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diff --git a/old/67856-0.txt b/old/67856-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 67a0f2d..0000000 --- a/old/67856-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,13588 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg eBook of Eris, by Robert W. Chambers - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you -will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before -using this eBook. - -Title: Eris - -Author: Robert W. Chambers - -Release Date: April 16, 2022 [eBook #67856] - -Language: English - -Produced by: Susan Skinner, David E. Brown, and the Online Distributed - Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This book was - produced from images made available by the HathiTrust - Digital Library.) - -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ERIS *** - - - - - - ERIS - - BY - ROBERT W. CHAMBERS - - AUTHOR OF “THE FLAMING JEWEL,” “THE LITTLE RED - FOOT,” “THE SLAYER OF SOULS,” “IN SECRET,” - “THE COMMON LAW,” ETC. - - NEW YORK - GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY - - - - - COPYRIGHT, 1922, - BY GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY - - [Illustration] - - ERIS. I - - PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA - - - - - TO - MY FRIEND - HARRY PAYNE BURTON - - - - -ERIS - - - - -ERIS - - - - -CHAPTER I - - -The baby was born at Whitewater Farms about nine in the morning, April -19, 1900. Two pure-breed calves,--one a heifer, the other a bull,--were -dropped the same day at nearly the same hour. - -Odell came in toward noon, heard these farm items from his foreman, Ed -Lister. - -For twenty years Odell’s marriage had been childless. He had waited in -vain for a son,--for several sons,--and now, after twenty sterile years -of hardship, drudgery, and domestic discord, Fanny had given him a girl. - -He stood in silence, chewing the bitter news. - -“Awright,” he said, “that’s _that_! Is Queen doin’ good?” - -Whitewater Queen was doing as well as could be expected and her fourth -heifer-calf was a miracle of Guernsey beauty. - -“Awright! Veal that danged bull-caaf. That’s White Chief’s second bull -outa White Rose. I’m done. We’ll take her to Hilltop Acres next time. -And that’s that!” - -He dusted the fertiliser and land plaster from his patched canvas -jacket: - -“It blowed some,” he said. “I oughta waited. Cost me five dollars, -mebbe. I thought it might rain; that’s why. It’s one dum thing after -another. It allus comes like that.” - -He scraped the bottom of his crusted boots against the concrete rim of -the manure pit. - -A bitter winter with practically no snow; dry swamps; an April drouth; -a disastrous run of bull-calves with no market,--and now, after twenty -years, a girl baby! - -How was a man going to get ahead? How was he to break even? Twenty -years Odell had waited for sons to help him. He should have had three -or four at work by this time. Instead he was paying wages. - -“I guess Fanny’s kinda bad,” remarked the foreman. - -Odell looked up from his brooding study of the manure. - -“I dunno,” continued the foreman; “another Doc is here, too. He come -with a train nurse n’hour ago. Looks kinda bad to me, Elmer.” - -Odell gazed stupidly at Lister. - -“What other Doc?” he demanded. - -“Old Doc Benson. Doc Wand sent Mazie for him.” - -Odell said nothing. After a moment or two he walked slowly toward the -house. - -In the kitchen a neighbour, one Susan Hagan, a gross widow, was -waddling around getting dinner, perspiring and garrulous. Two or three -farm hands, in bantering conversation, stood washing or drying their -faces at the sink. - -Mazie, the big, buxom daughter of Ed Lister, moved leisurely about, -setting the table. She was laughing, as usual, at the men’s repartee. - -But when Odell appeared the clatter of the roller-towel ceased. So did -Mazie’s laughter and the hired men’s banter. - -Mrs. Hagan was the first to recover her tongue: - -“Now, Elmer,” she began in unctuous tones, “you set right down here and -eat a mite o’ ham----” She already had him by the sleeve of his canvas -jacket. She grasped a smoking fry-pan in the other hand. The smoke from -it blew into Odell’s face. - -“Leggo,” he grunted, jerking his arm free. - -Mrs. Hagan encountered Mazie’s slanting black eyes, narrow with -derision: - -“Elmer don’t want to eat; he wants to see Fanny,” said Mazie Lister. -And added: “Your ham’s burning, Mrs. Hagan.” - -“Where’s Doc Wand?” demanded Odell heavily. - -Mrs. Hagan savagely snatched the answer from Mazie’s red lips: - -“Oh, Elmer,” she burst out, “he’s went and called in old Doc Benson; -and Benson he fetched a train nurse from Summit----” Smoke from the -burning ham strangled her. Odell left her coughing, and strode toward -the sitting room. - -“Dang it!” he muttered, “what next!” - -It was cool and dusky in the sitting room. He halted in the golden -gloom, sullenly apprehensive, listening for any sound from the bed-room -overhead. - -After a little while Dr. Wand came downstairs. He was haggard and -white, but when he caught sight of Odell he went to him with a smile. -The village folk feared and trusted Dr. Wand. They feared his sarcasm -and trusted his skill. But, with the self-assertion of inferiority, -they all called him “Fred” or “Doc.” - -“Well, Elmer,” he said, “the baby’s doing nicely.... I thought I’d like -to have Dr. Benson look at Fanny.... A fine baby, Elmer.... Fanny asked -me to think up some uncommon and pretty name for your little girl----” - -“Name her anything,” said Odell thickly.... “Dang it, I waited twenty -years for a boy. And now look what I get! It all comes to once. White -Rose drops me a bull-caaf, too. But I can veal _that_!” - -“Better luck next time----” - -“No,” he interrupted fiercely, “I’m done!” He turned and stared at the -sun-bars on the lowered shade, his tanned features working. - -“It’s like the herd,” he said. “Either the cow or the herd-bull’s to -blame for every dinged bull-caaf. And I can’t afford to breed ’em -together more’n twice.... Twenty years I been lookin’ for a boy, Doc. -No, I’m done. And that’s that!” - -“You’d better go and eat,” suggested the doctor. - -Odell nodded: “Fanny awright?” - -“We’re watching her. Perhaps you’d better stay around this afternoon, -Elmer----” - -“I gotta spread manure----” - -“I want you within calling distance,” repeated the doctor mildly. - -Odell looked up. After a moment’s hesitation: - -“Awright, Doc. I guess I can work around nearby. You must be dead-beat. -Eat a snack with us?” - -“Not now. I can’t leave your wife.” - -“Do you mean that Fanny’s kinda bad?” - -“Yes.... Your wife is very, very ill, Elmer. Dr. Benson is with her -now.” - - * * * * * - -Breaking ground for a new kitchen garden that afternoon, Odell found -the soil so infested with quack-root, horse-radish, and parsnip that he -gave it up and told Lister that they’d fence the place as cheaply as -possible and turn the hogs on it. - -Lister hooked up a horse and drove away to hunt for locust posts and -wire. Odell dragged his plow to the wagon shed, stabled the fat gray -horse, walked slowly back toward the wood shed. There was a dead apple -tree he could fell while waiting. - -It was very still there in the April sunshine. All signs of rain were -gone. The wind had died out. Save for the hum of bees in crocus and -snow-drop, and except for the white cock’s clarion from the runs, no -sound broke the blue silence of an April afternoon. - -Odell looked up at the window of his wife’s bed-room. The white-capped -nurse was seated there, her head turned as though intent upon something -taking place within the room. She did not stir. After a while Odell -picked up his spading fork and wiped the tines. - -Yes, every kind of bad luck was coming at once; drouth, bull-calves, -wind to waste fertiliser, doctors’ bills, expenses for a nurse, for -Mrs. Hagan, for posts and wire,--and the land riddled with quack and -horse-radish.... - -He’d about broken even, so far, during the last twenty years. All these -years he’d marked time, doggedly, plugging away. Because, after all, -there had been nothing else to do. He could not stop. To sell meant -merely to begin again somewhere else, plug away, break about even year -after year, die plugging. That was what general farming meant in White -Hills when there were wages to pay. He could have made money with sons -to help him.... Life was a tread-mill. What his cattle took from the -land they gave back; nothing more. He was tired of the tread-mill. A -squirrel in a cage travelled no further and got as far.... - -Odell drove his spading fork into the ground, sifted out fragments of -horse-radish roots, kicked them under the fence into the dusty road -beyond. - -Dr. Wand’s roadster stood out there by the front gate. Behind it waited -Dr. Benson’s driver in the new limousine car. Odell had not felt -he could afford any kind of car,--not even a tractor. These danged -doctors.... - -As he stood with one foot resting on his spading fork, gazing gloomily -at the two cars, Dr. Benson, fat, ruddy and seventy, came out of the -house with his satchel. - -He nodded to Odell: - -“Dr. Wand wants you,” he said. “She’s conscious.” - -After the portly physician had driven away down the dusty road, Odell -went into the house and ascended the stairs to the common bed-room from -which now, in all probability, he was to be excluded for a while. - -Dr. Wand, beside the bed, very tired, motioned Odell to draw nearer. It -was the ghost of his wife he saw lying there. - -“Well,” he grunted with an effort, “you don’t feel very spry, I guess. -You look kinda peekid, Fan.” - -All the stored resentment of twenty barren years glittered in his -wife’s sunken eyes. She knew his desire for sons. She knew what he now -thought of her. - -She said in a distinct voice to Dr. Wand: “Tell him.” - -The doctor said: “Your wife has asked me to think up some new and -unusual name for the baby. I suggested ‘Eris,’” he added blandly. And, -after a silence: “Your wife seems to like the name.” - -Odell nodded: “Awright.” - -His wife said to the doctor, in her painfully distinct voice: “I want -she should have a name that no other baby’s got.... Because--that’s all -I can give her.... Something no other baby’s got.... Write it, Doctor.” - -Dr. Ward wrote “Eris” on the birth certificate. His expression became -slightly ironical. - -“Eris,” he repeated. “Do you both approve this name?” - -Odell shrugged assent. - -“Yes,” said the woman. “She’s mine. All I can give her is this name. -_I_ give it.” - -“Eris was the name of a Greek goddess,” remarked the doctor. He did -not explain that Eris was the goddess of Discord. “I’m very sure,” he -added, “that no other baby is named Eris.... But plenty of ’em ought to -be.... Was there anything you wanted to say to your wife, Elmer?” - -“Hey?” demanded Odell, stupidly. - -Suddenly something in the physician’s eyes sent a dull shock through -Odell. He turned and stared at his wife as though he had never before -laid eyes on her. After a while he found his voice: - -“You--you’ll get better after a spell,” he stammered. “Feel like eatin’ -a mite o’ sunthin’ tasty? You want I should get you a little jell -’rsunthin’--Fanny----” - -Her bright, sunken gaze checked him. - -“You ain’t asked to see the baby,” she said in her thin, measured -voice; “I’m sorry I ever bore a child to you, Elmer.” - -Odell reddened: “Where is it----?” He stumbled up from his chair, -looking vaguely about him, confused by her brilliant eyes--by their -measureless resentment. - -For life was becoming too brief for pretence now. Fanny knew it; her -husband began to realise it. - -She said: “I’m _glad_ I have no sons. I’m sorry I bore a child.... -God forgive me.... Because I’ll never rest, never be quiet, now.... -But I don’t mind so much ... if THEY will let me keep an eye on her -somehow----” She tried to lift her head from the pillow: “I want to see -her,” she said sharply. - -“Yes,” said the doctor. “I want you to see her. Wait a moment----” - -As he passed Odell he drew him outside. “Go downstairs,” he whispered. -“I’ll call you if she asks to see you again.” - -“She ain’t a-goin’ to get no better?” demanded Odell hoarsely. - -“No.” - -The physician passed on into the adjoining room, where the nurse sat -watching a new-born baby in its brand new cradle. - -Odell continued down the stairs, and seated himself in the dim sitting -room.... - -Everything was coming at once--drouth, wind, bull-calves, girl -babies--and Death.... All were coming at once.... But no sons had ever -come. None would ever come now. So--wages must go on.... A woman to -mind the baby.... And somebody to keep house for him.... Expense piling -on expense. And no outlook--no longer any chance to break even.... -Where was he to get more money? He could not carry the farm on his own -shoulders all alone. The more work planned, the more men needed; and -the more it all cost. Increased acreage, redoubled production, got him -no further. Always it was, at best, merely an even break--every loss -offsetting every gain.... - -One of the cats came in with a barn rat hanging from her mouth, looked -furtively at Odell, then slunk out, tail twitching. - -The man dropped his elbows on the centre table and took his unshaven -face between both scarred fists.... - -The room had grown as still as death now. Which was fitting and proper. - -After a long while Dr. Wand descended the stairs. Odell stood up in the -semi-dusk of the sitting room. - -“She didn’t ask for you again,” said the doctor. - -“Is--is she--gone?” - -“Yes.... Quite painlessly.” - -They walked slowly to the porch. It was nearly milking time. The herd -was coming up the long lane,--the sun dipping low behind,--and a -delicate rosy light over everything. - -“You got your milking to do,” said the doctor. “I’ll notify Wilbur -Chase. I’ll see to everything, Elmer.” - -Wilbur Chase was the local undertaker. The doctor went out to the road, -cranked his car, got in wearily, and rolled away toward the village. - -Odell stood motionless. In his ears sounded the cow-bells, tonk-a-tonk, -tonk-a-tonk, as the Whitewater herd turned leisurely into the -barn-yard. Ed Lister opened the sliding doors to the cow-barn. A frisky -heifer or two balked; otherwise the herd went in soberly, filing away -behind spotless, sweet-smelling rows of stalls, greeted thunderously by -the great herd-bull from his steel bull-pen. - -Odell, heavy-eyed, turned on his heel and went upstairs. - -But at the door of the silent room above the nurse barred his way. - -“I’ll let you know when you can see her,” she said. “She isn’t ready.” - -Odell gazed at her in a bewildered way. - -“The baby is in the other room,” added the nurse. “Don’t wake her. -Better not touch her.” - -He went, obediently, stood in the doorway, his scarred hands hanging. - -Eris lay asleep in her brand new cradle, almost invisible under the -white fabrics that swathed her. - -The chamber of death was no stiller than this dim room where life was -beginning. There was no sound, no light except a long, rosy ray from -the setting sun falling athwart the cradle. - -So slept Eris, daughter of discord, and so named,--an unwelcome baby -born late in her parents’ lives, and opening her blind, bluish eyes -like an April wind-flower in a world still numb from winter. - -Odell stared at the mound of covers. - -It would be a long while before this baby could be of any use at -Whitewater Farms. - - - - -CHAPTER II - - -It is a long lane that has no turning, either for cattle or for men. - -When Fanny died Odell was forty. Two months later he married the -strapping daughter of Ed Lister. And came to the turn in the long, long -lane he had travelled for twenty years. - -For, as Whitewater Queen was a breeder of heifer-calves, Mazie Lister -proved to be a breeder of men. - -Every year, for the first four years, she gave Odell a son. - -There was no fuss made about these events. Mazie Lister was the kind of -girl who could eat cabbage for breakfast, wad it down with pie, drive -it deeper with a quart of buttermilk. - -Once, to prove she could do it, she ate a whole roast sucking pig, five -boiled potatoes, six ears of corn, a dish of cranberry sauce, and an -entire apple pie; and washed it down with three quarts of new cider. - -Her feed never fattened her; it seemed to make her skin pinker, teeth -whiter, long, slanting black eyes more brilliant. - -No cares worried her. She laughed a great deal. She was busy from dawn -to dark. Unfatigued but sleepy, she yawned frightfully toward nine -o’clock. It was her time to roost. - -Mazie’s instincts concerning progeny were simple. She nursed each -arrival as long as necessary, then weaned it. Then the youngster had to -learn to shift for himself--wash and dress, turn up at meal hours, turn -in with the chickens, rise with the crows. - -It was a little different, however, with Eris, whom Mazie had -inherited. Eris, of course, was bottle-fed. Whitewater Queen’s -heifer-calf, White Princess, had no better care. Whatever was advisable -was completely and thoroughly done in both cases. - -White Princess grew to beautiful Guernsey symmetry, with every promise -of conformation to classic type; and was duly registered. Little Eris, -small boned, with delicately fashioned limbs, looked out on the world -from a pair of crystal-blue, baby eyes, which ultimately became a deep, -limpid grey. - -Unlike White Princess, Eris did not promise to conform to the Odell -type. There seemed to be little of that breed about her. Fanny had -been bony and shiny-skinned, with a high-bridged, pinkish nose, watery -eyes--a wisp of a woman with a rodent’s teeth and every articulation -apparent as a ridge under a dry, tightly stretched epidermis. - -Odell, with his even, white teeth, coarse, highly-coloured skin and -brown eyes, was a compact, stocky, heavy-handed, broad-footed product -of Scotch-Irish pioneer stock. But Fanny’s grandmother, a Louisiana -Creole, had run away from school to go on the stage, and had married a -handsome but dissolute Southern planter who died of drink. - -Sundays Fanny used to wear her grandmother’s portrait painted in -miniature on ivory, as a breast-pin. - -“Hand-painted,” she used to explain. And always added: “Creoles are -all white.” Which was true. But, when quarrelling with his wife, Odell -pretended to believe otherwise. - - * * * * * - -Rummaging through Fanny’s effects a day or two after her marriage, -Mazie discovered a painted fan, a mother-of-pearl card-case, and this -breast-pin. She carried the miniature to Odell. - -“Looks like baby,” she explained, with her care-free laugh. - -“She’ll be lucky if she favours that pitcher,” said Odell. “But like -as not she’ll take after Fanny.” He was wrong in his guess. - -When Eris was five her resemblance to the miniature had become marked. -And Mazie’s boys looked like their mother and father. - -On Saturday nights, after immersing her own unwilling brunette brats -in the weekly bath, Mazie found the slim white body of little Eris an -ever-increasing amusement and a pique to her curiosity. The child’s -frail yet healthy symmetry, the fine skin, delicate, perfect limbs, -lovely little hands and feet, remained perennial sources of mirth and -surprise to this robust young woman who was equally healthy, but built -on a big, colourful, vigorous plan. - -Solid and large of limb and haunch, deep-bosomed, ruddy-skinned, the -young stepmother always bred true to type. Her sons were sons of the -soil from birth. There could be no doubt about her offspring. What -wasn’t Lister was Odell. They belonged to the land. - -But when Mazie looked at her husband and looked at the child, Eris--and -when she remembered Fanny--then she wondered and was inclined to smile. -And she was content that her sons’ thick, sturdy bodies and slanting, -black eyes so plainly advertised the stock they came from. Utility. -Health. Strength. - -Fanny had had a pink nose. Even a Guernsey ought to have one. But the -nose of Eris was snow white. To what stock did this child throw back? - -When Eris was seven she was sent to the village school, leading her -eldest stepbrother thither by the hand. Both were scared and tearful. -Nobody went with little Eris to mitigate the ordeal; and she was a most -sensitive child. - - * * * * * - -Hers had been a deathless curiosity since she was old enough to ask -her first question. An unquenchable desire for information seemed to -possess her. Her eternal, “Will you tell me why?” became a nuisance. - -“Dang it, send her to school!” shouted Odell at last. And that was how. - -At her small desk, rigid, bewildered, terribly intent on the first -teacher in human form she had ever gazed upon, she found herself on the -verge of tears. But, before she could dissolve, her brother forestalled -her, bursting into vigorous yells, bawling like a calf; and would not -be comforted. Which allowed Eris no time for private grief while wiping -his eyes with her pinafore. - -Noonday recess and lunch baskets and the wildly gyrating horde of -children let loose on a sandy playground ended the first encounter -between Eris Odell and the great god Education in His Local Temple at -White Hills Village. - - * * * * * - -Eris learned little in school. There is little to learn in American -schools. No nation is more illiterate. And in the sort of school she -went to the ignorant are taught by the half educated. - -None of her teachers could speak English as it should be spoken. In -their limited vocabulary there was no room for choice of words. Perhaps -that was why negatives were doubled now and then. - -As for the rest, she was stuffed with falsified history and unessential -geographical items; she was taught to read after a fashion, and to -spell, and to juggle figures. There was a nature class, too, full of -misinformation. And once an owlish, elderly man lectured on physiology; -and told them in a low and solemn voice that “there is two sects in the -phenonemy of natur, and little boys are made diffrunt to little girls.” - -That ended the lecture, leaving every little boy and little girl mad -with unsatisfied curiosity, and some of the older children slightly -uncomfortable. - -But The Great American Ass dominates this splendid land of ours. He -_knows_. He’ll tell the world. And that’s that--as Odell was accustomed -to say. And early in her career little Eris caught the cant phrase -of finality from her father, and incorporated it with her increasing -lingual equipment. - -When one of the boys tried to kiss her, she kicked his shins. “And -that’s _that_!” she added breathlessly, smoothing out her rumpled -pinafore. - - * * * * * - -In Mazie she had a stepmother who made no difference between Eris and -her own progeny. She kissed them all alike at bedtime; dosed them when -necessary, comforted their sorrows with stock reassurances from a -limited vocabulary, darned, sewed, mended, washed for all alike. - -Mazie gave her children and her husband all she had time to give--all -she had the capacity to give--the kindly, cheerful offices and -understanding of a healthy female. - -Whitewater Queen was as good a mother. Both lacked imagination. But -Whitewater Queen didn’t need any. - -For a time, however, the knowledge imbibed at school nourished Eris, -although there were few vitamines in the feed. - -When she was thirteen her brothers--twelve, eleven, ten and -nine--alternately bullied her, deferred to her, or ran bawling to her -with their troubles. - -When she was fourteen the world met its own weird at Armageddon. -The old order of things began to change. A new earth and a newly -interpreted Heaven replaced the “former things” which had “passed away.” - -At eighteen Eris looked out over the smoking débris of “former -things”--gazed out of limpid grey eyes upon “a new Heaven and a new -Earth”; and saw the cloudy, gigantic spectre of all-that-had-once-been -receding, dissolving, vanishing from the world where it had reigned so -tyrannically and so long. - - * * * * * - -About that time she dreamed, for the first time, that dream which so -often re-occurred in after years--that she stood at her open window, -naked, winged, restless for flight to some tremendous height where -dwelt the aged god of Wisdom all alone, cutting open a human heart that -was still faintly pulsating. - -At eighteen--the year the world war was ended--Eris “graduated.” - -She wrote a little act for herself, designed her own costume, made -it, acted, sang, and danced the part. It was the story of a poor girl -who prays for two things--a pair of wings so that she may fly to the -moon, and a new hat for the journey. Suddenly she discovers a new hat -in her hands. The next instant two beautiful little wings sprout on -her shoulders. Instantly she takes scissors and snips off the wings -and trims her new hat with them. Ready for her journey, suddenly she -realises that now she cannot fly. She tears the wings from the hat. Too -late. She can’t fasten them to her shoulders again. They flutter to her -feet. She falls on her knees in a passion of tears. The moon rises, -grinning. - -It was a vast success--this little act of Eris Odell--and while its -subtler intent was quite lost on the honest folk of White Hills -Village, the story itself was so obvious and Eris did it so prettily -that even her father grunted approval. - -That evening he promised her the next heifer-calf for her own. If it -proved a good one the sale of it should provide a nice nest-egg for -Eris when she married. - - * * * * * - -The next heifer-calf promised well. Eris named her White Iris and she -was so registered. - -In the yearling pure-breeds she was first at the Comity Fair. But Eris -refused to sell. At the State Fair White Iris beat every Guernsey and -every other heifer, pure-breed and grade. - -Brookvale Manor offered her three thousand dollars. Odell made her take -it, and put the money into the local bank. So, with tears blinding her -grey eyes, Eris sold White Iris out of the county. And would not be -comforted even by the brand new cheque-book sent to her by the cashier -of the White Hills Bank. - -The account, however, was in her father’s name. - - * * * * * - -Now, the horizon of Eris Odell had narrowed as her sphere of activity -dwindled after graduation. - -Whitewater Farms became her world. Within its confines lay her duties -and diversions, both clearly defined. - -They were her heritage. No loop-holes offered escape--excepting -marriage. And that way out was merely the way in to another and -similar prison the boundary of which was a barbed wire fence, and its -mathematical centre a manure pit. - - * * * * * - -She continued to dream of wings. An immense, indefinable longing -possessed her in waking hours. But she was only one of the youthful, -excited millions, waking after æons to the first instincts that had -ruled the human race. - -It was the restlessness of the world’s youth that stirred her--Modern -Youth opening millions of clear young eyes to gaze upon the wonders of -a new Heaven and a new earth, and mad to explore it all from zenith to -depths--sky, sea, land, and the waters under the earth. Youth, suddenly -crazed by an overwhelming desire for Truth, after æons and æons of lies. - -Explore, venture, achieve, live--demand Truth, exact it, face it, and -_know_!--the mighty, voiceless cry of the World’s Youth--claiming -freedom to seek, liberty to live, fearless, untrammelled, triumphant. -A terrible indictment of Age, and of those age-governed æons which -forever have passed away. - -Already the older, duller generation caught the vast vibration of young -hearts beating to arms, young voices swelling the tremulous, universal -cry of insurgence, a clear, ceaseless, sea-like sound of laughter -proclaiming the death of Sham--ringing an endless, silvery requiem. - - * * * * * - -Odell shoved up his spectacles and lowered the newspaper to glance at -Eris. - -“What say?” he repeated fretfully. - -“I’d like to study dancing.” - -“Can’t you dance? You go to enough socials and showers ’n’one thing -’n’other.” - -“I mean--stage dancing.” - -“Stage!” he thundered. “Be you crazy?” - -“Why, Eris, how you talk!” said her stepmother, too astounded to laugh. - -“I could go to New York and work in a store by day; and take -stage-dancing lessons evenings,” murmured the girl. “I want to be -somebody.” - -“You stay here and do your chores and try to act as if you ain’t a -little loonatic!” shouted Odell. “I’m sicka hearing about the capers -and kickups of young folks nowaday. Them gallivantins don’t go in my -house. I’m sicka reading about ’em, too. And that’s _that_!” - -“After all,” said Eris, “why do I have to do what I don’t care to do?” - -“Dang it,” retorted her father, “didn’t you never hear of dooty? What -d’they teach you in school?” - -“Nothing much,” she replied listlessly. “Did you always want to be a -farmer, daddy?” - -“Hey?” - -“Are you a farmer because you wanted to be? Or did you want to be -something else?” - -“What dinged trash you talk,” he said, disgusted. “I didn’t wanta be a -blacksmith or I’da been one.” - -“Why can’t _I_ be what I’d like to be? Will you tell me why?” - -Odell, speechless, resumed his newspaper. It was nearly nine o’clock -and he hadn’t read half the local news and none of the column devoted -to the Grange. - -Eris looked wistfully at him, loitering still in the doorway, slim, -grey-eyed, undeveloped. - -Her stepmother laughed at her: “Notions,” she said. “Don’t you know -you’d go to rack and rooin that way? You go to bed, Eris.... There’s -fresh ginger snaps in the pantry.” - - - - -CHAPTER III - - -Until the Great War turned the world upside down, Whitewater Farms made -money after Odell married Ed Lister’s daughter. - -Shortage of labour during the war cut into profits; taxes wiped them -out; the ugly, Bolshevik attitude of labour after the war caused a -deficit. - -It was the sullen inertia of the mob, conscious of power. Men did not -care whether they worked at all. If they chose to work, mills and -factories would pay them enough in three days to permit them to remain -idle the remainder of the week. No farmer could pay the swollen wages -demanded for field labour, and survive financially. - -Every village was full of idle louts who sneered at offered employment. - -Fruit rotted in orchards, grain remained uncut, cattle stood neglected. -The great American loafer leered at the situation. The very name of -Labour stank. It stinks still. The Great American Ass has made the term -a stench in the nostrils of civilisation. - - * * * * * - -The next year mills and factories began to lay off labour. Odell and -Lister scraped together a few sulky field hands, mainly incompetents, -men who had spent all their wages. Fields were sullenly tilled, crops -gathered, cattle cared for. - -Except for profiteers, reaction had set in. War profligacy, asinine -finance, crushing taxes already were doing their work. - -Rather than pay for feed, farmers sold their stock. The demand for -pork started everybody hog-raising. Prices fell; loss followed. Then -stagnation. It was the bitter aftermath of war--the deluge. Dead water. - -Only one star of hope glimmered over the waste,--the New Administration. - - * * * * * - -Spring was a month early that year. Odell, at sixty, unimpaired by pie -and the great American frying pan, his gaitered legs planted sturdily -in the new grass, looked out over his domain and chewed a clover stem. - -“I ain’t afraid,” he said to Lister. “I’m going the hull hog. Every -acre.” - -“Where’s your help?” remonstrated Lister. - -“I got ’em.” - -“Some on ’em is quitters. They’ll lay down on yeh, Elmer.” - -Odell spat out the clover stem: “Every acre, Ed!” he repeated. “And six -cows on test.” - -“We ain’t got the help----” - -“Six cows,” growled Odell; “White Lady, Snow Queen, Silver Maid, -Thistledown, Milkweed Lass, and Whitewater Lily.... I gotta make money. -I’m aimin’ to and I’m a-going to. I got four sons. And that’s that!” - -“Elmer----” - -“Awright. I know all what you gonna say, Ed. But where does it get -you to go around with a face a foot long? How’s things to start -unless somebody starts ’em? Awright, prices is bad. You can’t sell -a pure-breed caaf in this dinged country. There isn’t no market for -a fancy heifer. Everybody’s breedin’ Holsteins ’n’sloshin’ around -after grades. Awright; nobody wants Guernsey quality; everybody wants -Holstein bulk ’n’watery milk ’n’everything. I know. And my answer is, -_every acre_, Ed; and six cows on test; and higher prices on every -danged caaf that’s dropped. - -“If I sell a heifer it’s a favour to be paid for through the nose. And -I feed every bull-caaf and no vealin’ this year. Enough hogs to turn -out till October; not another danged snout! If the Bank don’t see me -through I’ll blow it up. Now, g’wan and make your plans.” - -He went into the creamery where his wife stood beside the separator, -watching a cat lap up some spilled cream. - -“Your pa’s timid, Mazie,” he said. “I tell him I cal’late t’start under -full steam. What do you say?” - -She laughed: “Pa’s got notions. He allus was a mite slow. I guess you -know best, Elmer.” - -“We all gotta work,” he said. “That means Eris, too.” - -“She allus helps me,” remarked Mazie, simply. - -“I dunno what she does,” grunted Odell; “--sets a hen or two, fools -around the incubators, digs up a spoonful of scratch-feed--what does -she do, anyhow?” - -“The child mends and irons----” - -“When she ain’t readin’ or tendin’ her flowers or moonin’ ’round the -woods ’n’fields,” retorted Odell. “Eris reckons she’s too fine a lady -for farm folk, I guess. I want her to keep busy. And that’s that.” - -“Somebody’s got to tend the flowers,” remonstrated Mazie. “You don’t -want we should have no posy bed, Elmer--like poor folks down to the -Holler, do you?” - -“I can git along ’n’eat dinner without posies. Why don’t Erie read the -_Grange Journal_? Oh, no; it’s fancy novels and highfalutin’ books she -studies onto. And she’s allus cuttin’ out these here fashions into -these here magazines with coloured pitchers outside. Did you ever see -Eris studyin’ into a cook-book? Or a seed catalogue? Or the _Guernsey -Cattle Magazine_? Or the _Breeder’s Guide_----” - -“You let her be,” said Mazie, good-naturedly. “The housework’s done and -that’s all you need to know. She can cook and make a bed if she’s a -mind to.” - -“Mind,” growled Odell, “--what’s a girl want of a mind? All she uses it -for is to plan how to play-act on the stage or gallivant into moving -pitchers. All she thinks about is how to git to New York to hunt up -some fancy job so she can paint her face and dance in bare legs----” - -“Now, Elmer, Eris is too smart to act foolish; and she’s educated real -well. You liked to see her act in school, and you thought she danced -nicely. She’s only a child yet----” - -“She’s twenty!” - -“She’s no more’n sixteen in her way of thinking, Elmer. She’s a good -girl.” - -“I didn’t say she’s bad. But she’s twenty, and she ought to be more -help to us. And she ought to quit readin’ and moonin’ and dreamin’ and -lazin’----” - -“You quit _your_ lazin’, too,” laughed Mazie, setting a pan of cream -in the ice chest. “Why don’t you go down to the barn and ring that new -herd-bull? You can’t get him into the paddock without a staff any more. -And if you don’t watch out Whitewater Chieftain will hurt somebody.... -’N’I’ll be a widow.” - -As Odell went out the dairy door, preoccupied with the ticklish job -before him, he met Eris with her arms full of new kittens. - -“Mitzi’s,” she explained, “aren’t they too cunning, daddy? I hope -they’re not to be drowned.” - -“I ain’t runnin’ a cat-farm,” remarked Odell. “Did you mend my canvas -jacket?” - -“Yes; it’s on your bed.” - -“Did you coop them broody hens? I bet you didn’t.” - -“Yes. There are seventeen in three coops.” - -“Housework done?” - -“Yes.” - -“Awright. Why don’t you get the cook-book and set in the hammock a -spell?” - -The girl laughed: “Don’t you like mother’s cooking?” - -“S’all right for _me_. But I don’t cal’late your mother’s going to cook -for the fella you hitch up with.” - -Eris turned up her nose: “Don’t worry. I shan’t ever marry. Not any boy -in _this_ town, anyway. Probably I’ll never marry.... I’ll not have -time,” she added, half to herself. - -Odell, who was going, stopped. - -“Why not?” he demanded. - -“An actress ought not to marry. She ought to give every moment to her -art,” explained the girl naïvely. - -“Is--that--so? Well, you can chase that idea outa your head, my girl, -because you ain’t never going to be no actress. And that’s _that_!” - -“Some day,” said Eris, with a flushed smile, “I shall follow my own -judgment and give myself to art.... And that’s _that_!” - -As they stood there, father and daughter, confronting each other in the -pale April sunshine, the great herd-bull bellowed from the cattle-barn, -shaking the still air with his thunderous reverberations. He was to be -shot that evening. - -Eris sighed: “He misses his companions,” she said, “and he tells us -so.... Poor White Lightning.... And I, also, miss the companionship -of all I have never known.... Some day I shall tell you so.... I hope -you’ll understand.” - -“You talk like a piece in a magazine,” said Odell; “you better quit -reading them danged love stories and movin’ pitcher magazines and study -into the _Farm Journal_.” - -“You’d be very proud of me if I became a great actress,” she said -seriously. - -“I’d be a danged sight prouder if you was a great cook,” he grunted. -And he went toward the cattle-barn, spinning the patent self-piercing -nose ring on his horny forefinger. - -Eris called after him: “Have you _got_ to shoot Lightning?” - -“Yes, I gotta beef him. He’s no good any more.” - - * * * * * - -So the great herd-bull, like all “Former Things,” was doomed to “pass -away.” - -As the Dionysia became the Mithraic Rites, so was taurian glory doomed -to pass.... A bullet where Aldebaran shows the way. The way of all -bulls. - -Neither Odell nor Eris had ever heard of Aldebaran. And the tombs of -the Magi were no more tightly sealed than the mind of the father. But -the child’s mind hid a little lamp unlighted. A whisper might reveal to -her Aldebaran shining in the midnight heavens. Or the Keys of Life and -Death hanging on the Rosy Cross.... - - * * * * * - -The bull died at the appointed hour. Eris stood in her bed-room closing -both ears with trembling palms. - -She did not hear the shot. Mazie found her there; laughed at her -good-naturedly. - -Eris’ lips formed the words: “Is he dead?” - -“My dear, he’s Polack beef by now.” - -Gloria tauri--gloria mundi. But whatever ends always begins again. - - * * * * * - -What was the Dionysia is now Rosicrucian ... and shall again be -something else ... and always the same. - -As for the Bull of Mithra--and Mithra, too--bull-calves are born every -day. And there are a million million suns in the making. - -It’s only the Old Order that changes, not what orders it. - - - - -CHAPTER IV - - -Bulls die; men die; the old order dies,--slowly sometimes, sometimes in -the twinkling of an eye. - -The change came swiftly upon Eris; passed more swiftly still, leaving -no outward trace visible. But when it had passed, the heart and mind of -Eris were altered. All doubt, all hesitation fled. She understood that -now the road to the stars was open, and that, one day, she would do -what she had been born to do. - - * * * * * - -The World War was partly responsible for the affair. The dye situation -in the United States resulted. In Whitewater Mills, both dyes and -mordants remained unsatisfactory. The mill chemist could do nothing and -they let him go. - -Where cotton was used in shoddy combination with wool, permanency of -colour scarcely mattered--the poor always getting the dirty end of -everything in a nation that has always laughed at a swindle. - -But before the war, Whitewater Mills had built a separate plant for -fine hosiery, lisle and silk, and had specialised in mauves and -blues--fast, unfading, beautiful colours, the secret of which remained -in Germany. - -Now, desiring to resume, and unable to import, the directors of the -mill sent a delegation to New York to find out what could be done. - -There the delegates discovered, dug out, and engaged a chemist named E. -Stuart Graydon. - -It appeared that the secrets of German dyes and mordants were known to -Mr. Graydon. How they became known to him he explained very frankly -and eloquently. Candour, an engaging smile, pale smooth features full -of pale bluish shadows,--these and a trim figure neatly clothed made up -the ensemble of Mr. Graydon. - -Permanent colour was his specialty. Anyway, his long, steady fingers -were permanently stained with acid and nicotine. He was employed by -a photographer when they discovered him. Or, to be accurate, _he_ -discovered _them_ at their third-class hotel on Broadway.... And never -left them until he had signed a contract. - - * * * * * - -It was after church that somebody introduced E. Stuart Graydon to Eris. - -He walked home with the family; and his talent for general conversation -earned him an invitation to remain to midday dinner. - -Quiet, convincing eloquence was his asset. There appeared to be no -subject with which he was not reasonably familiar. His, also, was that -terrible gift for familiarity of every description; he became a friend -over night, a member of the family in a week. He was what Broadway -calls “quick study,” never risking “going stale” by “letter perfect” -preparation for an opening. - -He took a deep interest in Guernsey breeding. But Odell did the -talking. That was how Graydon acquired a reputation for an astonishing -versatility;--he started the subject and kept it kindled while others -did the talking. And in ten minutes he was able to converse upon the -theme with a skilful and convincing fluency entirely irresistible. - - * * * * * - -After dinner Mazie showed him Fanny’s miniature on ivory. - -He smilingly sketched for the family a brief history of miniature -painting. It happened that he was minutely familiar with all methods -and all branches of Art. Indeed, that was how the entire affair -started. And Art accounted for the acid stains, also. - -To Eris, Art included the drama, and all that her ardent mind desired. -It took Mr. Graydon about five minutes to discover this. And of course -it transpired that he knew everything connected with the drama, spoken -and silent. - -The next evening he came to supper. He talked cattle, ensilage, -rotation of crops, sub-soils, inoculation, fertilisers, with Odell -until the hypnotised farmer was loth to let him go. - -He talked to Mazie about household economy, labour-saving devices, -sanitary disposal plants, water systems, bleaches--with which he was -dreadfully familiar--furniture polish, incubators. - -With the boys he discussed guns and ammunition, traps and trapping, -commercial education, the relation of labour to capital, baseball -in the State League, ready-made clothing, the respective merits of -pointers, setters, bull terriers and Airedales. - -Hypnotised yawns protested against the bed hour in the household of -Odell. Nobody desired to retire. The spell held like a trap. - -As for Eris, she decided to stay in the sitting room with Mr. Graydon -when the family’s yawns at last started them blinking bedward. - -Odell, yawning frightfully, got into his night-shirt and then into bed; -and lay opening and shutting his eyes like an owl on the pillow while -Mazie, for the first time in months, did her hair in curl papers. - -“A nice, polite, steady young man,” she said, nodding at Odell’s -reflection in the looking glass. “My sakes alive, Elmer, what an -education he’s got!” - -“Stew Graydon knows a thing or two, I guess,” yawned Odell. “You gotta -be mighty spry to get a holt onto that young fella.” - -“I’ve a notion they pay him a lot down to the mill,” suggested Mazie. - -“You can’t expec’ to hire a Noo York man like that fer nothin’,” -agreed Odell. “He’s smart, he is. And there’s allus a market fer real -smartness. Like as not that young fella will find himself a rich man in -ten years. I guesso.” - -A silence; Mazie busy with her lustrous hair,--the plump, rosy, -vigorous incarnation of matronly health. - -In the mirror she caught Elmer’s sleepy eye and laughed, displaying her -white teeth. - -“You think he kinda favours Eris?” she asked. - -“Hey?” - -“I don’t know why else he come to supper.” - -“He come to supper to talk farmin’ with me,” said Odell gruffly. - -“Maybe. Only I guess not,” laughed Mazie. - -“Well, why did he come, then? He wanted I should show him the new -separator and them samples of cork-brick. He’s a chemist, ain’t he? -He’s int-rested in cork-brick and separators ’n’ all like that.” - -Mazie twisted a curl paper around a thick brown tress. - -“When he talked about the theatre and acting,” she remarked, “did you -notice how Eris acted?” - -“She gawked at him,” grunted Odell. “She’d better get that pitcher -idee outa her fool head,--lazin’ around readin’ them pitcher magazines -’n’ novels, ’n’ moonin all over the place instid of findin’ chores to -occupy her ’n’ doin’ them----” - -“Oh, hush,” interrupted Mazie; “you talk and take on awful foolish, -Elmer. When Eris marries some bright, steady boy, all that trash in her -head will go into the slop-pail.” - -Odell scowled: - -“Well, why don’t she marry, then? She ain’t no help to you----” - -“She _is_! Hush up your head. You’ll miss her, too, when she marries, -and some strange man takes her away. I guess I know who aims to do it, -too.” - -“Well, who aims to do it? Hey? She don’t have nothin’ to say to our -Whitewater boys. She allus acts proud and highmighty and uppish. Dan -Burns he come sparkin’ her ’n’ she stayed in her room and wouldn’t even -come down to supper. ’N’ there was Clay Wallace, ’n’ Buddy Morgan----” - -“It looks like she’s willing to be sparked to-night, don’t it?” said -Mazie, with an odd little laugh. - -Elmer rose on one elbow: “Say, you don’t think _he_ wants our Eris, do -yeh?” - -“Why not? Isn’t Eris good enough for any man?” - -“Well, well, dang it all, Stew Graydon seems diff-runt.... He’s too -educated ’n’ stylish for plain folks--’n’ he’s got a big position in -the mill. He don’t want our Eris----” - -“Why _not_?” repeated Mazie. - -Odell shook his frowsy head: “He’ll want a rich girl. Eris hain’t got -only that heifer-money. I can’t give her more’n a mite----” - -“That don’t count with me, Elmer.” She flushed, “--it didn’t count with -_you_.” - -“Well, you was worth consid’ble more’n cash,” he grunted. - -“So’s any girl--if a boy likes her.” - -“You think a smart man like Stew Graydon----” - -“How do I know?” drawled Mazie. “She’s downstairs yet with him, ain’t -she? I never knew her to act that way before. Nor you, either.” - - * * * * * - -She never had “acted that way before.” - -The drowning swimmer and his straw--Eris and the first man she ever -had met who had been actually in touch with the mystery of the moving -pictures--that was the situation. - -For Graydon’s personality she had only the virginal interest which is -reassured by a pleasant manner, a pleasing voice, and the trim, neat -inconspicuousness of face, figure, and apparel which invites neither -criticism nor particular admiration,--nor alarm. - -But for his education, his knowledge, his wisdom, his fluency,--above -all for his evident sympathy and ability to understand her desire,--she -had an excited and passionate need. - -As he talked, he looked her over, carefully, cautiously--preoccupied -with odd and curious ideas even while conversing about other things. - -That evening, when taking leave, he pressed her slender fingers -together, gently, not alarming her--scarcely even awaking -self-consciousness. He was always the artist, first of all. - - * * * * * - -After a month, even Elmer understood that Graydon was “sparking” Eris. - -And, from the time that Eris first was made to understand that fact she -lived in a continuous, confused dream, through the unreality of which -sometimes she was aware of her own heart beating with excitement. - - * * * * * - -He had said to her, one evening, after the family had gone to bed, that -the stage was her vocation and that God himself must have ordained that -she should, one day, triumph there. - -She listened as in a blessed trance. All around her the night air -grew heavy with the scent of honeysuckle. A moon was shining. The -whippoorwill’s breathless cry came from the snake-fence hedge. - -When he had had his mental will of her--excited her almost to blissful -tears, soothed her, led her on, deftly, eloquently--he took her smooth -hand of a child. All set for the last act, he drew the girl against his -shoulder, taking plenty of time. - -Her head was still swimming with his eloquence. Hope intoxicated her. -His lips meant nothing on her cheek--but her mind was all a-quiver--and -it was her mind alone that he had stimulated and excited to an ecstasy -uncontrollable; and which now responded and acquiesced. - - * * * * * - -“And after we marry I am to study for the stage?” she repeated, -tremulously, oblivious of his arm tightening around her body. - -It transpired, gently and eloquently, that it was for this very reason -he desired to marry her and give her what was nearest her girl’s -heart--what her girl’s mind most ardently desired in all the world--her -liberty to choose. - -But he warned her to keep the secret from her family. Trembling, -enchanted, almost frightened by the approaching splendour of -consummation, she promised in tears. - -Then the barrier burst under an overwhelming rush of gratitude. She was -his. She would surrender, now, to this man who had suddenly appeared -from nowhere;--an emissary of God sent to understand, sympathise, guide -her to that destiny which, even he admitted, God had ordained as hers. - - * * * * * - -Eris was married to E. Stuart Graydon in her twentieth year at -the parsonage of the Whitewater Church, at ten o’clock in the -morning. All Whitewater attended and gorged. No rural precedent was -neglected--neither jest nor rice nor old shoes,--everything happened, -from the organ music and the unctuous patronage of “Rev. Styles,” to -the thick aroma of the “bounteous repast” at Whitewater Farms, where -neighbours came, stuffed themselves, and went away boisterously all -that rainy afternoon. - -Bride and groom were to depart on the six o’clock train for Niagara. - -About five o’clock, the groom, chancing to glance out of the window, -saw two men,--strangers in Whitewater but perfectly well known to -him,--walking up the path that led to the front door. - -For a second he sat motionless; the next, he turned and looked into the -grey eyes of his bride. - -“Eris,” he said calmly, “if anybody asks for me say I’ve run down to -the mill and I’ll be back in fifteen minutes.” - -She smiled vaguely as he rose and went out the back way where the -automobiles were parked. - -A few minutes later Odell was called from the room by one of his sons: - -“Say, pop, there’s a party out here inquiring for someone they call -Eddie Graydon.” - -Odell went out to the porch: “What name?” he demanded, eyeing the two -strangers and their dripping umbrellas. - -“You Elmer Odell?” demanded the taller man. - -“That’s what my ma christened me,” replied Odell, jocosely. - -“Your daughter marrying a man who calls himself E. Stuart Graydon?” - -“She ain’t marryin’ him. She’s done it.” - -“Where is he?” - -“He jest stepped out. Gone to the mill to fix up sunthin’ before -leavin’.” - -The taller man said to his companion: “Run down to the mill, will you?” -And, as the other turned and walked rapidly away in the rain: - -“I’ve got a warrant for Eddie Graydon when he comes back. That’s one -of his names. Eddie Carter is the right one. Sorry for you, Mr. Odell; -sorrier for your daughter.” - -Odell stared at him, the purple veins beginning to swell on his temples. - -“D-dang it!” he stammered,--“what’s all this dinged junk about? Who be -you?” - -And, when the tall, quiet man had terribly convinced him, Odell -staggered, slightly, and wiped the sweat from his temples. - -“That lad has a record,” said the detective, in his low, agreeable -voice. “He’s a fine artist and a crackerjack chemist. Maybe he don’t -know anything about the new tens and twenties. Maybe. Nor anything -about the location of the plates.... My God, Mr. Odell, we’ve _got_ to -get those plates. Only Brockway could have equalled that engraving. -Yes, sir--only the old man.” - -Odell scarcely heard him for the thunderous confusion in his brain. - -He sat down, heavily, staring at space under knitted brows. Minute -after minute passed. The distant laughter and clamour of guests came -fitfully from the great kitchen beyond. It rained and rained on the -veranda roof. - -After a quarter of an hour the detective came in from the porch. - -“You got a telephone, Mr. Odell?” - -The farmer nodded. - -“I want to call up my mate at the mill----” looking around the sitting -room and finally locating the instrument. “What’s the mill number?” - -“Seven.” - -He gave the crank a turn; the metal bell jingled. - -After a few moments he got his mate. He talked rapidly in a low, clear -voice. Odell heard without listening or understanding. The detective -hung up. - -“Say,” he said, “that fellow’s gone. He won’t come back here. He’s -gone!” - -“What say?” mumbled Odell, wiping away the sweat. - -“I’m telling you that Eddie Carter has beat us to it. He didn’t go to -the mill. He won’t come back here.... Who’s got a big yellow touring -car--a Comet Six--in this town?” - -Odell put his scarred hands to his forehead: “Doc Benson, I guess,” he -said vaguely. - -“He here?” - -“I guess he’s in there eatin’.” - -“Well, tell him his car went out of town twenty minutes ago at sixty -per,” said the detective briskly.... “So long. I’m sorry.... Is there a -garage in the village where they have cars for hire?” - -“At the hotel,” said the farmer.... “By God!...” He got up as though -dazed. - -“Mazie,” he called hoarsely. Nobody heard him in the gay tumult. He -stared after the detective, who was walking swiftly down the path in -the rain. - -“Jesus,” he whispered.... “He done us all.... ’N’ that’s that! Oh, -God!--’n’ that’s _that_!” - - * * * * * - -A nine days’ scandal in the village--a year’s food for gossip--and that -was that, also. - -Neither blame nor disgrace attached to anybody. Nobody thought less of -the Odells, nor did they of themselves. - -The crash of her dream-house stunned Eris. She took it very silently, -with no outward emotion. - -After a month the whole thing seemed, in fact, a dream--too unreal to -believe or to grieve over. - -After three months Odell talked vaguely of getting a di-vorce, “so’s -she kin hook up to somebody respectable when she’s a mind to.” - -Then Eris flashed fire for the first time: - -“I’ll never marry again! Never! I never wanted to anyway. This is -enough! I’ll live and die as I am. And there’ll be no more men in my -life and no bother about divorce, either. He’ll never come back. What -do I care whether I’m married or not! It doesn’t mean anything and it -never will. I’m through with marriage and with marrying men! And that’s -_that_!” - - - - -CHAPTER V - - -It was Sunday; and it was in May. To Whitewater Farms floated the -sound of bells from three village churches, pealing alternately. With -a final three strokes from each bell, Odell and Lister drove out of -the horse-barn in the family carry-all. In God’s honour, Odell wore a -celluloid collar. Lister’s reverence was expressed in a new scarlet -bandanna. - -Mazie, big, symmetrical, handsome in her trim summer clothes, appeared -from the house, herding her loitering, loutish offspring--Gene, 18; Si, -17; Willis, 16; Buddy, 15; all habited in the dark, ready-made clothing -and dark felt hats of rural ceremony, the gloomy similarity relieved -only by ready-made satin neck-scarfs of different but primitive hues. - -“Where’s Eris?” inquired Odell. - -Mazie laughed: “She ain’t ready, what with her curling and her manicure -set--busy ’s’a bee from fingers to toes--” - -“Eris!” shouted her father, looking up at the open window, where dotted -muslin curtains were blowing. - -Eris peeped out, her chestnut hair dishevelled. - -“Don’t wait,” she said. “I’ll walk.” - -Odell gathered the reins: “G’lang!” he grunted. - - * * * * * - -For twenty minutes or more there was no sound in the House of Odell -except the flutter of muslin curtains. - -Under the window a lilac bush was vibrant with bumble-bees; robins ran -through the grass; blue-birds drifted along the fence from post to post -in soft, moth-like flight. - -It was quite a while after the kitchen clock struck that light, hurried -steps sounded on the stairs. - -Eris stepped out on the porch, radiant and in her best. - -At twenty she had the slender immaturity of a girl of sixteen. Her slim -figure made her seem taller than she was. - -Her hat was one of those sagging straw affairs. It tied under the chin -with lilac ribbon. Her thin white gown had lilac ribbons on it, too. So -did her sun-shade. - -She was very late. She walked to the gate, keeping to the brick path on -account of her white shoes and stockings. - -Here she consulted her wrist-watch. There was no use hurrying now. She -glanced up and down the road--possibility of a belated neighbour giving -her a lift to the village. - -No, it was too late to hurry. Almost too late to go at all. - -She looked up at the gate lilacs, broke off a heavy, mauve cluster, -inhaled the fragrance. - -For a little while, still, she lingered on the chance of a passing -vehicle. Finally she returned to her room, took a book from her pillow, -took “the key to the fields,” and sauntered off through the hillside -orchard, now a wilderness of pink and white bloom. - -Everywhere the azure wings of blue-birds; the peach-red of a robin’s -breast; the broad golden glint of a flicker flashing through high white -bloom. - -The breeze which had fluttered her muslin curtains was busy up here, -too, blowing white butterflies out of their courses and spreading -silvery streaks across tall grasses. - -On the hill-top she paused, looking out over the world of May. - -Below her lay Whitewater Farms, neat as a group of newly-painted -toys, house, barns with their hip-gables, silos, poultry-runs, sheds, -out-buildings, whitewashed fences. - -A mile south, buried among elms and maples, lay White Hills Village, -the spires of its three churches piercing the foliage. - -All around, east, west, south, rose low hills, patched with woods, -a barn or two in silhouette on some grassy ridge. Ploughed fields, -pastures, squares of vivid winter wheat checkered the panorama, the -tender green of hard-wood groves alternating with the dark beauty of -hemlock and white pine. - -Overhead a blue sky, quite cloudless; over all, May sunshine; the young -world melodious with the songs of birds. And Eris, twenty, with the -heart and experience of sixteen. - -Sweet, thrilling came the meadow lark’s calling from the crests of tall -elms. It seemed to pierce her heart. - -To the breezy stillness of the hill came faintly out of the valley the -distant barking of a dog, a cock-crow, answered, answered again from -some remoter farm. - -Eris turned and looked into the north, where bluish hills spread away -into the unknown. - -Below her were the Home Woods, where Whitewater Brook ran over silver -gravel, under mossy logs, pouring into deep, spreading pools, gliding -swiftly amid a camouflage of ferns, gushing out over limestone beds to -clatter and sparkle and fling rainbow spray across every sunny glade. - -Eris looked down at the woods. To venture down there was not very good -for her low-heeled, white sport shoes.... Of course she could clean -them after noon dinner and they’d be dry in time for--anything.... But -for _what_? - -She paused at the wood’s edge, her mind on her shoes. - -“In time for what?” she repeated aloud. - -She stood, abstracted, grey eyes brooding the question. - -What was there to dress for--to clean her white shoes for? Evening -service. A slow stroll with some neighbour’s daughter along the village -street. Gossip with other young people encountered in the lamp-lit -dark. Banter with boys--passing the usual group clustered on fence or -wall--jests born of rural wit, empty laughter, emptier retort--the -slow stroll homeward.... This was what she dressed for.... Or for a -party ... where the deadly familiarity of every face and voice had -long since dulled her interest.... Where there was never any mental -outlook; no aspiration, no stimulation--no response to her restless -curiosity--where nobody could tell her “why.” - -Standing there on the wood’s edge, she wondered why she was at pains to -dress becomingly for the sake of such things as these. - -She wondered why she cared for her person so scrupulously in a family -where a bath a week was the rule--in a community where the drug-store -carried neither orange-stick nor depilatory. - -It is true, however, that with the advent of short skirts and -prohibition it was now possible to purchase lipstick and powder-puff in -White Hills. And State Troopers had been there twice looking for hootch. - -There was a rumour in local ecclesiastical circles that the youth of -White Hills was headed hellward. - - * * * * * - -As yet the sweet-fern was only in tassel; Eris could pick her way, -without danger to her stockings, through the strip of rough clearing. -She entered the woods, pensively, amid the dappled shadows of new -leaves. - -Everywhere her eyes discovered young ferns and wild blossoms. Trillium -and bunch-berry were still in bloom; viburnum, too; violets, blue, -yellow and white; and a few pink moccasin flowers and late anemones. - -Birds, too, sang everywhere; crows were noisy in the taller pines; -glimpses of wood-thrush and Veery in moist thickets; clear little -ecstasies of bird-song from high branches, the strident chirring of red -squirrels, the mysterious, muffled drumming of a cock-grouse far in -woodland depths. - -Where a mossy limestone ledge hung low over Whitewater Brook, Eris -spread her handkerchief and sat down on it carefully, laying her book -beside her. - -Here the stillness was melodious with golden harmonies from a little -waterfall. - -There were no black flies or midges yet,--no exasperating deer-flies -either. Only gilded ephemera dancing over the water, where, at -intervals, some burly trout broke with a splash. - -Green-clouded swallow-tail butterflies in floppy, erratic flight, -sped through sunny glades. Overhead sailed the great yellow -swallow-tail,--in aërial battle, sometimes with the Beauty of -Camberwell, the latter rather ragged and faded from last summer’s -gaiety, but with plenty of spirit left in her shabby wings. - -Sun-spots glowed and waned; shadows flickered; water poured and glided -between green banks, aglint with bubbles. The beauty of all things -filled the young heart of Eris, reddened her lips, tormented her, -almost hurt her with the desire for utterance. - -If inexperience really has anything to express, it has no notion how to -go about it. - -Like vast, tinted, unreal clouds, her formless thoughts crowded her -mind--guileless desire, innocent aspiration toward ineffable heights, -ambition as chaste as immature. - -And when in dreaming preoccupation the clouds took vague form, her -unformed mind merely mirrored an unreal shape resembling herself--a -magic dancing shape, ethereal, triumphant amid Olympian thunders of -applause--a glittering shape, like hers, lovelier, facing the world -from the jewelled splendour of the stage--a shadow-shape, gliding -across the screen, worshipped in silence by a breathless multitude. - -She opened her book. It was entitled: “How to Break into the Movies.” -She read for a few moments, gave it up. - - * * * * * - -It was May in the world; and, in the heart of Eris, April. And a -strange, ardent, restlessness in the heart of all youth the whole -world over--the renaissance, perhaps, of a primitive, lawless -irresponsibility curbed into discipline æons ago. And, after ages, let -loose again since the Twilight of the World fell over Armageddon. - - * * * * * - -Sooner or later she felt she must free mind, heart, body of whatever -hampered, and go--go on about her business in life--whatever it might -be--seek it throughout the world--ask the way--ask all things unknown -to her--learn all things, understand, choose, achieve. - -Twenty, in the April just ended! Her time was short. The time to be -about her business in life was very near.... The time was here.... It -was already here ... if she only knew the way.... The way out.... The -door that opened outward.... - - * * * * * - -Lifting her grey eyes she saw a man across the brook. He saw her at the -same moment. - -He was fat. He wore short rubber boots and no coat. Creel, bait-box, -and fishing rod explained his presence on Whitewater. But as to his -having any business there, he himself seemed in doubt. - -“Hello, sister!” he said jauntily. - -“Hello,” said Eris, politely. - -“Is it all right for me to fish here?” he inquired. “I’m not -trespassing, am I?” - -“People fish through our woods,” replied Eris. - -“Oh, are they _your_ woods?” He looked around him at the trees as -though to see what kind of sylvan property this girl possessed. - -“A pretty spot,” he said with condescension, preparing to bait his -hook. “I like pretty spots. It’s my business to hunt for them, too. -Yes, and sometimes I hunt for dreary spots. Not that I like them, but -it’s in my line----” He shoved a squirming worm onto the hook and wiped -his hands on his trousers. “Yes, that’s my line--I’m in all kinds of -lines--even fish-lines----” He dropped his hook into the pool and stood -intent, evidently indifferent to any potential applause as tribute to -his wit. - -He was sunburnt, fat, smooth-shaven. Thin hair partly covered his head -in damp ringlets. - -Presently he glanced across at Eris out of little bluish, puffy eyes -which sagged at the corners. He winked at her, not offensively: - -“Yes, that’s my best line, sister.... Spots! All kinds. Pretty, gloomy, -lovely, dreary--oasis or desert, it doesn’t matter; I’m always in the -market for spots.” - -“Are you looking for a farm?” inquired Eris. - -“Farm? Well, that’s in my line, too,--farms, mills, nice old stone -bridges,--all that stuff is in my line,--in fact, everything is in my -line,--and nothing _on_ my line----” He lifted a dripping bait, lowered -it again, winked at Eris. - -“I suppose,” he said, “there isn’t a single thing in all the world that -isn’t in my line. Why, even _you_ are!” he added, laughing fatly. “What -do you think of that, now?” - -“What is your line?” she inquired, inclined to smile. - -“Can’t you guess, girlie?” - -“No, I can’t.” - -“Well, I come out this way on location. The bunch is over at Summit. -I’m just scouting out the lay over here. To-day’s Sunday, so I’m -fishing. I can’t hunt spots every minute.” - -“I don’t know what you mean,” said Eris. - -“Why, we’re shooting the sanitarium over at Summit,” he explained, -gently testing his line. As there was nothing on it he looked over at -Eris. - -“You don’t get me, sister,” he said. “It’s pictures. See?” - -“Moving pictures?” - -“Yeh, the Crystal Film outfit. We’re shooting the ‘Wild Girl.’ It’s all -outside stuff now. We’re going to shoot ‘The Piker’ next. Nature stuff. -That’s why.” - -Once more he drew out and examined his bait. “Say,” he demanded, “are -there any fish in this stream?” - -“Trout.” - -“Well, they seem to be darned scarce----” - -“I want to ask you something,” interrupted the girl, breathlessly. - -“Shoot, sister.” - -“I want to know how people--how a girl----” - -“Sure. I get you. I’m glad you asked me. They all ask that. You want to -know how to get into pictures.” - -“Yes----” - -“Of course. So does every living female in the United States. That’s -what sixty million women, young and old, want to know----” - -He looked up, prepared to wink, but something in her flushed expression -modified his jocose intention: - -“Say, sister,” he drawled, “_you_ don’t want to go into pictures.” - -“Yes, I do.” - -“What for?” - -“Why are _you_ in pictures?” she asked. - -“God knows----” - -“Will you please tell me why?” - -“I like the job, I guess.” - -“So do I.” - -“Oh, very well,” he said, laughing, “go to it, girlie.” - -“How?” - -“Why, _I_ can’t tell you----” - -“You _can_!” - -He lifted his bait and flopped it into another place. - -“Now, listen,” he said, “some men would take notice of your pretty -face and kid you along. That ain’t me. If you break loose and go into -pictures it’s a one to a million shot you make carfare.” - -“I want to try.” - -“_I_ can’t give you a job, sister----” - -“Would the Crystal Film management let me try?” - -“Nobody would let you try unless they needed an extra.” - -“What is an extra?” - -“A day’s jobber. Maybe several days. Then it’s hoofing it after the -next job.” - -“Couldn’t they let me try a small part?” - -“We’re cast. You got to begin as an extra, anyhow. There’s nothing else -to it, girlie----” - -Something jerked his line; gingerly he lifted the rod, not “striking”; -a plump trout fell from the hook into the water. - -“Lost him, by jinx!” he exclaimed. “What the devil did I do that I -hadn’t oughto I dunno?” - -“You should jerk when a trout bites. You just lifted him out. You can’t -hook a trout that way.... I hope you will be kind enough to give me -your name and address, and help me to get into pictures.” - -For a while he stood silent, re-baiting his hook. When he was ready he -cast the line into the water, laid the rod on the bank, drew out and -lighted a large, pallid cigar. - -“Of course,” he remarked, “your parents are against your going into -pictures.” - -“My mother is dead. My stepmother only laughs at me.” - -“How about papa?” - -“He wouldn’t like it.” - -“Same old scenario,” he said. “And I’ll give you the same old advice: -if you got a good home, stay put. Have you?” - -“Yes.” - -“But you don’t want to stay put?” - -“No.” - -“You want to run away and-be-a-great-actress?” - -“I’m going to try.” - -“Try to do what?” - -“Find out what I can do and do it!” she replied hotly, almost on the -verge of tears. - -He looked up at the delicate, flushed beauty of her face. - -It wasn’t a question of talent. Most women have the actress in them. -With or lacking intelligence it can be developed enough for Broadway -use. - -“You young girls,” he said, “expect to travel everywhere on your looks. -And some of you do. And they last as long as their looks last. But men -get nowhere without brains.” - -“I have brains,” she retorted unsteadily. - -“Let it go at that. But where’s your experience?” - -“How can I have it unless I--I try?” - -“You think acting is your vocation, sister?” - -“I intend to find out.” - -“You better listen to me and stick to a good home while the sticking’s -good!” - -“I’m going into pictures,” she said slowly. “And that’s _that_!” - -Wearying of bad luck the fat man started to move down stream toward -another pool. - -The girl rose straight up on her mossy rock, joining both hands in -classic appeal, quite unconscious of her dramatic attitude. - -“Please--_please_ tell me who you are and where you live!” she -beseeched him. - -He was inclined to laugh; then her naïveté touched him. - -“Well, sister,” he said, “if you put it that way--my name is -Quiss--Harry B. Quiss. I live in New York--Hotel Huron. You can find me -there when I’m not on location or at the studio.... The Crystal Films -Corporation. We’re in the telephone book.” - -Mr. Quiss might have added that the Crystal Films Corporation was also -on its beam-ends. But he couldn’t quite do that. All he could say was: -“Better stick to papa while the sticking’s good, girlie. There’s no -money in pictures. They all bust sooner or later. Take it from one -who’s been blown sky-high more’n twice. And expects to go up more’n -twice more.” - -He went slowly toward the pool below, gesticulating with his rod for -emphasis: - -“There’s no money in pictures--not even for stars. I don’t know where -it all goes to. Don’t ask me who gets it. I don’t, anyway.” - - - - -CHAPTER VI - - -On Monday evening at five o’clock the Whitewater herd was ready for -milking. - -Odell, Ed Lister, and the foreman, Gene Lyford, scrubbed their hands -and faces and put on clean white canvas clothes. Clyde Storm, helper, -went along the lime-freshened concrete alleys, shaking out bran and -tossing in clover-hay. Everywhere in the steel stanchions beautiful -Guernsey heads were turned to watch his progress. In the bull-pen the -herd-bull pried and butted at the bars. The barn vibrated with his -contented lowing. - -Calves in their pens came crowding to the bars like herded deer, or -went bucketing about, excited to playful combat by the social gathering -after an all-day separation. - -In the stalls sleek flanks were being wiped down until they glistened -like the coats of thoroughbred horses; udders were washed with tepid -water; the whole place smelled fresh and clean as a hayfield. - -No mechanical apparatus was employed at Whitewater Farms. - -Odell, finished with the first cow, carried the foaming pail to the -steelyards, weighed it, noted the result on the bulletin with a pencil -that dangled there, and stepped aside to make room for Ed Lister, who -came up with a brimming pail. - -There was little conversation at milking hour, scarcely a word spoken -except in admonition or reassurance to some restless cow--no sounds -in the barn save the herd-bull’s deep rumble of well-being, a gusty -twitter of swallows from the eaves, the mellow noises of feeding -cattle, clank and creak of stanchion, gush and splash of water as some -thirsty cow buried her pink nose in the patent fonts. - -The still air grew fragrant with the scent of milk and clover-hay. - -One or two grey cats came in, hopefully, and sat on the ladder-stairs, -purring, observant, receptive. - -The cows on test were in the western extension, all becoming a trifle -restless now that their hour was again approaching. And presently two -of Odell’s sons, Si and Willis, came in, scrubbed and clothed in white, -prepared to continue the exhaustive record already well initiated. - -“Eris home yet?” asked Odell over his shoulder. - -Si shook his head and picked up a pail. - -“Well, where’n the dang-dinged town is she?” growled Odell. “If she’s -staying som’mers to supper, why can’t she send word?” - -Willis said: “Buddy went down street to look for her. Mommy sent him.” - -The boys passed on into the extension where the comely cattle on test -stood impatient. - -Odell remarked to Lister: “Ever since Eris drove over to Summit to see -them pitcher people makin’ movies she’s acted sulky and contrary like. -Now look at her stayin’ away all day--’n’ out to supper, too, som’mers.” - -“She acts like she’s sot on sunthin’,” suggested Lister, adjusting his -milking stool and clasping the pail between his knees. - -“She’s sot on j’ining some danged moving pitcher comp’ny,” grunted -Odell. “That’s what’s in her head all the time these days.” - -Lister’s pail hummed with alternate streams of milk drumming on -the tin. For a while he milked in silence save for a low-voiced -remonstrance to the young and temperamental Guernsey whose near hind -leg threatened trouble. - -As he rose with the brimming pail he said: “I guess Eris is a good -girl. I guess she wouldn’t go so far as to do nothin’ rash, Elmer.” - -“I dunno. You couldn’t never tell what Fanny had in her head. Fanny -allus had her secret thoughts. I never knowed what she was figurin’ -out. Eris acts that way; she does what she’s told but she thinks as -she’s a mind to. Too much brain ain’t healthy for no woman.” - -Lister weighed his pail, scratched down the record opposite the cow’s -name, turned and looked back at Odell. - -“Women oughta think the way their men-folks tell ’em,” he said. “That’s -my idee. But the way they vote and carry on these days is a-sp’ilin’ on -’em, accordin’ to my way of figurin’.” - -Odell said nothing. As he stood weighing his pail of milk, Buddy came -into the barn, eating a stick of shop candy. - -“Say, pa,” he called out, “mommy wants you up to the house!” - -“When? Now?” demanded his father in dull surprise. - -“I guess so. She said you was to come right up.” - -Odell placed the empty milk pail on the floor: “Eris home yet?” - -“I dunno. I guess not. Will you let me milk Snow-bird, pa?” - -“No. Look at your hands! You go up and shake down some hay.... Where’s -your ma?” - -“She’s up in Eris’ room. She says for you to come. Can’t I wash my -hands and----” - -“No. G’wan up to the loft. And don’t step on the pitchfork, neither.” - -He turned uncertainly toward Lister and found his father-in-law looking -at him. - -“Kinda queer,” he muttered, “Mazie sending for me when she knows I’m -milking....” - -Lister made no comment. Odell went out heavily, crossed the farm yard -in the pleasant sunset glow, walked on toward the house with lagging -stride. - -As he set foot on the porch he became conscious of his irritation, -felt the heat of it in his cheeks--the same old familiar resentment -which had smouldered through the dingy, discordant years of his first -marriage. - -Here it was again, creeping through him after all these placid years -with Mazie--the same sullen apprehension, dull unease verging on anger, -invading his peace of mind, stirred this time by Fanny’s child--Eris, -daughter of Discord. - -“Dang Fanny’s breed,” he muttered, entering the house, “--we allus was -enemies deep down, ... deep down in the flesh....” - -All at once he understood his real mind. Eris had always been Fanny’s -child. Never his. He remembered what Fanny had said to him at the -approach of death--how, in that last desperate moment the battered mask -of years had slipped from her bony visage and he had gazed into the -stark face of immemorial antipathy, ... the measureless resentment of a -sex. - -Fanny was dead. May God find out what she wants and give it to her. But -Fanny’s race persisted. She lived again in Eris. He was face to face -with it again.... After twenty years of peace!... - -He went to the foot of the stairs and called to his wife. Her voice -answered from the floor above. He plodded on upstairs. - -Mazie was standing in Eris’ room, a pile of clothing on the bed, a -suitcase and a small, flat trunk open on the floor. - -She turned to Odell, her handsome features flushed, and the sparkle of -tears in her slanting, black eyes. - -“What’s the trouble now?” he demanded, already divining it. - -“She’s gone, Elmer. She called me up on the telephone from Albany to -tell me. The Crystal Fillum Company offers her a contract. She wants -her clothes and her money.” - -A heavy colour surged through the man’s face. - -“That’s the danged secret blood in her,” he said. “I knowed it. There’s -allus sunthin’ hatchin’ deep down in women of her blood.... She’s allus -had it in her mind to quit us.... She never was one of us.... All -right, let her go. I’m done with her.” - -Mazie began unsteadily: “So many children of--of our day seem to feel -like our Eris----” - -“Mine don’t! My boys ain’t got nothin’ secret into them! They ain’t -crazy in the head ’n’ they ain’t full o’ fool notions.” - -Mazie remained silent. Her sons were fuller of “notions” than their -father knew. It had required all the magnetism of her affection and -authority to keep them headed toward a future on Whitewater Farms. For -the nearest town was already calling them; they sniffed the soft-coal -smoke from afar and were restless for the iron dissonance and human -bustle of paved and narrow ways. - -Theirs was the gregarious excitement instinct in human animals. -Beyond the dingy monochrome of life they caught a glimmer of distant -brightness. The vague summons of unknown but suspected pleasures -stirred them as they travelled the sodden furrow. - -Youth’s physical instinct is to gather at the water-hole of this vast -veldt we call the world, and wallow in the inviting mire of a thousand -hoofs, and feel and hear and see the perpetual milling of the human -herds that gather there. - -Only in quality did Eris differ from her brothers. It was her mind--and -the untasted pleasures of the mind--that drove her to the common fount. - -There is a picture by Fragonard called “The Fountain of Love.” And, -as eagerly as the blond and glowing girl speeds to the brimming basin -where mischievous little winged Loves pour out for her the magic -waters, so impetuously had Eris sped toward the fount of knowledge, -hot, parched with desire to set her lips to immortal springs. - - * * * * * - -Odell’s heavy eyes, brooding anger, followed Mazie’s movements as she -smoothed out the clothing and laid each garment in the trunk. - -“You don’t have to do that,” he growled. “Let her come and get ’em if -she wants ’em.” - -“But she needs----” - -“Dang it, let ’em lay. Like’s not she’ll sicken o’ them pitcher people -before the week’s out. She’ll get her belly full o’ notions. Let her -caper till she runs into barbed wire. That’ll sting some sense into her -hide.” - -“She only took her little leather bag, Elmer----” - -“She’ll sicken sooner. I ain’t worryin’ none. She ain’t a loose girl; -she’s just a fool heifer that goes bucketin’ over a snake-fence where -it’s half down. Let her kick up and skylark. You bet she’ll hear the -farm bell when it comes supper time----” - -He turned away exasperated, but Mazie took him by the sleeve of his -milking jacket: - -“She’s got to have money, Elmer----” - -“No, she hain’t! She’ll sicken the quicker----” - -“Elmer, it’s her money.” - -“’Tain’t. It’s mine.” - -“It’s her heifer-money----” - -“She shan’t have it! Not till she’s twenty-one. And that’s that!” - -Mazie looked at her husband in a distressed way, her black eyes full of -tears: - -“Elmer, you can’t use a girl like a boy. A girl’s a tender thing. And -I was afraid of this--something like this.... Because Eris is a mite -different. She likes to read and study. She likes to figure out what -she reads about. She likes music and statues and art-things like the -hand-painted pictures we saw in Utica. There’s no harm in art, I -guess.... And you know how she always did love to dress up for church -plays--and how nicely she sang and danced and acted in school----” - -“Dang it all!” shouted Odell, beating one tanned fist within the other -palm, “let her come home and cut her capers! She can do them things -when there’s a entertainment down to the church, can’t she? - -“That’s enough for any girl, ain’t it? And she can go to Utica and look -at them hand-painted pitchers in the store windows. And she can dance -to socials and showers like sensible girls and she can sing her head -off Sundays in church when she’s a mind to! - -“All she’s gotta do is come home and git the best of everything. But as -long as she acts crazy and stays away, I’m done with her. And that’s -that!” - - - - -CHAPTER VII - - -Spring had begun more than a month early. The young year promised -agricultural miracles. All omens were favourable. Ed Lister predicted -it would be a “hog-killin’.” - -June’s magic turned Whitewater to a paradise. Crystal mornings -gradually warming until sundown; gentle showers at night to freshen -herbage and start a million planted seeds; blossoms, bees, buds, -blue skies--all exquisitely balanced designs in June’s enchanted -tapestry--and nothing so far to mar the fabric--no late and malignant -frost, no early drouth, broken violently by thunderbolt and deluge; no -hail; no heavy winds to dry and sear; nothing untoward in the herd,--no -milk-fever, no abortion, no terrifying emergency at night. - -The only things to irritate Odell were the letters from Eris. They -aroused in him the dumb, familiar anger of Fanny’s time. - - * * * * * - -But after the first week in July there were no longer any letters from -Eris. The girl had written two or three times during June, striving to -explain herself, to make him understand her need of doing as she was -doing, the necessity that some of her own money be sent her. - -Her last letter arrived about the beginning of that dreadful era of -unprecedented heat and drouth which ushered in July and which caused -that summer to be long remembered in the Old World as well as in the -New. - -Odell’s refusal to send her a single penny, and his repeated summons -for her return had finally silenced Eris. No more letters came. Odell’s -attitude silenced Mazie, too, whose primitive sense of duty was to her -man first of all. - -Sometimes she ventured to hope that Eris might, somehow, be successful. -Oftener a comforting belief reassured her that the girl would soon -return to material comforts and female duties, which were all Mazie -comprehended of earthly happiness. - -Odell’s refusal to send Eris her money and her clothes worried Mazie -when she had time to think. But what could she do? Man ruled Mazie’s -universe. It was proper that he should. All her life she had had to -submit to him,--she had to cook for him, wash, sew, mend, care for his -habitation, bear his children, fed them, wean them, and, in the endless -sequence again, cook, wash, iron, sew, mend for these men-children -which she had borne her man. And it was proper. It was the way of the -world. Of heaven, too, perhaps. God himself was masculine.... She -sometimes wondered whether there really was any rest there for female -angels.... - -Of what other women desired and did,--of aspiration, spiritual -and intellectual discontent, Mazie knew nothing. For her nothing -desirable existed beyond the barbed wire. And yet, without at all -understanding Eris, always she had felt an odd sympathy for the girl’s -irregularities--had recognized that Fanny’s child was different from -herself, from her offspring--from other women’s children. But the -underlying motive that had sent Eris forth was quite beyond Mazie’s -ken. The resurrection of her sex came too early for her who had not yet -died. - -The farm year had begun prosperously. Until July there had been no -cloud on the horizon. In imagination Odell gazed across acres and acres -of golden harvest; saw a beneficent and paternal Government coming to -the relief of all farmers; saw every silo packed, every barn bursting; -saw the steady increase of the herd balanced by profitable sales; saw -ribbons and prizes awaiting his exhibits at County and State Fairs. - -Yet, very often after supper, when standing on the porch chewing his -quid as stolidly as his cows chewed their cuds, he was aware of a vague -unease--as in Fanny’s day. - -He could not comprehend the transmission of resentment from Fanny to -Fanny’s child. He could much less understand the inherited resentment -of a sex, now for the first time since creation making its defiance -subtly felt the whole world through. _Sub jugum ad astra!_ And now the -Yoke had fallen; stars blazed beyond. Restless-winged, a Sex stood -poised for flight, turning deaf ears to earthbound voices calling them -back to hoods and bells and jesses. - - * * * * * - -One stifling hot night in July, after two weeks’ enervating drouth, -Odell’s impotent wrath burst from the depths of bitterness long pent: - -“That ding-danged slut will shame us yet if she don’t come back! I’m -done with her if she ain’t in her own bed by Monday night. You write -and tell her, Mazie. Tell her I’m through. Tell her I say so. And -that’s that!” - - * * * * * - -The “ding-danged slut” at that moment lay asleep on the grass in a New -York public park. And all around her, on the hot and trampled grass, -lay half-naked, beastly, breathing human heaps--the heat-tortured -hordes of the unwashed. - - - - -CHAPTER VIII - - -July began badly in New York. Ambulances became busy, hospitals -overcrowded, seaside resorts thronged. Day after day a heavy atmosphere -hung like a saturated and steaming blanket over the city. The daily -papers recorded deaths from heat. Fountains were full of naked urchins -unmolested by police. Firemen drenched the little children of the poor -with heavy showers from hose and stand-pipe. - -Toward midnight, on the tenth day of the heat, a slight freshness -tempered the infernal atmosphere of the streets. It was almost a -breeze. In the Park dry leaves rustled slightly. Sleepers on bench and -withered sward stirred, sighed, relaxed again into semi-stupor. - -Two men in light clothes and straw hats, crossing the Park from West -to East, paused on the asphalt path to gaze upon the thousands of -prostrate figures. - -“Yonder’s a sob-stuff story for you, Barry,” remarked the shorter man. - -“There’s more than one story there,” said the other. - -“No, only one. I’ll tell you that story: these people had rather work -and die in their putrid tenements than work and live in the wholesome -countryside. You can’t kick these town rats out of their rat-ridden -city. They like to fester and swarm. And when any species swarms, -Barry, Nature presently decimates it.” - -They moved along slowly, looking out over the dim meadows heaped with -unstirring forms. - -“Perhaps,” admitted Annan, who had been addressed as Barry, “the mass -story is about what you outlined, Mike; but there are other stories -there----” He made a slight gesture toward the meadow, “The whole -gamut from farce to tragedy....” - -“The only drama in that mess is rooted in stupidity.” - -“That’s where all tragedy is rooted.... I could step in among those -people and in ten minutes I could bring back material for a Hugo, a -Balzac, a Maupassant, a Dumas----” - -“Why don’t you? It’s your job to look for literary loot in human scrap -heaps. Here’s life’s dumping ground. You’re the chiffonier. Why not -start business?” - -“I’m considering it.” - -“Go to it,” laughed the other, lighting a cigarette and leaning -gracefully on his walking stick. “Yonder’s the sewer; dig out your -diamond. Uproot your lily!” - -Annan said: “Do you want to bet I can’t go in there, wake up one of -those unwashed, and, in ten minutes, get the roots of a story as good -as any ever written?” - -“If you weren’t in a class by yourself,” said the other, “I’d bet with -you. Any ordinary newspaper man could go in there and dig up a dozen -obvious news items. But you’ll dig up a commonplace item and turn -it into an epic. Or you’ll dig up none at all, and come back with a -corker----” - -“I’ll play square----” - -“I know _you_! The biggest story in the world, Barry, was born a punk -little news item; and it would have died an item except for the genius -who covered it. You’re one of those damned geniuses----” - -“Don’t try to hedge!----” - -“Don’t tell _me_! Nothing ever really happens except in clever -brains. I can condense Hamlet’s story into a paragraph. But I’m glad -Shakespeare didn’t. I’m glad the Apostles were----” - -“You’re a crazy Irishman, Coltfoot,” remarked Annan, looking about him -at the thousands of spectral sleepers. “Shut up. I need a story and I’m -going to get one.... You don’t want to take my bet, do you?” - -“All right. Ten dollars that you don’t get the honest makings of a -real story in ten minutes. No faking! No creative genius stuff. Just -bald facts.” He looked at his wrist-watch, then at his companion. -“Ready?” - -Annan nodded, glanced out over the waste of withered grass. As he -stepped from the asphalt to the meadow a tepid breeze began to blow, -cooling his perspiring cheeks. - -A few sleepers stirred feverishly. Under a wilted shrub a girl lifted -her heavy head from the satchel that had pillowed it. Then, slowly, she -sat upright to face the faint stir of air. - -Her hat fell off. She passed slim fingers through her bobbed hair, -ruffling it to the cool wind blowing. - -Annan walked directly toward her, picking his way across the grass -among the sleeping heaps of people. - -As he stopped beside her, Eris looked up at him out of tired eyes which -seemed like wells of shadow, giving her pinched face an appearance -almost skull-like. - -Annan mistook her age, as did everybody; and he calmly squatted down on -his haunches as though condescending to a child. - -“Don’t be afraid to talk to me,” he said in his easy, persuasive way. -“I write stories for newspapers. I’m looking for a story now. If you’ll -tell me your story I’ll give you ten dollars.” - -Eris stared at him without comprehension. The increasing breeze blew -her mop of chestnut curls upward from a brow as white as milk. - -“Come,” he said in his pleasant voice, “there are ten perfectly good -dollars in it for you. All I want of you is your story--not your real -name, of course,--just a few plain facts explaining how you happen to -be sleeping here in Central Park with your little satchel for your -pillow and the sky for your bed-clothes.” - -Eris remained motionless, one slender hand buried in the grass, the -other resting against her temples. The blessed breeze began to winnow -her hair again. - -“Won’t you talk to me?” urged Annan. “You’re not afraid, are you?” - -“I don’t know what to say to you?” - -“Just tell me how you happen to be sleeping here in the Park to-night.” - -“I have to save my money--” She yawned and concealed her lips with one -hand. - -“Please excuse me,” she murmured, “I haven’t slept very well.” - -“Then you have _some_ money?” he inquired. - -“I have twenty dollars.... Money doesn’t last long in New York.” - -“No, it doesn’t,” agreed Annan gravely. “Did you work in a shop?” - -“In pictures.” - -“Moving pictures?” - -“Yes. I have a contract with the Crystal Films.” - -“Oh, yes. I heard about that outfit. It blew up. Did they ever pay you -any salary?” - -“No.” - -“How did you happen to hook up with that bunch of crooks?” he asked. - -“I don’t think they are crooks. Mr. Quiss isn’t.” - -“Who’s he?” - -“Well--I think he looks up places to photograph--and he supplies -extras----” - -“A scout. Where did you run into him?” - -“Near my home.” - -“Did your parents permit you to join that flossy outfit?” - -“No.” - -“I see. You ran away.” - -“I--went away.” - -“Could you go home now if you wished to?” - -“I don’t wish to.” - -“Then you must believe that you really possess dramatic talent.” - -Eris passed her fingers wearily through her hair: “I am trying to learn -something,” she said, as though to herself. “I think I have talents.” - -“What is it you most desire to be?” - -“I like to act ... and dance.... I’d like to write a play ... or a book -... or something....” - -“Like other people, you’re after fame and fortune. I’m chasing them, -too. Everybody is. But the world’s goal remains the same, no matter -what you are hunting. That goal is Happiness.” - -She looked at him, heavy-eyed, silent. She yawned slightly, murmured an -excuse, rubbed her eyes with her forefinger. - -“Which is your principal object in life, fame or fortune?” he inquired, -smiling. - -“Are those the principal objects in life?” she asked, so naïvely that -he suspected her. - -“Some believe that love is more important,” he said. “Do you?” - -She rested her pale cheek on her hand: “No,” she said. - -“Then what _is_ your principal object in life?” he asked, watching her -intently. - -“I think, more than anything, I desire education.” - -His surprise was followed by further suspicion. Her reply sounded too -naïve, too moral. He became wary of the latent actress in her. - -She sat there huddled up, brooding, gazing into the darkness out of -haunted eyes. - -“Do you think an education is really worth this sort of hardship?” he -asked. - -That seemed to interest her. She replied: - -“I think so.... I don’t know.” - -“What are you trying to learn?” - -“The truth ... about things.” - -“Why don’t you go to school?” - -“I’ve been through high-school.” - -“Didn’t you learn the truth about things in high-school?” - -“I don’t think so.” - -“Where are you going to learn it then?” - -She was plainly interested now: - -“I think the only way is to find out for myself.... I don’t know -anybody who can tell me reasons. I like to be told _why_. If I don’t -know the facts about life how can I write plays and act them? I _must_ -find out. I’m twenty, and I know scarcely anything worth knowing. It is -awful. It frightens me. I’m crazy to be somebody. I can’t be unless I -learn the truth about things. - -“There is nobody at home to tell me.... I couldn’t stand it any -longer.... I _had_ to find out for myself. Books don’t help. They -excite.” She looked at him feverishly: “It is a terrible thing to want -only facts,” she said. “Because nothing else satisfies.” - -He thought, incredulously, “Where did she get that line?” He said: “A -taste for Truth spoils one’s appetite for anything else.... So that’s -what you’re after, is it? You’re after the truth about things.” - -She did not reply. - -He said, always watching her: “When you know the truth what are you -going to do with it?” - -“Act it. Write it.” - -“Live it, too?” he inquired gravely. - -She turned to look at him, not comprehending. - -“Where are you going to get the money to do all this?” he asked lightly. - -“It is going to be difficult--without money,” she admitted. - -Something in the situation stirred a perverse sort of humour in him. He -didn’t quite believe in her, as she revealed her complexities and her -simplicities out of her own mouth. - -“The love of money is the root of all good,” he remarked. - -After a silence: “I wonder,” she said thoughtfully. “One needs it to -do good ... perhaps to _be_ good.... Nobody can tell, I suppose, what -starvation might do to them.... Money _is_ good.” - -“All things are difficult without money,” he said, pursuing his -perverse thesis. “The love of it is not the root of all evil. Money -is often salvation. Lack of it fetters effort. Want of it retards -fulfilment. Without it ambition is crippled. Aspiration remains -a dream. Lacking a penny-worth of bread, Hamlet had never been -written.... I think I’ll say as much in my next story.” - -His was an easy and humorous tongue, facile and creative, too--it being -his business to juggle nimbly with ideas and amuse an audience at so -much a column. - -Eris listened, unaware that he was poking fun at himself. Her shadowy -eyes were intent on his in the starlight. The white, sharp contours of -her face interested him. He was alert for any word or tone or gesture -done for dramatic effect. - -“So that’s your story, then,” he said in his gay, agreeable voice. “You -are a little pilgrim of Minerva in quest of Wisdom, travelling afoot -through the world with an empty wallet and no staff to comfort you.” - -“I understand what you mean,” she said. “Minerva was goddess of Wisdom. -We had mythology in high-school.” - -He thought: “She’s a clever comedienne or an utter baby.” He said: “Is -that really all there is to your story?” - -“I have no story.” - -“No ill-treatment at home to warrant your running away?” - -“Oh, no.” - -“Not even an unhappy love affair?” - -She shook her head slightly as though embarrassed. - -“How old are you?” - -“Twenty in April.” - -Annan was silent. He had not supposed her to be over seventeen. She -had seemed little more than a child in the starlight when she sat up -ruffling her bobbed hair in the first tepid breeze. - -She said seriously: “I am growing old. And if I have talent I have no -time to waste. That is why I went away at the first opportunity.” - -“What are your talents?” - -“I dance. I have acted in school plays. Once I wrote a one-act piece -for myself. They liked it.” - -“Go ahead and tell me about it.” - -She told him how she had written the act and how she had sung and -danced. Stimulated by the memory of her little success, she ventured -to speak of her connection with the Crystal Films. Then, suddenly, the -long-pent flood of trouble poured out of her lonely heart. - -“I drove over to Summit,” she said, “where they had been shooting an -exterior. Mr. Quiss introduced me to Mr. Donnell, the director. Mr. -Donnell said that they were just leaving for Albany on location, and he -couldn’t give me a test. So I went to Albany the next morning--I just -packed my night-clothes and walked all the way to Gayfield to catch the -six o’clock morning train. It was my first chance. I seemed to realise -that. I took fifty dollars I had saved. I have spent thirty of it -already. - -“At Albany Mr. Donnell had a test made of me. It turned out well. He -offered me a contract. I telephoned to my stepmother and told her what -I had done. I explained that I needed money.... I have some money of my -own. But my father wouldn’t let me have it. I wrote several times, but -they only told me to come home. They wouldn’t let me have any money. - -“Then, when the company arrived at the New York studio, Mr. Donnell -seemed to be in trouble. We were not paid. I heard Mr. Quiss say that -the principals had received no salary for a month. He said that Mr. -Donnell had not been paid, either. The carpenters who were building -sets refused to go on until they had their wages. Somebody cut off the -electric current. Our dynamo stopped. We stood around all day. Somebody -said that the bankers who owned the Crystal Films were in financial -difficulties. - -“Then, the next morning, when we reported for work at the studio, we -found it locked. I was sorry for our company. Even the principals -seemed to be in need of money. Mr. Quiss was very kind to me. He -offered to pay my fare back home. But I wouldn’t go. Mr. Donnell -offered to lend me ten dollars, but I told him I had twenty. He gave -me a nice letter to the Elite Agency. Mr. Quiss promised to keep me in -mind. But the agencies tell me that all the film companies are letting -their people go this summer. I can’t seem to find any work. They tell -me there won’t be any work until October.... I’m saving my twenty -dollars. And I’m wondering what I shall find to do to keep busy until -October.... Even if I could afford a room, I don’t need it. It is too -hot in New York to sleep indoors.... I can wash my face and hands in -the ladies’ room of any hotel. I give the maid five cents.... But I -don’t know what to do for a bath. I must do something.... I shall hire -a room for a day and wash myself and my clothes.... You see, twenty -dollars doesn’t go very far in New York.... I wonder how far I can go -on it.... Do you know what would be the very cheapest way to live on -twenty dollars until October?” - -After a silence Annan said: “I owe you ten for your story. That makes -thirty dollars.” - -“Oh. But I can’t take money from _you_!” - -“Why?” - -“I haven’t earned it. I had no story to tell you. I’ve only talked to -you.” - -Annan, sitting cross-legged on the grass, clasped his knees with both -arms. He said, coolly: - -“I offered you ten dollars for your story. That was too little to offer -for such a story. It’s worth more.” - -“Why, it isn’t worth anything,” she retorted. “I hadn’t any story to -tell you. I shan’t let you give me money just because I’ve talked to -you.” - -“Can you guess how much I shall be paid by my newspaper for writing out -this story you have told me?” he asked, smiling at her in the starlight. - -She shook her head. - -“Well, I won’t bother you with details; but your commission in this -transaction will be considerable. Your commission will amount to a -hundred dollars.” - -She sat so rigid and unstirring that he leaned a little toward her to -see her expression. It was flushed and hostile. - -“Do you think I am joking?” he asked. - -“I don’t know what you are doing.” - -He said: “I’m not mean enough to make a joke of your predicament. I’m -telling you very honestly that I can construct a first-rate short story -out of the story you have just told me. I’m workman enough to do it. -That’s my job. - -“Every week I write a short story for the Sunday edition of the New -York _Planet_. My stories have become popular. My name is becoming -rather well known. I am now paid so well for my stories that I can -afford to pay well for the idea you have given me. Your story is full -of ideas, and it’s worth about a hundred dollars to me.” - -“It isn’t worth a cent,” she said. “I don’t want you to offer me -money.... Or anything....” She laid both hands against her forehead as -though her head ached, and sat huddled up, elbows resting on her knees. -Presently she yawned. - -“Please excuse me,” she murmured, “I seem to be tired.” - -There was a long silence. Annan turned his head to see if his friend -Coltfoot still waited. Not discovering him, he inspected his watch. -Surprised, he lit a match to make certain of the time; and discovered -that he had been talking with this girl for more than an hour and a -half. - -He said to her in his pleasant, persuasive voice: “You’re not afraid of -me, are you?” - -She looked up, white and tired: “I’m not afraid of anybody.” - -“Well, you’re not entirely right. However, if you’re not afraid of me, -suppose I help you find a room to-night. You can afford a room now.” - -She shook her head. - -“You intend to stay here?” - -“Yes, to-night.” - -“You’d better not stay here with a hundred and twenty dollars in your -pocket.” - -“I shan’t take money from you.” - -“Do you want me to lose five hundred dollars?” - -“How?” she asked, bewildered by the sudden impatience in his voice. - -“If I write the story I get six hundred. I won’t write it unless you -take your commission.” - -She said nothing. - -“Come,” he said, almost sharply. “I’m not going to leave you here. You -need a bath, anyway. You can’t get a good rest unless you have a bath.” - -He sprang up from the grass, took her hand before she could withdraw -it, and drew her forcibly to her feet. - -“Maybe you’re twenty,” he said, “but some cop is likely to take you to -the Arsenal as a lost child.” - -She seemed so startled that he reassured her with a smile,--stooped to -pick up her hat and satchel, still smiling. - -“Come on, little pilgrim,” he said, “it’s two o’clock in the morning, -and the Temple of Wisdom is closed. Bath and bed is your best bet.” - -She pinned on her hat mechanically, smoothed her wrinkled dress. Then -she looked up at him in a dazed way. - -“Ready?” he asked gently. - -“Yes. What do you want me to do?” - -“Let’s go,” he said lightly, and took her by the hand again. - -Slowly through starry darkness he guided her between prone shapes -on the grass, and so along the asphalt, east, until the silvery -lamps of Fifth Avenue stretched away before them in endless, level -constellations. - -He was beginning to wonder where to take her at such an hour. But to -the sort of mind that was Annan’s, direct method and simple solution -always appealed. He came to a swift conclusion,--came to it the more -easily because it was an amusing one. - -“You’re not afraid of me, you say?” he repeated. - -She shook her head. “You seem kind.... Should I be?” - -“Well, not in my case,” he said, laughing.... “We’ll take that taxi--” -He hailed it, gave directions, and seated himself beside her, now -keenly amused. - -“Little pilgrim,” he said, “you’re going to have a good scrub, a good -sleep in a good bed, and a jolly good breakfast when you wake up. -_What_ do you think of that!” - -“I don’t know what to think.... I have found much kindness among -strangers.” - -He laughed and lighted a cigarette. The avenue was nearly deserted. -At Forty-second Street the taxi swung west to Seventh Avenue, south, -passing Twenty-third Street, west again through a maze of crooked -old-time streets. It stopped, finally, before a two-story and basement -house of red brick--one of many similar houses that lined both sides of -a dark and very silent block. - -Annan got out, paid his fare, took the little satchel, and handed Eris -out. - -“Is it a boarding house?” she asked. - -“One lodges well here,” he replied carelessly. - -They ascended the stoop; Annan used his latch-key, let her in, switched -on the light. - -“Come up,” he said briefly. - -On the landing at the top of the stairs he switched on another light, -opened a door, lighted a third bracket. - -“Come in!” - -Eris entered the bed-room. It was large. So was the bed, a four-poster. -So was the furniture. - -“Here’s your bath-room,” he remarked, opening a door into a white-tiled -room. He stepped inside to be certain. There were plenty of towels, -soap still in its wrapper, a row of bottles with flowers painted on -them--evidently for masculine use--cologne, bay rum, witch hazel, -hair-tonic. - -“Now,” he said, “your worries are over until to-morrow. There’s your -tub, there’s your bed, there’s a key in the door. Lock it when you turn -in. And don’t you stir until they bring your breakfast in the morning.” - -Eris nodded. - -“All right. Good-night.” - -She turned toward him as though still a little bewildered. - -“Are you going?” she asked timidly. - -“Yes. Is there anything you need?” - -“No.... I would like to thank you--if you are going....” - -“Little pilgrim,” he said, “I want to thank _you_ for an interesting -evening.” - -He held out his hand; Eris laid hers in it. - -“You needn’t tell me your name,” he said smilingly,--“unless you choose -to.” - -“Eris Odell.” - -“Eris! Well, that’s rather classic, isn’t it? That’s -an--unusual--name.... Eris. Suggests Mount Ida and golden apples, -doesn’t it?--Or is it your stage name?” - -Puzzled, smiling, he stood looking at her, still retaining her hand. - -“No, it’s my name.” - -“Well, then, my name is Barry Annan.... And I think it’s time we both -got a little sleep....” He shook her slender hand formally, released -it. - -“Good-night, Eris,” he said. “Lock your door and go to sleep.” - -“Good-night,” she replied in a tired, unsteady voice. - - * * * * * - -Annan walked through the corridor into the front bed-room and turned on -his light. - -He seemed to be much amused with the situation,--a little worried, too. - -“She’ll get in Dutch if she doesn’t look out,” he thought as he went -about his preparations for the night.... “A funny type.... Rather -convincing.... Or a consummate actress.... But she’s most amusing -anyway. Let’s see how she turns out.... She _looks_ hungry.... What a -little fool!... Now, you couldn’t put this over on the stage or in a -story.... Your public is too wise. They don’t grow that kind of girl -these days.... That’s romantic stuff and it won’t go with the wise -guy.... You can’t pull a character like this girl on any New York -audience. And yet, there she is--in there, scrubbing herself, if I can -judge by the sound of running water.... No, she doesn’t exist.... And -yet, there she is!... Only I’m too clever to believe in her.... There -is no fool like a smart one.... That is why the Great American Ass is -the greatest ass on earth....” - - - - -CHAPTER IX - - -Mrs. Sniffen, who had looked after Annan for thirty years, found him -bathed, shaved, and dressed, and busy writing when she brought him his -breakfast tray. - -“The gentleman in the other room, Mr. Barry--when is he to ’ave ’is -breakfast?” - -“It’s a lady, old dear.” - -Mrs. Sniffen’s pointed nose went up with a jerk. He had been counting -on that. He liked to see Mrs. Sniffen’s nose jerk upward. - -“A pretty lady,” he added, “with bobbed hair. I met her accidentally -about two o’clock this morning in Central Park.” - -When the effect upon Mrs. Sniffen had sufficiently diverted him, he -told her very briefly the story of Eris. - -“I’m writing it now,” he added, grinning. “Sob-stuff, Xantippe. -I’m going to make a little gem of it. It’ll be a heart-yanking -tragedy--predestined woe from the beginning. That’s what they want -to-day,--weeps. So I’m going to make ’em snivel.... Moral stuff, old -dear. You’ll like it. Now, be nice to that girl in there when she wakes -up----” - -He put his arm around Mrs. Sniffen’s starched and angular shoulders as -she indignantly placed his tray on the desk before him. - -“Leave me be, Mr. Barry,” she said sharply. - -Some of the parties given by Annan had been attended by what Mrs. -Sniffen considered “hussies.” Annan gave various sorts of parties. Some -were approved by Mrs. Sniffen, some she disapproved. Her sentiments -made a chilling difference in her demeanour, not in her efficiency. She -was a trained servant first of all. She had been in Annan’s family for -forty years. - -“Be kind to her,” repeated Annan, giving Mrs. Sniffen a pat and a hug. -“She’s a good little girl.... Too good, perhaps, to survive long. She’s -the sort of girl you read about in romance forty years ago. She’s a -Drury Lane victim. They were all fools, you know. I couldn’t leave the -suffering heroine of a Victorian novel out in the Park all night, could -I, old dear?” - -“It’s your ’ouse, Mr. Barry,” said Mrs. Sniffen grimly. “Don’t be -trying to get around me with your imperent, easy ways----” - -“I’m not trying to. When you see her and talk to her you’ll agree with -me that she is as virtuous as she is beautiful. Of course,” he added, -“virtue without beauty is unknown in polite fiction, and is to be -severely discouraged.” - -“You’re the master,” snapped Mrs. Sniffen. “I know my place. I ’ope -others will know theirs--particularly minxes----” - -“Now, Xantippe, don’t freeze the child stiff. I’m very sure she isn’t a -minx----” - -Mrs. Sniffen coldly laid down the law of suspects: - -“_I’ll_ know what she is when I see her.... There’s minxes and there’s -’ussies; and there’s sluts and scuts. And there’s them that walk in -silk and them that wear h’aprons. And there’s them that would rather -die where they lie than take bed and bread of a strange young gentleman -who follows ’is fancy for a lark on a ’ot night in the Park. ’Ussies -are ’ussies. And I’m not to be deceived at my time o’ life.” - -Annan chipped an egg, undisturbed. “I know you, Xantippe,” he remarked. -“You may not like some of the people who come here, but you’ll be nice -to this girl.... Take her breakfast to her at ten-thirty; look her -over; come in and report to me.” - -“Very well, sir.” - -Annan went on with his breakfast, leisurely. As he ate he read over his -pencilled manuscript and corrected it between bites of muffin and bacon. - -It was laid out on the lines of those modern short stories which had -proven so popular and which had lifted Barry Annan out of the uniform -ranks of the unidentified and given him an individual and approving -audience for whatever he chose to offer them. - -Already there had been lively competition among periodical publishers -for the work of this new-comer. - -His first volume of short stories was now in preparation. Repetition -had stencilled his name and his photograph upon the public cerebrum. -Success had not yet enraged the less successful in the literary puddle. -The frogs chanted politely in praise of their own comrade. - -The maiden, too, who sips the literary soup that seeps through the -pages of periodical publications, was already requesting his autograph. -Clipping agencies began to pursue him; film companies wasted his time -with glittering offers that never materialised. Annan was on the way to -premature fame and fortune. And to the aftermath that follows for all -who win too easily and too soon. - -There is a King Stork for all puddles. His law is the law of -compensations. Dame Nature executes it--alike on species that swarm and -on individuals that ripen too quickly. - -Annan wrote very fast. There were about thirty-five hundred words in -the story of Eris. He finished it by half-past ten. - -Rereading it, he realised it had all the concentrated brilliancy of an -epigram. Whether or not it would hold water did not bother him. The -story of Eris was Barry Annan at his easiest and most persuasive. There -was the characteristic and ungodly skill in it, the subtle partnership -with a mindless public that seduces to mental speculation; the -reassuring caress as reward for intellectual penetration; that inborn -cleverness that makes the reader see, applaud, or pity him or herself -in the sympathetic rôle of a plaything of Chance and Fate. - -And always Barry Annan left the victim of his tact and technique -agreeably trapped, suffering gratefully, excited by self-approval to -the verge of sentimental tears. - -“That’ll make ’em ruffle their plumage and gulp down a sob or two,” he -reflected, his tongue in his cheek, a little intoxicated, as usual, by -his own infernal facility. - -He lit a cigarette, shuffled his manuscript, numbered the pages, and -stuffed them into his pocket. The damned thing was done. - -Walking to the window he looked out into Governor’s Place--one of -those ancient and forgotten Greenwich streets, and now very still and -deserted in the intense July sunshine. - -Already the hazy morning threatened to be hotter than its humid -predecessors. Nothing stirred in the street, not a cat, not an iceman, -not even a sparrow. - -Tall old trees, catalpa, maple, ailanthus,--remnants of those old-time -double ranks that once lined both sidewalks,--spread solitary pools of -shade over flagstone and asphalt. All else lay naked in the glare. - -Mrs. Sniffen appeared, starched to the throat, crisp, unperspiring in -her calico. - -“She’s ’ad her breakfast, sir.” - -“Oh! How is she feeling?” - -“Could you lend her a bath-robe and slippers, sir?” - -He smiled: “Has she concluded to stay here indefinitely?” - -“Her clothes are in the tub, Mr. Barry.” - -“In the bath-tub?” - -“In the laundry tub.” - -“Oh. So you’re going to do her laundry for her!” - -“It’s no trouble, sir. I can ’ave them for her by early afternoon.” - -“You’re a duck, Xantippe. You look after her. I’m going down-town to -the office. Give her some lunch.” - -“Very good, sir.” - -He followed Mrs. Sniffen to the corridor, where his straw hat and -malacca stick hung on a peg. - -“Am I right, or is she a hussie?” he inquired, mischievously. - -“She’s an idjit,” snapped Mrs. Sniffen. “Spanking is what she needs.” - -“You give her one,” he suggested in guarded tones, glancing -instinctively at the closed door beyond. - -“Shall you be back to lunch, sir?” - -He was descending the stairs, his story bulging in his coat pocket. - -“No; but don’t let her go till I come back. I’m going to try to -persuade her to go home to the pigs and cows.... And, Xantippe, -there’ll be four to dinner. Eight o’clock will be all right.... I’d -like a few flowers.” - -“Very well, sir.” - -Annan went out. The house had cooled during the night and the heat in -the street struck him in the face. - -“Hell,” he muttered, “isn’t there any end to this!” - -There is no shabbier, dingier city in the world than New York in -midsummer. - -The metropolis seems to be inhabited by a race constitutionally untidy, -indifferent to dirt, ignorant of beauty, of the elements of civic pride -and duty. - -For health and comfort alone, tree-shaded streets are a necessity; but -in New York there is a strange hostility to trees. The few that survive -mutilation by vandals,--animal and human,--are species that ought not -to be planted in such a city. - -A few miserable elms, distorted poplars, crippled maples, accentuate -barren vistas. Lamp posts and fire boxes fill up the iron void, stark -as the blasted woods of no-man’s land. - -Annan found Coltfoot, the Sunday editor, in his undershirt, drops of -sweat spangling the copy he was pencilling. - -“You didn’t wait last night,” began Annan. - -“What do you think I am!” growled Coltfoot “I need sleep if you don’t.” -He picked up a cold cigar, relighted it. - -“Do I get your ten or do you get mine?” - -“There’s her story,” said Annan, tossing the manuscript onto the desk. - -“Is it straight?” - -“No, of course not. You yourself said that nothing really ever happens -except in the human brain.” - -“Then you hand me ten?” - -“I found a news item and made a story of it. As the girl is still -alive, I had to end my story by deduction.” - -“What do you do, kill her off?” - -“I do.” - -“You and your morgue,” grunted Coltfoot. “--it’s a wonder your public -stands for all the stiffs you bring in.... But they do.... They -want more, too. It’s a murderous era. Fashion and taste have become -necrological. But mortuary pleasures pass. Happy endings and bridal -bells will come again. Then you tailors of Grubb Street will have to -cut your shrouds according.” - -He glanced at the first pencilled page, skimmed it, read the next sheet -more slowly, lingered over the third--suddenly slapped the manuscript -with open palm: - -“All right. All right! You get away with murder, as usual.... Your -stuff is dope. Anybody is an ass to try it. It’s habit-forming stuff. I -don’t know now whether I owe you ten. I guess I do, don’t I?” - -“We’ll have to wait and see what happens to her. If her story works -out like _my_ version of her story, you’ll owe me ten,” said Annan, -laughing. - -“What really happened last night after I left?” demanded Coltfoot. - -Annan told him, briefly. - -“What,” exclaimed the other, “is that tramp girl still in your house?” - -“Yes, poor little devil. I’m going to ship her back to her native dairy -this afternoon.... By the way, you’re dining with me, you know.” - -Coltfoot nodded, pushed a button and dragged a bunch of copy toward him. - -“Get out of here,” he said. - - * * * * * - -Annan lunched at the Pewter Mug, a club for clever professionals, where -there were neither officers nor elections to membership, nor initiation -fees, nor vouchers to sign. - -Nobody seemed to know how it originated, how it was run, how members -became members. - -One paid cash for luncheon or dinner. The dues were fifty dollars -yearly, dumped into a locked box in cash. - -Of course, some one man managed the Pewter Mug. Several were suspected. -But nobody in the large membership was certain of his identity. - -Thither strolled Barry Annan after a scorching trip uptown. Wilted -members drifted in to dawdle over cold dishes,--clever youngsters who -had made individual splashes in their several puddles; professionals -all,--players, writers, painters, composers, architects, engineers, -physicians, sailors, soldiers,--the roll call represented all the -creative and interpretive professions that America is heir to. - -Annan’s left-hand neighbour at the long table was a boy officer whose -aëroplane had landed successfully on Pike’s Peak, to the glory of the -service and the star-spangled banner. - -On his right a young man named Bruce ate cold lobster languidly. He -was going to Newport to paint a great and formidable lady--“gild the -tiger-lily,” as Annan suggested, to the horror of Mr. Bruce. - -She had been a very great lady. Traditionally she was still a social -power. But she had seen everything, done everything, and now, grown -old and bad-tempered, she passed her declining days in making endless -lists of people she did not want to know. - -She was Annan’s great-aunt. She had never forgiven him for becoming a -common public entertainer. - -Once Annan wrote her: “I’ve a list of people you have overlooked and -whom you certainly would not wish to know.” - -Swallowing her dislike she wrote briefly requesting him to send her the -list. - -He sent her the New York Directory. The breach was complete. - -“What can you offer me that I cannot offer myself?” Annan had inquired -impudently, at their final interview. - -“If you come out of that Greenwich gutter and behave as though you were -not insane I can make you the most eligible young man in New York,” she -had replied. - -He preferred his “gutter,” and she washed her gem-laden hands of him. - -But the curse clung to Barry Annan. “He’s a nephew of Mrs. Magnelius -Grandcourt,” was still remembered against him when his name and -his stories irritated the less successful among his confrères. The -conclusion of the envious was that he had a “pull.” - -Bruce rose to go--a dark, sleek young man, trimmed in Van Dyck fashion, -with long, acquisitive fingers and something in his suave manner that -suggested perpetual effort to please. But his eyes were opaque. - -“Tell my aunt,” said Annan, “that if she’ll behave herself she can come -and live a sporting life with me in Governor’s Place, and bring her -cat, parrot, and geranium.” - -Bruce’s shocked features were Annan’s reward. He grinned through the -rest of luncheon; was still grinning when he left the Pewter Mug. - -Outside he met Coltfoot, hot and without appetite. - -“It’s ten degrees hotter down-town,” grunted the latter. “I’m empty, -but the idea of food is repugnant. Where are you going, Barry?” - -Annan had forgotten Eris. “I’m going to get out of town,” he said. “I -think I’ll go out to Esperence and get some golf. We can be back by -7:30. Does it appeal to you, Mike?” - -“It does, but I’m a business man, not a genius,” said Coltfoot, -sarcastically. “Did you ship your tramp girl home?” - -“Oh, Lord, I clean forgot her,” exclaimed Annan. “I’ve got to go back -to Governor’s Place. I must get rid of her before dinner----” - -He was already moving toward Sixth Avenue. He turned and called back, -“Eight o’clock, Mike!” - -“All set,” grunted Coltfoot. - -An elevated train was Annan’s choice. Preoccupied with the problem of -Eris, he arrived at No. 3 Governor’s Place before he had solved it. -He didn’t want to hustle her out. He couldn’t have her there at eight -o’clock. - -Letting himself into the little brick house with a latch-key, he -glanced along the corridor that led into the dining-room, and saw Mrs. -Sniffen in the butler’s pantry beyond. - -“Hello, Xantippe,” he said; “how’s the minx?” - -Mrs. Sniffen placed a cup of hot clam broth upon a tray. - -“Mr. Barry,” she said in an oddly altered voice, “that child is sick. -She couldn’t keep her breakfast down.” - -“For heaven’s sake----” - -“I made her some broth for luncheon. No use at all. She couldn’t keep -it.” - -“What do you suppose is the matter with her?” he demanded nervously. - -“Starvation. That’s my idea, sir. She’s that bony, Mr. Barry--no flesh -on ’er except ’er ’ands and face,--and every rib to be seen plain as my -nose!” - -“You think she hasn’t had enough to eat?” - -“That, and the stuff she did eat--and what with walking the streets in -this ’eat and sleeping out in the Park----” - -Mrs. Sniffen hauled up the dumb-waiter and lifted off a covered dish. - -“Toasted biscuit,” she explained. “She can’t a-bear anything ’earty, -Mr. Barry.” - -“Well,” he said, troubled, “what are we going to do with her?” - -“That’s for you to say, sir. You brought ’er ’ere.” - -He looked at Mrs. Sniffen and thought he detected a glimmer of -satisfaction at his predicament. - -“Where is she?” he asked. - -“In bed, sir. She wants to dress and go away but I wouldn’t ’ave it, -Mr. Barry. Ambulance and ’ospital--that’s what would ’appen next. And I -’ad a time with her, Mr. Barry. She said she was in the way and didn’t -want to give trouble. Hup she must get and h’off to the streets--But I -’ad ’er clothes I did, soaking in my tubs.... I let ’er cry. I don’t -say it ’urt ’er, either. It ’elped, according to my way of thinking.” - -“She can’t go if she’s ill,” he said; and looked at Mrs. Sniffen rather -helplessly: “Do you think I’d better call in a doctor?” - -“No, sir. I don’t mind looking out for her. A little care is all she -needs.” - -After a moment’s frowning reflection: “It will be awkward to-night,” he -suggested. - -Mrs. Sniffen’s nose went up: “The ladies will ’ave to powder their -faces in your room, Mr. Barry, and keep their ’ands off the piano.” - -He scowled at the prospect, then: “Here, give me that tray. I’ll feed -her myself.” - -He went upstairs with the tray, knocked at the closed door. - -“Tuck yourself in,” he called to her. “I’ve come to nourish you. All -set?” - -After a few moments: “Yes,” she said calmly. - -He went in. She sat huddled up in bed, swathed to the throat in a blue -crash bath-robe. - -“Well”, he exclaimed gaily, “I hear unruly reports about you. What do -you mean by demanding to get up and beat it?” - -“I can’t expect you to keep me here, Mr. Annan. I’ve been so much -trouble already----” - -“This is clam broth. I think you can keep it down. Sip it slowly. There -are toasted crackers, too----” - -He placed the tray on her knees. - -“Now,” he said, encouragingly, “be a sport!” - -“I’ll try.” - -The process of absorption was a slow one. She was very pale, and there -were dark smears under her eyes. Her bobbed chestnut hair accented -the slender purity of face and neck. Her hands seemed plump, but the -bath-robe sleeve revealed a wrist and fore-arm much too thin. - -“How does it feel?” he inquired, when the cup was empty. - -Eris flushed. He saw that it embarrassed her to discuss bodily ills -with him. Memory of her morning sickness deepened the painful tint in -her cheeks: - -“I don’t know--know what to say to you,--I am so ashamed,” she faltered. - -“Eris!” he interrupted sharply. - -She looked up, startled, her grey eyes brilliant with unshed tears, and -saw the boyish grin on his face. - -“No weeps,” he said. “No apologies. It’s no trouble to have you here. -And here you remain, my gay and independent little friend, until you’re -fit to resume this disconcerting career of yours.” - -“I feel well enough to dress, if Mrs. Sniffen would give me my clothes.” - -“Where would you go?” - -She made no reply. - -“Look,” he said, laying a hundred-dollar bill on the counterpane, “I -did your story this morning. Here’s your commission.” - -“Please--I can’t----” - -“Then I shall tear up my story and hand back to the _Planet_ six -hundred dollars that I need very badly.” - -She gave him such a piteous look that he laughed. - -That matter settled, he relieved her of the tray, set it outside, and -returned to seat himself in a rocking-chair beside the bed. - -“When they pull the galley proofs of your story, would you like to read -them, Eris?” - -“Yes, if I may.” - -“Why not? It’s your story.” - -“About--_me_?” - -“It’s the story of Eris. I call it ‘The Gilded Apple.’ It’s -sob-stuff. You begin to whimper after the first five hundred words. -Then it degenerates into a snivel, and finally culminates in one -heart-shattering sob.” - -She had begun to understand his flippancy. And now her smile glimmered -responsive to his. - -“If it’s really about me,” she said, “why is the story tragic?” - -“I gave a tragic turn to our adventure,” he explained. - -“How?” - -“I made myself out a bad sort. That was the situation,--a nice girl -out o’ luck, a rotter, a quick etching in of the Park situation--then -through remorseless logic I finish you in the spotlight. You’re -done for; but I drift away through darkness, complacent, furtive, -dangerous,--the bacteriological symbol of cosmic corruption,--the -Eternal Cad.” - -From the first moment he had spoken to her in the Park the night -before, his every word had fascinated her. - -Never before had she been in contact with that sort of mind, with the -vocabulary that was his, with words employed as he employed them. The -things this man did with words! - -Not that she always understood them, or their intent, or the true -intent of the man who uttered them. But this man’s speech had seemed, -suddenly, to have awakened her from sleep. And, awakened, everything he -said vaguely excited her. - -Blind, unknown forces within her stirred when he spoke. Her mind -quivered in response; her very blood seemed stimulated. It was as -though, shrouding her mind, vast cloudy curtains were opening to -disclose undreamed of depths darkly pulsating with veiled brilliancy. -Out, into interstellar space, lay the road to Truth. - -She thought of her dream--of her wings. She lay looking at Annan, -waiting for words. - -“Why do you look at me so oddly?” he asked, smiling. - -“I like what you say.” - -“About what?” - -“About anything.” - -No man is proof against the surprise and pleasure of so naïve an -avowal. Annan reddened, laughed, flattered and a little touched by his -power to please so easily. - -Looking at her very amiably and complacently, he wondered what effect -he might have on this odd little pilgrim if he chose to exert himself. -He could be really eloquent when he chose. It was good practice. It -gave him facility in his stories. - -Considering her, now, a half-smile touching his lips, it occurred to -him that here, in her, he saw his audience in the flesh. This was what -his written words did to his readers. His skill held their attention; -his persuasive technique, unsuspected, led them where he guided. His -cleverness meddled with their intellectual emotions. The more primitive -felt it physically, too. - -When he dismissed them at the bottom of the last page they went away -about their myriad vocations. But his brand was on their hearts. They -were his--these countless listeners whom he had never seen--never would -see. - -But he had spoken, and they were his---- - -He checked his agreeable revery. This wouldn’t do. He was becoming -smug. Reaction brought the inevitable note of alarm. Suppose his -audience tired of him. Suppose he lost them. Chastened, he realised -what his audience meant to him,--these thousands of unknown people -whose minds he titivated, whose reason he juggled with, and whose -heart-strings he yanked, his tongue in his cheek. - -“Eris,” he said with much modesty, “have you ever read any of my stuff?” - -“No. May I?” she asked, shyly. - -“I wish you would. I’d like to know what you think of it----” Always -with her in his mind typifying the average reader,----“I’ll get you my -last Sunday’s story----” He jumped up and sped away like a boy eager to -exhibit some new treasure. - -When he returned from his own room with the Sunday edition, Eris was -lying back on her pillows. Something about the girl suddenly touched -him. - -“You poor little thing,” he said, “I’m sorry you’re down and out.” - -Her grey eyes regarded him with a sort of astonished incredulity, as -though unable to comprehend why he should concern himself with so -slight a creature as herself. - - - - -CHAPTER X - - -About eight that evening Annan knocked and entered, and found Eris -intent on beef tea. - -“How are you?” he asked in his winning, easy way, leaning down to look -at her, and to inspect the broth. - -Her awe of him and his golden tongue made her diffident. She tried now -to respond to his light, informal kindness,--meet it part way. - -She said, shyly, that she was quite recovered,--sat embarrassed under -his amiable scrutiny, too bashful to continue eating. - -“I’m having two or three people to dinner,” he remarked, adjusting the -camelia in his button-hole. “I hope we won’t be noisy. If we keep you -awake, pound on the floor.” - -She thought that humorous. They both smiled. She looked at the camelia -in the lapel of his dinner jacket. He leaned over and let her smell it. - -“Tell me,” he said with that caressing accent of personal interest -which in such men is merely normal affability, “do you really begin to -feel better?” - -She flushed, thanked him in a troubled voice. Mustering courage: - -“I know I must be in the way here,” she ventured; “I could get up and -dress, if you’d let me, Mr. Annan----” - -“Dress? And go away?” - -“Yes.” - -“Go where?” - -“You forget what you’ve given me. I have plenty of money to take a -room.” - -“Do you mean that commission which brought me in five hundred dollars?” - -“You pretend it is that way.... Yes, I mean that money.” - -“You funny child, I don’t want you to get up and dress. You can’t go -yet. You’re not in the way here.” - -She said, solemn and tremulous: “I’ll never forget--your kindness----” - -“When you’re quite well again we’ll talk over things,” he said -cheerily. He was thinking that if she found him so persuasive he’d have -little trouble in starting her homeward. - -The front doorbell rang. He got up, gave her arm a friendly little pat. - -“I’ll look in later,” he said, “if you’re still awake.” - -He went away, lightly. She followed him with fathomless grey eyes; -listened to his steps descending the stairs--heard his gay greeting, -the voices of arriving guests--women’s laughter--the deeper voice of -another man. After a little while she continued her interrupted dinner, -gravely. - -Mrs. Sniffen arrived presently. She seemed as starched, as rigid, as -angular and prim as ever. But there was no disdainful tilt to her sharp -nose. For the Mrs. Sniffen who now approached Eris was not the chilling -automaton who had just admitted Annan’s dinner guests with priggish -disapproval. - -Eris, shy of her, looked up at her in some apprehension. - -“Well,” exclaimed Mrs. Sniffen with a wintry smile, “you _did_ eat it -all, didn’t you? That’s the way to grow ’ealthy _and_ wealthy, not to -say wise, isn’t it, now? ’Ome vittles ’elps all ’urts, big or little, -to my way of thinking.” - -“I enjoyed it so much, thank you,” murmured Eris. - -“And glad I am to ’ear you say it, Miss. ’Ave you quite finished?” - -“Yes, thank you very much.” - -Mrs. Sniffen took the tray, hesitated by the bedside: - -“I ’ope,” she said, “that you will soon be well, Miss.... New York is -just as bad as London, every bit! I know them both, Missy; and they’re -both uncommon nasty.” - -“I like New York,” said Eris, shyly. - -Mrs. Sniffen’s nose went up with a jerk. - -“And sorry I am to hear you say it,” she retorted severely. “Them that -has nice clean ’omes in the nice clean countryside don’t realise their -blessings, according to my way of thinking.” - -“Did you ever live in the country?” ventured Eris. - -“Turnham Green, Miss.” - -“Where is that?” - -“London. It was all dirt and gin and barracks when I was a kiddy. If -I’d a pretty ’ome in the nice clean countryside like you, Miss, I’d be -biding there yet, no doubt.” - -Eris shook her bobbed head: “I _had_ to come where I can have a chance -to learn something.” - -“And what, may I ask, Miss, would you learn ’ereabouts?” inquired -Mrs. Sniffen with elaborate irony. “There’s little to learn in -New York that’s good for a body. It’s only a big, ’ot, dirty -merry-go-round,--what with the outrageous noise and crowds and hurry -and scurry, and wild capers and goings-on. No, Miss, you’ll learn -nothing ’elpful ’ere, depend upon it!” - -Eris said, thoughtfully: “Only where are many people gathered is there -the foundation for a real education.... Good and evil _are_.... Only -truth matters. The important thing is to know.” - -“Who told you that?” demanded Mrs. Sniffen, amazed to hear such -authoritative language. - -“Nobody. But I’m quite sure it’s so. Books alone do not educate. They -are like roughage for cattle. There is no nourishment in them but they -help to digest Truth. I wish to see and hear for myself, and learn to -understand in my own way.... What _my_ eyes and ears tell me is what I -ought to think about and try to understand. And I believe this is more -important than reading in books what other people think of what _they_ -have seen and heard.” - -“God bless her baby-face!” exclaimed Mrs. Sniffen, exasperated. “Where -does a kiddy find such notions, and the outlandish words for them, now? -What are young folk coming to, any’ow, gypsying about the world as they -please these crazy days? It’s a bad world, Missy, and the worst of it -settles in big cities like rancid grease in a sink.... Not that I’m the -kind to push _my_ nose into others’ business. I know better. No, Miss, -I’ve troubles enough to mind of my own, I ’ave. But when I see a polite -and well mannered young person turn her back on ’ealth and ’ome to come -to a nasty, rotten place like New York and sleep in the public parks at -that, ’ow can I ’elp expressing my opinion? I _can’t_ ’elp expressing -it. I’m bound to say you ought to go ’ome; and it would be a shame to -me all my days if I ’adn’t spoken!” - -She seemed to be in a temper. She marched out with her tray, her -starched skirts bristling, her nose high. Opening the door, she looked -back wrathfully at Eris, hesitated, door-knob gripped: - -“I’ll ’ave some chicken for you before you sleep,” she snapped; and -closed the door with a distinct bang. - - * * * * * - -Downstairs, Annan had entertained three friends at dinner--Coltfoot, -Rosalind Shore, and Betsy Blythe. - -Of the making of moving pictures there is no end--until the sheriff -enters. And Miss Blythe helped make as many pictures as her rather -brief career had, so far, permitted. - -She was to have her own company now. The people interested finally had -“come across”; Betsy talked volubly at dinner. Gaiety, excitement and -congratulations reigned and rained. - -Rosalind Shore, another stellar débutante, already in her first season, -had won her place in musical comedy. She was one of those dark-eyed, -white-skinned, plumply graceful girls, very lazy but saturated with -talent. Which, however, would have meant little beyond the chorus -unless her mother, an ex-professional, had literally clubbed musical -and dramatic education into her. - -Indolent, but immensely clever, little Miss Shore’s girlhood had been -one endless hell of maternal maulings. She was whipped if she neglected -voice and piano; beaten if she shirked dramatic drill; kicked into -dancing school, and spanked if she loitered late away from home. Yet -she’d never have been anybody otherwise. - -She had Jewish blood in her. She was distractingly pretty. - -“Mom’s a terror,” she used to remark, reflectively. “She thumped me -till I saw so many stars that I turned into one.” - -She sang the lead in “The Girl from Jersey”--into which a vigorous kick -from her mother had landed her, to puzzle a public which never before -had heard of Rosalind Shore. - -The show ran until July and was to resume in September. - -The girlhood of Bettina--or Betsy--Blythe, had been very different. She -was one of a swiftly increasing number of well-born girls whom society -had welcomed as débutantes, and who, after a first season, and great -amateur success in the Junior League, had calmly informed her family -that she had made a contract with some celluloid corporation to appear -in moving pictures. - -New York society was becoming accustomed to this sort of behaviour. It -had to be. From the time that the nation’s war-bugles sounded assembly -at Armageddon, the younger generation had taken the bit between its -firm teeth. Nothing had yet checked them. They still were running away. - - * * * * * - -In Annan’s little drawing-room, where coffee had been served, -the excited chatter continued to turn around Betsy’s brand new -company,--this event being the reason for the dinner. - -Every capitalist involved was discussed, and pulled to quivering -pieces; every officer and director in the _Betsy Blythe Company, Inc._ -was dissected under the merciless scrutiny of four young people who -already had learned in New York to believe only what happened, and to -turn deaf ears to mere words. - -“Listen, Betsy,” said Rosalind Shore, “Mom says you’re all right with -Cairo Cotton and Levant Tobacco behind you.” - -“The main thing,” remarked Coltfoot, “is to begin in a businesslike -way. Don’t start off staggering under a load of overheads, Betsy. Don’t -let them take expensive offices. The people who’ll use ’em would have -to sit in a Mills Hotel if you didn’t provide a loafing place for them. - -“And don’t spill money down the coal hole for a plant. When you need -a studio, hire it for the length of time you expect to use it. Hire -everything. Spend your money on the people who’ll bring it back to you, -not on human objects d’art and period furniture.” - -“I know,” said Betsy, “but I can’t control those things, can I?” - -Annan said: “Perhaps you can. You know, socially, some of the people -who are putting up the money. Harry Sneyd has to account to them. He’s -handling you and you can handle him.” - -“You can see to it,” said Coltfoot, “that Levant Tobacco isn’t used -to pension a bunch of bums and dumb-bells. You can see to it that the -money is spent where it ought to be spent. Your people have got real -money. You can’t buy a good story for nothing; you can’t buy a good -director or a good camera-man for nothing. Those are the people to pay.” - -Rosalind nodded: “And low pedal on art-directors and carpenters,” she -added. “I’m not so sure that I need all I get. Scenery is on the -toboggan, sister Bettina. You don’t want expensive sets. Neither does -your audience. It wants you. And it wants your story. So don’t let -your bunch start rebuilding devastated France in your back yard when a -corner in a hall bed-room will do.... It will always do if the story -and the acting go over. I don’t have to tell you that, either.” - -“No interior ever made a picture,” agreed Annan, “and no exterior ever -saved one. But I’d go as far as I liked on the scenery that you don’t -have to pay God for.” - -Miss Blythe laughed: “Are you going to do a story for me, Barry?” she -asked. “You promised--when you were in love with me.” - -“I am yet. But your people don’t like sob-stuff any better than does -Rosalind’s audience.” - -“You don’t have to squirt tears into every story you write,” retorted -Betsy. “Did you ever see me cry? There are people, Barry, who manage to -get on without snivelling every minute.” - -“I never cry,” remarked Rosalind; “Mom spanked the last tear out of me -years ago.” She rose and moved indolently to the piano. - -Few professional pianists were better at her age,--thanks to “Mom,” who -had been a celebrated one. - -Rosalind talked and idled at the keys, played, chattered, sang -enchantingly, killed loveliness with a jest, slew beauty to light -a cigarette, cursed with caprice the charming theme developing or, -capriciously and tenderly protected, nourished and cared for it until -it grew to exquisitive maturity. Then strangled it with a “rag.” - -“You little devil,” said Betsy, tremulous under the spell--“I wouldn’t -strangle my own offspring as you do!--I _couldn’t_----” Emotion checked -her. - -Rosalind laughed: “It doesn’t matter when one can have all the -offspring one wants.... You’ll never get on if you’re too serious, -Bettina mia.” - -“That’s your friend Barry talking, not _you_,” retorted Betsy. “_He_ -can get away with it--sitting all alone in a stuffy room where his -readers can’t see him writing sob-stuff with his tongue in his cheek. -But you and I had better wear faces that can be safely watched, my -Rosalinda child!” - -“I want to ask you,” said Rosalind, turning to Annan, “whether an -audience can surmise what sort of private life one leads merely from -watching one on the stage or screen.” - -“I think so, in a measure,” he replied. - -“Then it does pay to behave,” concluded Betsy, walking to a mirror to -inspect herself. “Not guilty--so far,” she added, powdering her nose; -“--am I, Barry?” - -“Old Jule Cæsar’s wife was a schmeer in comparison,” he agreed. - -“I’ll tell you, young man,” she remarked, “I’ve found the Broadway -atmosphere healthier than it is in some New York younger sets.” - -“Is that one answer to why do young men haunt stage doors?” inquired -Coltfoot. - -“You miserable cynic,” retorted Betsy, “the sort of young man who does -that belongs in the sets I mentioned.” - -“Anyway,” added Rosalind, with lazy humour, “you and Barry are spending -a perfectly good evening as close to the stage as you can get. Why?” - -“Why,” added Betsy, “do men prefer women of the stage?” - -“Good God,” said Coltfoot, “take any Sunday supplement and compare the -faces of Newport and Broadway. That’s one reason out of hundreds.” - -“Few men chase a face that makes them ache,” added Barry, “even if the -atmosphere in some sets smells of the stage door.... Tell me, beautiful -Betsy, why you don’t canter about very much in your own gold-plated and -exclusive social corral?” - -“Because,” she replied tranquilly, “I have a better time with the -people I meet professionally ... mavericks from the gold-plated corral -like you, for instance. You and Mike and Rosalind are more amusing than -Sally Snitface or Percy Pinhead. And you’re far more moral.” - -“I wonder if I am moral,” mused Rosalind, shaking the cracked ice in -her glass. - -“God, your mother and your native laziness incline you that way,” said -Barry, gravely. “You’re better than good; you’re apathetic. Inertia -will see you through.” - -“It takes energy to be a devil,” added Coltfoot. “Your perfect angel -snoozes on a cloud. She’s too lazy to walk. That’s why she grew wings -and why you take taxi-cabs, Rosalind.” - -“I do. I use my legs sufficiently on the stage, thank you. Also, I -admit I like to snooze.” - -“Angel,” said Betsy from the mirror, “lend me your lipstick.” And, to -Annan: “May I ascend to the rear room and make up properly?” - -“No, go into my room.” - -“But there’s no dressing table there----” starting to go. - -“You can’t go up there,” he repeated. “I mean it.” - -The girl turned: “Oh, is there a lady there?” she asked with that -flippant freedom fashionable in certain sets, but mostly due to -ignorance. - -“There is,” said Annan, coolly. - -Rosalind did not believe it, but she said carelessly: “That’s rather -disgusting if it’s true.” - -“It’s true,” said Coltfoot. He sketched the story. Rosalind, who -had been sagging picturesquely, sat up straight. Betsy listened -incredulously at first, then with knitted brows. - -“I mean to ship her back to the old farm,” added Annan. “She needs a -wet-nurse----” - -“I want to see her,” said Miss Blythe abruptly. - -“Well, she isn’t on exhibition,” returned Annan in a dry voice. - -“Can’t I see her?” - -“Put yourself in her place. Would _you_ feel comfortable, lying in the -guest bed of a strange man? And would _you_ care to have a fashionably -gowned girl come flying in to stare at you?” - -Betsy gazed at him scarcely listening. She turned to Rosalind: - -“If she’s got as much nerve as that, couldn’t you or I do something?” - -“All right,” nodded Rosalind. - -“You’d better let her go home,” said Annan. “She has pluck and perhaps -talent, but she hasn’t the sense to take care of herself. You let her -alone, Bet, do you hear?” - -Betsy’s nose went up. “Mind your business, Barry. If she works for me -she needn’t worry.” - -“You’d better take her on, then,” said Rosalind. “Mom bangs me around -so that I’m too groggy to look out for anybody’s morals except my own.” - -Betsy came up to Annan and put her hands on his shoulders: - -“Let me see her; I shan’t eat her. I might use her. She’s a sandy kid.” - -“She’s twenty. She told me so,” he retorted. - -“It’s cruel to ship her back to the cows, Barry, when she’s gone -through such a rotten novitiate. I think you’re taking a great -responsibility if you use that easy and persuasive tongue of yours to -send her back to the stupidity she ran away from. Don’t you?” - -Rosalind said to her: “There’s no point in your pawing Barry Annan. -I’ve done it. He lets you. Then he does what he pleases.” - -Annan grinned faintly: Betsy suddenly slapped his face, not hard. - -“That complacent smirk!” she said, exasperated. - -Before Annan guessed what she was about, she turned and ran upstairs. -He followed, too late. The guest-room door opened and slammed, and he -heard the key turn inside. - -He returned to the drawing-room, laughing but irritated. - -“Little meddlesome devil,” he said, “talking to _me_ of responsibility! -Here’s where I wash my hands of the Eris kid. It’s Betsy’s deal now.” - - * * * * * - -It was. - -Eris, listening to the laughter and music below, lying wide-eyed on her -pillow, sat up startled and wider yet of eye when a scurry and flurry -of scented skirts, followed by the clash of a swiftly locked door -landed Betsy Blythe at her bedside. - -She stared at the breathless vision of flushed beauty, too astounded to -think of herself and her position. - -Down on the bed’s edge dropped Miss Blythe, radiant, cheeks and eyes -still brilliant from her victory. - -“I’m Betsy Blythe,” she said. “I heard about you. How fine and plucky -of you! What a perfectly rotten experience!... Tell me your name, won’t -you?” - -“Eris Odell,” said the girl mechanically, still under the spell of this -sudden brightness which seemed to fill the whole room with rose colour. - -“My dear,” said Betsy, “please forgive me for coming in on my head. -Mr. Annan tried to prevent me. You mustn’t blame him. But when I -heard how plucky you are I simply had to come up and tell you that -I’m going to ask my manager to take you on. I haven’t seen our first -script. They’re doing the continuity now. But I’m sure there must be -something--something, at least, to start you going--so you won’t need -to sleep in the park--you poor child----” - -She impulsively caressed one of the hands that lay on the quilt; -retained it, looking at Eris with increasing interest and kindness. -Suddenly, for one fleeting moment, the subtle warning that a pretty -woman feels in discovering greater beauty in another, touched Betsy -Blythe. And passed. - -“I’m in pictures,” she said, smilingly. “I should have told you that -first. I have my own company now. When you are quite recovered, will -you come and see me?” - -“Yes, thank you.” The eyes of Eris were great wells of limpid grey; her -lips, a trifle apart, burned deep scarlet. - -“You are _so_ pretty,” said Betsy,--“do you test well?” - -“They thought so.” - -“The Crystal Film people?” - -“Yes.” - -“I’ll have Mr. Sneyd give you another test. He’ll make you up. Or I -will. You know, of course, that it won’t be a part that amounts to -anything.” - -“Oh, yes.” - -“But it will be a part. We’ll carry you--not like an extra, you -see----” Betsy rose, went over to a little desk, wrote her address and -brought it to Eris. - -“You do forgive me for coming in to see you this crazy way, don’t you?” - -“Oh, yes--yes, I do----” Suddenly the grey eyes flashed tears. - -“You sweet child!” said Betsy Blythe, stooping over her. “You’re nice. -A woman can tell, no matter what a pig of a man might think. I like -you, Eris. I _want_ you to get on. I’d love to have you make good some -day.” She added naïvely: “--If only to put Barry Annan’s nose out of -joint.” - -Eris had covered her wet lashes with her fore-arm. Now she removed it. - -“Mr. Annan has been wonderful,” she said in a tear-congested voice. - -“Three cheers!” said Betsy, laughing. “You’re a loyal youngster, aren’t -you? Everybody likes Barry Annan. Several love him. But _you_ mustn’t,” -she added with a gravity that deceived Eris. - -“Oh, no,” she said hurriedly, “I wouldn’t think of such a thing.” - -At that Betsy’s clear laughter rang out in the room. Eris blushed -furiously; then, suddenly and swiftly _en rapport_, laughed too. - -“He’s so nice and so spoiled,” said Betsy. “That bland grin of -his!--and he _is_ clever--oh, very. He knows how to make your heart -jump when he writes. In private character he’s kind but mischievous. -He’ll experiment with a girl if she’ll let him. It interests him to -try cause and effect on us. Don’t _you_ let him. He has that terrible -talent for swift intimacy. That caressing courtesy, that engaging and -direct interest he seems to take in whoever he is with, means no more -than a natural and kindly consideration for everybody. It misleads some -women. I don’t mean _he_ does, intentionally. Only any man, seeing a -pretty girl inclined to be flattered, is likely to investigate further. -I don’t blame him. We do it, too, don’t we?” - -“I never did,” said Eris naïvely. - -Betsy’s smile faded and she gave Eris a sharp look. Then, abruptly, she -took both her hands and sat regarding her. - -“I’ll tell you something,” she concluded, finally. “Men won’t fool you: -you’ll fool them.” - -“I shan’t try to,” said Eris. - -“That’s how you’ll do it.... You’re unusual; do you realize it? What is -it that interests you most?” - -“I want to learn.” - -“I thought so. I’ve known one or two girls like you. Pretty ones.... -Almost as pretty as you, Eris. They raise the devil with men.” - -“How?” asked Eris, astonished. - -“Merely by being what they are,--absolutely normal under all -conditions. Men are completely fooled. To a man, feminine youth and -beauty mean a depthless capacity for sex sentiment. My dear, you have -very little of that sort.... Or, if you have any, it’s the normal -amount and is reserved for the great moment in life.” - -“What is the great moment in life?” asked Eris. - -“Love, I suppose.” - -“I do not think I shall have time for it,” said Eris, thoughtfully. - -“Good heavens!” exclaimed Betsy, laughing. “Don’t be unhuman!” - -“Oh, no.... I only mean that it’s--it’s a thing which has -not--occurred.... I have not thought about it, much.” - -“Nor wished for it?” - -“Oh, no.” - -“Still,” said Betsy, smiling, “we’re made for it, you know.... That is, -if we’re quite healthy.” - -“I suppose so,” said Eris absently. - -After a silence Betsy pressed her hands, rose, looked down at her with -friendly gaze. - -“I ought to join the others. You won’t forget to come? Please don’t: -I’d like to have you with us. Good-night, Eris. Get well quickly!” - -As she was going out: “Make my peace with Barry Annan,” she added. “I’m -in dutch with that young man.” - - * * * * * - -The slangy girl really was not. Annan, at the piano, pounding out a rag -while Rosalind and Coltfoot danced, merely called out to her that the -responsibility for Eris Odell was hers from that moment and if they -ever found the girl in the river it was none of his doings. - -Betsy smiled scornfully: “I’d trust that girl anywhere,” she said. -“Some day a girl like Eris will teach you a few new steps in the merry -dance of life, Barry.” - -“What new steps?” He continued playing but looked curiously up at -Betsy, who had come over beside him. - -“You’re so cocksure of yourself,” she said, “aren’t you, dear?” - -“You mean I’m a prig?” - -“No, just a very clever, good-looking boy with kind instincts and a -fatal facility. You think you’re real. You think you write realisms. -You’ll come up against the real thing some day. _Then_----” - -“Yes, yes, go on!” - -“Why,” she said, smiling at him, “then you’ll bump your complacent -head, my dear. _That_ will be reality. And maybe you’ll know it again -when you run into it. Maybe it will rid you of that bland grin.” - -“That’s a melting smile, not a grin, darling,”--pounding away -vigorously. “But tell me about this ‘real thing’ that I’m to crack my -noodle on.” - -“A girl, ducky.” - -“Sure. I’m cracked already on ’em all.” - -“The one I mean is named Nemesis and she’ll knock your silly head -off.... Like that child upstairs, for example.” - -“She’s got a Greek name, too. I’d better remember to ‘fear the -Greeks’--yes?” - -“Little Eris could double _you_ up.” - -“Wh-at?” - -“I don’t mean Eris in particular, dear friend. But one of her species.” - -“What’s her species?” - -“You, a writer!--and you haven’t even doped her out!” - -“I have, however,” he contradicted her tranquilly. - -“All right. Analyse her for me.” - -“Quantitatively?” - -“Certainly.” - -“Here she is then: clean, plucky, uneducated, obstinate, immature; and, -like any other girl, perfectly pliable when properly handled by an -expert.” - -“_You?_” - -“Oh, I wouldn’t say that, tweetums----” - -“You don’t have to say it. But I’m glad you think you’re an expert. For -it’s going to be _that_ kind of girl who will some day put a crimp in -you, Barry, and teach you what you don’t know anything about.” - -“What’s that, Rose of my Harem?” - -“Women,” she said maliciously, “and you make a living by writing about -them. And the Great American Ass believes you know what you’re writing -about!” - - * * * * * - -Coltfoot telephoned for his car after midnight and drove Annan’s fair -guests homeward. - -Annan, born with a detestation for sleep, locked up and put out the -lights unwillingly. - -As he passed Eris’ door on his way to his room, he halted a moment, -listening. - -“Are you awake, Eris?” he asked in a modulated voice. - -“Yes,” she answered. - -“That’s fine!” he exclaimed. “May I come in for a moment?” - -“Yes, please.” - -Her light was on. She was sitting up in bed. When he caught the first -glimpse of the radiant face, flushed with happy excitement, he scarcely -recognised the pinched and pallid girl of the park. In his astonishment -he thought her the prettiest thing he remembered ever seeing; stood -silent, quite overwhelmed by the unfamiliar beauty of the girl. - -Entirely unconscious of admiration, she smiled enchantingly--a piquant -and really charming picture in her bath-robe and bobbed hair. - -“Thank you so much,” she said, “for asking Miss Blythe to see me. She -pretended you wouldn’t let her come, but I knew she was joking. Miss -Blythe asked me to join her own company. I simply can’t sleep for -thinking of it.” - -He came over to the bedside and took a chair. - -“Eris,” he said, “I really didn’t want Miss Blythe to see you. I -thought you ought to go home when you recover.” - -She looked at him, startled. - -“Maybe I’m wrong,” he said, “but I think so, still.” - -After a silence: “You _are_ wrong.... But I know you mean it kindly.” - -“Hang it all, of course I do. You’re an unusual girl----” Betsy’s -words, she remembered--“and you interest me; and I like you.... And -I know something about Broadway.... It worries me a little--the -combination of you and Broadway.” - -“I--worry _you_?” - -“In a way.... Your inexperience.... And you don’t know men.” - -“No, I don’t know men.” - -“Well--there you are,” he said, impatiently. - -Yes, there she was,--in the guest-room bed of one of them. - -She said, tranquilly: “It is kind of you to be interested in me. I -feel it deeply, Mr. Annan. It seems wonderful to me, that a man so--a -man like yourself--should have--have time to care what happens to a -perfectly strange nobody.... But I _can’t_ go home.... Not yet.... I -shouldn’t care to live if I can’t have an opportunity to learn.... -So--so that’s _that_.” - -He, finally, laughed. “Is it, Eris?” - -“Yes,” she said, smiling at him, “I’m afraid it is.” - -“And that’s _that_,” he concluded. - -“Yes, really it is.” - -“All right.” He got up, stood fumbling with a cigarette. “All right, -Eris. If ‘_that’s_’ the verdict, I guess I was wrong. I guess you know -your business.” - -“No. But I hope to.” - -“You fascinatingly literal kid!----” He burst out laughing, went over -and shook hands with her. - -“Somebody else will have to milk the cows and feed the chickens. That’s -plain as the permanent curls on your bobbed head, isn’t it?” - -“Yes,” she said, laughing, “--and you’re so funny!” - -“Oh, I’m a great wit,” he admitted. “Well, little pilgrim, you require -sleep if I don’t.... I think I’ll go in and start a story.... Or -read.... _Your_ story is just beginning, isn’t it?” - -She ventured a timid jest: “_You_ finished my story for me, didn’t you?” - -“I did. When it’s published, and you read it, you’ll never stop guying -me, I suppose.” - -She still ventured pleasantries: “So you didn’t tell how I left the -Park and walked straight into an engagement, did you?” - -“My dear, I bumped you off to sneak-music. It goes, you know, with my -clients. They wouldn’t stand for what Miss Blythe did. Neither would -the _Planet_. I’d get the hook.” - -They both were laughing when he said good-night. - -He went into his room but did not light the lamp. For a long while he -sat by the open window looking out into the darkness of Governor’s -Place. - -It probably was nothing he saw out there that brought to his lips a -slight, recurrent smile. - -The bad habit of working late at night was growing on this young man. -It is a picturesque habit, and one of the most imbecile, because sound -work is done only with a normal mind. - -He made himself some coffee. A rush of genius to the head followed -stimulation. He had a grand time, revelling with pen and pad and -littering the floor with inked sheets unnumbered and still wet. His -was a messy genius. His plot-logic held by the grace of God and a -hair-line. Even the Leaning Tower of Pisa can be plumbed; and the lead -dangled inside Achilles’ tendon when one held the string to the medulla -of Annan’s stories. - - * * * * * - -He rose at his usual early hour, rather pallid, and parched by too many -pipes. - -When he left the house for down-town, Mrs. Sniffen reported Eris still -sound asleep. So Annan went away to deposit seven thousand words with -Coltfoot. - -“Off the bat just like that,” he said, tossing the untidy bundle onto -Coltfoot’s desk. - -“You mean that you did this story last night after we left?” demanded -Coltfoot. - -“That’s what I do, Mike,--sometimes. And sometimes I’m two or three -weeks on this sort of thing. I think I’ll go back and do another. I -feel like it.” - -“Probably,” remarked the other, “this is punk.” - -“Probably not,” said Annan serenely. “Are you lunching?” - -“Probably not if I read this bunk first. Is it really up to your worst -level?” - -“Your readers will wail like a bunch of banshees over it. It’s dingy, -squalid, photographic. What more does the Great American Ass require?” - -“That’s his fodder,” admitted Coltfoot. “Now g’wan outa here, you -licensed push-cart bandit!... By the way, how’s the park-bencher this -morning?” - -“Asleep when I left the house.” He seated himself sideways on -Coltfoot’s desk: - -“Mike, do you know she’s exceedingly pretty?” - -“How should I know?... But trust you to pick that kind----” - -“I forgot that you’ve never seen her. Well, last night after you left I -stopped to look in on her, and, honestly, her beauty startled me. She’s -beautiful thick chestnut hair and fine grey eyes, and the loveliest -mouth--its expression is charming!--and really, Mike, her arms and -hands are delicate enough for a Psyche. Maybe she milked and fed ducks, -but I can’t see any of the hick about her----” - -He smiled, made one of his characteristic, graceful gestures: “It’s -funny, but there she is. And yet, I’d not venture to use her in a story -‘as is.’ Because my wise guys wouldn’t believe in her. I’d be damned as -a romanticist. And you’d chuck me out of the Sunday Edition.” - -Coltfoot sat gazing up at him for a few moments, then put on his -reading-spectacles and pawed at a wad of proof. - -“I’m going to chuck you out of this office anyway,” he grunted. - - * * * * * - -Exactly why Annan chose to lunch at home did not occur to him until, -arriving there, Mrs. Sniffen handed him a note and announced the -departure of Eris Odell. - -“What!” he said irritably, “has she gone?” - -“About eleven, Mr. Barry. And would you believe that child would ask me -to take five dollars for making her bed? And she with scarce a penny. -What’s one ’undred and twenty dollars in New York? I could ha’ birched -her----” - -“Give me the note,” he interrupted, disappointed. Because that was -why he had come home to lunch,--to see this youngster who had so -ungratefully and rudely departed. - -He went upstairs to his room, seated himself, slit the envelope with -a paper cutter, and leisurely but sulkily unfolded the sheet of note -paper within. - -A hundred-dollar bank note fell to the floor. - - “Dear Friend,” he read,--a rural form of address that always annoyed - Annan,--“please do not be offended if I leave without awaiting your - return. Because I feel keenly that I ought not to impose upon your - great kindness any longer. - - “I am at a loss to express my gratitude. Your goodness has stirred - my deepest sensibilities and has imprinted upon my innermost mind a - sense of obligation never to be forgotten. - - “I shall always marvel that so well known and successful a man could - find time to trouble himself with the personal embarrassment of an - insignificant stranger. - - “What you have done for me is so wonderful that I can only feel it - but cannot formulate my feeling in words. - - “And thank you for the hundred dollars. But please, _please_ - understand that I could not keep it. - - “Confident in the promise of Miss Blythe, I shall venture to take - the room that sometimes I have taken for a single night. It is at 696 - Jane Street. - - “So good-bye--unless you ever would care to see me again--and thank - you with a heart very full, dear Mr. Annan. - - “Yours sincerely, - - “ERIS.” - - - - -CHAPTER XI - - -Annan had every intention of going to Jane Street. But Barry Annan was -that kind of busy man who takes the most convenient diversion in the -interims of work. - -He wrote a note to Eris, promising to stop in very soon; but week-ends -interfered. Then, in August, a house party at Southampton, another in -Saratoga for the races, and the remaining two weeks trout fishing in -the Maine forests, convicted him as the sort of social liar everybody -understands. - -But Eris was not anybody yet. She did not understand. There was not a -single evening she had not waited for him, not daring to go out lest -she miss him. - -Only when the Betsy Blythe Company departed on location did Eris -abandon hope and pack her little satchel for the Harlem & Westchester -train. - - * * * * * - -Annan, at Portage Camps, had a letter from Betsy Blythe on location, -dated from Cross River in Westchester. - - “Our first picture is called ‘The Real Thing,’” she wrote, “and - we’re shooting all our exteriors while the foliage lasts. This is - a wonderful spot for that--everything within a mile--and perfect - weather. - - “Frank Donnell is my director--a dear! And Stoll is our - camera-man--none better in the profession. Our people are pretty - good,--one or two miscast, I fear,--and we can get all the extras we - can use, right here,--it’s hick-stuff, my dear, and there’s poods of - it at hand. - - “My people bought Quilling’s novel for $50,000. You should have heard - Levant scream! But Dick Quilling can’t be had for nothing, and - Crystal Gray herself did the continuity. - - “I’m afraid to tell you how our footage stands--and no interiors so - far. But our sets will be few and will cost nothing. - - “Why should Tobacco shriek? We have our release already through the - Five Star, and we get back our cost of production. Isn’t that sound - business? - - “Besides, five weeks should be sufficient for studio shooting. We get - the Willow Tree Studios. Frank Donnell will do the cutting in the - Lansing Laboratories, and use their projection rooms. - - “I’ve a peach of a part if I’m up to it. Nobody else near me. Wally - Crawford plays opposite--a very trying kid--the good-looking, smarty, - rather common sort--all plastered hair and eyelashes--you know? - - “The other principals will do. - - “I’m _very_ happy, Barry. I could even believe you sincere if you - were here--I mean believe it for an hour or two of Westchester - moonlight. - - “I write Dad and Mother every night. They’ve been out here in the car - several times. Rosalind motored out Sunday. We had an awfully good - time. - - “Don’t you want to come up before we strike our tents and beat it for - the Bronx? - - “Yours contentedly, - - “BETSY B. - - “P. S.--I forgot to say that your little protégée, Eris, does - extremely well whatever is required of her. She plays one of those - self-conscious rustics, half educated, vain, credulous, and with a - capacity for a world of mischief. I’m a pig, I suppose, but I’m glad - Crystal Gray cut the part to slivers. Eris has no experience and no - training, of course, but she screens well, is intelligent, and does - exactly what Frank Donnell tells her to do. - - “She comes, diffidently, to sit in my hammock with me after dinner, - and curls up like a tired kitten. But, like a kitten, she is - receptive, responsive, ready to play or be talked to--an unspoiled, - generous nature already actively forming a character the daily - development of which is very interesting to watch. - - “I told her I was writing to you. She asks, _very_ shyly, to be - ‘faithfully remembered.’ - - “I, also, but _not_ faithfully. - - “BETSY.” - - - - -CHAPTER XII - - -A short story every Sunday would have grilled the brains out of -anybody, even a born story-teller. - -Perhaps quality might have suffered; perhaps the thread of invention -would have snapped had not Annan’s contract with the _Planet_ ended -with September. - -He had done twenty stories for Coltfoot in six months. Those stories -made Annan. It had finally come to--“Have you read Barry Annan in this -week’s number?” That, and a growing hostility always certain to be -aroused by recognition, were making of the young man a personage. - -From the very beginning, scarce knowing why, he had avoided the -shallow wallow of American “letters,” where the whole herd roots and -snouts--literati, critics, public,--gruffling and snuffling for the -legendary truffle disinterred and gobbled up so long--so long ago. - -Already the younger aspirants hailed him. Already the dreary brethren -of the obvious stared disapproval. - -The dull read him as they read everything. It takes all kinds of -pasture to keep a cow in cud. She chews but never criticises. - -Realists peered at him evilly and askance. His description of swill -didn’t smell like the best swill. There were mutterings of “heretic.” - -The “small-town” school found fault with his microscope. Waste -nothing--their motto--had resulted in a demand for their rag-carpets. -But here was a man who saved only a handful of threads and twisted them -into a phrase which seemed to do the duty of entire chapters. No, the -small-town school took a sniff at Annan and trotted on down the alley. - -As for the Romanticists, squirming and writhing and weaving amid their -mess of properties and scenery, what did they want of the substance -when the shadow cost nothing? - -No, Annan didn’t fit anywhere. He was just a good story-teller. - -Outside that, his qualifications for writing fiction were superfluous, -from an American audience’s point of view, for, to please that -audience, he didn’t have to write good English, he didn’t have to be -intellectual, cultured, witty, or a gentleman. But these unnecessary -addenda did not positively count against him. - - * * * * * - -He talked over the situation with Coltfoot, who was loath to lose him -and muttered of moneys. - -“No, Mike,” concluded Annan, “I’ve had my romp in your kindly columns. -You let me train there. I feel fit for the fight, now. I’m on tip-toe, -all pepped up.” - -“How much do you want then?” demanded Coltfoot, unconvinced. - -“Nothing. I’ve about a million things I want to try----” - -“Bosco,” nodded the other wearily;--“I know. But you’ll end in a Coney -Island show, matched against all comers to eat twenty-five feet of -sausages in twenty-five minutes.... Do a serial for us. We’ve never -tried it but I believe the newspaper is destined to put the magazine -out of business. I’ll take a chance, anyway. Will you?” - -“Maybe. I’m going to do a story--a kind of novel--a -thing--something----” - -“I’ll take it without sample or further identification. It may cost me -my job. Are we on?” - -“No, you crazy Irishman. Let me alone, I tell you. I may change my mind -and try a play, or a continuity direct,--hang it all, I might even -burst into verse. Do you want some poems?” he threatened. - -“No,” replied Coltfoot calmly, “but I’ll take them.” - -“I’ll do one farewell article for you. I’ll do it to-night. But that -ends it.” - -“How about the poems?” - -“You’re very kind,” said Annan laughing. “It’s just the yoke, Mike. It -hasn’t galled, but let me drop it for a while.... That stuff I did for -you--well, it’s out of my system. I don’t care, now, whether it’s good -or bad; I shan’t do any more anyway----” - -“Your public asks for it.” - -“I’m through----” - -“They want _that_!” - -“Well, I won’t do any more. I don’t want to. I can’t. I don’t think -that way any longer. Damn it, I’ve gone on----” - -“They haven’t!” - -“Let ’em stay put, then,” growled Annan. - -“You mean you are going to abandon your public?” - -“I move. If they don’t want to follow----” - -“No writer can afford to abandon his public,” said Coltfoot, seriously. - -Annan, also serious, said slowly: “The Masters we scribblers try to -follow went that way. They went _on_. Few followed them all the way.... -Poe wrote only _one_ ‘Tales of the Grotesque’; Kipling wrote only -one ‘Plain Tales from the Hills’; Scott one ‘Ivanhoe,’ Hawthorne one -‘Scarlet Letter’; Cooper, Dickens, Thackeray only _the_ one each.... -And there was only one ‘Hamlet.’... And but one ‘Inferno.’... And one -‘Song of Songs.’... And one ‘Iliad.’” - -He shrugged: “So maybe, in my own cheap little job I have hit my -high-spot with those stories of yours.... Maybe.... But I’m going on, -I’m going to write what I please if it costs me my last reader.” - -Coltfoot made his last effort: “Dumas wrote ‘Twenty Years After’?” - -“There was only one ‘Three Musketeers.’” - -“Sure.... The greatest romance ever written.... Sure.... All right, -Barry....” - -That evening Annan made himself some black coffee and wrote his -farewell article for Coltfoot. It took him only half an hour and it -left him too much keyed up for sleep. He called his article: “The Great -American Ass.” - -“September flowers gone to seed,” it began, deceptively; “withering -leaves and dry dirt--the Park and Fifth Avenue at their shabbiest. -Streets torn up, piles of sand, escaping steam, puddles of mortar, red -flag and red lantern crowning the débris, and the whole mess stinking -of illuminating gas: heat, dirt, noise--unnecessary, incessant, hellish -noise--seven million sweating people milling like maggots in the -midst--your New York, fellow citizens, on an unwashed platter! - -“_Of_ the metropolis itself there is scarcely any beauty--a church -here, an office-building there, one or two statues, a few dwellings: - -“_In_ the metropolis there is more beauty than anywhere else in the -world. It is to be found in the faces and figures of its women and -children. - -“For the beauty of woman is as usual in New York as it is rare in the -capitals of Europe. Without the charm, symmetry, vivacity of the faces -of her women, New York would be, indeed, the ugliest, dingiest, and -stupidest metropolis in the world. - -“Flower-like her pretty women bloom all over the arid, treeless -agglomeration of mortar and metal, serene amid the asinine clamour; -smiling, piquant, nourished by suffocating heat, flourishing in arctic -cold, hardy, healthy, wonderful in the vast abiding place of the Great -American Ass,--New York. - -“Here is his stronghold and he runs it to suit himself. Any woman -manages her own flat far better. - -“For your New Yorker comes of an untidy race, knowing neither civic nor -national pride in the proper sense. - -“His forefathers cleared forests and lived among charred stumps. He is -aware of no inborn necessity for beauty. - -“New York is the wastrel among states. Her sons pollute streams; her -country roads are vistas of bill-boards; even the ‘eternal’ hills that -line the Hudson crumble daily into cement. Here the Great American -Ass found a Paradise and created a Dump. He ravages, stamps out, -obliterates the lovely face of nature,--digs, burns, crushes, tramples. -Hundreds of miles of ghastly, charred forests mark the trail of the -Great American Ass among his mountains. Filthy sea-waves dash his -refuse upon his shores. - -“Loud, wanton, strident, and painted his metropolis sprawls, -unbuttoned, on the island leering at ugliness and devastation. And, -in her dirty ears, the ceaseless and complacent braying of the Great -American Ass. Her lover, Bottom, the eternal New Yorker. - -“Any woman’s kitchen is cleaner and her household run with greater -economy. - -“Poor bread--when France can teach him what bread really is--poorly -prepared food, making candy eaters of an entire people--an alimentary -viciousness unknown where food is properly cooked and properly eaten. - -“A _poor_ people, you New Yorkers, spite of your money--poorly -educated, bodily and mentally; poor in physique; poor sportsmen who -tolerate professionalism as your popular sport; too poor in spirit to -submit to universal service for the common weal. - -“So poor that your laws are made for you by the most recently settled -and most ignorant section of the nation. - -“The ‘Centre of Population,’ with its incubus of half educated women, -prescribes your bodily and your moral menu. And you become a metropolis -of moonshiners. - -“What are you, Manhattan? Ruins already, alas, to build upon--the -Yankee Ninevah trodden by an ass less wild. - -“And yet the endless caravans continue. Still, to New York come all -things, all people. And, alas, Youth comes too, and all afire to see -and learn and achieve. High ideals, high hopes, vigour, courage, face -to face with the Great American Ass enthroned amid the débris. - -“Youth floundering in the dump-heap bares a clean sword to hew its way -to beauty. And strikes a shower of ashes. There is no sympathy; no -audience for beauty in New York. - -“Dull eyes look on, dull minds weary. There is official inquiry as -to the purpose of ‘these here art artists.’ The waiter, taxi-driver, -janitor, gambler of yesterday are the arbiters of Art on Broadway -to-day. - -“It is not a sword that Youth needs in New York; it is a gas-mask. And, -somewhere, Destiny is already mixing mortar and Fate is baking bricks -for that coming temple that shall stand upon the futile ruins where, -some day, shall be disinterred the fossil bones of the Great American -Ass.” - - * * * * * - -Annan sent it to Coltfoot with a note: - - “This is a crazy article. You don’t have to use it.” - -Coltfoot used it. A few people laughed, a few protested, the Middle -West was angry, and the owners of the _Planet_ told Coltfoot to be more -careful. - -But the majority of New Yorkers liked the article, and grinned, having -been overfed on “our fair city” stuff. - -Besides, the tendency of the times was toward the unpleasant. - -Stilton and caviar are acquired tastes. - - * * * * * - -That night Annan made himself some black coffee and began his first -novel, “The Cloud.” - -About three o’clock in the morning he tore up what he had written and -smoked another pipe. - -“Oh, the rotten start!” he yawned, conscious that inwardly he was all -a-tremble with creative power,--like a boiler that taxes its safety -valve. - -The young vigour in him laughed its menace. All the insolent certainty -of youth was in his gesture as he flung the torn manuscript into the -fireplace. - -That night he embarked upon the sea of dreams. He seldom dreamed. But -this night tall clouds loomed in his sleep and an ocean rolled away. -His ship plunged on, always on, he at the helm. - -Far upon the storm-wastes pitched a tiny craft under naked poles, -hurled toward destruction. As he drove past her under thundering sail -he saw--for the first time in any dream--the ghost of Eris lashed to -the little helm, her death-white face fixed, her gaze intent upon the -last fading star. - -He awoke calling to her, the strain of nightmare an agony in his -throat, and shaking all over. But now, awake, he couldn’t understand -what had so terrified him in his dream, why he quivered so. - -“I suppose I thought she couldn’t ride out the storm in that -cockle-shell,” he muttered, gazing at the grey warning of dawn outside -his windows. - -The first sparrow chirped. Annan pulled the quilt over his ears, -disgusted. - -“I ought to look up that kid,” he thought. - -It was his last conscious effort until he awoke for another day. - - - - -CHAPTER XIII - - -Annan, leaving the Province Club--one of the remaining threads -attaching him to the conventional world--espied Coltfoot. - -They had not met in weeks, and they shook hands affectionately. - -“What are you doing these days, Mike?” inquired Annan. - -“Hunting geniuses as a dog hunts fleas. What’s your latest effort, -Barry?” - -“No effort. I am awaiting with composure the birth of my great novel.” - -“Any good?” demanded the other with professional curiosity. - -“It’s good enough to sell in Heaven,” replied Annan modestly. - -“Not so good then,” grunted Coltfoot. “And if that’s all you’re doing -this afternoon, why not saunter along with me?” - -“Gladly, but whither?” - -“To 57th Street. Frank Donnell is running Betsy Blythe’s stuff this -afternoon. Don’t you want to see it?” - -“Why, yes--of course.” - -Annan signalled a club taxi in waiting; they rolled away together, -Coltfoot directing the driver to go to “The Looking Glass”--quite the -most charming little motion-picture house yet erected on Manhattan -Island. - -“Albert Wesly Smull built it,” remarked Coltfoot. “It’s a gem.” - -“Isn’t Smull one of that bunch of sports behind Betsy Blythe?” - -“One of ’em. I hear ‘The Looking Glass’ is the first of a string of -picture houses that Smull means to build and operate.” - -“I supposed that Wall Street men had learned to fight shy of pictures,” -remarked Annan. - -“You can’t scare them away. It’s a bigger gamble than their own. That’s -why.” - -They stopped at the pretty bit of colonial architecture on -Fifty-Seventh Street, and entered a private corridor where an elevator -whisked them to the third floor. - -There were a number of people in Frank Donnell’s office. - -Donnell, prematurely grey, smooth-shaven and with the manners of a -gentleman, greeted Coltfoot who, in turn, made him known to Annan. - -Other men spoke to them, Dick Quilling--whose novel had been filmed for -Miss Blythe--a dapper, restless young man, eternally caressing a small -and pointed moustache with nicotine-stained fingers; Stoll, celebrated -camera-man, silent, dreamy and foreign; David Zanger, art-director, a -stumpy, fat man with no eyelashes, a round, pock-marked face, frayed -cuffs and dirty fingers. - -Annan, looking about, discovered Betsy Blythe, returned a smile for her -swift frown, and went over to make his peace for his long neglect of -her. - -“Where’s that blooming continuity you were to do for me?” she demanded -irritably. - -“I’m still evolving it, most beautiful of women----” - -“Gentle liar, you’ve never given it another thought. I suppose you -can’t help gazing at people as though you mean what you say, can you, -Barry?” And, to the man seated beside her--“You remember Mr. Annan, -Albert?” - -Albert Wesly Smull got up--an elaborately-groomed man of ruddy, -uncertain age. His expression, always verging on a smile, might have -been agreeable if less persistent. He had a disturbing habit of smiling -rather fixedly at people out of small, red-brown eyes. - -He knew Annan by sight, it appeared. They shook hands politely. - -“I used to see you in the Patroon’s Club,” said Mr. Smull. “I know your -aunt very well,” he added with his sanguine smile. - -“Probably better than I do,” said Annan. “I’m socially disinherited, -you know.” - -Smull’s reddish-brown eyes clung to Annan like two gadflies. - -“Your aunt is a very wonderful old lady,” he said; “--a great power in -New York under the old régime--” His eyes began to move, leaving Annan -and turning toward the window where people were grouped. - -“The grand dame is done for in this town,” remarked Betsy. “She’s as -important in these days as a stuffed Dodo.” - -Annan caught sight of Rosalind Shore near the window; Betsy shrugged -her congé; he went across to Rosalind, who stood with other people -looking at stills which Frank Donnell was sorting on a table. - -“Hello, ducky!” said Rosalind, extending one fair hand and drawing -Annan to her side. “We’re looking at Mr. Stoll’s delightful stills. -Isn’t this one interesting?”--holding up the finished photograph. -“How wonderfully Betsy screens! Look, Nan,”--turning to one of the -girls behind her; and then, remembering, she introduced Annan to Nancy -Cassell, a small, blond girl, as nervously organised as a butterfly. - -“Your stories in the _Planet_ have cost me many a tear, Mr. Annan,” -said Miss Cassell. “Why do you always exterminate your heroes and -heroines?” - -“Somebody’s got to thin ’em out,” he explained, “or they’d become a -pest like the sparrow and the potato beetle----” - -“If you don’t save a pair for breeding they’ll become extinct,” -retorted Nancy. “I’m going to join a hero-heroine protective -association with a closed season for mating.... Please join.” Her eyes -flickered provocation, curiosity, defiance. As usual he ignored the -challenge. - -Donnell, with his gentle but wearied smile, handed her a new -photograph, and offered a second to Rosalind. Behind them, in the -recess of the window, was another girl, and Donnell turned with kindly -courtesy and handed her a still. As he moved aside to give her room at -the table, Annan, also, politely made a place for her, noticing her -supple grace as she moved forward in silhouette, the sun, behind her, -outlining a curved cheek and slender neck. - -And suddenly he knew her. - -“Eris!” he exclaimed, delighted. - -“I was afraid you didn’t remember me, Mr. Annan----” - -A slim hand, scarce ventured, lay in his,--lay very still and cool and -unresponsive. - -“Eris,--_Eris!_” he repeated with a boyish warmth so unfeigned that the -bright colour slowly came into her face and her hand reacted nervously -to his. - -Rosalind gave them a lazy glance over her shoulder: “Ding-dong! Take -your corners,” she said, offering them a still in which Eris figured. -And, to Eris: “I’ll tell you something, my dear; if I screened like -you I’d quit squalling top notes.... _Look_ at her in this one, Barry! -Isn’t she _too_ sweet? Isn’t Eris wonderful, Frank?”--to Mr. Donnell, -who smiled in his amiable, tired way and sorted out more photographs. - -“Here, my dear,” said Rosalind, offering another still to Eris, “I can -stand a prettier girl than I am for just so long. But you and Barry may -admire indefinitely if you like.” - -The lovely colour of embarrassment came into the girl’s face as she -took the photograph thrust upon her: - -“Mr. Stoll gets the best out of one,” she protested. “The rest is all -in the make-up, Rosalind----” - -“The rest is all in _you_,” retorted Rosalind. “You’re scaring us all -stiff with your beauty. God help us to bear it.” - -Eris, holding her own picture, let her flushed glance stray toward -Annan as he bent beside her. - -“You’re coming into your own, Eris,” he said gaily. “I can see what you -have done for yourself already.” - -“You can see what _you_ have done for me,” she replied under her breath. - -“What?” - -“You gave me my chance.” - -“Nonsense. Betsy did that. You are doing the rest for yourself. You’re -making good. That’s evident. You’re happy, too.... Are you?” - -“Yes.” - -“Well, little pilgrim,” he said smilingly, “I guess you really knew -your business that night under the stars in the Park. And the credit is -all yours----” - -“It’s _yours_!” she interrupted with a sudden passion in her voice that -startled him. - -“My dear child,” he protested, but she went on breathlessly: - -“I know what you’ve done if _you_ don’t! You made it all possible. This -is what I craved; what I needed. It’s _life_ to me, Mr. Annan. And you -gave it.” - -“I had absolutely nothing to----” - -“You did! You had everything to do with it. From the time you spoke to -me in the Park to the time I left a letter for you, I _lived_ for the -first time in my life. You don’t understand. Kindness comes very easy -to you--and--and out of your rich store you are--are generous with the -treasures of your mind----” - -Something choked her; she averted her head. - -Surprised, yet half inclined to laugh, he waited a moment. Then: - -“You are so delightfully grateful for nothing,” he said. “I wish I -really had done you a service.” - -She spoke, unsteadily, still looking away from him: - -“You don’t understand.... I can’t trust myself now.... I seem to be -emotional----” She shook her head and he saw the bobbed hair glimmer -red against the sunny window. - -As they stood there in the curtained recess, Frank Donnell’s voice rose -above the general conversation: - -“Isn’t that operator nearly ready in the projection room?” - -Mr. Zanger left the room to inquire. - -Annan turned and accidentally encountered Mr. Smull’s fixed smile. - -Something in the persistent, sanguine gaze of the man annoyed him--as -though Mr. Smull had had him under impertinent observation for some -time without his knowledge. He turned to Eris: - -“I wish you really were under obligations to me,” he said lightly, -“--you assume imaginary ones so adorably. Shall we go and see how you -and Betsy behave yourselves on the screen?” - -She nodded with a swift intake of breath--let him draw her arm through -his. They followed the little crowd now moving toward the review room. - -Seated together there in the semi-darkness, they watched Frank Donnell -and Max Stoll take their places at desks on a raised platform behind -them. A stenographer, with pad and pencil, came in and seated herself -at Donnell’s elbow. - -Out went the lights except the green-shaded globe on Donnell’s desk. -The screen sprang into silvery relief. - -Donnell half turned, looking up over his shoulder toward the concealed -operator above: - -“All right, Jim. Don’t speed her too much. About 85. And watch your -frames.” - -“Are you ready, Mr. Donnell?” - -“Go ahead.” - - * * * * * - -No continuity was attempted. There were no titles, not even scratch -ones. Take followed take, faded or irised out. Nobody unacquainted with -the story could possibly follow it. - -In the darkness and silence there was no sound except the droning of -the machine, and Donnell’s calm voice occasionally,--“Frame! _Frame_ -her, Jim!” And whispered exclamations of approval at some unusually -beautiful shot of Stoll’s, or at some fragment revealing Betsy, -radiantly in action, or a butterfly flash of Nancy Cassell, or a lovely -glimpse of Eris. - -The door of the outer corridor kept opening and closing to admit -professionals arriving late. The darkness was becoming thronged with -people standing back against the door and walls. - -Once, as Betsy was enduring a chaste embrace from Wally Crawford, the -film broke. Everybody joined in the gaiety. Then the little audience -re-settled itself with scrape of chair and rustle of skirt as Donnell’s -shaded globe glimmered out, revealing a crowded room. - -Annan leaned over toward Betsy: “Good work,” he said cordially. “You’re -splendid. I hope the story is as clever.” - -“Thank you, Barry. Frank thinks it ought to go over.” - -“It’s beautifully cast and beautifully kissed, Betsy!” - -Coltfoot’s voice from the dark: “--But the censor won’t let you kiss -anybody but your grandmother.” - -“Great stuff, Betsy,” added Rosalind from somewhere. “God and the -Middle West will forgive that kiss!” - -“All set, Mr. Donnell,” came the operator’s voice from above. - -“Go ahead!” The light in the shaded globe snapped off; the drone of the -machine filled the room. On the screen Eris, in a rowboat, rested on -her oars and laughed at Betsy swimming toward her, pursued by her young -man. His permanent wave defied the waves. - -Annan thought: “Betsy is sure an artist or she’d never stand for the -beauty of this child, Eris.... I wonder how long she _can_ afford to -stand for it?” - -He bent close to the girl in the wicker chair beside him: “I couldn’t -know that you really had it in you, Eris, could I?” he whispered. - -“Do you think I have?” she breathed. - -He whispered: “I _know_ it. You are a born actress, Eris. Your work is -charming.” - -He felt her breath lightly on his cheek: - -“It’s all Frank Donnell: _I_ wouldn’t know what to do. He tells me and -shows me. I try to comprehend. I do exactly what he tells me.” - -“If you weren’t a born actress, even Frank Donnell couldn’t do anything -with you. It’s _you_, Eris. You’re intelligent; you’re lovely to look -at. I can’t see why your future isn’t in your own hands.” - -“I’m simply crazy to talk to you about it. Could I?” she whispered -excitedly. - -“Of course,” he said, much flattered. - -“I’ve wanted to for so long. There are so many things, Mr. Annan--and -you could tell me why.” - -Still the same, wistful cry, “Will you tell me why?”--and he remembered -it, now, guiltily, sorry for his long neglect. - -“Are you still living in Jane Street, Eris?” - -“Yes.” - -“Shall I come to see you?” - -“I haven’t a place to receive you.” - -“Only a bed-room? It wouldn’t do, I suppose.” - -“They wouldn’t let me. Mrs. Plummer is strict----” - -“Quite right.... Do you mind dining with me some evening?” - -She hesitated: “Where?” - -“Anywhere you choose. The Ritz?” - -“I haven’t--suitable clothes----” - -“If you feel that way, will you dine with me at my house?” - -“You’re so kind, Mr. Annan. I’d love to! When may I----” - -Their whispering was making somebody in front restless. Annan’s slight -pressure on her arm silenced her. He seemed to recollect that Mr. -Smull sat directly in front of Eris; and, again, very vaguely he was -conscious of irritation. - -There was no use in attempting to guess at the story which the machine -above was steadily unreeling. It all seemed an inconsequential jumble -of repetitions, full of aggravating close-ups--which better taste, some -day, will eliminate from the screen. - -When he thought Mr. Smull was again quiescent, Annan placed his lips -close to the unseen ear of the girl beside him: - -“Come Thursday at seven.... Shall I ask anybody else?” - -She shook her head. Then, turning impulsively to whisper to him, in the -darkness her lips brushed his. - -Instantly she recoiled, almost upsetting her chair, and he caught it -and steadied her. - -His inclination to laugh subsided. He could not see her face, but, in -the chilled silence, he was conscious of her dismay and of her rigid -body beside him. - -The shock of contact confused him, too. A delicate perfume of chaste -youth seemed to cling to him, invade him, disturbing his natural ease -and fluency. For the first time in his life, perhaps, he found nothing -flippant to say. - -For a long while they remained mute, unstirring, as the endless reel -droned on and on. - -Finally,--and very careful not to touch her,--he ventured to whisper: - -“Why not make it this evening--unless you are otherwise engaged?” - -He could scarcely hear her reply: “Mr. Smull is giving a dinner for -Betsy. I promised to go.” - -“_Who_ is giving the party?” - -“Mr. Smull.” - -Again he experienced a vague sense of irritation. - -“I thought you had no dinner gown,” he said drily. - -“Betsy offered me one of hers.” - -After a silence he said cheerfully: “I hope you’ll have a gay evening, -Eris. Call me up when you care to dine with me.” - -They watched the screen for a while, not speaking. Presently, however, -she whispered: “I wish I could, to-night. I’d rather be with you. I’ve -waited so long.... And now--I can’t! And I’m heartbroken, Mr. Annan.” - -He was beginning to realise that the candour of this girl held an -unsuspected but unmistakable charm for him. He said under his breath: - -“I’ll drive you home when this is over. We can plan things then.” - -“I can’t, Mr. Annan. Mr. Smull has offered to drive me home.” - -A disagreeable sensation--the same indefinite feeling--dismissed with a -slight shrug;--and suddenly, subtly, this girl’s position and his own -slipped into the reverse. Now it was he who seemed to have waited so -long for a chance to talk to her,--he who was becoming impatient. - -“Can you give me to-morrow evening, Eris?” - -“Oh, I’m sorry! There is another party. I promised Betsy to go with -her.” - -“Is Mr. Smull perpetually giving parties?” he demanded. - -“It’s somebody else. I don’t remember who. Mr. Smull is taking Betsy -and me.” - -“Have you any time at all to give me this week?” he inquired, the -slightest hint of sarcasm in his pretended amusement. - -“Yes. Thursday. May I come?” - -“I am flattered speechless.” - -He rather felt than saw her turn toward him in her chair, then subside -in silence. - -He leaned over, closer: - -“I _want_ you; I didn’t realise how much I wished to talk to you,” he -said. “I want you to come and dine at the house, Eris, and tell me -everything you care to. Will you?” - -After a while, slowly: “I need to ... if you’ll let me.... You don’t -seem to understand how much you mean to me. I never before talked to a -man like you. I’ve been wild to see you again----” - -“What!” - -“You know it!” she said passionately. “You fascinate me! If you’ll only -talk to me, sometimes, I can learn something!” - -“I’ll talk to you until you find out what a fraud I am,” he whispered, -still laughing. “On your own bobbed head be it! I’m not proof against -such charming flattery as yours. Is it to be Thursday, then?” - -“Please!--And thank you so much----” - -“Do you _promise_, Eris?” - -“I? Oh, you know I do. You are laughing at me, Mr. Annan----” - -“I’m very serious. I want you to promise to come--whether Mr. Smull -gives a party or not----” - -“You _are_ laughing at me!” - -“You listen to me! I’m never going to let you go again,” he said with -an ardour for which, later, he was unable to account. “This is the -beginning of a friendship. And that’s a serious business, Eris.” - -“Yes,” she whispered solemnly, “it is. How can I ever thank you? I’ve -dreamed of it often; but I didn’t dare hope for it.... Do you _really_ -feel as I do, Mr. Annan?” - -He had come to a point where he was not quite sure of what he did feel. -The increasing charm of her was confusing and upsetting him,--he having -suddenly to do with a kind of emotion to which he was naturally averse. -No woman had ever touched him, sentimentally ... so far.... What Eris -was doing to him he did not comprehend. - -In a sort of instinctive bravado he leaned toward her and laid his hand -firmly over hers. - -“You’re very generous,” he said. “I could have gone to see you and I -didn’t. That wasn’t friendly of me. Your loyalty makes me ashamed. If -you’ll give me another chance to be of practical use----” - -Her nervous fingers pressed his in protest: “No--not that! I thought I -made it clear----” - -“I didn’t mean--money----” - -“I’ll never accept it,” she whispered fiercely. “I only want _you_! -Don’t you know that I’ve been starved all my life and that you are the -first person who ever satisfied me! Can’t you understand what such a -man means to me?” - -Her amazing intellectual passion for him swept him clean off his feet: - -“I’ll never let you go again, never!” he whispered, not very clear as -to what he meant. - -She clung to his hand in pledge of the pact, every intellectual -aspiration excited, thrilled to the spirit by sheerest delight. - -As for him, emotions unsuspected and inextricably confused set his -youthful brain spinning. - -Disbelief, reluctance, fastidiousness, pride, perhaps, and constant -mental preoccupation had steered this young man clear of lesser -emotions. His few love affairs had been born of a mischievous -curiosity. No woman had ever really stirred him,--not even -intellectually. Women were agreeable to go about with, amusing to -analyse; characters to build on, to create. That was the real rôle they -played in his career. - -And now, for the first time in his life, emotional impulse had upset -his complacent equilibrium, and had incited him to say and do things, -the import of which was not very clear to him. - -And he hadn’t yet come to his senses sufficiently to analyse the -situation and discover what it was all about. - -In the darkness, beside her, the charm of her seemed to envelop him -progressively--steal stealthily through and through him, stimulating -his imagination, exciting his curiosity and a swiftly increasing desire -to learn more about her. - -The honesty of her admiration for him flattered him as he never before -had been flattered. Such naïve, such ardent adoration quite upset his -mental balance, and slightly intoxicated him. - -Nothing ever had so appealed, so moved this sophisticated young man. -And, add the girl’s beauty, and nascent talent to that, the total was -too much for him--might have been too much for older and more level -heads than Barry Annan’s. - -“Thursday,” he whispered, as she slowly released her hand from -his--freed it with a sort of winning reluctance. - -“Yes,” she breathed, “at seven.” - -“And many, many other hours together,” he added fervently. - -“Oh, I hope so.... Thank you, Mr. Annan.” - -Sitting in silence there he had a confused idea that never had he -encountered a feminine mind so utterly purged of material sentiment. - -“It behooves me to keep my own brain as clear,” he thought, -vaguely,--seeming to realise that it was no longer entirely so. - -Suddenly the drone of the machine ceased; the lights went on; the -screen faded. - -All around him people stirred, rose, turned to exchange impressions, -congratulations. - -The light sobered Annan. He turned almost apprehensively to look at -Eris. - -Something radical happened to him as he met her grey -eyes,--crystal-clear eyes, beautiful, unabashed. - -“Good-bye,” he said in a voice that sounded odd in his own ears. - -Once more he took her hand, and the contact stirred him to definite -emotion. Had she been experienced she could have seen much to astonish -and trouble her girl’s soul in this young man’s face. - -“Good-bye,” she said with adorable frankness, “--and thank -you--always--Mr. Annan.” - -As he went away toward the corridor where Coltfoot stood talking to -Rosalind, he began to realise that something had happened to him. - -Rosalind, seeing him, crinkled her eyes and wrinkled her fascinating -nose: - -“Did you turn her head, Barry? Is that child to follow Betsy and -myself? Everybody noticed you.” - -He said, annoyed: “She wouldn’t consider that very humorous.” - -Rosalind’s dark eyes widened lazily: “Did you suppose I meant it, -Barry? You’re rather crude for a subtle novelist, aren’t you?” - -“She wouldn’t understand it,” he repeated, annoyed. “She’s an unusually -sensitive girl.” - -He went on along the corridor to take leave of Frank Donnell. - -Rosalind looked at Coltfoot, inclined to giggle. - -“Don’t think it,” said Coltfoot with a shrug. - -“I don’t know--” Rosalind turned and looked across at Eris. Smull had -seated himself beside her in Annan’s chair. Other men gathered around -her. Her beauty startled Rosalind. - -“It would be funny,” she said. “That child has no heart. Neither has -Barry Annan.... They’re merely a pair of minds.... It would be funny if -they became entangled ... intellectually.” - - - - -CHAPTER XIV - - -They didn’t dine together at Annan’s house in Governor’s Place; or -anywhere else. - -Eris tried desperately to get him on the telephone. A few minutes -before train time she telegraphed: - - “Am leaving unexpectedly at three o’clock this afternoon for the - Pacific Coast. Heart-broken on account of our engagement. Shall write - from train. - - “Eris.” - -When Annan returned about six to order dinner and flowers, and to dress -for the rôle of host, he found her telegram. - -Whatever is snatched away from man or beast instantly becomes -disproportionately desirable. - -It was so with Annan. Suddenly he realised how much he wanted Eris. -Really he had not thought much about this dinner, except immediately -after their meeting at the _Looking Glass_. - -He had borne it in mind, impatiently the first day, pleasurably the -second, with complacent equanimity thereafter. But he _had_ remembered -it. - -For the moments of surprise and emotion so charmingly experienced in -the projection room had little else except surprise for a foundation. -Curiosity alone perpetuated them. - -To a young man agreeably immersed in his own affairs such episodes -became incidents very quickly. Only an unexpected obstacle evokes -afresh circumstances and emotions which have become vague. - -Her telegram did this. Disappointment, retrospection, regret, -annoyance, sentimental impatience,--these in sequence possessed the -young man as he sat holding her telegram. The only mitigation seemed -to be in her statement concerning her broken heart. That flattered and -helped. - -He was in no mood to dine out, but he didn’t want to dine at home -alone. The conflict continued, full of sentimental indecision. - -It ended by his ringing for Mrs. Sniffen, ordering a cold bite on a -tray, stripping to undershirt, chamber-robe, and slippers, and plunging -into his novel, now well under way. - - * * * * * - -About eleven next morning, in similar attire, and with an electric -fan whizzing in the room, he interrupted work long enough to open -the envelope which Mrs. Sniffen brought him and which bore a special -delivery stamp: - - “Dear Mr. Annan: - - “I tried to get you on the telephone up to the last moment. The - disappointment seemed too much for me after I had waited so long. I - could have wept. I didn’t; I don’t weep easily. But the vision of the - evening we might have had haunts me every moment. - - “This is what happened. The directors who finance the Betsy Blythe - Films suddenly decided to send us to the Coast for the new pictures. - The reasons, I believe, are economical. - - “Can you imagine the company’s consternation? We had no time to - prepare ourselves. If Mr. Smull and Betsy hadn’t stopped and taken me - in Mr. Smull’s car I couldn’t have caught the train. - - “My only consolation is that the play seems to be a good one and they - have given me a part--a darling part if I do it decently. I was to - have had only a maid’s part but Miss Cassell refused to go to the - Coast and there wasn’t time to recast the part. - - “Even then I don’t think they’d have given it to me if Mr. Smull - hadn’t said that he’d like me to have it. I pray humbly that I may be - equal to it. Never has anything so excited me as this chance. - - “But if only I could have known it, and spent every second talking - it over with you! I don’t mean that Mr. Donnell is not my hope and - salvation; but you are _you_, Mr. Annan, and there is no other man’s - mind that stimulates and enthralls mine as yours does. - - “Please don’t forget me. Please write to me. I know it is a very - great deal to ask of such a man. But you _are_ kind, and you are - famous; and I am ignorant and a nobody. Whatever you say helps. - Just your voice, even your smile, acts on me like intellectual - tonics--that lazy, wise, kindly, perplexing smile, so mischievously - experienced, that encourages yet warns! I _wanted_ it so desperately. - I needed it--and you--just when I felt that my career was beginning. - Oh, Mr. Annan, please understand and please, please don’t forget me. - - “Eris.” - -In a postscript she gave her address in Los Angeles. - - * * * * * - -Much flattered and genuinely touched, he wrote her immediately. - -The glamour lasted for the next few weeks. Complacency is a great -stimulation to memory. A bland satisfaction in the ardent mental -attitude of Eris toward himself incited him to real effort in his -letters. He became expansive--a trifle sentimental when he thought of -the girl’s beauty--but only airily so--and he rather settled down to a -Chesterfieldian attitude toward his unusual and odd little protégée. - -Wisdom in wads he administered with a surprising solemnity foreign to -his accustomed attitude toward himself. - -However, his flippancy _was_ an attitude as far as it concerned his -belief in himself. Because this young man really took himself very -devoutly. - -He prescribed a course of reading for Eris. He formulated rules of -conduct, exposed pitfalls, impressed maxims in epigrams, discoursed on -creative and interpretive art. It was perversely clever. He used some -of the material in his novel. - -This was all very well. The girl’s letters were charming and touching; -the correspondence was excellent practice for him, and part of it could -be salvaged for practical ends. - -But there were in use at that time, among the semi-educated, two -cant-words which the public, now, was working to rags;--_psychology_ -and _complex_. - -And it was these words that suggested to Annan that his letters to Eris -might, more profitably to himself, become experiments in research and -vivisection. - -Toward that angle,--and with all the delicacy and technical skill -possessed by him,--he started a cautious exploration of her character -as a “type,” including that untouched and undiscovered side which -comprehended the impulses, material motives, emotional passions, -popularly attributed to the human heart in contradistinction to -phenomena purely intellectual. - -Several letters came from her without any notice being taken of his -investigations. Apparently she either possessed no such side to her -character or else she did not understand him. Anyway, there was no -response, and therefore no revelation of herself to satisfy his -professional curiosity. - -One thing seemed to become clearer and clearer; he had not appealed to -this girl except intellectually. Of lesser sentiment in her there was -not a hint or a trace in all her correspondence--only ardent gratitude -for material kindness and passionate response to a generous mind that -had offered itself to a starved one. - -He had concluded that his subtle and mischievous epistolary -philandering was not destined to reveal any dormant inclinations to -response in Eris--much less any natural aptitude or acquired skill. - -And he was debating in his leisure moments whether or not such total -unconsciousness was normal or otherwise, when out of a serene sky came -a letter from her in reply to his last and cleverest experiment in -reactions: - - “Dear Mr. Annan: - - “Until rather lately it never occurred to me to analyse my feeling of - friendship for you. - - “I don’t know exactly how to. I have tried. It confuses me. - - “I like _everything_ you say. I didn’t realise I was silent - concerning any phase of our friendship. But I had not thought of your - having any liking for me outside of your natural kindness to me. Or - that I had any personal charm for you; or that you might like to be - with me even if we do not say a word to each other. - - “That idea of companionship had not entered my head. But now that you - have spoken of it--or your letters, lately, have seemed to suggest - it--I am venturing to reply that, just being with you is a pleasure - to me ... just to walk with you and remain mentally idle, I mean. I - realised it only when you spoke of it. - - “Friendship seems to be very complex. You must remember that this - is my first intelligent friendship. It quite overshadows all other - associations. So I really do not know just where my feeling for you - could fail to include all the best that is in me. - - “I’d like to talk to you about it. If only you were here! Do you know - that if it were not for your letters I’d be unhappy here, in spite of - my beloved profession? - - “Is this what you would like to have me say to you? - - “You drew a picture of yourself as a brain on two legs; and of me in - academic cap and gown, with a silly expression on my face, clasping - both hands in ecstasy before you. Out of your brain comes a balloon - with something written in Latin--‘Animus est in patinis.’ - - “I asked Mr. Donnell. He said it meant, ‘My mind is among the - sauce-pans.’ In other words, you mean that your mind sometimes - harbours material thoughts, while mine is the stupid, empty mind of a - horrid, unhuman, intellectual sponge! - - “That is very impudent of you. Good heavens, if I _am_ like that, it - will ruin me for my profession! - - “Experience is what I lack. I sit and actually beat my head with both - hands when, at moments, I catch a glimmer of all that I ought to be - and ought to have experienced, and ought to know. - - “Education is everything! One’s career depends on it. Yet, _is_ - experience necessary to education? It can not always be. The prospect - would seem terrifying. And of course any such theory becomes - ridiculous in the last analysis. - - “We were discussing that question the other evening--Mr. Donnell, - Betsy, Mr. Smull--he arrived unexpectedly last Monday--and I was - listening, not taking part in the discussion--when Mr. Smull said - that nobody was fit to play a person in love unless he or she had - actually been in love. - - “You know that startled me. After a while it scared me, too. - - “I asked Mr. Donnell, privately, if that were true, and he laughed - and said that several perfectly respectable women, guiltless of - murder, had successfully played Lady Macbeth. - - “But I’m still wondering. Of course it isn’t necessary to murder - somebody in order to play the part of an assassin. - - “But murder is an overt act. A murderous state of mind need not have - any concrete consequence. - - “Love, also, must be a state of mind. - - “So do you think that one must have been actually in love to - interpret convincingly in a play whatever results of love are to be - presented? - - “I asked Betsy. She said yes. So I suppose she has been in love, - because she does her part convincingly. - - “But what about me if ever I am cast for such a part? Yet, it seems - to me that I ought to have enough instinct and intelligence to know - how to be convincing. - - “You see Mr. Smull wants me to play second to Betsy in the next - production; and the part is a girl in love who has a most unhappy - time until the very end of the play. - - “One can study, read up, and prepare; but one can not enter into - _that_ state of mind at will. - - “So, if they give me the part I have concluded to approximate by - thinking of my friendship for you, which is the most important event - in my life. - - “It ought to represent the state of mind in question. It’s got to. Do - you think I could play that part convincingly? Why not? Because my - idea of a person in love is that there is only one object of supreme - affection. And I don’t care for anybody as much as I do for you. Why - can’t I build on that?----” - -Charmed, humiliated, thrilled by her candour, the humour of her appeal -went straight home to Annan. - -For here was this girl innocently proposing to analyse and use her -friendship for him to aid her in her profession;--the very thing that -he had been doing so cynically. - -Every word she wrote was helping him, professionally. Every line he had -written in reply was evidently a source of professional inspiration to -her. - -It was not flattering to him, but it was funny. And, somehow, it -knocked sentiment out of his letters: knocked out the letters, too, -toward the end of the year. - -The anesthetic of old Doctor Time is certain and irresistible. Sooner -or later constancy fades, memory evaporates, humanity succumbs. Only -the dog resists the anesthetic of old Doctor Time. - - * * * * * - -By February Annan had been in arrears for two months; and the effort to -re-open the correspondence bored him. - -Pigeon-holed, the memory of her would keep sufficiently fresh until -such time--if ever--she was resurrected in the flesh and came again -into the trail he travelled through life. - -He heard of her occasionally when he encountered Rosalind, who -corresponded with Betsy. - -Eris was being favourably discussed on the Coast. - - * * * * * - -In March a Betsy Blythe film was shown at _The Looking -Glass_,--following that first film, parts of which he had seen the -previous autumn in the projection room. - -Once or twice he attempted to see the new picture--rather as a sort of -obligation--but the place was crowded. Somehow time passed very swiftly -for Annan; and when again he thought about it the picture was gone; and -a new Betsy Blythe picture had replaced it,--playing to a crowded house -as before;--and Annan went once, failed to get in, and let it slip his -memory. - -Not that his conscience did not meddle with his complacency at times. -It did. - -Her last three letters still remained unanswered. - -But his novel was the vital, supreme thing which crowded out all -else--even the several pretty and receptive girls whose stellar orbits -had intersected his during the winter and early spring. - -The joy of literary achievement was his chiefest pleasure; its perils -his excitement, its fatigue the principal sleep-inducer that sent him -at last to a tardy pillow. - -Coltfoot read a typed copy. - -“It’ll be the making of you, I suppose,” he said, “but it’s all wrong, -Barry. Popular and punk!” - -“Why the devil do you say that?” - -“It _is_ wrong.” - -They were dining at Annan’s _à deux_, and had strolled into the -living-room with their cigars. - -“You sit down, Mike, and tell me why my book is popular and punk!” said -Annan wrathfully. - -Coltfoot dropped onto the piano stool, sounded a few dissonances -evolved by a master-modernist; sneered. - -“Barry,” he said, “if art isn’t wholesome it’s only near-art. What is -good is also healthy. If art is good it is sane, always; and always -beautiful.” - -“I’ve heard that song you sing. It’s an ancient rag, Mike.” - -“It’s real music, Barry--not _this_!--” he struck a series of -dissonant, ugly, half-crazed chords from the most modern creation of -the most modern of modernists. “That’s diseased,” he said. “There is no -virtue, no beauty, no art in disease.” - -“Of course,” remarked Annan, “I might mention ambergris, -paté-de-fois-gras, the virtues of ergot, the play of colour, and the -flower-like perfume of a dying grayling, and the----” - -“If you’re going to be flippant----” - -“No. Go on, Mike.” - -“Barry, do you understand the origin of this modern ‘revolt’--this -sinister cult of dullness, perversity, ugliness? It was born in -Bolshevism. Which is degeneracy. It is the worship of ugliness. It is -known to scientists as Satanism. - -“Once the prisons and asylums were the ultimate destinations of the -degenerate. Because degenerates, then, had no safe outlet in the fine -arts. Their manifestations were matters for police control. - -“Now, they have their outlets in literature, drama, music, sculpture, -painting. And their vicious or crazy creations profoundly impress The -Great American Ass. Why? Because he’s ignorant, and art awes him. But -he’s also, physically, a healthy beast, and he doesn’t understand the -degeneracy that masquerades as art. - -“What is ugly, morbid, dull, rotten, cynical, pessimistic, is -degenerate. To dwell upon disease in creative work is degeneracy. To -seek out, analyse, celebrate, perpetuate ugliness, deformity, decay, is -degeneracy. - -“Yet, that is modernism. That is the trend. That is what is being done. -That is what the new generation of creative genius offers,--and what it -calls realism,--a dreary multiplicity of photographic items; a sordid -recapitulation of daily and meaningless details; inspiration from -models of distorted minds and bodies; ugliness lovingly delved for and -dragged out into clean sunshine; triumphant exposure of the mentally, -morally, and physically crippled. - -“But there is the worse phenomenon--the degenerate writer, painter, -sculptor, who sees ugliness in beauty, decay in health, atrophy in the -normal,--and who caricatures the healthy and beautiful living model to -evolve the ugly and obscene spectres that haunt his brain. - -“Such are the so-called modernists. Their outer limit inside the bounds -of sanity are Manet and Degas. - -“Beyond that is the bedlam of Cezanne and Gauguin----” - -“Say, old chap----” - -“I _am_ saying it. It’s the same old crisis--Rome or the Barbarians; -Europe or Attila; the Prussians or Civilization. - -“I tell you these half-crazed brains are beating at the gates of the -world’s sanity to overthrow Reason from her very seat! - -“Any alienist can tell you what the cult of ugliness means--what the -morbid desire to mutilate means. What does it matter whether the living -human body be the victim, or the attack be made upon figments of the -imagination--whether upon the established order of harmony in music, or -upon the pure standard of Greek sculpture, or upon the immortal beauty -and symmetry in the pictures of the Great Masters! - -“The point is this: the desire to mutilate is there; the murderous -mania has discovered a safe outlet with pen, brush, chisel for weapons -instead of pistol and butcher knife. - -“The modernist is no longer a Ripper, except by intention. His -degenerate fury wreaks itself on Art. - -“Go to a Modernist Exhibition. Once the walls of an asylum would have -been decorated with these drawings. Read modernist literature. Scrawled -in prison bath-rooms would have been these lines in saner days. Listen -to the music of your modernist. Only Bedlam could have produced and -enjoyed it, once. - -“But to-day all crack-brains are being drawn together under the -Bolshevistic impulse to swarm, mutilate what is beautiful, destroy -what lies within the eternal laws, annihilate all order, all that has -withstood the test of civilisation. - -“The Great American Ass hears the pandemonium and looks over the walls -at the crazed herd of his demented fellows milling around the citadel. - -“He looks at them and wags his ears, interested, perplexed. They’ll -tear him to pieces if they get in----” - -“Good God!” burst out Annan, “--what has this to do with my novel----” - -“It’s tainted. It’s infected with the cult of ugliness. So were your -short stories in the _Planet_ that gave you a name! You’re stained with -modernism.” - -“Damn it, I’m personally decent----” - -“Some of the lunatics are, too. But the hullabaloo they’re making is -bound to affect--and infect--impressionable minds. All healthy and -creative minds are impressionable. Yours is. This satanic cult of -ugliness has influenced your mind to more sombre, more incredulous, -less wholesome creations. - -“All genius is imitative in some degree. You don’t escape, Barry. -The body-vermin of literature--the so-called modern critics--all are -applauding you and tempting you to perpetuate more of that sinister -ugliness which deformed your first work. - -“Don’t do it. Remember the real standards. They never change; only -fashion changes. Stick to the clean master-jobs of the real giants -in your profession. Those are the standards. Life is splendid. -Man is fine. The beauty of both are best worth recording in art. -Leave degeneracy to medicine. Leave modernism to the asylum. Make -the cleavage definite between art and science. Find your themes in -goodness, in beauty, in the nobility of the human mind----” - -“Good heavens, Mike, are you one of those moral fanatics who evoke -blue-laws even for literature?” - -Coltfoot slowly shook his head: “Barry, you won’t win out until you -change your attitude toward the God who made you without a blemish. I’m -telling you. The lunatic can’t last. The dirty, greedy, commercial Jew -or Christian art dealer or publisher who exploits Satanism, Bolshevism, -insanity, for the sake of dirty dollars,--he has his thirty pieces of -silver. And that’s all.... I took mine--and published your stories. I’m -through. I’m a he-Magdalen. I’m off that stuff.” - -“What do you mean?” - -“I’ve chucked the _Planet_,” said Coltfoot carelessly. - - - - -CHAPTER XV - - -Annan’s dreary, unpleasant and brilliantly ugly novel was published -in April. There were three printings in the first week. Five in the -second. In contradistinction to “small-town stuff,” it was “big-town.” -New York of the middle-lower class. And it _was_ New York. Stenograph -and photograph could verify every word uttered and every portrait. The -accuracy of its penny-gossip was amazing. It was apotheosis in epigram -of the obvious. - -The determined ignoring of all beauty; the almost fanatical blindness -to everything except what is miserable, piddling, sordid, and deformed -in humanity; the pathetic loyalty to the sort of “truth” which has -a place in economic statistics if not in creative art--the drab, -hopeless, ignoble atmosphere where swill was real enough to smell and -where all delicacy and functional privacy was sternly disregarded, -caused a literary uproar in the reading belt, and raucous applause -among all Realists. - -There are good Christians and good Jews, both admirable and loyal -citizens of the Republic, good scholars, good soldiers, good men. - -There are intellectual Bolshevists among Christians--degenerate -fanatics, perverted Puritans; and among Jews are their equivalents. - -The bawling Christian literary critic who assaults with Bolshevistic -violence all literature except his own is a privileged blackmailer and -commits legal libel. - -His Jewish confrère is no more vulgar. Both are only partly educated. -They live parasitically upon the body of literature. They are cooties. - -The several more notorious ones welcomed Annan. They liked what he -wrote because it was what they would have written if they could. Later, -if he didn’t continue to write what they liked, they’d bite him. They -had no other means of retaliation. - -One, named Minkwitz, who made a good living by biting harder and with -less discrimination than the usual literary cootie, wrote a violent -article in praise of raw realism, and crowned Annan with it. - -A female pervert on a Providence, Rhode Island, periodical discovered -that there was a “delicate stench” about Annan’s realism which she -found “rather stimulating than otherwise.” - -The joylessness of the novel appealed to the bluenose. He read it and -ordered his family to read it. They’d better learn as much as possible -about the “worm that never dies.” - -All crack-brains read it and approved. - -Then the Great American Ass read it. All Iowa borrowed it from -circulating libraries. Oklahoma read it. And finally Nebraska placed -upon it the official chaplet of literary success. - -Finally everybody read it--everybody from uplifter to shoplifter. - -And it became a best-seller in rivalry with the exudations of the -favourite female writer of the Centre of Population--a noisy and -bad-tempered woman whose only merit was that she unwittingly furnished -scientific minds with material for healthy laughter. - -Thus the first novel of Barry Annan, purposely un-serialised as a -_ballon d’essai_, ascended to the skies like the fat, bourgeois and -severed soul of Louis XVI, amid a roll of revolutionary drums. - -The unusual aspect of the case was that, technically, the book was -nearly perfect; the style admirable and with scarce a flaw. Now the -Great American Ass understands nothing of literary workmanship. Style -means nothing to him. Yet he bolted Annan’s book and seemed to enjoy -the flavour. _Seemed_ to. For one never can know anything definite -about an ass. - - * * * * * - -From the Pacific coast Betsy Blythe wrote Annan. She had read the -novel. That, ostensibly, was her theme. She applauded his fame, -expressed herself as proud to be numbered among the friends of such a -celebrity. - -Then there was some gossip about herself, the company,--inquiry as to -how he had liked the pictures which she assumed he had seen in the East. - -Then there was a paragraph: “What are you doing to our Eris, Barry? -I suppose it’s what you did to me, to Rosalind, to every fresh -and attractive face which possessed ears to listen to your golden -vocabulary. Still, I don’t see how you had time: you saw her only that -one afternoon in the projection room, she tells me. - -“But I suppose you’re as deadly by letter as otherwise. Like measles I -suppose we all have got to have you. Eris had it harder, that’s all. - -“But I’m going to tell you that when she recovers,--as we all -do,--you’ll be surprised at the charming creature she is turning into. - -“I honestly think she is the most intelligent girl I ever knew. She -not only _looks_ but she sees. She learns like lightning. The odd -thing about her is the decided quality in her. Her mind is the mind -of a gentlewoman. As for the externals--trick of voice and speech and -bearing, it scarcely seems as though she acquired them. Rather they -seem to have been latent in her, and have merely developed. - -“Yet she tells me she is the daughter of very plain people. - -“Well, Eris, in her way, is already a celebrity on the Coast. She has -become quite the loveliest to look at out here. And she is a natural -actress. There, my friend! Am I generous? - -“Alas, Barry, she worries me. I like her, admire her, but--it seems -ignoble in me--I can’t stand the competition. We can’t go on together. -She’s too pretty and too clever. It seems impossible to bury her under -any part, no matter how rotten. - -“There’ll come a time when the Betsy Blythe Films will mean only Eris. - -“If she’s going to become as good as that she ought to have her own -company. She couldn’t stand such competition; nobody could; and I’m not -going to. - -“_I_ don’t want to bury her; but if we go on playing together she’ll -bury me. It’s right that we should part, professionally. It’s only fair -to both of us. - -“That darned Albert Smull is responsible. He’s been out here three -times. When it comes to casting the company, outside of myself, what he -wants is done. And he’s mad about Eris. - -“The last time he came out here, his partner, Leopold Shill, came with -him. Between them they do two-thirds of our financing. Well, while they -were, as always, perfectly friendly to me, their interest was in Eris. -How the devil am I to make it plain to them that Eris and I ought not -to be in the same company? - -“I _could_ explain it to her and she’d understand. But Albert Smull and -Leo Shill would misunderstand, utterly, and put me down as a jealous -cat. - -“So ‘that’s that,’ as Eris has it when she’s made up her mind. I’ve -made up mine. I’ve got to kiss her good-bye. But when I do I’ll kiss a -future star. I’ll say so. You tell ’em. - -“Good-bye, you philandering but lovable egoist. I like your rotten -novel--not spontaneously--but because if one only could like that sort -of sob-stuff it’s the stuffiest, sobbyest story I ever snivelled over. - - “BETSY. - -“P. S.--Your dowdy, disagreeable aunt, Mrs. Magnelius Grandcourt, is in -Pasadena for her health--maybe her temper, too--and she was nasty to me -because I’m in pictures. - -“Of course I don’t mind: nobody pays any attention to those old dames -who ruled New York a decade ago. All that ended with the war. She knows -darned well where I belong. - -“But the funny part of it is that she’s taken a majestic shine to Eris. -She’s stopping with the Pelham-Cliffords at their handsome place near -Pasadena, and the Pelham-Cliffords are live ones and they let us shoot -some scenes on their place. - -“That was how your aunt had an opportunity to be nasty to me. But -exactly why she condescended to patronise Eris, I don’t know. - -“She continually asks the P-Cliffords to ask Eris over. Eris goes -occasionally. I asked her point-blank why that peevish old party was -so amiable to her, and she blushed in that engagingly confused way and -said that your aunt knew her great grandmother. - -“Apparently there _was_ quality in the forebears of Eris, or that dumpy -old snob wouldn’t have made any fuss over the great grandchild of -somebody who died years and years ago.” - - - - -CHAPTER XVI - - -Annan was in a way of being rather pleased with himself. Nobody can -remain entirely unshaken by the impact of the sort of flattery hurled -in hunks by the Great American Ass. - -For with him it is all or nothing, repletion or starvation. - -Also, unlike his French and British brothers, he is a disloyal ass. -Also a capricious one. There is no respect in him for past performance -once lauded. The established favourite grown old in service sooner or -later becomes a target for his heels. - -This is not heartlessness; it is ignorance of what has been done for -him and of those who have done it. - -For he really is the most sentimental of asses. Sentiment and temper -are the two outlets for the uneducated. They are his. Convince the -Great American Ass that his behaviour is callous, capricious, cruel, -and he’d asphyxiate his victim in sentimental saliva. - -For this secretion foams up from the Centre of Population and oozes -in all directions. It is the solvent for the repulsive, the ugly, the -sordid, offered in the pill of Art by Modernism. - -But what, exactly, this pill is going to do to the Great American Ass -is still a social and pathological problem. - - * * * * * - -Annan was up to his neck in saliva. That great army of slight -acquaintances with which the average man is afflicted became old -friends over night. - -Annan was running the whole gamut from these, and from readers utterly -unknown to him. Every mail brought requests for loans, autographs, -and for personal assistance of various sorts; and there were endless -charitable appeals, offers to lecture, offers of election to clubs, -guilds, associations, societies he never heard of; requests for his -patronage, his endorsement of saleable articles; requests for criticism -upon the myriad efforts of unsuccessful writers; demands that he should -“place” their effusions; personal calls from agents, publishers, cranks. - -And there was, of course, a great influx of silliness--flirtatious -letters, passionate love letters, sentimental requests for signed -photographs. And among these, as always, were offensive letters, -repulsive letters, sinister and usually anonymous. The entire gamut. - -Toward him there was a new and flattering attitude, even in old -friends, and no matter how honest and sincere, even in those who -disapproved his work, this unconscious attitude toward a publicly -successful man was noticeable. - -Otherwise, in public, his face and name were becoming sufficiently well -known to attract curiosity. - -In shops clerks would smirk and inquire, “Mr. Annan, the novelist?” -Proprietors and underlings in his accustomed haunts were likely to -point him out to other customers. He was becoming accustomed to being -stared at. - -Now, some of these phenomena are anything but agreeable to the newly -successful; but, _en masse_, these manifestations are not calculated to -inculcate steadiness and modesty in anybody. - -A thousand times Annan had told himself that no success could ever -unbalance him a fraction of one degree. But success is an insidious -fever. One walks with it without suspecting the infection. Without -knowing that three-quarters of the people who shake one’s hand are -carriers of this same and subtle fever. - -However, Barry Annan appeared to thrive. All was well with him. All was -going “according to plan.” - -His newest novel, scarcely begun, promised dazzlingly. He was eager, -always, to get at it. That was a most excellent sign. He even preferred -writing it to doing anything else. Another good sign. - -Otherwise all was well with him, and going well. - -His love affairs, always verbal ones, distracted him agreeably and were -useful professionally. Easily, as always, he slipped out of one into -another with no discomfort to himself and only a brief but deeper pang -for the girl. - -Few of these mildly amourous episodes resulted in anything except a -rather more agreeable and care-free friendship,--as in the cases of -Betsy Blythe and Rosalind Shore. Disillusioned they liked him better -but in a different way. - -Probably Eris would, too, when she returned from the Coast,--if ever -she did return. - -Thus, without effort, he reassured himself concerning her three -unanswered letters. His was the gayest and most optimistic of -consciences,--a little gem of altruism. Per se it functioned -beautifully. He never meddled. It ran like a watch ticking cheerily. - -But it never had had anything serious to deal with. How heavy a weight -it might sustain there was no knowing. - -In light marching order his conscience had guided him very nicely, so -far. How would it steer him when it carried weight? - - * * * * * - -It was early in June that he encountered Coltfoot by chance. They had -not met in months. - -Coltfoot did not look shabby nor even wilted, but he wore last year’s -summer clothes and straw hat, and his dark, rather grim features seemed -thinner. - -Annan insisted that they lunch together at the Province Club. They did. -Their respective reports revealed their situations since they last had -met; Annan had only success to recapitulate,--Coltfoot a cordial and -sincerely happy listener. - -But it had gone otherwise with Coltfoot. When he resigned from the -_Planet_ because his self-respect couldn’t tolerate its policy, the -business situation was not such as to make job hunting easy. - -“Outside of any salary I’ve income enough to live on rather rottenly,” -he remarked, “but I don’t want to.” - -“You mean you haven’t a job, Mike?” - -“Oh, I’ve got one--one of those stinking magazines which can be bought -any day and which always are being ‘revived’ by ‘new blood.’ - -“I’m supposed to be that fresh and sanguinary reservoir. We may file a -petition in bankruptcy or continue. There’s no telling.” - -“What an outrage! A man of your calibre----” - -“Don’t worry. Somewhere in dusty perspective the job I’m destined to -nab is lumbering along the highway of life. I’ll hold it up when it -tries to pass by me.” - -“You know, Mike, that if ever you’re short----” - -“Thanks.... No fear. What sort of fodder do you next hand out to your -famishing public?” - -“I’m preparing it.... You won’t like it, Mike.” - -“Same graft?” - -“What do you mean, graft----” - -“You poor fish, are you touchy already?” - -Annan reddened very slightly, then laughed: - -“Kick my pants hard if ever I’m _that_, Mike. May the Lord defend me -from solemnity and smugness!... Mike, I wish we could see more of each -other.... Things worry me a lot sometimes. A fellow has got to believe -in himself, yet complacency is destruction.... All this--you know what -I mean--disconcerts a man.... I admit it. It’s come to a point where -actually I don’t know whether my stuff is worth immortality, or a -tinker’s dam, or zero. - -“Yet I feel I _can_ deliver the hootch.” - -“It’s hootch all right.” - -“Well--God knows.... Like the Mad Hatter--or was it the Rabbit?--I’ve -used the best ingredient.” - -“There were crumbs in it,” said Coltfoot. “Besides, wood-alcohol isn’t -a lubricant.” - -Thus from simile to allegory, to inference via insinuation--discourse -in terms possible only between old friends of different species born in -the same culture among fellow bacilli of their period. - -“Hang it all,” insisted Annan, “the world isn’t swimming in syrup!” - -“Nor in vinegar, Barry.” - -“I can’t see the sugar-candy aspect of a story,” said Annan. “All that -lovey-lovey-sweetie-sweetie goo is as dead as Cleopatra.” - -“There _was_ a Cleopatra. And she loved. There _was_ beauty, -brilliancy, ardour, wit, gaiety, pleasure----” - -“--_And_ the asp!” - -“Yes, but why star the asp? It bit only once. Why devote the whole -story to ominous apprehension, the relentless approach of horror from -beyond vast horizons? There were long intervals of sunlight and song -in Cleopatra’s day. Why make of your book a monograph on poisons? Why -turn it into a history of the asp? Why minutely construct a treatise on -serpents? - -“Good Lord, Barry, when you’ve a good dinner served you at home, why -slink to the nearest ash-can and rummage for putrid bones?” - -“After all, there _are_ a few million garbage cans in the world.” - -“Their contents are not nourishing. Why not leave such scraps to the -degenerates so well known to the medical gentlemen who specialize -in them?--to the Gauguins, Cezannes, Matisses among professors and -students in that ghastly clinic where subject, operator and onlooker -are scarcely distinguishable to the normal eye?” - -“Good heavens, what bitterness!” - -“Good God, what insanity!” - -“I must hew out my own way----” insisted Annan hotly. - -“Hew on! But follow the standard! Don’t lose sight of the standard----” - -“Standards change----” - -“Not The Cross!” - -There was a silence; then Barry said: “Is it the function of art to -make people better by lying to them?” - -“It is not its function to make them worse by offering distorted -truths.” - -“Does it hurt people to know the truer and less pleasant side of life?” - -“No; but it hurts them to dwell on it. That’s what modernism makes them -do.” - -“Life is nine-tenths unpleasant.” - -“Then say so in a line. And in the rest of your story try to help -people to endure those nine-tenths by forgetting them while they read -about the other tenth.” - -“I’m not going to mutilate truth,” retorted Annan. - -“You _do_ mutilate it. The school that influences you mutilates truth -as was mutilated the body of Osiris! The school that stains you with -its shadow is a school of mutilators. I’m not squeamish, Barry. I’m -for plain writing. The truths leered at or slurred over or ignored by -convention can be decently presented in proportion to their importance -in any story. - -“But satyrism in art, the satanism that worships ugliness, the -perversion that twists, distorts, mutilates the human body, the human -mind, nature, the only flawless masterpiece,--no, I’m not for these. I -tell you that the entire modernist movement is but a celebration of The -Black Mass. Crazy and sane, _that_ is what the leaders in this school -are doing. Their god is Anti-Christ; their ritual destruction. And I -do not believe that Christ, all merciful, will ever say to the least -guilty among these--‘Absolvo te.’” - -There was a long silence. Finally Annan said: “On your side you are -more savage than I on mine. I am no missionary----” - -“_I_ am. The human being who is not is negligible. I tell you that -beauty is good and right. It is salvation. It is the goal. And I tell -you that the use of evil is to throw beauty in brighter, more perfect -relief. That is its _only_ use in art. - -“And it never should be the theme, nor bask in the spotlight, -nor centre the composition. All its arrows point inward to -that one divine and ultimate spot--the touch of highest value -in Rembrandt’s canvasses--the supreme pinpoint of clarity and -glory--Beauty--symmetrical, flawless, eternal.” - - * * * * * - -As they left the club together: “Almost thou persuadest me,” said Annan -lightly. - -Parting, they shook hands: “No, not I,” said Coltfoot. “Some sorrow -will do that.... Or some woman.” - -Annan turned down Fifth Avenue much amused. - - - - -CHAPTER XVII - - -Early in June Rosalind Shore celebrated the 365th performance of her -musical comedy. - -She got Annan on the telephone just as he was leaving his house to dine -wherever fancy suggested. - -“Harry Sneyd is giving a supper dance for me,” she explained, “and he -wants a bunch of names that will look well in to-morrow’s papers. Do -you mind coming, Barry? Or have you become too darned great to let the -public suspect that you know how to frivol?” - -“Pity your mother didn’t spank the sarcasm out of you while she was -getting busy,” he retorted. “Where is the frivolling and what time?” - -“You nice boy! It’s after the show in the directors’ suite at _The -Looking Glass_. Harry’s a director there, also. Mr. Shill let him have -the suite. Thank you so much, Barry; I do want all the celebrities I -can get, and our publicity department will be grateful to you.” - -“Glad you feel that way,” he said drily. - -“Ducky, it does sound like a poor relation touching the Family Hope; -but I love you anyway and you know it.” - -He laughed, hung up, and went his way. Only the florists at the great -hotels remained open for business. At one of these he was properly -robbed, but the flowers that he sent to Rosalind were magnificent. - -He joined half a dozen men of his own world at the Province Club and -made one of a group at dinner. - -Conversation was the sort of big-town-small-talk passing current as -conversation at the majority of such clubs--Wall Street tattle, social -prattle, golfing week-ends, summer plans. - -Somebody--Wilkes Bruce--remarked to Annan that his aunt was in town. - -The prospect of seeing her cheered him, stirring up that ever latent -perverse humour of his, with the prospect of an acrimonious exchange of -civilities. - -Not that Mrs. Magnelius Grandcourt ever received her nephew willingly; -but twice every year matters concerning the estate had to be discussed -with him personally. - -So Annan knew that before she took herself elsewhere a summons to the -presence would arrive for him at No. 3 Governor’s Place. - -She possessed a horrible house in town--a caricature of a French -château--closed most of the year. - -In the depths of that dim and over-upholstered stronghold these -semi-annual audiences were held. They resembled courts of justice, his -aunt sitting, and he the malefactor on parole, reporting at intervals -according to law. And he looked forward to these conferences with -malicious amusement, if his aunt did not. - -After dinner he played cowboy pool with Archie Mallison and Wilkes -Bruce, winning as usual. For he did everything with the same facility -that characterised his easy speech and manners--accurate without -effort, naturally a technician, always graceful. - -But a little of his own caste went a long way with Annan. Conversation -at The Province, as well as at The Patroons, bored him very soon. -So, having neatly disposed of Bruce and Mallison, he retired to the -library--the only place he cared about in any club except when some old -foozle went to sleep there and snored. - -For an hour he dawdled among the great masters of written English, -always curious, always charmed, unconsciously aware of a kinship -between these immortals and himself. - -For perhaps this young man was not unrelated, distantly, to that noble -fellowship, though the subtle possibility had never entered his mind. - -So he dallied among pages printed when writing was a fine art--and -printing and binding, too; and about midnight he went below, put on his -hat, and betook himself to _The Looking Glass_. - -In the amusement district the tide of gaiety was still ebbing with the -usual back-wash toward cabaret and midnight show. - -_The Looking Glass_ was dark and all doors closed, but there were many -cars in waiting and a group of gossiping chauffeurs around the private -entrance, where a gilded lamp burned. - -Through this entrance he sauntered; a lift shot him upward; he -disembarked amid a glare of light and a jolly tumult of string-music -and laughter. - -Somebody took his hat and stick and he walked into the directors’ suite -of _The Looking Glass_. - -There were a lot of people dancing in the handsome board-room--flowers, -palms, orchestra--all the usual properties. - -The supper room adjoining was gay with jewels and dinner-gowns, clink -of silver, tinkle of glass, speeding of waiters flying like black -shuttles through some rainbow fabric in the making. - -Near the door a girl--one of a group--turned as he strolled up. - -“Barry!” she exclaimed, and saluted him in Rialto fashion, with both -arms on his shoulders and a typical district kiss. - -“Thank you for my flowers, ducky,” added Rosalind, “and you’re a -darling to come. Here’s Betsy, by the way----” - -“Why, Betsy!” he said, taking her outstretched hands, “when did you -arrive from the Coast?” - -“Yesterday, my dear, and never was I so glad to see this wretched -old town. To hear Californians talk you’d think you were buying a -ticket to the Coast of Paradise. But I notice the Californians remain -here----” She took him by both arms: “The same boy. You don’t _look_ -great. Do you _feel_ very great, dear?” - -“Perhaps His Greatness needs food to look the part,” suggested -Rosalind. “Don’t get us any,” she added, as he turned to pay his -devoirs to the others in the group. - -He shook hands with Harry Sneyd, bowed to Wally Crawford, encountered -the mischievous gaze of Nancy Cassell, and paid his respects to her -with gay cordiality. - -There were other people, but the flow to and fro between supper and -dance cut them off. He noticed Leopold Shill, very shiny, and exchanged -a perfectly polite salute with him. Beyond, the thinning black hair -and sanguine face of Albert Smull were visible amid groups continually -forming and disintegrating. - -It came into Annan’s mind that Eris also must have returned from the -Coast; and he turned and made the inquiry of Rosalind. - -“Why, yes, she’s here somewhere.” - -“Where?” - -“Probably where the men are thickest,” drawled Rosalind. “If you see a -large crowd,--and a burgundy flush,--that’s the suitors of Eris,--and -Albert Smull; and you’ll find Eris in the centre of it all.” - -Annan laughed and strolled on. For Smull he had no enthusiasm. As for -Eris, when he thought of her he felt cordially toward her. But there -was now an uneasy and increasing sense of his own neglect to subdue -any spontaneous pleasure in meeting her. It annoyed him to feel that -he had been guilty of neglect. Until that moment he had not felt any -particular shortcoming. - -A girl he knew came drifting out of the throng--one of his many and -meaningless affinities. They always were glad to see him after the -storm and stress of the verbal love affair. So she drifted away in his -arms--one of the recent steps--picked up by him without effort--and -they danced the thing out. - -Some man took her off. But there were others--plenty--all sorts. He -danced enough to amuse him, thinking most of the time about his new -story, and now and then of Eris. - -Several times the ruddy features of Smull cut his rather hazy line of -vision; but he didn’t discover anybody resembling Eris in the vicinity. - -He had handed his latest partner over to Frank Donnell, and had swung -on his heel to avoid a large group of people. And at that moment he saw -Eris. - -The sheer beauty of the girl startled him, and it was an appreciable -moment before he realised that her grey eyes were encountering his. - -Annan seldom reddened. He did now. He was not certain, either, but that -she was administering a cut direct, because there was no recognition in -the grey eyes, no smile. - -There were a number of men standing about between them; he hesitated to -invite the full snub he deserved. Then he saw her silently disengage -herself from the group about her and start directly toward him. - -That galvanised him into action--rather brusquely--for he brushed a few -stalwart shoulders as he caught the hand she extended in both of his. - -“Can’t we find some quiet place----” she said unsteadily. - -He drew her arm through his and they made their way in silence across -the floor toward a vista of offices now banked with palms and flowers -and invaded by the few who courted seclusion and each other. - -A girl and a man gave them an unfriendly look as they entered the last -of the offices, and presently took themselves off. - -Eris glanced absently at the chairs they had vacated, then released her -arm, turned and walked slowly to the embrasure of the window. - -When he came to her she made a little gesture;--he waited. - -After a while: “I couldn’t control my voice,” she said.... “I am so -happy to see you.” - -For the first time in his life, perhaps, speech stuck in his glib -throat. - -She said: “I wondered if you were going to be here. Are you quite well? -You seem so.” - -“And you Eris?” - -“Yes;--tired, though.” - -“You are successful. I’ve heard that.” - -“I have very much to learn, Mr. Annan.... There seems to be no end to -study.... But there is no other pleasure or excitement comparable to -it.” - -“Are you still hot on the trail of Truth?” he ventured with a forced -smile. - -She laughed frankly: “Yes, and do you know that hunting truth doesn’t -seem to be a popular sport?” Then, more seriously: “Of what value is -anything else, Mr. Annan? Why isn’t truth more popular? Could you tell -me why?” - -The old, remembered cry of Eris--“Could you tell me _why?_”--was -sounding in his ears again--the same wistful, familiar question. - -If Annan had now regained his native equanimity it was entirely due to -this girl who had not even deigned to admit any awkwardness in their -encounter. And he realised, gratefully, that she was continuing to -ignore any lesser detail than the happy fact of reunion. - -“So that’s your idea of happiness?” he said, gratefully reassured. - -“It always was. I told you so long ago.” - -“I remember.” He looked at her, ashamed and sorry that he had had no -active part in this charming fruition. Or, rather, it was as yet merely -a delicate promise with blossoms still chastely folded. No flower yet. - -“It’s plain enough,” he said, “that you’ve never lost a moment in -self-improvement since you went away nearly a year ago.” - -“Being with Betsy taught me so much. And Frank Donnell is so wise and -gentle.... But _you_ began it all----” - -“Began what?” he demanded. - -“I told you that you were the first man of _your_ kind I had ever -met. That night--in the Park--it was just exactly as though I had -gone to sleep deaf, dumb, and blind, and waked up possessed of every -faculty----” - -“You’re loyal to the point of obstinacy,” he interrupted. “You owe -absolutely nothing to me. All I did was to fail you----” - -“Please don’t say that, Mr. Annan; you--annoy me when you do----” - -“I didn’t believe in you. I deserted you----” - -“Please--you _hurt_ me--when you speak that way----” - -“I didn’t even continue to write----” - -“You were too busy with important things----” - -“Eris! Are you really going to overlook my rotten behaviour?” - -They both had become nervously excited, although their voices were low. -Her protesting hand hesitated toward his arm; his fists were clenched -in his pockets,--effort at self restraint: - -“You’re so square and decent,” he said. “When I saw you I realised what -a rotter I’d been. You ought to have cut me dead to-night----” - -“Oh,” she said with a swift intake of breath and her hovering hand a -moment on his arm. - -After a long silence: “All right,” he said almost grimly. He looked up, -laughed: “I’m yours, Eris. Everybody else seems to be, too.” - -Her face, clearing, flushed swiftly, and she gave him a confused look. - -“I shan’t tease,” he said,--back on the old footing in a twinkling, -“--but you do seem to be popular with people. Isn’t it a rather -agreeable feeling?” - -“Yes.... I want to tell you----” She hesitated, laughed hopelessly. -“I’m so excited, Mr. Annan, I don’t know how to begin. Why, the things -I have to tell you--and the things I have to ask you--would take a year -to utter----” - -“All the time you’ve been away?” he inquired gaily. - -“That must be it. Every day they accumulated. I needed you....” She -checked herself, breathless, smiling, the colour bright in her cheeks. -“All you have done and are doing,” she said, half to herself, “I have -so longed to hear about. All I have tried to do I was crazy to tell you -about.... And now--I can’t think--remember----” - -“We must make another engagement.” - -“Please!... I was so unhappy about the other one----” - -“What hour can you give me, Eris?” - -To _give_ had been _his_ perquisite heretofore. She seemed to so -consider it, still. - -“Could you spare me a little time to-morrow?” she asked, almost timidly. - -“Would you dine with me?” - -She said naïvely: “Couldn’t we see each other before to-morrow night? -It seems so long----” - -The swift charm of her impatience surprised and touched him. Again this -young man was rapidly losing his balance in the girl’s candour. - -“Whenever you care to see me,” he said, “I’ll come.... Any day, any -hour.” - -She said, with surprise and emotion: “You are very kind to me, Mr. -Annan. You always have been----” - -“It is you who are kind. You seem unconscious of your own generosity. -Will you come to see me, or shall I come to you, Eris?” - -“You know,” she explained with happy animation, “I’ve taken the entire -floor where I had my room in Jane Street. It would be quite all right -for you to come.” - -“Fine!” he exclaimed. “Tea?” - -“Why--that’s not very early----” - -“After lunch, then?” - -“You _could_ come to breakfast,” she said with a half shy, half -laughing glance. “I was born on a farm and I rise very early. You do, -too--I remember----” - -“You friendly girl! You bet I’ll come!” - -“I hate to waste time in sleep,” she added, still shy and smiling.... -“What do you like for breakfast, Mr. Annan?--Oh, I remember. Mrs. -Sniffen told me----” - -“You surely can’t recollect----” - -“Yes, I do.... Do you think I could ever forget anything that happened -there?... You breakfast at eight----” She laughed with sheer delight: -“That is going to be wonderful, Mr. Annan--to be able to offer you -breakfast in my own apartment!” - -“And we lunch at the Ritz and dine at my house,” he added. - -“Wonderful! Wonderful! And I _can_ accept, because I have--proper -clothes! Isn’t it perfectly enchanting--the way it all has turned out?” - -That he was quite conscious of the enchantment appeared plain enough to -people who chanced to enter the room where they stood together in the -recess of the open window. - -Several of the men so recently bereaved of Eris evinced an inclination -to hover about the vicinity. Once or twice Annan was aware of black -hair and ruddy features in the offing--a glimpse of Albert Smull, -passing, elaborately oblivious. - -“I must tell you,” said Eris, making no effort to conceal regret, “that -there’s a business matter I shall have to attend to in a few minutes. -Rosalind insists that the announcement be made this evening. It’s a -great secret, but I’ll tell you: I’m going to have my own company!” - -She gave him her hands, laughing, excited by his astonishment and the -ardour of his impetuous congratulations. - -“Isn’t it too splendid! I can scarcely believe it, Mr. Annan. But -in our last picture it came to a point where Betsy thought we were, -perhaps, interfering with each other--I mean that--that----” - -“I understand.” - -Eris flushed: “Betsy was so sweet and generous about it. But I, -somehow, realised that I’d have to go.... It was right that I -should.... And I had a talk with Frank Donnell.... I don’t know who -told Mr. Smull about it, but he telegraphed that he was coming out. He -came with Mr. Shill.... That was how it happened. Mr. Smull offered me -my company. I was thunderstruck, Mr. Annan----” - -“You would be, you modest child. It’s splendid!----” He kept -continually forcing out of his mind the fact of Smull’s part in the -matter. “It’s an astonishing tribute to your talent and character, -Eris. Who is your director?” - -“Mr. Creevy.” - -“Oh, Ratford Creevy?” - -“Yes. Emil Shunk is our camera-man. Mr. Creevy brings his staff with -him.” - -Annan had his opinion of Mr. Creevy, but kept it. - -“Well,” he repeated, “that’s splendid, Eris. I’m astonished,--you -wanted me to be, didn’t you?----” - -She laughed. - -“--I’m astounded. And I’m just as happy as you are--you nice, fine -girl!--you clever, clever kiddie!----” - -They were laughing without reserve, her slim hands still clasped in -his; and both turned without embarrassment when Rosalind came leisurely -behind them. - -“Albert has been chewing his moustache for half an hour,” she drawled. -“Are you actually spooning, Eris?” - -“How silly! Does Mr. Smull want me?” - -“We’re all set. Leo Shill is to announce it. You’re to group with -Albert and Ratty Creevy and receive bouquets. Come, Eris; let that -young man’s educated hands alone----” - -Eris, unconscious until then that Annan still retained her hands, -withdrew them without embarrassment. Rosalind passed a beautifully -plump arm around her waist, letting her amused glance linger on Annan: - -“The immaculate lover,” she drawled, “always busy.” And to Eris: -“You’ll like him better, though, after it’s all over,--after the -teething, my dear. We all bite on Barry.” - - - - -CHAPTER XVIII - - -Annan spent the entire day with Eris; came home at midnight; seated -himself at his desk where his work lay in inviting disorder. - -But there was no more chance of his working than there was of his -sleeping. - -It was the first time it ever had happened. He could not remember an -instance when the subtle challenge of a disordered manuscript had been -declined by him. - -But something had happened to this young man. He was in no condition -to realise what. His mind, that hitherto faithful ally, seemed -incompetent; trivial thoughts thronged its corridors, wandering ideas, -irrelevant impressions drifted in agreeable rhythm. - -There was a letter from his aunt on his desk. He tore it open; glanced -through it without the usual grin; laid it aside. - -A slight, rather vacant smile remained on his lips: he kept moving the -lapel of his coat and inhaling the odour of a white clove-pink--one of -a cluster that had stood in a little rose-bowl between Eris and himself -at breakfast. - -A pencil, dislodged, rolled over his pad and dropped onto the floor. He -let it lie. - -Neither work nor sleep attracted him. From the oddly pleasant sense -of chaos in his mind always something more definite and more pleasant -seemed about to take shape and emerge. - -Whatever it was had delicately saturated him: all his being seemed -permeated, possessed with the spell of it. - -Time after time his mind mechanically began that day again, drifted -through the sequence of events, minute by minute, leading him at length -to where he now was seated,--but only to recommence again from the -beginning. - -About two o’clock he fell asleep, his boyish nose touching the -clove-pink. When his head sagged to a more uncomfortable position he -awoke, got out of his clothes and went to sleep in the proper place. - - * * * * * - -The first thing he did after he awoke was to unhook the telephone -receiver: - -“Is it you, Eris?” - -Then a perfectly damning sequence of solicitous inquiries--the -regulation and inevitable gamut concerning the young lady’s health, -night’s repose, condition of mind, physical symptoms. Followed a -voluntary statement regarding the day before and his intense pleasure -in it; then a diffident inquiry, and a hope expressed that she, also, -might have found the day not insupportably unpleasant;--surprise and -pleasure to learn that she, too, had considered the day “wonderful.” - -“Could I see you to-day?” he asked. - -But she had her hands full, it appeared. - -“I’ll try to get away after dinner,” she said. “Would you telephone -about nine-thirty, Mr. Annan?” - -“It’s a long time--all right, then!” - -“I may not be able to get away,” she said. - -“Don’t let me spoil your evening----” - -“I had _rather_ be with you.” - -Fluency seemed no longer his: “That’s--that’s jolly of you--awfully -nice of you, Eris,--most kind.... I’ll call your apartment at -nine-thirty, if I may.” - -“If I can’t get away,” she said, “could we see each other to-morrow?” - -“At _any_ hour, Eris!” - -“But--your work----” - -“That’s quite all right. I can always fit that in.” - -“You shouldn’t. You should fit _me_ in----” - -“Nonsense!” - -“But _I_ shall have to do that, too, when we begin work----” - -“I understand that. When may I see you to-morrow, if you can’t see me -this evening?” - -“Will you come to tea?” - -“Yes, if I can’t come earlier.” - -She laughed--a distant, gay little laugh--a new sound from her lips, -born quite unexpectedly the day before to surprise them both. - -“You make our friendship so easy,” she said. “You quite reverse -conditions. I’m happy and _grateful_ that you are coming to tea----” - -His unconsidered and somewhat impetuous reply seemed to confuse Eris. -There was a silence, then: - -“That’s the truth,” he repeated; “--it _is_ a privilege to be with you.” - -Her voice came, a little wistful, yet humourously incredulous: - -“You say such kind things, Mr. Annan.... Thank you.” - - * * * * * - -With a buoyant sense of having begun the day right, Annan took a noisy -bath, ate every scrap of breakfast, and sat down before his desk in -lively spirits, when Mrs. Sniffen had finished with his quarters. - -“Xantippe,” he said gaily, “do you know that little Miss Odell has -become a very clever and promising professional?” - -“That baby, sir?” - -“That child. What do you think of that, Xantippe?” - -Mrs. Sniffen’s countenance became grim: - -“I ’ope that God may guide her, Mr. Barry,--for there’s devils a-plenty -hunting out such jobs.” - -He said: “She’s turned out rather a wonderful sort, Xantippe. Sometimes -beginners do make good in such a short time. I’ve known one or two -instances. I’ve heard of others. Usually there’s disaster as an -aftermath. They’re people who were born to do that one thing _once_. -Nothing else. They’re rockets. Their capacity is emptied in one -dazzling flare-up. - -“A burnt-out brain remains.... There’s no tragedy like it.... -Consistent failure is less cruel. - -“But this girl isn’t like that. I’m satisfied. She’s merely starting. -She’s modest, honest, intelligent. You and I bear witness to her -courage. And there seems to be no question about her talent.... It -seems to be one of those instances where circumstance plays second -fiddle to Destiny.” - -He picked up the faded clove-pink, looked at it absently, laid it upon -his desk. - -“So ‘that’s that,’ as she says sometimes.” He looked up smilingly at -Mrs. Sniffen, then his smile degenerated into a grin: “Aunt Cornelia is -in town. I’m lunching there.” - -At one o’clock Annan sauntered up to the limestone portal. - -“Hello, Jennings,” he said genially to a large, severe man who opened -the door,--“the three most annoying things in the world are death, -hay-fever, and nephews. The last are worst, because more frequent. -Kindly prepare Mrs. Grandcourt.” - -She was already in the drawing-room. She offered him the celebrated -hand once compared to Queen Victoria’s. He saluted the accustomed -pearl--the black one: - -“Madame my Aunt, your most obedient----” - -Her butler, Seaman, announced luncheon with the reverence of a -Second-Adventist. Annan offered his arm to the dumpy old woman. - -Only her thin, high-bridged, arrogant nose redeemed her features of a -retired charwoman. Watery eyes inspected him across the table; a little -withered chin tucked between dewlaps, a sagging, discontented mouth, a -mottled skin, concluded the ensemble. - -White lace collar and cuffs turned over the black gown did what was -sartorially possible for Mrs. Magnelius Grandcourt. Otherwise, the -famous string of cherry-sized pearls dangled to what should have been -her waist. - -“It appears,” she said, “that you still inhabit your alley.” - -“Yes, Barry-in-our-alley,” he said cheerfully. - -“When are you going to move to a suitable neighbourhood?” she inquired -with that peculiar pitch of tone usually, in her sex, indicative of -displeasure. - -“I like to be quaint,” he explained, grinning. - -After a pause and a shift to the next course: “_I_ don’t know where you -get your taste for squalour,” she said. “You didn’t inherit it.” - -“Didn’t one of our ancestors haunt bar-maids?” he enquired guilelessly. -“I always understood that was where we acquired our bar-sinister----” - -“Come, Barry,” she said sharply; sat staring at him in a cold rage that -Seaman’s ears should have been polluted by such a pleasantry. - -Annan’s interior was riotous with laughter and his features crimsoned -with it. But he only gazed inquiringly at his aunt; and the wretched -incident waned. - - * * * * * - -They went into the library after luncheon. A secretary brought the -necessary papers. - -Annan’s was a cheerful nature. There was no greed in it. In all -questions, that might properly have become disputes concerning joint -income and investment, he yielded good humouredly to her. - -There was a more vulgar streak than thrift in Mrs. Magnelius -Grandcourt. The majority of rich are infected with it. - -However, family matters settled to her satisfaction, she seemed -inclined to a more friendly attitude. - -“That was very impudent of you to send me that New York Directory,” she -said, “but I suppose you intended it to be a pleasantry.” - -“Why, no,” he said innocently, “I thought it would gratify you to -discover so many people you didn’t care to know----” - -“Barry! I see nothing humorous in it. Do you think the breaking down of -society is humorous?” - -“Is it breaking down?” - -“Do I need to answer you? What has become of the old barriers that kept -out undesirables? _Once_ there was a society in New York. Is there -to-day? No, Barry;--only a fragment here and there. - -“Only a few houses left where we rally. This house, thank God, is one -of them. And while _I_ live and retain my faculties, I shall continue -to dictate my visiting list, here and in Newport, and shall properly -censor it, despite the unbecoming mockery of my own flesh and blood----” - -“Nonsense, Aunt Cornelia, it’s only in fun, not ill-natured. I -can’t take such matters solemnly. Who the devil cares who you are -to-day? It’s what you _do_. You’re no longer a rarity in an uncouth -town. There are too many like you--quite as wealthy, cultivated, -experienced--plenty of people who can give the denizens inhabiting any -of the social puddles a perfectly good time. - -“There isn’t any society. There never has been a real one since -Washington was President. What passed for it you helped boss very -cleverly. But it gradually swelled and burst--like one of those wobbly -stars--scattered into a lot of brilliant little fragments, each a -perfectly good star in itself----” - -“What you say is utterly absurd,” interrupted his aunt, wrathfully. “By -tradition there is and can be only one society in America. Its accepted -rendezvous is in New York; its arbiters are so by birth. Theirs is an -inherited trust. They are its censors. I shall never violate what I was -born to respect and uphold.” - -“Well,” he said, smiling, “I suppose you really consider me a renegade -and a low fellow because I entertain the public with my stories.” - -“A public entertainer has his proper place, Barry.” - -“Sure. On the door-step. That’s where we once were told to -sit--authors, players, painters--the whole job-lot of us. Now we prefer -it, although since your youth society welcomes anybody that can amuse -it. We go in, now and then. But it’s better fun outside. So I’m going -to sit there and tell my stories to the hoi-polloi as they pass along. -If what you consider society wishes to listen it can stick its head out -of the window.” - -“It is amazing to me,” she said, staring at him out of watery eyes, -“how utterly common my brother’s son can be. I can _not_ understand -it, Barry. And you are not alone in this demoralization. Young people -everywhere are infected. Only a week or two ago I met Elizabeth Blythe -in California. She was painted a perfectly ghastly colour in broad -daylight. Elizabeth Blythe--the daughter of Courtlandt Blythe, a -painted, motion-picture _actress_!” - -It was impossible for him to control his laughter. - -“She told me that you snubbed her,” he said. “But you don’t seem to be -consistent, Aunt Cornelia. I hear that you’ve been civil and kind to -another actress. I mean Eris Odell.” - -“Do _you_ know her?” inquired his aunt calmly. - -“I’ve met her.” - -Mrs. Grandcourt remained silent for a while, her pale eyes fixed on her -nephew. - -“That girl’s grandmother was my beloved comrade in boarding school,” -she said slowly. “We shared the same room. Her name was Jeanne -d’Espremont. Her grandmother was that celebrated Countess of the time -of Louis XV.... They were Louisiana Creoles. Her blood was as good as -any in France. Probably that means nothing to a modern young man.... It -meant something to me.... I shouldn’t have wished to love a nobody as I -loved Jeanne d’Espremont.” - -Mrs. Grandcourt bent her head and looked down at her celebrated -Victorian hands. Pearls bulged on the tiny, fat fingers. - -“Jeanne ran away,” she said. “She married the son of a planter. His -family was unimpeachable, but he looked like a fox. When he drank -himself to death she went on the stage. - -“She had a baby. I saw it. It looked like a female fox. Jeanne died -when the girl was sixteen.... I’d have taken her,----” - -Presently Annan asked why she hadn’t done so. - -“Because,” said his aunt, “she married a boy who peddled vegetables the -day after the funeral. His name was Odell.” - -“Oh! Was he the father of Eris?” - -“He was. And is.... What an astonishing reversion to the lovely, -aristocratic type of her grandmother.... I encountered her by accident. -She was with Elizabeth Blythe, but she was not painted.... I assure -you, Barry, it was a severe shock to me. She is the absolute image of -her grandmother.... She startled me so.... I never was emotional.... -But--I could scarcely speak--scarcely find my voice--to ask her.... But -I _knew_. The girl was Jeanne d’Espremont, _alive_.” - -After a moment: “Did you find her interesting?” he asked. - -“She has all the charm and intelligence of her grandmother.... And all -her lovely appeal. And her fatal obstinacy.” - -“Obstinacy?” - -“Yes.... I told her about her grandmother. I asked her to give up -her profession and come to me----” Mrs. Grandcourt’s features grew -red:--“I offered to stand her sponsor, educate her properly, give her -the position in the younger set to which her blood entitled her.... I -offered to endow her, Barry.... I think now you understand how I loved -her grandmother.” - -The idea of his aunt parting willingly with a penny so amazed and -entranced the young man that he merely gazed at her incapable of -comment. - -His aunt rose,--signal that the audience was ended. Annan got up. - -“Do you mean,” he said, “that she declined to give up her profession -for such a prospect?” - -“Not only that,” replied his aunt, getting redder, “but she refused -to accept a dollar.... And she hasn’t a penny except her salary. That -is like her grandmother, never permitting a favour that she could not -return.... Jeanne was poor, compared to me, Barry--my little comrade, -Jeanne d’Espremont.... I loved her ... dearly....” - -Annan coolly put both arms around his aunt and kissed her--a thing that -had not occurred since he was in college. - -“I’ll drop in for tea before you beat it to Newport,” he said. “Then -you tell me some more about Jeanne d’Espremont.” - -He gave her another hearty smack and went out gaily, leaving Mrs. -Magnelius Grandcourt with glassy, astonished eyes, and a little, -selfish, tucked-in mouth that was slightly quivering. - - - - -CHAPTER XIX - - -The day was warm enough to be uncomfortable. Except in recesses of -parks, New York is never fragrant. Once it was--when the odour of -lindens filled the Broad-Way from the Fort to St. Paul’s. Wild birds -sang in every street. Washington was President. Green leaves and scent -and song are gone where “The Almond Tree shall flourish,” deep planted -in the heart of man. - -As far as perfume is concerned, neither the eastward avenues nor -cross-streets suggested Araby to Annan. He carried, as usual, a large -pasteboard box full of flowers. - -Jane Street runs west out of Greenwich Avenue. Shabby red brick -buildings with rusty fire-escapes, lofts, stables, a vista of -swarming tenements through which runs a sagging pavement set with -pools of water--and, on the south side, half a dozen rickety -three-story-and-basement houses--this is Jane Street. - -The little children of the poor shrilled and milled about him as he -threaded his way among push-cart men and trucks and mounted the low -stoop of the house where Eris lived. - -It seemed clean enough inside as he climbed the narrow stairs, -manœuvering his big box full of flowers. - -He could hear her negro maid-of-all-work busy in the kitchen as he -knocked,--hear her call out gaily: “Miss Eris! Miss Eris, somebody’s -knockin’ an’ I can’t leave mah kitchen----” - -Came the light sound of feet dancing along the hall, the door jerked -open in his face, sudden vision of grey eyes and bobbed chestnut hair; -the swift bright smile: - -“Good morning!”--her offered hand, cool and fresh in his. “_More_ -flowers? But yesterday’s flowers are perfectly fresh! _Thank_ you, Mr. -Annan, _so_ much----” - -She was the most engaging person to give things to--anything, no matter -how trivial--and her delight and child-like lack of restraint were -refreshing reward to a young man accustomed to feminine sophistication. - -Any sort of a package excited her, and she lost no time in opening it. - -Now, with her arms full of iris and peonies, she exclaimed her delight -again, again made her personal gratitude a charming reward out of all -proportion to the gift. - -“If you’ll turn on the water in the bath-tub,” she said, “I’ll lay them -there until I can find something to put them in.” - -This was the usual procedure. He had sent her a lot of inexpensive -glass bowls, jars and vases. He now gave the flowers a bath while she -ran to the pantry and came back with half a dozen receptacles. - -Together they arranged the flowers and carried them into the three -rooms of the little apartment which, already, was blossoming -like a Persian garden. And all the while their desultory chatter -continued--fragments left from their last parting--gossip resumed, -unasked questions held over and now remembered, punctuated by the -girl’s unspoiled pleasure in every blossom that she chose and placed. - -Breakfast was ready when they were--the sort of breakfast she -remembered he liked. - -Nothing about Eris seemed to have been spoiled--least of all her -appetite. He thought it charmingly childish, and it always amused him. -Besides, the girl’s lovely freshness in the morning always fascinated -him. Only children turned unblemished faces to the morning in New York. - - * * * * * - -Together in the cool living-room, after breakfast, they settled for a -happy, busy morning--the business of exchanging thoughts, including -vast material for discussion accumulated over night. - -After a year’s absence, and in the sudden sun-burst of their reunion, -Eris was venturing more and more in the art of conversation. With -Annan, diffidence, shyness were vanishing in their new and happy -intimacy. She was learning to withhold from him nothing that concerned -the things of the mind. Its pleasures she hastened to surrender to him; -its perplexities she offered him with a wistful candour that constantly -was stirring depths within him hitherto obscurely stagnant. - -All these--her personality, the physical loveliness of the girl--were -subtly obsessing him, usurping intellectual routine when he was away, -crowding other thoughts, colouring his mental process, interfering with -its clarity when he worked--interrupting charmingly--as though her -light touch on his sleeve had arrested his pen. - -She was asking him now about the progress of his new novel: he was -lighting a cigarette, and he looked up over the burning match: - -“It’s an inert lump,” he said. “I come in and give it a kick but it -doesn’t even squirm.” - -“Why?” she asked, concerned. - -He lighted his cigarette. There was a mischievous glimmer in his eyes: - -“Probably it’s sulking because I’m having a better time with you.” - -“You’re not serious!” - -“Yes, I am. That fool of a novel is jealous. That’s what’s the matter -with it, Eris.” - -“If I believed that,” she said with a troubled smile, “I’d not go near -you.” - -“That would be murderous, Eris.” - -“How?” - -“Why, I’d go home and kick that novel to death.” - -Her light laughter was not wholly free of concern: - -“I’ve thought sometimes,” she said, “that perhaps our mornings together -might take a little of the freshness _out_ of you, Mr. Annan.... Take -_something_ from your work.... You’re so nice about it--but you mustn’t -let me----” - -“Nonsense. Even if it were true I’m not going to let anything spoil -our intellectual----” he hesitated,--“honeymoon,” he added with the -faintest malice in his laugh. - -“What a delightful idea!” she exclaimed. “That’s what this week has -been, hasn’t it!--on _my_ part, anyway. But of course you don’t -feel----” - -“I do, madam. Do you acknowledge our intellectual alliance?” - -“Yes, but----” - -“That settles it. You can’t honeymoon by yourself, can you?” - -She thought him delightfully ridiculous. But a faint misgiving -persisted: - -“About your novel,” she began,--and he laughed and said: - -“Well, what about it?” - -“When will you begin again?” - -“How long will our honeymoon last?” - -“That isn’t fair----” - -“Yes, it is. How long, Eris?” - -She laughed at his absurdity: “Forever, with me,” she said. “So you -might as well begin work now as later.” - -“Hasn’t our honeymoon interfered a little with your work?” he asked -lightly. - -“Of course not. It’s been the most stimulating of tonics, Mr. Annan.” - -“Well, it’s overstimulated me, perhaps. I can’t keep my feet on the -earth,--I float----” - -“You’re lazy!” - -“Blissfully, Eris.... Eris!... Eris, immortal goddess of eternal -discord.... Who gave you that lovely, ominous name?” - -“The ironical physician who brought me into the world, I believe.... I -believe I was well named.” - -“You don’t create discord.” - -“I seem to; from birth,” she said absently. She bent over a mass of -rose-scented white peonies, inhaling the slightly aromatic perfume. - -Watching her, he said: “It’s hard for me to realise that you’ve ever -had troubles.” - -“It’s hard for me, too,” she brushed her lips against the delicate, -crisp petals. “Troubles,” she said, “become unreal when one’s mind -remains interested.... I can’t even remember how it feels to be -unhappy.... A busy mind forgets unessentials like trouble.” - -He said: “You’re rather amazing at times, do you know it?” - -“Why?” - -He smiled: “Also,” he said, “there’s an incongruity about this -honeymoon of ours, Eris.” - -“Where, Mr. Annan?” - -“Between your lips and mine--when you say ‘Mr. Annan’ and I answer, -‘Eris.’ And on our honeymoon, too,” he added gravely. - -Her laughter was a little confused. - -“It seems natural for me to call you Mr. Annan. One is not likely to -think familiarly of famous people----” - -“Is it a horrible sort of bourgeois respect for the mystery of my art, -Eris?” - -She abandoned herself to laughter as his features grew gloomier. - -“You are funny,” she said, “but one’s first impressions of people are -not easily altered.... Would you wish me to call you--Barry?” - -“If consistent with your commendable and proper awe of me.” - -For a moment or two she was unable to control her laughter. Then a -moment’s hesitation, bright-eyed, flushed: - -“Barry,” she said, like a child plucking courage from embarrassment. - - * * * * * - -She had some books to show him from a list she had asked him to make -after one of their conferences on self-improvement. - -They went over them together, she ardently intent on the unread pages, -he conscious of her nearness; the faint, warm perfume of her bent head. - -Her mantel-clock struck and she looked up incredulously. - -“Yes,” he said, “you’ve got to go.” - -“It _can’t_ be noon, can it?” - -“I’ll drive you to the studio.” - -She called: “Hattie! Have you put up my lunch?” - -“All ready, Miss Eris, honey!” - -There was a silence, Eris gazing absently at the outrageous -mantel-clock, Annan’s eyes on her face. - -She drew a long, even breath: “Time--and its hours--like a flight of -bullets.... When can you come again?” - -“Any day--any hour you can give me----” - -“No.... You _will_ begin work again, won’t you?” She turned toward him. - -“I can’t, yet.” - -“Why?” - -“I suppose it’s because I’m so preoccupied with you.” - -“But--that isn’t possible!” She seemed so frankly perplexed and -disturbed that he said: - -“No, that isn’t the reason.... I don’t know what it is.” - -“Are you tired, perhaps?” she asked with a winning concern in her -voice, that now always seemed to stir within him those vague depths -hitherto unsuspected. - -Her mantel-clock tinkled the quarter-hour. - -They both looked up at it. - -“Well,” he said, “you must go to _your_ work.” - -“It’s annoying, isn’t it?” - -“It’s the way I feel about _my_ work, too,” he said. “I’d rather be -with you.” - -For a moment she did not notice the analogy. Then she turned and her -face flushed in comprehension. - -Neither spoke for a moment. Then she rose, went to her bed-room, pulled -on her hat, and came slowly out, not looking at him. - -As she moved toward the door his hand, lightly, then his arm detained -her, drew her to him face to face, held her in slightest contact. - -There was a damp sweetness to her mouth as he kissed it. She did not -change colour,--there was no emotion. Smooth, cool, her face touched -his--softly cool her relaxed hand that he took into his. - -He looked into grey eyes that looked back. He kissed a fresh mouth that -yielded like a flower but did not quiver. - -Released, she stood apart, slender, still, not aloof, nor altered -visibly by the moment’s intimacy. - -The little clock struck the half hour. - -He came to her, drew her head back against his face. - -“You’ll have to go,” he said. “Will you let me drive you up to the -studio? We’ll have time.” - -She nodded; they went slowly to the door, down to the hot street in -silence. - -On Greenwich Avenue, near the new theatre, still in process of -building, they found a taxi. - - * * * * * - -When they descended at the studio she was just on time. - -“Thank you so much,” she said, not offering him her hand. - -“To-morrow, Eris?” he asked. - -“I can’t. I’m called for ten o’clock.” - -“In the evening, then?” - -“I’m dining with Mr. Smull.” - -“Could you lunch with me the day after that?” - -“I’m sorry.” - -A pause: “Are you offended?” he asked in a low voice. - -She looked up, slightly shook her head. - -“You don’t seem very anxious to see me again,” he added, forcing a -smile. - -In the eyes of the girl he read neither response nor any comment. - -“I won’t detain you now,” he said. “I’m sorry you seem to be unable to -see me soon.” - -“I hope you will feel like working soon,” she said quietly. - -“I’ll begin in a day or so.... Are you free day after to-morrow, at any -time?” - -“Yes.” - -“When?” - -“Could you come to dinner?” - -His features altered swiftly: “You charming, generous girl! Of course -I’ll come----” - -“Good-bye,” she nodded, and turned away into the portal where the -door-keeper on duty stood watching them. - - - - -CHAPTER XX - - -Except for one disquieting symptom, Annan had no reason to suppose that -his budding affair with Eris was to develop and terminate differently -from other agreeable interludes in his airy career. - -That symptom was a new one--an odd disinclination to work because his -mind was preoccupied with a girl. - -No other tender episodes in this young man’s career had interfered with -his creative ability. On the contrary, they had stimulated it. - -Always he had taken such incidents gaily; always he remained receptive, -not seeking; the onus of initiative equally shared; the normal end -a mutual enlightenment, not too tragic, and with the germ of future -laughter always latent, even quickening under tears. - -There never had been any passion in these affairs--not on his part -anyway--unless a passion for the analysis of reactions counted, and a -passionate desire to comprehend beauty, physical and intellectual; its -multiple motives, responsibilities, and penalties. - -Partly experimental, partly sympathetically responsive, always tenderly -curious, this young man drifted gratefully through the inevitable -episodes to which all young men are heir. - -And something in him always transmuted into ultimate friendship the -sentimental chaos, where comedy and tragedy clashed at the crisis. - -The result was professional knowledge. Which, however, he had employed -rather ruthlessly in his work. For he resolutely cut out all that had -been agreeable to the generations which had thriven on the various -phases of virtue and its rewards. Beauty he replaced with ugliness; -dreary squalor was the setting for crippled body and deformed mind. The -heavy twilight of Scandinavian insanity touched his pages where sombre -shapes born out of Jewish Russia moved like anachronisms through the -unpolluted sunshine of the New World. - -His were essays on the enormous meanness of mankind--mean conditions, -mean minds, mean aspirations, and a little mean horizon to encompass -all. - -Out of his theme, patiently, deftly, ingeniously he extracted every -atom of that beauty, sanity, inspired imagination which _makes_ the -imperfect more perfect, creates _better_ than the materials permit, -_forces_ real life actually to assume and _be_ what the passionate -desire for sanity and beauty demands. - -For we become, visibly, what the passionate purpose of the strongest -among us demands. Bodies and minds alter in the irresistible demand for -beauty and sanity. - -It is the fixed, inexorable aspiration of the strong that has moved -mankind out of its own natal ugliness--so far upon the long, long -journey toward sanity, beauty, and the stars. - - * * * * * - -The old, old story: beauty is obvious and becomes trite: the corruption -from whence it sprung is the only interest. Not the flower but the -maggots in the manure which nourishes it; not symmetry, but the causes -that deform it; not sanity but the microbes which undermine it. - -Shadows everywhere framing a black abyss where, deep in obscurity, -cause and effect writhe endlessly like two great worms.... - -And he became uneasy and uncomfortable and perplexed because he seemed -to be disinclined to continue work. - -Eris was interfering. The damp sweetness of her mouth, her cool fresh -body, the still clarity of gray eyes, hands that lay in his lightly as -dawn-chilled flowers.... - -Neither intention of mind and pen--nor even effort where, hitherto, -inspiration and mechanics had so suavely co-ordinated--seemed to -replace him and reassure him in that easy security from whence, -hitherto, he had inspected mankind. - -An indefinable subconsciousness was becoming a restlessness shared -by mind and body. And it finally set him adrift from club to -avenue--trivial resources of those who depend upon externals for -occupation. - -Never before had Annan been at loss to know how to entertain his mind. -He had been an amusing host to himself. Now, for the first time he was -aware of a sort of obscure impatience with the entertainment. Not that -his was becoming the sordid state of mind of the time-killer--most -contemptible of unconscious suicides and slowest of any to enter that -meaningless void for which such human phantoms are fitted. - -But it seemed that something was lacking to make self-entertainment -worth while. Exactly what this was he did not know. There was effort -now where none ever had been. And that effort was the initiative of -a mind seeking, for the first time, its complement, vaguely, blindly -irritated by its own incompleteness. - - * * * * * - -He went to see his aunt, but she wasn’t very glad to see him. - -The reason he called on her was to talk about Eris, but Mrs. Grandcourt -bluntly inquired what his interest might be in an actress, and -suggested that he mind his business and try to foregather with women of -his own caste. - -“Isn’t she?” he asked rather rashly. - -But she, old, wise, disillusioned, and with a sort of weary -comprehension of men, made it plain that the granddaughter of Jeanne -d’Espremont concerned herself alone. - -As he was taking his leave: - -“I can imagine,” she remarked, “nothing as contemptible as any -philandering with this child by any man of my race.” - -He went out with that in his ear. - -It bored him all day. Finally it interested him. Because that is -exactly what would have happened in one of his own stories---- - -Abruptly he was conscious that it _was_ happening. That this had to do -with his restlessness. That possibly it was desire to see this girl -which was disturbing him. - -He realised, now, that he wanted to see Eris; was impatient at delay. -Well, that was interesting anyway. And, now that the possible cause of -discomfort seemed clearer, he decided to examine and analyse it coolly, -professionally.... - - * * * * * - -Toward one o’clock in the morning, dead tired, he gave it up. The -cause of restlessness still abided with him. He fell asleep, weary -of visualisation--young eyes, crystal-grey, that told him nothing, -answered nothing--eyes virginal, unaware, immaculate, incorruptible. - - - - -CHAPTER XXI - - -When Annan arrived at the Jane Street apartment, Eris had just -telephoned Hattie, the negro maid, that she had been detained at the -studio; would be late; and to say this to Mr. Annan. - -So constantly yet unconsciously during the two days’ separation had he -visualised this meeting, pictured it to the least detail, that this -slight delay in realisation tightened a nervous tension of which he had -been aware all day. - -It was rather ridiculous; he had seen her only two days before. It -had seemed much longer. Also, knowledge of her dinner engagement -with Albert Smull had not quieted his impatience. But there had been -nothing to do about it except to send her fresh roses and a great sheaf -of lilies. Over the telephone he told Hattie to place these in her -bed-room before she returned. - -So now he picked up the evening paper in the little living-room and -composed himself to wait. - -The culinary clatter of Hattie in the kitchen came to him fitfully; -shrill voices from ragged children at play in the sunset-flooded -street; the grinding roar of motor trucks herded like leviathans toward -their west-side corrals; the eternal jar and quiver of the vast, iron -city. Otherwise, silence; a heated stillness in the isolated abode -of Eris, “Daughter of Discord”; the subdued breath of his roses in -the air, which glimmered with gilded sun-dust; red rays from the west -painted across the eastern wall. And, possessing all, a hushed magic--a -spell invisible--the intimacy of this absent girl;--its mystery, -everywhere--in the shadowy doorway beyond, from which stole the scent -of unseen lilies.... - -So intimate, so part of her seemed everything that even his roses -appeared intruders here in the rosy demi-dusk where sun-rays barred -door and window of her sanctuary with barriers of crimson fire. - - * * * * * - -The evening paper had slipped to the floor. His speculative eyes, -remote, were fixed on the red rods of waning light: he sat upright, -unstirring, in the attitude of one who hears without listening, but -awaits the unheard. - - * * * * * - -She came up the stairs, running lightly; flung open the door ajar, -greeted him with a little gasp of happy, breathless recognition. - -When she could explain at her ease: “Frank Donnell is patching in and -re-taking with me before Mr. Creevy begins. To-morrow we finish, and -the day after--” she laughed excitedly, “--I begin with my own company!” - -“Wonderful!” he admitted; “I hope you’ll be as happy and as fortunate -with your new director, Eris.” - -“I hope so. I’m very fond of Mr. Donnell----” She pulled off her blue -turban, glanced over her shoulder into the mirror, turned and looked -happily at Annan. Then her smile faded. “Aren’t you well?” she asked. - -“Certainly I am. Why?” - -“I thought--you seemed thin--a trifle tired----” - -“Bored,” he nodded briefly. - -“Why?” she demanded, astonished. - -“I don’t know. Probably because I’ve missed you.” - -Recognising only a jest in kindness meant, she smiled response and went -into her bed-room. - -“Oh,” she exclaimed, “my room is full of lilies!” She came to the door, -inarticulate with gratitude, exaggerating, as always, kindness of giver -and beauty of gift; then inadequately thanked him--invited him to -enter and see where Hattie had placed his flowers. - -“Don’t sleep with them; they’ll give you a headache,” he remarked. - -For a little while she lingered over the scented flowers. Then there -was just a moment’s hesitation; and, as he did not seem inclined to -leave, she seated herself at her dressing table, shook out her bobbed -hair--fleeting revelation of close-set ears and nape milk-white under -thickest chestnut curls. - -Deftly she re-parted, re-touched, coaxed, petted, intent upon her -business with this soft, crisp shock of curls. Her every movement -fascinated him--the twisted grace of her lithe back, celerity of -slender wrist and fingers,--white!--oh, so white and swift and sure!... - -He bent and touched her head with his lips. Movement ceased instantly; -hovering hands froze stiff, suspended; she sat as motionless as the -lilies in her room. - -After a moment’s wordless silence, manual activity ventured to resume, -tentatively, with little intervals of hesitation--silent, intent, -inquiring perhaps; perhaps inherent apprehension which turns the -feminine five senses into ears. - -“You want the place to yourself,” he said, as coolly as he could; and -sauntered into the living-room. Where he resumed the evening paper as -though impatient to read it. But his eyes watched her closing door; -rested there. - -Before she reappeared, Hattie waddled into view to announce dinner. -Annan, pacing the room, impatient of his own restlessness, turned -nervously as Eris opened her door. She wore a thin black gown--nothing -to relieve its slim and sombre simplicity except the snowy skin and the -cheek’s rose-warmth shadowed by gold-red hair. - -She smiled her confidence; invited him with extended hand. He took -possession of her cool, bare arm, walked slowly with her to the -dining-room, seated her, touched her hair lightly with his cheek. - -For all his fluency he found no word to link the liaison--nothing to -smooth the slight contact of caress. - -She drew his attention to the rose beside his service plate: he leaned -toward her; she picked up the bud and drew it through his lapel without -embarrassment. - -In the girl’s slight smile suddenly Annan found his tongue. And now, as -always, his easy flow of speech began to stimulate her to an increasing -facility of response. - -Hers, too, was now the initiative as often as his; she told him -gaily about the closing hours at the studio under Frank Donnell’s -directorship; all about the assembling of her own company under Mr. -Creevy; about her new camera-man, Emil Shunk; the search for stories; -the several continuities still under consideration. She spoke warmly -of Albert Smull, and of his partner, Leopold Shill; of their constant -generosity to her, and of her determination that they should never -regret their belief in her ability to make their investment profitable. - -“It seems to me,” she said, “so amazing, so wonderful, that such keen -business men should venture to risk so much on a girl they scarcely -know, that it frightens me at moments.” - -“Don’t worry,” he remarked with a shrug; “it’s a more interesting -gamble for them than the stock-market offers these days. They’re having -their fun out of it--Shill, Smull & Co.” - -“Oh! Do you think it’s quite that?” she asked, flushing. - -“Well,” he replied, “every enterprise is a risk of sorts, isn’t it? To -take a chance is always amusing. Nothing flatters like picking a winner -on one’s own best judgment. You’re what Broadway calls ‘sure fire.’ It -doesn’t take much courage to lay odds on you, Eris.” - -She nodded, her colour still high: “Yes, I suppose Mr. Smull looks at -it that way. It really is a matter of business, of course.... But he is -very kind to me.” - -“If it were anything except a matter of business it would scarcely do, -would it?” asked Annan carelessly. - -“I don’t think I understand. Please tell me.” - -“I mean--it’s quite all right for a man to bet on a girl if he believes -her professionally capable. That’s finance--of one sort. That’s a -business investment.” - -“What other sort of investment is there?” she asked. “Will you tell me?” - -“The other sort is to finance an enterprise out of--friendship. That’s -not legitimate--on either side.... And even when it’s sheer business -it’s a ticklish one.” - -She remained absorbed for a while in her own reflections. Then, idling -over her strawberries and orange ice: “Do you think that a girl really -has no right to accept such heavy responsibility as is now mine?” she -inquired. - -“I’m thinking about your obligations--burdensome in success, crushing -in failure.... Because you are the kind of girl who will so consider -them.” - -“What kind of girl do you mean?” - -“Conscientious.” - -“Of course.” - -“But too sensitive, too generous, too easily overwhelmed by a sense of -obligations--mostly imaginary.” - -She continued with her reflections and her strawberries. Finally coffee -was served; he lighted a cigarette. Eris had not yet commented upon his -final proposition. - -“It really depends on the man,” he remarked, “how difficult or how easy -a girl’s position is to be. It’s always certain to be difficult if the -deal be merely a speculation in friendship and not in business.” - -She tasted her coffee: “Yes, it might be--perplexing,” she said. - -“You see the possibility of confusion?--gratitude worrying about what -is expected of it; dread of reproach for benefits forgot--the mask to -choose and wear in the lively hope of benefits to come--no; speculation -in friendship is never legitimate gambling. It’s bad business, bad -sportsmanship.” - -She considered this over her coffee, her serious eyes intent on the -flecks of foam in her cup, with which she played with her little silver -spoon. - -“Do you think,” she said slowly, “that Mr. Smull is taking a legitimate -chance in financing my company?” - -“You’re a perfectly legitimate risk. I told you so. You’re sure fire.” - -She looked up: “Do you think that was Mr. Smull’s motive?” - -“I don’t know, Eris.” - -After a pause: “You don’t like him, do you?” - -“Not much.” - -“Will you tell me why?” - -“I’m not quite sure why.... Do you like him, Eris?” - -“I’d be ashamed not to.” - -“Because he’s kind?” - -“Yes.” - -“That’s why you say you like me,” observed Annan, smiling. - -She smiled, too, rather vaguely. - -“Is that the reason you like me, Eris?” he persisted--“because you -consider me kind?” - -“What do you think it is?” she murmured, still smiling a little to -herself. - -“I’m not certain you like me as well as you once did.” - -The boy obvious, suddenly! The eternal and beloved ass that every woman -is destined to meet. And forgive. - -“I--think I do,” she said. - -“Like me as well as you once did?” - -“Yes.” - -“Oh! My conversation still amuses you. But otherwise--well, I’m afraid -you don’t care quite as much for me as you did, Eris.” - -“Why?”--with slow lifted eyes. - -“Because I kissed you.” - -The ass obvious, at last! - -She made no reply. Perhaps he hoped for shy denial--for some diffident -evasion anyway. Her unembarrassed silence troubled him because he had -not really harboured the fear he pretended. - -Now, however, the possibility made him uneasy. - -“Glance into your mirror, Eris,” he said lightly, “and tell me how I -could have helped what I did.” - -Her face, partly averted, remained so, unflushed, unresponsive. - -Hattie opened the kitchen door and looked in, bulking like a vast, dark -cloud. - -“You may come in and clear up,” said Eris quietly. She rose from the -table and they walked into the farther room and seated themselves, she -on the sofa, with an untroubled aloofness that did not encourage him to -closer approach than a chair pulled up opposite her. - -She had turned to some of his flowers as though to include them in a -friendly circle. - -“Your roses are such heavenly company,” she said in a low voice. - -“I never knew anybody so charmingly interested in flowers,” he said -with smiling malice. - -She understood, laughed, turned to him. - -“I’m interested, also, to hear how your novel is progressing,” she said. - -“It isn’t.” - -“Haven’t you worked?” she inquired with sweet concern. - -“No.” - -“Why not?” - -“Because,” he said deliberately, “my mind is too full of you to contain -anything else.” - -A pause: “Then,” she said, “you had better not see me until you feel -inclined to resume work.” - -“You don’t seem to care very much,” he remarked. - -She was looking again at the roses. She made no reply. The cold, rosy -loveliness of her enthralled and chilled him. Where the chestnut hair -touched her cheek a carnation flush warmed the slight shadow. - -“I’ll resume work,” he said abruptly. - -She nodded, her face close to the roses. - -“How would you like me to make a scenario of my last novel for -you?” he asked. He had prepared this surprise during the two days’ -separation--had even visualised her delight. - -If he expected emotional response, the impulsive gratitude that -hitherto had so charmingly over-valued his little gifts, he was to be -stunningly disappointed. - -She turned and looked at him out of frankly troubled eyes; and from -that moment he learned that whatever he ever was to have from this girl -would be only what her honesty could offer. - -“I couldn’t play such a part,” she said.... “You are most kind.... But -I never could be able to do it.” - -“Why? Do you think it would prove too difficult?” - -“Yes, ... too difficult ... because I don’t believe in such a part--or -in such a character.” - -He sat thunderstruck. Then he flushed to the temples and the last -rag of masculine condescension fell from him, leaving him boyishly -bewildered and chagrined. - -“Do you mean that you don’t _like_ the story?” he asked incredulously. - -“I like the way you wrote it. But my opinion is of no value. Everybody -says it is a great novel. Betsy told me that the whole country is madly -discussing it. Everybody who can judge such things knows that it is a -very wonderful book. So does it matter what I think----” - -“It does, to _me_,” he said almost savagely. “Why don’t you like it, -Eris?” - -She was silent, and his tone changed: “Won’t you tell me why?” he -pleaded. - -Again the order reversed--the eternal cry of Eris on _his_ lips, -now,--he, her court of appeal, appealing to her,--in mortified quest -of knowledge,--of truth, perhaps,--or, astonished, wounded in snobbery -and pride, seeking some remedy for the surprising hurt--some shred of -his former authority to guide her back into the attitude which now he -realised had meant so much to unconscious snobbery and happy vanity. - -And now Eris knew that their hour for understanding had arrived. She -had much to say to him. Her clasped hands tightened nervously in her -lap but the level eyes were steady. - -She said, very slowly: “I have known unhappiness, Mr. Annan. And -ugliness. And hardship. But I’d be ashamed to let my mind dwell -upon these things.... Stories where life begins without hope and -continues hopelessly, seem needless and more or less distorted. And -rather cowardly.... One’s mind dwells most constantly on what one -likes.... I do not like deformity. Also, it is not the rule; it is -the exception.... So is ugliness. And evil. A little seasons art -sufficiently.... Only beasts eat garlic wholesale.... Those who find -perpetual interest in misshapen minds and bodies and souls are either -physicians or are themselves in some manner misshapen.... Unhappiness, -ugliness, squalor, misery, evil,--in the midst of these, or of the -even more terrible isolation of the lonely mind,--always one can -summon courage to dream nobly.... And what one dares dream one can -become,--inwardly always,--often outwardly and actually.” - -She lifted her deep, grey eyes to his reddened face. - -“I do admire you, and your mind, and your skill in attainment. But I -have not been able to comprehend the greatness of what you write, and -what all acclaim.... I do not like it. I cannot. - -“I could neither understand nor play such a character as the woman -in your last book.... Nor could I ever believe in her.... Nor in -the ugliness of her world--the world you write about, nor in the -dreary, hopeless, malformed, starving minds you analyse.... My God, -Mr. Annan--are there no wholesome brains in the world you write -about?... I’m sorry.... You know that I am ignorant, not experienced, -crude--trying to learn truths, striving to see and understand.... I -have not travelled far on any road. But I shall never live long enough -to travel the road you follow, nor shall I ever comprehend such vision, -such intention, such art as you have mastered.... You are a master. I -do believe that.... Always you have remained very wonderful to me.... -Your mind.... Your wisdom.... _You._” - -She clasped her slender fingers tighter over her knees but looked at -him out of clear, intelligent eyes that seemed almost black in their -purplish depths. - -“With me,” she said, “the love of beauty, and the belief in it, give -me all my strength. I need to believe in beauty: it is my first -necessity.... And remains my last.... And I never have discovered a -truth that is not beautiful.... There is no ugliness, no evil in Truth.” - -He got to his feet slowly, and began to walk about the room in -an aimless, nervous way, as though under some vague, indefinite -menace,--of proven inferiority, perhaps. - -Reaction set in toward boyish self-assertion; and it came with a sudden -rush,--and a forced laugh that, unexpectedly to her, exposed his wound. - -Surprised that he had suffered such a one, incredulous that so slight -a mind as hers had dealt it, she sat watching him. Gradually all the -bright hardness in her gaze melted to a tender grey. Yet, it seemed -incredible that so slight a creature as she could matter to him -intellectually,--could have hurt so brilliantly armoured a being. - -And then, all suddenly, she realised she had hurt a boy and not a mind. - -He came to her where she was seated, took her hands from her lap, -looked wretchedly into her eyes, starry now with imminence of tears. - -“All that really matters,” he said, “is that your mind should forgive -mine and your heart care for mine.” - -His clasp was drawing her to her feet; and she stood up, not resisting, -not confused, nor betraying any emotion visible to him, unless he -understood the starry brilliancy of her young eyes. - -“I’m falling in love with you, Eris. That is the only thing that -matters,” he said. - -He kissed her mouth twice; drew her warm head to his breast; touched -her face with his lips, very gently,--her clustered curls; and she -looked back at him out of eyes in which light trembled. - -If her soft, cool lips remained unresponsive, at least they did not -avoid his, nor did her cool body drawn close, closely imprisoned. - -After a long while, against him, he was aware of her heart, hurrying. -In the first flash of boyish passion he crushed her in his arms and -felt her breath and lips suddenly hot against his. - -Then, in the instant, she had disengaged herself violently and had -stepped clear of him, scarlet and silent. Nor spoke until he followed -and she had avoided him again. - -“Don’t--do that,” she said unsteadily.... “You--hurt me.” - -“Eris! I love you----” - -“Don’t say that.... I don’t like it.... I don’t _like_ it,” she -repeated breathlessly. - -A silence--confusion of hurrying atoms of time--a faint flash from -chaos. - -“Can’t you care for me, Eris?” he whispered. - -She turned on him, pale, controlled: “I don’t like what you did, I tell -you!... And that’s _that_!” - -For a long while they stood there, unstirring. - -“Do you dismiss me?” he asked at last. - -She made no reply. - -“Had you rather that I should go, Eris?” - -“Yes.” - -“Why?” he asked, like a whipped boy. - -“Because I am tired of you,” she said evenly. - -He stepped to the corridor, took his hat and stick, but lingered, all -hot with the rebuff, despising himself for lingering. He laid his hand -on the door-knob, miserably hoping, miserable in his self-contempt. - -“Eris!” - -She did not even turn her head. - -He left the hall door open, still miserably hoping, scorning himself, -but lagging on the stairs. As he reached the street door he heard her -close her own with a crash and bolt it. - - * * * * * - -It was after midnight,--and after she had finished crying,--that the -girl began to undress. - -Once she thought she heard him return,--thought she heard his voice at -her door, calling her; and her eyes flamed. - - * * * * * - -But on her pillow she began to cry again, soundlessly, one arm flung -across her face. - -Eris, daughter of Discord.... - - - - -CHAPTER XXII - - -Coltfoot had a short note from Annan asking him to lunch. He called up, -saying that he couldn’t get away until afternoon. - -When he did arrive at No. 3 Governor’s Place, Mrs. Sniffen said that -Mr. Annan was lying down--that for the last two weeks he had not seemed -to be very well. - -“What’s wrong with him?” asked Coltfoot. - -“I don’t know, sir. ’E doesn’t go out any more. ’E ’asn’t left the -’ouse in the last fortnight.” - -“That’s nothing. He’s working.” - -“No, sir; Mr. Annan don’t write. He just reads or sits quiet like till -a fit takes ’im sudden, and then he walks and walks and walks.” - -“Does he eat?” - -“Nothing to keep a canary ’ealthy. It’s ’igh-balls what keep ’im up, -Mr. Coltfoot; and I ’ate to say so, but it worrits me.” - -“Mr. Annan doesn’t drink,” said Coltfoot incredulously. - -“Oh, no, sir--a glass of claret at dinner--a cocktail perhaps. It’s -only the last two weeks that I ’ave to keep ’im in ice and siphons.” - -Coltfoot, puzzled, thought a moment: “All right,” he said, “I’ll go up.” - -Annan, lying on the lounge, heard him and sat up. - -They shook hands; Annan pushed the Irish whiskey toward him and pointed -to the ice and mineral water. - -“Mike,” he said, “is my stuff rotten?” - -Coltfoot, who had been inspecting his thin features, laughed. - -“Not so rotten,” he said. “Why?” - -“You once said it was all wrong.” - -“Probably professional jealousy, Barry----” He constructed an iced -draught for himself, sipped it, furtively noticing the bluish shadows -on Annan’s temples and under his cheek-bones. - -“What’s the matter with you?” he demanded. - -“Nothing.... I’m worried because I can’t write.” - -“Rot, my son.” - -“It’s quite true. I haven’t touched a pen for a month, nearly.... The -hell of it is that I’ve nothing to say.” - -There was a silence. - -“Good God, Mike,” he burst out, “do you think I’m done for?” - -“I think not,” drawled the other. - -“Because--I can’t work. I _can’t_. I seem to be in a sort of nightmare -state of mind.... Did you ever feel that the world’s askew and -everything out of proportion?” - -“No, I never did. Something has happened to you, Barry.” - -“Nothing--important.... No.... But I’m rather scared about my work. You -know those stories I did for you? I hate them!” - -“You ungrateful young devil, they made you.” - -“_What_ did they make me?” - -“A best-seller--for one item. A fine workman for another----” - -“Mike! Who cares for good workmanship in these days? Who understands it -when he sees it? Who does it? - -“It’s a jerry-age,--jerry-built houses, furniture, -machinery,--jerry-built literature, music, drama,--jerry-built nations -too,--and marriages and children and every damned thing that once -required good workmanship. - -“Now, everything is glue and pasteboard and unskilled labour----” - -“Oh, lay off on your jerry-built jeremiad!” cried Coltfoot, laughing. -“Where do you get that stuff?” - -“Stuff is right, too. I’m a fake, also. I’m a jerry-built author with -a jerry-built education and I write jerry-bui----” He dodged a lump of -ice. - -“Shut up,” said Coltfoot wearily. “How long do you think I’m going to -listen? Come on, now, what’s started you skidding, Barry?” - -“You started me.” - -“Oh--that line of talk I handed you?” - -“It got under my skin.” - -“Oh! Who’s been sticking the knife into you since? Not your fool -public. Not the Great American Ass.” - -Annan shook his head. - -“Well, who?” - -“Another--friend.” - -“Is that what upset you?” - -“Yes.... Partly.” - -“You’re not ill, are you, Barry?” inquired the elder man, curiously. - -“No, I should say not!” - -“Financial troubles?... You don’t mind my asking?” - -“Oh, it isn’t anything of that sort, Mike.... It really isn’t anything.” - -“You’re not--in love.... Are you?” - -“Hang it all, no, I’m not!... No.... I’ve never been in love, Mike.” - -“You’ve had a few affairs, dear friend,” remarked Coltfoot, amused. - -“Well, you know the kind. Everybody has ’em. Everybody has that sort. -That’s just vanity--silliness--no harm, you know.... The young are -always sparring--like little chicks and kittens.” - -Coltfoot finished his glass. There was an interval; Annan set both -elbows on his knees and framed his drawn face between his hands. - -“No, I’m not in love,” he said as though to himself. - -They discussed other matters. But now and then Annan drifted back to -love, and his ignorance of it. - -“I suppose,” he said carelessly, “a fellow is able to diagnose the -thing if he gets it.... Recognise it.... Don’t you?” - -“Probably.” - -“I suppose every fellow stands a chance of landing there sooner or -later.” - -“You write about it. Don’t you know?” - -“Certainly.... I’m familiar with some phases of it.... The phenomena -are well known.” - -“The various sorts of love and its aftermath that you write about are -enough to scare any man off that stuff,” remarked Coltfoot. - -“Those are the sorts I’ve seen.... Or the cut and dried hypocrisy of my -own kind and kindred.... I’ve seen darned few cases of satisfactory and -enduring love.... Darned few, Mike.” - -“Then there are a few?” - -“Sure.” - -“Why not write about one such incident?” - -After a silence Annan lifted his eyes and gave him a haggard look. - -“I’m afraid of Christmas-card stuff, I guess.... Mike, I’ve always been -afraid of it. I’ve had a morbid fear of weakness.... And do you know I -believe _that_ was the real weakness? I _am_ weak!” - -“Barry, you’ve merely had things come to you too easily. You’ve had -your own way too much. You’re persuasive; you get it. You’ve been, -perhaps, a little self-complacent, a bit smug, a trifle cocksure.... -All strength is in danger of such phases. But weakness never is. -Weakness _must_ assert itself or silently acquiesce in its own visible -inferiority. For the bragger is the weakling, not he who does not need -to assert himself. - -“And always there lies a danger in the reticence of strength that, -unawares, complacency and self-satisfaction may taint it, and strength -go stale.” - -After a silence: “My stuff has been pretty narrow, I guess,” muttered -Annan. - -“Narrow calibre, perhaps; but powerful. You can shoot a bigger gun and -bigger projectile, Barry. I don’t know what your limits may be, but I -know they’re wide--if you care to range them.” - -“That’s nice of you, Mike.... I guess I’ll feel like working ... pretty -soon.... As for falling in love, ... I suppose I’ll know it if I do.... -Don’t you think so?” - -Coltfoot took his hat and stick: - -“I’m not sure. I don’t believe the thing conforms always to specific -gravity or Troy weight or carats or decimals. I don’t believe that a -standard test will always give the same reaction.” He scowled: “I don’t -believe there’s such a thing as love in elemental supply. I think it’s -always found in combination--endless combinations.... And how the hell -you’re to recognise it, candidly, I don’t know.” - -“Stay to dinner; will you, Mike?” - -“Sorry.... By the way, how is your little waif, the Goddess of Discord, -getting on with Smull?” - -“All right, I fancy.” - -“Don’t you see her?” - -“I haven’t lately.” - -“Well, the gossip is that she’s sure fire. Frank Donnell believes in -her. I’ve heard that Smull is crazy about her and stands to back her to -the limit.... I’m sorry--rather.” - -“About what?” asked Annan sharply. - -“Well, in Frank Donnell she had a gentleman. But Creevy is a vulgar -fellow. His staff isn’t so much, either. Too bad the little girl -couldn’t have remained in Betsy Blythe’s company. It was a decent -bunch.” - -“Isn’t hers?” - -“Oh--I guess it’s endurable.... Creevy is a rat. So’s Emil Shunk. Marc -Blither and Harry Quiss are just common and harmless.... Of course, if -anybody offends your little protégée Albert Smull will do murder.” - -“You don’t like Smull,” said Annan. - -“Neither do you.” - - * * * * * - -When Coltfoot had gone Annan went to the telephone. And sat there for -an hour without calling anybody. He had done this every day for two -weeks. Sometimes he did it several times a day. - -Mrs. Sniffen knocked and asked him what he wished for dinner. - -“I don’t know,” he said absently. - -She stood waiting for a while: “Will you ring, sir, when you decide?” - -“Yes, I will, Xantippe.... Thank you.” - -After she had been gone for some time: “Well,” he breathed, “I--I -can’t call her and keep any self-respect.... I simply can’t do it.... -She’s through with me anyway.... I suppose I acted like a cad.... She -wasn’t the girl to understand such affairs.... She is better than such -things.... Or too stupid for them.... Stupid in that way only.... Too -damned serious.... My God, what a hiding she gave me for my book!... -But the other was worse.... I haven’t any self-respect when I remember -that.... If I call her now, she can’t take any more away from me, as -she’s got all I had....” - -He came back to the telephone. He could feel the painful colour hot in -his face as he unhooked the receiver. - -In a hard voice he called her number. - -“Now,” he said with an oath, “she can do her damnedest!” - -She did. - - - - -CHAPTER XXIII - - -Hattie’s voice answered him: “Who is it, please?” - -“Mr. Annan. Is Miss Odell at home?” - -“I’ll enquiah, suh. Please to hold the wiah.” - -He could hear her fat feet clattering away along the corridor. An -endless, endless wait, almost a quarter of a minute. Steps again on the -tiled corridor,--not Hattie’s; then the composed voice of Eris: - -“Mr. Annan?” - -“Yes.... Do you--are you quite all right?” he faltered. - -“Quite, thank you. Are you?” - -“Yes, I’m fine.... I’m so glad you’re all right.... Do you mind my -calling up?” - -“I hoped you would,” she replied calmly. - -“D-did you?--really?” he stammered, unable to believe his ears. - -“Naturally. I’ve wondered whether you have been too busy to call me. -Have you?” - -“Not exactly--busy. Do you--suppose I--I could see you, Eris?” - -“Did you suppose you couldn’t?” she asked in a low voice. - -“I didn’t know.... When may I?” - -“Probably,” she said, “you have an engagement this evening--” - -“No! I’m not doing anything at all!” - -“Then--will you come?” - -“Yes. What time?” - -“_Any_ time.” - -“Do you--do you mean _now_?” he cried, enchanted. - -Her reply was slightly indistinct: “Yes, as soon as you possibly -can--if you would be--so kind----” - - * * * * * - -Again the low hanging sun at the western end of Jane Street, cherry-red -in the river mist, washing out all shabbiness and squalor in a rosy -bath of light. - -A barrel-organ, played by an old, old man, drew legions of ragged -children to the pavement in front of her house, where they whirled like -gnats at sunset, dancing to some forgotten rag--the sun spinning its -nimbus around each dishevelled, childish head. - -Annan made his way through the milling swarm with a caress for those -who stumbled across his path and a silver-piece tossed to the ancient -where he leaned on his organ, bent almost double, tears perpetual in -his sunken eyes. - -He ran up the stairs; knocked. - -“Hello, Hattie,” he tried to say--scarcely conscious of voice at all, -or sight or hearing. - -“Go right in, Mr. Annan, suh----” - -He was already going, not knowing any longer what he was about. The -sun-glare on the windows dazzled him a moment before he saw her. - -She was standing at the further end of the room. He went slowly toward -her, not knowing how they were to meet after ages of dead days. - -Then, still knowing nothing, he took her into his arms. - -Her mouth warmed slightly against his. As his embrace tightened, her -hands hovered close to his shoulders, touched them, crept upward. - -Suddenly the girl strained him to her with all her strength. - -In the silence of passionate possession, her lips melted to his, ... a -moment, ... then her head dropped on his arm with a sob. - -“I was lonely;--you made me feel lonely.... Where have you been?” - -“I’ve been in love with you----” - -She released herself but clung to his hand. They came together again, -sank down on the lounge together. - -“I’ve been lonely,” she repeated; “--it’s been deathly lonely without -you.... I’m tired--of the pain of it....” - - * * * * * - -Dusk in the room turned golden with a rosy tinge. They had not spoken. -His gaze never left her face. At intervals she rested her bobbed head -against him, confused by the dire ruin that once had been her mind -before love burst in, disordering everything. - -Now, groping for the origin of the cataclysm, she retraced her progress -through a maze of memories to the first step. The Park! Vision of hot -stars overhead; vision of the great bed where she lay in this man’s -house; vision of the Coast--a confusion of sunshine and feverish -endeavour;--but in none of these was the germ of The Beginning.... Yet -she was drawing nearer now. The place of the birth of love was not far -away.... Suddenly she found it. - -And, as this man now was to know everything that she knew, Eris -prepared to bare her untried heart.... She offered her lips first; -looked into his eyes with a vague and virgin curiosity. - -“--And after you went out,” she continued, “what had happened seemed -suddenly to demoralise me. I was exasperated.... I tore your rose from -my belt and threw it after you.... I slammed the door and bolted it.... -As though I could bolt out what had happened to me!--” She laughed and -looked happily into his eyes,--“Barry! As though I could bolt it out!” - -He kissed her hands; her lips caressed his bent head. - -“... And, do you know,” she went on, “I even swore at you?” - -“Swore at----” Laughter checked him. - -“Yes, I damned you. I knew how to. They swear hard on farms.... Oh, -Barry, I swore at you like a hired man!” - -“You dear,” he said, “--you dear!” - -“You say that now, but you nearly drove me mad that evening.... You -_did_!” - -“I was half crazy myself, Eris----” - -“Were you!” she pleaded with swift tenderness. “Oh, Barry, you are -_thin_! You look _ill_. I was frightened when you came in this -evening----” - -She drew his head to her again, caressed it, tender, penitent: - -“You are _not_ well. Can I do anything?” - -“You are doing it.” - -“I know.... I wish I could take care of you----” - -“You’re going to feed me, presently.” - -“You make a joke of it; but you’re _ill_, and I did it!” - -“Blessed child, I’ll be so fat in a week that I’ll waddle like Hattie!” - -“Show me,” she urged, enchanted. - -He got up and tried to waddle, and she sank back, convulsed. - -In fact, they both had become rather light headed by the time Hattie -announced dinner. - -It was love’s April--gusty with unbidden gaiety--with heavenly -intervals of calm; of caprice; of stormy contact; of smiles, tremulous, -close to tears--lips touching in wonder; and the sudden breeze of -laughter freshening, refreshing mind and body:--their April in Love -after youth’s long winter. - -“Poor boy,” she said, “I’ve rather a horrid dinner for you. I was -dining out, and you didn’t give me time----” - -“You broke a dinner engagement for me, Eris?” - -“I telephoned Nancy Cassell that I couldn’t come. It doesn’t matter.... -Anyway, that’s why you’re having omelette and minced chicken....” - -Now and then she slipped her cool, smooth hand into his under the -camouflage of the cloth. And she ate so, sometimes awkwardly; and clung -a little to his hand when he would have released hers. - -Once she drew a deep, uneven breath: “I never expected to be in love,” -she said. “Oh, Barry, it’s so inconvenient!” - -“How?” he protested. - -“My _dear_! I work like the dickens! It would be all right if I could -come back to you at night. But this way----” - -After a silence: “That must happen, too, Eris.” - -“I’ll have to talk to you about that.... And there are evenings when -I must study--rehearse before the mirror--or read very hard. And some -evenings I am dead tired.... And then there are dinners.... And one’s -friends.... Darling!--you look at me so oddly!” - -“Well--as I’m in love with you, I’d rather like to see you more than -twice a year----” - -She laughed and caught his hands--set her lips to them--looked up at -him again with her heart in her eyes. - -“To be loved by _you_!” she said, “is too wonderful for me!” - -“Once,” he reminded her with malice, “you told me you were tired of -me----” - -Her shocked face checked him. - -“I was only joking, Eris----” - -“I _did_ say it! And I was already in love with you when I said it. God -and you punished me instantly. But I couldn’t ever bear to have you two -do it again----” - - * * * * * - -Somebody had sent her some cordials,--mint, curaçoa,--that sort. She -was unaccustomed--had no taste for such things. But she was happy to -show him her sideboard after dinner. - -“It’s all for you. You like such things, don’t you? Well, then, I’m -going to keep them for you.... Rosalind goes schmoozing about when she -comes here. Other girls, also. But I’ve been unutterably mean--and -I’ve hoarded it for you.” - -“Then you _did_ expect me to call you up?” he asked, laughingly. - -“Oh, Lord, I didn’t know. If you hadn’t called me I couldn’t have stood -it much longer.” - -“Would you have called me?” - -“Of course.... Or died.” - -“Why didn’t you call me?” - -“I was afraid.... And I wasn’t quite dead, yet----” - -“Of what were you afraid?” - -“I knew you must be very bored with me.... And there was something -else.... It scared me.... It still exists.” - -“Tell me, Eris.” - -“Yes; I’ll have to tell you, now.” They rose from the table and she -took his arm.... “But you _must_ love me, Barry!--I’ve got to be loved -by you now.” - -In the lamp-lit sitting room he drew her to him: “How could I help -loving you, Eris?” - -“I don’t want you to help it.” - -“I couldn’t, anyway. So you needn’t fear to tell me anything you -please.” - -“No.... I’ve got to tell you, whether it scares me or not.... I think -I’d rather wait until just before you go.” - -She curled up on the sofa close to him, one hand clasping her ankles, -the other against his shoulder. - -“Also, I want to explain to you,” she said, “that I didn’t know Mrs. -Grandcourt was your aunt until _after_ I’d fallen in love with you.” - -“I don’t follow the continuity----” - -“I mean I’m not socially ambitious.” - -He was still mystified. - -“I didn’t know you were so very important socially,” she explained. - -“I’m not. My aunt thinks she is, but really she isn’t any more. Life -passed her on the road at eighty with every cylinder hitting. I never -travelled that highway. But my poor aunt still trundles along it in an -ancient victoria. Even the flivvers cover her old-mine diamonds with -plebeian joy-dust----” - -Eris, helpless with laughter, clung to his shoulder. - -“I don’t wish to laugh,” she protested. “Your aunt is nice to me.... -Though rather horrid to Betsy.... It seems she knew my grandmother. She -says she told you that.” - -“When did she admit to you that my relationship disgraced her?” - -“Yesterday.” - -“Oh, so you continue to see her in town?” - -“I lunched with her.” - -“In her private morgue?” - -“It _is_ gloomy.” - -“I suppose, while she was about it, she handed you a lurid line or two -regarding me.” - -“Well--yes.... I am instructed to beware of you.... Darling!” - -“Are you going to beware of me?” - -“No.” - -He kissed her threateningly: “What do you suppose my aunt would think -if she knew you had once been my guest over night?” - -“I told her.” - -“What!” he exclaimed. - -“But, Barry, I couldn’t allow her to be so friendly unless she -understood what sort of girl I am.” - -“You didn’t tell her about the Park, also?” - -“I did.” - -“How did she take it?” - -“She said such severe things about you--I was quite annoyed!... -Dreadful things, darling----” - -“About _me_?” - -“Yes. She called you several ghastly names----” - -“Which?” - -“Well--‘libertine’.” - -He roared with laughter but Eris had turned rosy. - -“I told her very plainly that you were _not_,” she said. “I told her -you were kind and generous and harmless----” - -“Good Lord!” he exclaimed, helpless with laughter again. - -“What are you laughing at? You _are_ harmless!” she repeated. “Aren’t -you?” - -“Yes, darling.... But some encomiums hurt as well as edify.... Never -mind. Go on.” - -“That was all.... Except she tried to persuade me to give up my -profession. She always does.” - -“What does she graciously suggest for you?” - -“Why, I suppose she wishes to be kind to me because she was very fond -of my grandmother.... But I couldn’t go and live with her.” - -“She asked you?” - -Eris nodded. - -“My aunt,” he said good humouredly, “is very rich and very stingy. -You’re the only person I ever heard of on whom she was ready to spend -real money. What did she propose?” - -“Adoption, I believe.” - -“Lord! She really must have cared for your grandmother....” - -“I think she really did.” - -After a silence: “You declined?” - -“Darling! Do you think such things count with me?” - -After a silence: “Did you tell her I’d ever kissed you?” he asked -curiously. - -“_That_ was none of her business, Barry.” - -He laughed: “So you pass up the wealthy aunt for the libertine nephew? -Do you?” - -“I do. I like him. In fact, I’m rather in the way of loving him. Also, -I love liberty, and freedom to pursue happiness. Happiness means work, -and you.” - -“Which comes first, work or me?” - -“Darling!” - -“_Which?_” - -“I don’t have to make that choice----” - -“Suppose you had to?” he insisted. - -“I’d be fearfully unhappy----” - -“But you’d choose work.... Would you, Eris?” - -“I--suppose so.... Probably I’d die in either case.... Work means -life.... I guess you do, too. But if I had to choose I’d choose work, I -suppose.” - -Nothing ever had touched him so deeply; nor had so profoundly surprised -him. - -He said: “Every word I ever have heard you utter merely reveals new -beauty in you,--and my own heart, more and more in love with you.” - -He drew her close to his breast; spoke with his lips on her cheek: - -“Would marrying me hamper you?... Had you rather wait until you are -more secure in your profession?” - -“Darling!” she said pitifully, “--that is what I had to tell you. I -_am_ married.” - -He stared at her astounded. - -After a tense silence: “Please love me--Barry----” she whispered. -“Please, dear!” - -She clasped her hands in appeal, as unconscious of drama as she had -been that day on Whitewater Brook when Mr. Quiss threatened to swim out -of her ken. - - * * * * * - -“Barry! Are you disgusted?” - -“Why, it seems so impossible----” - -“To love me?” - -“No!--that you--_you_ ever have been married!” - -“I haven’t been--entirely.... Only legally ... and partly.” - -He thought: “My God, there seems to be something the matter with -everybody and everything.” And to Eris: “Why didn’t you ever tell me?” - -“It was none of your business until I fell in love with you, was it?” - -He caught her in his arms, roughly: “It’s my business now. Do you -understand? I’ll never give you up.... Look at me, Eris!” - -He was hurting her; and she smiled and endured her bruises, breast and -lips and limb. - -She said: “If you marry me I shall have to get unmarried first--somehow -or other----” - -“Where is--this man?” - -“I don’t know, darling.... This was how it all occurred----” - - * * * * * - -Now, sullenly, and in silence he listened to the sordid story of the -marriage of Eris. - -She told it without resentment--and with the candour and brevity of a -child. - -Always it had seemed to her as though she had been merely a witness of -the miserable affair and not personally concerned. And she told it in -that manner. - -“You see, it really doesn’t count,” she concluded. “I was so ignorant -that it meant nothing to me at the time. I scarcely ever think of it, -now. Barry.... I _want_ you to love me.... But if you had rather not -marry me----” - -He reddened: “What alternative do you suggest?” - -“Why--this!--as we are.... It leaves us both free to work----” - -“_That_ is your ruling passion,” he said bluntly, “--work!” - -“If we don’t marry, I can have you, and work, too----” - -“Do you think me narrow enough, selfish enough, to interfere with your -career if you marry me?” - -She answered gravely: “I wasn’t afraid of that.... I was afraid -of--children--if I marry you ... dearest.” - -“But if----” Then the candour of her chaste self-revelation grew clear -to him--her exquisite ignorance, her virgin confidence in the heavenly -inviolability of love. - -“Do you understand, Barry?” - -“I think so.” - -“You see,” she explained, “unmarried I can go and still have you.... -But careers often end when children come.” - -“Don’t you ever want them, Eris?” - -“Well--as I’ve never had any, isn’t it natural I should prefer you and -a career to you and a baby?” - -“I suppose it is.” - -“Not that I don’t care for children,” she murmured. Her grey eyes grew -remote; a hint of tenderness curved her lips, and she smiled faintly to -herself. - -“We’ll try out your idea first,” he said, “--the combination you -prefer,--your work first, then me.... Our life will pass in one endless -courtship.” - -“Could anything be lovelier!” she cried, enchanted. - - - - -CHAPTER XXIV - - -If Annan supposed he was to see Eris frequently during those first -enchanted days, he presently realised his mistake. She was working -under pressure at the studio. - - * * * * * - -Pressure, due to laziness and ignorance, seldom bears hard on -the incompetents who cause it. In this case it was due to hasty -organization and Mr. Creevy’s direction. And Eris was always about to -take a train when Annan called her on the telephone,--always starting -“on location,” or “working late at the studio,” or kept idle awaiting -“re-takes.” - -These phrases began to irritate Annan; but there seemed to be nothing -he could do about it. - - * * * * * - -In New York, theatres were closing for the summer; roofs and beaches -opening; synthetic fruit-drinks appeared. June did her pathetic best -for the noisy, shabby city in park and square;--put on her prettiest in -green leaves and blossoms. The Park Department ruined the effort with -red and yellow cannas. God knows whether New York’s dull and bovine -eyes notice such things at all. Does the ox notice the wild flowers he -chews, or the ass admire the thistle blossoms before munching? But why -New York is not nauseated by its floral display remains a mystery. - -The only dose the aborigine notices is an emetic. But even red and -yellow cannas in combination left New York’s bowels unaffected. - -Still, ailanthus and catalpa in Governor’s Place spread once more -their cool, green pools of shade over parched sidewalks; ampelopsis on -Annan’s house and an ancient wistaria twisted over the iron balcony -did their missionary part to touch the encysted hearts of those who -‘have eyes but see not.’ A white butterfly or two fluttered through -Governor’s Place. - -Annan’s house, stripped for summer, was cool and dusky and still, -haunted by a starched and female phantom that flitted through the -demi-light in eternal quest for moth and dust and rust. - - * * * * * - -The only inclination of a man really in love is to keep at work in the -absence of the beloved. Nothing else helps to slay the intolerable -hours and days. - -It was thus with this young man. Eris on location was so tragic a -calamity that he could endure it only by rushing headlong into the -clutch of literature. - -All day, in dressing-gown and slippers, pen in hand, he scratched madly -at a pad. - -Nourishment was set before him at proper intervals; he ate it at -improper intervals. - -But the pinched look had left his youthful and agreeable features and -shadows were gone from cheek and temple. - -Every day he wrote a morning and an evening letter to Eris. And no -doubt it was her letters to him that were feeding him fat. - -Sometimes Coltfoot dropped in to lounge in an arm-chair and smoke his -pipe and lazily observe the younger man, _flagrante delicto_ with his -brazen Muse. - -And once Rosalind coolly invaded his threshold, announced with a sniff -by the Starched One. - -Rosalind wanted a cocktail and lunch. She sat on the edge of Annan’s -writing table, swinging one trim foot, interrupting breezily when it -suited her, or satisfying her capricious curiosity with his inky copy. - -“Not so bad,” she drawled, shuffling a dozen unnumbered sheets together -and tossing them under his nose. “Come on, ducky, and talk to me ere we -feast and revel.” - -“I’m going to give you your lunch when it’s ready. Until then I want to -work. Run away and play, Linda----” - -“Play nothing! We’re closed for the summer. Mom’s gone to the mountains -and I’m queen of the flat. I sleep most of the time. Lay off, ducky, -and converse with your little lonely Linda----” - -“Wait a second, will you----” he protested. “Let my papers alone----” - -“No, not a second will I wait--not a heart-throb! Regardez-moi, beau -jeune homme. Ayez pitié de moi----” - -She leaned over, patted his crisp hair, joggled his pen, gave a fillip -to his nose. - -“Betsy’s going to Paris,” she said. “What do you think of that?” - -“Why don’t you go too?” - -“You want to get rid of me? You can’t. By the way, how’s your solemn -friend, Mr. Coltfoot?” - -“All right,” he murmured, scratching away on his copy. - -“And Eris? Do you ever see her, Barry?” - -“Now and then.” - -“Is it all over?” - -“What?” - -“Your affair with her----” - -“Can it, Rosalind!----” - -“_You’re_ the canner, my fickle friend. We’re all pickles and you -jarred us.... Sour pickles.... When you’re through with a girl she’s a -schmeer. - -“Look at me! I’m a schmeer. I was innocent and happy till you came -schmoozing.... You know what I hear about Eris?” - -No answer. - -“Albert Smull is crazy about her.... He’s married, isn’t he?” - -“Yes.” - -“They’re the fancy devils, aren’t they?--those red-necked, -ruddy-jowled, hand-groomed Wall Street Romeos. But there’s just a -vulgar suspicion of the natty and jaunty about them;--and their chins -are always shaved blue----” - -“Confound it----” he exclaimed, “can’t you let me finish this page?” - -“Don’t you like gossip, ducky?” she inquired with a baby stare. - -He lay back in his chair while a scowl struggled with an unwilling -smile. - -“His Greatness,” she said, “looks hungry. When do we trifle with rare -wines and sparkling fruits? Oh--and that reminds me, I want to tell you -about a suitor--you know him--Wilkes Bruce, the painter ... just to -show you how a man sometimes cans himself. There are two words that all -fakes love to hand a girl. - -“He was making a hit with me at the Ritz, and I was showing him that -scarab ring you tell me is phony; and he suddenly said those two -words--said ’em both in one breath!--‘_Indubitably_,’ says he, ‘this is -a _veritable_ antique!’ The _two_ words!... I’m off that schmeer,” she -added. - -Annan wanted to yawn but stifled the indiscretion. - -“You know,” she drawled, “I’m sorry for Eris.” - -“Why?” - -“Well, she has picked a bum in Ratford Creevy, and in that Dutch souse, -Emil Shunk. It isn’t agreeable to work with such people.... And I fancy -Smull is beginning to bother her, too.” - -A slight colour stained Annan’s temples: “Why do you fancy that?” - -“Oh, I don’t know. One notices and hears. He’s always on her heels, -always schmoozing around. Of course there’s gossip, there always is. -But that’s the kind of man Smull is.... And there you are.” - -“Is he--that kind?” - -“Well, he tried it on Betsy. Imagine! _On Betsy_, my dear!” - -“What happened?” - -“Why, she told him to go to the devil. And he backing her! Can you -imagine?” - -“I hope I can.” - -“They’re mostly that sort, ducky--Jews and Gentiles.... It’s a good -thing I have Mom. All I have to do is whistle her. Run? It would -surprise you.” - - * * * * * - -Luncheon was announced. - -He nodded, absently.... He was rather silent during luncheon. But -Rosalind departed rather pleased with herself. - -That night, writing to Eris, he said: “If ever anything disagreeable -happens to annoy you, I want you to come to me with it immediately.” - -Commenting on this, from the Berkshires: “Everything is gay and -nothing is disagreeable. Mr. Smull came up and we had a picnic near -Williamstown--the jolliest party!--except that Mr. Shunk had been -drinking and Mr. Creevy’s jokes were rather vulgar. But a girl becomes -impervious to such details. Only--I miss Frank Donnell and the nice, -clean people in Betsy’s company....” - -That was all. And Annan, relieved, yet always vaguely uneasy, went on -with his brand new story--scratched away at it, biding the return of -Eris. - - * * * * * - -She came when the month was nearly gone, warning him by wire of her -train, evidently not expecting him to meet it, for she asked him to -come to Jane Street for dinner at seven. - -He never had gone to the train to meet Eris,--had never even thought -of doing it. He thought of it now and wondered why he never before had -done so. - -By telephone he ordered flowers to be sent to Jane Street; and, a few -minutes before six, he walked into the Grand Central Station and was -directed to the exit where the incoming train was already signalled. - -Outside the ropes, where people had gathered to welcome arriving -friends, Annan encountered Albert Smull. As usual they shook hands. -Smull wore his habitual and sanguine smile. His features had grown into -it. - -“Saw your good aunt at Newport, Friday,” he said, “but I seldom see you -anywhere these days, Annan.” - -“I don’t go about. How is it at Newport?” - -“Fine weather----” Through the open gates the train glided into view. -“Thought I’d come down and see how our picture people are looking -after their tour on location,” said Smull. “You know some of them, -Annan--you’ve met our clever little Eris?” - -Annan turned and deliberately looked him over from his ruddy jowls to -the polished tan shoes. - -“Yes,” he said slowly, “I’ve known Miss Odell for some time. I’m here -to meet her.” - -Smull’s sanguine face slowly took on a heavier red but the set smile -remained. - -“Bright kid,” he said, “--getting away with it, Creevy tells me. Shill -and I are putting a lot of money into this picture----” - -Passengers from the train just arrived were now pouring out of the -exit, recognising waiting friends behind the ropes, signalling them -with eager gestures, hurrying around the barriers to meet them. - -Annan, ignoring Smull, and intently scanning the throng, finally -perceived Ratford Creevy and Emil Shunk. Behind them, in the crowd, -were other faces slightly familiar--members of the cast--and suddenly -he saw Eris in a turquoise blue toque and summer gown, carrying her -satchel,--a lithe, buoyant figure, moving quickly through the gates -followed by a red-cap with her luggage. - -Smull, perhaps not caring to bend too much at the waist, went around -the rope; Annan stooped under it. - -“Barry!” she exclaimed in happy surprise. - -“It’s been a thousand years,” he said. “I’ve a taxi here----” - -Smull, smiling eagerly out of dark eyes set a trifle too closely, and -carrying his straw hat in his hand, confronted them. - -“How do you do, Mr. Smull,” said Eris gaily, withdrawing her gloved -hand from Annan’s and offering it to Smull. - -“You’re looking fine, Eris,” he said, with too cordial familiarity. “I -just passed Creevy and he says everything went big. Glad you’re back, -little lady. I’ve a car here----” - -“Thank you, Mr. Smull----” - -The girl turned to Annan: “Mr. Smull wired me that he’d meet our -train.... So thank _you_, too--for asking me.... I’m so sorry you have -troubled to keep a taxi waiting for me----” - -Smull, always smiling, turned to Annan: “Can’t we drop you somewhere, -old chap?” - -Annan said: “Thanks, no.” And, looking at Eris with cool curiosity, he -took off his hat. - -“I’m so glad you’re back,” he said. “I hope I may see you while you’re -here. Good-night.” - -“Good-night,” she replied, as though slightly confused. - -Annan bowed pleasantly, including them both, and turned to the left -along the rope. The girl went rather slowly away beside Smull, followed -by the red-cap with her luggage. - -Outside the station, on the ramp above, Annan found his taxi and got -into it. All the way home he stared persistently at the chauffeur’s -frowsy head; but, whatever his thoughts, nothing on his smoothly -composed features betrayed them. - -As he entered his house the telephone was ringing, and he went to the -lower one in the butler’s pantry. - -“Barry!” - -“Yes.” - -“Are you coming to dinner?” - -“I had expected to.” - -“Could you come _now_?” - -“Where are you?” - -“Why, at home, of course.” - -“Alone?” - -“Alone!----” she repeated. “Why, yes, of course I am alone. I said -seven, but I want you now. I can’t wait. Do you mind?” - -“All right,” he said drily. At such moments, in most young men in love, -the asinine instinct dominates. - -Still chilled by the unpleasant impression of an intimacy, the natural -existence of which he had never thought about, he went to his room and -got into a dinner jacket, sulkily. - -As he was dressing it occurred to him that this was one sample of -the sort of thing he was very likely to encounter. A rush of boyish -jealousy and resentment flushed his face--irritation that the world -should entertain any doubt as to his proprietary right in this girl. - -It was high time that the world made no mistake about it. Men of Albert -Smull’s sort had better understand what was his status vis-à-vis with -Eris. - -Intensely annoyed--and without any reason, as he realised--he went out -in a characteristically masculine frame of mind, hailed a disreputable -taxi on Greenwich Avenue, and drove to Jane Street. - -The declining sun, not yet low enough to transmute its ugliness to -terms Turneresque, searched out every atom of shabbiness and squalor in -the humble street. And it all added to his sullen dissatisfaction. - -“One thing,” he muttered; “--she’s got to get out of this dirty -district. It’s no place for the girl I’m going to marry.” - - * * * * * - -Fat Hattie admitted him, simpering her welcome: - -“Yuh flowers done come, Mistuh Annan. They’s just grand, suh. Miss Eris -she’s taking a bath. She says foh you to go into the settin’ room, -Mistuh Annan. Might I offah yuh the hospitality of some Sherry wine, -Mistuh Annan?” - -He declined and went in; stood looking around at the plain, familiar -place, brightened only by his flowers. - -“Another thing,” he thought irritably, “--this installment-plan -furniture has got to go. She doesn’t seem to know what nice things -look like.... She hasn’t any comforts in her bed-room, either. This -third-rate existence has got to stop.” - -Unreasonably glum he picked up the evening paper, unfolded it, stood -holding it; but his gaze rested on her closed door. Then, even as he -gazed, it opened and the girl herself came out in a soft wool robe and -slippers, her chestnut hair in lovely disorder. - -“Darling!” she said with the breathless smile he knew so well. “I just -couldn’t wait. I was so afraid you were annoyed with me----” - -His kiss made her eager explanation incoherent; she nestled to him, -dumb, happy in the physical reunion, wistful for the spiritual, seeking -it in his face with questioning grey eyes. - -“It mustn’t happen again,” he said. “You’re mine, Eris, and people have -got to understand.” - -“Darling! Of course I am. But I don’t quite see how people are going to -understand----” - -“We’ll talk about that this evening.” - -“All right.... Darling, I must dress. Oh, Barry, I’m so glad--I’m -always lonely without you, wherever I go!” - -One long, deep embrace--her swift ardour leaving him trembling--and -before he knew it her door had slammed behind her. - -From within her bed-room: “Your letters have been so wonderful, Barry -darling! They made work delightful.”... The excited clatter and rustle -of a girl in a hurry came indistinctly through the closed door.... -“It’s a peach of a part, Barry. There are real brains in it.... I wish -I had Frank Donnell to _tell_ me----” - -“Can’t Creevy do that?” - -“I don’t know.... He isn’t a drill-master.... Sometimes I’m afraid he -doesn’t know. - -“It’s a helpless feeling, Barry. I trusted Frank. I knew I could lean -on him. But Mr. Creevy----” - -“I haven’t much use for Creevy, either,” he said bluntly. - -She opened the door. He found her seated before her little mirror, -tucking up stray crisp curls. She wore a mauve dinner gown--a scant -affair--as though her supple, milk-white body were lightly sheathed in -orchid petals. - -She stretched back her head to him where he stood behind her; he kissed -her soft lips, her throat. Leaning so, against him, she looked back -again at her fresh young beauty in the mirror. - -“That year with Frank Donnell,” she murmured, “is saving my very skin, -now. I _don’t_ know enough to go ahead without a strong, friendly power -reassuring, leading me. Mr. Creevy lets me go my own way, or loses his -temper and shouts at me.” - -“He’s rather a cheap individual,” remarked Annan. - -“He’s always shouting at us.... And I haven’t much confidence in Emil -Shunk, either.... Oh, how I long for Frank, and for that nice, kind -camera-man, Stoll! To work with gentlemen means so much to a girl.” - -“It means that she can do her best work,” said Annan. “In other words, -it’s bad business to employ a pair of vulgarians like Ratford Creevy -and Emil Shunk to direct decent people in a decent picture.” - -“I seem to have no point of contact with them,” she admitted. “Betsy’s -company was so respectable,--and even the Crystal Films people were so -decent to me that I didn’t expect to encounter film folk as common and -horrid as I have met.... And the Jews are no worse than the Gentiles, -Barry.” - -“Gentile or Jew,” he said, “--who cares in these days how an educated -gentleman worships God? But a Christian blackguard or a Jewish -blackguard, there’s the pair that are ruining pictures, Eris. Whether -they finance a picture, direct it, release it, exhibit it, or act in -it, these two vermin are likely to do it to death. - -“Your profession is crawling with them. It needs delousing. It’s -all squirming with parasites. They carry moral leprosy. They poison -audiences. Some day the public will kill them.” - -Eris stood up and linked her arms in Annan’s: “It’s so stupid,” she -said “--a wonderful art--and only in its infancy--and already almost -monopolised by beastly people.... Well, there _are_ men like Frank -Donnell.... And, as for the rest of us--as far as I can judge the vast -majority among us appreciate decency and have every inclination toward -it.... I don’t know a woman in my profession who leads an irregular -life from choice.” - -“It’s that or quit, sometimes, I suppose,” he said gravely. - -“I’ve heard so.... Before I knew anything I used to hold such a girl in -contempt, Barry. I know better, now.” - -“With all your passion for learning,” he said, “did you ever suppose -there was such sorry wisdom to acquire?” - -“Oh, yes. I guessed, vaguely. One can’t live in a little village -without guessing some things.... Or on a farm without guessing the -rest.... It’s best to know, always.... Lies shock me; but, do you -know, truth never did. Truth has frightened me, disgusted, angered, -saddened me. But it never shocked me yet.... I’m afraid you think me -hardened----” - -His arm drew her and she turned swiftly to his lips--in full view of -Hattie in the dining-room beyond. - -“I don’t care,” whispered Eris, her cheeks scarlet, “--she ought to -guess what we are to each other by this time.” - -As he seated her he said: “If she does know she knows more than I do, -Eris.... _What_ are we to each other?” - -He took his chair and she laughed at him. - -“I’m serious,” he repeated. “_What_ are we to each other?” - -“Darling! Are you trying to be funny?” - -“Not a bit. Please answer me, Eris.” - -“Ridiculum!” - -“Answer me!” - -“Why--why, you goose, we are in love with each other. Isn’t that the -answer?” - -“Are you engaged to me?” - -“_Darling!_----” - -“_Are_ you?” - -“Why--no.” - -“Why not?” - -“You know one reason, anyway.” - -“You mean that fellow,” he said with a shrug. - -“Yes, of course.” - -They remained rather silent for a while. Presently he said: - -“Merely to be in love with each other doesn’t place either of us -definitely.” - -“Place us?” she repeated, perplexed. “It places us with each other, -doesn’t it?” - -“But not with the world.” - -She considered this while covers were removed and another course laid. - -“Darling, do you mind carving that chicken? If you don’t want to, -Hattie can take it to the kitchen----” - -“Watch me,” he boasted, impaling the tender, roasted bird and shaving a -smoking slice from its sternum. - -“Wonderful,” she murmured, clasping her snowy fingers; “he knows -everything, does everything. And he asks me where it places him!... It -places you, darling, like a god, under lock and key inside the secret -shrine of my innermost heart.” - -“No,” he said, “that temple is already reserved. It’s occupied by the -real and only god you worship.... The god of Work!” - -After a moment she raised her eyes, tenderly apprehensive: - -“I do love you, Barry.” - -“But you _worship_ the other one.... You can’t serve two gods.” - -“I worship you, too, whatever you say!” - -“I’m a minor deity compared to the great god Work.” - -“Darling--don’t speak that way--even in jest----” - -“I want a shrine for myself. I won’t interfere with the other god----” - -“--When I tell you you’re the only man in the world!----” - -“I want you to engage yourself to me. You can take your time about -marrying me if you’re afraid it will spoil your career. But I want the -world to know we’re engaged.” - -“Why, dear?” she asked in uneasy surprise. - -“Because that will place us both, definitely.” - -“Goodness,” she murmured uncertainly, “I didn’t suppose that falling in -love was so complicated.... Darling! I haven’t time to--to find out how -to get rid of that man, now; or do it, either----” - -“It will have to be done sooner or later,” he insisted. “And that’s -that, as you say.” - -Until coffee was served they spoke rarely and of other matters. - -After coffee, in the living-room, she brought out a packet of stills to -show him. They went over them, minutely, consulting, criticising, she -explaining every picture and its relation to the continuity. - -“You should hear Mr. Creevy bellow, ‘Hold it! Hold it! D’ye think I -told you to shimmy?’ Oh, he is rough, Barry. The first time I heard -him bawl out, ‘Kill that nigger!’ I was terrified: I thought there was -going to be a lynching----” - -They sat laughing uncontrollably at each other. - -“You imitate Creevy’s cracked contralto voice,” said Annan. “I didn’t -know you were a mimic, Eris.” - -“Didn’t you?” And she laughed adorably. Then, suddenly, Ratford -Creevy’s high-pitched, irritated voice came again from her lips: -“‘Everybody! Everybody! Yaas, _you_, too, you poor dumbbell! Get on -there.... Eris! Eris! My Gawd, where’s that amateur!... Well, where -were you?... Well, stand up next time.... Lights!... Hey, where’s that -amateur camera-man.... Where the hell’s Shunk? Emil! Emil!----’” - -His laughter and her own checked her and she leaned back, the stills -sliding from her lap to the floor. - -Together they squatted down like two children to gather the litter of -scattered photographs, interrupting to touch lips, lightly; and finally -he dumped the stills onto a table and drew her to the lounge and -gathered her close. - -“You know, sweet, the reasonable goal of real love is marriage. Don’t -you know that?” - -“Darling!” - -“Isn’t it?” - -She looked at him uncertainly. - -“Isn’t it?” he insisted. - -“Sometimes.” - -“Always, ultimately. You realise that, don’t you, Eris?” - -“Y-es.... Ultimately it’s the goal. But----” - -“You love me enough to marry me, don’t you?” - -“Now?” - -“No, not now. Ultimately.” - -She said, pitifully: “I love you enough to marry you this moment.... -But even if I were free you wouldn’t ask it, would you, Barry?” - -“I don’t know.” He looked intently at her. “It wouldn’t be any use, -anyway,” he concluded. “Your work is more to you than I am. Isn’t it?” - -The girl laid her face against his shoulder in silence. - -“It’s your ruling passion, Eris, isn’t it?” - -“I--suppose so.... But there never can be any other man than you.” - -“You would make any sacrifice for your work, but you wouldn’t sacrifice -your work for me, would you, Eris?” - -Her head only pressed his shoulder closer. - -He said: “You’ve starved for your work, gone almost in rags, slept in -public parks----” - -“I’d do these for you.... I’ll give you anything, do anything for -you--except----” - -“Except give up your work,” he ended drily. - -“I couldn’t love you if you made me do that,” she whispered. - -“If I _made_ you do it? Do you admit I could make you give it up?” he -demanded almost arrogantly. - -She shrugged slightly: then raised her head and looked dumbly into his -hard eyes. - -There are dumb creatures that let themselves be slain without -resistance; but in their doomed eyes is something that the slayer -never, never can forget. - -And, as Annan looked at this girl, something of his masculine egotism -and arrogance became troubled. - -He said in a more subdued voice: “After you are firmly established in -your profession, we can think about marriage, can’t we?” - -“I always think about it.... I often wonder if you can wait.” - -“I suppose that I must.... How long, Eris?” - -“I don’t know.... Darling! I don’t know----” - -Suddenly she took his head in her arms and kissed him passionately, -strained him to her convulsively. - -“I don’t want you to have a living corpse for a wife,” she said -tremulously. “That’s what I’d be if I stopped work now. I’d be a dead, -inert, mindless thing. I couldn’t love. Let us go on this way. I must -have my freedom.... I’ll come to you when I’m ready, Barry.... There’ll -come a time when I’ll have to have you to go on at all. I’ll not be -able to work without you.... There’ll come such a time.... Then, if I -don’t have you, I shall be unable to work at all.... Work will stop. I -_know_ it.... If only you will understand....” - -It seemed that he did understand. He said he did, anyway. But he also -wanted their engagement to be understood. And she promised him to -consult his lawyer as soon as work permitted and find out what could be -done to eliminate from her life the last traces of Eddie Carter, alias -E. Stuart Graydon. - -For Eris never expected to lay eyes again upon the nimble Mr. Graydon. - -But it is the unexpected that usually happens, particularly if it’s -disagreeable. - - - - -CHAPTER XXV - - -Her first picture--from a popular novel of the hour called “The Bird of -Prey”--was finished and ready for cutting, except for picking up a mass -of ragged ends. - -Few sets had been knocked down, for there were re-takes -necessary--accidents due to Shunk or to Creevy, and charged to -everybody else from door-keeper to star. - -The barn-like studio was in disorder and it rang all day with a hell -of dissonance--infernal hammering, trample of heavy feet, the racket -of hoarse voices, scrape of props and electric cables over the wood -flooring, and the high-pitched, spiteful scolding of Ratford Creevy--as -though a noisy mouth could ever remedy confusion resulting from mental -incapacity. - -Smull came every day to take Eris to lunch--such frequent consultation -being both customary and advisable, he informed her. - -As a result the girl was a target for gossip and curiosity, sneered -at by some, leered at by others, but generally fawned on because of -suspected “pull with the main guy.” Courted, flattered, deferred to by -one and all, she was inexperienced enough to believe in such universal -friendliness, innocent enough to entertain no suspicion of these -less-fortunates who were kind to her; of Albert Smull’s unvarying and -eager cordiality. - -The girl was radiantly happy, despite misgivings regarding Mr. Creevy. - -And, as far as that gentleman’s incompetence was concerned, although -she did not know it she was learning a courage and self-reliance that -had been slower coming if she had remained under the direction of Frank -Donnell. - -Artistically, intellectually, Eris, from sheer necessity, had made, -unconsciously, a vast advance amid obstacles and conditions that always -worried and sometimes dismayed her. - -As a matter of fact she had taught more to Creevy than he had ever -taught anybody. - -Like a good field-dog, the bird-sense and instinct being there, with a -little training she had begun to instruct her instructor in qualities -and in technique entirely unfamiliar yet astonishingly sound. - -A mean mind accepts but resents. Creevy said to Smull, with sufficient -cunning to insure further employment: - -“She takes her head and wears me out. Full of pep but don’t know -anything. All the same, I’d rather handle that kind. If you want me to -go on with her I’ll guarantee her.” - -But Smull was fretting about the overhead. He had the financier’s -capacity for detail. He prowled about the studio--when he could take -his eager gaze off of Eris--prying, peeping, mousing, snooping, asking -misleading questions of employees, gradually informing himself. - -He put Creevy on the rack over the books. He told him, always with -his fixed and sanguine smile, that the footage was forty per cent. -unnecessary. He compared the cost of sets to Frank Donnell’s bill; the -cost of transportation to the same item in Betsy Blythe’s company. -Creevy writhed, not daring to show resentment. - -But he did worse; he pointed out that Betsy Blythe had a limousine -listed on Frank Donnell’s account, and that he had cut that out of the -perquisites of Eris and substituted a taxi. - -Of course Smull knew that. He had connived at this petty economy, but -only partly from meanness; for it gave him a better excuse to offer his -own car. And he cared nothing about the girl’s convenience. - -He said to Creevy: “You start in and clean up this picture by the end -of the week. You begin to cut Monday next.” - -“All right, Mr. Smull. But I better start Marc Blither on the next----” - -“What next?” - -“The next picture. You have the continuity and director’s script----” - -“I may give it to Frank Donnell. There may not be another Odell -picture,” said Smull, smiling fixedly. - -Creevy said nothing. - -“Usually,” added Smull, “I make up my mind at my own convenience and to -please myself,--not others.” - -He got up from the rickety chair, walked to the outer door of the -dressing rooms, and sent word to Eris that his car was waiting to take -her to luncheon. - -She appeared presently without her make-up, Creevy being uncertain -that he wanted her during the afternoon, but insisting that she “stick -around.” - - * * * * * - -As they went down the steps to the car--a glittering affair with two -men on the box--Smull took the girl familiarly by the arm. - -“I want to talk over the next picture with you this evening,” he said. -“I’m asking Frank Donnell to dine with me at my rooms. Will you come?” - -She halted at the open door of the car and gave him a surprised and -happy look. - -“Frank Donnell? I’d love to come. But, Mr. Smull!--you don’t mean that -Mr. Donnell is to direct _me_!” - -“We’ll see,” he smiled. - -“But--Betsy! I _couldn’t_ do that to _her_!” - -Or to anybody, she might have added. But the mere thought of Frank -Donnell brought pleasure and gratitude. - -“You’re so wonderfully kind, Mr. Smull,” she said with another radiant -look as he aided her to enter the car. - -As he got in after her a pallid, shabby man across the street watched -her intently. He seemed interested in Smull, too, and in the shining -car, and even in the license number. And he stood looking after it as -long as it remained in sight. - - * * * * * - -That afternoon Eris sat idle in her dressing-room, reading, or wandered -about among electric cables and lumber and sets while Mr. Creevy tried -to fill in and supplement poor directorship with little fiddling -re-takes. - -Emil Shunk, the camera-man, slightly drunk, had turned very sulky. Most -of the afternoon was wasted in futile altercation with Creevy, until -the latter, exasperated, dismissed everybody. - -The taxi allotted to Eris took her back to the city, tired, disgusted, -and a little nervous. - -The last profane scene between Creevy and Shunk, her all-day idleness, -the stifling summer heat in the studio, the jolting drive back to New -York through the squalor of the river-front, all these left her tired -and depressed. - -In her own apartment, bathed, freshened of the city’s penetrating -grime, and now at her ease in a cool morning wrap, she sipped the tea -that Hattie brought and then stretched out on the sofa, thankful to -rest body and mind. - -For a wonder, Jane Street was quiet that hot afternoon. The blessed -stillness healed her ears of the blows of sound; she lay in the -pleasant demi-light of lowered shades, disinclined to stir, to speak, -to think. - -But thinking can be stopped only by sleep. She remembered that she was -to call Annan when she got home. Somehow she didn’t feel like it. - -Lying there, her hands clasped under her chestnut curls, grey eyes -widely remote, the idle thoughts went drifting through her mind, -undirected, unchecked. - -Visions of the past glimmered, went out, followed by others that -floated by like phantoms--glimpses of Whitewater Farms, of her father -in his spotless milking jacket, of a girl standing with ears stopped -and eyes desperately shut while the great herd-bull died. - -Tinted spectres of village people she had known rose, slipped away, -faded, vanished;--Mazie’s three uncouth sons, Si, Willis, and -Buddy--all already unreal to her, as though she merely had heard -of them;--Dr. Wand, Dr. Benson, Ed. Lister, always redolent of -fertilizer;--the minister, “Rev. Stiles”;--and then, unbidden, into her -mind’s vague picture stepped a trim, graceful, polite young man with -agreeable voice and long, clever fingers always stained with nicotine -or acid-- - -The girl sat up abruptly; cleared her eyes of tangled curls with a -sudden sweep of her slim hand as though to brush away the vision. - -As she looked over her left shoulder at the mantle clock her telephone -rang. - -She sprang up, suddenly aware that she had but a few minutes to dress -and go to meet Frank Donnell at the apartment of Albert Smull. - -It was Annan on the wire. - -“Hello, dearest,” she said, stifling the yawn that had been threatening -since she aroused herself from her torpor. - -“I thought you were to call me when you got home,” he said in a dismal -voice that sounded rather hollow to her. - -“Forgive me, Barry dear. I was rather fagged and I just lay down on the -sofa. And I nearly had a nightmare.... Are you well, darling?” - -“I’m seriously ill and----” - -“What!” she exclaimed. - -“Dying--to see you, Eris.” - -“You mustn’t joke that way; you startle me,” she said with a quick -breath of relief. - -“Would you wear black for me?” - -“Please don’t make a jest of it----” - -“You sweet little thing,” he said, “will you dine at my place, or out, -or shall I come----” - -“Darling! I’m sorry.” - -“You haven’t made an engagement, have you?” - -“But I have, dear.” - -“Where?” he asked impatiently. It was none of his business. But she -said: - -“Mr. Smull asked me to dine with him and Frank Donnell. Are you going -to be lonely, dear?” - -“Where are you dining?” he demanded impatiently. - -She did not resent it: “In Mr. Smull’s apartment.” - -“Do you think that’s the thing to do?” he asked sharply. - -“Darling! Isn’t it?” - -“Are you accustomed to dine with married men in apartments which they -maintain outside their homes?” - -His anger and insolence merely astonished her: - -“Barry dear,” she said, “it is merely a business matter. He asked me to -meet Frank there and discuss my next picture. I can’t understand why -you seem offended----” - -“Do you think it’s agreeable for me to expect an evening with you, and -suddenly discover that you have arranged to pass it with Albert Smull?” - -“I’m sorry.... I can’t very well help it----” - -“It’s perfectly rotten of you!” he retorted in a blaze of boyish temper. - -“Barry dear?” - -“What?” - -“You mustn’t talk that way to me.” - -“Then don’t deserve it----” - -“Barry!” - -“Yes.” There was a pause. He waited. Then her voice, rather low and -quiet: - -“To control my own temper it is necessary for me to keep reminding -myself that you love me.... Perhaps you wouldn’t speak that way if you -didn’t.... Perhaps men are that way.... I’m sorry I’m not dining with -you.... I’m sorry because I’m in love with you.... And always will -be.... Good-night, dear.” - -“Eris!” - -“Yes, dear.” - -“I’m ashamed--penitent--miserable. I’m rottenly jealous----” - -“Darling! You have no cause----” - -“No. But--I can’t bear to think of you alone with other men. I know -it’s all right. I know also that jealousy is a low-down, common, -disgusting, contemptible emotion----” - -“Barry! I _want_ you to be properly jealous of my safety and -well-being. I adore it in you, you funny, delightful boy! I’m not -experienced with men, but I’m beginning to understand you. Darling! You -may even swear at me if you want to--if you do it’s because you’re in -love with me.” - -The girl, laughing, heard the boy sigh: “It’s doing queer things to -me,” he said, “--this love business. All I can think of is you; and -when you’re away I just dope myself with work.... I don’t mean to be -selfish----” - -“I _want_ you to be. Be a perfect pig if you like, darling. Bully me, -threaten, monopolise me--oh, my dear, my dear, give me my allotted time -to work, learn, and make good; and then I promise--I _promise_ you -all that is within me to give--mind and soul, Barry--utter devotion, -gratitude unmeasured, all, all of me--darling!----” - -She was late,--nearly three-quarters of an hour late, when she arrived -at Albert Smull’s apartment on Park Avenue. - -A man servant directed her to a rear room fitted amazingly like the -boudoirs she had read about. - -It was a charming place hung with a sort of silvery rose-silk; and on -an ivory-tinted dresser everything that femininity could require, brand -new and sealed. - -But Eris spent only a moment at the mirror, and, the next, she was -shaking hands with Albert Smull in a delightful lounging room, slightly -aromatic with a melange of flowers and tobacco. - -“I’m sorry to be late,” she said with smiling concern, “but I’m so -relieved to find that Mr. Donnell hasn’t yet arrived.” - -“We won’t wait dinner for him anyway,” said Smull with his near and -eager smile. “He’ll have to take his chances, Eris.... I say, you’re -stunning in that gown!” - -“Oh, do you like it?” she said politely. - -He repeated emphatically his admiration; seemed inclined to touch the -black fabric; expatiate on fashion, suitability, harmony of snowy skin, -red hair, and the smartness of dead black--“Only the young dare wear -it, and usually they’re too stupid to until they’re too old to.” - -A grave-faced servant brought three cocktails. - -“Come, now, Eris, it’s time you learned,” he insisted. “Be a good -fellow and you won’t be sorry. I’ve got to drink Frank’s cocktail -anyway. You’ll have it on your conscience if I have to drink yours too!” - -To be rid of his insistence she touched her lips to her glass, set it -back on the tray, and wiped her lips when he wasn’t looking. - -Smull’s ruddy visage was ruddier after the third cocktail. The grave -servant opened two folding glass doors; Smull gave his arm to Eris. - -Everything in the dining-room was suffused in a glow merciful to age -and exquisitely transfiguring mortal youth into angelic immortality. - -The sheer beauty of the flowers, of the silver and glass; the white -walls, the antique splendour of mirror and painting entranced the girl. - -Faultlessly chosen, perfectly served, the dinner progressed gaily, and -without the visible embarrassment of Eris who, however, was conscious -of a vague uneasiness, and who wondered why Frank Donnell did not -arrive. - -There was champagne. She touched the glass with her lips, but all his -gay cajolery and persuasion could not induce her to do more. - -She glanced at his face from time to time, noticing the deepening -colour with curiosity but without uneasiness; always politely returning -the fixed smile that never left those two little blackish brown eyes -set a trifle too close together. - -Politely, too, she awaited Smull’s introduction of the subject matter -to be discussed--the reason, in fact, and the excuse for her presence -at this man’s table. - -But Smull talked of other matters,--trivial matters,--such as her -personal beauty; the personal success she might make over sentimental -men if she chose; the certain surprise and jealousy of other women--but -what women, and of what sort he did not specify or make very clear. - -“You ought to get on,” he said, almost grinning. - -“I’m trying to,” she laughed. - -“Oh, sure. I mean----” But what he meant seemed to expire on his heavy -lips as though lack of vocabulary, or perhaps of assurance, left him -dumb for the moment. - -She wondered why Frank didn’t arrive. Coffee was now to be served in -the lounge, which was part library, part living-room. - -Eris understood she was to rise: Smull joined her with his familiar -arm taking possession of hers. His large, hot hand made her a little -uncomfortable and she was glad to free her bare arm and retire with her -coffee to a solitary arm-chair. - -The grave-faced servant seemed to know what to bring to Mr. Smull in -addition to the frozen mint offered to Eris--and smilingly declined. - -After the grave one had retired with the empty coffee cups and had -closed the folding glass doors, Eris looked enquiringly at Mr. Smull, -awaiting the broaching of what most closely concerned her. - -But Smull, half draining his frosted glass, assumed a familiarity -almost boisterous. - -“See here, Eris, you’re not going to get on unless you’re a good -fellow. You’re not going to get anywhere if you don’t learn to keep up -your end.” - -“If you mean cocktails and champagne,” she said, laughing, “I can’t -help not liking them, can I?” - -“Certainly you can. Once you get the first glass down you’ll begin to -like it. Come on, Eris! Show your pep. I’ll have Harvey bring you some -champagne----” - -“I’m wondering,” she said, “why Frank Donnell doesn’t come. Have you -any idea, Mr.----” - -She looked up as she spoke, and fell silent. Smull’s fixed smile had -become a fixed grin. Out of a red, puffy face two darkish little eyes -rested on her with disconcerting intentness. - -“Look here, Eris, we don’t need Frank Donnell. It’s up to me, after -all. Isn’t it?” - -Her lips unclosed, a trifle stiffly: “Why yes, I suppose so----” - -“Well then!” - -She met his grin with a forced smile. - -“Well?” she enquired, “have you chosen to discuss matters with me -alone?” - -“You bet. That’s right, Eris. That’s what. You get my first curve for a -homer, little girl.” - -He hunched his chair nearer to hers: “Look here, Eris; you can have -pretty nearly what you want out of me. You want your own company for -keeps? O. K.! You want to pick your director and your camera-man? -That’s O. K. You want Frank Donnell? Sure!----” - -“But Betsy----” - -“Don’t worry. I pay his salary. I pay hers, too. If you want Frank----” - -“No, I don’t. I wouldn’t do such a thing----” - -“Puff! She’d do it to you. Didn’t she put you out of her company!” - -“She was right. It was perfectly understood by me----” - -“Say, sweetness, don’t you let anybody put that over. Betsy couldn’t -stand your competition and she canned you. Now you can get back.” - -“Thank you, Mr. Smull, but I couldn’t.... Not that I--I care for Mr. -Creevy very much----” - -“Bing! He’s out! Who do you want?” He hunched his chair closer: “And -say, sweetness, are you getting enough per?” - -“What?” - -“Are you satisfied with your contract?” - -“Yes.” - -“You mean you don’t want a raise?” - -She said, rather bewildered: “I have signed for three years----” - -“Blaa! What’s a contract! You can have them both. Stick ’em in the -fire. Is that right?” - -“But----” - -“Listen, my dear. You ought to get what Blythe’s getting the first -year. After that we’ll see. What do you say?” - -“It is too kind of you----” - -“Let me worry over that. Are we set? You have what you want--anything -you want. You fix it up and I’ll O. K. it. Is that right, sweetheart?” - -The girl looked at him in a dazed way. He left his seat, came over, -seated himself on the arm of her chair. As she rose, instinctively, his -arm brushed her bare shoulder. - -And now he also stood up, his hot, red features, and the grin and the -little darkish eyes very close to her face. - -“See here, Eris,” he said thickly, “I’m crazy about you.” - -A slight chill possessed her, but she was calm enough. She said: “I’d -rather not understand you, Mr. Smull.” - -The grin never altered: “Why not?” he demanded. - -“For one thing, if you honestly cared for me you wouldn’t have brought -me here alone to say so.... For another----” she looked at him -curiously; “--you are married, aren’t you?” - -“Is that going to matter when a man’s crazy about you----” - -“Slightly,” she said. - -“--Crazy enough,” he went on, ignoring her comment, “--crazy enough to -tell you to hand yourself whatever you fancy? Do you get me right? You -can have whatever----” - -“I don’t want anything,” she said wearily, moving toward the door. - -He made the mistake of laying hands on her--hot, red, puffy hands; and -she struck him across his fixed grin with all her strength. - -Breathless, motionless, they fell back, still confronted. A streak of -bright blood divided his chin, running down from his mouth, dripping -faster and faster to the rug. - -He got out his handkerchief, staunched the flow, spoke while the -handkerchief grew sopping red: - -“That’s all right, sweetness. Sorry I was premature. You take your time -about it--take all the time you need. Then give me my answer.” - -“I’ll give it to you now,” she said unsteadily. - -“I don’t want it now, Eris----” She smiled: “You’ve already had part -of it. The rest is this: I’m engaged--or practically so--to a man I’m -going to marry some day.... And, as to what you’ve said and done this -evening, I’m not very much shocked. They said you were that kind. You -look it.... I’m not angry, either. The whole affair is so petty. And -you don’t seem to know any better. I think,” she added, “that I’m more -bored than annoyed. Good-night, Mr. Smull.” - -“Eris!” - -“What?” - -“If I were divorced would you marry me?” - -“No,” she said contemptuously. “And that’s _that_!” - -To the man at the hall door she said: “Please call a taxi for Miss -Odell,” and passed on to the silver-rose boudoir where she took her -scarf and reticule from a chair and tossed Smull’s orchids onto the -dresser. - -“Oh, dear,” she thought to herself, “--such cheap, such petty -wickedness! If I’m out of a job it will complete the burlesque.” - -At the hall door the servant had vanished and Smull stood waiting. - -“I’m sorry, Eris,” he said. - -“I’m sorry, too. You won’t want me for another picture, I suppose.” - -“Would you stay?” - -“I have to, don’t I? There’s my contract, you know.” - -“Good God, Eris, I didn’t realise I loved you seriously. I’m -half-crazed by this; I--I don’t know what to do----” - -“Then let me suggest that you talk it over with your wife,” she said. -“That ought to be a household remedy for you, Mr. Smull.” - -She passed him, stepped to the lift, rang, turned and laughed at him -with all the insolence of virgin intolerance. - -“You little slut,” he said in a distinct voice that quivered, “I don’t -get you but you’ve played me for a sucker. You’re out! Do you get that? -Now run to your Kike attorney with your contract!--God damn your soul!” - -As she stepped into the lift she thought: “--Burlesque and all.” But -the strain was telling and she was close to tears as she went out into -Park Avenue and got wearily into her taxi-cab. - -“Oh, dear,” she said in a low voice. “Oh, dear.” But reaction was -tiring her to the edge of drowsiness. She yawned, wiped the unshed -tears from her eyes with her wisp of a handkerchief, yawned again, and -lay back in the cab closing the grey virgin eyes that had looked into -hell and found the spectacle a cheap burlesque. - - - - -CHAPTER XXVI - - -It was not yet ten o’clock when Eris arrived at Jane Street. Gutters -stank; the heated darkness reeked with the stench of stables, slops, -and unwashed human bodies. - -Sidewalks still swarmed; tenements had muted and disgorged; every -alley spewed women and men in every stage of undress. Fat females with -babies at breasts squatted beside dirty doorsteps; dishevelled hags -hung out of open windows, frowsy men sprawled on chairs, or nude to the -trousers, looked down from rusting fire-escapes at a screaming tumult -of half-naked children shouting and dancing in the cataract of spray -from a hose which two firemen had opened on them from a hydrant. - -Flares burning redly on push-carts threw smoky glares here and there as -far as Greenwich Avenue, where the light-smeared darkness was turbulent -with human herd. - -Into this dissonance and clamour, clothed in silk, came Eris, daughter -of Discord. As in a walking dream she descended from her taxi; fumbled -in her silken reticule to find the fare; paid, scarcely knowing what -she was paying. - -As she turned and ascended the low steps of her house, still searching -about in the reticule for her latch-key, she became aware that a man -was standing in the vestibule. - -When she found her latch-key she glanced up at the shadowy shape. - -Then the man uttered her name. - -Instantly his voice awoke in her ears that alarming echo which -sometimes haunted her dreams. And though the man’s features were only a -grey blur in the obscurity, she knew him absolutely. - -For an instant all her strength seemed to leave her body, and she -sagged a little, sideways, resting against the vestibule wall. - -The shock lasted but a second; blood rushed to her face; without a word -she straightened up, stepped forward, refitted her latch-key. - -“Eris,” he whimpered, “won’t you speak to me?” - -As she wrenched open the front door, light from the hall gas-jet fell -across the man’s pale visage, revealing his collarless shirt and shabby -clothes. - -Already she had set foot inside. Perhaps the ghastly pallor of the man -halted her--perhaps some occult thing within the law held her fettered -in chains invisible. She stood with head averted, dumb, motionless, -grasping her key convulsively. - -“My God,” he whispered, “won’t you even look at me?” - -“What do you want?” she asked in the ghost of a voice. Then, slowly, -she turned and looked at her husband. - -“I’m sick----” He leaned weakly against the vestibule door, and she saw -his closing eyes and the breath labouring and heaving his bony chest. - -What was this miserable creature to her, who had cheated her girlhood -and struck her a blow that never could entirely heal? - -What had she to do with any sickness of this man and his poverty and -misery? - -“Why should you--come--to me?” she asked. Suddenly she felt her body -quivering all over. “What do I owe to you?” she cried, revolted. - -He muttered something;--“In sickness and in health--till--till death do -us--part----” - -A dry sob checked his mumbling. He shook his head, slightly. His heavy -eyes closed. - -She stood staring at him and holding the door partly open. Twice she -clutched the knob in nervous fingers as though to slam the door in his -face and bolt out this pallid spectre of the past. She could not stir. - -“What is the matter with you?” she finally forced herself to ask. - -He opened his sick eyes: “Hunger--I guess----” - -“You may have money if you need it. Is that what you want?” - -He seemed to summon strength to stand upright and pass his bloodless -fingers over his face. - -“It’s all right,” he muttered thickly; “I didn’t mean to bother you----” - -He turned as though to go, steadying himself with one shaky hand on the -stoop railing. At the door-step he stumbled, swayed, but recovered. - -“Stuart!” she burst out, “come back!” - -He pulled himself together; turned toward her: “I don’t want money.... -I’m too sick----” - -“Wait! You can’t go into the street that way!...” - -He seemed so shaky and confused that she took hold of his ragged arm. -Very slowly, and supported by her, he entered the doorway. They climbed -the stairs together, wearily, in silence. - -Hattie usually went home at night and arrived, by key, early in the -morning. Eris unlocked her door, lighted the corridor, went on to the -living-room and lighted that. Then she returned to her husband and led -the way to the kitchen and pantry and lighted them both. - -“There is a chair,” she said. “I’ll make you some hot coffee.” - -She flung a cloth over the kitchen table, laid a cover, brought what -there was in the ice-box,--cold lamb, sardines, butter, fruit. She went -again to the pantry and sliced bread for him. Then she started the gas -range in the kitchen. - -“I’m putting you to a great deal of trouble,” he mumbled. - -She paid him no attention but went on with her preparations. When -finally she returned with the steaming coffee she found he had eaten -nothing. - -However, he drank some of the coffee. After that he slumped on his -chair, dazed, inert, his lack-lustre gaze on the floor. But his -bony, bloodless fingers--those long, clever, nimble fingers she -remembered--picked aimlessly at everything--at his face, at his -clothing, at the sliced bread. - -“Have you been ill long?” she forced herself to ask. - -He mumbled something. She bent nearer to understand, but he fell -silent, continuing to pick and fumble and stare at space. - -“Do you feel very ill, Stuart? I want you to tell me.” - -“If I could have--a little whiskey--or something--to buck up----” - -She rose, got the gift bottle that she had been saving; brought it to -him with a tumbler; left him there with it. - -As she turned her back and walked nervously toward the front of the -house, he peeped after her out of shadowy eyes, not lifting his head. -Then he poured out half a glass of neat whiskey, steadily enough, -swallowed it, looked around. - -In the living-room Eris flung scarf and reticule on the sofa, stood for -a moment twisting her fingers in helpless revolt; then, fighting off -nervous reaction, she paced the room striving to think what to do, what -was right to do in this miserable emergency. - -Did she owe this man anything more than she owed to any sick, hungry, -ragged man? If so, _what_? How much? How far did the law run that -fettered her? What were the statutes which exacted service? And the -ethics of the case--what were they? Anything except the bare morals -involved? Anything except the ordinary humanity operating generally -in such cases and involving her in obvious obligation? Were they the -obligations which once involved those who looked upon Lazarus and -“passed by on the other side”? Were they really more vital? - -She went slowly back to the kitchen. Hearing her approach, her husband -had crossed both arms on the table and dropped his marred face in them. - -“Are you really very ill, Stuart?” she asked calmly. - -“No. I’ll go----” He tried, apparently, to get to his feet; fell back -on the chair, whimpering. - -There was a small room off the pantry where, in emergency, Hattie -sometimes slept on a box-couch. - -“You can lie down there for a while if you wish,” she said. She helped -him get up; he stumbled toward the pantry, guided by her, to the couch -in the little room beyond. Here he sank down and dropped his head -between his hands. She had turned to leave but halted and looked back -at him from the pantry doorway. - -“I had better call a physician,” she said, frightened by his deathly -colour. - -He might have explained that his pasty skin was partly due to prison -pallor, partly to drugs. Instead he asked for a little more whiskey. - -“I don’t want a doctor,” he muttered; “I’ll be all right after a nap. -This whiskey will pull me together.... You go to bed.” - -After a while he looked up at her, rested so, his shadowy eyes fixed on -her with a sort of stealthy intentness. - -“You’d better sleep if you can,” she said. “I’ll have to wake you soon. -It is growing very late.” - -“Oh God!” he burst out suddenly, “what a wreck I’ve made of our lives!” - -“Not of mine,” she retorted coolly; and turned to leave. - -“I’m sorry,” he whined. “I didn’t mean to get you in wrong.... I meant -to go straight after we were married.... But they got me wrong, Eris, -they got me wrong!... It was the very last job I ever meant to do.... -I gave up the plates. That’s how they let me off with a light one.... -I’m out over a month, now----” - -“Were you in--in _prison_!” she demanded with an overwhelming surge of -disgust. - -He began to snivel: “You couldn’t get over _that_, could you, Eris?... -And what I did to you--getting you in wrong--disgracing you that -way----” - -She made no answer but her grey eyes grew cold. - -“You couldn’t ever forgive me, could you, Eris?” he whimpered, watching -her intently. - -“I can forget you, in time, if you keep away from me.... But--it is -terrible to see you--_terrible_!” - -He licked his dry lips, furtively, always watching her. - -“If ever you would let me try to make amends--if you’d just let me work -for you,--slave for you----” - -For an instant she stared at him, incredulous that she had heard -correctly. Then wrath set her cheeks ablaze: but her voice remained -controlled, and she chose and measured her words: - -“Listen to me, Stuart: I wouldn’t let you lift a finger for me; I -wouldn’t let you touch me,--I don’t expect ever to see you again,--I -don’t want even to hear of you. And that’s _that_!” - -“Do you hate me so bitterly, Eris?” he whimpered, cringing but always -watching her face. - -“It isn’t hate. For what you did to an ignorant girl--for your -deception, your meanness, your lying, I have no _hatred_. I don’t hate: -I merely rid myself of what offends me.” - -He began to snivel again, seated on the edge of the box-couch, swaying -from side to side: - -“I know I shouldn’t have married you. But I wanted to go straight. I -was madly in love with you, Eris--and I haven’t changed. Haven’t you a -word for me----” - -She gazed at him with a loathing in which no saving spark of anger -mitigated the cold disgust. She said, slowly: - -“All I need ever say to you can be said through a lawyer. That is all -that concerns you. If you wish to lie down, do so. I don’t want you -here; but I wouldn’t turn a sick snake out of doors.” - -She left him and went back to her bed-room. For an hour she sat there, -unstirring, waiting, listening at moments. The flush remained on her -cheeks; and into her eyes there came a glint at times, as where storms -brood behind grey horizons. - -The day, indeed, had bred storms for Eris--for Eris, daughter of -Discord--sitting here in her dim chamber all alone. - -Twice after midnight she had gone to the little room off the pantry, -only to find her husband heavily asleep. He seemed so wretched a thing, -so broken, so haggard, that she had yet not found courage to awake him -and send him into the street. - -So now, once more, she returned to her bed-room and her sombre vigil; -sat there brooding, waiting, listening at intervals, wondering what to -do, and how, and when. - -The fatigue of that unhappy day had strained her nerves, not her -courage. But for the advent of this miserable man she would have had -leisure to think about what was to be done for the future and face the -fact that she was out of work. - -Now she felt too weary to think--too tired to examine the situation -which so suddenly confronted her when Albert Smull flung his last -insult in her shrinking face. - -Troubles thickened about her; trouble was invading her very door; but -she was too sleepy to consider the misfortunes that involved her--the -menacing situation at the studio--the sordid problem in the next room. - -Her little mantel-clock struck two o’clock before she finally summoned -energy to rise and go to awaken her husband. - -He seemed to be in a sort of coma. Only after she twitched his sleeve -repeatedly did he unclose his dangerous eyes. And then he merely -muttered fretfully that he was too weak to move and meant to sleep -where he lay until morning. - -“You can’t remain here all night,” she said. “I can’t permit that. Do -you understand, Stuart?” - -But he only turned over, muttering incoherencies, and buried his -dishevelled head in his ragged arms. - -Not knowing what to do, she went wearily back to her bed-room. Twice, -trying to think what to do, she fell asleep in her chair. The second -waking found her on her feet, blind with sleep, but with instinct -leading her to lock and bolt her bed-room door.... That is the last she -remembered for a while. - - * * * * * - -She awoke, lying diagonally across her bed, fully dressed, in the -dull, rosy glow of her little night-lamp. Something was scraping and -scratching at her door. She turned her head, saw the door-knob twisting -very softly, now this way, now that. - -She got up from the bed and went quickly to the door. - -“If you don’t leave this house,” she said in a low voice, “I shall -telephone for a policeman.” - -“Take me back, Eris,” he whined. “As God sees me, I love you! I’ll work -my fingers to the bone for you----” - -“Leave this house,” she repeated. - -He tried the door again, gently, then wrenched at the knob. Suddenly he -threw his full weight against the door. But they wrought well in the -days when that old house was built. - -Listening, she heard him moving off, softly, and realised he had -removed his shoes. - -For a long while she continued to listen, but heard no further sound -from him. There was not the slightest sense of fear in her, merely -loathing and weariness unutterable. - -She went back, finally, to the bed and lay down across it. - -Four o’clock struck in the living-room. After that she remembered -listening and trying to remain awake. - - * * * * * - -She had been sleeping heavily for two hours when Eddie Carter, alias E. -Stuart Graydon, tried the bolt with the blade of a kitchen knife. He -had contrived, also, to fashion another instrument out of a steel fork. -Neither of these worked. - -As half-past five struck in the living-room, where he was seated, he -concluded that the other plan had become inevitable. He had hoped it -might be avoided. But the girl he now had to deal with was no longer -the ignorant, impressionable child he had so easily moulded to his -fancy. - -There were two matters which preoccupied this man: the first, a genuine -passion for the girl-wife he had been forced to abandon. Whatever this -sentiment was,--love or a lesser impulse,--it had been born the moment -he lost her; and it had painfully persisted through those prison months. - -The second matter which absorbed him was hatred for the man who had -sent him to a second term in prison. The charge was forgery; the firm -of Smull, Shill & Co. procured his arrest. - -On these two matters his mind had remained fixed until the poignancy of -brooding became intolerable; and he sought relief in prison-smuggled -drugs. Which, so far, was the history of Eddie Carter, addict, and -penman par excellence. - - * * * * * - -Now, hunched up in an arm-chair in her living-room, he studied the -immediate problem of Eris, picking eternally at the upholstery -with scarred fingers, or at his clothing, his face, his own -finger-nails--the skin around the base of the nails raw from long habit -of self-mutilation. - -His first plan of enlisting the girl’s sympathy had proven hopeless. -There remained the alternate plan. - -Six o’clock sounded from the mantel-clock. He got up and went to -the pantry, where was a telephone extension for servants. With some -difficulty and delay he got the person he was calling: - -“Say, Abe, it’s Eddie. I’ve done what you said for me to do----” - -“I didn’t tell you to do anything!” interrupted his lawyer, angrily. -“Get next to yourself or I quit right now! D’you get that, you cheap -dumbbell?” - -“Sure! But listen, Abe. I’m _here_. I’ve been here since ten o’clock -last night. We’re _both_ here, Abe----” - -“Is it fixed up?” - -“No, Abe; and I want you to come right now. You understand, Abe----” - -“Cut out the Abe every other word,” interrupted the attorney -wrathfully. “What are you trying to do to me? Act like you got sense or -I’m through!” - -“All right. Take it on the run. I’ll let you in. You better not stop to -shave; it’s six, now.” - -“I’ll be around,” replied the lawyer briefly. - - * * * * * - -He came in a taxi-cab. Eddie Carter saw him from the front window, went -downstairs in his stocking-feet, and let him in. - -Climbing the stairs again they came into the living-room without -exchanging a word; but here Carter pointed to the closed door of Eris’ -bed-room. - -“Asleep?” inquired the other, still breathing hard from the ascent. - -“I don’t know. She’s locked in.” - -The lawyer looked at him: “So she locked you out? When?” - -“Last night.” - -“Wouldn’t she make up?” - -“No.” - -“Well, we’ll have to fix it----” - -There was a silence; then the short, fat attorney took hold of Carter’s -arm and spoke close to his ear: - -“Get this right! When she unlocks that door to come out, _you came out -with her_!” - -“You saw me,” nodded Carter. - -They began to prowl around the apartment. In the kitchen the lawyer -whispered: “She must have some kind of a maid that comes by the day.” - -“Yes, a nigger. Her name’s Hattie. You going to buy her, Abe?” - -“We don’t have to. She’s our witness anyway,” added the little fat -attorney, with a hint of a grin. - -At that moment a key rattled in the kitchen door. - - - - -CHAPTER XXVII - - -As Eris was entirely alone in the apartment at night, it had been her -custom to lock and bolt her chamber door,--a rough neighbourhood and -rear fire-escapes making it advisable. - -So now, when the rapping on her bed-room door aroused her, she rose -mechanically, still drugged with sleep, made her way blindly to the -door, and unlocked it. - -As she opened her door so that Hattie could enter and draw her morning -bath, the sight of the coloured woman’s agitated features startled her. - -Suddenly a glimpse of Graydon in the living-room beyond brought the -girl to her shocked senses. - -There seemed to be another man there, too--a fat, bald, bland little -man who smiled and bowed to her, flourished a straw hat, clapped it on -his shiny head, and immediately waddled out of the apartment. - -For one dreadful moment a premonition of disaster paralysed the girl, -blanched her face. - -Then she walked straight into the living-room where her husband -slouched against the mantel, his hands in his pockets, an unlighted -cigarette sagging over his chin. - -“Get out of this house!” she said in a low voice that quivered. - -“Send that wench of yours to the kitchen,” he retorted coolly. - -Suddenly something about this man frightened her. It was a vague, -formless fear. But it was fear. She felt the chill of it. - -“Will you leave this house?” she managed to say. - -“You listen to me first.” - -Again a swift, indefinite fear silenced her. Danger was written all -over this man. What menaced her she did not know, had no vaguest guess. -But never before had she looked into eyes so perilous. - -When she found her voice: - -“You may start breakfast, Hattie,” she said. - -“Start some for me, too,” added Graydon, without removing his gaze from -Eris. - -And, when the lingering servant had gone, reluctant, perplexed, still -loitering in the dining-room devoured by curiosity, Graydon said -quietly: - -“Eris, I want you back! That’s what’s the matter. Take me back. You -won’t be sorry.” - -“Who was that man who came here?” she demanded. - -“He needn’t matter--if you’ll give me a chance to make good----” - -“I want you to tell me who that man was!” - -“Answer _me_! Will you take me----” - -“No! Now, who was he?” - -“My lawyer,” he said, “--if that interests you.” - -“Did you telephone for him, or was it already arranged?” - -“If you’ll listen to me----” - -“Answer me!” - -“I called him up.... I hope I shan’t need him----” - -“Are you threatening me with scandal because I let you sleep here last -night?” - -“There’s no scandal--as long as you _are_ my wife----” - -“How long,” said she, “do you suppose I shall remain married to an -ex-convict?” - -Graydon laughed, fished in his soiled vest for a match, lighted his -cigarette: - -“You’ve condoned whatever I’ve done, Eris,” he said. - -“What!” - -“You’ve no case. You’ve condoned my offence. I guess you’ll have to -remain married to me, Eris.” - -For a full minute she failed to understand, watching him intently, -searching for the sinister import of his words. - -Suddenly her face flushed scarlet. The hideous thing confronted her. - -“You see,” he said coolly, “you can’t afford to face a jury, now.” - -“I see,” she said. “You have two witnesses. Also, _you_ have nothing to -lose, have you!” - -“Yes, I have.” - -“What?” she asked. - -“You!... I have _you_ to lose. And I’m going to make the play of my -life for you----” - -His hideous features altered and a rush of startling colour painted his -cheek-bones with two feverish smears: - -“You listen to me, now, and hold your tongue! I know what you’re up -to!” he said in a voice that broke with passion. “I’ve trailed you; -I’ve followed you; I’ve kept tabs on you.” - -“When you’re not playing up to young Annan you’re vamping Albert Smull. -Yes, you are! Don’t stall! You go to his fancy apartment alone. You -go to Annan’s house. You’ve got ’em both on your string. You’ve got -others. Any man who meets you falls for you!----” - -He flung his chewed, wet cigarette into the fireplace; he was trembling -all over. - -“You may think it’s because you’re making a wad of money that I’m -trying to get you back! That’s all right, too; I’m glad you are on easy -street. I need money, but not much. - -“It’s _you_ I want. And whatever you say or think, I _was_ in love with -you when I married you. I _had_ to beat it. It drove me almost crazy to -leave you. Two years in prison drove me crazier. I’ve been sick. I’m -sick now. I’ll get well if you take me back.... And if you won’t----” -He came closer, looking intently into her eyes: “If you _won’t_--well, -there’s _one_ man who isn’t ever going to get you, Eris.... And his -name’s Albert Smull.... And the next time I find him loafing around -you, you’d better kiss him good-bye. For, by Jesus, I’ll fix him good!” - -The girl seated herself on the arm of a chair. Her head was reeling a -little, but she kept it high. - -“How much money do you want?” she asked. - -“I need that, too. I’ll take twenty-five dollars if you can spare it. -And I’d like a cheque with it. You’re making good money: I guess five -hundred won’t crimp you.” - -Her silk reticule still lay on the sofa where she had flung it the -night before. She picked it up, took from it the money he required, and -handed it to him. - -Her cheque-book was in her desk. Seating herself she opened it and -wrote out the amount he had demanded, blotted the strip of yellow -paper, gave it to him. - -“Now,” she said, “I’ve paid you to keep away from me until I free -myself. After that the police can take care of you if you annoy me.” - -He smiled: “When you consult your attorney you’ll realise that you have -no witnesses and no case, little lady.” - -“I need only one witness,” she said. - -“Who?” - -“Any--physician.” Suddenly her white fury was loosened and she took him -by his ragged arm and shook him till he stumbled and almost fell. - -“I tell you this,” she said, her grey eyes blazing, “because you had -better understand it in time to save yourself from another term in -prison! For if you ever dare contest the action I shall bring with -the vile lie you threaten, any witness I call will send you back to a -cell,--and your attorney with you! And that’s _that_, damn you!” - -Her hand fell away from his sleeve. He stood motionless, sickly white -as though something vital in him had been shattered. - -For, as he stared at her, he never doubted that she had spoken the -truth. And the truth meant his finish. - -As he stood there, stricken dumb, his bony frame was shaking slightly -and sweat chilled his face. He groped for control of what mind his -drugs had spared him,--strove to clear it of chaos, formulate some -thought, some charge of misconduct against her--something to involve -her with some man. And knew, somehow, that it would be useless. The -girl had not lied. Any witness she chose to call meant her vindication. - -After a long while he passed his scarred fingers over his face, wiping -the sweat from his eyes. Then he turned, slouched toward the door, -opened it. And, on the sill, slowly faced around and looked back at her. - -“You win, Eris,” he mumbled. “I guess you’re good.... Stay so, and I -won’t bother you.... But I won’t stand for any other man.... Don’t make -any mistake there.... I mean Albert Smull. I know him. I know how he -gets women. You think you stop him but he’ll fool you every time.... -He’s a rat.... You keep away from him.... That’s all.” - -He went, shambling, dull eyed, ghastly, picking at his face with long, -scarred fingers. - - - - -CHAPTER XXVIII - - -As the door closed behind Graydon, Hattie appeared from the dining-room -and sullenly confronted her mistress. - -“I ain’t a-going to stay,” she said. - -Eris looked up, blankly, still pale and confused by the gust of passion -that had swept her. - -“I don’t have to work in no such kinda place,” continued the coloured -woman doggedly, “and I ain’t a-going to. Mah week’s up Friday, but you -pay me up to las’ night an’ I’ll go now.” - -The girl comprehended. A painful colour surged over her face to the -roots of her hair. - -“Very well,” she said in a low voice. She went to her desk, opened an -account book, then drew a cheque for the balance of the woman’s wages. - -Hattie took the cheque, hesitated: “Of co’se,” she ventured, “if yo’ -wishes me to stay, Miss Eris, mah wages will be jess ten dollahs mo’ a -week. Any real lady would be glad to gimme that foh all I does----” - -“I don’t need you,” said the girl quietly. “Go as soon as you can get -ready.” - -“Suit yo’se’f, Mrs. Graydon,” retorted Hattie, with elaborate -disrespect, “and if I may kindly persume to be excused, Mrs. Graydon, I -will attend to the requiahments necessary fo’ my departure.” - -Said Eris: “Pack your effects, Hattie, and call an expressman. I shall -not expect to find you loitering here when I return.” - -The coloured woman’s eyes snapped as Eris entered her bed-room and -closed the door. - -To bathe and dress did not take her very long. - -When she came out she was dressed for the street. There was no -breakfast on the dining-room table, but she wanted none. - -She went to the kitchen and found Hattie seated, feeding on hambone, -and her rickety valise still unpacked. - -“I want you to be out of this apartment by noon,” said Eris quietly. -Then she opened the hall door and ran downstairs, Hattie’s malignant -laugh ringing in her ears. - -When Eris had disappeared, the negress waddled to the gas stove, lit -it, and started to make herself a cup of tea. She meant to do what -gastronomic damage she could short of theft. - -Before the kettle boiled, the telephone rang. To ignore it was a -haughty pleasure for Hattie; but presently African curiosity prevailed -and she got up and waddled to the telephone, muttering to herself. - -“Yaas, suh?” she replied to some query. - -“_Who?_” - -“Mistuh Annan?” - -“No, suh, she ain’t home. Dey’s nobody home ’cept’n myse’f.” - -Annan said: “I’ve some flowers. I’d like to arrange them to surprise -Miss Odell. Could I bring them around, Hattie?” - -“Suit yo’se’f, suh. It ain’t botherin’ me none.” - -“I’ll be right around,” he said gaily. - -She went sullenly back to her kettle, meditating mischief. - -Annan arrived in a few moments, laden with long, flat boxes of -pasteboard. He nodded pleasantly to Hattie, took his flowers to the -living-room, returned to fetch a dozen plain glass vases, jars and -rose-bowls, and went happily back to the business of decoration. - -He remained very busy for half an hour or more, filling the vases at -her bath-tub, clipping stems, trimming too profuse foliage, arranging -the sheaves of fragrant bloom, and carrying each vase to its proper -place in the three rooms. - -When he had finished, and on his way out, he stopped to speak to Hattie -at the dining-room door: - -“Please ask Miss Odell to call me up when she returns,” he said. “I -suppose she has gone to the studio,” he added. - -“I don’t know, suh. Miss Eris’ husband he stayed here las’ night. I -reckon she’s payin’ him a call, maybe.” - -Annan stared at her as though she suddenly had gone mad. - -“Yaas, suh,” continued the negress, “I’se quit, I has. Too many doin’s -in this here flat to suit me. I guess you all didn’t know Miss Eris -had a husband sleepin’ here,” she added with a bland malignance that -stunned him. - -He inspected the wench in silence for a moment, then turned sharply on -his heel and went down stairs. - -His taxi was waiting. He drove directly home, entered his study and sat -down to the sorry business of waiting. - -All the morning and afternoon he waited there, his face white and set, -his grim gaze fixed on space. - -About five o’clock he called up. The house did not answer. - -Eris had asked him not to call her at the studio for obvious reasons, -and he never had done so, except by previous agreement. But now he -decided to do so. He got the doorman, Flynn. - -“Yes, sir; Miss Odell come in half an hour ago.” - -“Is the company working?” inquired Annan nervously. - -“No, sir, nobody’s here to-day except Miss Odell and Mr. Smull----” - -“_Who?_” - -“Mr. Smull, sir. He just come in a minute since----Hold the wire, -please.” - -After a minute or two the door-keeper’s voice: “She’s busy, sir. She -can’t talk to you now----” - -“Did Miss Odell tell you to say that?” - -“No, Mr. Smull told me she couldn’t talk to nobody just now.” - -“Call up Mr. Smull again and tell him Mr. Annan wishes to speak to Miss -Odell at once!” - -“I don’t like to--all right, hold it again----” - -Annan waited. Suddenly Smull’s voice: “Annan?” - -“Yes.” - -“Sorry, but the little lady can’t be interrupted just now----” - -“Yes, she can. She isn’t working. Tell her to come to the wire!” - -“There’s a business conference----” - -“Will you kindly say to her that I wish to speak to----” - -“Sorry,” interrupted Smull, and hung up in his ear. - -Annan picked up his hat, descended the stairs, and went out. - -About five minutes after he left the house his telephone rang. Mrs. -Sniffen answered it, and recognised the voice of Eris inquiring for -Annan. - -“I’ll see if he’s in, Miss----” - -“Did he call me a few minutes ago, Mrs. Sniffen?” - -“I couldn’t say, Miss; I was in the kitchen. I’ll see if he’s in his -study----” - -She returned in a moment to say that Mr. Annan was not in. - -“Thank you,” came the girl’s hasty voice. - - * * * * * - -Eris hung up the receiver of the telephone in the directors’ office at -the studio, where Smull stood. - -“Now will you believe me?” he demanded. - -“I heard you ask if it were Mr. Annan,” she said. “I could hear -perfectly well from my dressing-room.” - -“I thought Flynn said it was Annan and I asked,” insisted Smull, “but -it turned out to be a _Herald_ man who wanted copy. So now if you’ll -listen to me, Eris----” - -“I have already tried to make you understand that I have no interest in -anything you say----” - -“For God’s sake, be charitable and overlook what a man says and does -when he’s drunk----” - -“I don’t think you were----” - -“I was, I tell you! I carry it that way. I turn ugly. When I get a few -highballs in me I’m a different kind of man.... Look here, Eris, if -you’ll be a sport and call it off, I’ll give you my word, as long as -you and I are friends, never to touch a drop of anything!” - -“I wish you would let me alone,” she said in a colourless voice. “I -don’t know how you knew I was here----” - -“I told Flynn to notify me as soon as you arrived----” - -“That was insolent of you----” - -“Good heavens, Eris, I couldn’t let things stand as they were, could I? -The memory of my beastly behaviour to you was driving me crazy. Anyhow, -you’ve a cheque coming to you and I had to get at the books----” - -“That is Mr. Creevy’s business.... I didn’t come here for that, either. -I came to gather up my personal belongings----” - -“Listen, Eris. After all, I’ve given you your chance, haven’t I? I’ve -backed you with real money. Except for that one break last night I’ve -played square, haven’t I? All right. Are you going to quit me cold?” - -“I’ve got to----” - -“You’re going to put this outfit on the bum? You’re going to walk out -on us?” - -“You told me I was out.” - -“Can’t you forget what a souse says when he’s all to the bad? What’ll -we do if you leave us flat? Do you think it’s a cinch to pick another -like you? What’ll this bunch do? What’ll Creevy do, and Shunk? Look at -this plant! I’ve got it for a year more. Do you know what our overhead -costs me a week? Listen, Eris; have a heart. Don’t do that to us----” - -“It’s what _you’ve_ done, Mr. Smull, not I. You’ve spoiled any pleasure -I might have had in working for you. I couldn’t go on here. I couldn’t -do good work. When you told me, last evening, that I was out, you were -right. I was out as soon as you said so. It was final.... Truth always -is final.... I learned it last night.... There is nothing further to -learn.” - -She walked slowly past him to the door and looked out across the -great, barn-like place all littered with the lumber and canvas of -half-demolished sets, tangles of insulated wires and cables, and -sprawling batteries of lights of every sort. - -In the heated stillness of the place a light footfall echoed sonorously -across the flooring. The chatter of intruding sparrows came from the -arches overhead. Outside sunny windows ailanthus trees, intensely -green, spread motionless fronds under the July sky. - -Eris moved on, slowly, to her dressing-room--a built-in affair with its -flimsy partition adjoining the directors’ office. - -Chintz and paint had mitigated the bareness of the room with its -extemporised dressing table and couch and a chair or two. - -For a while she was occupied with her make-up box; then, locking it, -she opened her suitcase and began to lay away such articles as belonged -to her. - -As she locked and strapped it, Smull appeared at her door, and she rose -in displeasure, although the infraction of rule meant nothing to her -now. - -“Your cheque,” he said, extending it. - -“Thank you, I don’t want it.” - -“It belongs to you.... You could hold me for the balance of the year if -you chose, and not do a stroke of work.” - -Her short upper lip curled shorter in contempt: - -“I release you, Mr. Smull.” - -“I want you to take this, anyway----” - -“No.” - -“Please, Eris----” - -“_No!_” She picked up her suitcase and make-up box. But he continued to -block the doorway. - -“Eris! Eris!” he stammered. “Don’t do this--don’t leave me! My God, -my God!--I--can’t stand such--such cruelty----” His face was heavily -flushed and his fat neck was swelling red behind the ears. - -He began to tremble and stammer again--“I’ll do anything you ask--give -you anything--if you’ll only listen--Eris---- - -“Eris--my God, I want to marry you! I want you! I’ll keep away until I -can get a divorce----” - -He caught her arm in his hot, red hands; suddenly clutched her body, -crushing her face against his with an inarticulate cry as though -strangling. And she fought him back, savagely, in silence, bruised, -wild with the shame of it. Both chairs fell; he trod on one, crushing -it to splinters, and his powerful shoulder tore the mirror from the -wall and wrecked the dressing table with it. - -With a desperate wrench she tore free of him. They stood, panting, -watching each other for a full minute. Then her grey eyes dilated with -horror, for he slowly took a pistol from his pocket, his near-set black -eyes, all bloodshot, fastened on her. - -“You listen to me,” he said brokenly, his great chest heaving with -every word,--“I want you because I can’t live without you.... Will you -marry me?” - -“No!” - -“If you don’t,” he said, “I’ll blow my brains out in your face.” - -There was a terrible silence. Then he said: - -“If you leave this room I’ll kill myself.... It’s up to you, now.” - -Another silence. - -“Well, why don’t you go?” he said. - -“I--am going.” She picked up the suitcase and make-up box. Watching -him, she began to move slowly toward the door--passed him where he was -standing, slowly, never taking her eyes off him. - -She reached the door. - -“I swear I will do it!” he shouted. - -She looked at him coolly over her shoulder. - -“You are too fond of yourself,” she said. And walked on. - - - - -CHAPTER XXIX - - -At the head of the stairway Eris, carrying her suitcase and make-up -box, encountered Flynn, the voluble door-keeper, coming upstairs. - -“Miss Odell,” he began, half way up, “the same gentleman that -tillyphoned you is downstairs askin’ for you with a taxi-cab. I -wouldn’t leave him come up after what the Governor told me. ‘No, sir,’ -says I, ‘ye can’t see Miss Odell. I have me orders,’ says I, ‘and I’m -door watch here,’ says I, ‘and whin the Governor says to me, “Flynn, do -this; Flynn, do that,” be gob it’s meself that does ut!’ Was I right, -Miss Odell?” - -“I couldn’t see any newspaper man now,” she assented, nervously. - -“So I told Mr. Annan, Miss,” commented the door-keeper, relieving her -of her baggage. - -“Was it _he_ who telephoned? I--I understood it was a _Herald_ man----” - -She continued on down the stairs, followed volubly by Flynn. Outside -the barred gate she saw Annan standing beside a taxi-cab. Flynn opened -the wicket. She went out. - -“I didn’t know it was you,” she said. “They misinformed me. I’m so -sorry.” - -The girl looked white and tired. One shoulder of her frail summer gown -was torn to the elbow and there were red bruises on the skin already -turning darker. - -“What is the matter?” he demanded bluntly, retaining the nervous hand -she had offered and touching her torn sleeve with the other. - -She noticed the damage, then, for the first time; the hot colour swept -her face. - -“An accident,” she murmured. “The place is impassable--a jungle of -lumber and knocked-down sets.... Will you please drive me home, Barry?” - -“Where is Mr. Smull?” - -She lifted her gaze to the man beside her, then calmly turned to Flynn -and bade him place her luggage in the taxi. Something in Annan’s eyes -had alarmed her. - -“Is Smull here?” he repeated. - -She did not answer. - -An instant vision of Smull’s heavy black pistol and a swift intuition -that Smull was capable of using it on anybody except himself,--these -thoughts paralysed her tongue. - -She looked dumbly at Annan. The stillness of his drawn face terrified -her. - -“Barry, come with me----” - -“Wait a moment,” he said, but she caught his hands desperately. - -“Help me,” she whispered, “I need you. I tell you I need you----” - -“I’m going to help you.” - -“Barry! You will destroy me!” - -She meant that he would destroy himself, but intuition shaped her -speech. - -“I want you to take me home,” she said.... “It is the first thing I -ever asked of you. Will you do it?” - -“Could you wait till I--speak--to Smull?” - -“No. Take me _now_!” - -He hesitated. She had clasped his arm. Her weight on it was heavy; her -face had grown deadly pale. He looked at her closely; looked down at -her torn sleeve. - -“Is--is it anything that _he_ did?” he demanded harshly. - -She put out one hand blindly, reaching for the cab door; wrenched -it open; sagged heavily on his arm. He almost lifted her into the -vehicle; and she crumpled up in the corner, her eyes closing. - -Annan spoke to the driver, cast a quick, grim look at the gate, then -turned and jumped into the cab. - -“Now,” he said, drawing her head to his shoulder, “we won’t talk until -we get home. If you feel faint we can stop at a chemist’s. Lie quietly, -dear.” - -She lay against his shoulder, perfectly inert--so still that, at -moments, he leaned over to see her face, fearing she had fainted. - -Neither uttered a word. His thoughts had made glimmering slits of his -eyes and had set the hard muscles working around his jaws. - -But all the girl thought of was to get him away from that heavy black -pistol and from the man whose neck had swollen red behind the ears. - -For suddenly in that moment when she had seen that terrifying -expression on Annan’s face, a new and vital truth had flashed clear as -crystal in her brain. She saw it; saw through it; knew it for Truth. - -With her, Truth was always final. It settled everything for her in whom -no tiniest seed of self-deception ever had germinated. - -And Eris knew now that whatever became of her career, this man beside -her, who was her lover, was something more, too. He was a care. He was -a responsibility. He was something to be defended; something to be -guided. - -For in that instant of fear in his behalf her whole being responded -with passionate solicitude. - -Now she was beginning to comprehend that this solicitude for him must -always be hers while life endured; that the overwhelming instinct -to defend, protect, guide the man who must always be a boy for her, -dominated all else; and would always rule her every thought and motive; -her every plan, every action. - -She was beginning to understand that she must have her way with him -as a mother with her son; that, to do so, she must contrive, scheme, -prepare, foresee, and above all, love. - -And, above everything, even love,--if truly in her life this man -had become the passion paramount--she must be prepared to give. And -supreme, even above love and above giving, she must give up! - -She lay unstirring on his shoulder, her lids drooping, thinking, -understanding, searching, accepting. - -It had happened. It was true. Chiefest of all in life, and suddenly, -and in the twinkling of an eye, had become the passionate necessity for -the happiness and well-being of this man. - -And she knew that she would give her life without a second’s hesitation -to protect his. And she knew that in her heart, her mind, her soul, he -came first. And all that even most remotely pertained to him. And then, -only, came herself. Which was her career. The career, hardly begun, -to which she had dedicated all the best in her of belief and effort. -The career which, germinating, had filled her ardent heart of a child, -which had budded in girlhood, and was in earliest blossom, now. The -career for which she had so gratefully gone shabby, had starved, had -slept under the stars in public parks. - -Lying there on his breast she felt it slipping away--slipping through -her slender fingers on his breast. And if, for an instant, her small -fingers clutched at what was slipping through them, it was his coat she -grasped. And held, tightly, knowing now what truly was her goal and -what above all else she must hold her whole life through. - - * * * * * - -“Dear,” he said gently, “we are here. Do you feel strong enough to -stand, or shall I carry you?” - -If her smile were faintly wise it also was tenderly ironical. God -knew--and had whispered to her--who it was between these two who would -do the carrying; and who it would be who was carried by the stronger. - -“Darling,” she murmured, “you’re so funny. I only needed a nap because -I didn’t sleep last night.” - -“Have you really been asleep, Eris?” - -“Well, I had visions, anyhow. Please pay this frightfully expensive -taxi and carry up my luggage, because Hattie has left and I’m going to -cook our dinner.” - -They climbed the bare and poorly lighted stairs. Eris fumbled for her -keys, selected the right one, and opened the door. The whole place was -sweet with the scent of flowers. - -As always, the girl’s gratitude was out of all proportion for anything -offered her; and now, in the living-room, she stood enchanted, gazing -at the flowers, touching them here and there with finger tip and lip. - -“Oh,” she murmured, “you are so sweet to me, Barry.... And you must -have brought them and arranged them while I was out.” She turned, -happily, and took both his hands. And saw the darkness of impending -trouble in his clouded face. - -“Darling?” she exclaimed. - -“It’s nothing, Eris.... That miserable wench of yours lied about -you.... I suppose I’d better tell you----” - -“What did she say, dear?” - -“That--I can’t!--and it was a damned lie----” - -“Perhaps it wasn’t. Tell me.” - -“I’m ashamed to.... She said a man was here--all night----” - -“Oh,” she said disdainfully, “that was my husband. He pretended to be -ill and starving and I let him in. When he got inside he tried to bully -me. So I locked my door; and in the morning I turned him out.” - -In the girl’s healthy and flushed contempt, making of a sinister -situation only a squalid commonplace, the boy’s formless fears--all the -tragic perplexity faded, burned out in a wholesome rage. - -But into her grey eyes came the swift shadow of anxiety again and she -took hold of him, impulsively, by both elbows. - -“What am I going to do with you!” she cried in tender exasperation. -“Will you smooth out that scowl and mind your business, darling? I -can manage my own affairs. I’ve never been afraid of anything--except -to-day. My only fear in the world is that you’ll get into mischief----” - -“Well, do you think I’m going to sit still and let----” - -“Will you mind your adorable business, Barry? You worry me. You’re on -my mind. I’ve got to marry you as soon as I can I realise _that_----” - -He caught her in his clasp, fiercely. - -“You _will_!” - -“I’ve got to----” - -“You promise?” - -“Good heavens, yes!” she looked up at him, laughing. - -Suddenly her eyes filled. She tore his arms away and took him to her -breast in a fiercer, closer clasp. Then the long tension broke with her -cry: - -“Barry--Barry,” she breathed brokenly, “you belong to me--you’re _my_ -boy! You’re all I ever owned in all my life that really belonged to -me.... I--I had a--a heifer”--she was laughing hysterically--“but I had -to sell her--and _they_ kept the money....” - -She clung to him, strained him to her in an abandon of long-pent need, -incoherent between convulsive tears and the sobbing laughter that shook -her slender body: - -“You want me, you need me, don’t you, Barry? You’re lonely. No boy ever -should be lonely. It is the wickedest thing in the world--that any -child should ever be lonely for need of love.... You _are_ a child! -Mine! You’re all I care about.... And I’m going to marry you because -you want me to--because we both want to--Barry, my darling--my boy who -belongs to me----” - - - - -CHAPTER XXX - - -Before she could inherit this boy who had willed himself to her, Eris -had to do everything for herself and she knew it. - -For a day or two she abandoned herself utterly to Annan. Night alone -separated them. Early morning saw them united. - -The hot, sunny July days they spent in the surf at Long Beach, or in -motoring through Westchester. Evenings they dined together on some cool -roof, or by the sea, and returned to whisper happy intimacies together -until long into the morning hours. - -Every lovely self-revelation of this girl more utterly turned the boy’s -head. Desire became absolute necessity. Necessity became dependence. He -did not understand that. He supposed the dependence was hers--that, in -the turbulent torrent of Life he was the rock to which she clung. - -It was well that he thought that. It was well that she let him think -so. It always is best for a man. - -Once, during those heavenly days, he met Coltfoot walking with Rosalind -Shore on Fifth Avenue. - -“I thought Eris would break with Albert Smull,” drawled Rosalind. “What -a sketch he is!--schmoozing about and telling everybody he had to let -her go! Betsy’s got him buffaloed. He’s afraid of her parents; that’s -all that holds Albert.... I get banged around a lot, but Mom’s a pretty -good policewoman, and God help the Johnny with fancy intentions towards -her little Rosie.” She looked at Coltfoot, standing beside her, with -faintest malice. - -Coltfoot’s sophisticated retort was a bored smile. But it was to Annan -he spoke, asking him how his work was going. - -“What do you care how my story is going?” said Annan, laughing. “You’re -an enemy to realism, and that’s all I write.” - -“Realism! You don’t know what it means,” said Coltfoot bluntly. “What -you write isn’t realism. If you want realism, study your pretty friend -Eris! She’s real. Everything about her is genuine. Study her story. -That’s realism. Not as _you_ once wrote it,” he added disgustedly, “but -devoid of ugliness and tragedy and sob-stuff. _She_ doesn’t whimper. -She doesn’t know how to pose. The _beau geste_ and the attitude mean -nothing to her. Sob-stuff is wasted on her. Health never snivels. Do -you get that, Barry? _Health!_ That’s the key. And by the Eternal, it -is the usual, not the unusual that is wholesome. The great majority -are healthy. That’s realism. And when health is your keynote you have -beauty, too. And _that_ is Realism, my clever friend!” - -“Am I real because I am beautiful, Mike?” drawled Rosalind, “or -beautiful because I am real?” - -So these three parted with the light jest of Rosalind floating between -them in the sunshine. - -But Annan went on, a trifle out of countenance, to keep a rendezvous -with Eris at the Ritz. - - * * * * * - -At luncheon he said abruptly: “The stuff I do, Eris--you know I’d like -your opinion--I mean while I’m doing it.... Or rather, I’d like to talk -over the story with you, first, before I begin it.” - -The girl looked up over her peach-ice. Her eyes were very clear and -still. - -“What I want,” he explained, “is a perfectly fresh eye--a fresh mind -and a--a bystander’s point of view.... Not that I don’t most deeply -respect you as an artist----” - -“It would make me very happy,” she said, “to have your confidence in -such things.” - -“Well, I have a lot of confidence in your judgment. I’d like to consult -you.... Perhaps--I don’t know--no man does know when his nose is too -close to his work--but I’m rather afraid I’ve been getting away from -things--facts--” - -Her eyes grew tenderly humorous: “Whatever you get away from, Barry, -you can’t ever get away from me. I’m the Nemesis called in to chasten -you and clip those irresponsible wings.... I know a little about wings. -I used to dream of them. Do you remember I once told you?” - -“About your flight. And how you found the god of Wisdom seated all -alone on the peak of Parnassus dissecting a human heart?” - -“So you remember.” - -“Yes; and I remember that little play you wrote in school--the story of -the wish, the wings, and the new hat.” - -She laughed, but there was the slightest shadow over the grey eyes. The -shadow which renunciation casts, perhaps. - -“I took a longer flight than to Olympus,” she said, “and it was you -I discovered above the clouds;--all by yourself, Barry,--on a funny -little world, spinning up there----” - -“Was I busy dissecting somebody’s heart?” - -“Mine--I guess.” - -“Well, I’ll tell you one thing, sweetheart; you never shall regret -marrying me. Never shall I by look or word or deed interfere with your -career. If I do, chuck me!” - -She smiled--that tender, intelligent smile which lately was one of her -charming revelations that vaguely surprised him. For the gods were -granting her a little time yet--a little respite for a career the limit -of which already was visible to her. - -He had told her, diffidently, that he was not obliged to live -economically; that what he had was hers, also; that there always was -sufficient to finance any arrangement she wished to make for her own -productions. - -But the girl who had returned a hundred dollars to him when she had -only twenty more in all the world was no more capable of accepting such -an offer than of requesting it. - -Besides, no sooner had it been rumored that Eris Odell and Albert -Smull no longer coöperated, than telegrams began to pour in from -all sorts of people, responsible and irresponsible. Offers arrived -from keen, clever, capable and ruthless producers, with releases -guaranteed, and who wished to fetter her for years at the lowest -figure; from enthusiastic people new in the game, with capital -guaranteed but no release. Scores of communications came from -various birds of prey who infest the fringes of the profession--the -“don’t-do-anything-till-you-hear-from-me” boys; the noisy, persistent -Gentile who lies for a living and whose only asset is the people -he traps; the Jew, penniless and discredited, determined to make a -commission out of anybody and undeterred by the dirt of the transaction. - -All of these communications Eris laid before Frank Donnell. - -Theirs was a close and sober friendship,--sombre even, at -times--because Frank Donnell had been in love with her since her first -awkward step in the Betsy Blythe company. The girl knew it; both knew, -also, that the matter was hopeless. - -And for Frank Donnell, Eris was conscious of a gravely tender affection -she never had felt for anybody else in her brief life. - -He had saved enough money to finance one picture for her; and he could -have secured guarantees from the best of the releasing companies on his -own name alone. But, again, it was one of those things that Eris could -not do. It was desirable; it was legitimate business. But to use the -resources of any man to whom she had given any intimate fragment of -herself was not possible for Eris. - -And, although Frank Donnell never had said one word of love to the -girl; and she always had ignored a fact that from the beginning had -been touchingly plain to her; there never could be any speculative -combination between them. It was her way. - -But, following his advice, an arrangement had been made possible -for one year between her and a great producing company. And of this -proposed contract she informed Annan. - -Together they consulted Annan’s attorney, Judge Wilmer; and the first -steps, in her suit for annulment of that unconsummated farce of -marriage, were taken. - -Eris had not thought of going away that summer, although her contract -did not call her to report for duty until October. - -But early in August she began to feel a desire to be alone for a -while--a need for solitude,--leisure for self-examination. - -Lately, too, she had thought much of her home. Not that she missed the -people who inhabited it. There never had been any tie between her and -her father. - -But the girl cherished no resentment toward him. And toward Mazie all -her instincts always had been friendly. - -Often she had thought of Whitewater Farms, not regretting, not even -missing the home where she had been born, unwelcomed. - -Yet, in these last weeks, a desire to go home for a while had -developed, and had slowly increased to a point where she coupled it -with her increasing necessity for quiet and rest. - -The girl was tired--saddened a little, perhaps. That is the aftermath -of all effort, the reaction from all attainment, the shadow that dogs -knowledge. And it is the white shadow cast by Happiness. - -There were other things, too, which directed her thoughts unconsciously -toward the only home she ever had known. - -Eddie Carter had been annoying her again. She never spoke to Annan -about it. But her husband was always writing to her, now. Every -few days brought begging letters, maudlin appeals, veiled threats -concerning Albert Smull’s supposed attentions to her,--maundering, -wandering, incoherent epistles born of the drugs he used, perhaps. - -And this was not all. Little Leopold Shill, Smull’s partner, wrote -to her in behalf of Smull, begging her to pardon his unpardonable -offences, expressing concern over Smull’s desperate state of mind, -begging her to be generous and merciful to a man whose flagrant conduct -had been due to love alone--to a mighty and overwhelming passion which -bewildered him and made him really irresponsible. - -To Leopold Shill’s two letters she made no reply. And Shill did not -write again. But Smull did. He had been writing to her twice a day. She -never replied. After the first letter she destroyed the others without -opening them. - -But the annoyance was telling on her. - -Sometimes, from her window, she saw Smull’s limousine pass and repass -her door, and the man’s red face at the window peering up at her house. - -At times the car stood for hours on Greenwich Avenue, where its -occupant commanded a view of Jane Street. - -More than once, on the street, Smull had accosted her, even followed on -behind her. - -Lately, too, it became apparent to the girl that her husband also -had been watching and spying on her, because he wrote a violent, -crazy letter insisting that she warn Smull to keep his car out of her -neighbourhood: - -“--I’ve been keeping tabs on you,” he wrote. “Now, I’ll keep an eye on -that”--unprintable epithets followed, nauseating Eris; and she burned -the letter without reading the remainder. - -One evening in early August Albert Smull, standing beside his car on -Greenwich Avenue and waiting for Eris to leave her house, noticed a -shabby individual apparently watching him from the opposite corner. - -On a similar occasion, a day or two later, he noticed the same shabby -man on the same corner, staring steadily across the street at him. - -After a few recurrent glances, a vague idea came into Smull’s brain -that the shabby man’s features were familiar to him. - -Ordinary cowardice was not Smull’s kind. He walked leisurely across the -street and came up to the shabby man and coolly scrutinised him. - -“Well, by God,” he said calmly, “I _thought_ I’d seen you before. I -heard you were out of prison. What’s your graft now, Eddie?” - -“_Yours_,” replied Carter. - -Smull, puzzled, awaited further explanation. Carter, twitching all -over, stood digging at the bleeding roots of his finger nails. - -“Well,” inquired Smull with his close-eyed, sanguine smile, “what do -you suppose is _my_ graft, Eddie?” - -“My wife.” - -“Hey?” - -“My wife, Eris Carter.” - -Smull’s features turned a heavy crimson. After a silence: - -“So _that’s_ the situation,” he said heavily. - -Carter ceased twitching. He said very distinctly: “When you and Shill -sent me up the River, that’s what you did to me, too.... On the day I -was married to her, that’s what you did to me. You made a crook out of -me because you didn’t pay me living wages when I worked for you. Then -you made a jail-bird out of me. Now, you’ve made me a bum. - -“And that isn’t enough for you. You want to make a prostitute out of my -wife.” - -“Shut your filthy mouth,” said Smull coolly. - -“I’ll stop your filthy mouth if you don’t keep away from my wife,” said -Carter in a still, uncanny voice. - -Smull laughed. “Beat it,” he said. - -And, as Carter did not stir: “Get a move on, you dirty bum. Come on!... -Or shall I have to hunt up a cop to give you the bum’s rush?” - -Carter’s visage turned ghastly: - -“All right; I’ll go.... But you’ll go farther yet if you don’t let my -wife alone.” - -He took one step toward Smull, hesitated, then, twitching all over, he -turned and shuffled away down Greenwich Avenue, digging his thumbnails -into his mangled fingers. - - - - -CHAPTER XXXI - - -Eris went home early in August. - -One fine afternoon, a week later, lonely as a dog that has lost its -master, and, like a lost dog, finding all things perplexing in the -absence of the Beloved, Annan, wandering along, chanced to pass one -of the great Broadway picture-theatres; and noticed Betsy Blythe and -Rosalind Shore standing in the lobby. - -They always welcomed him with affection. They did so now. Betsy fairly -bubbled energy, radiant in the warm sun-rays of success, impatient for -further triumphs, excited, gossipy, cordial, voluble. - -“I told Albert Smull I wouldn’t renew my contract unless Frank -Donnell went with it,” she said. “And I’ve nailed Frank for five more -years, Barry,--and my camera-man, too. That is the only way to handle -people--tell them exactly where they get off. And off they’ll get every -time!” - -“I’d like,” remarked Rosalind lazily, “to see anybody handle Mom that -way.” - -“What are _you_ going to do next season?” inquired Annan without much -curiosity. - -“Sing a little song in a punk little play, for that’s where I belong -and that’s my little lay.” - -“She’s got a sure fire comedy,” added Betsy, “and she’s the whole show. -She wears practically nothing, by the way. But it’s horribly expensive.” - -“Where does it get me?” drawled Rosalind. “I’m fed up. _I_ don’t want -to work.” - -“What do you want to do?” inquired Annan, amused. - -“You’d be surprised.... I’d like to get married and quit.” - -“Betsy knows. I’ll tell you, too, ducky. I’d like to marry Mike.” - -“Who?” he demanded, astonished. - -“Mike Coltfoot, ducky. He makes a living. And I make Mom’s. There’s the -hitch. Mom would have my life. And Mike would draw a corpse.” - -Annan took her by both hands: “Bless your nice little heart,” he said, -“I never dreamed that you and Mike cared for each other.” - -“I don’t know how _he_ feels; I only know how he says he feels,” she -said cynically. “But, oh God, the fireworks if Mom gets next! Do you -wonder I’m fed up with work?” - -Betsy said: “I tell her that if she feels that way about her profession -she’d better walk out on her mother and marry Mike. I follow what I -love. Every person ought to.... By the way, what has become of Eris, -Barry?” - -“She has gone home for a rest,” he said carelessly. - -“Where? Back to the pigs and cows?” - -He reddened. “She’s gone to her home at Whitewater Farms.” - -After he had departed, Betsy looked at Rosalind; her rosy mouth made a -small oval. - -“What did I do to _him_?” she asked. - -“He’s spiked,” nodded the latter. “I’m spiked myself, but if ever you -see me as solemn about it as Barry is, why, kick my shins, dear, and -accept gratitude in advance.” - -Then she turned to shake hands with Coltfoot, who came sauntering up, -hat in hand. - -“Hello, old top,” she said. “You’re half an hour late, but I’d wait a -lifetime for anybody who resembles you. Come on in and see Betsy cut up -on the scr-r-r-een!” - - * * * * * - -Since the departure of Eris, Annan’s appetite had become an increasing -source of worry to Mrs. Sniffen. - -That evening he left most of his dinner untouched. When he had been -writing all day he often did that. But he had done no writing for days. - -To Mrs. Sniffen’s fears and remonstrances he turned a deaf ear, denying -that he was not perfectly well. - -“When does the last mail arrive?” he asked. He asked her this every -evening, now, and she always instructed him, but he seemed to forget. - -He went upstairs to his study, dropped onto the lounge, lighted a pipe. -What else was he to do--with the main-spring broken. - -He didn’t want to work. He didn’t intend to do any more writing, -anyway, without the close coöperation of Eris. Something, evidently, -was the matter with his work and he was certain that she was capable of -telling him what it was. He knew that he was going to take a new view -of things in general, but he wanted her to point it out. He wanted to -start right; and be kept on the track for a while until accustomed. - -That, insensibly, he had become dependent upon the mind of another -person, did not occur to him. At least not definitely. - -He realised that the world meant Eris, and that without Eris he had no -other interest in the world, now. - -And, to this man who never before had evinced any interest in the world -except as it concerned himself, it did not seem odd that every vital -principle in him now surged around and enveloped this girl. The girl he -had found asleep in a public park. - -Wherever he went, whatever he was doing, his mind was on her. Not -selfishly; although a deep instinct was always telling him that -whatever real work he ever was to do would come through her. - -Nor did he seem to think it odd that his personal ambition now remained -in abeyance. Fluency, too, seemed to have departed: nimble mind and -facile pen, the careless arrogance of youth and power, the almost -effortless ability, flippant juggling with phrase and word, and the -gay contempt for the emotion with which his audience responded when he -tossed up the letters of the alphabet and let them fall into words--all -these seem to have died. - -Without analysing it he was feeling already the tension of a new -gravity in his character. It came, perhaps, from the constant presence -of an unknown god--the one that always seemed to be waiting at the -elbow of Eris--waiting to be recognized before speaking. The god with a -thousand faces whose name is Truth. - -He appeared to be on friendly terms with Eris. But Annan had not yet -become familiar with his faces. - - - - -CHAPTER XXXII - - -When Eris decided to go home she gave her lover a few hours’ notice and -went without further preliminaries or fuss. - -Annan met her in the station,--a very sober-faced young man, solemn and -sad. - -It was she who offered the serious kiss of parting; she who retained -his hand, tender, reluctant, candidly concerned as to his health and -welfare if left for a while entirely self-responsible. - -Neither saw any humour in the situation. - -“Please write me every evening, Barry,” she urged. “And if you don’t -sleep well, take a glass of hot milk when you go to bed.” - -“All right, but how about you?” - -“Oh, I’ll let you hear from me,” she nodded absently; “--but I shall be -rather anxious if you fail to write me every evening. You won’t neglect -to do it, will you?” - -Finally he began to think her solicitude was mildly funny. - -“If I had a mother,” he said, “that’s about what she’d say to me. Who -do you think is running this outfit, anyway, Eris?” - -“You, darling.” - -His masculine smile made this obvious. And the solemn directions he -gave her about danger of catching cold in a country house, about -changing shoes and stockings when she came indoors, and his warning -concerning fried foods and sudden change of drinking water were -specimens of psychological self-assertion which settled his real -status. - -They kissed again as soberly as two children. She followed her Red Cap -through the gates, not looking back. - -He turned again to a city desolate. - - * * * * * - -The journey proved tedious and hot. Her Pullman porter brought her a -paper-bag for her new straw hat. He brought her a pillow, also; and -luncheon later. - -She had plenty of reading matter provided by Annan, but it lay unopened -on her lap; and Annan’s fruit, bon-bons, and flowers lay on the floor -at her feet. - -All that sunny morning and early afternoon she lay listlessly in her -chair, watching the celebrated and deadly monotonous river, content to -rest, unstirring, unthinking, her grey eyes partly closed, the water a -running glimmer between her fringing lashes. - -At East Summit she changed to the local. She recognised the conductor -who took her ticket, but it was evident he did not know her, and she -was content to let it go that way. - -Familiar farms sped into view, fled past, succeeded by remembered hills -and brooks and woods. - -Reaping already was in progress on some farms. She noted, mechanically, -the cattle as she passed through a dairy country. Mostly Holsteins. -She saw a few Ayrshires with their Noah’s Ark horns; a herd or two -of Guernseys--not to be compared to the Whitewater cattle as she -remembered them. - -Summit Centre held the train until people finished getting on and off, -and the last crate of raspberries was aboard. - -Summit and the great Sanitarium came next. It was here she had seen -her first picture-folk in action. A little tightening of lip and -heart--lest any atom of courage escape--then the train moved on. - -West Summit--a cross-roads, no more. And after a little while, -Whitewater. - -She got out with her suitcase, her books, illustrated papers, bon-bons, -fruit, and flowers. A number of people looked twice at her to be -certain before speaking. Men looked oftener, shy of speaking. - -She returned greetings smilingly, exchanged commonplaces when -necessary, aware but indifferent to the curiosity visible in every face. - -There was a new bus driver. She gave him the baggage-check, got into -the vehicle with hand luggage, flowers, books, periodicals, bon-bons, -and fruit. - -Two commercial men bound for Whitewater Inn were inclined to assiduous -politeness. She remained scarcely aware of them. She exchanged -salutations with Gumbert, the butcher, who got off at his shop. -Otherwise, her fellow travellers were unknown to her and unnoticed. - -It was a mile to Whitewater Farms. - -The country looked very lovely. It had rained that morning; grass and -foliage were fresh; gullies still ran water; brooks gurgled bank high. - -The sun, low in a cloudless sky, flung rosy rays across green uplands -and here and there a few acres of early stubble. Trees cast long bluish -shadows. Cattle were beginning to wander toward the home-lane. It would -be near milking time at Whitewater Farms. - -And now, leaning wide of her window in the clumsy bus, she could -see the gilded weather-cock a-glitter on the main barn and swallows -circling above brick chimneys. - - * * * * * - -At the front gate her trunk was dumped. She paid the driver fifty -cents; watched him drive away; then turned and looked at the white -house with green shutters, where she had been born. It had been newly -painted. - -The world seemed very still there. She set her suitcase beside her -trunk, laid flowers, books, periodicals, fruit, bon-bons on top of it, -and walked slowly around the house to the dairy. - -One of her half-brothers, Cyrus, came out in his white, sterilised -milking jacket and trousers, chewing gum. - -“Well, f’r Gawd’s sake,” he said when the slow recognition had been -accomplished. - -She offered her gloved hand and he took it with a plowman’s clasp and -wrung it, shifting from one leg to the other--rural expression of -cordiality--legs alone eloquent. - -Commonplaces said, she made inquiries and learned that everybody was -well. - -“Go right in, Eris! Pa’s getting into his milkin’ duds; Ma she’s -cookin’ supper. Go right in, Sis! I guess you know the way----” loud -laughter and a large red hand under her arm to pilot and encourage. - -In the kitchen Mazie turned from the range, then set aside a skillet, -wiped both hands on her apron, and took Eris to her ample bosom. - -When she had kissed her stepdaughter sufficiently: “Pa!” she called, -“oh, Pa! Get your pants on and come down here quick!” - -Elmer was already on his way downstairs, clump, clump, clump. He halted -at the kitchen door, buttoning his snowy jacket, gaping stolidly at -Fanny’s child. - -For he knew her instantly--Eris, daughter of Discord. - -“Hello, Dad,” she said uncertainly. - -“Hello.... Waal, waal, I’ll be jiggered! Waal, dang it all!... So you -took a notion to come back, did you?” - -“If you’ll let me stay for a little while----” - -“Why, Eris, how you talk!” exclaimed Mazie. “This is your home; ain’t -it, Pa?” - -Elmer buttoned the last button of his milking jacket: - -“She can stay if she’s a mind to. She allus does as she’s a mind to,” -he replied grimly. - -“Now you quit, Pa,” remonstrated Mazie, cheerily. “Eris, you go right -up to your own room. Everything’s just like you left it. Where’s your -trunk? All right; Si and Buddy will take it up.” And to her husband: -“Pa, I’m surprised at you. Ain’t you a-going to shake hands with your -own daughter?” - -“Gimme a chance,” he grunted. - -He offered Fanny’s child a horny paw, gave her fingers one pump-like -jerk. - -“Time you come home,” he observed. “I guess you want your caaf money, -don’t you?” - -“Not if _you_ need it,” she replied tranquilly. “Is the farm doing -well, Dad?” - -Mazie said, laughingly: “He’s only foolin’. He’s making more money than -he can spend, Eris. You take your heifer-money when you’re good and -ready. It’s down to the bank and all safe and snug.” - -Eris smiled at them both: “Where’s that blue checked gingham dress of -mine?” she inquired. “If it’s clean I want to milk.” - -“I guess you’ve kinda forgotten how,” drawled Elmer. “You jest better -set and rock and read into them novels you allus liked----” - -“I want to milk,” she repeated with a humorous glance at Mazie. - -“Come right up to your room then, Eris. I’ll show you where I put that -gingham.” And, to Elmer: “You hush your face, Pa. Eris can milk any cow -she’s a mind to. Come along, Eris----” - -But the girl lingered on the stairs: “What is the herd-bull’s name, -Dad?” she asked curiously. - -“We got White Cloud now. Lemme see,--was it Whitewater Chieftain when -you was here----” - -“Yes.... I want to see the herd come in. I’ll hurry, Dad----” - -She ran upstairs after Mazie. - -Her father passed his huge hand over his face absently; then, very -deliberately, he scratched his grizzled head. - -Si broke the silence: “She’s a hum-dinger, Pa. I’ll say so.” - -“Hey?” grunted Elmer, scowling at his son. - -“Ain’t she?” insisted Cyrus. - -“Waal, I dunno. She dresses kinda tidy.” - -“She looks like she did when we all seen her on the screen,” said Si. -“I guess she’s made her pile. They all get big wages in the movies. You -gotta go to the city to make big money----” - -“G’wan down to the barn,” said his father drily. - -The first murmur of discord already: and Fanny’s child scarcely arrived! - -Elmer’s frowning face was lifted to the floor overhead--a moment--then, -heavily he followed his own and unmistakable offspring down to the -milking barn. - - * * * * * - -In her room the sight of objects long forgotten filled her heart;--and -the odour of the house, the particular odour of her own room--melange -of dyed curtains, cheap wall-paper, ingrain carpet--a musty, haunting -odour with a slight aroma of fresh air filtered by forests. - -Two of her half-brothers appeared with her luggage. - -Buddy, grown fat and huge, shyly shook hands with her and fled. Mazie -kissed her again and retired, taking Si with her, whose fascinated gaze -had never stirred from the only real actress he ever had beheld. - -Eris seldom cried. But now she sat down on her bed’s edge and buried -her face in the pillows. - -Tears flowed--tears of relaxation from strain, perhaps. And perhaps the -girl wept a little because she really had nothing here to weep for--no -deep ties to renew, no intimate memories of tenderness. - -Bathed, her bobbed hair hatless, and in gingham and apron, Eris went -downstairs and out across the grass. - -Below, winding into the barn-yard, tonk-a-tonk, tonk-a-tonk, came the -Whitewater herd. Here and there a heifer balked and frisked; now and -then a cow lowed; and the great herd-bull, White Cloud, set the barn -vibrating with his thunderous welcome to the returning herd. - -Red sunshine poured through the lane, bronzing the silky coats of -moving cattle. Overhead, martins twittered and dipped and circled. -There was the scent of milk in the still air--of clover, and of distant -woods. - -In the milking barn she encountered old Ed Lister. He seemed to have -grown much older, and there was a dim bluish look to his eyes. - -Eris shook hands with him. - -“How-de-do,” he said, peering at her. And answered, “Yes, marm,” and -“No, marm,” as though in his mind there was some slight confusion -concerning her identity. - -She passed along the stanchions, petting and caressing the beautiful -creatures, dropping handfuls of bran, tossing in a little clover-hay. - -Everywhere satin-smooth coats were being wiped off, udders bathed in -tepid water. The cattle were busy with bran and hay or drinking from -the patent buckets. - -Eris went to the calf-pen, where fawn-like heifer-calves, pretending -shyness and alarm, soon came crowding to lick her hands. - -She looked at the bull-calves; at the two young bulls selected to -aspire to future leadership. - -She went to the bull-pen, where the herd-bull, White Cloud, gazed -curiously upon her, sniffed her hand, stretched his massive neck to be -rubbed and fondled, rolling contented and sentimental eyes. - -Her half-brothers, Gene and Willis, came in wearing spotless white. -Greetings were friendly and awkward; and presently they went on into -the western wing to attend to the cows on test there. - -Her father and Cyrus were already milking. Buddy was in the loft; Ed -Lister sat with gnarled fingers clasped and dim gaze fixed on the -cattle, quiet, solemn, aged. - -Eris walked slowly along, reading the names of the cows affixed to -each stall--Mazie of Whitewater Farms, Star-Dust, White Gentian, -Guelder-Rose of Whitewater, Snowberry Lass, Moon-Queen, Apple-bloom’s -Daughter---- - -She took milking stool and pail and seated herself by Guelder-Rose, who -became a trifle restive. - -“So, lass!--soo--lass,” she murmured, stroking the white and golden -skin. And in a few moments the pail vibrated with alternate streams of -milk. - -“Well, Dad,” she said, “have I forgotten?” - -Elmer grunted. Then, abruptly: - -“Guelder-Rose is by Whitewater Chieftain outa Snow-Rose, with a record -of eleven thousan’ six hunder’n’ ten an’ two-tenth pound uv milk, an’ -five hunder’n’ twenty-one, forty-seven pound uv butter-fat in class G.” - -“That is a fine record, Dad,” said the girl cordially. - -“I guesso. Yes. An’ that there Moon-Queen; she’s got a record uv eleven -six fifty-four an’ three-tenths and five sixty-two, thirty-four. -Herd sire, Chieftain; outa Silver Frost’s daughter, Snow-Crystal of -Whitewater----” - -“Outa Lass o’ the Mist,” croaked Ed Lister in uncompromising correction. - -“You’re right, Ed,” admitted Elmer. - -For a time there was no sound save the hissing of milk in the pails. - -Eris carried her pail to the steelyards, weighed it, took the pencil -dangling by its string and filled in her memoranda opposite the name -of Guelder-Rose. Then she transferred her attentions to Apple-bloom’s -Daughter. - -“Made a lotta money, Eris?” inquired Elmer abruptly. - -“Some.” - -“Waal, I guess you spent it, too.” - -“No.” - -“Hey? Got it yet?” - -“Most of it, Dad.” - -“Waal, I’ll be jiggered.... What you aimin’ to do with it, Eris?” - -“Save it.” - -“Any investments?” - -“Some.” - -“What d’ya buy? Wild-cats?” - -“Liberty bonds.” - -“Gosh!” - -Cyrus’ voice from behind a cow: “You gotta go to the city to make -money.” - -Elmer said: “You poor, dumb thing, they’d skin ya. You ain’t got a gift -like Eris. G’wan an’ weigh your milk ’n’ shut your face.” - -Cyrus muttered for a while. Eris said: “There seems to be too many -people for the jobs in New York.... The poor are everywhere.... I’ve -seen them sleeping in the grass in the public parks.” - -“Ya hear that, Si?” demanded Elmer. - -Unstirring, solemn, dim of eye, Ed Lister spoke: “I was to York in ’85. -I seen things in my day.” - -Elmer said to Eris: “Ed he worked in West Fourteenth Street. He knows -what, too, same’s you.” - -“I was a-truckin’ it fur Amos T. Brown & Company,” said the old man -shrilly. “I was a hefty fella, I was. I seen doin’s in my time, I did. -But they hain’t nothin’ into it. You spend more’n you git down to York. -Yes, marm.” - -Cyrus sniffed derisively, unconvinced. Buddy, having shaken down -sufficient hay, came in with a sack of lime. - -“You most done?” he inquired. “Supper’s ready, I guess.” - - - - -CHAPTER XXXIII - - -Annan’s letters came to her every day. She answered infrequently,--not -oftener than once a week. - -Other letters were forwarded from Jane Street,--persistent letters from -Smull begging to know where she had gone,--abject letters betraying all -the persistence of a man who knows no pride, no shame in pursuit where -there ever had been an end to gain. - -Eris read only the first of Smull’s letters. The others went, unopened, -into the kitchen range. - -Twice, also, her husband wrote her,--evidently aware of annulment -proceedings,--vaguely threatening her in case she married -Smull,--furnishing her with a mass of filthy detail concerning Smull’s -private life, menacing her and him, pleading,--sometimes begging for -money. - -She read both letters, sent them to her attorney, and cleansed her mind -of them and of the creature who had written them. - - * * * * * - -The time was shortening; the days were drawing near when she must -report for work.... Her last year of work, perhaps.... The last year, -maybe, of her screen career. - -She wrote to the man who already had become the object paramount of her -life: - - “Dearest:-- - - “Your daily letters reassure me. You do me a great kindness in - writing them. Long ago, before I knew what love was, your unvarying - kindness won me. Always, to me, it remains the most wonderful thing - in the world. - - “We are not yet in full autumn here at Whitewater Farms. Few leaves - have turned. Except for miles of golden-rod and purple asters on - fallow and roadside, and acres of golden stubble, and the wine-red - acres of reaped buckwheat, one would scarcely believe that summer had - ended in these Northern hills. - - “I went to-day to Whitewater Brook, where I encountered the first - person connected with pictures I ever had seen. You will laugh. It - was poor old Quiss. - - “He was fishing. He didn’t possess much skill. He called me ‘sister’ - and ‘girlie.’ - - “I clung to him as a cat clings to a back fence. I pleaded, I - implored for his aid and advice. - - “Poor old fellow, I always shall be grateful. I met Frank Donnell - through him--dearest of my friends excepting you, Barry. - - “Well, then, I walked along the brook and sentimentalised in the - dappled sunlight of the yellowing woods. The blue-jays were like - winged sapphires everywhere; squirrels made a most prodigious noise - among dry leaves. In a hemlock I saw a large owl sitting. - - “I took home a huge sheaf of asters. Even in my arms butterflies - hovered about the gold and blue blossoms. - - * * * * * - - “I shall leave here soon. My stepmother and my half-brothers are kind - to me. My father, too, in his own way. - - “But I shall not come to Whitewater Farms again. - - “In spite of kindness, I am not wanted. Finally, I have come to - understand that. - - “I am not really welcome; I am pleasantly endured. My people have - nothing in common with me. It always has been so. I seem to have been - born an outsider. I still am. They can’t help it; nor can I. There - seems to be no bond, no tie, no natural obligation of blood, none of - custom, to hold me here.... It is a lonely feeling. But it has been - mine from earliest recollection. - - “Often I used to wonder why I had no intimate affection for this - house, for the place--trees, hills, woods. - - “I love them--but as one who passes that way often, and becomes fond - of a neighbour’s house and trees. - - “Never have they, in any intimate sense, been mine, or part of me.... - Not even my old dresses, my few books, my fewer child’s toys, have I - ever truly considered mine--lacking, perhaps, the love that should - have been the gift,--the spirit, Barry--which left me only with the - substance--a lonely, lonely child. - - “Gradually I have come to realise that, before I came back, harmony - reigned at Whitewater Farms. Now, there is the slightest note of - discord. I am conscious of it. I know the others are. I understand, - now, it was inevitable.... I am Eris, daughter of Discord.... But - for you, Eris and Eros are merged and one. I strike out the i!... - Forever, Barry. I and i melt into U and you! My eyes, too. Darling! - Did you ever suspect such silly wit in me? - - “Your attorney writes to me occasionally. He assures me he is - speeding the annulment. To me, that brief phase was vaguer than a - dream of which one remembers only an indefinable discomfort. - - “When it is brushed away forever I shall marry you. If children come - I can’t go on acting--or only between times. Not even then, because I - shan’t leave them or you;--or you, Barry--chiefly you.... I shall be - a good wife and a good mother.... And you shall provide our fame. - - “And I shall turn lazy, and repose in the shadow of your greatness. - - * * * * * - - “When our time has come I should like a small house in the country. - Would you? A garden? Hills--breezy in spring--and a little brook in - the woods--and a cow or two--for the children’s sake. Do you mind, - darling? - - “When I was a young girl I was inclined toward verse. Here is one - effusion: - - ‘This is my Prophet’s Paradise to come:-- - Long grass a-tremble by a little brook, - A hillside where brown bees contented hum, - And I alone there with God’s Wonder-book - Wherein I read and ponder, read and pray, - Learning a truer Truth from day to day.’ - - “Be merciful to a school-girl’s rhymes. I’ve still a book full to - show you, dear. - - “And now, back to earth: I begin work in a little while, as you - know.... And I am very fain to have you take me in your arms, Barry. - And so shall soon come to you, being inclined that way--yours--yours - no less truly now than when the law permits--always your - property--your refuge, God willing--your roof, your shelter, your - retreat, to hold by right, to enjoy in peace--the girl you found - shabby and asleep, and have awakened, clothed in light. - - “Gratitude undying; loyalty to you; love. - - “Eris.” - - - - -CHAPTER XXXIV - - -That mental jumping-off place, popularly known as “the psychological -moment,” is usually hatched out of the dust-pan of Destiny. -Materialistic sweepings. And, sometimes spontaneous combustion follows. - -Old Lady Destiny, house-cleaning, swept together, from various -directions, elements which, uncombined, would not have set the dust-bin -afire. - -Apropos of Annan and his stories, Coltfoot had made this objection, -saying that the literary explosion never seemed to be spontaneous, -and charging the author with secreting in the heap a firecracker of -commercial manufacture. - -Coltfoot, in the absence of Eris, began to frequent Annan. A rudderless -ship, a homeless pup, a gasless flivver--these similes haunted him -whenever he beheld the quenched features of Barry Annan. - -Annan had been candid with him. It was love, he admitted, that knocked -every other ambition out of him. - -And, at first, Coltfoot thought so, although in his case with Rosalind, -love was proving a stimulus to effort amazing, resembling inspiration. - -But gradually a disturbing explanation for Annan’s idleness forced -itself upon Coltfoot. The boy’s motive power seemed to be suspended. - -Except for the personal pleasure Annan had taken in his mental -acrobatics, there never had been anything inspired in his work until he -began his latest novel--still merely blocked in. - -But this story had in it, carefully and skilfully laid, a deep-bedded -foundation of truth. And work on it began from the day that Eris had -promised to become his wife. - -Through all the upsetting excitement of the boy’s courtship, the -inception of the story had produced nothing material. - -In the glow of glorious certainty it had flowered under the girl’s -tender ministry. - -In her absence, now, all growth ceased. - -It was a disturbing explanation that seemed to force itself upon -Coltfoot,--that, in Annan, there was nothing creative except through -the vitality of this girl. Or that the living germ was in her; and -that Annan was merely the medium for transplantation--adequate soil -skilfully mixed for culture of seeds developed in the entity of Eris. - - * * * * * - -He said one day to Annan: “How far in any creative work Eris would -go if she had the chance, I couldn’t prophesy.... I saw some of the -continuity of that last Smull picture she made----” - -Annan looked up sharply. - -“--It is a noble piece of creative acting,” said Coltfoot in a -deliberate voice. - -After a silence Annan said: “She shall have every chance in the world.” - -“The trouble is, with such a girl, that she is likely to lend herself -to her husband’s career.... And ignore her own.... There is in her a -breadth of generosity I have seen very seldom, Barry,--perhaps never -before.... And she is very much in love.” - -“Do you suppose I’d accept any such sacrifice, Mike?” demanded Annan -impatiently. - -“You may have no option. She is a curious girl. Enormously capable. -Perfectly normal. Intensely human.... She is the balanced type which -civilisation is supposed to breed. And seldom does. That is why the -ordinary becomes extraordinary; why symmetry is such a rarity.... -We’re a twisted lot, Barry. We never notice it until we see somebody -who not only was born straight, but who has continued to grow that way.” - - * * * * * - -The elements of ignition began to collect in Destiny’s dust-pan toward -the end of the month. - -Camille Armand, Gowns, 57th Street, sent Betsy Blythe an estimate for -her personal adornment in the proposed production of a super-picture to -be called _The Devil’s Own_. - -Betsy sent the outrageous estimate to Frank Donnell. - -Donnell sent it to Albert Smull. - -His partner, Leopold Shill, got hold of it and objected with both hands. - -Smull telephoned to Donnell that he’d drop in and discuss cuts in the -morning. - -A minor accident detained Donnell’s suburban train. - -Smull arrived at Donnell’s office and sat down at Donnell’s desk to -wait. - -Donnell’s secretary opened the director’s morning mail and laid it on -his desk under the ruddy nose of Albert Smull. On top was a telegram to -Donnell from Eris, dated from Whitewater, N. Y. Smull read it: - - “Arrive Saturday evening, Jane Street. Would love to see you before I - begin work. Do call me up after Monday. Best wishes always. - - “Eris.” - -Smull was standing by one of the windows looking out on Broadway when -Donnell arrived. - -They discussed the estimate Betsy had submitted, came to an economic -conclusion, parted. - -Smull went down-town. But he could not keep his mind on business. He -had a row with Shill, was brutal to a stenographer, made enemies of one -or two customers, bullied his personal office force, and finally put on -his hat and light overcoat and departed, leaving everything in a mess. - -At the Patroon’s Club that afternoon he saw Annan passing, and saluted -him; and was ignored. - -This didn’t suit him. He turned back, and, coming up alongside of Annan: - -“What’s the matter?” he asked; “anything wrong, Annan?” - -“Yes, _you_ are,” said the boy. - -Smull was still smiling his near-eyed smile, but his sanguine features -reddened more heavily. - -They had walked as far as the Strangers’ Room. There was nobody there, -not even a servant. - -“What’s all this about?” demanded Smull. “I don’t get you, Annan----” - -“You don’t get anybody. That’s why your activities are ridiculous and -you obnoxious.” - -Smull’s grin became mechanical: “Are you trying to quarrel with me over -a skirt who has made monkeys out of both of us----” - -Annan hit him hard. He lost his balance, stumbled backward and landed -on a leather sofa, seated. His left eye was already puffing up. He -seemed too astonished to stir. - -Annan went over to the door, locked it, leaving the key there. Then he -came back and waited for Smull to get up, which he did after a moment, -and began to remove his coat and waistcoat. - -“We’ll both be expelled,” he said coolly, “but it’s worth it to me----” - -A heavy automatic pistol fell from an inside coat pocket to the carpet. - -“That’s what I ought to use on you,” he remarked; but he picked it up -and dropped it into the side pocket of his coat. - -Then he turned and was on Annan like a panther. Both fell, smashing a -chair; both were on their feet the next second. But Smull’s bolt was -sped. His face was congested; he was panting already. He had lived too -well. - -Annan walked toward him, perfectly aware that he could hit him when and -where he chose. - -But after he had selected the spot he couldn’t do it. In fact, there -was nothing further to do or say. - -He looked into the crimson, disfigured visage, at the two red and -swollen fists awaiting attack. - -Then, dropping his hands into his pockets, he turned on his heel, -walked slowly to the door, let himself out, closed the door quietly -behind him. - - * * * * * - -Smull emerged a little later, stepped into the elevator, and went up to -the club barber. - -“Charlie,” he said, “I got bunged playing squash. Kindly apply the -sinking fund process to my left eye.” - -After an hour’s treatment: “I guess that’s the best I can do, Mr. -Smull,” concluded the barber. - -Smull inspected himself in the glass: “Hell,” he said, “--and I’ve got -a date.” - -However, he dined early at the club. He maintained sleeping quarters -there. Dinner was served in his room. He had a quart of Burgundy to -wash down the entrée, and one or two more serious highballs for the -remainder of the repast. He was a fastidious feeder, but always a large -one. It was that, principally, which played the devil with him. A skin -saturated with alcohol completed the muscular atrophy of what had been -a magnificent, natural strength in college. - -But that was long ago: his sensations had been his gods too long. -They had done for him--worse still, they had nearly done _with_ him. -What remained, principally, was a shameless persistence. Only the man -himself knew the tragedy of it. But such men are doomed to go on. - -That is their hell. - - * * * * * - -From the club Smull called up his limousine. - -When the doorman announced it, Smull threw aside the evening paper, -took a look at his damaged eye in a mirror, put on hat and overcoat, -and went out to where his car stood. - -“You know where,” he said to his chauffeur, “--and stop somewhere for -the evening papers.” - -A newsboy on 42d Street supplied the papers. Smull continued to read -all the way to Jane Street. But when his car drew up along the east -curb of Greenwich Avenue, he laid aside the papers and settled back to -watch. - -Through the early October dusk, illuminated shop windows and street -arc-lights shed conflicting rays and shadows over passers-by. - -Smull’s vision, too, was impaired, and he squinted intently at every -taxi, watching for one that would turn into Jane Street. - -He could see the front of the house where Eris lived. He could see, -also, that her windows were unlighted. It was evident that she had not -yet arrived. - -He hadn’t the least idea what time she would appear. She had said -nothing about that in her telegram to Frank Donnell. Her telegram said -“Saturday evening,” nothing more precise. There was nothing for him to -do except to wait. - - * * * * * - -And now the Old Lady, scraping away vigorously at the four points of -the compass, dislodged a bit of rubbish and swept it into her dust-pan -with all the rest. - -The fragment in question came drifting through Greenwich Avenue in -the October night, half revealed in the glow of some humble shop -window, lost in the shadow beyond, dimly visible along the dark fringe -of an arc-light, fading to a shade again,--a spectre now, and now a -ghost-white face adrift in the night. - -At the corner of Jane Street the shape stood revealed,--a shabby man, -deathly pale, who stood as though he had nowhere else to go--stood with -lowered head as though preoccupied, picking nervously at the raw skin -around his finger-nails. - -Chance and the Dust Pan dumped him there,--the chance that his wife had -returned to Jane Street. He had no knowledge of her coming; did not -know where she had been or when she would return. All he knew was that -there never were any lights in her windows any more. He had written to -her, but she had not replied. And he needed money. - - * * * * * - -Smull’s chauffeur, reposing resignedly at the wheel, straightened up -abruptly, then left his seat and came around to the open window of the -car. - -“That bum is over there on the corner again, Mr. Smull,” he said. - -“Where?” - -“He’s in the shadow of that doorway--just south of the corner, sir.” - -“All right,” nodded Smull. - -He could now just distinguish a shape there. For some time he watched -it, speculating on the affair and still puzzled. For how the girl who -had so contemptuously repulsed him could ever have married the derelict -across the street, Smull was unable to conjecture. - -More perplexing to him still were her relations with Annan. He did not -wish to believe they were meretricious. In the muddy depths of him he -didn’t believe that. But he would not have hesitated to accuse her. - -Anyway, it didn’t matter. Annan didn’t matter, nor did the bum across -the way; nor did the girl’s intrigues, chaste or otherwise, matter to -this man. - -He was after his quarry. Perhaps in the muddy depths of him he knew -the chase was hopeless. Perhaps he was doomed to hunt anyway--never to -rest, never to quit the trail over which he had sped so eagerly, so -long ago, after his first quarry. - - * * * * * - -He had smoked four large cigars and was lighting a fifth. It was ten -o’clock. No taxi had turned into Jane Street. - -The windows of the house he watched remained unlighted. And, across the -street, the shadowy shape had not stirred. Undoubtedly the fellow had -recognised Smull’s car. Which concerned Smull not a whit. - -However, he was growing restless. He had over-smoked, too. - -Now he flung away the cigar just lighted, opened the limousine door and -got out. - -To his chauffeur he said: “That’s all. Call up at eight-thirty -to-morrow morning.” - -“That bum is still over there, sir----” - -“All right, Harvey. Go back to the garage.... And I’ll want the coupé -to-morrow.” - -“Very good, sir.” - -Smull watched the car glide away down Greenwich Avenue, turn east, -disappear. - -Then he walked across to Jane Street and as far as the house he was -watching, and gazed up at her darkened windows. - -For half an hour or so he sauntered back and forth between her house -and the corner. The night had grown warmer and he loosened his light -grey overcoat and threw it back. - -Now and then he noticed that the shadowy shape of Carter had not -stirred. That did not concern him for a while. - -But, as the hour wore on, irritation increased and his nerves became -more susceptible to annoyance. - -And once, although his contempt for Carter remained supreme, he ran his -right hand over the coat pocket where the pistol sagged,--a movement -involuntary and quite unconscious. - -A little before eleven a taxi-cab suddenly turned out of Greenwich -Avenue and halted before the house in which Eris dwelt. - -Smull was prowling some distance to the westward on the opposite -side of the street; and the sudden appearance of the cab caught him -unprepared. - -He started back instantly; but even before he arrived opposite the -house she had entered it, carrying her suitcase. - -Her taxi-cab, however, remained waiting. - -Smull gazed up at her windows. Suddenly a light broke out behind the -lowered shades. - -He looked across at the waiting taxi. He was going to have another -chance. - -When the light went out behind the yellow shades it would be time -enough to cross the street. He thought so. Meanwhile, he would wait. -He’d take his time. What’s time to a gentleman? - - * * * * * - -Eris had lighted the apartment, had taken one swiftly comprehensive -glance at the dusty solitude about her, then she hurried to the -telephone and gave Annan’s number. And heard his voice, presently: - -“Who is it?” - -“_Darling!_” - -“Eris! Why on earth did you wire me and neglect to tell me what train -to meet?” - -“Because I didn’t know, dearest. Sometimes the Central waits for the -local and sometimes it doesn’t. I didn’t want you to spend the evening -hanging around the Grand Central----” - -“You blessed child, I’ve done it. I’ve met every train. They told me -there were no more from Whitewater. So I came home.” - -“_Darling!_ I’m fearfully sorry. They were quite right, too. The -Central did not wait for the local, so I took a taxi at the station and -drove thirty miles to catch an express----” - -“Where on earth are you?” - -“Home----” - -“I’m coming----” - -“No! It’s dusty and messy and horrid. May I come to Governor’s place? I -have a taxi--and I’m starved----” - -“Jump into that taxi instantly! I’ll find Xantippe and have something -for you in a few minutes. Will you come at once?” - -“I’m on the way, Barry.” - -She was on the way. But it was the feminine way. - -First of all she had a toilet to make, a complete change of clothing to -effect. No girl ever lived who would deny herself that much before she -braved her lover. - -She went to the windows to reassure herself that the shades were -properly lowered. Her taxi was both visible and audible below. She -noticed nothing else in the street except that it was beginning to rain. - -Probably she could not have recognised Smull, even if she had caught -sight of him on the opposite side of the way. - -There is an old brick building there, untenanted, its shabby façade -running westward toward the North River. - -Against it Smull stood in darkness. - -But already another person had discovered Smull; had recognised him; -and now was shuffling slowly along toward him. - -The last bit of rubbish in the Dust Pan. - -Smull, intent on the lighted windows above, did not notice The Rubbish -until it had drifted close to his elbow. Then he turned. It did not -suit Smull to have any altercation then or there. - -He said in a guarded voice: “Get out of here, you son of a slut!” - -“I want to talk to you,” said Carter, hoarsely. “I’ve got to have some -money----” - -Smull, infinitely annoyed, turned his back and walked westward, turning -up the collar of his light overcoat as the drizzle thickened from the -River. - -He walked a few paces, stood looking back over his left shoulder at -the windows where light shone behind the yellow shades. - -Presently he was aware of Carter close behind him. His instinct was to -kick him aside; but it was too near the house he was watching and he -wanted no outcry or scuffle. - -“What do you want, you dirty bum?” he demanded, fumbling in his pocket, -“--a dollar for a shell of coke?” - -“I want you to keep away from my wife,” said Carter in a ghost of a -voice. - -Smull turned on him savagely. Neither stirred. But it was too close to -her house: and Smull, deciding to end the matter quickly, turned once -more and walked toward the North River. - -When he concluded that he was far enough away in the obscurity he -halted, listening for the shuffle of feet. - -But Carter came very silently; he was at his elbow again before he -heard him. Then, for the first time, the stealthy movements of the man -seemed to convey a menace to Smull. - -As he confronted Carter he began to unbutton his overcoat, deliberately -at first, then more swiftly as he saw the expression in his enemy’s -eyes. - -White as a corpse, Carter said something to him he did not understand -as his hand closed on the pistol sagging in his coat pocket. - -Then he saw a pistol in Carter’s hand; felt a terrific blow in the -stomach that knocked him against the brick wall behind him. - -As he slid down to a sitting posture, all darkness seemed crashing down -around him. And through the rushing chaos he freed his pistol and fired -at a grey blur above him,--fired again as sight failed in his dying -eyes,--lay very still there in the rain.... - - * * * * * - -Eris, aglow from her shower bath, began to realise it was time to hurry. - -In her clothes press she rummaged feverishly, selecting the freshest -of last season’s dinner-gowns,--an orchid-mauve affair with touches of -violet and silver,--very charmingly calculated to enhance her chestnut -hair and slender, milk-white beauty. - -Now she really must hurry--for the mantel-clock had run down weeks ago -and her wrist-watch was broken, and she had that deliciously guilty -feeling which is entirely and constitutionally feminine--the sensation -of being awaited by love impatient and probably adorably out of temper. - -To see whether it still was raining she ran to the window. The street -seemed to be full of movement and noise--shrill voices, people running, -a throng in the rain surging, ebbing, scattering as an ambulance -clanged into the street from Greenwich Avenue. - -A second’s hesitation, then she lowered the shade, ran to her closet -for a cloak and umbrella, opened the outer door, switched off every -light, and hurried downstairs. - -On the steps she opened her umbrella and made her way through the -increasing crowd toward the taxi-cab. - -She had no morbid curiosity concerning such painful scenes, when -curiosity alone could afford no aid. She heard a ragged boy say -something about “a coupla guys dead acrost the street”--and shuddered -as she stepped into the taxi-cab. - -The driver turned around and opened the front window: - -“When I heard that first shot,” he said excitedly, “I tuk it f’r a -blow-out. Yes, ma’am. Then come two more shots an’ I gets wise an’ -ducks. I hear them two fellas are dead. Some gun-play. I’ll say so.... -Where to, lady?” - - - - -CHAPTER XXXV - - -Only in books does the story of an individual begin and end. - -But birth cannot begin that story; nor can death end it. - -Sequel and sequence, continued and continuous, serial interminable. - -At the autopsy enough coal-tar was discovered in the viscera of Mr. -Carter to account for the large orifice he blew in the abdomen of Mr. -Smull. - -The motive, too, seemed to be clear enough. Smull had been instrumental -in sending Carter to prison, where he had become an addict. - -Also, Mr. Shill exhibited letters in which Mr. Carter promised to “get” -Mr. Smull unless a satisfactory financial arrangement were made for his -personal maintenance. - -The name of Eris did not appear in the newspapers. - -There were black-edged cards tacked to the bulletin boards of several -fashionable clubs, announcing the decease of Albert Wesly Smull. -Nothing like that for Eddie Carter. - -Saint Berold’s Chapel indorsed Smull. The music was especially fine. -The Crook’s Quickstep for Carter; Broadway’s roar his requiem. - -However, what was left of Eddie, coal-tar and all, went to Evergreen -Valley Cemetery in an automobile hearse, chased by one trailer. - -A young girl got out of the trailer after the coffin was lowered, the -grave filled, and the mound deftly shaped. She laid a bunch of wild -blue asters and golden-rod on the mound. - -Then, after she had stood motionless for a minute, she got into the -trailer again, where a young man awaited her. - -Until their automobile was outside the cemetery neither of them spoke. - -Then: “I’ve been wondering,” said Annan, “what is your religion, -Eris,--what particular denomination.” - -“Oh,” she said, “I am quite happy in any church. Or, in synagogue or -mosque, I should feel no barrier between my mind and God’s.... Would -you?” - -He could not say. - - * * * * * - -Annulment proceedings, not yet begun, never, of course, were. - -The status of Eris, its solution and dissolution, had been effected by -another solution. Coal-tar. Chemistry had sundered the tie which, we -are instructed, God alone manufactures. - - * * * * * - -When they arrived at No. 3 Governor’s Place, Eris went into the -guest-room, where, centuries ago, she had lain abed under the roof of a -man whose name even she did not know. - -“I want to lie down before dinner, Barry. May I?” - -“Yes. Can Mrs. Sniffen do anything for you?” - -But the girl said no, and turned down the lace spread. So Annan lowered -the shades and went out to his study. - -At dinner Eris appeared very much herself, smiling, gaily inquisitive -concerning Annan’s conduct during her recent absence, tenderly diverted -to hear how intolerable he had found those few weeks without her. He -became emphatic in recollection of his solitary misery. - -“Darling, we should not feel that way, ever,” she insisted. “Absence -should be a stimulus to carry on. Otherwise----” she shrugged, stopped. -But he knew she had meant death. - -“All right,” he said, “but I want to tell you that in that event, I -follow. And that’s _that_!” - -He even borrowed her phrase to fix, irrevocably, their mutual -positions. But without that the girl already knew,--deep, deep within -her she had long known,--where the spring of their vital strength had -its occult source. And more absolutely, more perfectly the knowledge -made this man hers. - -Truly there was nothing else in the world for her; no other rival she -ever could brook that claimed the mind and strength that she was giving -to this man--and must always give as long as mind and strength endured. - -There still remained for the career of Eris an autumn, a winter, and a -spring in California. - -Work was to begin very soon. This knowledge sobered their leave-taking -that night. - -It tinged all their meetings and leave-takings, a little, during that -otherwise perfect week in town. - - * * * * * - -She wore his betrothal ring when she went away. - -Annan stood the separation for a month, then went after her. - -During the winter Annan went three times to the Coast. Both, however, -thought it best that he should not remain. - - * * * * * - -Eris made three pictures. Two were the species known as feature -pictures; the third a super-picture. - -She was paid for her work five hundred dollars a week. She was offered -twice as much to sign for another year. Then twice as much again. - -To Annan she wrote: - -“I had to tell them that circumstances beyond my control might -interfere. I meant children, darling, but did not consider it necessary -to be more definite.” - - * * * * * - -As for Annan, excepting his brief journeys to the Coast, he passed a -miserable, apathetic, unreal winter. - -To Coltfoot it was painfully plain where was the true and only source -of the boy’s inspiration. - -Everything else now appeared to be only a sort of native ability -polished with usage to cleverness where technical fluency and -journalistic nimbleness in narrative did brilliant duty for the real -thing. - -For a few days, after being with Eris, enough of her in him lasted so -that he could get on with his novel. Then he needed her again. But he -realised his necessity only when he had gone on for a while without her. - -Dark days came for the boy; incredulity, alarm, chagrin, the struggle -renewed, doubt, helplessness, and the subconscious cry for her, never -written nor voiced, yet, somehow heard by her at the edge of the other -ocean. - -Always the occult appeal was answered; always she responded in a -passion of tenderness and abnegation--her promise that the days of -separation were drawing to their end, that soon she would come to him -forever. - -She came when May was ending. - - * * * * * - -He thought she seemed a trifle taller;--had never dreamed she was as -lovely a thing;--yet should have been prepared--for always she had been -a series of enchanting revelations. - -It transpired that she still had a few days left of her career--spots -to fill in with “Eastern stuff,” where the continuity called for it--a -location here, a set or two to be knocked together, nothing exacting. - -Then the professional career of Eris was to be “irised out.” - -“Never!” repeated Annan, holding her so that he could see deeply in -her grey eyes. And saw a tiny image there, reflected--the miniature of -himself. - -“Well,” she murmured, “that event is with God, darling. But I don’t -think there’s much doubt, because I love children.... And anyway----” - -She lifted her eyes to her lover, smiled, recognising her destiny. - -After dinner that evening, in his study, he sat at his desk with the -typed manuscript over which he had agonised all winter. - -Eris, perched on the arm of his chair, read it over his shoulder, page -after page. - -“It seems to be getting on, darling,” she ventured. - -“Well, I’ve got to talk it over with you. I _want_ it to be the real -thing.” - -“You’ll make it so.” - -He looked up at her. In his eyes there was a sort of tragic curiosity. -Her heart seemed to stand still for an instant. - -Suddenly he smiled, bent and touched his lips to her betrothal ring. - -“‘_Things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme_,’” he murmured. “And these -things are in _you_.” - -She bent her head close to his: “What do you mean by ‘_things -unattempted_’?” - -“Milton’s line, Eris, not mine.... ‘_Things unattempted._’... And -latent in you.... Not within _me_ ... unless you give them.” - -Her grey eyes said: “If they truly are in me you have only to take.” -Her lips tenderly denied such possession, attributing all origin to him. - -The boy said: “God knows where it comes from; but it is in me only when -you are near.” - -She rested her cool cheek against his. Her career was paid for. - -“One thing,” he said with an embarrassed grin, “is likely to annoy you. -But I’ve got to show it to you. You haven’t seen to-day’s papers, have -you?” - -“No.... Oh, _Barry_!----” - -“You bet, sweetheart. It’s the announcement of our engagement.” - -“Darling! How wonderful! And what do you mean by my being annoyed? I -authorised you to announce it any time in May it suited you.” - -“That’s it,” he admitted. “_I_ was to send the announcement to the -papers. But I didn’t know how such things were done so I was ass -enough to go to my Aunt about it.” - -Eris flushed. “Was Mrs. Grandcourt annoyed?” - -“I’ll tell you what happened. I knew she had just arrived from Bermuda, -and I went yesterday afternoon. Well--my aunt is my aunt. We don’t get -on. - -“We went through our semi-yearly financial pow-wow. That’s all fixed -for the next six months. - -“Then she gave me an opening by asking, suspiciously, whether I knew -where you were.... Did you know she once warned me to keep away from -you?” - -The colour in Eris’ face deepened: “No, I didn’t know that.” - -“The reason,” he said airily, “was because she liked and respected you, -and considered me a philanderer----” - -“Barry!” - -“I _was_.” - -There ensued a painful pause. Then their eyes met; and he reddened and -said in a low voice: - -“I haven’t anything to ask your pardon for--even mentally.” - -They both were trembling a little when they kissed. - -“--About my aunt,” he resumed, the faint grin again apparent; “when she -mentioned you I said, ‘Oh, by the way, I’m marrying Eris in June. I -meant to mention it----’ - -“Dearest, the extraordinary face my aunt made at me stopped me. - -“I think she was too astounded to understand whether she was pleased -or not. You see she had got me all wrong, dear. I wasn’t the sort she -believed. - -“One thing was rather extraordinary. Did you suppose my aunt could -swear? Well, she can. She swore at me for ten minutes, threatening -dire things if I philandered with the granddaughter of Jeanne -d’Espremont----” - -“Barry!” - -“Well, she did. And when finally it filtered through her skull that I -was semi-decent, she became very much excited.... You’ve got to have a -very grand church wedding, Eris. Do you mind?” - -“Darling! I’d adore it!” - -“Well, for heaven’s sake--Well, I’m glad you feel that way. Men usually -don’t, you know.... But it’s all right----” - -“Oh, Barry!” she said in ecstasy, clasping her white hands as -unconscious of dramatic effect as when she pleaded with Mr. Quiss on -Whitewater Brook. - -He said: “My aunt’s a snob. Here’s the announcement she sent out -yesterday afternoon----” - -He opened a drawer, took out a dozen clippings. They read them together: - - “Mrs. Magnelius Grandcourt announces the engagement of Eris Odell, - granddaughter of the late Comtesse Jeanne d’Espremont, of Bayou - d’Espremont, Louisiana, to Barry Annan, only son of the late Mr. and - Mrs. Grandcourt Annan, of New York. - - “Miss Odell is the descendant of one of the oldest Royalist families - of France,--her great grandfather coming to this country as a refugee - during the Terror of ’93. Miss Odell’s grandmother, Comtesse Jeanne - d’Espremont, and Mrs. Magnelius Grandcourt shared the same room at - boarding school in Exmouth, Virginia. - - “Miss Odell, who early in childhood evinced unusual artistic - proclivities, had chosen the silent drama as a medium for - self-expression, and is charmingly known to the artistically - fastidious section of the nation’s public. - - “But after the wedding, which will occur in June, Miss Odell has - decided to retire from a career which promises such brilliant - fulfilment. - - “Mr. Annan served his country in the Great War as Liaison Officer and - was decorated for gallantry in action. - - “He is an author of repute and promise.” - -After a silence: “_That’s_ her work, Eris. I told you she’s a snob.” - -The girl looked at him with a troubled smile: “It’s rather too late to -do anything except live up to what she says of us--isn’t it, Barry?” - -“You wonderful girl, you’ve already lived way beyond anything that -anybody says of you.” - -Her arms went around his neck, tightened: - -“_Darling!_... But we must make good.... You know it.” - -He knew it. He knew that she already had. He rested his head on her -breast like a tired boy. - -It was up to him. - - -THE END - - - - -TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES: - - - Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_. - - Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. - - Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized. - - Archaic or alternate spelling has been retained from the original. - -*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ERIS *** - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the -United States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part -of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm -concept and trademark. 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