+behind the times. But please remember that he would have been Watts,
+Newton, and several other discoverers if he had existed before them.
+He's as much of a pilgrim on this earth to-day as if he were a visitor
+from another planet. But he has an extraordinary type of mind and very
+good taste--a strong, ignorant, instinctive feeling for the best. If
+he would write a series of short articles giving his point of view to
+the busy men and women of to-day, they should be 'good stuff'--a sort
+of artistic voice crying in the commercial wilderness, don't you see.
+You or some one else may have to put them into shape, until he catches
+the idea, but he will catch it all right. He's clever enough. If you
+want to try him, and it turns out as I think it will, I'll buy the
+material for simultaneous publication in Chicago. What do you say?"
+
+"Agreed," said Maxwell, briefly. "I think you're right. We'll try it,
+anyhow. I guess we won't have much trouble persuading Harrington to
+favor us with the opportunity of examining his manuscript." He smiled
+as he glanced at the other. Harrington's eyes were shining. His words,
+when he spoke, came breathlessly.
+
+"I'll have the first copy ready in the mo'ning, Mistah Maxwell," he
+promised. "And I reckon," he added, straightening his splendid
+shoulders--"I reckon I'll give up the elevatah, suh."
+
+Maxwell laughed in high good-humor.
+
+"Oh yes," he agreed, "I guess we'll have to give you a successor
+there, in any event. However this experiment turns out, it's time you
+had something better than that."
+
+Harrington's first paper was signed "A Visitor from Mars," and Maxwell
+marvelled as he read it. It was not a great production, and it was
+full of small faults; but there was an indescribable naivete and charm
+about it to which its quaint, old-time style added the final touch.
+Harrington's studies of what he called "the olden masters" had not
+been in vain. Late the next evening, in the peace of his small Harlem
+flat, Maxwell submitted the manuscript to his wife for criticism. He
+passed it over without comment, desiring the unprejudiced opinion of
+the intelligent general reader, and Mrs. Maxwell read it twice, very
+carefully, before she handed it back. When she did there was a mist
+over her bright brown eyes.
+
+"The darling thing!" she cried. "Who wrote it, Bob? It's as clever as
+it can be, and yet there's something about it that makes me feel queer
+and choky. It's--it's"--her face brightened--"it's something like the
+feeling I had when little Bobbie wrote me his first letter, that time
+I went home to take care of mother. One almost expects to see the
+words staggering down one side of the page in dear little, crooked,
+printed letters. It's the manuscript of a grown-up, sophisticated
+baby."
+
+Maxwell took the copy from her, well pleased at this conjugal
+confirmation of his own impression.
+
+"It's Harrington's," he explained, "and he's not sophisticated enough
+to hurt anybody yet. But he's going to make a success of this job--
+there's no doubt of that. I'll ask him to come up to dinner to-morrow
+night and go over the stuff with me a bit. I don't want to do it in
+the office."
+
+The Western editor was equally enthusiastic the following day. He was
+also glowing pleasantly in the confirmation of his own keenness of
+intuition.
+
+"You wouldn't have seen what you had here," he explained to Maxwell,
+unnecessarily. "This is pretty much like genius. This fellow will be
+writing his autobiography some day, and perhaps he'll remember his
+humble discoverers. Meantime, don't you spoil his work by trying to
+edit it. Let it alone. It's all right."
+
+The column of "The Visitor from Mars" grew to two columns, and became
+a strong feature of the Sunday _Searchlight_. Harrington, now in
+possession of a fair weekly income and unlimited leisure, bought new
+clothes, rented a sitting-room, bedroom, and bath in a comfortable
+bachelor apartment-house, and spent his days browsing in libraries,
+where he read omnivorously. Incidentally, he discovered not only the
+telephone, telegraph, and other inventions predicted by the Sunday
+editor, but a locomotive fire-box which had received some favor among
+railroad officials for ten years, and a superb weapon of destruction
+which had been used in the Japanese army for six.
+
+"He's getting on!" cried Wilson, delightedly, when Maxwell recounted
+these small disappointments in an otherwise inspiring onward career.
+"He's learned to dress like a gentleman, speak like a gentleman, and
+look like a gentleman, and he has also learned that there have been a
+few active minds in the world before his came. Give him time. He'll do
+something big yet."
+
+Harrington promptly verified this prediction by falling in love, which
+he did on a scale and with an abandon unprecedented in the history of
+Park Row. It was a tempestuous upheaval for the emotional Southerner,
+and every other interest in his life retired to the remotest
+background and remained there, unseen and unsuspected. His choice fell
+on a woman reporter of the _Searchlight_, a quiet, refined young girl,
+whose journalistic activities were confined to reports of meetings of
+women's clubs and the descriptions of other social events. For her
+Bart Harrington commanded the morning stars to sing together, and
+dared the dazzled sun to look upon her like. To him she was Laura,
+Beatrice, Juliet, Francesca--the essence of all the loves of all the
+ages in one perfect form. During their brief engagement he called for
+her in a cab each morning, and drove her to her home each night. He
+would have laid a carpet of flowers for her from the office to the
+curb had it been practicable. Also, he discovered Keats and Shelley
+and Byron and Swinburne, and quoted them until the office boys, who
+alone remained to listen to him, demanded that increase of salary
+justly attached to increased nervous strain. Swinburne, Harrington
+promptly decided, he did not like. There was an earthiness in his
+verse, he explained to Maxwell, a material side, wholly lacking in the
+love of the right man for the right woman--in other words, in his own
+love for Miss Evans. He wrote a column about this kind of love in his
+Mars department, and a hundred thousand men read it with gurgles of
+warm appreciation and quoted it at dinner the next night. Then he
+married Miss Evans and became interested in the price of coal and
+other household supplies. His absorption in these topics was almost
+feverish. He talked about them morning, noon, and night. His interest
+in literature flickered and died out. To Maxwell, his first and still
+his best friend, he finally confided his dilemma.
+
+"You see, old man," he began, one morning about six months after the
+wedding, "we've discovered, Clara and I, that the least we can live on
+in New York is fifty dollahs a week. And you see I'm only getting
+forty. It's serious, isn't it? But Clara says that if we buy all ouah
+canned goods at Lacy's---"
+
+Maxwell stopped him with a gesture of desperation.
+
+"Harrington, if you say another word I shall go crazy," he announced,
+with the calmness of despair. "We'll give you fifty dollars a week.
+Now consider that settled, and for God's sake get your mind off it. If
+you don't look out you'll be writing about coal and canned goods in
+your Mars column. What are you going to write this week, anyhow?" he
+demanded, with sudden suspicion.
+
+Harrington looked guilty.
+
+"I thought I'd say something about how prices have advanced," he
+faltered. "Clara says that two yeahs ago--" But Maxwell had taken him
+by the shoulders.
+
+"No, you don't!" he shouted, fiercely. "You'll keep on writing about
+literature and life and lily-pads and love--that's what you'll do. If
+you don't, you'll lose your job. Don't you dare to introduce a single-
+dollar sign or canned tomato into those columns," he added, warningly,
+as he returned to his work.
+
+Harrington's look of reproach as he went out haunted him for days--so
+long, in fact, that he bore with extraordinary patience a confidence
+that gentleman favored him with several months later. He came to the
+office one morning wearing an expression oddly combined of pride and
+shame, in which first one and then the other predominated. For a long
+time he discussed apartments and janitors and domestic supplies, and
+Maxwell humored him. Then he said:
+
+"I've been an awful ass, Maxwell, but that's no reason why I should
+keep on being one, is it? I've got to tell you something impo'tant,
+and I'm going to do it now. I can't write any more about literatuah of
+the past and lily-pads of the present, as you would say. Who ca'es
+about 'em? _I_ don't. The wo'ld to-day is interested in the life of
+to-day. Men think about theah wo'k and theah incomes and theah homes
+and theah wives and theah children, and that's _all_ they think about.
+And women think about men, and that's all _they_ think about. And heah
+I'm writing all the time about literatuah--literatuah." He turned the
+word over in his mouth and ejected it with supreme contempt.
+
+As once before, Maxwell was silent in the presence of simple truth. He
+rallied, however, and voiced a protest.
+
+"I suppose you haven't lost interest in earning your living," he
+suggested, ironically. "How do you intend to do that if you give up
+this job?"
+
+Harrington flushed a little, and cleared his throat nervously before
+he spoke. Then he drew a paper from his pocket, and as his fingers
+touched it his face cleared and happy pride beamed from him.
+
+"I've got something else," he said, simply. "I waited to see how it
+would tu'n out befoah I told you. It's quite a story. You see," he
+went on expansively, settling back in his chair, and swinging his foot
+with the characteristic swing of the boy of two years before--"you
+see, Clara needed a hat-pin, the kind that would stay in and keep a
+hat _on_. None of them do, Clara said. So I made one foh huh, and
+Clara's brothah saw it and thought it was a good thing. He's a lawyer,
+you know. He showed it to some man with money, and they took it up and
+we patented it, and now we've got a facto'y and we're selling it.
+It's--it's making lots of money." He turned an apologetic eye on his
+friend and continued, more firmly: "They gave me twenty thousand
+dollahs down and twenty pe' cent, of the stock, and a block of stock
+foh you, because I insisted on that. I want you in on my luck. Heah it
+is. E.W. Hubbard is the chief backah, and he says this is wuth ten
+thousand dollahs. He says every woman in Ame'ica will be wearing one
+of ouah hat-pins this time next yeah."
+
+He laid the certificate on the table as he spoke, and for a moment
+Maxwell sat staring at it, speechless. He knew Hubbard--a rich, shrewd
+financier, and no leader of forlorn-hopes. If Hubbard was in the thing
+the thing was all right. But a _hat-pin_! Maxwell looked at the
+certificate and thought of the hat-pin, and reviewed the Harrington of
+the past two years, and felt a horrible desire to laugh and to cry.
+Then he pushed the paper toward the inventor.
+
+"It's awfully good of you, old man," he said, huskily. "But of course
+I can't take this. There's no reason why you should give me ten
+thousand dollars, you know."
+
+Harrington laughed--a queer little laugh.
+
+"Ain't they a reason?" he asked, lapsing in his earnestness into the
+careless grammar he had almost overcome. "Well, I guess I know moah
+than any one else 'bout _that_. Do you remembah the fifteen dollahs
+you lent me the day I came heah? Well, suh, I was sta'ving. I hadn't
+eaten fo' two days, an' I couldn't get wo'k, an' I couldn't beg.
+That's why I meant to kill myself. That money saved me. Now heah's
+this thing. It ain't money. It's an _idea_. It's an idea out of my
+haid, an' that haid wouldn't be heah at all if it wasn't fo' you.
+You've given me mah chance. What I've done ain't much, but it's
+brought results, and results ah the things that count. So we'll just
+call it interest, if you don't mind. I think it's goin' to be wuth
+while. An' you know," he added, almost timidly, "we ah friends--ahn't
+we, you and I?"
+
+Maxwell wrung his hand. Then he picked up the certificate, folded it,
+and put it carefully into his pocket.
+
+"Thanks, old man," he said, quietly. "It's the biggest thing that's
+ever come my way, and I'll take it--from my friend."
+
+Later, when Harrington had taken his jubilant departure, Maxwell
+related the incident to his chief. Wilson listened with flattering
+attention. At the end he nodded sympathetically.
+
+"He's all right," he said, "and you needn't worry about him. He's got
+one quality left that sets him far enough apart from the rabble of to-
+day." He looked keenly at the young man as he added, suddenly: "Of all
+the fellows you've ever helped, Maxwell--and I know you've helped a
+lot in one way or another--has any one of them before to-day ever
+shown you any gratitude?"
+
+Maxwell shook his head. "Don't remember any," he admitted. "But I
+didn't expect any, and don't want any."
+
+"And you don't get it," ended the older man, with a sigh. "It's the
+rarest thing in life. So make the most of it this time, my boy. One
+doesn't often meet a visitor from Mars!"
+
+THE END
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Many Kingdoms, by Elizabeth Jordan
+
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