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diff --git a/old/68390-0.txt b/old/68390-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 7395a1a..0000000 --- a/old/68390-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,10399 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg eBook of Down among men, by Will Levington -Comfort - -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: Down among men - -Author: Will Levington Comfort - -Release Date: June 23, 2022 [eBook #68390] - -Language: English - -Produced by: D A Alexander and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team - at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images - generously made available by University of California - libraries) - -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DOWN AMONG MEN *** - - - - - - _Down Among Men_ - - BY - - WILL LEVINGTON COMFORT - - AUTHOR OF “ROUTLEDGE RIDES ALONE,” - “FATE KNOCKS AT THE DOOR,” ETC. - - - NEW YORK - GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY - - - - - COPYRIGHT, 1913 - BY GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY - - - - -TO THE MEN OF THE UPPER ROOM - - -... AND THIS IS THE STORY I TOLD YOU THROUGH THE SEVERAL NIGHTS: -OF THE MAN WHO CAME UP THROUGH THE DARK AND THE FIGHTING (OFTEN IN -SUCH A RUCK OF FIGHTING THAT HE COULDN’T HEAR VOICES); HOW HE WAS -PUNISHED BY MEN, BROKEN BY SELF, AND HEALED BY A WOMAN; INDEED, BUT -FOR HER, HE MIGHT HAVE CHOSEN THE LONG WAY OF THE BRUTE TO PUT ON HIS -POWERS AND ATTAIN THE CERTAIN ROYALTY OF THE HUMAN ADULT IN THIS YEAR -OF OUR LORD. SHE PAID THE PRICE; SHE WAS THE MAN-MAKER; SHE SAW THE -WORLD-MAN SHINING AHEAD.... IT IS A STORY OF THE PATH AT OUR FEET, OF -THE COMPASSIONATES WHO DRAW NEAR TO SPEAK, WHEN WE ARE BRAVE ENOUGH -TO LISTEN, OF THE WOMEN WHO WALK BESIDE US. A TALE OF THE ROAD AS WE -GO--MANY ARE AHEAD, MANY BEHIND--BUT WE DO NOT TRAVEL THIS STRETCH -AGAIN. - - --_W. L. C._ - - - - -KAO LIANG - - -_No one thought of kao liang._ - -_Morning did not mention it in his great story; even Duke Fallows did -not think of it._ - -_Kao liang, the millet of China. Inland seas of it are there, green -in the beginning of its flow, dull gold in its high tide._ - -_A ruffianly scouring grain. Rice is its little white sister. Millet -is the strength of the beast, the mash of the world’s poor. A hundred -millions of acres of Asia are in yield or waiting for kao liang to-day. -Remember the poor._ - -_In Manchuria kao liang grows strong and high. Its fox-tails brush -the brows of the tall Chinese of the north country. It brushed the caps -of the Russian soldiers one certain Fall._ - -_The Censurer came with the planting in that year. Kao liang was -like a soft green mould upon the hills and valleys when he came -to his battle-fields. He was watching for a browner harvest and a -ruddier planting. Fall plowing and red planting--for that, he came to -Liaoyang._ - -_His soldiers trampled it, devastated the young grain with their -formations, foraged their beasts upon it. Yet the millet grew, hardened -and covered the earth--for the poor must be served. Out of flood and -gale and burning, it waxed great, filling the hills and the hollows, -closing in on the city, climbing thinly to the Passes._ - -_Its protest to the invasion was mute as China’s, but it did not -run. Before the Japanese, it closed in. It was ripe when the brown -flanker crossed the Taitse. It was ripe when two Slav chiefs took -their thousands forth to form the anvil upon which the flanker was -to be broken. The Cossacks had been feeding their beasts upon it for -many days, and they drank in the deep hollows where the roots of -kao liang held the rain. It was ripe for the world’s poor, when the -Sentimentalist strode forth at last--the hammer that was to break the -spine of the flanker._ - - - - -CONTENTS - - - BOOK ONE - PAGE - AFIELD 1 - - BOOK TWO - THE HILL-CABIN 115 - - BOOK THREE - THE BARE-HEADED MAN 239 - - - - -BOOK I. - -AFIELD - - - 1 - -THE town of Rosario was ahead. The cavalry expected to sup -and sleep there. Chance of firing presently from the natives was -pure routine. John Morning, back in the second troop, on the horse -of a missing soldier, wondered if years of service and exploration -would make him ever as great a correspondent as Mr. Reever Kennard -looked. The wide, sloping shoulders of the Personage were to be seen -occasionally when the trail crooked, far forward and near the General. - -The bit of fighting was over before the rear troopers got rightly into -the skirmish-line (every fourth trooper holding four horses); and -now the men breathed and smoked cigarettes in one more Luzon town; -and another _Alcalde’s_ house was turned into headquarters.... -This was a brigade expedition of December, 1899. Two weeks before the -General had ridden out of Manila. Various pieces of infantry had been -left to garrison the many towns which would not stay held without pins. -Two or three days more, then Batangas, and the big ride was over, the -lower Luzon incision complete, and drainage established. - -Morning, with the troopers, had to look to his mount in regulation -fashion, and did not reach Headquarters until after the others. The -_Alcalde’s_ house in Rosario as usual stood large among the -straw-thatched bamboo huts. The little upper room which Morning had -come to expect through the courtesy of the staff, was easily found. -The saddle-bags and blanket-rolls of Mr. Kennard and his companion, -a civilian, named Calvert were already there, each in a corner. -Morning’s thought was that he would hear these men talk after supper. -In a third corner he placed his canteen, and shyly tucked away in the -shadow, the limp haversack. - -There was a small table in the room, of black wood worn shiny by the -hands of the house, as the black wood of the floors was worn shiny by -the bare feet of servants. Upon the table was a small sheath-knife, the -brass handle of which was inscribed _Mio Amigo_. - -It becomes necessary to explain that the human male is discriminating -about his loot, by the time he has been afield two weeks in a tropical -island, especially if he has camped in a fresh town every night. The -day’s march makes him value every pound that he can throw away, for -he has already been chafed by each essential button and buckle. A tin -pail of silver pesos unearthed in a church had passed from hand to -hand among the soldiers. As the stress of the days increased (and the -artificial sense of values narrowed to the fundamentals such as food -and tobacco and sleep), Morning had observed with curious approval that -the silver hoard leaked out of the command entirely--to return to the -natives for further offerings to the priests. - -So the knife on the table aroused no desire. It was not even a good -knife, but _Mio Amigo_ took his eye, as if affording a bit of -insight to the native mind. It could not have been wanted by Mr. -Kennard or Mr. Calvert, since it lay upon the table. Morning put it -in his coat, knowing he would toss it away before to-morrow’s sun -was high. In his hot moist hand the brass-handle sent up a smell of -verdigris. A little later in the village road, he encountered Mr. -Reever Kennard in the act of purchasing ancient canned stuff from a -native-woman, too lame to run before the cavalry. Morning was not -natural in the Presence. - -The great man was broad and round and thick. He criticised generals -afield, and in Washington when times were dry. He had dined with the -President and signed the interview. His head dropped forward slightly, -his chin sunk in its own cushions. He bought the native wares with the -air of a man who is keeping a city in suspense, and the city deserves -it. Morning stood by and did not speak. There was no reason for him to -stay; he did not expect companionship; he had nothing to say; no money -with which to buy food--and yet, having established himself there, he -could not withdraw without remark of some kind. At least he felt this; -also he felt cruelly the cub. He was at home in this service with -packers and enlisted men, but always as now, officers, and others of -his own work, made him feel the upstart. - -Mr. Kennard now turned to perceive him, his eyes opening in the “Bless -me--what sort is this?” manner of the straying Englishman; and John -Morning, quite in a funk, fell to enforcing an absurd interest in the -native sheath-knife. Kennard was not drawn to such a slight affair, -but perceiving the menial in Morning, allowed him to carry some of his -purchases back to Headquarters. - -Supper was a serious matter to the boy. He had no money nor provisions. -In the usual case, money would have been no good--but there were a few -things left in the shop of the lame woman. The field ration was light; -and while he would not go hungry if the staff-officers knew, it was a -delicate matter to make known his grubless state. Morning rambled over -the town, after helping Mr. Kennard to quarters, and returned empty to -the upper room. Mr. Calvert was there and appeared to see Morning for -the first time. Calvert was a slender quiet chap, and believed in what -he had to say. - -“Where did you get that little sheath-knife you showed Mr. Kennard?” he -asked abruptly. - -Morning sickened before the man’s eyes. His life had been fought out in -dark, rough places. He was as near twenty as twenty-five. He had the -way of the under-dog, who does not expect to be believed, looking for -the worst of it, whether guilty or not. He told Calvert he had found -the knife on this table. - -“I thought I put it in my saddle-bags,” Calvert said. - -“You are very welcome to it. The _Mio Amigo_ made me look at it -twice----” - -“That’s why I wanted it. Take this for your trouble.” - -Calvert placed a bit of paper money on the table between them. - -“It was no trouble. I don’t want the money.” - -“Take it along. Don’t think of it again.” - -Morning didn’t want to appear stubborn. This was the peculiarity of the -episode. The thought of taking the money repelled him. The connection -of the money with supper occurred, but not with the strength of his -dislike to appear perverse or bad-tempered.... He saw all clearly after -he had accepted the paper, but the matter was then closed. He was very -miserable. He had proved his inferiority. The little brush with big men -had been too much for him. He belonged among the enlisted.... - -He went to the lame woman and bought a bottle of pimientos and a live -chicken. The latter he traded for a can of bacon with a soldier. - - - 2 - -IMPERIAL HOTEL, Tokyo, early in March, 1904.... The Japanese -war office had finally decided to permit six American correspondents -to accompany each army. The Americans heard the news with gravity. -There were two men for every place. Only three Japanese armies were -in conception at this time. The first six Americans were easily -chosen--names of men that allowed no doubt; and this initial group, -beside being the first to take the field, was elected to act as a -committee to appoint the second and third sets of six--twelve places -and thirty waiting. The work at hand was delicate. - -The committee was in session in the room of Mr. Reever Kennard. Five of -the second list had been settled upon when the name of John Morning (of -the Open Market) was brought up. It was Duke Fallows of San Francisco, -who spoke: - -“I don’t know John Morning, but I know his stuff. It’s big stuff; -he’s the big man. We’ve gone too far without him already. He has more -right to be on the committee than I. He was here before I was. He has -minded his own business and taken quarters apart. I had no intention of -breaking into the picture this way, but the fact is, I expected John -Morning to go in first on the second list. Now that there is only one -place left, there really can’t be any doubt about the name.” - -Mr. Reever Kennard of the _World-News_ now arose and waited for -silence. He got it. The weight of Mr. Reever Kennard was felt in this -room. Everything in it had weight--saddle and leggings of pigskin, -gauntlets, typewriters, cameras, the broadside of riding-breeches, -and a little arsenal of modern inventions which only stop firing upon -formal request. Without his hat, Mr. Reever Kennard was different, -however. Much weight that you granted under the big hat, had left that -arid country for the crowded arteries of neck and jowl and jaw, or, -indeed, for the belted cosmic center itself. He said: - -“Mr. Fallows talks wide. This Morning is out on a shoe-string; and -while he may have a bit of force to handle certain kinds of action, -it isn’t altogether luck--his not getting a good berth. The young -man hasn’t made good at home. He hasn’t the money backing to stand -his share of the expense. The War Office suggests that each party of -correspondents employ a sutler----” - -Fallows was still standing and broke in: - -“I’m interested in that matter of making good at home. I’ve seen the -work of most Americans here, and I believe John Morning to be the best -war-writer sent out from the States. As for the shoe-string, I’ll -furnish his tooth-brush and dinnercoat--if the sutler insists----” - -“We understand very clearly the enthusiasm of Mr. Fallows who wants a -second column-man for his paper. Doubtless this Morning is open----” - -“I hadn’t thought of it, but certainly the _Western States_ would -profit, if John Morning turned part of his product there. How about -your _World-News_ on that?” - -“I favor Mr. Borden for the sixth place in second column,” Kennard said -simply. - -“Borden reached Tokyo three weeks after Morning--and never campaigned -before.” - -“He’s one of the best of the younger men in New York--a Washington -correspondent of big influence----” - -“I have no objection to him, except as one to take the place that -belongs to John Morning. I can’t see him there.” - -Kennard looked about him. Morning was not well known, having been -little seen at the _Imperial_ in the last six weeks. Fallows had -not helped him by saying he was the best war-writer sent out from the -States; still in a general way he could not be put aside. Kennard saw -this. - -“I wasn’t going to hurt Morning badly, if I could help it,” he said, -“but Mr. Fallows has rather forced it. This Morning isn’t straight. We -caught him stealing a sheath-knife from the saddle-bags of Archibald -Calvert down in Luzon four or five years ago. Morning said he found it -on a table in the room assigned to us. He took money from Calvert for -restoring the knife.” - -Fallows laughed at this. - -“I can’t believe the story,” he said. “The man who did the stuff I’ve -read, isn’t stealing sheath-knives from another’s saddle-bags.... Oh, I -don’t mean that it didn’t seem true to you, Kennard----” - -Kennard had waited for the last, and was not good to look at until it -came. He turned quickly to the others. Borden was chosen. - -“You’ve still got a place to fill in the first list,” said Fallows. - -The committee was now excited. The five faces turned to the Westerner. - -“I repeat, Kennard, that your remarks may be within the letter of -truth, but I wouldn’t campaign in the same army with a man who’d -bring up a thing like that against a boy--and five years afterward. -Understand, I have never spoken a word to John Morning----” - -“You’re not giving up your place?” said the committee. - -“Exactly.” - -“Then you’ll take Borden’s with the second----?” - -“I have nothing against Borden. I wouldn’t spoil the chance of a man -already chosen.” - -“Then first with the third army,” urged the committee. - -“I can do better than that,” said Fallows. “Gentlemen, I thank you, and -beg to withdraw.” - - - 3 - -JOHN MORNING waved back the rickshaw coolie at the door of the -little Japanese Inn, where he had been having his own way for several -weeks, and walked down the Shiba road toward the _Imperial_ hotel. -He had half-expected to get on the committee, which meant work with the -first army and a quick start; failing in that, he looked for his name -to be called early in the second list, and was on the way now to find -out. Morning shared the passion of the entire company to get afield at -any cost. - -Reasoning, however, did not lift his restlessness and apprehension. -He had not been on the spot. He had been unable to afford life at the -_Imperial_; and yet, the costliness of it was not altogether vain, -since the old hotel had become a center of the world in the matter -of war-correspondence. Japan reckoned with it as the point of foreign -civilian force. While his brain could not organize a condition that -would spoil his chance, Morning’s more unerring inner sense warned him -that he was not established, as he walked in the rain. - -His name was not posted in any of the three groups. The card blurred -after his first devouring glance, so that he had to read again and a -third time. For a moment he was out of hand--seething, eruptive. Yet -there was nothing to fight.... - -Corydon Tait, a young Englishman with whom he had often talked and -laughed, was standing by. Tait’s name was not down. Morning controlled -himself to speak courteously. - -The Englishman looked beyond him at the card. A chill settled upon -Morning’s self-destructive heat. This was new in his world. In the -momentary misunderstanding, he grasped Tait’s arm. - -“Really, old chap, I’d prefer you not to do that,” the other said, -drawing his arm away. “It must be plain that I don’t know you.” - -“I thought you were joking,” said Morning. - - - 4 - -BACK on Shiba Road in the beginning of dusk, he turned to the -native inn. The door slid open before his hand touched the latch; his -figure having been seen through the papered lattice. The proprietor -bowed to the matting and hissed with prolonged seriousness, hissed -in fact until the American had removed and exchanged his shoes for -sandals. The hand-maidens appeared and bowed laughingly. The old -kitchen drudge emerged from her chimney and ogled. The mother of the -house took the place beside her lord on the rostrum-of-the-pencils. -She did not hiss, but it was very clear that the matting under the -white man’s feet was far above her in worthiness. - -There was something of this formality with his every entrance. Morning -had felt silly during the first days as he passed through the hedge of -bent backs; the empty cringing and favor-groveling had seemed indecent. -But now (in the dusk of the house before the candles) a faint touch of -healing came from it. They had all served him. He had been fearfully -over-served. They had bothered his work through excessive service--so -many were the hands and so little to do. The women were really happy -to work for him. To-night, a queer gladness clung to their welcome. -He had fallen indeed to sense it. He was starving for reality, for -some holy thing. They had stripped him at the _Imperial_. In his -heart he was trying to make a reality now of this mockery of Japanese -self-extinction. - -The bath-boy, wet from steam, with only a loin-cloth about him, -followed Morning to his room. The American was not allowed to bathe -alone; would not have been allowed to undress himself, had he not -insisted upon the privilege. He sat in a tub, three walls of which -were wood and the fourth of iron. Against the outside of the latter, -burned a furious fire of charcoal. For the benefits of this bath, he -was begged to make no haste and to occupy his mind with matters of the -higher life. A moment or two before the water reached a boiling-point, -Morning was allowed to escape. Exceeding pressure of business was -occasionally accepted as precluding the chance of a bath for one day, -but to miss two days in succession, without proving that he had bathed -elsewhere, meant a loss of respect, and a start of household whispering. - -He was sick to get back to work, turned to it for restoration and -forgetfulness, as a man to a drug. Moreover, there was need, for he -was on space. Two or three papers in the Mid-west used what he could -write, though he had no holding contracts, and had left Chicago with -such haste to catch a steamer, that there had been no chance to make -an arrangement, whereby these papers might have used the same story -simultaneously. And then, there had been a delay of nearly a day -in Vancouver. This time in Chicago would have been enough for the -establishment of a central office and an agent on percentage, who -could have enlarged his market without limit, and cut down his work -to one letter a day. Instead, he did the same story now, from three -different angles. It had been this way before. With war in the air, -Morning was unable to breathe at home. Off he went, without a return -ticket--tourist cars and dingy second-class steamer passage--but with -a strange confidence in his power to write irresistibly. It was like a -mark--this faith of his in the ability to appeal. - -All his life he had lived second-class. To-night he wondered if it -would always be so; if there was not something in the face of John -Morning, something that others saw at once, which placed him instantly -among culls and seconds in the mysterious adjustments of the world. -They had made him feel so at the _Imperial_, before this episode. -Men who didn’t write ten lines a day were there on big incomes; and -others, little older than he, with only two or three fingers of his -ability, on a safe salary and flexible expense account. - -The day was brought back to him again and again. The cut of Corydon -Tait had crippled him. He felt it now crawling swiftly along the nerves -of his limbs until it reached his brain, and remaining there coldly -like undigested matter in a sick body. He felt his face queerly. There -was neither fat nor flabbiness upon it. He could feel the bone. His -fingers brushed his mouth, and a sort of burn came to him. It was the -finest thing about John Morning. There was a bit of poetry about it, -a touch of tenderness, finer than strength. Passion was in the mouth, -intensity without intentness, not a trace of the boarish, nor bovine. -It is true you often see the ruin of such a mouth in quiet places where -those of drugs and drinks are served; but you see as well the finished -picture upon the faces of those men lit with world’s service, who have -heard the voice of the human spirit, and are loved by the race, because -they have forgotten how to love themselves. - -Morning knew it only as his weakness. It was the symbol to-night of his -failure.... Those at the _Imperial_ had seen it; they had dared to -deny him because of it. The greatest among the war-men were thin-lipped -and sinewy-jawed--the soldier face.... He knew much about war; none had -campaigned more joyously than he. In the midst of peril, courage seemed -altogether obvious and easy; his fearlessness was too natural for him -to be surprised at it, though it surprised others.... - -The typewriter buzzed on. Wearily he caught up the trend, but the drive -was gone, although there was hardly a lull in the registering of the -keys for two-thirds of a page. Always before, this sort of hackwork had -been done with a dream of the field ahead. His forces fused. He had -been denied a column. His hand brushed across his face and John Morning -was ashamed--ashamed of his poverty, of his work, of his own nature, -which made a tragedy of the cut of Corydon Tait; ashamed of the heat in -his veins from the stimulants he had drunk; ashamed because he had not -instantly demanded his rights at the _Imperial_; ashamed of the -mess of a man he was, a fool of his volition and vitality, commonness -stamped on his every feature. - -Morning’s affinity for alcohol was peculiar. He worked with it -successfully. So resilient was his health that he was usually fresh in -the morning. Often he had finished a long evening of work on pretty -good terms with himself, the later pages of copy coming in a cloud of -speed.... The copy-producing seemed to use up the whipping spirit, -rather than himself; at least, he treasured this illusion. The first -bottles of rice-beer lasted the longest.... He recalled now that the -maid-servants had twice heated _sake_ for him at supper; as for -the rice-beer he had been more than ever thirsty to-night. He glanced -into the corner where the bottles were and a sense of uncleanness came -over him--as if his body were flowing with the slow spirit, like a -sea-marsh at high tide. - -... He heard the shafts of a rickshaw grate upon the gravel outside. -Amoya had come; it was midnight. He opened the papered lattice. The -runner was bowing by his cart, holding his broad hat with both hands. -Morning covered his machine, put fresh charcoal in the brazier, caught -up his hat and overcoat, and shuffled down the stairway, holding -his slippers on with his toes. The door-boy gave him his shoes and -opened the way to the street. Morning greeted Amoya with a pat on the -shoulder, and climbed into the cart. - -“Yoshuwara?” the runner asked. - -“No, you shameless ruffian!” - -“No?” Amoya squeaked pleasantly. - -“No--not--no must do.” - -Morning waved his arm, signifying solitary and peaceful enjoyment of -the night air and contemplation of the dark city. These night journeys -had become the cooling features of his day. Amoya was a living marvel, -the rickshaw runner incomparable--tireless, eager, very proud of his -work; too old to be spoiled. He was old; indeed, enough to be Morning’s -father, but his limbs were young, and his great trunk full of power -unabated. - -The night was dark, damp, no moon nor star. The cold which was almost -tempted thinly to crust the open drains, was welcome to the man’s -nostrils. Amoya warmed and gathered speed. Up the broad Shiba Road he -sped, past the far dim lights of the highway, past Shiba temple, the -tombs of the Ronins, past the cavalry barracks (by far the best joke on -Japan), and the last of the known land-marks. - -Now Morning suffered strange temptations. Few white men who have lived -any time in Japan have escaped. A Japanese house with every creature -comfort was within his resources even now; wholesome food, _sake_, -rice-beer were cheap; excellent service, even such service as Amoya’s -was laughably cheap. Why not sink into this life and quit the agony?... -Why did he think of it as _sinking_ into this life? Why did he -agonize anyway?... There was always a fresh sore on him somewhere. -Surely other men did not burn back and forth every day as he did. - -The shame came again. He ordered Amoya back within an hour, left him at -the door of the Inn, drenched with sweat and delighted with his extra -fare. - -Morning slid open the door of his room. Nothing could be seen but the -glow of the brazier, yet he knew some one was within.... A series of -mattresses and robes had been taken out from a chest of drawers and -made up on the matting. The women as usual, had waited for him to go -out. He lit the lamp. - -A little Japanese maid-servant was curled up asleep at the foot of -his bed. Morning sat down upon the cushion and mused curiously.... -It was thus that Naomi had ordered Ruth to steal into the couch at -the feet of Boaz. Ruth had found a home, and was not long allowed to -make herself glad with mere gleanings.... It was this sort of thing -that made Morning hate Japan. In the eyes of the old, limp-backed -Inn-keeper, this child was a woman. He would not have dared to delegate -a mere maid-servant to ply the ancient art with his guest, but there -were extenuations here: the delicacy and subtlety of the little one’s -falling asleep, and the child-like freshness of the offering. It was -this last that stung Morning, because he knew the old Japanese found a -commercial value in this very adolescence. - -He had smiled at this child during the day, and asked her -name--Moto-san--and repeated it after her, as one might have done the -name of a child. She had just come in from the fields, reported the -bath-boy who preëmpted any leakage of English whatsoever, and who was -frequently on the verge of being understood.... Her hands showed labor, -and she was not ashen as the Japanese beauties must be, but sweet and -fragrant--and so little. - -“It is the same the world over, when they come in from the fields,” -he said. “Good God, she ought to be sleeping with her dolls.... Poor -little bit of a girl in a man’s country ... and they sent you in here -to keep me from night-riding. One cannot complain of hospitality ... -Moto-san... Moto-san....” - -She stirred, and snuggled deeper. “She is truly asleep,” he thought. - -“Moto-san!” he said softly again. - -The girl opened her eyes, which suddenly filled with fright. Morning -patted her shoulder gently. And now she sat up staring at him, and -remembering. - -He leaned his head upon his palm and shut his eyes--sign of falling -asleep--then pointed her to the door.... Morning could not tell if -she were pleased. It all seemed very strange to her--her smile was -frightened. He repeated the gesture. She had slid off the bed to the -matting upon her knees, facing him. And now she bowed to the floor, and -backed out so, bowing with frightened smile.... He reflected dismally -that she had lost value for the eye of the Inn-keeper. - - - 5 - -MORNING’S idea as he reached the _Imperial_ next forenoon -was to call the committee together, or a working part of it, and to -demand why he had been barred from the projected columns.... The -high and ancient lobby was practically empty. It appeared that the -correspondents _de rigeur_ and _en masse_ were posing for a -photograph on the rear balcony, which was reached through the billiard -room. Morning went there and stood by the window while the picture -was taken. It required an hour or more. He was passed and re-passed. -Two or three Americans seemed on the point of asking him to take his -place with the fifty odd war-men, but they checked themselves before -speaking. Morning felt vilely marked. Stamina did not form within him. -He did not realize that something finer than physical courage was -challenged. - -He watched the backs of the formation--the squared shoulders, the -planted feet. He knew that in the minds of the posing company, -each was looking at his own. From each individual to his lesser -or greater circle, the finished picture would go. It would be -reproduced in the periodicals which sent these men--“_our special -correspondent_”--designated. Personal friends in each case would -choose their own from the crowd. The little laughing chap in brown -corduroys who arranged the group was the best and bravest man in field -photography. He left the camera now to his assistant, and took place -with the others. Men of twenty campaigns were there. The dim eyes of -a certain little old man had looked upon more of war than any other -living human being. In one brain or another, pictures were coiled from -every campaign around the world during the past forty years. Never -before in history had so many famous war-men gathered together. It -would be a famous picture.... He, John Morning, would hear it in the -future: - -“... Why weren’t you in that picture?” - -“I sat in the billiard room behind at a window. I had been barred out -of a place among the first three columns. I was under a cloud of some -kind.” - -No, that would not be his answer. Various lies occurred. - -This little mental activity completed itself without any volition. It -was finished now, like the picture outside--the materials scattering. -The idea of the truth merely appeared through a mental habit of looking -at two sides--a literary habit. It had brought no direct relation to -John Morning. But the lies had brought their direct relation. - -He could not remain at his place by the window, now that the fifty came -in for drink and play. He was afraid to demand what evil concerning him -was in the minds of men; afraid something would be uncovered that was -true. He felt the uncleanness of drink upon him, and a moral softening -from years of newspaper work, a training begun in glibness, which does -not recognize the rights of men, but obeys a City Desk. He could not -organize a contending force; and yet loathed the thought of return to -the Japanese Inn. He was not ready to face himself alone. - -It had never come to him so stirringly as now--the sense of -_something_ within, utterly weary of imprisonment and forced -companionship with the visible John Morning. His misery was a silent -unswerving shame. A feverish impulse almost controlled him to take -something either to lift him away, or permit him to sink in abandonment -from the area of pain. - -He stood near the desk in the lobby. Duke Fallows was coming. The -Californian’s legs, in their worn corduroys, were far too lean for the -big bony knees--a tall man of forty, with tired and sunken eyes and -sunken mouth. Fallows had a reputation. Its strongly drawing side-issue -was his general and encompassing, though fastidious, love of women. -Someone had whispered that even if a man has the heart of a volcano, -its outpouring must be spread rather thin in places to cover all women. -He was out for the _Western States_, not only to show war, but to -show it up. Certainly he loved the under-dog, which is an epigram for -stating that he was an anarchist. - -No anarchist could be gentler to meet, nor more terrible to read. -Fallows owned a formidable interest in the _Western States_; -otherwise he would have had to print himself. The rest of that San -Francisco property was just an excellent newspaper. Its effort was -to balance Duke Fallows; sometimes it seemed trying to extinguish -him in order to save itself. It brought sanity and common-sense and -the group-souled observation of affairs, to say nothing of news and -advertising--all to cool the occasional column of this sick man. To -a few, however, on the Pacific Coast, since his new assignment was -announced--the Russo-Japanese war and Duke Fallows meant the same -thing. The majority said: “Watch the _Western States_ boom in -circulation. They are sending Fallows to Asia.” - -The two stood together, Fallows looking down. Morning was broad in brow -and shoulder; slender otherwise and of medium height. - -“I’m Fallows.” - -“Yes.” - -The tall man’s eyes turned upward so that only the whites were visible. -He fingered his brow as if to pluck something forth through the bone. - -“Come on upstairs.” - -Morning followed the large, slow knees. It was less that the knees -wobbled--rather the frailty of the hangings and pinnings. They did -the three high flights and began again, finally drawing up in a broad -roof-room that smelled of new harness and overlooking an especially -hard-packed part of Tokyo, toward the Ginza. Fallows lit the fire that -was ready in the grate and sprawled wearily. - -“Where did you study religion, Morning?” - -“I didn’t.” - -“That’s one way to get it.” - -The sound of his own laugh came to Morning’s ears and hurt him. -Fallows’ eyes were shut. There was no trace of a smile around the wan -mouth. - -“You’ll likely be more religious before you’re done. I mean many things -by being religious--a man’s inability to lie to himself for one; a -passion for the man who’s down--that’s another.... I’ve read your -stuff. It’s full of religion----” - -Now it seemed to Morning as if he had just entered a fascinating -wilderness; apart from this, he saw something about the worn, -distressed mouth of Fallows that made him think of himself last night. -There was one more effect from this first brush. Something happened in -Morning’s mind with that sentence about the inability to lie to one’s -self. It was like a shot in the midst of a flock of quails. A pair of -birds was down, but the rest of the flock was off and away, like the -fragments of an explosive. - -“I read some of your stuff about the Filipino woman--‘woman of the -river-banks,’ you called her. Another time you looked into a nipa-shack -where an old man was dying of _beri-beri_, and an old woman sat at -bay at the door----” - -These brought back the pictures to Morning, and the dimension behind -the actual light and shade and matter. The healing, too, was that -someone had seen his work, and seen from it all that he saw,--the -artist’s true aliment, which praise of the many cannot furnish. It gave -him heart like an answer to prayer, because he had been very needful. - -“You must have come up hard. Did you, boy?” Fallows asked after a -moment. - -“Perhaps you would say so.” - -“Farm first?” - -“Yes----” - -“And a father who misunderstood?” - -“A good deal of the misunderstanding was my own bull-headedness, I see -now----” - -“And the mother, John Morning?” - -“I was too little----” - -“Ah----” - -Morning found himself saying eagerly a little later: - -“And then the city streets--selling newspapers, errands, sick all the -time, though I didn’t know it. Then I got to the horses.... I found -something in the stables good for me. I liked horses so well that it -hurt. I learned to sleep nights and eat regularly--but read so much -rot. Still, it was all right to be a stable-boy. A big race-horse -man took me on to ship with stock. I’ve been all over America by -freight with the racers--from track to track. I used to let the tramps -ride, but they were dangerous--especially the young ones. I had to -stay awake. An old tramp could come in anytime--and go to sleep--but -younger ones are bad. They beat you up for a few dimes. I was bad, -too, bad as hell.... And then I rode--there was money, but it went. I -got sick keeping light. The pounds over a hundred beat me out of the -game--except the jumps. I’ve ridden the jumpers in England, too--been -all broken up. In a fall you can’t always get clear.... All this was -before I was eighteen--it was my kind of education.” - -“I like it,” said Fallows. - -“One night in New York I heard a newspaper man talk.... It was in a -back-room bar on Sixth avenue. I see now he was a bit broken down. He -looked to me then all that was splendid and sophisticated. I wanted to -be like him----” - -Fallows bent forward, his face tender as a father’s. “You poor little -chap,” he said, as if he did not see Morning now, but the listening boy -in the back-room bar. - -“You see, I never really got the idea of having money--it went so -quickly. The idea of a big bundle didn’t get a chance to sink in. -I’ve had several hundred dollars at once from riding--but the next -day’s races, or the next, got it. What I’m trying to say is--winnings -didn’t seem to belong to me. Poverty was a habit. I always think yet -in nickels and dimes. I seem to belong--steerage. It wasn’t long after -I listened to that reporter, that I got a newspaper job, chasing -pictures. A year after that the wars began. I went out first on my -own hook; in fact, I think you’d call it that now. I seem to get into -a sort of mania to be off--when the papers begin to report trouble. I -didn’t know I was poorly fixed this time, until here in Tokyo I saw how -the others go about it. Dinner-clothes, and all sorts of money invested -in them--whether the war makes good or not----” - -“I was right,” Fallows said finally. He had listened as a forest in a -drouth listens for rain. - -Morning was embarrassed. He had been caught in the current of the -other’s listening. It was not his way at all to talk so much. He wasn’t -tamed altogether; and then he had been extra hurt by the night and the -day. An element of savagery arose, with the suspicion that Fallows -might be making fun of him. - -“What were you right about, Mr. Fallows?” - -“You’ve got an especial guardian.” - -Morning waited. The fuel was crackling. The Californian watched the -fire and finally began to talk. - -“You’re _one of them_. I saw it in your stuff. Then they told me -here that you lived in a little Japanese hotel alone. That’s another -reason. Your kind come up alone--always alone. To-day I saw you -watching that picture business. You looked tired--as if you had a long -way yet to swim against the current. You had a fight on--inside and -out. You’ll keep on fighting inside, long after the world outside has -called a truce. When you’re as old as I am--maybe before--you’ll have -peace inside and out.” - -Morning was bewildered; and had somewhat braced himself in scepticism, -as if the other were reading a fortune out of a cup. - -“You’re one of them, and you’ve got a guardian--greater than ten of -these militia press-agents. You don’t know it yet, but your stuff shows -it; your life shows it. You try to do what _you_ want--and you’re -forced to do better. You’ll be kept steerage, as you call it,--kept -down among men--until you see that it’s the place for a white man -to be, and that all these other things--dinner-coats and expense -accounts--are but tricks to cover a weakness. You’ll be held down among -men until you love them, and would be sick away from service with them. -You won’t be able to rest unless you’re helping. You’ll choke when you -say ‘Brother.’ You’ll answer their misery and cry from your sleep, ‘I’m -coming.’ You hear them with your soul now, but the brain won’t listen -yet. You’ll go it blind for the under-dog--and find out afterwards that -you were immortally right.” - -Morning’s breast was burning. It was more the fiery flood of kindness -than the words. He had been roughed so thoroughly that he couldn’t take -words; he needed a sign. - -“The time will come when you’ll hear your soul saying, ‘Get down among -men, John, and help.’ You’ll jump. A storm of hell will follow you if -you don’t. They’ll throw you overboard and even the whale won’t stomach -you if you don’t. ‘Get down among men, John’; that’s your orders to -Nineveh.” - -The Californian changed the subject abruptly: - -“They were good enough to give me a place with the first column, but -I can’t see it quite. There’s going to be too much supervision. These -Japanese are rivet-headed. I like the other end. New Chwang is still -open. Lowenkampf is in command there. I knew him years ago in Vienna. -Good man for a soldier--old Lowenkampf. He’ll take us in. Let’s go -over----” - -“I won’t be exactly ‘healed’ for a long stay. My money is coming -here----” - -“Let it pile up. I’ll stake you for the Russian picnic.” - -Morning wanted it so intensely that he feared Duke Fallows might die -before they got to Lowenkampf and New Chwang.... He was terrorized by -this thought: “Fallows has somehow failed to understand about me not -getting a column, and not being asked into the picture. When he finds -out, he’ll change his mind....” - -He wanted to speak, gathered strength with violent effort, but Fallows -just now was restlessly eager to go below. - - - 6 - -SECOND class, that night, on the Pacific liner _Manchuria_, forward -among the rough wooden bunks, eating from tin-plates.... It had been -Morning’s suggestion. Fallows had accepted it laughingly, but as a good -omen. - -“Two can travel cheaply as one,” he said. “I’m quite as comfortable as -usual.” - -Morning realized that his friend was not comfortable at best. He was -too well himself, too ambitious, quite to realize the other’s illness. -Morning found a quality of understanding that he had expected vaguely -to find sometime from some girl, but he could not return the gift in -kind, nor right sympathy for the big man’s weakness. Fallow’s didn’t -appear to expect it. - -They left the _Manchuria_ at Nagasaki, after the Inland Sea -passage, found a small ship for Tientsin direct; also a leftover winter -storm on the Yellow Sea. Morning, at work, typewriter on his knees, -looked up one night as they neared the mouth of the Pei-ho. An oil-lamp -swung above them smokily; the tired ship still creaked and wallowed in -the gale. Fallows has been regarding him thoughtfully from time to time. - -“You keep bolstering me up, Duke, and I don’t seem to help you any,” -Morning said. “Night and day, I worry you with the drum of this -machine--when you’re too sick to work; and here you are traveling like -a tramp for me. I’m used to it, but it makes you worse. You staked me -and made possible a bit of real work this campaign--why won’t you let -me do some stuff for you?” - -“Don’t you worry about what I’ve done--that’s particularly my affair. -Call it a gamble. Perhaps I chose you as a man chooses his place to -build a house....” - -Morning wondered at times if the other was not half dead with longing -for a woman.... In the fifteen years which separated the two men in age -lay all the difference between a soldier and an artist. Morning had to -grant finally that the Californian had no abiding interest in the war -they were out to cover; and this was so foreign that the rift could not -be bridged entirely. - -“War--why, I love the thought!” Fallows exclaimed. “The fight’s the -thing--but this isn’t it. This is just a big butchery of the blind. The -Japanese aren’t sweet in this passion. We won’t see the real Russia -out here in Asia. Real Russia is against all this looting and lusting. -Real Russia is at home singing, writing, giving itself to be hanged. -Real Russia is glad to die for a dream. This soldier Russia isn’t ready -to die. Just a stir in the old torpor of decadence--this Russia we’re -going to. You’ll see it--its stench rising.... I want the other war. -I want to live to fight in the other war, when the under-dog of this -world--the under-dog of Russia and England and America, runs no more, -cowers no more--but stops, turns to fight to the death. I want the -barricades, the children fired with the spirit, women coming down to -the ruck, the girls from the factories, harlots from the slums. The -women won’t stay at home in the war I mean--and you and I, John, must -be there,--to die every morning----” - -Yet Fallows didn’t write this. He lay on his back dreaming about it. -Always the women came into his thoughts. Morning held hard to the game -at hand.... Lying on his back--thus the Californian became identified -in his mind. And strange berths they found, none stranger than the -one at last in the unspeakable Chinese hotel at New Chwang. Morning -remembered the date--4/4/’04--for he put it down in the black notebook, -after smashing a centipede on the wall with it. They were awakened the -next morning by the passing of a brigade of Russian infantry in full -song. Each looking for “good-morning” in the eyes of the other, found -that and tears. - -The Chinese house stirred galvanically at mid-day--from the farthest -chicken-coop to the guest-chamber of the most revered. Lowenkampf, -commanding the port, in sky-blue uniform, entered with his orderly and -embraced a certain sick man lying on a rough bench, between his own -blankets. It was just so and not otherwise, nor were the “European” -strangers of distinguished appearance. They had come in the night, -crossing the river in a junk, instead of waiting for the Liao-launch. -They had not sought the Manchurian hotel, where Europeans of quality -usually go, but had asked for native quartering. So rarely had this -happened, that the tradition was forgotten in New Chwang about angels -appearing unheralded. - -It was a great thing to John Morning, this coming of General -Lowenkampf. He had not dared to trust altogether in the high friend -of Duke Fallows--nor even in finding such a friend in New Chwang. The -actual fact meant that they would not be sent out of the zone of war, -when the Russians evacuated from New Chwang, if Lowenkampf could help -it; and who could help it if not the commander of the garrison? It -meant, too, that everything Duke Fallows had said in his quiet and -unadorned way when speaking of purely mundane affairs had turned out -true. - -Fallows sat up in his bunk to receive the embrace he knew was coming. -The General was a small man. He must have been fifty. He appeared a -tired father,--the father who puts his hands to his ears and looks -terrified when his children approach, but who loves them with secret -fury and prays for them in their beds at night. He had suffered; he -had a readiness to tears; he needed much brandy at this particular -interval, as if his day had not begun well. He spoke of the battle -of the Yalu and his tears were positive. It was a mistake, a hideous -mistake. He said this in English, and with the frightened intensity of -a woman whose lover has died misunderstanding her.... No, they were not -to stay at New Chwang.... He would make them comfortable.... Yes, he -had married a woman six years ago.... It murders the soldier in a man -to marry a woman and find her like other women. You may think on the -mystery of childbirth a whole life--but when your own woman, in your -own house, brings you a child, it is all different. A thing to be awed -at.... It draws the soldier-pith out of one’s spine, as you draw the -nerve out of a tooth.... You are never the same afterward. - -Fallows sank back smiling raptly. - -“You’re the same old nervous prince of realizers--Lowenkampf--always -realizing your own affairs with unprecedented realism. God knows, I’m -glad to see you.... John Morning, here is a man who can tell you a -thing you have heard before, in a way that you’ll never forget. It’s -because he only talks about what he has realized for himself. His -name is blown in the fabric of all he says.... Lowenkampf, here’s a -_boy_. I’ve been looking for him, years--ever since I found my own -failure inevitable. John Morning--Lowenkampf, the General. If you both -live to get back to your babies--Morning’s are still in the sky, their -dawn is not yet--you will remember this day--for it is a significant -Trinity.... General, how many babies have you?” - -“Oh, my God--one!” - -Fallows seemed unspeakably pleased with that excited remark. Lowenkampf -glanced at the shut eyes of his old friend, and then out of the window -to the sordid Chinese street, where the Russian soldiers moved to and -fro in the unwieldy disquiet of a stage mob in its first formation. - -“But they’re all my babies----” - -John Morning had a vision of a battle with that sentence. All the rest -of the day he thrilled with it. Work was so pure in his heart from -the vision, that he left his machine that night (Duke Fallows seemed -asleep) and touched the brow of his friend.... - - - 7 - -AUGUST--Liaoyang, the enemy closing in.... There were times -when John Morning doubted if he had ever been away from the sick man, -Duke Fallows, and the crowds of Russian soldiery. Individually the days -were long. Often in mid-afternoon, he stopped to think if some voice or -picture of to-day’s dawning did not belong to yesterday or last week. -Yet routine settled upon all that was past, and the days accumulated -into a quantity of weeks that grew like the continual miracle of a hard -man’s savings. - -Always he missed something. He was hard in health, but felt white -nowhere, in nor out, so much had he been played upon by sun and wind -and dust. The Russian officers were continually asking him to try -new horses--the roughest of the untamed purchases brought in by the -Chinese. It had become quite the custom among the officers to advise -with Morning on matters of horse-flesh. Fallows had started it by -telling Lowenkampf that Morning formerly rode the jumpers in England, -but the younger man had since earned his reputation in the Russian post. - -A sorrel mare had appeared in the city. Rat-tailed and Roman-nosed she -was, and covered with wounds. They had tried to ride her in from the -Hun. Her skin was like satin and she had not been saddled decently. -Just a wild, head-strong young mare in the beginning, but bad handling -had made her a mankiller. Lieutenant Luban, soft with vodka and -cigarettes, had dickered for the mare, and drunkenly insisted upon -mounting at once. Morning caught the bridle after the first fight, and -Luban slid off in his arms in a state of collapse. Clearly an adult -devil lived in the sorrel. She was red-eyed in her rage, past pain, and -walked like a man. She would have gone over backwards with Luban, and -yet she was lovely to Morning’s eye, perfect as a yellow rose. He knew -her sort--the kind that runs to courage and not to hair; the kind of -individual that rarely breeds. - -He led her apart, talked to her; knew that she only cared to kill him -and be free. She was outrage; hate was the breath of her nostrils; -but she made Morning forget his work.... Thirty officers were -gathered in the compound. Morning had saddled her afresh; her back -was easier--yet she was up, striking, pawing. He knew she meant to go -back. Stirrup-free, he held her around the neck as she stood poised. -His weight was against her toppling, but sheer deviltry hurled back -her head, breaking the balance. They saw him push the hot yellow neck -from him as she fell. He landed on his feet, facing her from the side, -leaped clear--and then darted forward, catching the bridle-rein before -she straightened her first front leg. Morning was in the saddle before -she was up. Then the whole thing was done over again as perfectly as -one with his hand in repeats a remarkable billiard-shot. - -“It’s only a question of time--she’ll kill you,” said Fallows. - -“How she hates the Chinese, but she’s the gamest thing in Asia,” -Morning answered. “I’d like to be away alone with her.” - -“You’d need a new continent for a romance like that,” Fallows said, and -that night, in their room of Lowenkampf’s headquarters, he resumed the -subject, his eyes lost in the dun ceiling. - -“There’s only one name for that sorrel mare, if I’m consulted.” - -“Name her,” Morning said. - -“The one I’m thinking of--her name is Eve.” - -Fallows shivered, and turned the subject, but Morning knew he would -come back.... They heard the sentries on the stone flags below. It -was monotonous as the sound of the river. An east wind had blown all -afternoon. Dust was gritty in the blankets, sore in the rifts of -lip and nostril caused by the long baking wind. Their eyes felt old -in the dry heat. Daily the trains had brought more Russians; daily -more Chinese refugees slipped out behind. Liaoyang was a mass of -soldiery--heavy and weary with soldiers--dull with its single thought -of defense. For fifty or more miles, the southern arc of the circle -about the old walled city was a system of defense--chains of Russian -redoubts, complicated entanglements, hill emplacements and rifle-pits. -Beyond this the Japanese gathered openly and prepared. It seemed as if -the earth itself would scream from the break in the tension when firing -began.... - -“John--a man must be alone----” Fallows said abruptly. - -“That’s one of the first things you told me--and that a man mustn’t lie -to himself.” - -“It must be thinking about your romance with that sorrel fiend--that -brings her so close to-night, I mean the real Eve. I had to put the -ocean between us--and yet she comes. Listen, John, when you are dull -and tired after a hard day, you take a drink or two of brandy. You, -especially you, are new and lifted again. That’s what happens to me -when a woman comes into the room....” - -Twice before Morning had been on the verge of this, and something -spoiled it. He listened now, for Fallows opened his heart. His eyes -held unblinkingly the dim shadows of the ceiling. The step of the -sentries sank into the big militant silence--and this was revelation: - -“God, how generous women are with their treasures! They are devils -because of their great-heartedness. So swift, so eager, so delicate in -their giving. They look up at you, and you are lost. My life has been -gathering a bouquet--and some flowers fade in your hand.... I hated it, -but they looked up so wistfully--and it seemed as if I were rending in -a vacuum.... Always the moment of illusion--that _this_ one is the -last, that here is completion, that peace will come with _this_ -fragrance; always their giving is different and very beautiful--and -always the man is deeper in hell for their bestowal.... A day or -a month--man’s incandescence is gone. Brown eyes, blue eyes--face -pale or ruddy--lips passionate or pure--their giving momentary or -immortal--and yet, I could not stay. Always they were hurt--less among -men, less among their sisters, and no strangers to suffering--and -always hell accumulated upon my head.... Then she came. There’s a match -in the world for every man. Her name is Eve. She is the answer of her -sisterhood to such as I. - -“She was made so. She will not have me near. And yet with all her -passion and mystery she is calling to me. The rolling Pacific isn’t -broad enough. She has bound me by all that I have given to others, by -all that I have denied others. She was made to match me, and came to -her task full-powered, as the sorrel mare came to corral to-day for -you.... Oh, yes, I honor her.” - -There was silence which John Morning could not break. Fallows began to -talk of death--in terms which the other remembered. - -“... For the death of the body makes no difference. In the body here we -build our heaven or hell. If we have loved possessions of the earth--we -are weighted with them afterward,--imprisoned among them. If we love -flesh here, we are held like shadows to fleshly men and women, enmeshed -in our own prevailing desire. If our life has been one of giving to -others, of high and holy things--we are at the moment of the body’s -death, like powerful and splendid birds suddenly hearing the mystic -call of the South. Death, it is the great cleansing flight into the -South....” - -This from the sick man, was new as the first rustle of Spring to John -Morning; yet within, he seemed long to have been expectant. There was -thrill in the spectacle of the other who had learned by losing.... - -Morning’s mind was like the beleaguered city--desperate with waiting -and potential disorder, outwardly arrogant, afraid in secret.... Duke -Fallows was thinking of a woman, as he visioned his lost paradise. The -younger man left the lamp-light to go to him, and heard as he leaned -over the cot: - -“... Like a lost traveler to the single point of light, John, I shall -go to her. Eve--the one red light--I will glow red in the desire of -her. She is my creation. Out of the desire of my strength she was -created. As they have mastered me in the flesh, this creation of mine -shall master me afterward--with red perpetual mastery.” - -Lowenkampf came in. They saw by his eyes that he was more than -ever drawn, in the tension and heart-hunger. He always brought his -intimacies to the Americans. A letter had reached him from Europe in -the morning, but the army had given him no time to think until now. It -was not the letter, but something in it, that reminded him of a story. -So he brought his brandy and the memory: - -“... It was two or three evenings before I left Petersburg to come -here. I had followed him about--my little son who is five years. I had -followed him about the house all day. Every little while at some door, -or through some curtain--I would see the mother smiling at us. It was -new to me--for I had been seldom home in the day-time--this playing -with one’s little son through the long day. But God, I knew I was no -longer a soldier. I think the little mother knew. She is braver than -I. She was the soldier--for not a tear did I see all that day.... And -that night I lay down with my little son to talk until he fell asleep. -It was dark in the room, but light was in the hall-way and the door -open.... You see, he is just five--and very pure and fresh.” - -Fallows sat up. He was startling in the shadow. - -“... For a long time my little man stirred and talked--of riding -horses, when his legs were a little longer, and of many things to do. -He would be a soldier, of course. God pity the little thought. We would -ride together soon--not in front of my saddle, but on a pony of his -own--one that would keep up. I was to take him out to swim ... and we -would walk in the country to see the trees and animals.... My heart -ached for love of him--and I, the soldier, wished there were no Asia -in this world, no Asia, nor any war or torment.... He had seen a gray -pony which he liked, because it had put its head down, as if to listen. -It didn’t wear any straps nor saddle, but came close, as one knowing a -friend, and put its head down--thus the child was speaking to me. - -“And I heard her step in the hall--the light, quick step. Her figure -came into the light of the door-way. She looked intently through the -shadows where we lay, her eyelids lifted, and a smile on her lips. Our -little son saw her and this is what he said so drowsily: - -“‘We are talking about what we will do--when we get to be men.’” - - * * * * * - -Fallows broke this silence: - -“‘When we get to be men.’ Thank you, General. That was good for me.... -Our friend John needed that little white cloud, too. I’ve just been -leading him among the wilted primroses.” - -Morning did not speak. - -Lowenkampf said the fighting would begin around the outer position -to-morrow.... But that had been said before. - - - 8 - -ON the night of August 31st, for all the planning, the progress of -the battle was not to the Russian liking. All that day the movements -of the Russians had mystified John Morning. The broad bend of the -river to the east of the city had been crowded with troops--seemingly -an aimless change of pastures. He felt that after all his study of the -terrain and its possibilities, the big thing was getting away from -him. When he mentioned this ugly fear to Fallows, the answer was: - -“And that’s just what the old man feels.” - -Fallows referred to Kuropatkin. - -The monster spectacle had blinded Morning. He had to hold hard at times -to keep his rage from finding words in answer to Duke Fallows’ scorn -for the big waiting-panorama which had enthralled him utterly--the -fleeing refugees, singing infantry, the big gun postures, the fluent -cavalry back along the railroad, the armored hills, the whole marvelous -atmosphere.... None of this appeared to matter to Fallows. He had -written little or nothing. God knew why he had come. He would do a -story, of course.... Morning had written a book--the climax of which -would be the battle. He had staked all on the majesty of the story. His -career would be constructed upon it. He would detach himself from all -this and appear suddenly in America--the one man in America who knew -Liaoyang. He would be Liaoyang; his mind the whole picture. He knew the -wall, the Chinese names of the streets, the city and its tenderloin, -where the Cantonese women were held in hideous bondage. He knew the -hills and the river--the rapid treachery of the Taitse. He had watched -the trains come in from Europe with food, horses, guns and men; had -even learned much Russian and some Chinese. He had studied Lowenkampf, -Bilderling, Zarubaieff, Mergenthaler; had looked into the eyes of -Kuropatkin himself.... - -Duke Fallows said: - -“All this is but one idea, John--one dirty little idea multiplied. -Don’t let a couple of hundred thousand soldiers spoil the fact in your -mind. Lowenkampf personally isn’t capable of fighting for himself -on such a rotten basis. Fighting with a stranger on a neighbor’s -property--that’s the situation. Russia says to Old Man China, ‘Go, -take a little airing among your hills. A certain enemy of mine is on -the way here, and I want to kill him from your house. It will be a -dirty job, but it is important to me that he be killed just so. I’ll -clean up the door-step afterward, repair all damages, and live in -your house myself.... And the Japanese have trampled the flowers and -vegetable-beds of the poor old Widow Korea to get here----’” - -Thus the Californian took the substance out of the hundred thousand -words Morning had written in the past few months. Dozens of small -articles had been sent out until a fortnight ago through Lowenkampf, -via Shanghai, but the main fiber of each was kept for this great story, -which he meant to sell in one piece in America. - -_Kuropatkin_--both Morning and Fallows saw him as the mighty -beam in the world’s eye at this hour. To Morning he was the risen -master of events; to Fallows merely a figure tossed up from the moil. -Morning saw him as the source of power to the weak, as a silencer of -the disputatious and the envious, as the holding selvage to the vast -Russian garment, worn, stained and ready to ravel, the one structure of -hope in a field of infinite failures. Fallows saw him as an integral -part of all this disorder and disruption, one whose vision was -marvelous only in the detection of excuses for himself in the action -of others; whose sorrow was a pose and whose _self_ was far too -imperious for him firmly to grip the throat of a large and vital -obstacle. What Morning called the mystical somberness of the chief, -Fallows called the sullen silence of dim comprehension. Somewhere -between these notations the Commander stood.... They had seen him at -dusk that day. “He seems to be repressing himself by violent effort,” -the younger man whispered. - -“What would you say he were repressing, John--his appetite?” - -The answer was silence, and late that night, (the Russian force was now -tense and compact as a set spring), Fallows dropped down upon his cot, -saying: - -“You think I’m a scoffer, don’t you?” - -“You break a man’s point, that’s all----” - -“I know--but we’re not to be together always.... Listen, don’t think me -a scoffer, even now. These big, bulky things won’t hold you forever. -Perhaps, if I were a bigger man, I’d keep silent. You’ll write them -well, no doubt about that.... But don’t get into the habit of thinking -me a scoffer. There’s such a lot of finer things to fall for. John, -I wasn’t a scoffer when I first read your stuff--and saw big forces -moving around you.... A man who knows a little about women, knows a -whole lot about men.... To be a famous soldier, John, a man can’t have -any such forces moving around him. He must be an empty back-ground. All -his strength is the compound of meat and eggs and fish; his strength -goes to girth and jowl and fist----” - -“You’re a wonderful friend to me, Duke.” - -“That’s just what I didn’t want you to say.... There’s no excellence on -my part. Like a good book, I couldn’t riddle you in one reading.” - -Morning found himself again, as he wrote on that last night of -preparation; that last night of summer. It was always the way, when -the work came well. It brought him liveableness with himself and -kindness for others. He had his own precious point of view again, -too. He pictured Kuropatkin ... sitting at his desk, harried by his -sovereign, tormented by princes, seeing as no other could see the -weaknesses in the Russian displays of power, and knowing the Japanese -better than any other; the man who had come up from Plevna fighting, -who had written his fightings, who was first to say, “We are not -ready,” and first to gather up the unpreparedness for battle. - -Morning felt himself the reporter of the Fates for this great carnage. -He wanted to see the fighting, to miss no phase of it--to know the -mechanics, the results, the speed, the power, weakness and every -rending of this great force. He did not want the morals of it, the evil -spirit behind, but the brute material action. He wanted the literary -Kuropatkin, not a possible reality. He wanted the one hundred thousand -words driven by the one-seeing, master-seeing reporter’s instinct. He -was Russian in hope and aspiration--but absolutely negative in what -was to take place. He wanted the illusion of the service; he saw the -illusion more clearly; so could the public. The illusion bore out every -line of his work so far. To laugh at the essence of the game destroyed -its meaning, and the huge effect he planned to make in America. - -Morning was sorry now for having lost during the day the sense of fine -relation with Fallows, but everything he had found admirable--from -toys and sweets to wars and women--the sick man had found futile and -betraying; everything that his own mind found good was waylaid and -diminished by the other. Fallows, in making light of the dramatic -suspense of the city, had struck at the very roots of his ambition. The -work of the night had healed this all, however. - -The last night of summer--joyously he ended the big picture. Three -themes ran through entire--Nodzu’s artillery, under which the -Russians were willingly dislodging from the shoulders and slopes of -Pensu-marong; the tread of the Russian sentries below, (a real bit of -Russian bass in the Liaoyang symphony), and the glissando of the rain. - -He sat back from his machine at last. There were two hundred and -seventy sheets altogether of thin tough parchment-copy--400 words -to the page, and the whole could be folded into an inside pocket. -It was ready for the battle itself.... All the Morning moods were -in the work--moments of photographic description, of philosophic -calm, instant reversals to glowing idealism--then the thrall of the -spectacle--finally, a touch, just a touch to add age, of Fallows’ -scorn. It was newspaper stuff--what was wanted. He had brought his -whole instrument up to concert-pitch to-night. The story was ready for -the bloody artist. - -His heart softened emotionally toward Fallows lying on his back over -in the shadows.... Lowenkampf came in for a queer melting moment.... -Morning looked affectionately at his little traveling type-mill. It -had never faltered--a hasty, cheap, last-minute purchase in America, -but it had seen him through. It was like a horse one picks up afield, -wears out and never takes home, but thinks of many times in the years -afterward. Good little beast.... And this made him think with a thrill -of Eve, brooding in the dark below.... She was adjusted to a thought in -his mind that had to do with the end of the battle. It was a big-bored, -furious idea. Morning glanced at his watch. Two-fifteen on the morning -of September. He unlaced one shoe, but the idea intervened again and -he moved off in the stirring dream of it. It was three o’clock when he -bent to the other shoe. - - - 9 - -ALL the next day, Liaoyang was shelled from the south and -southeast; all day Eve shivered and sweated in the smoky turmoil. At -dusk, Morning, to whom the mare was far too precious to be worn out in -halter, rode back to Yentai along the railroad. She operated like a -perfect toy over that twelve miles of beaten turf. The rain ceased for -an hour or two, and the dark warmth of the night seemed to poise her -every spring. The man was electric from her. At the station Morning -learned that Lowenkampf, with thirteen battalions, already had occupied -the lofty coal-fields, ten miles to the east on a stub of the railroad. -He had first supposed the force of Siberians now crowding the station -to be Lowenkampf’s men; instead it was his reserve. Eve had lathered -richly, so that an hour passed before she was cool enough for grain or -water. He rubbed her down, meanwhile, talked to her softly and made -plans. Her eye flashed red at the candle, as he shut the door of the -stable. That night on foot he did the ten miles to the collieries, -joining Fallows and the General at midnight.... Morning was struck with -the look of Lowenkampf’s face. He wasn’t taking a drink that night; his -mouth was old and white. A thin bar of pallor stretched obliquely from -chin to cheek-bone. The chin trembled, too; the eyes were hungerful, -yet so kind. Desperate incongruity somewhere. This man should have been -back in Europe with his neighbors about the fire--his comrade tucked in -up-stairs, the little mother pouring tea. And yet, Lowenkampf--effaced -with his anguish and dreamy-eyed, as if surveying the distance between -his heaven and hell--was the brain of the sledge that was to break the -Flanker’s back-bone to-morrow. - -“The Taitse is only ten miles south,” said Fallows, as they turned in. -“Bilderling is there. Kuroki is supposed to poke his nose in between, -and Lowenkampf is to smash it against Bilderling. Mergenthaler’s -Cossacks are here to take the van in the morning, and we’re backed up -by a big body of Siberians, stretching behind to Yentai station----” - -“I saw ’em,” said Morning. “Lowenkampf looks sick with strain.” - - * * * * * - -Day appeared, with just the faintest touch of red showing like a broken -bit of glass. Rain-clouds, bursting-heavy, immediately rolled over -it,--a deluge of grays, leisurely stirring with whitish and watery -spots. Though his troops were taking the field, Lowenkampf had not left -his quarters in the big freight _go-down_. Commanders hurried in -and out. Fallows was filling two canteens with diluted tea, when an -old man entered, weeping. It was Colonel Ritz, bent, red-eyed, nearly -seventy, who had been ordered, on account of age and decrepitude, to -remain with the staff. Brokenly, he begged for his command. - -“I have always stayed with the line, General. I shall be quick as -another. Don’t keep an old man, who has always stuck to the line--don’t -keep one like that back in time of battle.” - -Lowenkampf smiled and embraced him--sending him out with his regiment. - -Mergenthaler now came in. There was something icy and hateful about -this Roman-faced giant. His countenance was like a bronze shield--so -small the black eyes, and so wide and high the cheek-bones. For months -his Cossacks had done sensational work--small fighting, far scouting, -desperate service. He despised Lowenkampf; believed he had earned the -right to be the hammer to-day; and, in truth, he had, but Lowenkampf, -who ranked him, had been chosen. Bleak and repulsive with rage, the -Cossack chief made no effort to repress himself. Lowenkampf was -reminded that he had been policing the streets of Liaoyang for weeks, -that his outfit was “fat-heeled and duck-livered.”... More was said -before Mergenthaler stamped out, his jaw set like a stone balcony. It -seemed as if he tore from the heart of Lowenkampf the remnant of its -stamina.... For a moment the three were alone in the head-quarters. -Fallows caught the General by the shoulders and looked down in his face: - -“Little Father--you’re the finest and most courageous of them all.... -It will be known and proven--what I say, old friend--‘when we get to be -men.’” - -The masses of Lowenkampf’s infantry, forming on the heights among the -coal-fields, melted at the outer edges and slid downward. Willingly -the men went. They did not know that this was the day. They had been -fearfully expectant of battle at first--ever since Lake Baikal was -crossed. Battalion after battalion slid off the heights, and were lost -in the queer lanes running through the rocks and low timber below. The -general movement was silent. The rain held off; the air was close and -warm. Lowenkampf, unvaryingly attentive to the two Americans, put them -in charge of Lieutenant Luban, the young staff officer, whom Morning -had caught in his arms from the back of the sorrel. Down the ledges -they went, as the others. - -Morning was uneasy, as one who feels he has forgotten something--a -tugging in his mind to go back. He was strongly convinced that -Lowenkampf was unsubstantial in a military way. He could not overcome -the personal element of this dread--as if the General were of his -house, and he knew better than another that he was ill-prepared for the -day’s trial. - -Fallows welcomed any disaster. As he had scorned the army in its -waiting, he scorned it now in its strike. He looked very lean and long. -The knees were in corduroy and unstable, but his nerve could not have -been steadier had he been called to a tea-party by Kuroki. As one who -had long since put these things behind him, Fallows appeared; indeed, -as one sportively called out by the younger set, to whom severing the -spine of a flanker was fresh and engrossing business.... Morning choked -with suppressions. Luban talked low and wide. He was in a funk. Both -saw it. Neither would have objected, except that he monopolized their -thoughts with his broken English, and to no effect. - -Now they went into the _kao liang_--vast, quiet, enfolding. It -held the heat stale from yesterday. The seasonal rains had filled the -spongy loam at the roots, with much to spare blackening the lower -stems.... For an hour and a half they sunk into the several paths and -lost themselves, Lowenkampf’s untried battalions. The armies of the -world might have vanished so, only to be seen by the birds, moving like -vermin in a hide.... Men began to think of food and drink. The heights -of Yentai, which they had left in bitter hatred so shortly ago, was now -like hills of rest on the long road home. More and more the resistance -of men shrunk in the evil magic of this pressure of grain and sky and -holding earth--a curious, implacable unworldliness it was, that made -the flesh cry out. - -“They should have cut this grain,” Luban said for the third time. - -Fallows had said it first. Anyone should have seen the ruin of this -advance, unless the end of the millet were reached before the beginning -of battle. They had to recall with effort at last, that there was an -outer world of cities and seas and plains--anything but this hollow -country of silence and fatness. - -If you have ever jumped at the sudden drumming of a pneumatic hammer, -as it rivets a bolt against the steel, you have a suggestion of the -nervous shock from that first far machine-gun of Kuroki’s--just -a suggestion, because Lowenkampf’s soldiers at the moment were -suffocating in _kao liang_.... In such a strange and expensive -way, they cut the crops that day. - -Morning trod on the tail of the battalion ahead. It had stopped; he -had not. The soldier in front whom he bumped turned slowly around -and looked into his face. The wide, glassy blue eyes then turned to -Fallows, and after resting a curious interval, finally found Luban. - -The face was broad and white as lard. Whatever else was in it, there -was no denying the fear, the hate, the cunning--all of a rudimentary -kind. Luban was held by the man’s gaze. The fright in both hearts -sparked in contact. The stupid face of the soldier suddenly reflected -the terror of the officer. And this was the result: The wide-staring -suddenly altered to a squint; the vacant, helpless staring of a -bewildered child turned into the bright activity of a trapped rodent. - -Luban had failed in his great instant. His jaw was loose-hinged, his -mouth leaked saliva. - -Now Morning and Fallows saw other faces--twenty faces in the grain, -faces searching for the nearest officer. Their eyes roved to Luban; -necks craned among the fox-tails. There was a slow giving of the line, -and bumping contacts from ahead like a string of cars.... Morning -recalled the look of Luban, as he had helped him down from the sorrel. -He had helped then; he hated now. Fallows was better. He plumped the -boy on the shoulder and said laughingly: - -“Talk to ’em. Get ’em in hand--quick, Luban--or they’ll be off!” - -It was all in ten seconds. The nearest soldiers had seen Luban -fail. Other platoons, doubtless many, formed in similar tableaux -to the same end. A second machine-gun took up the story. It was -far-off, and slightly to the left of the Russian line of advance. The -incomprehensible energy of the thing weakened the Russian column, -although it drew no blood. - -A roar ahead from an unseen battalion-officer--the Russian -_Forward_. Luban tried to repeat it, but pitifully. A great beast -rising from the ooze and settling back _against_ the voice--such -was the answer. - -The Thought formed. It was the thought of the day. None was too -stupid to catch the spirit of it. Certain it was, and pervading as -the grain. Indeed, it was conceived of _kao liang_. The drum -of the machine-gun, like a file in a tooth, was but its quickener. -It flourished under the ghostly grays and whites of the sky. In the -forward battalions the Thought already clothed itself in action: - -To run back--to follow the paths back through the grain--to reach the -decent heights again. And this was but a miniature of the thought that -mastered the whole Russian army in Asia--to go back--to rise from the -ghastly hollows of Asia and turn homeward again. - -It leaped like a demon upon the unset volition of the mass. -Full-formed, it arose from the lull. It effected the perfect turning. - -Morning saw it, and wanted the source. He had planned too long to -be denied now. The rout was big to handle, but he wanted _the -front_--a glimpse of the actual inimical line. It was not enough -for him to watch the fright and havoc streaming back. Calling a cheery -_adieu_ to Fallows, he bowed against the current--alone obeying -the Russian _Forward_. - - - 10 - -AT the edge of the trampled lane, often shunted off into the -standing crop, Morning made his way, running when he could.... The -pictures were infinite; a lifetime of pictures; hundreds of faces and -each a picture. Men passed him, heads bowed, arms about their faces, -like figures in the old Dore paintings, running from the wrath of the -Lord. Here and there was pale defiance. Nine sheepish soldiers carried -a single wounded man, the much-handled fallen one looking silly as the -rest. - -The utter ghostliness of it all was in Morning’s mind.... Gasping -for breath, after many minutes of running, he sank down to rest. -Soldiers sought to pick him up and carry him back. There were others -who could not live with themselves after the first panic. They fell -out of the retreat to join him. Others stopped to fire--a random -emptying of magazines in the millet. Certain groups huddled when -they saw him--mistaking a civilian for an officer--and covered their -faces. Officers begged, prayed for the men to hold, but the torrent -increased, individuals diving into the thick of the grain and leaking -around behind. White showed beneath the beards, and white lips moved -in prayer. The locked bayonets of the Russians had never seemed so -dreadful as when low-held in the grain.... One beardless boy strode -back jauntily, his lips puckered in a whistle. - -The marvelous complexity of common men--this was the sum of all -pictures, and the great realization of John Morning. His soul saw much -that his eyes failed. The day was a marvelous cabinet of gifts--secret -chambers to be opened in after years. - -Now he was running low, having entered the zone of fire. He heard the -steel in the grain; stems were snapped by invisible fingers; fox-tails -lopped. He saw the slow leaning of stems half-cut.... Among the fallen, -on a rising slope, men were crawling back; and here and there, bodies -had been cast off, the cloth-covered husks of poor driven peasants. -They had gone back to the soil, these bodies, never really belonging to -the soldiery. It was only when they writhed that John Morning forgot -himself and his work. The art of the dead was consummate. - -The grain thinned. He had come to the end of Lowenkampf’s infantry. It -had taken an hour and a half for the command to enter in order; less -than a half-hour to dissipate. The rout had been like a cloud-burst. - -And this was the battle. (Morning had to hold fast to the thought.) -Long had he waited for this hour; months he had constructed the army -in his story for this hour of demolition. It was enough to know that -Lowenkampf had failed. Liaoyang, the battle, was lost.... Old Ritz went -by weeping--he had been too old, they said; they had not wanted him to -take his regiment to field. Yet he was perhaps the last to leave the -field. Only his dead remained, and Colonel Ritz was not weeping for -them.... - -Now Morning saw it was _not_ all over. Before gaining the ridge -swept by Kuroki’s fire, he knew that Mergenthaler was still fighting. -It came to him with the earthy rumble of cavalry. To the left, in a -crevasse under the crest of the ridge, he saw a knot of horses with -empty saddles, and a group of men. Closer to them he crawled, along the -sheltered side of the ridge, until in the midst of Russian officers, he -saw that splendid bruising brute, who had stamped out of headquarters -that morning, draining the heart of Lowenkampf as he went. Mergenthaler -of the Cossacks--designed merely to be the eyes and fingers of the -fighting force; yet unsupported, unbodied as it were, he still held the -ridge. - -Kuroki, as yet innocent of the rout, would not otherwise have been -checked. His ponderous infantry was not the sort to be stopped by these -light harriers of the Russian army. The Flanker was watching for the -Hammer, and the Hammer already had been shattered.... Mergenthaler, -cursing, handled his cavalry squadrons to their death, lightly and -perfectly as coins in his palm. Every moment that he stayed the -Japanese, he knew well that he was holding up to the quick scorn of -the world the foot-soldiers of Lowenkampf, whom he hated. His head was -lifted above the rocks to watch the field. His couriers came and went, -slipping up and down through the thicker timber, still farther to the -left.... Morning crawled up nearby until he saw the field--and now -action, more abandoned than he had ever dared to dream: - -An uncultivated valley strewn with rocks and low timber. Three columns -of Japanese infantry pouring down from the opposite parallel ridge, all -smoky with the hideous force of the reserve--machine-guns, and a mile -of rifles stretching around to the right. (It was this wing’s firing -that had started the havoc in the grain.) - -Three columns of infantry pouring down into the ancient valley, under -the gray stirring sky--brown columns, very even and unhasting--and -below, the Cossacks. - -Morning lived in the past ages. He lay between two rocks watching, -having no active sense--but pure receptivity. Time was thrust back.... -Three brown dragons crawling down the slopes in the gray day--knights -upon horses formed to slay the dragons. - -Out of the sheltering rocks and timber they rode--and chose the central -dragon quite in the classic way. It turned to meet the knights upon -horses--head lifted, neck swollen like the nuchal ribs of the cobra. In -the act of striking it was ridden down, but the knights were falling -upon the smashed head. The mated dragons had attacked from either -side.... - -It was a fragment, a moving upon the ground,--that company of knights -upon horses,--and the Voice of it, all but deadened by the rifles, came -up spent and pitiful. - -Mergenthaler’s thin, high voice was not hushed. He knew how to detach -another outfit from the rocks and timber-thickets, already found by -the Japanese on the ridge, already deluged with fire. Out from the -betraying shelter, the second charge, a new child of disaster, ran -forth to strike Kuroki’s left.... Parts of the film were elided. The -cavalrymen fell away by a terrible magic. Again the point thickened -and drew back, met the charge; again the welter and the thrilling -back-sweep of the Russian fragment. - -Morning missed something. His soul was listening for something.... It -was comment from Duke Fallows, so long marking time to events.... He -laughed. He was glad to be free, yet his whole inner life drew back in -loathing from Mergenthaler--as if to rush to his old companion.... And -Mergenthaler turned--the brown high-boned cheeks hung with a smile of -derision. He was climbing far and high on Lowenkampf’s shame.... He -gained the saddle--this hard, huge Egoist, the staff clinging to him, -and over the ridge they went to set more traps. - -The wide, rocking shoulders of the General sank into the timber--as he -trotted with his aides down the death-ridden valley. It may have been -the sight of this little party that started a particular machine-gun -on the Japanese right.... The sizable bay the chief rode looked like a -polo-pony under the mighty frame. Morning did not see him fall: only -the plunging bay with an empty saddle; and then when the timber opened -a little, the staff carrying the leader up the trail. - -It was the mystery which delayed the Japanese, not Mergenthaler. When -at last Kuroki’s left wing continued to report no aggressive movement -from Bilderling river-ward; and when continued combing in the north -raised nothing but bleak hills and grain-valleys hushed between -showers, he flooded further columns down the ridge, and slew what he -could of the Russian horsemen who tried with absurd heroism to block -his way. At two in the afternoon the Flanker fixed his base among the -very rocks where Morning had lain--and the next position for him to -take was the coal-hills of Yentai. Only the ghosts of the cavalry stood -between--and _kao liang_. - -Morning turned back a last time to the fields of millet in the early -dusk. He had been waiting for Mergenthaler to die. The General lay in -the very _go-down_ where he had outraged Lowenkampf that morning; -and now the Japanese were driving the Russians from the position.... -Mergenthaler would not die. They carried him to a coal-car, and -soldiers pushed it on to Yentai, the station. - -The Japanese were closing in. They were already in the northern heights -contending with Stakelberg; they were stretched out bluffing Bilderling -to the southward. They were locked with Zarubaieff at the southern -front of Liaoyang. They were in the grain.... Cold and soulless Morning -felt, as one who has failed in a great temptation; as one who has lived -to lose, and has not been spared the picture of his own eternal failure. - -He looked back a last time at the grain in the closing night. The -Japanese were there, brown men, native to the grain. The great shadowed -field had whipped Lowenkampf and lost the battle. It lay in the dusk -like a woman, trampled, violated, feebly waving. Rain-clouds came with -darkness to cover the nakedness and bleeding. - - - 11 - -DUKE Fallows saw but one face.... John Morning studied a -thousand, mastered the heroism of the Cossacks, filled his brain with -blood-pictures and the incorrigible mystery of common men. Duke Fallows -saw but one face. In the beauty and purity of its inspiration, he read -a vile secret out of the past. To the very apocalypse of this secret, -he read and understood. The shame of it blackened the heavens for his -eyes, but out of its night and torment came a Voice uttering the hope -of the human spirit for coming days. - -Morning had left. Luban had put on bluster and roaring. Their place in -the grain was now broad from trampling; the flight was on in full. It -meant something to Fallows. It was not that he wanted the Japanese to -win the battle; the doings of the Japanese were of little concern to -him. He felt curiously that the Japanese were spiritually estranged -from the white man. Russia was different; he was close to the heart of -the real Russia whose battle was at home. Russia’s purpose in Asia was -black; he was full of scorn for the purpose, but full of love for the -troops. Strange gladness was upon him--as the men broke away. Reality -at home would come from this disaster. He constructed the world’s -battle from it, and sang his song. - -One soldier running haltingly for his life looked up to the face of -Luban of the roaring voice--and laughed. Luban turned, and perceived -that Fallows had not missed the laugh of the soldier. This incident, -now closed, was in a way responsible for the next. - -... Out of the grain came striding a tall soldier of the ranks. His -beard was black, his eyes very blue. In his eyes was a certain fire -that kindled the nature of Duke Fallows as it had never been kindled -before, not even by the most feminine yielding. The man’s broad -shoulders were thrust back; his face clean of cowardice, clean as the -grain and as open to the sky. His head was erect and bare; he carried -no gun, scorned the pretense of looking for wounded. Had he carried a -dinner-pail, the picture would have been as complete--a good man going -home from a full-testing day. - -In that moment Fallows saw more than from the whole line before.... -Here was a conscript. He had been taken from his house, forced across -Europe and Asia to this hour. The reverse of his persecutors had set -him free. This freedom was the fire in his eyes.... They had torn him -from his house; they had driven and brutalized him for months. And -now they had come to dreadful disaster. It was such a disaster as a -plain man might have prayed for. He _had_ prayed for it in the -beginning, but in the long, slow gatherings for battle, in the terrible -displays of power, he had lost his faith to pray. Yet the plain man’s -God had answered that early prayer. This was the brightness of the -burning in the blue eyes. - -His persecutors had been shamed and undone. He had seen his companions -dissipate, his sergeants run; seen his captains fail to hold. The -great force that had tortured him, that had seemed _the world_ -in strength, was now broken before his eyes. Its mighty muscles were -writhing, their strength running down. The love of God was splendid in -the ranker’s heart; the breath of home had come. The turning in the -grain--was a turning homeward. - -All this Fallows saw. It was illumination to him--the hour of his great -reception. - -Luban, just insulted by the other infantryman, now faced the big, -blithe presence, emerging unhurried from the grain. Luban raised his -voice: - -“And what are _you_ sneaking back for?” - -“I am not sneaking----” - -“Rotten soldier stuff--you should be shot down.” - -“I am not a soldier--I am a ploughman.” - -“You are here to fight----” - -“They forced me to come----” - -“Forced you to fight for your Fatherland?” - -“This is not my Fatherland, but a strange country----” - -“You are here for the Fatherland----” - -“I have six children in Russia. The Fatherland is not feeding them. My -field is not ploughed.” - -The talk had crackled; it had required but a few seconds; Luban had -done it all for Fallows to see and hear--but Fallows was very far from -observing the pose of that weakling. The Ploughman held him heart and -soul--as did the infallible and instantly unerring truth of his words. -The world’s poor, the world’s degraded, had found its voice. - -The man was white with truth, like a priest of Melchizedek. - -Luban must have broken altogether. Fallows, listening, watching the -Ploughman with his soul, did not turn.... Now the man’s face changed. -The lips parted strangely, the eyelids lifting. Whiteness wavered -between the eyes of the Ploughman and the eyes of Duke Fallows. Luban’s -pistol crashed and the man fell with a sob. - -Fallows was kneeling among the soaked roots of the millet, holding the -soldier in his arms: - -“Living God, to die for you--you, who are so straight and so young.... -Hear me--don’t go yet--I must have your name, Brother.... Luban did -not know you--he is just a little sick man--he didn’t know you or he -wouldn’t have done this.... Tell me your name ... and the place of -your babes, and their mother.... Oh, be sure they shall be fed--glad -and proud am I to do that easy thing!... You have shown me the Nearer -God.... They shall be fed, and they shall hear! The world, cities and -nations, all who suffer, shall hear what the Ploughman said--the soul -of the Ploughman, who is the hope of the world.... You have spoken for -Russia.... And now rest--rest, Big Brother--you have done your work.” - -The soldier looked up to him. There had been pain and wrenching, the -vision of a desolated house. Now, his eyes rested upon the American. -The shadow of death lifted. He saw his brother in the eyes that held -him--his brother, and it seemed, the Son of Man smiled there behind -the tears.... He smiled back like a weary child. Peace came to him, -lustrous from the shadow, for lo! his field was ploughed and children -sang in his house. - - * * * * * - -Fallows had not risen from his knees. He was talking to himself: - -“... Out of the grain he came--the soul of the Ploughman. And gently -he spoke to us ... and this is the day of the battle. I came to -the battle--and I go to carry his message to the poor--to those who -labor--to Russia and the America of the future. Luban spoke the thought -of the world, but the Ploughman spoke for humanity risen. He spoke for -the women, and for the poor.... Bright he came from the grain--bright -and unafraid--and those shall hear him, who suffer and are heavy-laden. -This is the battle!... And his voice came to me--a great and gracious -voice--for tsars and kings and princes to hear--and I am to carry his -message....” - -Luban laughed feebly at last, and Fallows looked up to him. - -“You’ll hear him in your passing, Luban, poor lad. You’ll hear him in -your hell. Until you are as simple and as pure as this Ploughman--you -shall hear and see all this again. Though you should hang by the neck -to-night, Luban,--this picture would go out with you. For this is the -hour you killed your Christ.” - - - 12 - -LOWENKAMPF was the name that meant defeat. Lowenkampf--it was -like the rain that night.... “Lowenkampf started out too soon.”... -Morning heard it. Fallows heard it. The coughing sentries heard it. -The whole dismal swamp of drenched, whipped soldiery heard it. Sleek -History had awakened to grasp it; Kuropatkin had washed his hands.... -Lowenkampf had started out too soon that morning. The Siberians had -only left Yentai Station proper when Lowenkampf set forth from the -Coal-heights. Had his supports been in position (very quickly and -clearly the world’s war-experts would see this) the rout in the grain -would have been checked. - -As it was, many of Lowenkampf’s soldiers had run the entire ten -miles from the heights to the station, Yentai--after emerging from -_kao-liang_--evading the Siberian supports as they ran, as chaos -flies from order. Now in the darkness (with Kuroki bivouacked upon the -main trophy of the day, the Coal-heights) the shamed battalions of -Lowenkampf re-formed along the main line in the midst of their unused -reserves. - -The day had been like a month of fever to Morning, but Duke Fallows -was a younger man, and a stranger that night.... Morning tried to -work, but he was too close to it all, too tired. It was as if he -were trying to tell of a misfortune that had no beginning, and whose -every phase was his own heart’s concern. His weariness was like the -beginning of death--coldness and pervading _ennui_. Against his -will he was gathered in the glowing currents of Duke Fallows--watching, -listening, not pretending even to understand, but borne along. Together -they went in to the General’s private room. Lowenkampf looked up, -gathered himself with difficulty and smiled. Fallows turned to Morning, -asked him to stand by the door, then strode forward and knelt by the -General’s knees. It did not seem extraordinary to Morning--so much was -insane. - -“You were chosen, old friend. It has been a big day for the -under-dog----” - -“I have lost Liaoyang.” - -“That was written.” - -“My little boy will hear it in the street. He will hear it in the -school. Before he is a man--he will hear it.” - -“I shall take him upon my knee. I shall tell him of you in a way that -he shall never forget. And his mother--I shall tell her----” - -Lowenkampf rubbed his eyes. - -“I have business in Russia. This day I heard what must be done. It is -almost as if I had gotten to be a man.” - -Fallows leaned back laughingly, his arms extended, as if pushing the -other’s knees from him. - -Some inner wall broke, and the General wept. Morning put his foot -against the door. The thought in his heart was: “This is something I -cannot write.”... - -Morning held the idea coldly now that Fallows was mentally softened -from the strain. Other things came up to support it.... He, too, had -seen a soldier shot by an officer. It was discipline. At best, it was -but one of the thousand pictures. It had happened less because the man -was retiring without a wound--thousands were doing that--than because -the man answered back, when the officer spoke. He did not hear what the -soldier said. This soldier possibly had trans-Baikal children, too. The -day and his long illness had crazed Fallows, now at the knees of the -man who had lost the battle. - -“... I know what you thought this morning--when you saw your men march -down into the grain,” Fallows was saying to the General. “You thought -of your little boy and his mother. You thought of the babes and wives -and mothers--of those soldiers of yours whom you were sending to the -front. You didn’t want to send them out. You’re too close to becoming a -man for that. You wondered if you would not have to suffer for sending -them out so--and if this particular suffering would not have to do with -_your_ little boy and his mother----” - -“My God, stop, Fallows----” - -“You had to think that. You wouldn’t be Lowenkampf if you failed to -think that.... I love you for it, old friend. Big things will come from -Lowenkampf, and from the conscript who came to me out of the grain with -vision and a voice. The battle at home won’t be so hard to win--now -that this is lost.” - -There was a challenge and heavy steps on the platform--and one low, -hurried voice. - -Lowenkampf stood up and wiped his eyes. - -“The Commander----” he whispered. - -A pair of captains towered above him, a grizzled colonel behind; then -Morning saw the gray of the short beard, and the dark, dry-burning -of unblinking eyes, fixed upon Lowenkampf.... The latter’s shoulders -drooped a little, and his eyes lowered deprecatingly for just an -instant. Kuropatkin passed in. The soft fullness of his shoulders was -like a woman’s. Fleshly and failing, he looked, from behind.... The -Americans waited outside with the colonel and captains. The door was -shut. - -Midnight.... Fallows and Morning had moved in the rain among the -different commands. The army at Yentai seemed to be emerging from -prolonged anæsthesia to find itself missing in part and strangely -disordered. It was afraid to sleep, afraid to think of itself, and -denied drink. Fallows had told everywhere the story of the Ploughman; -just now he helped himself to a bundle of Morning’s Chinese parchment, -and was writing copy in long-hand. - -His head was bowed, his eyes expressionless. - -“And I alone remain to tell thee!” he muttered at last. - -Morning did not answer, but resigned himself to hear more of the -Messiah who came out of the grain. - -“I told one of Mergenthaler’s aides the story,” Fallows said coldly. -“He said it was quite the proper thing to do--to shoot down a man -who was leaving the field unwounded. I told Manlewson of the First -Siberians, who replied that the Russians would begin to win battles -when they murdered all such, as unflinchingly and instantly as the -Japanese did, and hospital malingerers as well. I told Bibinoff (who -is Luban’s captain), and he said: ‘That’s the first good thing I ever -heard about Luban.’ He was pleased and epigrammatic....” - -Fallows stood up--his face was in shadow, so far beneath was the -odorous lamp. - -“Living God--I can’t make them see--I can’t make them see! They’re -all enchanted. Or else I’m dead and this is hell.... They talk about -Country. They talk about making a man stand in a place of sure death -for his Country--in this Twentieth Century--when war has lost its -last vestige of meaning to the man in the ranks, and his Country is a -thing of rottenness and moral desolation! What is the Country to the -man in the ranks? A group of corrupt, inbred undermen who study to -sate themselves--to tickle and soften themselves--with the property -and blood and slavery of the poor.... A good man, a clean man, is torn -from his house to fight, to stand in the fire-pits and die for such -monsters. Suddenly the poor man sees! - -“... He came forth from the grain with vision--smiling and unafraid. -He is not afraid to fight, but he has found himself on the wrong side -of the battle. When he fights again it will be for his child, for his -house, for his brother, for his woman, for his soul. Blood in plenty -has he for such a war.... Think of it, John Morning, the Empire was -entrusted to poor little Luban--against this man of vision! He came -forth smiling from the grain. ‘_I do not belong here, my masters. -I was torn away from my woman and children, and I must be home for -the winter ploughing. It is a long way--and I must be off. I am a -ploughman, not a soldier. I belong to my children and my field. My -country does not plough my field--does not feed my children...._ -What could Luban do but kill him--little agent of Herod? But the starry -child lives!... - -“And listen, John, to-night--you heard them--we heard these fat-necked, -vulture-breasted commanders--vain, envy-poisoned, scandal-mongering -commanders, complaining to each other: ‘See, what stuff has been given -us to win battles with!... I have told it and they cannot see. They -are not even good devils; they are not decent devourers. They have -no humor--that is their deadly sin. An adult, half-human murderer, -seeing his soldiers leave the field, would cry aloud, ‘Hello, you -Innocents--so you have wakened up at last!’ But these cannot see. -Their eyes are stuck together. It is their deadly sin--the sin against -the Holy Ghost--to lack humor to this extent!” - -Morning laughed strangely. “Come on to bed, you old anarchist,” he -said, though sleep was far from his own eyes. - -“That’s it, John. Anarchy. In the name of Fatherland, Russia murders -a hundred thousand workmen out here in Asia. In answer, a few men and -women gather together in a Petersburg cellar, saying, ‘We are fools, -not heroes. When we fight again it will be for _Our_ Country!’ And -they are anarchists--their cause is Terrorism!” - -“We’re all shot to pieces to-night, Duke----” - -“We are alive, John. Lowenkampf is alive. But he who spoke to me this -day, who came forth so blithely to die in my arms (his woman sleeps ill -to-night in the midst of her babes), and he is lying out in the rain, -his face turned up to the rain. God damn the fat reptile that calls -itself Fatherland!... But, I say to you, that we’re come nearly to the -end of the prince and pauper business on this planet. The soul of the -Ploughman was heard to-day--as long ago they heard the Soul of the -Carpenter.... He is lying out there in the millet--his face turned up -to the rain. Yet I say to you, John, there’s more life in him this hour -than in his Tsar and all the princes of the blood.” - -Fallows covered his face with his hands. - -“You’re tired and thick to-night, John, but you are one who must see!” -he finished passionately. “You must help me tell the story to the -cellar gatherings in Petersburg, to the secret meetings in all the -centers of misery, wherever a few are gathered together in the name of -Brotherhood--in New York, London, Paris, and Berlin.... You must help -me to make other men see--help me to tell this thing so that the world -will hear it, and with such power that the world will be unable longer -to lie to itself. - -“I can see it now--how Jesus, the Christ, tried to make men see.... -That was His Gethsemane--that He could not make men see. I tell you it -is a God’s work--and it came to Jesus, the Christ, at last--‘If they -crucify me, perhaps, a few will see!’... I’m going over to Russia, -John, to learn how to tell them better.” - - - 13 - -THE night of the third of September, and John Morning is off -for the big adventure. Between the hills, the roads are a-stream.... -All day he had watched different phases of the retreat. Fighting back -in the city; fighting here and there along the staggering, burdened, -cruelly-punished line; a sudden breaking-out of fighting in a dozen -places like hidden fires; rain and wounded and seas of mud; the gray -intolerable misery of it all; the sick and the dead--Morning was -glutted with the colossal derangement. And they called it an orderly -retreat. - -He was riding the sorrel Eve out of the zone of war. The battle was -behind him now, and he breathed the world again. He had something to -tell. Liaoyang was in his brain. He was off for the ships that sail. -A month--America--the great story.... He felt the manuscript against -him. It was in a Chinese belt, with money for the passage home, tight -against his body, a hundred thousand words done on Chinese parchment -and wrapped in oil-skin. The book of Liaoyang--he had earned it. He had -written it against the warping cynicism of Duke Fallows. On the ship he -could reshape and renew it all into a master-picture. - -It had been easier than he thought to break away from Fallows, his -friend. The latter was whelmed in the soul of the Ploughman. A big -story, of course, as Fallows saw it--but there were scores of big -stories. It would ruin it to let an anarchist tell it. Suppose officers -in general did stop to listen to troops sneaking off the field? - -Duke had given him a letter, and a story for the _Western States_. -The first was not to be read until he was at sea out from Japan. When -Morning spoke of the money he owed, the other had put the thought -away. Sometime he would call for it if he needed it; it was a trifle -anyway.... It hadn’t been a trifle. It had meant everything. - -Morning was glad to breathe himself again. Yet there was an ache in -his heart for Duke Fallows, now off for Europe the western way. He, -Morning, had not done his part. He hadn’t given as he had taken; had -not kept close to Duke Fallows at the last. There was a big score that -money could never settle. Soundly glad to be alone, but in the very -gladness the picture of Duke Fallows returned--lying on his back, in -bunks and berths and beds, staring up at the ceiling, accentuating -his own failures to bring out the hopeful and valorous parts of his -friend. It was always such a picture to Morning, when Fallows came -to mind--staring, dreaming, looking up from his back. It had seemed -sometimes as if he were trying to make of his friend all that he had -failed to be.... Yet the Duke Fallows of the last twenty-four hours, -wild, dithyrambic--had been too much.... Again and again, irked and -heavy with his own limitations, Morning’s brain had seized upon the -weakness of the other, to condone his own slowness of understanding.... -It may have been Eve, and her relation to the Fallows revelation, or -it may have been putting hideous militarism behind, that made John -Morning think of Women now as he rode, and a little differently from -ever before.... Certain laughing sentences of Duke Fallows came back to -him presently, with a point he seemed to have missed when they were -uttered: - -“We have our devils, John. You have ambition; Lowenkampf has drink; -Mergenthaler has slaughter.... You will love a woman; you already -drink too readily, but Ambition will stand in your house and fight -from room to room at the last--and over the premises to the last -ditch. He’s a grand devil--is Ambition.... My devil, John? Well, it -isn’t the big-jawed male who loves a woman as she dreams to be loved. -It’s the man with a touch of women in him--just enough to begin upon -her mystery.... When I hear a certain woman’s voice, or see a certain -passing figure--something old, very old and wise, stirs within, seems -to stir and thrill with eternal life. And, John, it isn’t low--the -thought. I’d tell you if it were. It isn’t low. It’s as regal as Mother -Nature in a valley, on a long afternoon. It isn’t that I want to hurt -her; it isn’t that I want something she has. Rather, I want all she -has! I want her mind; I want her soul; I want her full animations. -I want to make her yield and give; I want to feel her battle with -herself, not to yield and give.... Oh, the flesh is nothing. It is the -cheapest thing in the world--but her giving, her yielding--it’s like -an ocean tide. It breaks every bond; it laughs at every law. Power -seems to rush into a woman when she yields! That’s the conquest of my -heart--to feel that power.... All devils are young compared to that in -a man’s heart--all but one, and that is the passion to hold spiritual -dominion over other men.” - -Morning’s mind had fallen into the habit of allowing much for the -other’s sayings--of accepting much as mere facility.... Thus he thought -as he traveled in the rain, Eve’s swift, springy trot a stimulus to -deep thinking; and always there was a bigger and finer John Morning -shadowing him, fathoming his smallnesses, wondering at his puny -rebellions and vain desires. It was in this fairer John Morning, -so tragically unexpressed during the past few months, that the pang -lived--the pang of parting from his friend. - -Morning was terrific physically. The thing he was now doing was as -spectacular a bit of newspaper service as ever correspondent undertook -in Asia; and yet, to John Morning the high light of achievement -fell upon the manuscript, not upon the action. It had not occurred -to him to be afraid. If he could get across the ninety miles to -Koupangtse--through the _Hun huises_, through the Japanese -scouting cavalry, across two large and many smaller yellow rivers--and -reach the railroad, he would quickly get a ship for Japan from -Tientsin or Tongu--and from Japan--_home_.... He was doing it for -himself--passionately and with no sense of splendor. - -Fallows had been so sure of his friend’s physical courage, that he made -no point of it, in the expression of attachment.... He had called it -vision at first, this thing that had drawn him to John Morning--a touch -of the poet, a touch of the feminine--others might have called it. No -matter the name, he had seen it, as all artists of the expression of -the inner life recognize it in one another; and Fallows knew well that -where the courage of the soldier ends, the courage of the visionary -begins. - -Morning was a trifle peculiar, however. Unless it sank utterly, he -stuck to a ship, until the horizon revealed another sail. - -He had come up through the dark. The world had grounded him deeply in -illusion. Most brilliant of promises--even Fallows had not seen him -that first day in too bright a dawn--but he learned hard. And his had -been close fighting--such desperate fighting that one does not hear -voices, and one is too deep in the ruck to see the open distance.... -Much as he had been alone--the world had invariably shattered his -silences. Always he had worked--worked, worked furiously, angrily, for -himself.... He was taught so. The world had caught him as a child in -his brief, pitiful tenderness. The world was his Eli. As from sleep, he -had heard Reality calling. He had risen to answer, but the false Eli -had spoken--an Eli that did not teach him truly to listen, nor to say, -when he heard the Voice another time--“Speak, Lord, for thy servant -heareth.” - - - 14 - -THE Taitse, of large and ancient establishment, runs westward -from Liaoyang for twenty-five miles, and in a well-earned bed, portions -of which are worn in the rock. Morning rode along the north bank, -thus avoiding altogether a crossing of the Taitse, since his journey -continued westward from the point where the river took its southward -bend. From thence it paralleled the Hun in a race to join the Liao. The -main stem of the latter was beyond the Hun, and these two arteries of -Asia broke Morning’s trail. Fording streams of such magnitude was out -of the question, and there was a strong chance of an encounter with the -_Hun huises_ at the ferries.... - -Rain, and the sorrel’s round hoofs sucked sharply in the clay. She -had no shoes to lose in these drawing vacuums. The scent of her came -up warm and good to the horse-lover. Alone on a road, she had always -been manageable, hating crowds and noise--soldiers, Chinese, and -accoutrements. Perhaps, this was merely a biding of time. Eve had a -fine sense of keeping a strange road. This was not usual, although a -horse travels a familiar road in the darkness better than a man. These -two worked well together. - -By map the distance from Liaoyang to Koupangtse was seventy miles. -Morning counted upon ninety, at least. The Manchurian roads are old and -odd as the Oriental mind.... He passed the southward bend of the big -river, and at daybreak reached Chiensen, ten miles beyond, on the Hun. - -Chiensen, unavoidable on account of the ferry, was a danger-point. -Japanese cavalry, it was reported, frequently lit there, and the _Hun -huises_ (Chinese river-pirates and thieves in general, whom Alexieff -designated well as “the scourge of Manchuria”) were at base in this -village.... In the gray he found junks, a flat tow and landing. - -You never know what Chinese John is going to do. If you have but -little ground of language between you, he will take his own way, on -the pretext of misunderstanding. Morning’s idea was to get across -quickly, without arousing the river-front. He awoke the ferryman, -placing three silver taels in his hand. (He carried silver, enough -native currency to get him to Japan, his passport, and the two large -envelopes Duke Fallows had given him, in the hip-pockets of his riding -breeches.) The ferryman had no thought of making the first crossing -without tea. Morning labored with him, and with seeming effect for a -moment, but the other fell suddenly from grace and aroused his family. -He was not delicate about it. Morning resigned himself to the delay, -and was firmly persuading Eve to be moderate, as she drank from the -river’s edge, when Chinese John suddenly aroused the river population. -Standing well out on the tow-flat, he trumpeted at some comrade of the -night before, apparently no less than a hundred yards up the river. -There were sleepy answers from many junks within range of the voice. -It was the one hateful thing to John Morning--yet to rough it with the -ferryman for his point of view would be the only thing worse. - -The landing was rickety; its jointure with the tow-boat imperfect. -The American took off his coat, tossed it over the sorrel’s head, -tying the sleeves under her throat. She stiffened in rebellion, but -as the darkness was as yet little broken by the day, she decided to -accept the situation. Morning felt her growing reluctance, however, -as she traversed the creaking, springy boards. The crevasse between -the landing and the craft was bridged; and the latter, grounded on the -shore-side, did not give. The mare stood in the center of the tow, -sweating and tense. - -Numerous Chinese were now abroad--eager, even insistent, to help. Their -voices stirred the mare to her old red-eyed insanity. Morning could -hold himself no longer. Once or twice before in his life this hard, -bright light had come to his brain. Though the exterior light was -imperfect, the ferryman saw the fingers close upon the butt of the gun, -and something of the American’s look. He dropped his tea, sprang to -the junk and pulled up the bamboo-sail. This was used to hold the tow -against the current. - -Two natives in the flat-boat stood ready with poles. And now the -ferryman spoke in a surprised and disappointed way as he toiled in -front. He seemed ready to burst into tears; and the two nearer Morning -grunted in majors and minors, according to temperament. The American -considered that it might all be innocent, although the voices were many -from the town-front. Poling began; the tow drew off from the landing. -Clear from the grounding of the shore, the craft sank windily to its -balance in the stream. - -This was too much for Eve. Her devil was in the empty saddle. She -leaped up pawing. The two Chinese at the poles dived over side -abruptly. Water splashed Eve’s flanks, and she veered about on her -hind feet--blinded and striking the air in front. The wobble of the -tow now finished her frenzy--and back she went into the stream. The -saddle saved her spine from a gash on the edge of the tow. Morning had -this thought when Eve arose; that he need fear no treachery from the -Chinese; and this as she fell--a queer, cool, laughing thought--that -after such a fall she would never walk like a man again. - -He had been forced to drop the bridle, but caught it luckily with -one of the poles as she came up struggling. He beckoned the ferryman -forward, and Eve, swimming and fighting, was towed across. To Morning -it was like one of his adventures back in the days of the race-horse -shipping. - -Eve struck the opposite bank--half-strangled from her struggle and the -blind. The day had come. The nameless little town on this side of the -Hun was out to meet him. Had he brought a Korean tiger by a string, -however, he could not have enjoyed more space--as the mare climbed -from the stream. He talked to her and unbound her eyes. Red and deeply -baleful they were. She shook her head and parted her jaws. The circle -of natives widened. Morning straightened the saddle and patted Eve’s -neck softly, talking modestly of her exploit.... Natives were now -hailing from mid-stream, so he leaped into the sticky saddle and guided -the mare out to the main road leading to Tawan on the Liao.... Queerly -enough, just at this instant, he remembered the hands and the lips of -the ferryman--a leper. - -Ten miles on the map--he could count thirteen by the road--and then -the Liao crossing.... The mare pounded on until they came to a wild -hollow, rock-strewn, among deserted hills. Morning drew up, cooled his -mount and fed the soaked grain strapped to the saddle since the night -before. Eve was not too cross to eat--nor too tired. She lifted her -head often and drew in the air with the sound of a bubble-pipe.... Just -now Morning noted a wrinkle in his saddle blanket. Hot with dread, he -loosed the girth. - -He looked around in terror lest anyone see his own shame and fear. He -had put the saddle on in the dark, but passed his hand between her -back and the cloth. Long ago a trainer had whipped him for a bad bit -of saddling; even at the time he had felt the whipping deserved. He -lifted the saddle. A pink scalded mouth the size of a twenty-five-cent -piece was there.... God, if he could only be whipped now. She was -sensitive as satin; it was only a little wrinkle of the rain-soaked -blanket.... His voice whimpered as he spoke to her. - -Only a horseman could have suffered so. He washed the rub, packed soft -lint from a Russian first-aid bandage about to ease the pressure; and -then, since the rain had stopped again, he rubbed her dry and walked -at her head for hours, despairing at last of the town named Tawan. -The Liao was visible before the village itself. Morning shook with -fatigue. He had to gain the saddle for the possible need of swift -action, but the wound beneath never left his mind. It uncentered his -self-confidence--a force badly needed now. - -And this was the Liao--the last big river, roughly half-way. The end of -the war-zone, it was, too, but the bright point of peril from _Hun -huises_.... Morning saw the thin masts of the river junks over -the bowl of the hill, their tribute flags flying.... To pass was the -day’s work, to make the ferry with Eve. There was too much misery and -contrition in his heart for him to handle her roughly. The blind could -not be used again. She would connect that with the back-fall into the -Hun. The town was full of voices. - - - 15 - -CHINESE were gathering. Morning went about his business as if -all were well, but nothing was good to him about the increase of these -hard, quick-handed men. They were almost like Japanese. With the tail -of his eye, he saw shirt signals across the river. The main junk fleet -was opposite. Trouble--he knew it. The hard, bright light was in his -brain. - -In the gathering of the natives, Eve was roused afresh. His only way -was to try her without the blind. If she showed fight, he meant to -mount quickly and ride back through the crowd for one of the lower-town -crossings. - -Without looking back, he led the way to the landing, holding just the -weight of the bridle-rein. His arm gave with her every hesitation. -To his amazement she consented to try. The tow-craft was larger -here--enough for a bullock-pair and cart--and better fitted to the -landing. Step by step she went with him to her place. - -Now Morning saw that in using the blind the first time he had done her -another injury. She would not have gone back into the Hun but for that. -She awed him. Something Fallows had said recurred--about her being -unconquerable, different every day. Also Fallows had said, “She will -kill you at the last....” - -He drove back the Chinese, all but two pole-men, that would have -gathered on the tow. This was quietly done, but his inflexibility was -felt. Many signals were sent across, as the tow receded from the shore, -and numbers increased on the opposite bank. - -Eve, breathing audibly, swung forward and back with the craft, as it -gave to the river. The towing junk, as in the Hun, held the other -against the current; the rest was poling and paddling.... The junk -itself slipped out of the way as the tow was warped toward the landing. -Other junks were stealing in.... Morning already had paid. He felt the -girth of the saddle, fingered the bridle, tightened his belt. A warm, -gray day, but he was spent and gaunt and cold. Eve was hushed--mulling -her bit softly, trembling with hatred for the Chinese. - -The road ascended from the river, through a narrow gorge with rocky -walls. The river-men were woven across the way. While the tow was -yet fifteen feet from the landing, Morning gained the saddle. The -ferry-man gestured frantically that this had never been done before; -that a man’s beast properly should be led across. Morning laughed, -tightened his knees, and at an early instant loosened the bridle-rein, -for the mare to jump. The heavy tow shot back as she cleared the -fissure of stream. - -Morning was now caught in the blur of events. The Chinese did not give -way for the mare, as she trotted across the boards to the rocky shore. -Up she went striking. Again he had not known Eve. The back-dive into -the Hun had not cured her. She would walk like a man and pitch back -into Hell--and do it again.... Someone knifed her from the side and she -toppled. - -The fall was swift and terrible, for the trail sloped behind. Morning’s -instinct was truer than his brain, but there was no choice of way to -jump. He could not push the mare from him completely to avoid the -cliff. He was half-stunned against the wall, and not clear from the -struggle of her fall. The brain is never able to report this instant -afterward, even though consciousness is not lost. He was struck, -trampled; he felt the cold of the rock against his breast, and the burn -of a knife. - -The Chinese struck at him as he rose. The mare was up, facing him, but -dragging him upward, as a dog with a bone. His left hand found the -pistol. He cleared the Chinese from him, emptying the chambers.... Eve -let him come to her. He must have gained the saddle as she swung around -in the narrow gorge to begin her run. The wind rushed coldly across -his breast and abdomen. His shirt had been cut and pulled free. It was -covered with blood. He tried to hold the mare, but either his strength -was gone or she was past feeling the bit. It was her hour. All Morning -could do was to keep the road. - -He was all but knocked out. He had mounted as a fighter gets up under -the count--and fights on without exactly knowing. The mare was running -head down. He tried his strength again. The reins were rigid; she had -the bit and meant to end the game.... He loved her wild heart; mourned -for her; called her name; told her of wrongs he had done. Again and -again, the light went from him; sometimes he drooped forward to her -thin, short mane, and clung there, but the heat of her made him ill. -They came into hills, passed tiny villages. It was all strange and -terrible--a hurtling from high heaven.... Eve was like a furnace.... - -And now she was weaving on the road--running drunkenly, unless his eyes -betrayed.... The rushing wind was cold upon his breast. His coat was -gone; his shirt had been cut. He tried to pull the blood-soaked ends -together. At this moment the blow fell. - -These Chinese had been quick-handed, and they knew where to search for -a man’s goods. He was coldly sane in an instant, for the rending of his -whole nature; then came the quick zeal for death--the intolerableness -of living an instant. The wallet--the big story--some hundreds of tales -in paper! It was the passing of these from next his body that had left -him cold.... Fury must have come to his arms. The mare lifted her head -under his sudden attack. - -Yes, he could manage her now. The bloody mouth and the blind-mad head -came up to him--her front legs giving like a colt’s. Down they went -together. Morning took his fall limply, with something of supremely -organized indifference, and turned in the mud to the mare. - -She was dead. The gray of pearl was in her eyes where red life had -been.... No, she raised herself forward, seemed to be searching for -him, her muzzle sickly relaxed. She could not stir behind. Holding -there for a second--John Morning forgot the big story. - -Eve fell again. He crawled to her--tried to lift her head. It was heavy -as a sheet-anchor to his arms.... Her heart had broken. She had died on -her feet--the last rising was but a galvanism.... He looked up into the -gray sky where the clouds stirred sleepily. He wanted to ask something -from something there.... He could not think of what he wanted.... Oh, -yes, his book of Liaoyang. - -And now his eye roved over the mare.... Her hind legs were sheeted with -fresh blood and clotted with dry.... Desperately he craned about to see -further. Entrails were protruding from a knife wound. The inner tissues -were not cut, but the opened gash had let them sag horribly. She had -run from Tawan with that wound.... He had worn her to the quick in -night; blinded her for the Hun crossing, when she would have done nobly -with eyes uncovered.... He had not been able to keep her from killing -herself.... John Morning, the horseman.... He had left a gaping wound -in the spirit of Duke Fallows.... All that he had done was failure and -loss; all that he had planned so passionately, so brutally, indeed, -that the needs and the offerings of others had not reached his heart, -because of the iron self-purpose weighed there. - -Luban, Lowenkampf, Mergenthaler, even the Commander-in-chief, looked -strangely in through the darkened windows of his mind. The moral -suffocation of the grain-fields surged over him again.... He caught a -glimpse of that last moment in the ravine, but not the taking of the -wallet.... Was it just a dream that a native leaped forward to grasp -his stirrup, and that he leaned down to fire? He seemed to recall the -altered brow. - -The pictures came too fast. The sky did not change. The something did -not answer.... Eve was lying in the mud. She looked darker and huddled. -He kissed her face, and as he gained his feet, the thought came -queerly that _he_ might be dead, as she was. He held the thought -of action to his limbs and made them move. - -When he could think more clearly, he scorned the pain and protest of -his limbs. He would not be less than Eve. If he were not dead, he would -die straight up, and on the road to Koupangtse. - - - 16 - -THIRTY-SIX hours after Morning left Eve, an English correspondent -at Shanhaikwan added the following to a long descriptive letter -made up of refugee tales, and the edges and hearsay of the -war-zone: - - Night of Sept. 5.... An American whose name by passport is John - Morning reached here to-night on the _Chinese Eastern_, having - left Koupangtse this morning. According to his story, he was with the - Russians, now in retreat from Liaoyang, on the night of Sept. 3, only - forty-eight hours from this writing. - - Morning was in an unconscious condition upon arrival. His passage - had been fourth-class for the journey, and he was packed among the - coolies and refugees on an open flat-car so crowded that all but the - desperately fatigued had room only to stand. This white man had fallen - to the floor of the car, among the bare feet of the surging Oriental - crowd, beneath their foul garments. - - ... He was lifted forth from the car by the Chinese--a spectacle - abjectly human, covered with filth; moreover, his body was incredibly - bruised, his left puttee legging torn by a deep knife-wound that began - at the knee, and traversed a distance of eight inches downward--the - whole was gummed and black with blood; another knife-wound in his side - was in an angry condition, and his clothing was stiffened from flow of - it. - - A few _taels_ in paper and silver were found upon him; the - passport, an unopened letter addressed to himself; also a manuscript - addressed to a San Francisco paper, and to be delivered by John - Morning. The natives reported that he had reached Koupangtse an hour - before the arrival of the _Chinese Eastern_; had employed a - native to buy him fourth-class passage, paying the native also to - help him aboard. He had collapsed, however, until actually among the - Chinese on the flat-car. He had tasted neither food nor drink during - the long day’s journey, nor in Koupangtse during the wait. The natives - affirm that he crawled part of the distance up to the railway station; - and that there were no English or Americans there. - - Upon reaching here, Morning was revived with stimulants, his wounds - bathed and dressed, fresh clothing provided. His extraordinary - vitality and courage indicate that he will overcome the shocks and - exhaustion of a journey hardly paralleled anywhere, if his story be - true. He asserts that he must be on his way to Tientsin to-morrow - morning--but that, of course, is impossible.... He is not in condition - to answer questions, although undoubtedly much is in his dazed and - stricken brain for which the world is at this moment waiting. - - In his half-delirium, Morning seems occupied with the loss of a - certain sorrel mare. He also reports the loss of his complete story - of the battle, the preliminary fighting, the generals in character - sketch, the terrain and all, covering a period of four months up to - the moment of General Zarubaieff’s withdrawal from the city proper. - This manuscript, said to contain over a hundred thousand words done on - Chinese parchment, was in a wallet with the writer’s money, and was - cut from him in the struggle on the bank of the Liao, when the wounds - were received. His assailants were doubtless _Hun huises_. - - Whatever can be said about the irrational parts of his story, the - young man appears to know the story of the battle from the Russian - standpoint. He brings the peculiar point of view that it was the - millet that defeated the Russians, although the superiority of the - Japanese in _morale_, markmanship, fluidity, is well known, etc. - -... Morning lay in a decent room at the Rest House in Shanhaikwan. -There seemed an ivory finger in his brain pointing to the sea--to -Japan, to the States. So long as he was walking, riding, entrained, -all was well enough, and the rest was mere body that had to obey--but -when he stopped, the ivory finger grew hot or icy by turns; and as now, -he watched in agony for the day and the departure of the train for -Tientsin. - -He would require help. Below the waist he was excruciating wreckage -that for the present would not answer his will.... They were good to -him here. The Chinese coolies had been good to him on the open car.... -Lowenkampf, Fallows, good to him--so his thoughts ran--the sorrel -Eve was his own heart’s mate. He loved her running, dying, striking. -She had run until her heart broke. He could not do less. She had run -until she was past pain--he must do that--and go on after that.... -Was it still in his brain--the great story? Would it clear and write -itself--the great story? - -That was the question. All was well if he could get Liaoyang out in -words. He would do it all over again on the ship. Every day the ship -would be carrying him closer to the States. He was still on schedule. -He would reach America on the first possible ship after the battle of -Liaoyang--possibly, ahead of mails. On the voyage he would re-do the -book--twenty days--five thousand words a day. He might do it better. -It might come up clean out of the journey, the battle itself and the -pictures strengthened, brightened, impregnated with fresh power.... -Three weeks--every moment sailing to the States--the first and fastest -ship!... The driving devil in his brain would be at rest. The big story -would clear, as he began to write. The days of labor at first would -change to days of pure instrumentation. He would drive at first--then -the task would drive him.... But he must not miss a possible day to -Japan--to Nagasaki.... He had not money for the passage to America. At -this very moment he could not get out of bed--but these two were mere -pups compared to the wolves he had met.... - -They found him on the floor drawing on his clothes in the morning--an -hour before the train. His wounds were bleeding, but he laughed at that. - -“You see, I’ve got to make it. You’ve been very kind. I’ll heal on the -way--not here. I’ve got the big story. I’ve got to keep moving to think -it out. I can’t think here. I’ll get on--thank you.” - -And he was on. That night his train stopped for ten minutes at Tongu, -the town near the Taku Forts, at the mouth of the Pei-ho.... All day -he had considered the chance of getting ship here, without going on -to Tientsin, seventy miles up-river. The larger ships lightered their -traffic from Tongu; he might catch a steamer sailing to-night for -Japan, or at least for Chifu.... It was getting dark. - -The face that looked through the barred window at the Englishman in -charge of the station at Tongu unsettled the latter’s evening and many -evenings afterward. - -“Is there a ship from the river-mouth to-night?” - -Morning repeated his question, and perceived that the agent had dropped -his eyes to the two hands holding the ticket-shelf. Morning’s nails -were tight in the wood; he would wobble if he let go. - -“Yes, there’s the little _Tungsheng_. She goes off to-night----” - -“For Japan?” - -“Yes, but she doesn’t carry passengers--that is--unless the Captain -gives up his quarters, and he has already done that this trip.” - -“Deck passengers----” - -“Sure, all carry coolies out of here--best freight we have.” - -“Do you sell the tickets?” - -“Who’s going?” - -“My servant.... I won’t go on to Tientsin if I can get--get him on -to-night----” - -“The launch and lighter are supposed to be down shortly from -Tientsin--that’s all I can say. It’s blowing a bit. She may not clear.” - -“She’ll clear if any does?” - -“Yes, Himmelhock has taken her out of here worse than this. You’d -better decide--I’ve got to go out now. The train’s leaving.” - -Seventy miles up the river, he thought,--the wrong way if he stuck -to the train. Every mile that ivory finger would torture him. His -brain now seemed holding back an avalanche. If he chose falsely, he -would tumble down the blackness with the rocks and glaciers.... This -Englishman looked a gamester--he might help. Perhaps he wasn’t a corpse. - -“I’ll stay,” he said, and the story and all his purpose wobbled and -grew black.... He mustn’t forget. He mustn’t fall.... So he stood there -holding fast to the ticket-shelf, which he could not feel--held and -held, and the train clattered, grew silent, and it was dark. - -“Where’s your servant?” - -Morning’s lips moved. - -“Where is your servant?” - -“I am my servant.” - -“I can’t give a white man deck passage. It’s not only against the -rules--but against reason.” - -Morning groped for his arm. “Take me into the light,” he said. - -The man obeyed. - -“What day is this?” - -“Night of September six.” - -“I left Liaoyang the night of the third. I rode a good horse to -death--along the Taitse, over the Hun and the Liao. I rode through the -_Hun huises_ twice. I was all cut up and beaten--the horse went -over backward in the Hun, and in the gut on the bank of the Liao.... -I was in Liaoyang for the battle. I was there four months waiting for -the battle. They took my story--hundred thousand words--the _Hun -huises_ did, in the fight on the Liao bank. The horse killed herself -running with me ... but I’ve got it all in my head--the story. I’ll get -to the States with it before any mail--before any other man. It’s all -in my head--the whole Russian-end. I can write it again on the ship to -the States in three weeks.... I’ve got to get off to-night. You’re the -one to help me.... See these----” - -Morning opened his shirt and then started to undo his legging. - -“For God’s sake--don’t.... But you’ll die on the deck----” - -“No, the only way to kill me would be to wall me up--so I couldn’t keep -moving.” - -“I’ll go down to the river with you in a few minutes.” - -And then he had John Morning sobbing on his shoulder. - - - 17 - -THE Englishman at Tongu was a small, sallow man, with the face -of one who is used to getting the worst of it. Tongu, as a post, was no -exception from an outsider’s point of view. Morning saw this face in -odd lights during the days that followed. It came to the chamber of -images--and always he wanted to break down, and his hands went out for -the shoulder.... He remembered a pitching junk in the windy blackness -at the mouth of the Pei-ho. (He had seen the low mud-flats of the Taku -forts from here in another service.)... The _Tungsheng_ looked -little--not much bigger than the junk, and she was wooden. There was -chill and a slap of rain in the blackness. - -“Hul-lo, who is dere?” The slow, juicy voice came from the door of the -pilot-house. - -“Endicott. I’ve got a deck passenger----” - -“Huh--dere dick as meggots alretty----” - -“This is a kitchen coolie of mine--he must go. Send someone down to -make a place and take his transportation----” - -The grumbling that followed was a matter of habit rather than of -effectiveness. Morning seemed to see the lower lip from which the voice -came, a thick and loppy member.... The mate came down, stepping from -shoulder to back, across the complaining natives. They were three deep -on the deck. He kicked clear a hole in the lee of the cabin.... Morning -sank in, and Endicott bent to whisper: - -“Put the grub-basket between your knees and don’t take your hands -off it.... Put the blanket over it. It’s a thick, good blanket. I -could give you a better passage, but they wouldn’t take you--honest, -they wouldn’t. If they see you’re white, tell old Himmelhock you’re -Endicott’s house-coolie. He can’t do anything now.... If you live, -write and send the big story to Endicott at Tongu.” - -Morning was sinking to sleep. He felt the warmth of the blanket, a -thick, rough blanket Endicott had donated. Its warmth was like the -man’s heart.... Morning’s hands went out. A coolie growled at him.... -There was no worry now. It was the night of the sixth, and he was -sailing. He could do no more; the ivory finger in his brain neither -froze nor burned.... The pitching did not rouse him--nor the men -of sewers and fields--sick where they sat--woven, matted together, -trusting to the animal heat of the mass to keep from dying of exposure. -John Morning lay in the midst of them--John Morning whose body would -not die. - -The days and nights rushed together.... - -Sometimes he wondered if he were not back at the shipping--in some -stock-car with the horses--but horses were so clean compared to -this.... When he could think, he put clean lint to his wounds. He -scorned pain, for he was on his way; and much was merciful coma. - -There was rain, deluges; and though the air rose heavy as amber -afterward, the freshness at the time was salvation. He learned as it -is probable no other American ever learned, what it means to live in -the muck of men. All one at the beginning and at the ending, it is -marvelous how men separate their lives in the interval--how little they -know of one another, and how easily foolish noses turn up. Here was a -man alive--dreaming of the baths he had missed, of Japanese Inn baths -most of all. - -“Who am I?” he asked.... “John Morning,” would whip back to him from -somewhere. “And who in hell is John Morning to revolt at the sufferings -of other men?” - -He had seen the coolies in the steerage of many ships--even these -massed deck passages of the Yellow and China Seas and the Coasting -trade. He had looked at them before as one looks into a cage -of animals. Now he was one of those who looked out, one of the -_slumees_. Once he asked, “Is this the bottom of the human drain, -and if not--must I sink to it?” - -The Chinese did steal his food that first night, but fed him -occasionally from their own stock. Finding him white, they fouled him, -but kept him warm.... The _Tungsheng_ ran into Chifu harbor to -avoid a storm, and a full day was lost. John Morning had no philosophy -then--a hell-minded male full of sickness--not good to view, even -through the bars of a cage. But at best to sit five hours, where he sat -more than five days and nights, would condemn the mind of any white man -or woman to chaos, or else restore it to the fine sanity of Brotherhood. - -And then the day when the breeze turned warm and the Islands were -green!... Coolies were men that hour, men with eyes that melted to -ineffable softness. It was like Jesus coming toward them on the -sea--the green hills of Japan. Their hearts broke with emotion; they -wept and loved one another--this mass all molten and integrated into -one. It was like the Savior coming to meet them through the warm bright -air. He would make them clean; their eyes would follow Him always.... - -Morning was not the only one who had to be carried ashore at -Shimoneseki, after the quarantine officer had finished with the herd. -His passport saved him. “I had to come. It was the first ship out -of Tongu. Deck passage was the only way they would take me,” was -the simple story. He was fevered, but strangely subdued that day. -Himmelhock was at the door of the pilot-house, when Morning looked up -from the shore a last time, and his native sailors, bare to the thigh, -were sluicing the decks. - -The bath was heaven. He was able to walk afterward. The officials -burned his clothing, but made it possible for him to buy a few light -things. The wound in his leg was healing; the bruises fading away. The -wound in his side did not heal; it was angry as a feline mouth. - -He had bandages, but no stockings; clean canvas clothing, but no -underwear.... He found that he had to wait before answering when anyone -spoke; and then he was not quite sure if he had answered, and would -try again--until they stopped him. Somewhere long ago there was a -parrot whose eyes were rimmed--with red-brown, and of stony opaqueness. -He couldn’t recall where the parrot was, but it had something to do -with him when he was little, almost beyond memory. His eyes now felt -just as the parrot’s had looked. - -It was a night run back to Nagasaki by rail--his thought was of ships, -ships, ships. He could stand off from the world and see the ships--all -the lines of tossing, steaming ships. Then he would go down to the deck -of one--and below and aft where Asiatics were crowded together. To the -darkest and thickest place among them he would go, and there lie and -rest until the finger in his brain roused him. Then he would find that -the train had stopped. It was the halt that awakened him. - -There were two ships, all but ready to clear for the States, lying -in the harbor of Nagasaki that morning. The first was the liner -_Coptic_, but she had to go north first, a day at Kobe, and -two days at Yokohama, before taking the long southeastern slide to -Honolulu. She was faster than the American transport, _Sickles_ -(with a light load of sick and insane from the Islands), but the latter -was clearing for Honolulu at sundown and would reach San Francisco at -least one day earlier than the liner. Moreover, the _Coptic_ would -have recent mails; the _Sickles_ would beat the mails. - -Money was waiting for him at Tokyo, less than an hour’s journey from -Yokohama; he would have good care and a comfortable passage home on the -old liner, but his brain burned at the thought. Four days north--not -homeward.... The _Sickles_ was clipper-built--she was white and -clean-lined, lying out in the harbor, in the midst of black collier -babies. She was off for Home to-night. He had traveled home once before -on a transport. He was American and she--the flag was there, run -together a bit in the vivid light, but the flag was there! And to-night -he would be at sea--pulling himself together for the big story, alone -with the big story--the ship never stopping--unless they stopped in -ocean to drop the dead.... - -The actual cost of the transport passage is very little, merely a -computation for food and berth; the difficulty is to obtain the -permit. As it was, he had not enough money, barely enough to get up -to Yokohama, second class on the _Coptic_; and yet, this hardly -entered. It was like a home city, this American ship, to one who had -been in the alien heart of the Chinese country so long. He would know -someone, and a telegram from ’Frisco would bring money to him. He had a -mighty reliance from the big story. - -The U. S. quartermaster at Nagasaki was a tired old man. He advised -Morning to cable to Manila for permission. Morning did not say that -he lacked money for this, but repeated his wish to go. The old man -thought a minute and then referred him to Ferry, the _Sickles_ -quartermaster. He had been doing this for thirty years, referring -others to others so that all matters merely struck and glanced from -him. Thus he kept an open mind. Morning wanted something to take -from this office to Ferry of the _Sickles_. The resistance he -encountered heated him. The smell of the deck-passage was in his -nostrils; it seemed in his veins, and made him afraid that others -caught the taint. The old quartermaster did not help him. Morning could -hear his own voice, but could not hold in mind what he said.... The -officer did not seem to be interested in Liaoyang. This disturbed him. -It made him ask if he had not gone mad after all--if he could be wrong -on this main trend, that he had something the world wanted. - -He took a _sampan_ at the harbor-front and went aboard the -transport. Ferry, the _Sickles_ quartermaster, was a tall, lean -man with a shut smile that drooped. The face was a pinched and -diminished Mergenthaler, and brought out the clouds and the manias of -Morning’s mind. - -Were all quartermasters the same? What had become of men? Had the world -lost interest in monster heroisms? Ferry did not help him--on the -contrary, stood looking down with the insolence of superior inches. -Morning found himself telling about the sorrel mare. That would not do. -He returned to the main fact that he had the big story and must get -across the Pacific with it. - -“I can’t take you----” - -Morning heard it, but couldn’t believe. He tried to tell about -the _Hun huises_ and the loss of the manuscript, the walk to -Koupangtse---- - -“Really--it’s no affair of mine. I can’t take you on.... The -_Coptic_ is sailing----” - -And just now Mr. Reever Kennard appeared on the deck. The summer had -added portliness. He was in flannels--a spectacle for children and -animals.... The insignificance of all about was quickened when Mr. -Reever Kennard appeared. The decks were less white, sailors, soldiers -more enlisted. John Morning became an integer of the _Tungsheng’s_ -deck-passage again, and the lining of his nostrils retained the reek of -it. - -“How do you do, Mr. Kennard?” he said. His back was different. He felt -a leniency there, very new or very ancient, as he turned to Ferry, -adding: “This gentleman knows me. We parted in Tokyo this Spring, when -I went over with the Russians. I met him long ago in the Philippine -service. He will tell you----” - -Ferry’s face grew suddenly saturnine, his eyes held in the glance of -the famous correspondent’s. - -“You’ll please count it closed--I can’t take you.” - -Morning now turned to Kennard, who was sealing with his tongue a little -flap of cigar-wrapper which may have prevented the perfect draught. -Morning bowed and moved aft, where the dust of the coaling was thick, -and the scores of natives, women and men, who handled the baskets, were -a distraction which kept the reality from stifling him. Presently he -went ashore and it was noon.... He could not understand Kennard; could -not believe in an American doing what Ferry had done, to a man who had -the big story of Liaoyang. It was some hideous mistake; he had not been -able to make himself understood. - -The _Sickles_ launch was leaving the pier at two. Morning was -there and took a seat. He was holding himself--the avalanche again--and -rehearsing in his mind what he should say to Ferry. His brain was -afire; the wound in his side had scalded him so long that his voice had -a whimper in it. He had not eaten--the thought was repulsive--but he -had bought drink in the thought of clearing his brain and deadening his -hurt.... - -His brain was clearer on the launch, but the gin fumed out of him as he -approached the upper deck, where Ferry’s quarters were. - -The Quartermaster saw him, but was speaking to an infantry captain. -Morning waited by the rail. Many times he thought--if he could only -begin to speak _now_. Yet he feared in his heart when Ferry -turned to him, he would fail. It was something little and testy in the -man--something so different from what he had known in the great strains -of Liaoyang--except for Luban. Yes, Ferry was like Luban, when Luban -was in the presence of a fancied inferior.... They talked on--Morning -thought of murder at last. A peculiar wiry strength gathered about the -idea of murder in its connection with Ferry’s dark, mean face. He felt -all the old strength in his hands, and more from days of pain--days of -holding one’s self--will, body, brain. - -“Well----” Ferry had turned to him suddenly. - -Morning’s thoughts winged away with a swarm of details of the -crime.... “I could tell you something of the Story--I could show you -how they cut me on the Liao--the _Hun huises_----” - -“If you come to this deck again--I’ll send you ashore in irons.” - -At four that afternoon Morning saw the _Coptic_ draw up her chains -and slide out of the harbor, with the swift ease of a river-ferry.... -He could not count himself whipped on the _Sickles_--and this is -the real beginning of John Morning. He was Fate-driven. The man who -did not have the courage to ask his rights in Tokyo--to inquire the -reason of his disbarment, was not through with the American transport -_Sickles_. A full day ahead of the mails in San Francisco--and he -was waiting for the dusk. The fight had been brought to him. He was -dull to the idea of being whipped. - -Three enlisted men were drinking in the little apothecary shop which -Morning had used for the day’s headquarters. They belonged to the -_Sickles_. They had been taking just one more drink for many -minutes. He told them he was sailing on the transport and joined -them in a _sampan_ to the ship when it was dark. The harbor was -still as a dream; the dark blending with the water.... They touched -the bellying white plates of the ship. Morning seemed to come up from -infinite depths.... The men were very drunk; they had ordered rapidly -toward the end; the effect caught up as swiftly now. They helped -each other officiously. Morning put on the fallen hat of one who had -become unconscious.... The watch was of them, a corporal, who was -no trouble-maker. He blustered profusely and hurried them below.... -Morning was bewildered. He had spoken no word, but helped the others -carry the body, a wobbly deputation, down among the hammocks.... He -heard the voices of those maimed in mind.... He placed his end of the -soldier’s body down, left his companions, and made his way forward, to -where the hammocks were farther apart. Early years had given him a -sort of enlisted man’s consciousness of things; and he knew now not to -take another’s place. He chose one from a pile of hammocks and slung -it forward, close to the bulk-head of the bedlam, and well out of the -lights.... He lay across his only baggage, a package containing a -thousand sheets of Chinese parchment. He lay rigid, trying to remember -if out-going ships took a pilot out of Nagasaki. - -He heard the anchor-chain. He was very close to it. The voices of the -sun-struck and vino-maddened men from the Islands were deadened by the -hideous grating of the links in the socket.... It was not too late for -him to be put ashore even now; since it was war-time. Of course there -would be a pilot, for the harbor was mined.... He drew the canvas about -his ears, but the voices of the brain-dead men reached him.... Cats, -pirates, and river-reptiles terrified them; one man was still lost in -a jungle set with bolo-traps; the emptiness of others was filled by -strange abominations glad of the flesh again. - - - 18 - -HE had been listening to Duke Fallows for a long time--Duke’s -voice blended with war and storm and a woman’s laugh.... Then he -reverted to the idea of murdering Ferry. Finally someone said: - -“He’s a new one from Nagasaki. He’s got the fevers----” - -And then: - -“Who in hell is he?” - -They began to ask questions. Morning answered nothing. Day had come. -He heard the throb of the engines, felt the swell of the sea, but the -strength of yesterday’s concentration was still upon him. It had built -a wall around him, holding the life of his mind there; as a life of low -desires imprisons the spirit to its own vile region after death.... He -did not speak, but looked from face to face for Ferry. - -They ceased to expect an answer from him.... A young doctor appeared. -His eyes rolled queerly; his cheek folded over his mouth, as if he were -beyond words from drink, and tremendously pleased with his prowess. -They called him Nevin. He prepared himself profoundly for speech. -Morning now realized the nimbleness of Nevin’s hands, unwinding the -filthy bandages. Presently, the Doctor straightened up, passed his hand -over his brow, tongued the other cheek, and after a sweating suspense -ordered: - -“Take him to the hospital.” - -A white room.... The Doctor came again. They took his clothing and -bathed him.... He heard and smelled the sea through an open port ... -glad, but utterly weary ... waiting for Ferry. - -“My God--not only cut, but trampled----” a voice said. - -Morning felt if he were alone with Nevin he could have said -something.... The Doctor looked like a jockey he had once known. It -wasn’t that, however, that gave him heart, but the quick, gentle -hands.... More and more as he watched the dusty face with its ineffable -gravity, he saw bright humanity burning like a forge-fire behind the -mask. This brought tears to his own eyes. Nevin, seeing them, became -altogether nervous to look at, seemed to have a walnut in his mouth. - -And now John Morning felt himself breaking--he was brittle, hard like -glass--and his last idea concerned the package of Chinese parchment -which they had not brought from the hammock.... Six days afterward he -asked for it. - -For a short while each day, during the interval, he just touched -the main idea and sank back to sleep. He suffered very little. The -after-effects of his journey from Liaoyang tried to murder him in -various ways, but relaxation, nourishment, good air and care worked as -a sort of continuous anæsthesia. On this sixth day the Doctor appeared -to ignore his question about the package of paper, but leaned forward, -glanced to the right and left, as if to communicate a plan to scuttle -the ship, and said: - -“You’re one more little man. You’ve had a new one each day--pneumonia, -sclerosis, brain-fever.... My hospital report on your case will drive -the Major-Surgeon into permanent retirement.... What did you say was -the matter to-day--Chinese parchment?” - -“I’ve got so much to do, Doctor?... What day is this?” - -“Morning of the nineteenth.” - -The color swept into Morning’s face, terror into his eyes. - -“I didn’t think it was so bad as that--I can’t lay up any more--twelve -days left.... Two weeks and two days since I rode out of Liaoyang----” - -“I’ll have to let ’em put you in the forward hutch--if you begin to -talk Liaoyang, now that your fever’s down. There wasn’t any Americans -in that fighting----” - -“I’m not a soldier----” - -Nevin wrung his hands. A thought recurred to Morning. - -“There was a couple of letters in my clothes--one addressed to a paper -in ’Frisco, and one to me.” - -The other was curious enough to send an orderly to search. - -“Have him bring the package of paper, too,” Morning said. When all was -brought in good order, he added: “This letter to me I’ll read later. -The larger package is Duke Fallows’ first hurried story of the battle -of Liaoyang. I won’t read that either, because I’ve got to do one of -my own. I did one, you know--ten times as long as this--but the _Hun -huises_ got it on the Liao-crossing, from Tawan--that’s where I got -cut up. Morning of the fourth, it was.... The sorrel mare did fifteen -miles with her guts sticking out, and I walked thirty to Koupangtse, -with these wounds and smashed from a couple of falls--before the -morning of the fifth.... You can look at Duke Fallows’ story, Doctor, -and I’ll take a little doze----” - -Fallows’ battle was done clearly as a football game, and as briskly, -to the withdrawal of the Russian lines upon the inner positions of the -city and the flanking movement of Kuroki. A dramatic pause then to -survey the Russian force on the eve of disaster, from which the reader -drew the big moral sickness. After that Lowenkampf, the millet and the -Ploughman. In quite a remarkable way Fallows turned the reader now from -the mass to the individual. In a little trampled place in the grain the -battle was lost by the Russians and won by Japan.... The Doctor was -interrupted several times, but no force was missed. It was a new voice -to him. He wondered if Fallows would make the world hear it. It seemed -to compel a reckoning. - -The Fallows story laughed all the way. One did not have to look twice -at a sentence to understand, yet two readings did not wear it out, nor -would it leave one alone. All the time the Doctor read, matters he had -heard in delirium from the lips of John Morning came back. - -Nevin remembered the tears on the first morning, the choke in his own -throat; the first sight of the wounds, the queer, extra zeal he had put -into this case. Finally he could hardly wait to learn the rest--chiefly -how John Morning had happened to be lying in the darkest end of the -hammock-hole, over against the insane compartment.... Yet he did not -wake up his patient. When Morning finally opened his eyes, it was time -for nourishment. Nevin brought a glass of extra wine before inquiring. -“First, tell me--has Ferry seen me?” - -“Captain Ferry, the quartermaster?” - -“Yes.” - -“I’d rather think not. He’s about occasionally--but his truck with the -sick men is mostly transportation and nourishment----” - -“The second time I came to ask him to take me across that -afternoon--the second time,” Morning said slowly, “he told me that if -I appeared on his deck again he’d send me ashore in irons. You see the -_Sickles_ is to beat the _Coptic_ in. I had to come. Why, the -mails couldn’t beat me through from Liaoyang.... I finally got aboard -with some soldiers--but I would have leeched to the anchor.... And, -say, I think I knew you that morning. It seemed as if I could let go -when I felt your hands----” - -The two were quiet. The Doctor looked obliquely at an open port with -one eye shut, as if he were not sure of the count.... - -Accompanying the manuscript was a letter to Noyes, editor of _Western -States_, which chiefly concerned John Morning. Many brave things -were said.... Nevin, deeply stirred with the whole business, saw -the Ploughman coming forth from the millet--saw the Ploughman -going home. That little drama so dear to Fallows’ heart _was_ -greater than Liaoyang. Nevin saw that such things are deathless.... -Deathless--that’s the word. They look little at the time in the midst -of thunder and carnage; but the thunder dies away and the rains come -and clean the stains--and the spirit of it all lives in one deed or in -one sentence. A woman nurses the sick at Scutari, and the Crimean war -is known for the angel of its battlefield, by the many who do not know -who fought, nor what for.... Nevin felt the big forces throbbing in the -world--the work of the world. It had come to him distantly before. It -had pulled him out of the comfort and ease of his home town to serve -the sick at sea and in the Islands. - -The mystery of service. He had never dared tell anyone. His voice broke -so easily. He had covered the weakness in leers and impediments, so the -world would not see. He had talked of his rights and his wages, the -dusty-faced little man. Mystery of Service--and men were ashamed when -it touched them. - -But Fallows, laughing and so powerful, this boy’s man-friend, wasn’t -afraid. Was the boy afraid? What had driven him? Did the boy know what -had driven him? What, in God’s name, had driven this human engine that -would not stop--that threw off poisons and readjusted itself against -the individual and collective organizations of death? - -Nevin was shaken by the whole story--it girded, girdled him.... Let -Ferry come. Ferry was one of those bleak despoilers of human effort, -whose presence consumed the reality in another. What was Ferry anyway -and Ferry’s sort--a spoiled child or an ancient decadent principle? Was -it merely a child-soul with a universe ahead, or was he very old and -very ill--incorrigible self-love on its road back to nothing?... But -the Ploughman lived, Fallows lived, the boy Morning lived--their work -was marching on. - -The Doctor did not speak, because his voice would break. He went about -his work instead--swift magnetic hands.... At least, he could stand -between Morning and the quartermaster--if there were need. - -When he came back Morning was at work, a hard bright look of tension -about him, and a line of white under the strange young beard.... - -“I think I can get it going now. I think it is beginning to come -again,” he said in a hushed tone. The Doctor arranged the pillows -better, sharpened an extra pencil and went out. - -“I may have to do those first pages again,” he said an hour later. -“It’s hard to get out of the hospital--you know, what I mean--a man’s -bath is so important to one lying-up that it shuts out a battle-line. -What a fool a sick man is. But I’ll get it----” - -He fell asleep in the dusk before the candles came. The Doctor found -him cool, his breathing normal.... The next day Morning worked until -Nevin remonstrated. - -“You’ll die, if you go on----” - -“I’ll die, if I don’t,” said Morning. The Doctor knew in his heart -that it was true. Still they compromised. That night, as Morning -dropped down into an abyss of exhaustion, he mumbled the whole story of -Eve--the sorrel mare. “She rose to her feet--white death in her eyes,” -he finished.... - -Nothing attracts the eye on ship-board like a man at work. All idle -ones are caught in the current and come to pay their devoirs to the -man mastered by a strong task.... The Doctor had Morning taken to an -extra berth in his own state-room. The door had a spring lock, for many -medicines and stores were there. Ferry was not likely to happen in -the Doctor’s quarters. The latter even doubted if he would recognize -Morning. He came and went, as the task drove on. Once Morning stopped -to tell him about the deck passage on the _Tungsheng_, and -another time about his brush with the _Hun huises_ in the ravine -across the river from Tawan.... The Doctor saw that Morning had made -a wonderful instrument of himself; he studied how the passion of an -artist works on the body of man. The other found that so long as he ate -regularly and fell asleep without a struggle--he was allowed to go on. - -The _Sickles_ was swinging down into the warmth. The sick man had -a bad day, lying in the harbor at Honolulu. - -“It isn’t the work, Doctor--it’s the ship’s stopping,” Morning said, -squirming in the berth. “It makes my head hot. I see steamy and all -that. I had it when the _Tungsheng_ lay up for a day in Chifu -on account of the blow.... I had it that day in Nagasski when Ferry -wouldn’t take me on. I’ll be all right to-night.... Give me a little -touch of that gin and lime juice----” - -“Just lime juice when heads get hot.... You’re a clever little -drunkard. I’ve been wondering how far you’d go.... Yes, we’ll clear -to-night.... Ferry’s ashore. Come out and see the black boys dive for -pennies.” - - * * * * * - -“There’s something doing with this knife-wound--it doesn’t heal,” the -Doctor said, mid-way between the Islands and the Farallonnes. “The -leg’s all right. Organs and all the little organs seem to thrive on -work. That is, they’re no worse. The leg heals--but this one--you seem -to have established a permanent drain----” - -“Fifty pages yesterday--two hundred words a page,” Morning muttered. - -“Yes--and the day before--and to-morrow--and the night we left -Honolulu.... If a man worked that way for money, he’d be as dead as -Ferry inside of a month.... Have you read your friend Fallows’ story -yet?” - -“No, I don’t dare--a sick man isn’t all himself. And _this_ story -is me. It’s got to be me. It’s better in places than the other, the -one I lost.... I haven’t read Duke’s letter to me yet. He’s strong -medicine. He keeps coming back to me, as it is. I want to get off alone -when the work is done and think. You can’t see him all, when he’s in a -room with you.... He was like you, in being a friend to me.... Yet, I -seem to know you better. You’ve helped me so. I’m pretty happy the way -the story is coming----” - -“See how long you can go without a drink to-day.” - -“It starts me off, you see. It doesn’t seem to touch me--just steams -right off with the work----” - -“That’s rotten sophistry. I’m watching you----” - -Nevin had never seen a body so driven by will. Morning appeared no -worse; certainly he was no better; his brain was in absolute abeyance; -his will crashed through clouds of enervation and irresolution. There -were times when Nevin believed Morning would collapse, when he was -finished with Liaoyang, but he was not so sure now. He was sure, -however, that he must not interfere except in extremity.... This was -part of the big work. Somehow he trusted in Duke Fallows--who had -allowed the boy to write the detailed battle-end, and gone back to -Europe to feed the babes of the Ploughman. That last made him want to -doctor the whole world.... - -Morning had done the story and re-written the lead. The _Sickles_ -would enter the Gate at daylight. - -“There’s seventy-five or eighty thousand words of it. It’s good--unless -I’m crazy. It’s good, unless this is all a dream. God, I’m thirsty.” - -With the work done for the day, however, he asked for lime juice and -water. His temperature was less than two points above normal; nothing -had broken; yet the voyage had not replenished Morning’s body. He could -hardly stand. - -“To-night I’ll read the Fallows’ stuff--and the letters.... Doctor, can -you get me ashore early?” - -“Think a minute--you don’t know what you ask----” - -“Quarantine----” - -Nevin nodded. “There’s extra attention to a ship like this--they’ll -have to see that running wound of yours for instance----” - -“Not if you don’t report it----” - -The Doctor’s lower jaw reached down, and to the right, finding the -walnut. “You wouldn’t even read Duke Fallows’ story before you wrote -yours. A man can’t lie in his own work----” - -“You’ve been so good,” Morning said huskily. “I begin to expect -miracles----” - -“You can get messages--telegrams, letters--ashore.... And then it may -only take a couple of hours. There isn’t any contagion here that I know -of.” - -Morning first read Fallows’ letter to Noyes, editor _Western -States_. It told of the story accompanying--but more of the bearer. -Laughing, loving-hearted, eloquent--Fallows was all through it, and -fine gifts of the man’s thinking. There was suggestion to Noyes to use -Morning’s story and get it across simultaneously in New York. “The boy -has never yet, so far as I can see, found time to arrange a decent -payment for his work. Please observe that unless some one, equally as -capable, gets into Port Arthur, Morning’s story will be the biggest -feature of the war in a newspaper way. I’m going on to Europe on the -Ploughman story. Let Morning do the big battle--I’ll begin to crackle -later.” - -And then Morning read the story.... His voice trailed up finally from -the shadows of lower berth. “It’s good,” he said to the Doctor after -midnight. - -“It’s dam’ good. It’s better than mine.... He was alive with it--I -mean with the _Ploughman_. It’s the way he did it. He tried to -get it across before we separated. He told me from every angle--told -Lowenkampf--told them all at the station at Yentai. None of us could -see.... He was crazed about it--that we couldn’t see. We were all -choked with blood and death that night. He said Kuropatkin and the -others would see that the Ploughman was right--if they had a sense -of humor. Such density to humor, he called the sin against the Holy -Ghost----” - -After they had talked many minutes, Morning broke the seal to his own -letter and learned why he had been barred from the earlier Japanese -armies. - - - 19 - -THE fineness of Fallows, of Nevin, of Endicott, the station-agent -at Tongu, the risen humanity of the Ploughman--Morning’s soul to -sense these men was empty within him. All that he knew was -blood and blow and force and mass and hate. He lay panting and -possessed. As he had plotted in delirium how to kill Ferry, dwelling -upon the process and the death; so Reever Kennard came in now for a -hatred as perfect and destructive. The letter had called up something -of the same force which had driven John Morning from Liaoyang, over or -through every barrier to the present hour in which the _Sickles_ -lay off the entrance of the Golden Gate waiting for dawn, thirty-six -hours ahead of the _Coptic_. - -His work was diminished in his own mind; the value of his story was -lost, the zest to market it, the sense of the world’s waiting. He was -a thief in the eyes of men. A man cannot steal. They believed him a -thief.... He thought of moving about the halls of the _Imperial_ -that day--of his thoughts as he had watched from the window in the -billiard-room while the picture was taken. He had been tranced in -terror.... Had he but known, he would have made a hell in that house. -He saw Reever Kennard again on the deck of the _Sickles_--his -turning to Kennard for help--unparalleled shame.... The thing he -desired with such terrible zeal now was enacted in his brain. That -hour on the deck of the _Sickles_ was repeated, but this time he -knew what Kennard had done. He called him to the lie in imagination. -The jowl was heavy with scorn and the small slow eyes were bright with -fear--yet they took nothing back and Morning moved closer and closer -demanding, until the devil broke from him, and his knotted hand sank -into the soft center of the man. He watched the writhing of that clean -flanneled liar, watched him arise. The hand sank once more ... the -vile play romping through his mind again and again--hideous fighting -of a man brought up among stable and race-track and freight-route -ruffians--the fighting that feels no pain and only a knockout can -stop.... - -“Wow--it’s hot as hell in here,” came from Nevin in the upper bunk. - -A little before dawn, utterly ravaged by the poison of his thinking, -Morning was struck by the big idea. He turned on the light, steadied -himself to paper and pencil and wrote to Noyes of the _Western -States_: - - Inclosed find (I) Duke Fallows’ first story of Liaoyang; (II) - his letter to you, containing among other things information - concerning the bearer; (III) the first ten thousand words of my - eighty-thousand-word story of the battle fought a month ago to an - hour--including sketches of Kuropatkin, and others, covering exactly - terrain, the entire position, strategy, and finally the cause of - the Russian disaster, with word-picture of the retreat, done on - the day when it was at its height. The writer left the field and - made the journey to Koupangtse alone, nearly one hundred miles to - the railroad. This is the only American eye-witness story besides - Fallows’. The mails of the second-hand reports will not reach here - before the arrival of the _Coptic_.... I will sell this story - to the _Western States_ on condition that it appear in the - _World-News_, New York, simultaneously--the story to be run in - not less than seven installments, beginning by telegraph to-morrow. I - insist on the _World-News_, but have no objection to the general - syndicating of the story by the _Western States_, my price for - the American newspaper rights being $1,800 and transportation to New - York. - -“In God’s name, are you doing another book?” Nevin demanded, letting -himself down from the berth. “What’s the matter--you’re on fire?” - -Morning was counting off the large first installment of his manuscript. -He placed it upon the table, with the Fallows’ story and the two -letters to Noyes.... Then he put an empty water-pitcher on it, -restoring the balance of his story to its place under his pillow. - -“Listen” he said, clutching Nevin’s arm, “here’s the whole thing--if -I’m sick to-morrow. Give it to the reporter from the _Western -States_--make him see it is life-blood. Make him rush with it to -Noyes. It’s the whole business.... He’ll get it--before the quarantine -is lifted, if you--oh, if you can! It’s all there.... You do this for -me?” - -“And where will you be all this time----” - -“Oh, Nevin--Nevin--for God’s sake put me to sleep! I’m full of burning -and devils! Fill up that needle business and put me to sleep!... I -can’t wait to get across in the New York _World-News_. That’s -Reever Kennard’s own paper.” - - - 20 - -THE voices sounded far and muted--voices one might hear when -swimming under water. It was easier for him to stay down than rise and -answer. He seemed carried in the strong flow of a river, and preserved -a consciousness, very vague, that it meant death to go down with the -stream. At last, opening his eyes, he saw the city over the pier-sheds. - -The rest of the manuscript was still under the pillow, but the -water-pitcher rested upon the bare wood of the table. It was after -twelve. His deadly fury had burned itself out. The thought of the -_World-News_ taking the story, steadied his weakness. It was much -harder to dress than usual, however. He had no shore clothes, but Nevin -would see to that for him. With a glad thrill, he realized that the -_Sickles_ had passed the quarantine, or she wouldn’t be in the -slip. His mind turned to Nevin again, and when he was thinking about -this deep-rooted habit the voyage had inculcated, the Doctor himself -entered. - -“Well, you gave me a night.” - -“You’ll have some rest now.” - -“I’ve brought some clothes for you to go ashore with.... The _Western -States_ got your story two hours ago. Ferry has gone ashore.” - -“Did the reporter take it here--or from across the harbor in -quarantine?” - -“He was waiting with others--for us to be turned loose. I gave him the -stuff as we were putting about. He didn’t come aboard, I saw his launch -reach landing. I told him to put the stuff into the hands of Noyes and -to hurry back. All of which he did----” - -“Why to hurry back?” - -The little man’s mouth gave way to strange twistings, and he answered -grudgingly, “Well, I had a story to give him.” - -Morning took a room at the Armory, refusing a loan from the Doctor. -“I’ll have it shortly--plenty, I think. I’ll lie up there until I hear -from Noyes. I may hurry East----” - -The process was not clear exactly, but the old story of _Mio -Amigo_ had given him a terror of borrowing. The Armory was nearby. -It was clean and cheap. This little decision of choosing the Armory, a -result of _Mio Amigo_, too, is the most important so far.... The -Doctor went with him. The two were hushed and sick with things to say. -Nevin felt he was losing the throb of great service; that he could not -hold it all after this power-house of a man went his way. It was not -only Morning, but Morning was attached to the large, quiet doings and -seeings of the stranger named Duke Fallows. - -Morning loved the Doctor. Nevin did not tower; Nevin was instantly in -his comprehension. Their throats tightened.... Nevin saw him to the -light little room, and said as he was leaving: - -“I’ve been all over Chinatown, looking up a formula for that wound that -won’t heal. It’s this--full directions inclosed. You’ll have to get -settled before you try it out.” - -He disappeared saying he would be back. Morning put the envelope in -a wallet, which he had carried afield.... It was not yet two in the -afternoon. There was a timorous rap at the door. Morning’s head dropped -over drowsily. The door opened just a little and a voice said: - -“Is there a sick American soldier in here?” - -It was low and timorous like the tapping, but there was a laugh in it, -and something that drove the wildness out of his heart. - -“Yes,” he said. - -“And may I come in?” - -“Yes.” - -She was slight and young and pale. She passed between the window and -his eyes. Her brown hair seemed half-transparent. The day was bright, -but not yellow; its soft gray luster was exactly the woman’s tone. -There was a curious unreality about the whole figure. The light in -her eyes was like the light in the window; gray eyes and very deep. -So quietly, she came, and the day was quiet, the house--a queer hush -everywhere. - -“There are a few of us who meet the transports--and call on the sick -soldiers. We talk to them--write letters or telegrams. Sometimes they -are very glad. All we want is to help. I haven’t tried many times -before----” - -Someone had told him once of a woman in London, who met the human -drift in from the far tides of chance--and made their passing or their -healing dear as heaven. He had always kept the picture. He scarcely -heard all that this young woman was saying. - -She was not beautiful, not even pretty. You would see her last in a -room full of women. Under her eyes--he could not tell just where--there -was a line or shadow of strange charm; and where the corner of her -eye-lids folded into the temple a delicate perfection lived; her frail -back had a line of beauty--again, he could not describe this. The -straightness of the figure was that of lightness, of aspiration.... -Sometimes she seemed just a girl. Her underlip pursed a little; it was -not red.... She seemed waiting with the lightness of a thistle--waiting -and listening in the lull before a wind. - -“My name is Betty Berry.” - -“Mine is John Morning.” - -She told him that she was a musician, and that San Francisco was her -home, although she was much away. He saw her with something that Duke -Fallows had given him. The hush deepened with the thought. Had he taken -from that tired breast a certain age and clear-eyedness and judgment -of the ways of love-women? There might have been reality in this; -certainly there was reality in his not having seen a white girl in many -months. He was changed; his work done for the moment; he was very tired -and hungry for something she brought.... “Betty Berry.” - -He _was_ changed. This Western world was new to him. He seemed -old to the East--old, much-traveled, and very weary; here was faith -and tenderness and reality. Duke Fallows’ city--Duke had strangely -intrenched himself here; and this wraith of an angel who came to him -ministering!... Malice and ambition--reprisal and murder were gone. -What a dirty little man he had been--how rotten with self, how furious -and unspeakable. Why had he not seen it? Why had he rejected Duke -Fallows with his brain and accepted him with his soul? The soul--what -queer place in a man is this? Duke Fallows, Lowenkampf--were in and -out, and Nevin, even the Ploughman now; and this little gray hushed -spirit of a girl had come straight to his soul. Why could one not -always feel these Presences? Would such destroying and malignant hatred -return as that for Reever Kennard last night? Was it because he had -been so passionate for self--that until now, (when he was resting and -she came), decency, delight, nor vision had been able to break through -the deadly self-turned currents?... This was like his finer self coming -into the room. - -“How did you know that boys coming home--need to see you?” he asked. -He had to be very careful and arrange what he meant to say briskly and -short. Most of his thoughts would not do at all to speak. - -“Women know. So many boys come home--like those on the _Sickles_ -whom one is not allowed to see. I have watched them going out, too. -They don’t know why they go. They don’t expect to find a new country, -and yet it seems as if they must go and look. And many come home so -numbed with loneliness that they have forgotten what they need.” - -“Then women know what boys--men are?” - -She smiled, and seemed listening--her lips pursed, her eyes like a -cloudy dawn, turned from him slightly. What did she hear continually -that did not come to him? - -“I mean the men,” he added, “whom the world calls its bravest--the -gaunt explorers and fighters--do women know what boys they are?” - -“I don’t know those whom the world calls its bravest.” - -“I think I needed to have you come,” he said, “but I didn’t know it.” - -The hush was in the room again. Morning felt like a little boy--and as -if she were a child with braids behind. They felt wonderful things, but -could only talk sillinesses.... There was something different about her -every time he looked. It seemed if she were gone; he could not summon -her face to mind. He did not understand it then. - -It had grown quite a little darker before they noticed. The far rumble -of thunder finally made them see a storm gathering. - -“You won’t go until it’s over?” - -“It might be better for me to go now--before it begins.” - -“Do you live far?” - -“Yes.” - -“Then stay--please.” - -She drew her chair closer. They tried to tell each other of what they -had been, but this didn’t prosper. The peculiar thing was that their -history seemed to begin from now--all was far and unimportant but -this. Morning, moreover, did not mean to spoil the primary idea in her -mind of his being an American soldier; though all his recent history -impinged upon the one fact that he wasn’t.... He tried to hold her face -in his mind with shut eyes, but it was a forced and unfair picture when -mentally dragged there.... The thunder increased and the rain. - -“Once when I was little,” she said, “I was alone in the house when a -storm came, and I was so frightened that day--that I never could be -since, in just the same way.” - -Perfect revelation. Something in him wished she were pretty. She was -such a shy and shadowy creature. He called to mind the girls he had -known--coarse and tawdry lot, poor things. Betty Berry was all that -they were not; yet some of them were prettier. He could see their faces -quite distinctly, and this startled him, because shutting his eyes from -full gaze at this girl, he could not see her twice the same.... The -weather cleared. They were together in silence for moments at a time. -She became more and more like a wraith when the natural dusk thickened. - -“Was it hard for you to knock and speak--that first moment?” - -“Yes.” - -“Do--do any of the soldiers ever misunderstand?” - -“No----” - -“That’s fine of them,” he granted. - -“They couldn’t when one has no thought, only to be kind to them----” - -“You think they see that at once?” - -“They must.” - -“A man doesn’t know all about soldiers simply because he ‘soldiers’ -with them,” Morning said. - -“And then----” - -“Yes----” - -“They look at me and it’s very plain that I come just to be good to -them.... They think of me in the same way as a Salvation Army lassie or -a missionary----” - -“Now, that’s queer,” said he. “It didn’t occur to me at all. It would -never come to me to ask you to leave a tract.” - -“And I didn’t feel like a missionary, either.... Now it’s all cleared -again. I must go.” - -There was a pang.... Where was Nevin? Why had Noyes or someone from -the _Western States_ not come to him? Coming back to these things -pained.... A boy in the halls called the afternoon papers in a modified -voice. - -“Will you get me the papers--especially the _Western States_?” - -She hurried to call the boy. He saw the huge picture of Duke Fallows on -the sheet toward him, as she re-entered. - -“This is what I want,” he said hoarsely, taking the _Western -States_.... - -“John Morning,” she whispered. - -In inch letters across the top--there it was: - - JOHN MORNING BRINGS IN THE FIRST FALLOWS STORY. - - Full Day Ahead of _Coptic_ Mails.... Morning Leaves Fallows on - the Field Beyond Liaoyang, Night of September 3rd.... Two Americans - Alone See Great Battle.... The Incomparable Fallows’ Story Printed in - Full in the _Western States_ To-day.... John Morning’s Detail - Picture--a Book in Itself--Begins in the _Western States_ - To-morrow--Biggest Newspaper Feature of the Year’s Campaign.... Read - To-day How John Morning Brought in the News--a Story of Unparalleled - Daring and Superhuman Endurance.... - -Such was the head and the big-print captions. Morning’s riding forth -from Liaoyang on the night of the third--the sorrel mare--the Hun -Crossing--the Liao Crossing and the fight with the river-bandits--the -runaway of the sorrel and her broken heart--his journey dazed and -delirious, covered with wounds, thirty miles to Koupangtse--Tongu--the -battle to get aboard the _Sickles_, first, second, and third -attempts--redoing the great story on shipboard--all this in form of an -interview and printed as a local story, ran ahead of the Duke Fallows -article. - -A great moment, and John Morning, forgetting all else, even forgetting -the girl who glanced at him with awed and troubled eyes, held hard for -a moment to the one realization: Noyes would not have printed, “Begins -in the _Western States_ to-morrow,” had he not arranged for -publication in Reever Kennard’s _World-News_.... - -Her chair was farther away. She waited for him--as one expecting to be -called. He turned; their eyes met full. - -“You are not an American soldier----” - -“I am an American. I have had a hard time, almost as hard as any -soldier could----” - -“I wouldn’t have come--the whole city will serve you----” - -“That’s why I didn’t speak. No soldier could have gotten more good.” - -Her eyes turned downward. The room was almost dark. A knock at the door. - -“I must go----” - -He held out his hand. “Won’t you come again?” - -“It doesn’t seem----” - -He would not let her hand go. “Oh, won’t you come again?” - -“Yes.” - -“Thank you.” - -Betty Berry opened the door for Noyes and another, and she passed out. - - - 21 - -NOYES said lightly: - -“The young lady doesn’t need to go on our account----” - -“But she’s gone,” Morning muttered. The walls gave him back the words. - -“If it’s any interest to you, Morning, I’ve followed directions in your -letter,” the editor said presently. - -“The _World-News_----” - -“That’s what I waited for--before coming here. They’re using Field’s -local story to-morrow morning. It’s on the wire to them now. This is -Field.” - -“I had the pleasure of bringing in your manuscript from the -_Sickles_ rather early this morning,” said the latter. “Also I did -the story that Doctor Nevin told me.” - -“I wish he would come,” said Morning. - -“Nevin?” - -“Yes.” - -“He’s on his toes where you are concerned,” said Field. - -“He has done much for me----” - -“Friend Fallows is rather strong for you, too, I should say,” Noyes -offered. - -He was a pale, soft, middle-aged man who gave the impression of being -more forceful than he looked. - -“I owe everything to him,” said Morning. - -“By the way, Morning, what were you mad at, when you wrote that -letter of directions to me? I followed it carefully as you -said--price--_World-News_--everything. We’ll have a lot of other -papers beside the _World-News_--but that letter made me hot under -the collar every time I glanced at it----” - -“I was just about to break. I was very sick of words. Every sentence -was like drawing a rusty chain in one ear and out the other.” - -“Of course you know you’ve got the world by the tail on this Russian -end--this Liaoyang story,” Noyes observed. - -“I’ve written the story. The big part of the copy is here for you.” - -“You’re not going to quit now. Are you down and out physically?” - -“No.” - -“Why, Morning,” Field broke in, “you ought to make ten thousand dollars -in the next thirty days. You’ve got a big feature for every magazine in -America--and then the book.” - -“The chance doesn’t come but once in a life time--and then only to -God’s chosen few, who work like hell,” said Noyes, and he sat back to -review this particularly finished remark. - -“What would you do?” Morning asked. - -“I’d start for New York to-night. Field’s story about you--the one -we run to-night at the head of Fallows’ story--will start the game. -A couple of installments of your big yarn will have appeared in the -_World-News_ when you reach New York. If it ends as good as it -begins, you’ll have the big town groggy within a week. You’ll receive -the magazine editors in your hotel, contract to furnish so much--and -talk off same to expert typists. That’s the way things are done. You’ve -got the goods. New York serves a man like that. It’s nothing to me, but -I know the game--even if I never cornered a Liaoyang story. Fallows -said you have done more work for less money than any man in America. -He’s one of our owners----” - -So Noyes rambled on; Field breaking in with fresh and timely zest. -Morning had not looked beyond the main story. He saw separate articles -now in every phase. It would work out.... Four days of rest--looking -out of the car-window. He would land in New York once and for all--land -hard--do it all at once. Then he would rest.... He was seething -again.... With this advantage he could break into the markets that -would stand aloof from his ordinary product for years. All day his -devil had slept, and now was awake for rough play in the dusk. His -dreams organized--the big markets--breaking out of the newspapers into -the famous publications! He had the stuff. It would be as Noyes said. -He would have thought of it for another man. - -“How soon can I start?” he said. - -“Four or five hours.” - -“I’m obliged to you.... Fallows seems still with me,” he said -strangely.... “I must see Nevin----” - -There was a ringing in his brain at some unused door, but he did not -answer. He was driven again. Harrowing the idea of waiting a single day -... in these modern hours when world-events are so swiftly forgotten. - -Everything was settled. Morning was taken from place to place in a -cab. Noyes not only was conscientious about seeing to every detail for -Friend Fallows--but he made it very clear that he was not accustomed to -spend his evenings down-town. From time to time, he dropped hints of -what he would be doing at home at this hour. Down-town nights were all -put away for him, he declared. - -The balance of the manuscript was locked in the safe at the _Western -States_ to be set up to-morrow, and proofs sent out. The second -and possibly third installments of the story would go to the -_World-News_ by telegraph, the rest follow by mail. - -“To-morrow morning, out in the mountains, you’ll have the satisfaction -of knowing that New York is reading Field’s story which we ran to-day. -Is that stuff the Doctor gave us, right, Morning?” - -“Huh?” - -“Did you dream about that sorrel mare--entrails out--walking like a -man--white death in her eyes?” Noyes pursued. - -“God, I wonder if I did? Did I dream that I did the big story -twice?----” - -He was in pain; there was lameness in his mind at being driven again. -He wished Noyes would go home.... Messengers were back and forth to the -_Sickles_ trying to get Nevin. Transportation to New York was the -newspaper’s affair; when it was handed him, something went from Morning -that he could not get again. There was much to drink. Noyes had put all -this from him so long that he found the novelty humorous--and yet, what -a bore it was after all! Field was a steaming geyser of enthusiasms. -Both talked. Others talked. Morning was sick with words. He had not -had words drummed into his brain in so long. He half-realized that his -impatience for all these things was disgust at himself, but all his -past years, and their one-pointed aim held him now. This was his great -chance.... He wanted Nevin. - -These city men gave him everything, and disappointed him. Had he -been forced to battle with them for markets; had he been forced to -accept the simple column rate, he could not have seen them as now. -Because they had become his servants, he touched their weakness. And -what giants he had known--Fallows and Nevin--and Endicott, the little -Englishman at Tongu.... You must answer a man’s need when that need is -desperate--to make a heart-hold. A man makes his friends before his -world capitulates. - -He was waiting in the bar of the _Polander_.... Nevin had not -been found. Morning was clothed, expensed; his order upon New York for -the price of the story would not be touched until he reached there. He -had won already; he had the world by the tail.... Nevin did not come. -There was no bite in the drink for Morning. He was in pain; others -made a night of it. He struggled in the pits of self, that sleepless, -never-forgetting self. There was a calling, a calling deep within, but -the outer noise spoiled the meaning. Men drank with single aim; they -drank like Russian officers--to get drunk. They were drunk; all was -rich and free. Noyes knew many whom he saw every day, and many whom -he had seen long ago. He called them forward to meet Morning, who had -brought in the story.... Morning who knew Duke Fallows--Morning who had -the big story of the year, beginning to-morrow.... And always when they -passed, Noyes remarked that the down-town stuff was silly as the devil. -White and clerical, his oaths were effective. He drank hard and well -as men go. Field drank well--his impulses becoming more gusty, but not -evil.... Once Morning would have called this a night of triumph. Every -one looked at him--talked respectfully--whispered, pointed.... Twenty -minutes left--the crowd grew denser in the _Polander_ bar. There -was a voice in the arch to the hotel. Ferry entered in the midst of -men. He was talking high, his eyes dancing madly. - -“Why, the son of ... threw me--that’s all. He’s done with the -_Sickles_.... Who? Why, Nevin, the squint-eyed son of a.... He -threw me.... I thought this Morning was some drunken remittance man -wanting passage. Reever Kennard said he was a thief.... Nevin might -have come to me.... Why, Morning didn’t even pay his commutation for -rations----” - -“I would have mailed it to you, Ferry--except for this meeting,” said -Morning, his voice raised a little to carry. - -An important moment to him, and one of the strangest of his life. This -was the man whom he had dreamed of murdering, the man who had made -him suffer as only the gods should make men suffer. And yet Ferry was -like an unpleasant child; and Morning, troubled by greater things, -had no hate now, no time nor inclination to hate. The face that had -seemed dark and pitiless on the deck in Nagasaki harbor--was only weak -and undone--an unpleasant child crying, refusing to be quieted--an -annoyance to the house. Such was the devil of the _Sickles_, -the man who had stood between him and America, the man who had tried -to make him miss beating the _Coptic_ mails.... They faced each -other, the quartermaster, wincing and shrunken. - -“I had to get across, Ferry. I was too sick to make you see. Kennard -always says that. He seems to know that best--but it isn’t true.... I -was bad to look at. You see, I had come a long way. I was off my head -and eyes----” - -“I didn’t know,” Ferry blurted, “and now Nevin has thrown me. I wasn’t -supposed to take civilians----” - -“I know it--only I had to get across.... I don’t know what I’d have -done but for Nevin. He was mother and father on the voyage. I can give -you the commutation now----” - -“You were a stowaway----” - -“That’s what made it delicate to pay for the passage----” - -Ferry was broken-nerved. He suggested buying a drink, as a child who -has learned a fancied trick of men. - -And Morning drank. Noyes glanced at Field, who had suddenly become pale -and anxious with a story-idea. He was at work--drink-clouds shoved -back and all the exterior enthusiasm--fresh as after a night’s rest. He -was on a new story. - -Ferry went away and Morning looked at the clock. Only five minutes -of his life had been used in this important transaction. Nevin had -not come--Nevin who had lost his berth, thrown over his own work for -him.... There would be no more _Nevin_ on the _Sickles_. -Would he come East? - -“Oh, I say, Field--drop the Ferry end of the story,” Morning said. - -“Sure,” said Field glibly. - -“Nothing to it,” said Noyes. - -Morning was too tired to go further, though he felt their lie. - -“But, Nevin,” he said to Noyes. - -“I’ll have him found to-morrow. That’s the big local thing to-morrow.” - -“Tell him----” - -When Morning stopped telling Noyes and Field what to tell Nevin for -him, it was time to go for the ferry. The _Polander_ slipped -out of Morning’s mind like a dream--smoke, voices, glasses, indecent -praise. Noyes reached across the bar for a package. That last seemed -quite as important as anything. - -They left him at the ferry--these men of the _Western States_--servants - of his action and his friends.... And somewhere in the city was little -Nevin, who had done his work and who had not come for his pay; somewhere -in the city, but apart from voices and adulation--the man who had -forgotten himself in telling the story of how the news was brought -in.... It was all desperately unfinished. It hurt him every moment. - -In the Pullman berth he opened the package Noyes had given him; the -porter brought a glass. Afterward, he lay in the darkness. It was very -still when he had become accustomed to the wheels. The going always had -soothed him. In the still train and the peace of the road, he heard -at last that ringing again at the new door of his life, and opened to -Betty Berry, who had promised to come. - - - - -BOOK II. - -THE HILL-CABIN - - - 1 - -MORNING sat in the yielding leather of the _Boabdil_ library, -quite as if he had passed his youth in the midst of people who -talk of doing things. Liaoyang had been written, even the abandoned -impediments of retreat covered. It had all come to pass quite -according to the early ideas of Noyes and Field. John Morning was -Liaoyang in America. His book _Liaoyang_, magazine and newspaper -articles gathered together, was established as important authority in -encyclopædic and other reference books. The most captious must grant -that living man can do no more than this. - -Morning had dined with the president. One after another he had made -every magazine of note, and much money. He had done his own story of -the journey, which proved more of a comment maker than the battle -description; and his article on the deck passages of the Chinese -coolies will always be an incentive to foreign missions. New York had -waited upon him, had exploited him, given him bewildering payments, and -called him everything, even Hugoesque and Tolstoianic. It was very hard -for Morning to retain the conviction that there wasn’t ten pages of all -this copy that ranked in sheer value with the ten pages of Fallows’ -_Ploughman_. He didn’t for awhile. - -Liaoyang was on in full magazine blast in America, while Mukden and -Sha River were being fought across the world. At this time Morning -spent an hour a day, as war-expert for a particularly incessant daily -newspaper of New York. So all people knew what the campaign was about, -and what certain generals might do, from past grooves of their wearing -in history. Also German gentlemen of military pasts wrote letters -disputing the prophecies. Morning had certainly arrived. - -The condition or place of arrival was slippery. The peace of Portsmouth -had been protocoled.... Liaoyang, deep in the valley of desuetude, was -without even the interest of perspective. The name, Liaoyang, made the -mind of the world lame.... Even in the heat of arrival, the thing had -puzzled him. Money ceased to gladden him after a few mails; did not -spare him from the nearest irritation. Plainly he was quite the same -John Morning after appearing in the great magazines as before; and the -people whom he had interested were mainly of the same sort that had -come forward in the _Polander_ bar. - -He had been a sick man since the Hun Crossing. When the big New York -task was finished, and it was done with something of the same drive -of will that characterized the second writing of the main story on -board the _Sickles_, he was again ready to break, body and -brain. Running down entirely, he had reached that condition which has -an aversion to any task. His productive motors had long lain in the -dark, covered from the dust. This was the time he clubbed about. The -_Boabdil_ was a favorite, but even here, men drew up their chairs -from time to time, day and night, dispatching the waiter for drink and -saying: - -“Those Japs are pretty good fighters, aren’t they?” or, “What do you -consider will become of China in the event of----” or, very cheerily, -“Well, Mr. Morning, are you waiting for another war?” - -He slept ill; drank a very great deal; the wound in his side had not -healed and he had made no great friends. He thought of these four -things on this particular mid-day in the _Boabdil_ library.... -Nearby was old Conrad with the morning papers, summoning the strength -to dine. It was usually late in the afternoon, before he arose to -the occasion, but with each stimulant, he informed the nearest -fellow-member that he was going to eat something presently. The old -man stopped reading to think about it. After much conning, he decided -that he had better have just one more touch of this with a dash of -that--which he took slowly, listening for comment from within.... -After dinner he would smoke himself to sleep and begin preparing for -the following morning’s chops. “Eat twice a day, sir--no more--not for -years.” - -Conrad in his life had done one great thing. In war-time, before the -high duty was put on, he had accumulated a vast cellar full of whiskey. -That had meant his hour. Riches, a half century of rich dinners, -clean collars and deep leather chairs--all from that whiskey sale.... -“Picturesque,” they said of Conrad at the _Boabdil_. “What would -the club do without him?”... - -Morning watching him now, remembered an old man who used to sit at a -certain table in a Sixth avenue bar. The high price of whiskey had -reversed conditions in this case, and a changed collar meant funeral or -festivity. Forty years ago this old man had bred a colt that became a -champion. That was his hour, his answer for living. After all, Morning -concluded, having seen Conrad fall asleep one night, the old horseman -was less indecent. - -Finally Morning thought of the little Englishman at Tongu and the -blanket; then of Fallows and Nevin--Fallows saying, “Come on upstairs,” -that day of their first meeting at the _Imperial_, and Nevin -saying, “Well, you gave me a night----” .... Morning began to laugh. -“Picturesque, what-would-we-do-without Conrad”--sitting five days and -nights on the deck passage from the mouth of the Pei-ho to the lowest -port of Japan.... - -He hadn’t thought much of Nevin and Fallows and the Tongu Endicott in -the months that followed his arrival from San Francisco, when the work -went with a rush. And Betty Berry--there were times when he was half -sure she--name, Armory and all--formed but an added dream that Nevin -had injected hypodermically the night before. - -Morning could think about all these now. The editors had begun to tell -what _they_ wanted. He had sent in stuff which did not meet their -needs. He was linked to war in their minds. Moreover, plentiful money -had brought to the surface again his unfinished passion to gamble, -as his present distaste for work had increased the consumption of -alcohol.... It was _Reverses_ that reminded him of Fallows and -Nevin and the Tongu blanket and the angel he had entertained in the -Armory room. - -Editors didn’t care for his fiction. “A good war story is all right -any time,” they said, but apparently his were not, for five or six -trials didn’t take. He had a tendency to remember Fallows when he -wrote fiction. The story of the Ploughman came curiously back to mind, -when he was turned loose from straight narrative, and he was “balled” -between planes.... He thought of a play.... - -Varce now came into the library and drew up a chair. Varce had -one of his stories; Varce edited a magazine that sold several -million every two weeks. Long ago, with great effort, and by paying -prodigiously, Varce had secured from Morning one of the final tiles -of the great Liaoyang mosaic.... Varce was tall, a girl’s dream of -poet-knight--black, wavy hair, straight excellent features, a figure -lean enough for modern clothes. - -“Morning,” he said, “do you know the fighting game?” - -“You mean pugilistically?” - -“Yes.” - -“I used to do fights.” - -Varce went on presently: - -“A great series of articles is to be written on the boyhood and general -atmosphere of the men who have made great ring history--big stuff, you -know--well written--from a man who can see the natural phenomena of -these bruisers--how they are bred and all that. Now three things go -into the fighter--punch, endurance, but, most of all, instinct--the -stuff that doesn’t let him ‘lay down’ when the going is rough, and -doesn’t keep him from putting the wallop on a groggy opponent. Many a -good fighter has missed championship because he was too tender-hearted -to knock-out a helpless----” - -“Do you like that story of mine you have, Varce?” Morning asked yawning. - -“Oh, it’s a good enough story--a bit socialistic--what are you trying -to get at?” - -“No need of me furnishing diagrams, if the manuscript leaves you that -way,” Morning said. “You were just saying about the last touch to a -beating--yes, I’ve heard about those three things----” - -“Do you want the series?” - -“No, I’m doing a play.” - -... After Varce had gone, Morning thought it all out again. Varce was -living a particularly unmitigated lie. Five years ago he had done -some decent verse. He had a touch of the real poetic vision, and he -had turned it to trade. He was using it now to catch the crowd. An -especially sensational prostitution, this--one that would make the -devil scratch his head.... And Varce could do without him. Liaoyang had -not made the name of John Morning imperative. Moreover, he himself was -living rotten. He wished he had told Varce what he thought of him and -his multi-millionaire subscription.... He hadn’t; he had merely spoken -of his play. The bridges were not burned behind him. He might be very -glad to do a series of “pug” stories for Varce. There were good stories -in these fighters--but the good stories, as he saw them, were not what -Varce saw in the assignment. - -It summed up that he was just beginning over again; that he must beat -the game all over again in a different and larger dimension--or else -quit.... He ordered a drink.... He could always see himself. That was a -Morning faculty, the literary third eye. He saw himself doing a series -of the fighters--saw it even to the red of the magazine covers, and the -stuff of the announcements.... John Morning, the man who did fifty-mile -fronts at Liaoyang, putting all his unparalleled battle color in the -action of a 24-foot ring. Then the challenge to the reader: “Can -you stand a descriptive force of this calibre? If you can, read the -story of the great battle between Ambi Viles and Two-pill Terry in -next issue.”... He would have to tell seriously before the battle -description, however, how Ambi was a perfect gentleman and the sole -support of his mother, an almost human English gentlewoman. It is well -to be orthodox. - -Somebody spoke of whiskey in the far end of the library, insisting -on a certain whiskey, and old Conrad cocked up his ears out of a -meaty dream.... Morning closed his eyes. He felt the warmth of a ship -beneath, the drive of the cold rain on deck and the heaving of the -sea. There was something almost sterile-clean about that deck-passage, -compared to this.... Then he remembered again the men he had known, -and the woman who came to the Armory room--and the long breath his -soul took, with her coming.... Finally he saw himself years hence, -as if he had quit the fight now and taken New York and Varce as they -meant to use him.... He was sunk in leather, blown up like an inner -tube and showing red, stalled in some club library, and forcing the -world to remember Liaoyang, bringing down the encyclopædia to show his -name, when extra drunk.... No, he would be hanging precariously to some -porter job on Sixth avenue, trying to make the worn and tattered edges -of his world believe how he had once carried the news from Liaoyang to -Koupangtse.... - -A saddle-horse racked by on the asphalt, and turned into the park. -Morning arose. There was stabbing and scalding from the unhealed wound -in his side. The pain reminded him of the giants he had once known and -of the woman who came to the Armory room. It had always been so; always -something about him unsound, something that would not heal. He had -accepted eagerly, but ever his giving had been paltry. And he had to -be pulled down, out of the shine of fortune, before he remembered how -great other men had been to him. - - - 2 - -THAT night he dreamed that he had passed through death.... He was -standing upon a cliff, between the Roaming Country and a valley of -living earth. He did not want the spirit region; in his dream he turned -his back upon it. He did not want the stars. Illusion or not, he wanted -the earth. He looked down upon it through the summer night, down -through the tree-tops into a valley that lay in the soft warm dusk. He -watched with the passion and longing of a newly-dead mother, who hears -her child crying for her, and senses the desolation of her mate.... -The breath of earth came up to him through the exhaling leaves--leaves -that whispered in the mist. He could have kissed the soil below for -sheer love of it. He wanted the cool, damp earth in his hands, and the -thick leaf-mould under his feet, and the calm wide listening of the -trees.... Stars were near enough, but earth was not. He wanted to be -down, down in the drip of the night. He would wait in ardor for the -rain of the valley.... Looking down through the tree-tops, he sensed -the earth passion, the lovely sadness of it--and desired it, even if he -must die again.... There was an ache in the desire--like the ache of -thirst that puts all other thoughts away, and turns the dream and the -picture to running water. - -He awoke, and went to his window in the dark. He saw New York and -realized that he was dying for the country. His eyes smarted to tears, -when he remembered rides and journeys and walks he had taken over the -earth, so thoughtlessly, without knowing their boon and beauty and -privilege.... While he was standing there, that which he had conceived -as To-morrow, became To-day, and appeared over the rim of the opposite -gorge of apartments. The first light of it sank far down into the tarry -stuffiness of the pavement, but the dew that fell with the dawn-light -was pure as heaven to his nostrils. - -That day he crossed the river, and at the end of a car-line beyond -Hackensack, walked for a half-hour. It was thus that Morning found his -hill. Just a lifted corner of a broad meadow, with a mixed company of -fine trees atop. He bought it before dusk. The dairyman’s farmhouse was -a quarter-mile distant; the road, a hundred and fifty yards from the -crest of the hill, with trees thinly intervening. The south was open to -even wider fields; in the far distance to the west across the meadows, -the sky was sharpened by a low ribbon of woods and hill-land. In the -east was the suspended silence of the Hudson. - -“I want a pump and a cabin, and possibly a shed for a horse,” he said, -drinking a glass of buttermilk, at the dairyman’s door. - -He was directed to Hackensack. - -With the falling darkness again upon the hills, he saw that certain -crowded, mid-growth trees were better down. The fine thought of -building his cabin of them occurred. By the time he reached Hackensack, -the house of logs was so dear in thought, that he wanted nothing short -of a cabinet-joiner for such a precious task. That night he met Jake -Robin, who was sick of nailing at houses in rows, a job that had long -since ceased to afford deep breaths to his capacity. - -The next day Morning moved to Hackensack, and Jake was at work.... -Three thousand he had lost gambling ... he wished he had it now. -Much more had been lost, and not so cleanly, in reaching the final -_Boabdil_ realization, but he had enough. Presently he was helping -Jake, and there was joy in it. - -They tapped a spring some thirty feet beneath the humped shoulder of -the hill; built a shed for the horse he had not yet found, and then -fitted the cabin to the fire-place of concrete and valley stone. One -sizeable room it was, that faced the open south from the brow of the -hill. - -A fine unfolding--this love of Morning’s for wood itself, and woods. -Over a half-hundred trees were his own--elm, beech, hickory, oak, -ash, and maple--and like a fine clean colony of idealists they stood -meditating.... One never knows the quality of wood until one builds -his own house. Opening the timbers for the big mortices--each was a -fresh and fragrant discovery. Jake and he lingered long, after the -cabin was roofed, over the heavy oak flooring, and the finishing of -windows and doors and frames. They built some furniture together of -hickory, which is a wood a man should handle with reverence, for it is -fine in its way as wheat and grapes and honey and wild olives. Hickory -answers graciously to the work of the hand, and, like a good dog, -flourishes with men.... They built a table and bed-frame and a chest -of drawers; and Morning at last went to Hackensack for pots, kettles, -and tea things. Jake Robin, like one who has built a ship, was loath to -leave without trying the cabin. Morning kept him busy in the clearing, -long after he was in the mood to start work on the play. There was a -platform to build for the pump; also a certain rustic bench. The shed -needed tinkering; an extra cabinet for books was indispensable--and -screens.... No one had ever let Jake play before in his life.... -Moreover, he was paid for the extra hour required to walk to and from -town. All Hack heard about it. - -“You’ll need a chicken-coop----” - -“No,” said Morning. The look on Jake’s face was like old Amoya’s in -Tokyo, when the rickshaw-runner was forbidden to take him to the -Yoshuwara. - -“I can fit you up a little ice-box near the spring--so’s you’ll pump it -full of water, and keep your vittles----” - -Morning wanted the stillness for the play, but he couldn’t refuse. Two -days more. Then Jake scratched his head. - -“You’ll be wantin’ a vine on the cabin,” he ventured. “I know the man -who has the little ivies.” - -This was irresistible. “Can you see me owning a vine?” asked Morning. -Yet there was significance in the idea together with the play. - -“And I’ll build a bit of a trainer to start it. By the end of -summer----” - -“Bring it on, Jake----” - -“An’ I’ll fetch a couple of rose vines, and dreen them with broken -crockery from the holler----” - -The vine prospered and the play; and the roses began to feel for Jake’s -trellis. The tool-box was still there. - -“You’ll be needin’ fire-wood for the winter. To be sure, you can buy -it, but what’s the good, with dead stuff to be knocked down and small -trees to be thinned out, and the shed gapin’ open for the saddle-horse -you’re not sure of findin’? It’s wood you ought to have in there----” - -In fact, it was no small task to break Jake of the hill-habit. Morning -grew accustomed to the ax, and the crashing of branches, many of which -would have been sacrificed to the strong winds of the Fall. Meanwhile, -the shed had come into its own, and there were piles of firewood -seasoning in the sun and shade. - -He was alone with the nights; sitting there in his doorway when it was -fine, studying the far lights of the city.... City lights meant Varce -and Conrad, not his great friends. Every hour that he looked, he liked -better the wind about the doorway and the open southern fields. - -One night he felt his first twinge of sorrow for the big city. -Hatred, it had been before. Other men were tortured as he had been, -but somehow, the way didn’t get into their dreams and drive them -forth, as he had been driven. They were really not to blame for -_Boabdilling_; they sank into the cushions and lost the sense of -reality. And then the thousands in the hall-bedrooms and worse, to whom -_Boabdil_ was heaven’s farthest pavilion! Morning seemed to have -something to say to those thousands, but wasn’t ready yet. - -He longed for Fallows, whom he saw more clearly every day--especially -since the _Ploughman_ had crept into the play.... He wanted to -wait upon the big sick man; to have him here, to prepare food for him, -and sit with him in these silences. He wanted Endicott at Tongu, too, -and Nevin--oh, yes, Nevin. It was like a prayer that he sent out some -nights--for the unearthing of these giants from their hiding--so that -he could listen to them, and serve them and make them glad for their -giving to him. - - * * * * * - -A deep summer night. The purple of the north seemed washed and thinned -in ether, (nothing else could bring out the heavenly lustre of it), -and the black, fragile top-foliage of the woods leaned against it, -listening, feminine. Darkness only on the ground; yet he loved it, the -heart of the dusk that throbbed there. He loved the earth and the water -that mingled in the hollows. He breathed with strange delight the air -that brushed the grass and the clover-scent that came to him around the -hill.... And this was the momentary passion--that he was going from all -this. He loved it as one who was passing beyond. It was like the dream -after all. Just as Mother Earth was unfolding, he was called. She was -like a woman long lived-with, but unknown, until the sudden revelation -of parting.... He touched the stones with his hand. - -In the hush, waiting for a katydid to answer, that night, Morning fell -asleep.... He had climbed to his cabin, as if it were a room on an -upper floor. Before he opened the door, he knew someone was within. -Before the light, it was clear that someone was curled up asleep on the -foot of his hard bed.... Yes, it was she who had restored his soul, -that day at the Armory--and there she lay sleeping.... He did not call -her, as he had called Moto-san; there was no thought to waken her, for -everything was so pure and lovely about it. He stood there, and watched -her gratefully--it seemed a long time--until the katydid answered. - - - 3 - -AFTER Markheim had kept the play three months--it was now -November--Morning crossed to the city to force the decision. -The producer was prevailed upon to see him. - -“It will be read once more,” said Markheim. “It will go or not. We like -it, but we are afraid of it. To-morrow we will know or not.” - -“What are you afraid of?” - -“I don’t know. I do not read plays.” - -“To-morrow?” - -“Yes.” - -Markheim bought his opinions, and was attentive to those which cost the -most.... - -Morning drew a napkin the size of a doll’s handkerchief from a pile. A -plate of eggs and bacon rung, as if hitting a bull’s-eye upon the white -marble before him. He was still wondering what Markheim was afraid of. -He didn’t like the feel of it. The Lowenkampf of Duke Fallows’ had -crept into the play--Lowenkampf, whose heart was pulled across the -world by the mother and child. How they had broken his concentration on -the eve of the great battle. - -At the time, he had seen the tragic sentimentalist as one caught in a -master weakness, but all that was gone. Lowenkampf still moved white in -his fancy, while the other generals, even Mergenthaler, had become like -the dim mounds in his little woodland.... And what a dramatic thing, to -have a woman and a child breaking in upon the poised force of a vast -Russian army. It was like Judith going down into the valley-camp of the -Assyrians and smiting the neck of Holofernes with his own fauchion. -Morning’s mind trailed away in the fascination of Fallows, and in the -dimension he had been unable to grasp in those black hours of blood.... -So many things were different after this summer alone; yet he had never -seemed quite rested, neither in mind nor body.... He had been all but -unkillable like the sorrel Eve before that journey from Liaoyang to New -York. Now, even after the ease and moral healing of the summer alone, -his wound was unhealed.... - -The telephone-miss in Markheim’s reception-room was very busy when -he called the next afternoon.... Something about her reminded him -of _Mio Amigo_. She was a good deal sharper. Was it the brass -handle?... To hear her, one would think that she had come in late, and -that New York needed scolding, even spanking, which exigencies of time -and space deferred for the present. Her words were like the ‘spat, -spat, spat,’ of a spanking.... She was like an angry robin, too, at one -end of a worm. She bent and pulled, but the worm had a strangle-hold on -a stone. It gave, but would not break.... Morning saw the manuscript -at this point on her side-table, and the fun of the thing was done.... -She looked up, trailed a soft _arpeggio_ on the lower-right of her -board, grasped the manuscript firmly, and shoved it to him. - -“Mr. Morning to see Mr. Markheim,” he said. - -“Mr. Markheim is----” - -But the husky voice of the producer just now reached them from within. - -“Busy----” she finished with a cough.... New York was at it again. -_Stuyvesant_ especially had a devil, and _Bryant_ was the -last word. - -“... You can’t see Mr. Markheim. This is your message----” - -“Oh, it really isn’t. This is just an incident. I hesitate to trouble -you, but I must see Mr. Markheim.” - -The play was wrapped in the identical paper in which it had been -brought. - -She must have touched something, for a boy came in--a younger brother, -past doubt--but so bewildered, as to have become habitually staring. - -“Tell Mr. Markheim, Mr. Morning insists on seeing him.” - -The boy seemed on the point of falling to his knees to beg for mercy. -Morning’s personal distemper subsided. Here was a drama, too--the great -American stage.... One word came out to him from Markheim: - -“In-zists!” - -“How do you do, Mr. Morning--good afternoon.” - -Markheim had his hand in a near drawer, and was smiling with something -the same expression that old Conrad used when listening for the dinner -notice. - -“You see we do not want it--we are afraid,” he began, and becoming -suddenly hopeful, since Morning drew forth no bomb, he added, “You have -a girl’s idea of war, Mr. Morning--good afternoon.” - -He liked his joke on the name. “We were in doubt about the war -part--afraid--and so we consulted an expert--one who was on the spot,” -he said pleasantly. - -Morning’s mind was searching New York; his idea was fateful. - -“We are not bermidded to divulge who the expert is, but we did not -spare money----” - -Morning’s eye was held to the desk over the shoulder of Markheim, to a -large square envelope, eminent in blue, upon the corner of which was -the name “Reever Kennard.” - -“I’m sure you did not. He was always a high-priced man,” he said -idly.... And so this was the long-delayed answer to his appearance in -the _World-News_ to the extent of eighty thousand words. He had -heard that Mr. Reever Kennard was back on finance and politics.... -Markheim had not followed his mind nor caught the sentence. Morning -passed out through the hush. He paused at the door to give the -office-boy a present--a goodly present to be divided with the sister, -just now occupied with a fresh outbreak of obstreperousness on the part -of _Gramercy_. - - * * * * * - -Morning had moments of something like the old rage; but the extreme -naturalness of the thing, and its touch of humor, helped him over for -the next hour or so. Apparently, the opportunity had fallen into the -lap of Mr. Reever Kennard; come to him with homing familiarity. The -war-expert had spoken, not as one offering his values gratuitously, -but as one called and richly paid. Morning reflected that the summer -alone on his hill must have subdued him. As a matter of fact, he was -doubtful about the play; not because Markheim was afraid; not by any -means because Mr. Reever Kennard had spoken, but because it had not -come easily, and the three incidents which made the three acts did -not stand up in his mind as the exact trinity for the integration of -results. But one cannot finally judge his own work. - -He wandered straight east from that particular theatre of Markheim’s -where the offices were and passed Fourth Avenue. He never went quite -that way again, but remembered that there was an iron picket-fence of -an old residence to lean against; and at the corner of it, nearer town, -the sidewalk sank into a smoky passage where lobsters, chops, and a -fowl or two were tossed together in front. It was all but dark. He was -averse to taking his present mood across the river. It wasn’t fair to -the cabin. _Mio Amigo_ recurred queerly and often to mind.... - -“Look--there’s Mr. Morning----” - -“Sh-sh--oh, Charley--sh-sh!” - -Morning was compelled. Could this little shrinking creature, beside -whom the under-sized brother now appeared hulking, be the same who had -bossed Manhattan to a peak in his presence such a little while ago? She -seemed terrified, all pointed for escape, sick from the strain of the -street. - -“Why, hello!” Morning said. - -She pulled her brother on, saying with furious effort of will, “I’m -sure we’re much obliged for your present----” - -“I had forgotten that,” Morning said. - -“We’re going to take in the show,” the boy remarked, drawing back. At -large, thus, he was much better to look upon. - -“Come on, Charley--we mustn’t detain----” - -Morning had an idea, and looked at the sister as he said, “Won’t you -have supper with me somewhere? I have nothing----” - -Her face was livid--as if all the fears of a lifetime had culminated -into the dreadful impendings of this moment. She tried to speak.... -Then it came to Morning in a belated way that she thought she was -accosted; that she connected his gift with this meeting. He couldn’t -let her go now--and yet, it was hard for him to know what to say. - -“I mean we three,” he began hastily. “This play being refused rather -knocked me out, and I didn’t know what to do with the evening. I don’t -live in New York, you know. I thought you and your brother--that we -might have supper together----” - -He spoke on desperately, trying to stir to life the little magpie -sharpness again. It was more to her brother she yielded. New York -must have frightened her terribly.... Morning managed to get down to -the pair that night. He was clumsy at it, however, for it was a new -emprise. Mostly John Morning had been wrapped and sealed in his own -ideas. The boy was won with the first tales of war, but the sister -remained apart with her terrors. No one had taught her that kindness -may be a motive in itself. - -And now Morning was coping with what seemed a real idea: What was the -quality of the switch-board that harnessed her character? Here she was -wild and disordered--like a creature denied her drug. With that mystic -rumble of angry New York in her ears--the essential buzz of a million -desires passing through her--she was a force, flying and valuable -force. Was she lain open to obsession now because she was removed from -that slavery? Was that maddening vibration the lost key to her poise? - -He tried hard, not daring to be attentive in the least. She would have -fled, if he had. He was boyishly kind to her brother. That awed, and -was beginning to hold her. - -Morning saw clearly that she stood like a stretched wing between her -brother’s little soul and the world. She could be brave in sheltering -Charley. The boy was really alive. He ate and answered and listened -and lived, the show ahead.... In the midst of it, Morning awoke to the -fact that he was having a good time; and here was the mystery--with -the last two people in New York he would have chosen; a two, his -whole life-business had taught him to employ thoughtlessly, as other -metropolitan adjuncts--pavements, elevators, messengers. Here was life -in all its terror and complication, the same struggles he had known; -yet he had always seen himself as a sort of Titan alone in the great -destroying elements. The joke was on him. - -Charley left them for just a moment. The sister said, as if thinking -aloud: - -“... And yet, he cries every morning because he has to go to the -office. Oh, he wouldn’t go there without me----” - -A world of meaning in that. They were sitting in the dark of the -_Charity Union_ play-house, with Charley between them. The aims -and auspices of the performance were still indefinite to Morning, who -had not ceased to grapple with his joke--the seriousness with which he -had habitually regarded John Morning, his house, his play, his unhealed -wound, his moral debility.... - -For fifteen minutes a giant had marvelously manhandled his companion. -The curtain dropped an instant, and in the place where the giant had -performed now stood a ’cello and a chair.... She came on like the -wraith of an angel--and sat down and played.... How long she played -Morning never knew, but somewhere in it he caught his breath as one -who had come back to life.... And then she was gone. The audience was -mildly applauding. He turned to the sister leaning on the knees of the -boy: - -“I know her. She is very dear to me. If you don’t mind, I’ll leave you -now. You are safe with Charley--and some time again I’ll come. I thank -you very much. I really want to do this again--we three----” - -Even though his own joy was bewildering, he saw the sudden happiness -of Charley’s sister, who, in spite of all, had been haunted by the -dread of the _afterward_. Now that was gone from her. Relief was -in her face. It was all so much better than she had dared to hope. He -had wanted nothing--except to be kind--and now he was going. She gave -her hand impulsively.... Charley did, too, and was ordered to call a -carriage for his sister if he wished; at all events, the means was -attended.... Then they saw him making his way forward--putting money -into the hands of ushers, and inquiring the way to the stage.... And -she was there, playing again. - - - 4 - -SHE was making the people like her. Her effect was gradual. -They had been held by more obvious displays. The instrument seemed -very big for her, but the people liked her all the better for this.... -He could not be one with the audience, but the old watching literary -eye--the third eye--caught the sense of the people’s growing delight. -She made them feel that she belonged to them; as if she said: - -“I have come back to you. I will do just what you ask. Everything I -have is yours----” - -It was different and dearer to John Morning than anything he had ever -known. The picture came clearly to him as he walked around behind.... -This was the hour of her return. She had gone from the hearts of her -people long ago to bring back music. It was the beautiful old story -of their sacrifice to send her away. How splendidly she had learned; -how thrillingly they remembered her beginnings. And she had never -forgotten; she would always love and thank them--indeed, she was -happier than any now.... Morning was lost for a moment in his story. - -She was approaching, but did not see him yet. The house was pleased -with her, not noisily, but pleasantly. She turned to bow to the -people--and then back toward the wings. She saw him standing there. -Her arms went out to him, though she had not quitted the stage.... The -gesture was new to the people.... It was different from her coming to -him at the Armory.... They were standing together. - -“Why don’t you go on again?” a voice said, and with a queer irritation -in the tone. - -... She was playing again--and with dash and power. - -Morning had to shut his eyes now, really to hear; and yet, he could -not summon her face to mind when his eyes were shut. He thought with -a quick burn of shame that he had once wished her prettier. Sadness -followed, for, it seemed to him, their meeting had been broken. She -belonged to the people and not to him. They loved her.... She was -different. He saw it now. The audience, so pleased and joyous, lifted -her in a way perhaps that he could never do. - -It was everywhere--the music. It filled the high, brick-walled stage, -vibrated in the spiral stairways, moved mysteriously in the upper -darkness and immensity. Behind the far wings a man was moving up and -down in a sort of enchantment--no, he was memorizing something. A few -of the far front rows were visible from where Morning stood, and the -forward boxes opposite.... - -Morning was wandering in a weird land, a hollow land. The woman’s -playing was between him and the world of men; half for them, half for -him. The Memorizer was but another phantom, wandering with the ghost of -a manuscript. Between Morning and the player was only the frail, fluent -current of music. This was a suspense of centuries.... Would she go to -_Them_, or return to Him? The tall, dim canvases were fields of -emptiness and silence, in which he wandered listening, tortured with -tension; and the loft was sunless, moonless, unearthly.... - -The music ceased. He heard the calling of the other world to her. He -was apart in the shadows. Would she go to them, or would she remember -him, waiting?... She was coming. He heard her step behind the wings. -It was light as a gloved hand upon a table. He was hungry and athirst -and breathless. For the first time he saw that her throat and arms -were bare.... They were standing together again, but the Other Phantom -intercepted. - -It was the Memorizing Man. He came forward in an agony of excitement. -“You’ll have to prompt me,” he said to Betty Berry, speaking roughly in -his tension. “It’s my first time with this new dope. I thought I had -it, but I ain’t--and there’s a barrel of it.” - -The stage was slightly changed. Morning was thinking how hideous the -work of some men. The Phantom was scourged with the fear of one who was -to do imperfectly what another had written. The woman had carried a -small table and chair to the wings, out of view of the audience and as -near as possible to the Memorizer.... Morning found something soft and -fragrant in his hands. Betty Berry’s wrap, which she had given to him -before going to the table. And now the monologue had begun.... It was -to be humorous. - -Betty Berry, standing beside the table, raised her eyes from the paper, -and beckoned to Morning. His first thought was that he might disturb -her prompting, and he hesitated. She looked up again. Then he thought -she might want her wrap. He tiptoed forward and put it around her -shoulders. - -“It wasn’t that,” she whispered, her eyes upon the paper. “I wanted you -to keep me company. This is long. Sit down.” - -“Won’t _you_--sit down?” he said from behind, very close to her -hair. - -She shook her head.... It was peculiar--she standing, and he in the -chair. The soft wrap winged out, and her arm beneath slid across his -shoulder; the hollow of her left arm against his cheek. He kissed it, -and his face burned against its coolness. - -She shivered slightly, but did not take her arm away. Now he looked -up into her face--her eyelids drawn, her lips compressed, her gaze -steadily held to the manuscript. The Phantom was carried on by the -alien humor. Laughter was beginning to crackle here and there through -the house. Betty Berry followed with her eyes--just the words. - -“I was so glad to find you,” Morning whispered. - -Her lips moved. - -Matters tumbled over each other in his mind to say to her; he was -thinking sentences rather than words. He knew that it was not well -to talk now, but there seemed so much to say, and so little time. He -caught himself promising to give her understanding, and he told her -that she seemed everything he wanted to know. His cheek was burning as -never before.... - -The remotest happened. The Phantom faltered in a climax, and covered -the difficulty with a trick--awaiting the line from the wings. Betty -Berry had become rigid. Her eyes would not see the page. - -Morning spoke a sentence in a low, carrying way. He had plucked it from -the page painfully near his own eyes. It may be that the Memorizer -righted himself, or that the prompted line was what he needed. Anyway, -he was going again, and rising to the end.... - - * * * * * - -The two stood together while the house laughed, recalling the performer. - -“Thanks. I caught it fine,” the Phantom said hastily. “Not even the -front rows knew. I was listening for Miss Berry--and your cue came----” - -“It went all right,” said Morning. - -The other took the manuscript and passed on, rolling a cigarette.... -For just a moment, the two were alone. Into each other’s arms they -went, with the superb thoughtlessness of children ... and then they -heard steps and voices.... He wondered that Betty Berry could laugh and -reply to those who spoke to her.... He wanted to escape with her. Never -had he wanted anything so much. He was exhausted, humbled, inspired. To -be out in the street with her--it seemed almost too good to be.... She -was saying good-night and good-bye. He followed, carrying the ’cello. - - - 5 - -MORNING remembered that he had thought of her once before as having -braids down behind--as if they were boy and girl together, and now it -seemed as if they were wandering through some Holland street. He had -never been in a Holland street, but the sense of it came to him--as he -walked with her, carrying her instrument. His primary instinct was to -turn away from the noise of the cars, and where the lights were less -glaring. Moreover, now that they were alone, the impulse to say many -things had left him. - -“We must hurry to the ferry--there is only a few minutes----” - -He had known somehow that she was going away--perhaps from something -she had said to the others at the theatre. - -“You’re not going way back to--to the Armory?” - -“No, to Europe just for a few weeks. I sail to-morrow morning from -Baltimore. All we have to do is to catch the ferry and train. I have -sleeper-tickets--and berth and all----” - -“I’ll--I’ll go across on the ferry with you,” he said huskily. - -She felt his suffering by her own, and said: - -“My old master is there. I am to meet him--I think in Paris--I shall -know when I reach London. There is to be just a few private concerts -and some lessons further from him. For two years we’ve planned to do -this. I go to Baltimore, because it is cheaper to sail from there----” - -“And you’ll be back--when?” - -“By the first of March--just a few days over three months----” - -He was silent for a time, and then asked: “Do you think this is just -like a chance meeting to me--as one meets an old friend in New York?” - -“No.” - -“I was in a whirl when I saw you,” he said desperately. “It was such a -pretty thing, too--the way I happened to come to the theatre ... and -now you’re going away----” - -“Yes--yes--but it’s only a little while----” - -“Did you know I was here in New York?” - -“I knew you had been. I saw your work----” - -“But anywhere my work appears--a letter sent in care of the paper or -magazine would find me----” - -“We--I mean women--do not write that way----” - -“I know--I know.... But _I_ didn’t have anything but the name, -‘Betty Berry’----” - - * * * * * - -“It seemed that night after I left you at the Armory everyone was -talking about John Morning. And to think I supposed you just a -soldier. Everywhere, it was what John Morning had done, and what he -had endured--and I had spent the afternoon with you. I started to read -that story about your journey, but I couldn’t go on. It seemed that I -would die before I was half through your sufferings.... I would try -to think of the things we said, but they didn’t come back. I couldn’t -rest. I was glad you asked me to come again. I could hardly wait for -the morning--to go back to the Armory----” - -He had no answer. They were in a cross-town car. - -“But I think I understand. We won’t say anything of that again....” - -“You went back to the Armory that next morning?” - -“Yes----” - -“Oh, but I wasn’t ready,” he said at last, as if goaded by pain. “I had -so much to learn. Why, I had to learn this--how little this means----” - -He pointed out of the windows to the city streets. - -“You mean New York?” - -“Yes----” - -“It really seems as if men must learn that, first of all. You have done -well to learn so soon.” - -“It’s so different now. I must have been half-unconscious that day when -you came. You were like an angel. I didn’t know until afterward what -it really meant to me.... You remember the men who came--newspaper -men? They showed me what I could do in New York--how I could make the -magazines and the big markets. I was knocked-out. You must see it--all -I wanted to do in coming years--to make what seemed the real literary -markets--all was to be done in a few weeks.... It was not until I was -on the train that night that I remembered you were a living woman, and -had come to me.... Then I didn’t know what to do.... But ever since I -have thought of that afternoon, every day....” - -They boarded the ferry and moved away from the rest of the people. - -“I hate to have you go,” he said. The words were wrung from him. They -were such poor and common words, but his every process of thought -repeated them. He looked back the years, and found a single afternoon -in the midst of passionate waste--the single afternoon in which she -came.... She was everything to him. He wanted to go on and on this way, -carrying her ’cello. He could ask no more than to have her beside him. -He had learned the rest--it was trash and suffering. He wanted to tell -her all he knew--not in the tension of this momentary parting--but -during days and years, to tell his story and have her sanction upon -what was done, and to be done. She was dear; peace was with her.... She -would tell him all that was mysterious; together they would be One Who -Knew. Together they would work--do the things that counted, and learn -faith.... - -She took the ’cello from him, so that he could carry to the Pullman her -large case checked in the Jersey station.... It was very quiet and dark -in the coach. All the berths were made up but one, in which they sat -down.... They were alone. It was perfect. - -“I can’t go back now. I’ll go on with you to Trenton.... I have thought -so much of meeting you.... When the men came that day to the Armory -they showed me everything that seemed good then--fame and money waiting -in New York. It seemed that it couldn’t wait another day--that I must -go that night.... When the train started (it was like this in Oakland) -I thought of you--of you, back in ’Frisco and coming to the Armory in -the morning. It broke me. But I wasn’t right--not normal. I had worked -like a madman--wounds and all. I worked like a madman in New York----” - -She put her hand on his. Her listening centered him. That was it--as if -he had not been whirling true before.... Her hand, her listening, and -he was himself--eager to give her all that was real. - -“It’s so good to have you here,” she said in a low, satisfied way. -“Will you be able to get a train back all right?” - -“Yes.” Now he thought of Charley and his sister. - -“It was such a good little thing that brought me to you,” he said. -“One of the little things that I never thought of before,” he told her -hurriedly. - -“They are very wonderful--those little things, as you call them.... A -person is so safe in doing them----” - -“I must tell Duke Fallows about that,” he added. “About that word -‘safe,’ as you just said it.... Did you read his story?” - -“About the _Ploughman_?” - -“Yes.” - -“Oh, it was wonderful!” Betty Berry said. “He made me see it. It was -almost worth a war to make people see that----” - -She stopped strangely. He was bending close, watching her. - -“Do you know you are a love-woman?” - -“You mean something different?” she asked queerly. - -“I mean you are everything--don’t you see? You know everything at once -that I have to get bruised and tortured to know. And when you are here, -I know where I am. It’s different from any kind of resting to be here -with you. It’s kind of being made over. And then you are so--tender----” - -“You make the tears come, John Morning.” - -Now, it was very dark where they were; the real silences began. He knew -the most wonderful thing about her--her listening.... Sometimes, she -seemed hardly there. Sometimes the love for her and the sweet quality -of it all--shut his throat, and he stared away in the dark. It came to -him that Betty Berry--left to herself--would be infallible. She might -do wrong, through the will of someone else, but her own impulses were -unerringly right. There was delicacy, perhaps, from the long summer -alone, in this sense that he must not impose his will. She would be -unable to refuse anything possible. If ever Betty Berry were forced to -refuse anything he asked, they would never be the same together. And -so he studied her. Her nature was like something that enfolded. It was -like an atmosphere--his own element. - -“Betty----” - -“Yes.” - -“Betty----” - -“Yes-----” - -And then she laughed and kissed him. He was saying her name in the very -hush of contemplation; so real that the name was all.... - - - 6 - -THE Pullman conductor passing through after Trenton gave -Morning further passage, and moved on with a smile. A wonderful old -darkey was the porter, very huge, past seventy, with a voice purringly -kind, and the genial deference of the Old South. Morning was thinking -there couldn’t be better hands in which to leave the Betty Berry.... -Fifteen minutes at Philadelphia; they hurried out for a cup of coffee. -As one of the big station clocks marked the minutes, Morning felt havoc -with a new and different force. - -“I can’t go back now,” he said. - -“You look so tired--the long night journey back----” she faltered. - -“Would you like to have me go farther--to Wilmington--to Baltimore?” - -“Oh, yes.” - -“And you won’t mind staying up?” - -Betty Berry covered her eyes.... “I never rested in quite the same way -as to-night,” she said. “It has been happy--so happy, unexpected. I -shall have nine days at sea to think of it--to play and think of it, -moment by moment.” - -“I’ll go with you clear through to the ship then.” - -The clock ceased its torment. - -“Have you plenty of money to get back--and all?” - -“Yes.” - -“Are you sure--because I could loan you some?” - -He told her again, but the thought held a comradeship that gripped him. -It happened that he was plentifully supplied; though he would have -walked back rather than confess otherwise--a peculiar stupidity. The -beaming of the old porter made the moment at the steps of the coach so -fine, Morning found himself explaining: - -“The lady is sailing from Baltimore in the morning. I’ve decided to go -clear through to the pier.” - -This was an extraordinary thing for him to explain. - -They sat in silence until the train moved, and they could forget the -snoring.... The coach grew colder, and Betty unpacked a steamer rug -which they used for a lap-robe. Even the old darkey went to sleep after -Wilmington. - -“Letters--” she said at last. “I have been thinking about that.... -There’s no way to tell where I am to be. I won’t know until London, -where I am to meet my old master. Perhaps then I could tell you--but -I daren’t think of letters and risk disappointment.... You must wait -until I write you----” - -Morning began to count the days, and she knew what was in his mind. - -“That’s just it--one gets to lean on letters. One’s letters are never -one’s self. I know that extended writing throws one out from the true -idea of another. I shall think of to-night during the weeks.... It -seems, we forgot the world to-night. There--behind the scenes--how -wonderful.... There was no thought about it. I just found myself in -your arms----” - -“Then I am not to write--until I hear from you?” he asked. It had not -occurred to him before that she could have any deeper reason than an -uncertain itinerary. - -“That will be best.... Don’t you see, writing is your work. It will -make you turn your training upon me. Something tells me the peril of -that. As to-night dimmed away--you would force the picture.... Trained -as you, one writes to what he wishes one to be, not to what one is.... -You would make me all over to suit--and when I came, there would be a -shock.... And then think if some night--very eager and heart-thumping, -I should reach a city--so lonely and hungry for my letter--and it -shouldn’t be there.... No, to-night must do for me. I shall go on my -way playing and biding my time, until the return steamer. Then some -morning, about the first of March, you shall hear that I am back--and -that I am waiting for my real letter----” - -“And where did you learn all this--about a man writing himself out of -the real?” John Morning asked wonderingly. - -“If I were to be in one place to receive your letters, I might not have -thought of it--yet it is true.... Then, my letters are nothing. Perhaps -I am a little afraid to write to you. I think with the ’cello----” - -“All that seems very old and wise, beyond my kind of thinking,” he said. - -For a long time she was listening. It was like that first afternoon.... -What did Betty Berry hear continually? It gave him a conception of -what receptivity meant--that quiescence of all that is common, that -abatement of the world and the worldly self, that quality purely -feminine. It was like a valley receiving the afternoon sunlight. He -realized vaguely at first that the mastery of self, necessary for such -listening, is the very state of being saints pray for, and practice -continually to attain.... Perhaps, he thought, this is the way great -powers come--from such listening--the listening of the soul; perhaps -such power would come again and again, if only the strength of it were -turned into service for men; perhaps it was a kind of prayer.... It was -all too vague for him to speak.... - -She was first to whisper that the dawn had come. - -“I love you,” he said. - -He saw her eyes with the daylight, as he had not seen them since that -first afternoon--gray eyes, very deep. The same strange hush came to -him from them. And there was a soft gray lustre with the morning about -her traveling-coat; and her brown hair seemed half-transparent against -the panes. No one was yet abroad in the coach. - -“I don’t seem to belong at all--except that I love you,” he whispered. - -“Tell me--what that means--oh, please----” - -“When I think of what I am, and who I am, and what I have been--and -what common things I have done in the stupidity of thinking they were -good,” he explained with a rush of words: “when I think of the dozen -turnings in my life, when little things said or done by another have -kept me from greater shame and nothingness--oh, it doesn’t seem to me -that I belong at all to such a night as this! But when I feel myself -here, and see you, and how dear you are to me, how you wait for my -words, and what happiness this is together--then it comes to me that -I don’t belong to those other things, but only to this--that I could -never be a part of those old thoughts and ways, if you were always -near----” - -“And I have waited a long time.... The world has said again and again, -‘He will never come,’ but something deeper of me--something deeper -than plays the ’cello, kept waiting on and on. That deeper me seemed to -know all the time.” - -Talking and listening carried them on. John Morning had the different -phases of self segregated in an astonishing way. He spoke of himself -as man can only with a woman--making pictures of certain moments, as a -writer does. Volumes of emotion, they burned, talking and listening, -leaning upon each other’s words and thoughts. They were one, in a very -deep sense of joy and replenishment. They touched for moments the plane -of unity in which they looked with calm upon the parting, but the woman -alone poised herself there. They left the old darkey--a blessing in -his voice and smile. Such passages of the days’ journeys were always -important to Betty Berry. - -Morning fell often from the heights to contemplate the journey’s -end and the dividing sea. In spite of his words, in spite of his -belief--his giving was not of her quality of giving. His replenishment -was less therefore.... They moved about the streets of Baltimore in -early morning. The baggage went on to the ship. An hour remained. -Sounds and passing people distracted him. The woman was fresher than -when he had seen her last night, but Morning was haggard and full of -needs.... She was a continual miracle, unlike anything that the world -held--different in every word and nestling and intonation. Much of her -was the child--yet from this _naive_ sweetness, her mood would -change to a womanhood which enfolded and completed him, so that they -were as a globe together. In such instants she brought vision to his -substance; mind to his brain, intuition to his logic, divination to his -reason, affinity to each element--enveloping him as water an island. -The touch of her hand was a kiss; and of her kiss itself, passion was -but the atmosphere; there was earth below and sky above.... She took -him to the state-room where she was to be, “so you will know where I -am when you think of me.”... They heard the knock of heels on the deck -above.... - -He could not think. He heard them calling for visitors to go ashore.... -He thought once it was too late, and when he was really below on the -wharf and she above, and he realized that the wild hope of being taken -away with her, (his own will not entering, as the serpent entered -Eden,) he could hardly see her for the blur--not of tears, but of his -natural rending. Her voice was but one of many good-byes to the shore, -yet it came to him out of the tumult of voices and whistles--as a ewe -to find her own. - - - 7 - -MORNING heard some one nearby say that so-and-so had not -really sailed, but was just going down the bay.... It was thus he -learned that he might have passed the forenoon with Betty Berry on -the Chesapeake. In fact, there was no reason for him not taking the -voyage.... In a quick rush of thinking, as he stood there on the -piers, all his weaknesses paraded before him, each with its particular -deformity. The sorry pageant ended with a flourish, and he was left -alone with the throb of the unhealed wound in his side. - -Betty Berry would not have agreed to let him take the voyage, just for -the sake of being with her. He knew this instinctively, but perhaps it -might have been managed.... To think he had missed the chance of the -forenoon.... The liner was sliding down the passage, already forgotten -by the lower city.... Morning found himself looking into the window of -a drink-shop. Bottles and cases of wine in their dust and straw-coats -were corded in the window, which had an English dimness and look of -age. A quiet place; the signs attested that ales were drawn from -the wood and that many whiskeys of quality were within. Something -of attraction for the spirituous imagination was in the sweet woody -breath that reached him when he opened the door. A series of race-horse -pictures took his mind from himself to better things. - -These influences played merely upon the under-surfaces of an -intelligence whose thoughts followed the steamer down the Chesapeake -as certainly as the flock of gulls.... It was that quiet time in the -morning, after the floors are washed. The day was bright, with just a -touch of cold in the air. - -... A drink improved him generally. He examined the string of horses -again, and talked to the man behind. The man declared it was his law -not to drink oftener than once in the half-hour, during the forenoon; -he stated that it paid to exert this self-control, as his appetite was -better and he was less liable to “slop over” in the afternoon. Morning -was then informed that oysters were particularly good just now, and -that a man with a weak stomach could live on oysters.... There was just -one little flange of an oyster that was indigestible. The man knew -this because drink makes one dainty about his eating, and one can tell -what agrees with him or otherwise. Furthermore, one could detach the -indigestible flange in one’s mouth before swallowing--anyone could with -practice. The man glanced frequently at the clock.... Well, he would -break over, just once, and make up later. A half hour was sometimes a -considerable portage.... They became companionable. - -Morning started back for New York at noon. The particular train he -caught was one of the best of its kind. The buffet, the quality of -service and patronage had a different, an intimate appeal to-day. -He sat there until dark--in that sort of intensive thinking which -seemed very measured and effective to Morning. His chief trend was -a contemplation, of course, of the night before. Aspects appeared -that did not obtrude at all with the woman by him. Considering the -opportunity, he had kissed her very rarely, as he came to think of -it.... - -His fellow-passengers let him alone. He reflected that he could always -get along with the lower orders of men--with sailors, soldiers, -bartenders; with the Jakes, Jethros, and Jerries of the world. Duke -Fallows had remarked this.... Duke Fallows ... the old Liaoyang -adventure came back more clearly than it had for months.... That -_was_ a big set of doings. Certainly there was a thrill about -those days, when one stopped to think. - -At dinner time, approaching the end of the journey, Morning met a -pronounced disinclination to stay on the Jersey side. The little cabin -on the hill was certainly not for this condition of mind. He had -to stop and think that it was only yesterday noon when he left the -cabin. A period of time that flies rapidly, appears strangely long -when regarded from the moments of its closing. The period of the past -thirty hours since he had left the hill was like a sea-voyage. The -lights across the river had a surprising attraction. When he realized -the old steam of alcohol, his mind glibly explained that it was merely -an episode of a sick and overwrought body; that the real John Morning, -of altruism and aspiration, was away at sea with the love-woman, much -cherished, the very soul of him. - -More than a half-year before he had fled to the country, weary -to nausea of men in chairs and buffets. The animalism of it had -utterly penetrated him at last; the Conrad study was but one of many -revelations. He had hated the _Boabdil_; and hated more the -processes of his own mind when alcohol impelled. Only yesterday morning -he had hated the whole vanity of New York leisure, with the same -freshness that had characterized his first month of cleanliness. Yet -he found novelty in the present adventure; the prevailing illusion of -which was that he was wrong yesterday rather than now. That night he -sought his old haunts. There was a gladness about it. - -“One mustn’t be too much alone,” he decided, “especially if he -is to write.... I must have got cocky sitting there alone by the -cabin-door.... These fellows aren’t so bad....” - -Presently he was telling the old story of Liaoyang. That roused him -a little and pulled upon mental fibers still lame.... Was he to be -identified always with that?... A week later he was telling the story -of breaking away from the Russians at Liaoyang and making the journey -alone to Koupangtse. This was in a strangely quiet bar on Eighth -Avenue, in the Forties. A peculiarity about this particular telling of -the story was that he remembered the ferryman on the Hun--the one who -had wakened the river-front as he led Eve down to drink--the ferryman -who was a leper.... - -As days passed he went down deeper than ever before. “I must have had -this coming----” he would say, and refused to cross the river to rest. -There were moments when he felt too unutterably dirty to go to the -cabin. One day, he kept saying, “I’m going to see this through.” And -on another day he reflected continually (conscious of the cleverness -of the thought) that this drink passage was like the journey to -Koupangtse.... Then there was the occasion when it broke upon him -suddenly that he was being avoided at the _Boabdil_. He never went -back.... One morning he joined some sailors who had breezed in from -afar. They brought him memories and parlances; their ways were his -ways all that day, whose long drift finally brought them to Franey’s -_Lobelia_, as tough and tight a little bar as you would ask any -modern metropolis to furnish. The sailors were down and done-for now, -but Morning stood by for the end, enjoying the place and the wide -bleakness of it.... A slumming party came in about midnight--young men -and women of richness and variety, trying to see bottom by looking -straight down--as if one could see through such dirty water. - -The city’s dregs about him--a fabric of idiocy and perversion and -murder--did not look so fatuous nor wicked to Morning’s eye, as did -this perfumed company. They thought they were seeing life, but, deeper -than brain, they knew better; their laughter and their voices were -off the key, because they were not being true to themselves. Franey’s -regulars were glad for the extra drinks, but Morning had a fury. His -shame for the party was akin to the shame he had held for Lowenkampf on -the eve of battle long ago. He arose, short and flaming, yet conscious -even in his rage of the brilliance of his idea. - -“You people make me sick,” he said, lurching out. “You’d have to be -_slumee_ to see how silly you look----” - -They tried to detain him--to laugh at him--but one woman knew better. -Her low voice of rebuke to her companions was a far greater rebuke to -John Morning at the door. - -... Finally he began to wonder how long they would keep on giving him -money at the bank. He turned up every day. No matter what he drew it -was always gone. Sometimes a holiday tricked him, and he suffered. He -watched for Sundays, after he learned.... The banking business was a -hard process, because he had to emerge; had to come right up to the -window and speak to a clean, white man--who had known him before. It -became the sole ascent of Morning’s day--a torturing one. He washed and -shaved for it, when possible, and after a time managed frequently to -save enough to steady his nerves for the ordeal. Then he had to write -his name, and always a blue eye was leveled at him, and he felt the -dirt in his throat.... So he drifted for six weeks, and it was winter. - -His descent was abrupt and deep. He tried to get back, and found his -will treacherous. He was prey at times to abominable fears. His body -was unmanageable from illness. There were times when it would have -meant death or insanity not to drink. For the first time in his life -he encountered an inertia that could not be whipped to the point of -reconstructivity. His thoughts cloyed all fine things; his expression -made them mawkish and teary; his emotions overflowed on small matters. -Betty Berry, around whom all this brooding revolved, hardly reached -a plane worthy of interpretation. Morning’s conception of the woman -on the afternoon she came to the Armory, or on the night-trip to -Baltimore, contrasted with this mental apparition of the sixth week: - -“She is a professional musician, making her own way in the world, and -taking, as many a man would, the things that please her as she passes. -This is not the great thing to her that it is to me. Other men have -doubtless interested her suddenly and rousingly, and have gone their -way.... Had she been a stranger to a man’s sudden loving she would -never have beckoned me to the chair in the wings that night. She would -never have come to my arms--as I went to hers----” - -Sweat broke from him. The savage and abandoned company of thoughts -had ridden down all else, like a troop of raiders, destroying as they -went.... The troop was gone; the shouting died away--but he was left -more lewd and low than the worst. He had defiled the image of the -woman who had given herself so eagerly. He recalled how he had talked -of understanding, how he had praised her in his thoughts because she -was brave enough to be natural, and to act as a natural woman who has -found her own, after years of repression. The other side of the shield -was turned to torture him--the sweet, low-leaning, human tenderness of -Betty Berry, her patience, her endless and ever-varying bestowals. She -had called his the voice of reality, and become silent before it; had -proved great enough to remain undestroyed in a man’s world; her faith -and spirit arose above centuries of lineage in a man’s world--and she -was Betty Berry who knew her lover’s presence, though they were almost -strangers to each other, and opened her arms to him.... - -It was a hell that he vividly reviewed for seven weeks, and with no -Virgil to guide. A scene or two from the final day is enough: - -... He had come from the bank about one in the afternoon, and had taken -a chair in the bar of the _Van Antwerp_. He was neither limp -nor sprawling, but in a condition of queer detachment from exterior -influences. He knew that it was daylight; heard voices but no words, -and carried himself with the rigid effort of one whose limbs are -habitually flippant. Perhaps it was because he was so very generous -to the waiter that he was allowed to close his eyes without being -molested. In any event, his consciousness betrayed him, and away he -went in the darkness of dream: The Ferryman of the Hun was poling -away at the stream and he, John Morning, was but one of a company in -passage. It was not the Hun river this time; the sorrel Eve was not -there. Not alone the Ferryman, but all on board were lepers--he, John -Morning in the midst of them, a leper. The old wound was witness to -this.... They tried to land at the little towns but natives came forth -and drove them away. Down, down stream they went and always natives -came forth to warn them as they neared the land.... Even when they drew -in to the marshes and the waste-places natives appeared and stoned them -away.... And so they went down--to the ocean and the storm and Morning -opened his eyes. - -Opposite, his back to the marble bar, his elbows braced against the -rail, stood Mr. Reever Kennard, watching him, and the look upon the -face of the famous correspondent was that of scornful pity--as if there -was a truce to an old enmity, no longer worth while. - -Still later on that day, over on Second Avenue, Morning almost bumped -into a small yellow sign at the elevator entrance to the Metal Workers’ -Hall, to the effect that Duke Fallows was to address a gathering there -that night. - - - 8 - -A FLASH of love came to his heart for Duke Fallows at the -sight of the name. There was nothing maudlin about this; rather, a -decent bit of stamina in the midst of sentimental overflows. It was -the actual inside relation, having nothing to do with the old surface -irritation.... Morning took care of himself as well as he could during -the day. He meant to mix with the crowd at the meeting, but not to make -himself known until he was free from vileness. He would keep track of -the other’s place and movements in New York. When he was fit--there -would be final restoration in the meeting. His heart thumped in -anticipation. The yellow poster had turned the corner for him. These -first thoughts of the upward trend are interesting: - -He meant to cross the river and build a big fire in the cabin. There -he would fight it out and cleanse the place meanwhile, in preparation. -He pictured the cabin-door open, water on the floor, the fire burning, -the smell of soap. He would heat water, wash his blankets, put them out -in the sun; polish his kettles with water and sand. Every detail was -important, and how strangely his mind welcomed the freshness of these -simple thoughts. The glass of the windows would flash in the morning, -and the door of oak would gleam with its oil.... Finally he would bring -Duke there. - -This was the triumph of it all. He would bring the sick man home; -tend the fire for him, go to the dairyman’s for milk and eggs. They -could call Jake and talk to him--seeing the heart of a simple man.... -They would talk and work together ... the sick man looking up at the -ceiling, and he, Morning, at the machine as in the old days. Spring -would come, the big trees would break their buds and sprinkle the -refuse down--and, God, it would be green again--all this rot ended.... -So the days would pass quickly until Betty Berry came.... Duke would be -glad to hear of her. - -... That night Morning went in with the workers to their Hall and sat -far back. The meeting had been arranged under socialistic auspices; -seven hundred men at least were present. Through the haze of pipe, -cigarette, and cigars, Duke Fallows came forth. - -And this was no sick man. His knees were strong, and there was a -lightness of shoulder that did away with the huddle of old times. His -eyes shone bright under the hanging lamp, and his laugh was as far as -Asia from scorn. There was brown upon him; his hands, when they fell -idle, were curved as if to fit a broad-ax, and “I’m glad to be with -you, men,” he said. - -“... I have come to tell you a story--my story. Every man has one. I -never tell mine twice the same, but some time I shall tell it just -right, and then the answer shall come.” - -Power augmented in the silence of the smoky hall. The gathering -recognized the artist that had come down to them, because he loved -the many and belonged with them. They gave him instinctively the rare -homage of uncritical attention. Fallows told of Liaoyang--of the whole -preparation--of the Russian singing, the generals, the systems by -which men were called to service. Always the theme that played through -this prelude was the millet of Manchuria. He told of the great grain -fields, the feeding troop-horses, the hollows between the hills--how -the ancient Chinese city stood in a bend of the river--of the outer -fighting, the rains, the mass of men, the Chinese. - -This new Duke Fallows hated no man; had no scorn for the Russian -chiefs. His ideas of service and humanity concerned Russia rather than -Japan--and not the imperialistic Russia, but the real spirit--the -toiler, the dreamer, the singer, the home-maker--the Russia that was -ready, perhaps as ready as any people in the world, to put away envy, -hatred, war; to cease lying to itself, and to grasp the reality that -there is something immortal about simplicity of life and service for -others. What concerned this Russia, Fallows declared, concerned the -very soul of the western world. - -He placed the field for the battle in a large way--the silent, watery -skies, all-receiving _kao-liang_, and the moist earth that held -the deluges. Morning choked at the picture; the action came back again -as Fallows spoke--Lowenkampf himself--the infantry of Lowenkampf -slipping down the ledges into the grain--Luban, machine-guns, rout--the -little open place in the millet where the Fallows part of the battle -was fought. - -“... He was a young Russian peasant. If he came into this hall now, -we would all know instinctively that he belonged to us. He was fine -to look upon that day, coming out of the grain--earnest, glad, his -heart turned homeward. His enemy was not Japan, but Imperialism, and -defeat was upon it. This defeat meant to him, as it did to hundreds -of soldiers in that hour--the beginning of the road home. Luban was -burning with the shame of detected cowardice. A common soldier had -commented upon it in passing. And now this young Russian peasant met -the eyes of Luban, and the two began to speak, and I was there to -listen. - -“The peasant said that this was not his war; that he had been forced -to come; that it meant nothing to him if Russia took Manchuria; but -that it meant a very great deal to him--this being away--because his -six babies were not being fed by the Fatherland, and his field was not -being ploughed. - -“It was very simple. You see it all. The Fatherland forced starvation -upon a man’s children, while his field remained unploughed. Only a -simple man could say it. You must be straight as a child to speak such -epics. It is what you men have thought in your hearts. - -“Of course, Luban only knew he was an officer and the man was not. -Machine-guns were drumming in the distance, and the grain was hot and -breathless all about. The forward ranks were terribly broken--the -soldiers streaming back past us. Luban, who opened the discussion, was -getting the worst of it, and his best reply was murder. He handled the -little automatic gun better than the cause of the Fatherland--shot the -_Ploughman_ through the breast. I thrust him back to take the -falling one in my arms.... - -“We seemed alone together. There was power upon me. Even in the -swiftness and tumult of the passing I made the good man see that I -would father his babes, look to the ploughing of his field, and be -the son of his mother. His passing made all clear to me. His message -was straight from the heart of the world’s suffering poor, from the -heavy-laden. He spoke to kings and generals, and to all who have and -are blind. There in the havoc of the retreat, dying in my arms--he -made it vivid as the smiting sun of Saul--that this hideous disorder -of militia was not his Fatherland. He would have fought for the real -Fatherland. He was a son in spirit, and a state-builder; he would have -fought for that; he was not afraid to die.... - -“Love for him had come strangely to my heart, men. I said to him--words -I cannot remember now--something I had never been able to write, -because I had not written for men before, but for some fancied elect. -I made him know that he had done well, that his field would bring -forth, and that his house would glow red with firelight.... I think my -Ploughman felt as I did even before his heart was still--that there is -something beyond death in the love of men for one another.... It was -wonderful. We forgot the battle. We forgot Luban and the firing. We -were one. His spirit was upon me--and the good God gave him peace. - -“I tell you quietly, but don’t you see--this that I bring so quietly -is the message from the Ploughman who passed--the message of Liaoyang? -And this is the sentence of it: Where there is a real Fatherland--there -will be Brotherhood. - -“The world is so full of pallor and agony and sickness and stealing. -First, it is because of the Lubans. The Lubans are sick for power--sick -with their desires. Having no self-mastery, they are lost and full of -fear. They fear the whip, they fear poverty and denial; theirs is a -continual fear of being stripped to the nakedness of what they are--as -old Mother Death strips a man. In the terror of all these things they -seek to turn the whip upon others, to reinforce their emptiness with -exterior possessions. Because their souls are dying, and because they -feel the terror of sheer mortality, they seek to kill the virtue in -other men. Because they cannot master themselves, they rise in passion -to master others. They could not live but for the herds. - -“We who labor are the strength of the world. I say to you, men, poverty -is the God’s gift to His elect. It is to us who have only ourselves -to master--that the dream of Brotherhood can come true. It is alone -to us, who have nothing, that these possessions can come, which old -Mother Death is powerless to take away. And we who labor and are -heavy-laden are making our colossal error to-day. We are the muttering -herds. Standing with the many we may not know ourselves. We look upon -the cowardice and emptiness of the Lubans and call it Power. We see -the ways of the Herd-drivers--and dream of driving others, instead of -ourselves. We look upon the Herd-drivers--and turn upon them the same -thoughts of envy and hatred and cruelty--which cuts them off from -every source of power and leaves them empty and cowardly indeed. - -“These are the thoughts of the herds--and yet down in the muscling -mass men are not to blame. It takes room for a man to be himself--it -takes room for a man to love his neighbor and to master himself. -Terrified, whipped, packed, sick with the struggle and the strain of it -all--how can men, turning to one another, find brotherhood in the eyes -of their fellows. Living the life of the laboring herds in the great -cities--why, it would take Gods to love men so!... The world is so full -of pallor and agony and sickness and stealing--first, because of the -Lubans, and, second, because of the City.... And after Liaoyang, I went -straight to the Ploughman’s house--for I had given my word. And now I -will tell you what I found on the little hill-farm up in the Schwarenka -district among the toes of the Bosk mountains, a still country.” - - - 9 - -“I REMEMBER the soldiers at Liaoyang, the last thing, the many -who had grasped at the hope that defeat meant the end of the war. They -were learning differently as I left. Hundreds gave up from the great -loneliness.... I carried the name of my Ploughman across the brown -country, and the northern autumn was trying to hold out against the -frosts. Asia is desolate. We who are white men, and who know a bit of -the loveliness of life--even though we labor at that which is not our -life--we must grant that the Northern Chinese have learned this: To -suffer quietly. - -“Baikal was crossed at last. On and on by train into the West--until I -came to the little village that he had said. For days it had been like -following a dream. Sometimes it seemed to me so wonderful--that young -man coming out of the millet, and what he said--that I thought it must -have come to me in a vision, that I was mad to look for his town and -the actual house in the country beyond. Yet they knew his name in the -little town, and said that early next morning I could get a wagon to -take me to the cabin, which was some _versts_ away. - -“I had known so much of cities. For weeks I had been in the noises -of the Liaoyang fighting and in trains. Moreover, I had been ill -for a long time, too--a crawling, deadly illness. But that night my -soul breathed. I ate black bread by candle-light and drank milk. The -sharpness of mid-October was in the air. You will laugh when I say it -seemed to me, an American, as if I had come home. In the morning early -I looked away to the East, from whence I had come, and where the sun -was rising. (The ceiling of the little room was so low I had to bend my -head.) To the north the mountains were sharp in the morning light and -shining like amethyst.... I left the wagon at the first sight of the -hut in the distance, and I reached there in the warmth of the morning. - -“An old man was sitting in the sun. He asked me to have bread, and said -they had some sausage for the coming Sunday. This was mid-week. A child -brought good water. Then I heard the cane of the old woman, and saw -her hand first, as it thrust the cane out from the door--all brown and -palsied, the hand, its veins raised and the knuckles twisted from the -weight that bent her fingers against the curve of the stick. The rest -was so pure. She had been a tall woman--very thin and bent and white -now. When I looked into that face I saw the soul of the Ploughman. I -can tell you I wanted to be there. It was very strange.... I can see -her now, looking up at me, as the old do from their leaning. It was -like the purity and distance of the morning. I trembled, too, before -this old wife, for the fact in my mind about her son. I tell you, old -mother-birds are wise. - -“It was as if my garments smelled of the fighting. She knew whence I -had come; she looked into my soul and found the death of her son. Her -soul knew it, but not her brain yet. She may have found my love for -him, too--the deep bond between us. - -“‘Ask the stranger to stay. We will have sausage by the Sunday,’ said -the old man. His thought was held by hunger. - -“‘Hush, Jan--he comes from our son----’ - -“‘And where are the children and the young mother?’ I asked. - -“‘They are out for faggots in the bush--they will come----’ - -“I had thought, as I traveled, (the thoughts of the weeks on the road,) -to do many things; to give them plentifully of money; to arrange for -someone to do the late fall and winter work. I had intended to go on, -when sure that everything was at hand to make them comfortable. I -tell you, men, it was all too living for that. One could not perform -unstudied benefits for the mother of the Ploughman. There was more than -money wanted there. - -“‘We would like to have you stay with us,’ the mother said, ‘but our -poverty is keen, and we have not bread enough now for the winter.... He -was taken long before the harvest, and it is long until the grain comes -again----’ - -“‘But if he were here--what would be done, Mother?’ - -“‘Ah, if he came,’ she said strangely. ‘If he came----’ - -“The father now spoke: - -“‘He would cut wood for our neighbors this winter--when the ploughing -was finished. That would provide food--good food. Oh, he would know -what to do--our Jan would know----’ - -“I won’t soon forget that high, wavering voice of the old man--‘Oh, he -would know what to do--our Jan is a good son----’ and the shake of his -head. - -“‘But may I not do some of the things that he would do?’ - -“I had to say it twice, for I spoke their language poorly. I had -understood the son at Liaoyang--but all moments were not like those in -which he spoke to me. - -“‘And then,’ I added hastily, ‘he sent you some money----’ - -“I dared not offer much with that pure old face looking at me. The -silver and gold that was in my purse I put in her lap. - -“‘Oh, it is very much--the good God brought you from him, did he not?’ - -“‘And we will not need to wait until Sunday for----’ - -“‘Hush--Jan--no, we will not need to wait.’ - -“... And then the young mother came. I saw her steps quicken when -yet she was far off. The little ones were about her--all carrying -something. The older children were laughing a little, but the others -were quiet in their haste and effort to keep up.... There was one -little boy, but I will tell you afterward of the littlest Jan.... There -was a pallor over the brood. Their health was pure, and their blood -strong, but that pallor had come. Men, it was hunger already. Here were -the fields, and the Fatherland had taken him before the harvest. This -thing, the shocking truth of it; that this actually could be; that -a country could do such a thing--made me forget everything else for -the moment. Then I realized that I must keep the truth from the young -mother. Before I spoke at all they told her that I had come from her -husband. - -“Her lips were white, her breasts wasted. She was lean from hunger, -lean from her bearing. Young she was for the six, but much had she -labored, and there was a mountain wildness in her eyes. She was -stilled, as the old mother had been, by the fear of hearing her man’s -death. She dared not ask. She accepted what was said--that I had come -from him, that I had brought money, and wished to stay for a little.... -She leaned against the door, the smaller children gathering at her -knees, the others putting away the wood. Her single skirt hung square, -and her arms seemed very long, nearly to her knees; her hands loose -and tired. Her hair was yellow; the wind had tossed it. You know how -a horse that has been listening, suddenly catches his breath again. -The same sound came from her as she started to breathe again.... One -of the smaller children laughed, and I looked down. It was the little -four-year-old, the third Jan of that house, and he was close to my -knees, looking up at me ... and we were all together. - -“I loved the world better after that look of the child into my eyes.... -I took him on my shoulder. We went to the village together. That night -the wagon brought us back; there was much food.... And that was my -house. I looked out on the mountains the next day, and for many days to -come, and, men--their grand sky-wide simplicity poured into my heart. I -took the old horse out, and we ploughed during the few days remaining. -There was not much land--but we ploughed it together to the end, when -the frost made the upturned clods ring. Then I strawed up the shed for -the old horse to pass his winter in warmth, and brought blankets for -him. I respected that old horse. Health and good-fellowship had come -to me as we worked together. I remember the sharp turning of the early -afternoons from yellow to gray and to dark.... Then we went into the -bush together in the early winter days. The ax rang, and the snow-bolt -was piled high each day with wood. The smell of the wood-smoke in the -morning air had a zest for my nostrils I had never known before, and -at night the cabin windows were red with fire-light. We were all one -together. And I think the spirit of the Ploughman was there in the -happiness. - -“Sometimes in the night when I would get up to replenish the fire--the -mystery of plain goodness would come to me. I would see the children -and others all around. Then at the frosty window, shading the fire -from my eyes, I looked out upon the snows. I was unable to contain the -simple grandeurs that had unfolded to me day by day.... And then I -would go back to the blankets where the little boy lay--his hand always -fumbling for me as I crept in. The love that I felt for this child was -beyond all fear. We could stand together against any fate. And one -night it came to me that from much loving of one a man learns to love -the many, and that I would really be a man when I learned to love the -world with the same patience and passion that I loved the little boy. -The Ploughman came along in a dream that night and said it was all -quite true. - -“And that was the winter.... I wish you could have seen this sick -man who had come. I had lain on my back for months, except when some -great effort aroused me. I had that coming on, men, which makes a man -walk--as a circus bear turns and totters on his back feet. The house, -the field, the plough, the horse, woods, winter, and mountains, love -for the child, love for all the others--the much that my hands found to -do and the heart found to give--these things made me new again. These -simple sound and holy things. - -“I had been a sick man mentally and morally, too, sick with ego and -intellect--a nasty sickness. But one could not look, feeling the joy -in which I lived, upon the snows of the foothills, nor afar through -the yellow winter noons to the gilded summits of the Bosks; one could -not look into the eyes of the children, the last vestige of hunger -pallor gone from them; one could not talk of tobacco-and-sausage with -the old man by his fireside; nor watch the mysterious great givings -of the two mothers--their whole lives giving--pure instruments of -giving--passionate givers, they were; givers of life and preservers of -life--I say, men, one could not live in this purity and not put away -such evil and cruel things.... As the sickness of the blood went from -me--so that sickness of mind.... And, I tell you, we were ready as a -house could be, when the news came officially that our Ploughman was -among the missing from the battle of Liaoyang. - -“It was sharper than any winter night. We stood in the cabin and -wept together. Then in the hush--the real thought of it all came -to one--to whom, do you think?... She was on her knees--_the old -mother_--praying for the other peasant cabins in Russia--the -thousands of others from which a son and husband was gone--‘cabins to -which the good God has not sent such a friend.’... I tell you, men, -all the evil of past days seemed washed from me in that hour.... And -that is my home. (The old horse and I opened the fields again in the -springtime.) - -“After that I went down to Petersburg to tell my story, and to Moscow. -I have told it in cellars and stables--in Berlin, in Paris, and London. -I am making the great circle--to tell it here--and on, when we are -finished, to Chicago, to Denver and San Francisco--and then the long -sail homeward, following the first journey to the foothills of the Bosk -range. I will go to my old mother there, and to the little boy, who -looked up into my eyes--as if we were born to play and talk and sleep -together. - -“The days of the conscript gangs are over here, men. Such days are -numbered, even in Russia. They don’t come to your door in this country -and take you away from your work to fight across the world--but the -Lubans are here--and the cities are full of horror. It is in the -cities where the herds are, where the little Lubans whip, and the -bigger Lubans thrive. In the pressure and heaviness of the cities--the -thought that comes to the herd is the old hideous conception of the -multitude--that the way of the Lubans is the way of life.... It isn’t -the way. The way of life has nothing to do with greed, nor with envy, -nor with schemes against the bread of other men. It is a way of peace -and affiliation--of standing together. And you who have little can go -that way; you who labor can go that way--because you are the strength -of the world. Don’t resist your enemies, men--leave them. The Master -of us all told us that. And when the herds break, and this modern hell -of the city is diminished--the Lubans will follow you out--whining and -bereft, they will follow you out, as the lepers of Peking follow the -caravans to the gates and beyond.... I have told you of my home--the -little cabin that came to me from the beginnings of compassion. And -there is such a home for every man of you--in the still countries where -the voice of God may be heard.” - -Morning, desperately ill, rose to leave the hall. In the momentary -hush, as he reached the door, the voice of Duke Fallows was raised -again, calling his name. - - - 10 - -“JOHN----” a second time. - -Morning turned, his arms lifted despairingly. - -“Wait, John, I’ll join you!” - -Fallows came down.... The man who gently held the door shut smiled with -strange kindness. There was a shining of kindness in men’s faces.... -Morning did not feel that he belonged. He was broken and shamed.... The -big man was upon him--the long arms tossed about him. - -“I’ve been looking and listening for you too long, John, to let you go.” - -“... I just wanted to hear you. I’m shot to pieces, Duke; I’ll get a -few drinks and wait for you. Then, you’ll see, I’m all out of range of -the man you are----” - -There was no answer. Morning looked up to find the long bronzed face -laughing, the eye gleaming. Fallows turned to the doorman and another, -saying: - -“Both of you go with him. He needs a drink or two, and one of you come -back to show me the way to him--when I’m through here.... This is a -great night for us, John.” - -The three went down in the elevator.... And so the sick man had not -come back--the dithyrambic Duke Fallows was gone for good. The sick -man was strong; the impassioned phrase-maker had risen to the simple -testimony of service. From scorn and emotion, from judgment and -selection, he had risen to the plane of loving kindness.... The air in -the street refreshed him a little. Morning found a bar. - -“I’ve been drinking,” he said to the men. “Fallows is a king. I -was there with him at Liaoyang.... Maybe you saw my story in the -_World-News_.... He stayed in the grain with Luban. I went on to -see the cavalry fight.... I came back home to do the story. He went on -to Russia on the _Ploughman_ story----” - -“Is he a preacher?” said one of the men. - -“Yes--but he learned about war and women first.” - -“I’ll take a soft drink and go back. You stay here, and I’ll bring him -to you,” the same one went on. - -The other drank with Morning and agreed that they would not leave until -Fallows came. - -“And so he learned about war and women first,” he said queerly, when -they were alone. “But he has been a laboring man----” - -“Yes. You heard him.” - -“But before that farm in Russia----” - -“Oh, yes; he was a laborer.” - -“Well, he certainly got the crowd with him,” the man acknowledged. - -“You know why, don’t you?” Morning said impressively. - -“No.” - -“He’s _for_ the crowd. People feel it.” - -“Oh, I knew that.” - -There was quiet, and then the face turned to Morning: - -“Say, how did you get such a start as this? This kind means weeks----” - -“It got away from me before I knew it. I must have got to gambling with -myself to see how far I could go.” - -“Are you going to quit?” - -A mist filled Morning’s mind. The question seemed an infringement. Then -it occurred to him how he had fallen to lying to himself. - -“He’ll make you quit, but don’t let him stop you too short. You’d be a -wreck in a few hours. You see how you needed these two or three drinks?” - -... Fallows entered with several of the committee. He had promised to -speak to them again. - -“It’s what I came for,” he was saying. “So long as I am wanted I’ll -stay.... Yes, I’m a socialist.... Yes, I believe in fighting, but when -our kind of men stand together, there won’t be anything big enough to -give us a fight. When our kind of men look into one another’s eyes and -find service instead of covetousness--there’s nothing in the world to -stand against us.” - -Fallows and Morning were in a steam-room together two hours afterward. -Morning was limp and light-headed. He had told of some of the -things that had happened since Baltimore--of men he had met--of the -slummers--of harrowing nights and waiting for the bank to open. - -“You had to have it, John?” - -There was something in the way Fallows spoke the word, _John_, -that made Morning weaker and filled his throat. He had to speak loudly -for the hissing of the steam. - -“Why, if you didn’t get humble and stay humble after such a -training--you’d be the poorest human experiment ever undertaken by -the Master. But you can’t fail. It isn’t in the cards to fail. You’ve -ridden several monsters--Drink, Ambition, Literature--but they won’t -get you down. Why, even the sorrel mare didn’t kill you, as I promised -aforetime. I saw a lot in that story. You loved her to the last. You -left her dead and hunched on an alien road. You’ve loved these others -long enough. You’ll leave them dead--even that big fame stuff. I think -you’ve ridden that pompous fool to death already. They are all passages -on the way to Initiation. Your training for service is a veritable -inspiration--and you’ll write to men--down among men. I love that -idea--you’ll write the story of Compassion--down among men----” - -Fallows’ face came closer through the steam. He scrutinized the wound -that wouldn’t heal. “Did you ever hear about Saint Paul’s thorn in the -flesh?... ‘And lest I be exalted above measure through the abundance of -revelations, there was given me a thorn in the flesh--?’ It all works -out. You’ll have to excuse me. The Bible was the only book I had with -me up in the Bosk country. I found it all I wanted. I would take it -again.... Yes, John, it’s all right with you.” - -Morning was telling of that afternoon at the Armory. He passed over -quickly the period of worldly achievement in New York to the quiet -blessedness he had hit upon, finding the hill and the elms. - -“That’s the formula--to get alone and listen----” - -“That’s what you preached to-night, wasn’t it?”... Presently he was -back to Betty Berry again--finding her at the ’cello--the wonderful -ride to Baltimore--which brought him to the drink chapter once -more.... He couldn’t see Duke’s face as he spoke of the woman. There -was a peculiar need of the other saying something when he had finished. -This only was offered: - -“We won’t talk about that now, John.... You’d better take another -little drink. Your voice is down.... You’ll be through after a day or -two, and I’ll stay with you----” - -“We’ll go over to the cabin to-morrow,” said Morning. - -They were lying cot by cot in the cooling-room, and the talk for a time -concerned Lowenkampf, his court-martial and discharge. - -“Do you know how I thought of you coming back, Duke?” Morning whispered -afterward. - -“Tell me.” - -“I always thought of you coming back a sick man--staring at the ceiling -as you used to--sometimes talking to me, sometimes listening to what -I had written. But the main thought was how I would like to take care -of you. I was rotten before. I wanted you sick, so I could show you -better.” - -The huge hand stretched across from cot to cot. - -“It was afterward--that all the things you said in Liaoyang came back -to me right.... We were lying in ’Frisco waiting for quarantine, and my -stuff was finished the second time, before I read your letter to me and -the one to Noyes--and the Ploughman story. That was the first time I -really saw it right. There was a little doctor with me--Nevin--who got -it all from the first reading. At Liaoyang we were down too low among -the fighting to get it. That Ploughman story made my big yarn look like -a death-mask of the campaign. Betty Berry got it too.... It was the -same to-night--why, you got those men, body and soul.” - -“I’d like to think so, John; but I’m afraid you’re wrong. It was just -a seed to-night. Men need to be cultivated every day in a thousand -ways.... Women get things quicker; they can listen better.... The last -night before Jesus was taken by the Roman soldiers, he told the Eleven -that he could be sure only of them. He knew that of the multitude that -heard him--most would sink back. He counted on just the Eleven, and -built his church on the weakest, upon the most unstable--counting only -on the strength of the weakest link.... The fact is, John, I’m only -counting on you. I’ve got to count on you.” - - * * * * * - -Less than five weeks had elapsed, and yet the worst seemed as far -back, in some of Morning’s moments, as the deck-passage out of China. -He had suffered abominably. Fallows stood by night and day at first. -He brought back a certain quality from the Russian farm that was pure -inspiration to the other. They spoke about the Play. Morning was more -than ever glad that Markheim had refused it. They sat long by the -fire. More happened than modern America would believe off-hand--for -John Morning began to learn to listen. Fallows was happy. His presence -in the room was like the fire-light. Twice more he went across to the -Metal Workers’ Hall, and still the New York group would not let him -go. The Socialists brought him their ideas. He was in the heart of -threatening upheavals. He reiterated that they must be united in one -thing first; they must have faith in one another. They must not answer -greed with greed. They must be sure of themselves; they must have -a pure voice; they must know first what was wanted, and follow the -vision.... Duke Fallows knew that it was all the matter of a leader.... -He told them of the men and women in Russia who have put off self. -Finally Duke appeared to see that his work was done, and he retired -from them. - -“It is delicate business,” he said to Morning. “There’s fine stuff -in the crowd--then there’s the rest. If I should show common just -once--all my work would be spoiled, and even the blessed few would -forget the punch of my little story. They think I’ve gone on west.” - -Still he didn’t leave the cabin on the hill. - -It was only when Morning undertook to touch upon the love story--that -Fallows looked away.... Morning tried to comprehend this. Something -had happened. The big man who had stared at so many ceilings of Asia, -breaking out from time to time in strange utterances all colored with -desire; the man who had met his Eve, and talked of being controlled by -her even after death--shuddered now at the mention of Betty Berry.... -Morning even had a suspicion at last that the other construed a -relation between the woman’s influence and the excess of alcohol. These -moments dismayed him. - -There is a dark spot in every man’s radiance--and this was the -Californian’s, Morning concluded. In the transformation which the -journey to Russia had effected, his particular weakness seemed hardened -into a crust of exceptional austerity. The only women he ever spoke -of in the remotest personal fashion belonged to the peasant family of -the Ploughman. His audiences were unmixed by his own arrangement. In -tearing out his central weakness, a certain madness on the subject had -rushed in, a hatred that knew no quarter, and a zeal in denial that -only one who has touched the rim of ruin can know. - -On the last night of February they talked and read late. The reading -was from Saint Paul in the different letters. Fallows seemed -impassioned with the figure. - -“I understand him,” he said. - -“He was afraid of women. Sometimes he seems to hate women,” Morning -remarked. Certain lines of Paul’s on the subject had broken the -perfection of the message for him. - -A strange look came to Fallows. The finger that was turning a page -drew in with the others, and the hand that rested upon the book was -clenched.... “Paul knew women,” he muttered. - -“You think before he took that road to Damascus--he knew women?” - -“Yes----” - -“Even the Paul who stood by holding the garments of the stoners of -Stephen?” - -“He was a boy then. He learned afterward, I think.” - -“He couldn’t have known the saints among them,” said Morning, who was -smiling in his heart. - -“Perhaps some saint among them was the one who made him afraid. You -know women won’t have men going alone--not even the saints among -women.... There may have been one who refused to be dimmed altogether -even by that great light.” - -“But he went alone----” - -“In that way she wouldn’t be the Thorn,” Fallows said slowly. “She -would be greater power for him. Yes, Saint Paul went alone. We wouldn’t -be reading him to-night--had he turned back to her.” - -That hurt. Morning was no longer smiling within. “I didn’t learn -women--even as a boy,” he said. - -Fallows was unable to speak. He had never loved Morning as at this -moment. He was tender enough to catch the strange pathos of it, which -the younger man could not feel. - -“You’re a natural drunkard, John,” he said presently. “You are by -nature ambitious, as it is intimated Cæsar was; but you are naturally a -monk, too. I say it with awe.” - -“You are wrong,” Morning said with strength. “When this woman came into -the room at the Armory that first day--it was as if she brought with -her the better part of myself----” - -“You said that same before. You were sick. You were torn by exhaustion -and by that letter of mine about Reever Kennard. It was the peace and -mystery a woman always brings to a sick man.... _Your_ woman -is your genius, John. Any rival will stifle and defame it. It’s the -woman in a man that makes him a prophet or a great artist. Your ego is -masculine; your soul is feminine. When you learn to keep the ego out -of the brain, and use the soul, you will become an instrument, more or -less perfect, for eternal utterances. When you achieve the union of the -man and woman in you--that will be your illumination. You will have -emerged into the larger consciousness. You are not so far as you think -from that high noon-light. If you should take a woman in the human -way, you will not achieve in this life the higher marriage, of which -the union of two is but a symbol. That would be turning back, with the -spiritual glory in your eyes--back to the shadow of flesh.” - -“How do you know that?” Morning asked coldly. - -“Because of the invisible restraints that have kept you from women so -far.... I believe you are prepared to tell men something about the -devils of drink and ambition--having met them?” - -“It is possible.” - -“I speak with the same authority.” - -Morning did not accept this authority, but was long disturbed after the -light was out.... Her ship had been six days at sea. - -They opened the door wide to the first morning of March. Snow was upon -the hill, but there was a promise in the air, even in the sharpness -of it. The wind came in, searched among the papers of the table, -disordered the draughts of the chimney, filling the room with a faint -flavor of wood-smoke, that perfect incense. They stood there, testing -the day, and each was thinking of the things of the night before. -Fallows said: - -“John, you didn’t build this cabin with the idea of a woman coming?” - -“No; it was built before I found her the second time. It was my -escape from _Boabdil_.... But I thought of her coming, many -times afterward--just as I thought of you coming back to stare at the -rafters----” - -Fallows looked down intently at him for a moment, and said: - -“John, you’ve got about all your equipment now. You can’t stand much -more tearing down. My road is not for you. You were given balance -against that. Don’t venture into what is alien ground for you. You will -get back your health. Even the wound will heal. Then will come to you -those gracious ideals of singleness, plainness of house and fare, of -purity and solitude and the integration of the greater dimension of -force.... You are through looking--you must listen now. The blessedness -you told me of this last summer was but a breath of what you will -get.... - -“You are a natural monk. If you were in a monastery, the laws -restraining you would be gross and material, compared with those bonds -which nature has put upon you. The cowl, the cell, and the solitude -are but symbols again of the inner monasticism a few rare souls have -known. You need no exterior bonds, vows, nor threatenings--no walls, -no brandishing threats of damnation. But, if you should betray the -invisible restraints that have held you for so many years, the sin -would be far deadlier than breaking any vows made to a church or to an -order. Vows are for half-men, John; vows are but the crutches of an -unfinished integrity.” - - - 11 - -ON the morning of the Third, at ten, her call came to him. -Shortly after twelve he was across the river and far uptown in -the hallway of an apartment-house. Even as he spoke her name, his -was called from the head of the stairs. He always remembered the -intonation.... A fire was burning in the grate. The ’cello was there. -She left the hall-door of the room open, but they heard voices, and it -was draughty.... She went to close it and returned to Morning, who was -still standing. - -“What is the matter? You are not well,” she said.... It was hard for -him to realize that this was only the third time he had seen her. He -was trying to adjust her in the other meetings with this--the angel who -had come helping to the Armory; the concert Betty Berry, her nature -flung wide to expression, bringing her gift with love to her people. -The Armory was one; but the Betty Berry of the concert-night was many: -she who had come forth from the stage to his arms (and that was the -kiss of all time); the listening Betty Berry in the dimness of the -Pullman car; holding fast to his hand as a child might, while they -watched the dawn of morning together; the Betty Berry who had led him -to her berth on the ship--that kiss and this.... - -The room had disordered him at the first moment. It was so particularly -a New York apartment room. But the ’cello helped it; the grate-fire -was good, and after she had shut the door--there was something eternal -about the sweetness of that--it was quite the place for them to be. - -He was animate with emotions--and yet they were defined, sharp, of -their own natures, no soft overflow of sentiment, each with a fineness -of its own, like breaths of forest and sea and meadow lands. These -were great things which came to him; but they were not passions.... He -saw her with fear, too. Simply being here, had the impressiveness of a -miracle. It was less that he did not deserve to be with her, than that -the world he knew was hardly the place for such blessedness. He was -listening to her, in gladness and humility: - -“... I asked myself again and again after you were gone, ‘Is it a -dream?’ ... I moved about the decks waiting for the night, as one in a -deep dream.... You were gone so quickly after that voice. Oh, I was all -right. I was full of you. It would have seemed sacrilege to ask for you -again.... Yet I seemed to expect you with every knock or step or bell. -They asked me to play on shipboard, and I could hardly believe you were -not among those who listened.... That first night at sea, the moon was -under a hazy mass. I don’t know why I speak of it, but I remember how I -stood watching it--perhaps hours--and out of it all I only realized at -last that my hands were so small for the things I wanted to do for you, -and for everybody.” - -That was the quality of her--as if between every sentence, hours of -exterior influences had intervened.... He began to realize that Betty -Berry never explained. All that afternoon, in different ways, his -comprehension augmented on how fine a thing this is. She was glad -always to abide by what she said or did. Even on that night, when she -came from her playing to the wings where he stood, came to his arms, -while the people praised her--she never made light of that acceptance. -Many would have diminished it, by saying that they were not accountable -in the excitement and enthusiasm of a sympathetic audience. It was -so to-day when the door was closed. It seemed to Morning as if human -adults should be as fine as this--above all guile and fear. - -He was in a risen world that afternoon. Often he wished he could make -the world see her as he did. But that was the literary habit, and a -tribute to her. Certainly it was not for the writing. He was clay -beside her, but happy to be clay.... She did not know it, he thought, -but she was free. - -That was his thought of the day. Betty Berry was free. The door of the -cage was open for her. She did not have to stay, but she did stay for -love of the weaker-winged. - -“Will all our meetings be so different and lovely?” she asked in the -early dusk. “Please tell me about yourself very long ago--the little -boy, before he went away.” - -It was queer for her to ask that. He had expected her to inquire at -once about the three months since their parting in Baltimore. He had -determined to tell if she asked, but it was hard even to think of his -descents, with her sitting by the fire so near. Such things seemed -to have nothing to do with him now--especially when he was with her. -They were like old and vile garments cast off; and without relation to -him, unless he went back and put them on again. Little matters like -Charley and his sister had a relation, for they were without taint. -His thoughts to-day were thoughts of doing well for men, as in fine -moments with Duke Fallows--of going out _with her_ into the world -to help--of writing and giving, of laughing and lifting.... It was -surprising how he remembered the very long ago days--the silent, solid, -steadily-resisting little chap. Many things came back, and with a -clearness that he had not known for years. The very palms of her hands -were upturned in her listening; it seemed as if the valves of her heart -must be open. - -“I can see him--the dear little boy----” - -He laughed at her tenderness.... They went out late to dinner; and by -the time he had walked back to the house it was necessary for him to -leave, if he caught the last car to Hackensack. Duke Fallows would be -expecting him at the cabin.... - -It came to him suddenly, and with a new force, on the ferry, that he -had once wished she were pretty. He suffered for it again. He could -never recall her face exactly. She came to him in countless ways--with -poise for his restlessness, with faith and stamina that made all his -former endurings common--but never in fixed feature. It was the same -with her sayings. He remembered the spirit and the lustre of them, but -never the words.... She was a saint moving unobserved about the world, -playing--adrift on the world, and so pure. - -He realized also that he had spoken of Betty Berry for the last -time to Duke Fallows. There was no doubt in his mind now that -Fallows had replaced his old weakness with what might be called, in -kindness--fanaticism.... The thought was unspeakable that Betty Berry -could spoil his work in the world--he, John Morning, a living hatch of -scars from his errors ... and so arrogant and imperious he had been in -evil-doing! This trend made him think of her first words to-day: “You -are not well.” It was true that he had been astonished often of late by -a series of physical disturbances, so much so that he had begun to ask -himself, in his detached fashion, what would come next. He could not -accept Fallows’ promise that he would get altogether right in health -again. He was certainly not so good as he had been. These things made -him ashamed. - -Now that he was away from her, the sense obtained that he had not been -square in withholding the facts of the wastrel period. It didn’t seem -quite the same now, as when she was sitting opposite. He would have to -tell her some time, and of that certain mental treachery to her, and of -the wound, too.... He saw the light of the hill cabin. A touch of the -old irritation of Liaoyang had recurred of late. Morning could master -it better now. Still so many things that Fallows had said in Asia had -come true. Climbing up the hill, he laughed uneasily at the idea of -his being temperamentally a monk.... He had not strayed much among -women; he had been too busy. Now he had met his own. He would go to -her to-morrow. His love for her was the one right thing in the world. -Fallows nor the world could alter that.... - -The resistance which these thoughts had built in his mind was all -smoothed away by the spontaneous affection of the greeting. They sat -down together before the fire, but neither spoke of the woman who had -come between. - - - 12 - -ON the way to Betty Berry the second day, Morning could not -quite hold the altitude of yesterday. There was much of the boy left -in the manner of his love for her. The woman that the world saw, and -which he saw with physical eyes, was only one of her mysteries. The -important thing was that he saw her really, and as she was not seen by -another.... They had been together an hour when this was said: - -“There comes a time--a certain day--when a little girl realizes what -beauty is, and something of what it means in the world. That day came -to me and it was hard. I fought it out all at once. I was not exactly -sure what I wanted, but I knew that beauty could never help me in any -way. I learned to play better when I realized this fully. I have said -to myself a million times, ‘Expect nothing. No one will love you. -You must do without that,’ I believed it firmly.... So you see when -I went back to the Armory that next morning I had something to fall -back upon.... I would not have thought about it except you made me -forget--that afternoon. Why, I forget it now when you come; but when -you go, I force myself to remember----” - -“Why do you do that?” - -She was looking into the fire. The day was stormy, and they were glad -to be kept in. - -“Why do you do that?” he repeated. - -“Because I can’t feel quite at rest about our being together always. It -seems too wonderful. You must understand--it’s only because it is so -dear a thing----” - -She had spoken hastily, seeing the fear and rebellion in his eyes. - -“Betty Berry.... We’re not afraid of being poor. Why not go out and get -married to-day--now?” - -Her hand went out to him. - -“That wouldn’t be fine in us,” she said intensely. “I would feel that -we couldn’t be trusted--if we did anything like that.... Oh, that -would never keep us together--_that_ is not the great thing. And -to-day--what a gray day and bleak. We shall know if that day comes. -It will be one such as the butterfly chooses for her emerging. It -must not be planned. Such a day comes of itself.... Why, it would be -like seizing something precious from another’s hand--before it is -offered----” - -“And you think you are not beautiful?” he said. - -“Yes.” - -He tried to tell her how she seemed to him when they were apart--how -differently and perfectly the phases of her came. - -“It makes me silent,” he went on. “I try to tell just where it is. And -sometimes when I am away--I wonder what is so changed and cleansed and -buoyant in my heart--and then I know it is you--sustaining.” - -“It doesn’t seem to belong to me--what you say,” she answered. “I don’t -dare to think of it as mine.... Please don’t think of me as above other -women. I am not apart nor above. I am just Betty Berry, who comes and -goes and plays--dull in so many ways--as yet, a little afraid to be -happy. When you tempt me as now to be happy--it seems I must go and -find someone very miserable and do something perfect for him.... But, -it is true, I fear nothing so much as that you should believe me more -than I am.” - -A little afterward she was saying in her queer, unjointed way, as if -she spoke only here and there a sentence from the thoughts running -swiftly through her mind: - -“... And once, (it was only a few weeks after the Armory, and I was -playing eastward) I heard your name mentioned among some musicians. -They had been talking about your war, and they had seen the great -story.... I couldn’t tell them that I know you?... It was known you -were in New York, and one of the musicians spoke of an early Broadway -engagement--of starting for New York that very night. It was the most -common thing to say--but I went to my room and cried. Going to New -York--where you were. Can you understand--that it didn’t seem right -for him, just to take a train like that? And I had to go eastward -so slowly. For a while after that, traveling out there, I couldn’t -hold you so clearly; but as we neared New York--whether I wished it -or not--I began to feel you again, to expect you at every turning. -Sometimes as I played--it was uncanny, the sense that came to me, that -you were in the audience, and that we were working together.... And -then you came.” - -Her picture changed now. Morning grew restless. It was almost as if -there were a suggestion from Duke Fallows in her sentences: - -“I thought of you always as alone.... You have gone so many ways alone. -Perhaps the thought came from your work. I never could read the places -where you suffered so--but I mean from the tone and theme of it. You -were down among the terrors and miseries--but always alone.... You -will go back to them--alone, but carrying calmness and cheer. You will -be different.... It’s hard for me to say, but if we should clutch at -something for ourselves--greedily because we want something now--and -you should not be able to do your work so well because of me--I -think--I think I should never cease to suffer.” - -A dozen things to say had risen with hostility in his mind to check -this faltering expression, the purport of which he knew so well in its -every aspect. He hated the thought of others seeing his future and -not considering him. He hated the fear that came to him. There had -been fruits to all that Fallows had said before. He had plucked them -afterward. And now Betty Berry was one with Fallows in this hideous and -solitary conception of him. And there she sat, lovely and actual--the -very essence of all the good that he might do. He was so tired of what -she meant; and it was all so huge and unbreakable, that he grew calm -before he spoke, from the very inexorability of it. - -“There is no place for me to go--that you could not go with me. Every -one seems to see great service for me, but I see it with you. Surely we -could go together to people who suffer.... I have been much alone, but -I spent most of the time serving myself. I have slaved for myself. If -Duke Fallows had left me alone, I should have been greedy and ambitious -and common. I see you now identified with all the good of the future. -You came bringing the good with you to the Armory that day, but I was -so clouded with hatred and self-serving, that I really didn’t know it -until afterward.... All the dreams of being real and fine, of doing -good in work, and with hands and thoughts, of sometime really being -a good man who knows no happiness but service for others--that means -you--you! You must come with me. We will be good together. We will -serve together. Everybody will be better for us. We will do it because -we love so much--and can’t help it----” - -“Oh, don’t say any more--please--please! It is too much for me. Go -away--won’t you?” - -She had risen and clung to him, her face imploring. - -“Do you really want me to go away?” he said. - -“Yes--I have prayed for one to come saying such things--of two going -forth to help--prayed without faith.... I cannot bear another word to -be said to-day.... I want to sit here and live with it----” - -He was bewildered. He bent to kiss her brow--but refrained.... Her face -shone; her eyes were filled with tears.... He was in the street trying -to recall what he had said. - - - 13 - -HE did not cross the river, but wandered about the city.... -She had starved her heart always, put away the idea of a lover, and -sought to carry out her dreams of service alone. Then he had come. In -the midst of mental tossing and disorder to-day, he had stumbled upon -an expression of her highest idea of earth-life: for man and woman to -serve together--God loving the world through their everyday lives.... -And she had been unable to bear him longer near her. It was the same -with her heart, as with one who has starved the body, and must begin -with morsels. - -He was in the hotel writing-room--filling pages to her. He did not mean -to send the pages. It was to pass the time until evening. He lacked -even the beginnings of strength to stay away from her until to-morrow. -He would have telephoned, but she had not given him the number, or the -name of the woman who kept the house. The writing held his thoughts -from the momentarily recurring impulse to go back. The city was just a -vibration. Moments of the writing brought her magically near. In spite -of her prayer for him not to, his whole nature idealized her now. His -mind was swept again and again with gusts of her attraction. Thoughts -of hers came to him almost stinging with reality ... and to see her -again--to see her again. Once in the intensity of his outpouring, he -halted as if she had called--as if she had called to him to come up to -her out of the hollows and the vagueness of light. - -It was nightfall. He gave way suddenly--to that double-crossing of -temptation which forces upon the tempted one the conviction that what -he desires is the right thing.... He would be a fool not to go. She -would expect him.... He arose and set out for her house. - -But as he neared the corner something within felt itself betrayed. - -“And so I cannot be content with her happiness,” he thought. “I cannot -be content with the little mysteries that make her the _one_ Betty -Berry. I am not brave enough to be happy alone--as she is. I must have -the woman....” - -He was hot with the shame of it. He saw her bountifulness; her capacity -to wait. Clearly he saw that all these complications and conflicts of -his own mind were not indications of a large nature, but the failures -of one unfinished. She did not torture herself with thoughts; she -obeyed a heart unerringly true and real. She shone as never before; -fearless, yet with splendid zeal for giving; free to the sky, yet eager -to linger low and tenderly where her heart was in harmony; a stranger -to all, save one or two in the world, pitilessly hungry to be known, -and yet asking so little.... Compared with her, he saw himself as a -littered house, wind blowing through broken windows. - -... That night, sitting with Duke Fallows before the fire, brooding -on his own furious desires, he thought of the other John Morning who -had brooded over the story of Liaoyang in so many rooms with the -same companion. All that former brooding had only forced the world -to a show-down. He knew, forever, how pitifully little the world can -give.... A cabin on the hill and a name that meant a call in the next -war.... - -The face of the other cooled and stilled him. Duke was troubled; Duke, -who wasn’t afraid of kings or armies or anything that the world might -do; who didn’t seem even afraid now of the old Eve violence, whoever -she was--was afraid to speak of Betty Berry to his best friend.... -Morning wondered at this. Had Duke given up--or was he afraid of mixing -things more if he expressed himself? The fire-lit face was tense. -One after another of the man’s splendid moments and performances ran -through Morning’s mind--the enveloping compassion--in Tokyo, Liaoyang, -in the grain, in the ploughed lands--the Lowenkampf friend, the friend -of the peasant house, the friend of men in Metal Workers’ Hall, his -own friend in a score of places and ways--the man’s consummate art in -friendliness.... - -“Duke, there’s a lot to think about in just plain living, isn’t there?” - -The other started. “Hello,” he said. “I didn’t think you were in my -world.” - - * * * * * - -Betty Berry was waiting at the stairs the next morning. - -“Did you get my letter?” she whispered, when the door had swung to. - -“No.... Mailed last night?” - -“Yes.” - -“I left the cabin two hours before the mail. It’s rural delivery, you -know. Jethro reaches my box late in the forenoon----” - -“I wrote it about dark, but didn’t mail it until later. I thought you -would come----” - -He told her how he had written, how he had come to her house, and -turned away. They were very happy. - -“To think that you came so far. I couldn’t sit still, I was so -expectant at that very time.... But it was good for us----” - -“I understood after a while.” - -“Of course, you understood.... I was--oh, so happy yesterday. Yet, -aren’t we strange? Before it was night, I wanted you to come back.... -I didn’t go out last night. I couldn’t practice. To-night, there are -some friends whom I must see----” - -Morning, in a troubled way, reckoned the hours until evening.... She -was here and there about the room. The place already reflected her. She -had never been so blithe before.... It was an hour afterward that he -picked up a little tuning-fork from the dresser, and twanged it with -his nail. She started and turned to him, her thumb pressed against her -lips--her whole attitude that of a frightened child. - -“I wonder if I could tell you?” she said hesitatingly. “It would -make many things clear. You told me about little boy--you. It was my -father’s----” - -He waited without speaking. - -“... He used to lead the singing in a city church,” she said. “Always -he carried the tuning-fork. He would twang it upon a cup or a piece -of wood, and put it to his ear--taking the tone. He had a soft tenor -voice. There was never another just like it, and always he was -humming.... I remember his lips moving through the long sermons, as he -conned the hymn-book, one song after another, tapping his fork upon -a signet ring. How I remember the tiny twanging, the light hum of an -insect that came from him, from song to song, his finger keeping time, -his lips pursed over the words. - -“He never heard the preacher. There was no organ allowed, but he led -the hymns. He loved it. He held the time and tone for the people--but -never sang a hymn twice the same, bringing in the strangest variations, -but always true, his face flaming with pleasure. - -“For years and years we lived alone. As a little girl, I was lifted to -the stool to play his accompaniments. As a young woman, I supported -him, giving music lessons. The neighbors thought him an invalid.... All -his viciousness was secret from the world, but common property between -us from my babyhood. I pitied him and covered him, fed him when he -might have fed himself, waited upon him when he might have helped me. -He would hold my mind with little devilish things and thoughts--as -natural to him as the tuning-fork.... He would despoil the little stock -of food while I was away, and nail the windows down. My whole life, I -marveled at the ingenuity of his lies. He was so little and helpless. I -never expected to be treated as a decent creature, from those who had -heard his tales. They looked askance at me. - -“For years, he told me that he was dying, and I sat with him in the -nights, or played or read aloud. If any one came, he lay white and -peaceful, with a look of martyrdom.... And then at the last, I fell -asleep beside him. It was late, but the lamp was burning. I felt him -touch me before morning--the little old white thing, his lips pursed. -The tuning-fork dropped with a twang to the floor. I could not believe -I was free--but cried and cried. At the funeral, when the church people -spoke of ‘our pain-racked and martyred brother’----” - -She did not finish. - -Morning left her side. “I never thought of a little girl that way,” he -said, standing apart. “Why, you have given me the spirit of her, Betty. -It is what you have passed through that has made you perfect.... And I -was fighting for myself, and for silly things all the time----” - -But he had not expressed what was really in his mind--of the beauty and -tenderness of unknown women everywhere, in whose hearts the sufferings -of others find arable ground. Surely, these women are the grace of the -world. His mother must have been weathered by such perfect refinements, -otherwise he would not have been able to appreciate it in Betty Berry. -It was all too dreamy to put into words yet, but he felt it very -important in his life--this that had come to him from Betty’s story, -and from Betty standing there--woman’s power, her bounty, her mystic -valor, all from the unconscious high behavior of a child. - -She had given him something that the _Ploughman_ gave Duke -Fallows. He wanted to make the child live in the world’s thoughts, as -Duke was making the _Ploughman_ live. - -It was these things--common, beautiful, passed-by things, that revealed -to Morning, as he began to be ready--the white flood of spirit that -drives the world, that is pressing always against hearts that are pure. - -He went nearer to her. - -“Everything I think is love for you, Betty,” he said. - -The air was light about her, and delicate as from woodlands. - - - 14 - -THE horse and phaeton--both very old--of the rural-carrier could -be seen from the hill-cabin. Duke Fallows walked down to the fence -to say “Hello” to Jethro whom he admired. He returned bearing very -thoughtfully a letter addressed to John Morning. It was from across the -river; the name, street, and number of the sender were written upon the -envelope.... Fallows sat down before the fire again, staring at the -letter. He thought of the woman who had written this, (just the few -little things that Morning had said) and then he thought of the gaunt -peasant woman in Russia, the mate of the _Ploughman_, and of the -mother of the _Ploughman_. He thought of the little boy, Jan--the -one little boy of the six, that had his heart, and whom he longed for. - -He thought of this little boy on one hand--and the world on the other. - -Then he thought of Morning again, and of the woman. - -He loved the world; he loved the little boy. Sometimes it seemed to -him when he was very happy--that he loved the world and the little boy -with almost the same compassion--the weakness, fineness, and innocence -of the races of men seeming almost like the child’s. - -He thought of John Morning differently. He had loved him at first, -because he was down and fighting grimly. He thought of him of late as -an instrument, upon which might be played a message of mercy and power -to all who suffered--to the world and to the little boy alike. - -And now Fallows was afraid for the instrument. Many things had maimed -it, but this is the way of men; and these maimings had left their -revelations from the depths. Such may measure into the equipment of -a big man, destined to meet the many face to face. Fallows saw this -instrument in danger of being taken over by a woman--to be played upon -by colorful and earthly seductions. No man could grant more readily -than he, that such interpretations are good for most men; that the -highest harmony of the average man is the expression of love for his -one woman and his children. But to John Morning, Fallows believed such -felicity would close for life the great work which he had visioned from -the beginning. - -He did not want lyrical singing from John Morning, he wanted prophetic -thunderings. - -He wanted this maimed young man to rise up from the dregs and tell his -story and the large meaning of it. He wanted him to burn with a white -light before the world. He wanted the Koupangtse courage to drive into -the hearts of men; a pure reformative spirit to leap forth from the -capaciousness where ambition had been; he wanted John Morning to ignite -alone. He believed the cabin in which he now sat was built blindly from -the boy’s standpoint, but intelligently from the spirit of the boy, -to become the place of ignition. He believed this of Morning’s to be -a celibate spirit that could be finally maimed only by a woman. He -believed that Morning was perfecting a marvelous instrument, one that -would alter all society for the better, if he gave his heart to the -world. - -Fallows even asked himself if he did not have his own desperate -pursuits among women in too close consideration.... It would be easy -to withdraw. So often he had faltered before the harder way, and found -afterward that the easy one was evil.... He left it this way: If he -could gain audience with Betty Berry alone this evening he would speak; -if Morning were with her, he would find an excuse for joining them and -quickly depart. Last night Morning had returned to the cabin early; -the night before by the last car. It was less than an even chance.... -Fallows crossed the river, thinking, if the woman were common it -would be easy. The way it turned out left no doubt as to what he must -do. Approaching the number, on the street named on the corner of the -envelope, he passed John Morning, head down in contemplation. He was -admitted to the house. Betty Berry appeared, led him to a small upper -parlor, and excused herself for a moment. - -Fallows sat back and closed his eyes. He was suffering. All his fancied -hostility was gone. He saw a woman very real, and to him magical; he -saw that this was bloody business.... She came back, the full terror of -him in her eyes. She did not need to be so sensitive to know that he -had not come as a cup-bearer.... He was saying to himself, “I will not -struggle with her....” - -“Have I time to tell my story?” - -“I was going out.... John Morning just went away because I was to meet -old friends. But, if this is so very important, of course----” - -“It is about him.” - -“I think you must tell your story.” - -Fallows talked of Morning’s work, of what he had first seen from -Luzon, and of the man he found in Tokyo. He spoke of the days and -nights in Liaoyang, as he had watched Morning at his work. - -“He’s at his best at the type-writer. When the work is really coming -right for him, he seems to be used by a larger, finer force than he -shows at other times.... It is good to talk to you, Miss Berry. You are -a real listener. You seem to know what I am to say next----” - -“Go on,” she said. - -“When a man with a developed power of expression stops writing what -the world is saying, and learns to listen to that larger, finer force -within him--indeed, when he has a natural genius for such listening, -and cultivates a better receptivity, always a finer and more sensitive -surface for its messages--such a man becomes in time the medium between -man and the energy that drives the world----” - -“Yes----” - -“Some call this energy that drives the world the Holy Spirit, and -some call it the Absolute. I call it love of God. A few powerful men -of every race are prepared to express it. These individuals come up -like the others through the dark, often through viler darkness. They -suffer as others cannot dream of suffering. They are put in terrible -places--each of which leaves its impress upon the instrument--the -mind. You have read part of John Morning’s story. Perhaps he has told -you other parts. His mind is furrowed and transcribed with terrible -miseries. - -“Until recently his capacity was stretched by the furious passion of -ambition. It seemed in Asia as if he couldn’t die, unexpressed; as if -the world couldn’t kill him. You saw him at the Armory just after he -had passed through thirty days hard enough to slay six men. Ambition -held him up--and hate and all the powers of the ego. - -“This is what I want to tell you: ‘When the love of God fills that -furious capacity which ambition has made ready; when the love of God -floods over the broadened surfaces of his mind, furrowed and sensitized -by suffering, filling the matrix which the dreadful experiences have -marked so deeply--John Morning will be a wonderful instrument of -interpretation between God and his race.’ - -“I can make my story very short for you, Miss Berry. Your listening -makes it clearer than ever to me. I see what men mean when they say -they can write to women. Yes, I see it.... John Morning has made ready -his cup. It will be filled with the water of life--to be carried to -men. But John Morning must feel first the torture of the thirst of men. - -“Every misery he has known has brought him nearer to this realization; -days here among the dregs of the city; days of hideous light and -shadow; days on the China Sea, sitting with coolies crowded so they -could not move; days afield, and the perils; days alone in his little -cabin on the hill; sickness, failures, hatreds from men, the answering -hatred of his fleshly heart--all these have knit him with men and -brought him understanding. - -“He has been down among men. Suffering has graven his mind with -the mysteries of the fallen. You must have understanding to have -compassion. In John Morning, the love of God will pass through human -deeps to men. Deep calls to deep. He will meet the lowest face to face. -He will bring to the deepest down man the only authority such a man can -recognize--that of having been there in the body. And the thrill of -rising will be told. Those who listen and read will know that he has -been there, and see that he is risen. He will tell how the water of -life came to him--and flooded over him, and healed his miseries and his -pains. The splendid shining authority of it will rise from his face and -from his book. - -“And men won’t be the same after reading and listening; (nor women who -receive more quickly and passionately)--women won’t be the same. Women -will see that those who suffer most are the real elect of this world. -It’s wonderful to make women listen, Miss Berry, for their children -bring back the story. - -“It isn’t that John Morning must turn to love God. I don’t mean that. -He must love men. He must receive the love of God--and give it to -men. To be able to listen and to receive with a trained instrument of -expression, and then to turn the message to the service of men--that’s -a World-Man’s work. John Morning will do it--if he loves humanity -enough. He’s the only living man I know who has a chance. He will -achieve almost perfect instrumentation. He will express what men need -most to know in terms of art and action. The love of God must have man -to manifest it, and that’s John Morning’s work--if he loves humanity -enough to make her his bride.” - -Fallows was conscious now of really seeing her. She had not risen, but -seemed nearer--as if the chair, in which she slowly rocked, had crept -nearer as he talked. Her palms resting upon her knees were turned -upward toward him: - -“And you think John Morning is nearly ready for that crown of -Compassion?” - -“Yes----” - -“You think he will receive the Compassion--and give it to men in terms -of art and action?” - -“Yes----” - -“You think if he loves me--if he turns his love to me, as he is -doing--he cannot receive that greater love which he must give men?” - -“Yes----” - -“And you think it would be a good woman’s part to turn him from her?” - -“Yes----” - -“And you came to tell me this?” - -“Yes.” - -“I think it is true----” - -“Oh, listen--listen----” he cried, rising and bending over her--“a good -woman’s part--it would be that! It would be something more--something -greater than even he could ever do.... What a vision you have given me!” - -She stood before him, her face half-turned to the window. Yet she -seemed everywhere in the room--her presence filling it. He could not -speak again. He turned to go. Her words reached him as he neared the -door. - -“Oh, if I only had my little baby--to take away!” - - - 15 - -FALLOWS stood forward on the ferry that night and considered -the whole New York episode. He had done his work. He had told the -_Ploughman_ story five times. It was just the sowing. He might -possibly come back for the harvest.... He had another story to tell -now. Could he ever tell it without breaking?... He had tortured his -brain to make things clear for Morning and for men. He realized that -a man who implants a complete concept in another intelligence and -prevents it from withering until roots are formed and fruitage is -assured, performs a miracle, no less; because, if the soil were ready, -the concept would come of itself. He had driven his brain by every -torment to make words perform this miracle on a large scale. - -And this little listening creature he had just left--she had taken -his idea, finished it for him, and involved it in action. To her it -was the Cross. She had carried it to Golgotha, and sunk upon it with -outstretched palms.... There was an excellence about Betty Berry that -amazed him, in that it was in the world.... He had not called such -women to him, because such women were not the answer to his desires. -He realized with shame that a man only knows the women who answer in -part the desires of his life. Those who had come to him were fitted -to the plane of sensation upon which he had lived so many years. He -had condemned all women because, in the weariness of the flesh, he had -suddenly risen to perceive the falsity of his affinities of the flesh. -“What boys we are!” he whispered, “in war and women and work--what -boys!” - -Betty Berry had taught him a lesson, quite as enormous to his nature as -the _Ploughman’s_. A man who thinks of women only in sensuousness -encounters but half-women. He had learned it late, but well, that -a man in this world may rise to heights far above his fellows in -understanding, but that groups of women are waiting on all the higher -slopes of consciousness for their sons and brothers and lovers to come -up. They pass their time weaving laurel-leaves for the brows of delayed -valiants.... - -Duke thought of the men he had seen afield, the gravity with which -these men did their great fighting business, the world talking about -them. Then he thought of the little visionary in her room accepting her -tragedy.... - -Even now, in the hush and back-swing of the pendulum, it seemed very -true what he had said. She had seen it. It is dangerous business to -venture to change the current of other lives; no one knew it better -than Fallows. But he considered Morning. Morning, as it were, had been -left on his door-step. Morning would be alone now--alone to listen and -receive his powers.... Fallows looked up from the black water to the -far-apart pickets of the wintry night. He was going home. - - * * * * * - -The cabin was lit. Fallows climbed the hill wearily. There was a -certain sharpness as of treachery from his night’s work, but to that -larger region of mind, open to selfishness and the passion to serve -men, peace had come. He was going home, first to San Francisco--then to -the Bosks and the little boy. - -Morning arose quickly at the sound of the step on the hard ground, and -opened the door wide. He had been reading her letter, which Fallows had -left upon the table. The letter had been like an added hour with her. -It was full of shy joy, full of their perfect accord, remote from the -world--its road and stone-piles and evasions.... Fallows saw that he -looked white and wasted. The red of the firelight did not mislead his -eye. Its glow was not Morning’s and did not blend with the pallor. - -“I’m going on to-morrow, John,” he said. - -“’Frisco?” - -“Yes--and then----” - -“You’ll come back here?” - -“No, I’ll keep on into the west to _my_ cabin----” - -“It would be nearer this way. I planned to see you after ’Frisco.” - -“I’ll come back,” Fallows’ thought repeated, “for the harvest.” - -“And so you are going to make the big circle again?” - -“Yes.” - -“You haven’t finished this first one, until you reach Noyes and your -desk in the _Western States_.” - -“The next journey won’t take so long.” - -“You’ve been the good angel to me again, Duke. It’s quite a wonder, how -you turn up in disaster of mine.... I wonder if I shall ever come to -you--but you won’t get down. You wouldn’t even stay ill.” - -“You won’t get down again, John, at least, in none of the ways you know -about----” - -Both men seemed spent beyond words.... Morning saw in the other’s -departure the last bit of resistance lifted from his heart’s quest. -Betty Berry had come between them. Morning’s conviction had never -faltered on the point that Fallows was structurally weak on this one -matter.... And so he was going. All that was illustrious in their -friendship returned. They needed few words, but sat late before turning -in. The cabin cooled and freshened. Each had the thought, before -finally falling asleep, that they were at sea again.... And in the -morning the thing that lived from their parting was this, from Duke -Fallows: - -“Whatever you do, John--don’t forget your own--the deepest down man. He -is yours--go after him--get him!” - - * * * * * - -... She was at the top of the stairs when he called the next morning; -and he was only half-way up when he saw that she had on her hat and -coat and gloves. The day was bitter like the others. He had thought of -her fire, and the quiet of her presence. He meant to tell her all about -Duke Fallows and the going. It was his thought--that she might find in -this (not through words, but through his sense of release from Duke’s -antagonism) a certain quickening toward their actual life together. He -wanted to talk of bringing her to the cabin--at least, for her to come -for a day. - -“You will go with me to get the tickets and things. I must start west -at once.” - -It was quite dark in the upper hallway. Morning reached out and turned -her by the elbow, back toward the door of her room. There in the light, -he looked into her face. She was calm, her eyes bright. Whatever the -night had brought--if weakness it was mastered, if exaltation it was -controlled. But she was holding very hard. There was a tightness about -her mouth that terrified him. It was not as it had been with them; he -was not one with her. - -“You mean that you are going away--for some time?” - -“Yes.... Oh, you must not mind. We are road people. We have been -wonderfully happy. You must not look so tragic----” - -It wasn’t like her at all. “We are not road people,” he thought.... -“You must not look so tragic,”--that was just like a thing road people -might say. - -He sat down. The weakness of his limbs held his mind. It seemed to him, -if he could forget his body, words might come. At first the thought -of her going away was intolerable, but that had dwindled. It was the -change in her--the something that had happened--the flippancy of her -words.... He looked up suddenly. It seemed as if her arms had been -stretched toward him, her face ineffably tender. So quickly it had -happened that he could not be sure. He wanted this very thing so much -that his mind might have formed the illusion. He let it pass. He did -not want her to say it was not so. - -Words of her letter came back to him. Neither the letter nor yesterday -had anything to do with this day.... “You are drawing closer all the -time. I have been so happy to-day that I had to write. You must know -that I sent you away because I could not bear more happiness....” - -Where was it? What had happened? He was fevered. Something was -destroying him.... Betty Berry did not suffer for herself--it was with -pity for him. The mother in her was tortured. It was her own life--this -love of his for her--the only child she would ever have. She had loved -its awakenings, its diffidences, the faltering steps of its expression. -The man was not hers, but his love for her was her very own.... She had -not thought of its death, when Fallows talked the night before. She had -thought of _her_ giving up for his sake, but not of the anguish -and the slaying of his love for her. And this was taking place now. - -“You will let me write to you?” he said, still thinking of the letter. - -“Oh, yes.” - -“And you will write to me?” - -She remembered now what she had written.... The fullness of her heart -had gone into that. She could not write like that again. Yet he was -asking for her letters, as a child might ask for a drink.... She could -not refuse. It wasn’t in nature to see his face, and refuse.... Surely -if she remained apart it was all any one could ask. - -“Yes, I will write sometimes.” - -He stood in the center of the room, his head bowed slightly, his eyes -upon the wall. He was ill, bewildered, his mind turning here and there -only to find fresh distress.... Suddenly he remembered that he had not -told her of his drinking.... That must be it. Some one else had told -her, and she was hurt and broken. - -“I meant always to tell you,” he said. “Only it really did not seem -to signify by the time you came back. And when I was with you--oh, I -seemed very far from that. I don’t understand it now----” - -She did not know what he meant; did not care, could not ask. It was -something he clutched--in the disintegration.... He looked less -death-like in his thinking of it. - -“It doesn’t greatly matter,” she said. “I have to go west.... Won’t you -come with me to get the tickets?” - -“I can’t go out into the street yet. If there is anything more I have -done--won’t you let me know?” - -Suddenly he realized her side, that he was detaining her; that it -wasn’t easy for her to speak. It was not his way to impose his will -upon anyone; his natural shyness now arose, and he fingered his hat. - -“Dear John Morning--you haven’t done anything. You have made me happy. -I must go away to my work--and you, to yours.... It is hard for me, -but I see it as the way. I have promised to write----” - -The words came forth like birds escaping--thin, evasive, vain words. -That which she had seen so clearly the night before, (and which she -seemed utterly to have lost the meaning of) was a lock upon every real -utterance now. She had not counted upon this tragedy of her mother -instinct--this slaying of the perfect thing in him, which she had loved -to life. - -He arose, and sat down; he swallowed, started to speak, but could not. -He was like a boy--this man who had seen so much, just a bewildered -boy, his suffering too deep for words--the sweetest part of him to -her, dying before her eyes. And the dream of their service together, -their hand-in-hand going out to the world, their poverty and purity and -compassion together--these were lost jewels.... It was all madness, -the world--all madness and devilishness. Beauty and virtue and loving -kindness were gone, the world turned insane.... The thought came to -tell _him_ she was insane; a better lie still, that she was not -a pure woman. She started to speak, but his eyes came up to her.... -She tried it again, but his eyes came up to her. He fingered his hat -boyishly. The mother in her breast could not. - - * * * * * - -Their dreadful night. The winter darkness was coming on swiftly. Her -train was leaving. - -“But you said you were not going to work for the present. You have been -working so hard all winter----” - -He had said it all before. - -“Yes--but there is much for me to do--days of study and practice--and -thinking. You will understand.... Everything will come clear and you -will understand. You see, to-day--this isn’t a day for words with -us.... One must have one’s own secret place. You must say of me, ‘She -suddenly remembered something--and had to go away.’...” - -“‘She suddenly remembered something and had to hurry away,’” he -repeated, trying to smile. “But she will write to me. I will -work--work--and when you let me, I will come to you----” - -“Yes----” - -He had to leave.... He kissed her again. There was something like death -about it. - -“If we _were_ only dead,” she said, “and were going away -together----” - - * * * * * - -... A man stepped up to him, regarded him intently. Morning realized -that he must get alone. He had been shaking his head wearily, -and unseeingly--standing in the main corridor of the station in -Jersey--shaking his head.... It was full night outside. He forgot that -he did not have to recross the river--and was on the ferry back to New -York before he remembered.... - -He gained the hill to his cabin long afterward. That reminded him that -Duke Fallows had gone, too--and that very morning. - -It seemed farther back in his life than Liaoyang. - - - 16 - -BETTY BERRY’S journey was ten hours west by the limited -trains--straight to the heart of her one tried friend, Helen Quiston, a -city music teacher. Her first thought, and the one buoy, was that she -would be able to tell everything.... She could not make Helen Quiston -feel the pressure that his Guardian Spirit (she always thought of Duke -Fallows so) invoked in that half-hour of his call, but with a day or a -night she could make her friend know what had happened, and something -of the extent of force which had led to her sacrifice. Helen would tell -her if she were mad. All through that night she prayed that her friend -would call her mad--would force her to see that the thing she had done -was viciously insane. - -She was engulfed. For the first time, her spirit failed to right itself -in any way. She was more dependent upon Helen Quiston than she had -conceived possible, since the little girl had fought out the different -cruel presentations of the days, during the early life with her father. - -Throughout the night _en route_ she thought of the letter she had -promised to write to John Morning. The day with him had brought the -letter from a vague promise to an immediate duty upon her reaching -the studio.... She was to write first, and at once. Already she was -making trials in her mind, but none would do. He would penetrate -every affectation. The wonder and dreadfulness of it--was that she -must not tell the truth, for he would be upon her, furiously human, -disavowing all separateness from the race, as one with a message must -be; disavowing the last vestige of the dream of compassion which his -Guardian Spirit had pictured.... She knew his love for her. She had -seen it suffer. Would Helen Quiston show her that she must bring it -back--that the Guardian Spirit was evil? There was a fixture about it, -a whispering of the negative deep within. - -She could not write of the memories. Not the least linger of perfume -from that night at the theatre must touch her communication. Yet it -was the arch of all. As she knew her soul and his, they had been as -pure as children that night--even before a word was spoken. It had been -so natural--such a rest and joy.... She had learned well to put love -away, before he came. From the few who approached, she had laughed -and withdrawn. The world had daubed them. In her heart toward other -men, she was as a consecrated nun. And this was like her Lord who had -come.... She had made her way in the world among men. She knew them, -worked among them, pitied them. Her father had been as weak, as evil, -as passionate, as pitiable. In the beginning she had learned the world -through him--all its bitter, brutal lessons. As she knew the ’cello and -its literature, she knew the world and the cheap artifices it would -call arts.... She had even put away judgments; she had covered her -eyes; accustomed her ears to patterings; made her essential happiness -of little things; she had labored truly, and lived on, wondering why. -And he had come at last with understanding. She had seen in Morning -potentially all that a woman loves, and cannot be. He had made her mind -and heart fruitful and flourishing again. Then his Guardian Spirit had -appeared and spoken. As of old there had been talk of a serpent. As of -old the serpent was of woman. - - * * * * * - -Helen Quiston was just leaving for a forenoon’s work away from the -studio. She sat down for a moment holding the other in her arms; then -she made tea and toast, and hastened off to return as quickly as -possible.... For a long time Betty Berry stood by the piano. The day -was gray and cold, but the studio was softly shining. All the woods -of it were dark, approximately the black of the grand piano; floors -and walls and picture frames were dark, but the openings were broad, -and naked trees stirred outside the back windows.... She did not look -the illness that was upon her. She was a veteran in suffering.... She -forgot to breathe, until the need of air suddenly caught and shook -her throat. It was often so when the hidden beauty of certain music -unfolded to her for the first time. - -She went to the rear windows, gradually realizing that it would soon -be spring-time. There was a swift, tangible hurt in this that brought -tears. There had been no tears for the inner desolation.... “Poor dear -John Morning,” she whispered. - -The reproduction of a wonderful painting of the meeting of Beatrice and -Dante held her eye for a long time.... The blight was upon her as she -tried a last time to write. It spread over her hand and the table, the -room, the day. There was a hurt for him in everything she wanted to -say. She was hot and ill--her back, her brain, her eyes, from trying. -She could not hurt him any more. He had done nothing but give her -healing and visions. His Guardian had done nothing but tell the truth, -which she had seen at the time. This agony of hers had existed. It was -like everything else in the world. - -She wrote at last of their service in the world. They needed, she -said, the strong air of solitude to think out the perfect way. It was -very hard for her, who had fared so long on dreams and denials and -loneliness. He must remember that. “Great things come to those who -love at a distance,” she wrote bravely. Tears started when she saw -the sentence standing so dauntlessly upon the page of her torture.... -It would make them kinder, make their ideals live--and how young they -were!... She said that she was afraid to be so happy as he had made her -in certain moments. Often she found herself staring at the picture of -Beatrice and Dante. - -The thought that broke in upon this brave writing was that she was -denied the thrill of great doing, as it had come to her while Fallows -had spoken.... It would have lived on, had she gone that night, without -seeing Morning again. Moreover, her way was different from that which -she had pictured, as his Guardian talked. She did not see then that her -action made a kind of lie of all her giving up to that hour; and that -there could be no united sacrifice. It was pure, voiceless sacrifice -for her--and blind murdering for him.... - -From the choke of this, her mind would turn to the song of triumph her -spirit had sung as his Guardian told the story.... She had seemed to -live in a vast eternal life, as she listened; and this which she was -asked to do--was just to attend a temporary flesh sickness. She had the -strange blessedness that comes with the conviction that immortality is -here and now, as those few men and women of the world have known in -their highest moments. - -She could get back nothing of that exaltation. It would never come -again. The spirit it had played upon was broken.... She had been -rushing away on her thoughts. It was afternoon, the letter unfinished, -the ’cello staring at her from the corner. It had stood by her in -all her sorrows of the years, but was empty as a fugue now--endless -variations upon the one theme of misery.... Happiness does not come -back to the little things--after one has once known the breath of -life.... She closed the narrow way of the letter, which she had filled -with words--no past nor future, only the darkness that had come in to -mingle with the dark hangings of the room of her friend.... She kissed -the pages and sent them back the way she had come in the night. - - * * * * * - -The qualities that had brought her the friend, Helen Quiston, and which -had made the friendship so real, were the qualities of Betty Berry. -She had come to the last woman to be told of her madness, or to find -admonition toward breaking down the thing she had begun.... They had -talked for hours that night. - -“I know it is lovely, dear Betty. Why, you look lovelier this instant -than I ever dreamed you could be. Loving a man seems to do that to -a woman--but the privilege of the greater thing! Oh, you _are_ -privileged. That’s the way of the great love. I should like sometime -to know that Guardian. How did mere man grasp the beauty and mystery of -service like that?... Stay with me. I will serve you, hands and feet. -It is enough for me to touch the garment’s hem.... You are already -gone from us, dearest. You have loved a man. You do love a man. He is -worthy. You have not found him wanting. What matters getting him--when -you have found your faith? Think of us--think of the gray sisterhood -you once belonged to--nuns of the world--who go about their work -helping, and who say softly to each other as they pass, ‘No, I have not -been able to find him yet.’” - - - 17 - -MORNING awoke in the gray of the winter morning. The place was -cold and impure. He had fallen asleep without the accustomed blasts of -hill-sweeping wind from window to window. He had not started the fire -the night before; had merely dropped upon his cot, dazed with suffering -and not knowing his weariness. He was reminded of places he had -awakened in other times when he could not remember how he got to bed. -Beyond the chairs and table lay the open fire-place, the ashes hooded -in white. - -The blackness of yesterday returned, but with a hot resentment against -himself that he had not known before. He had followed Betty Berry about -for hours, and had not penetrated the hollow darkness with a single -ray of intelligence. This dreadful business was his, yet he had been -stricken; had scarcely found his speech. There was no doubt of Betty -Berry now, though a dozen evasions of hers during the day returned. -She was doing something hard, but something she thought best to do. -The real truth, however, was rightly his property.... To-day she would -write. To-morrow her letter would come. If it did not contain some -reality upon which he might stand through the present desolation, he -would go to her.... Yes, he would go to her. - -His side was hurting. He was used to that; it had no new relation now. -Everything was flat and wretched. Distaste for himself and this nest -in which he had lain, was but another of the miserable adjuncts of the -morning. He stood forth shivering from the cot; struck a match and held -it to some waste paper. Kindling was ready in the fire-place, but the -paper flared out and fell to ashes, as he watched his left hand. He -went to the window and examined his hand closer. The nails were broken -and dry; there were whitish spots on the joints. He had seen something -of this before, but his physical reactions had been so various and -peculiar, in the past six weeks, that he had refused to be disturbed. - -Just now his mind was clamoring with memories. He had the sense that -as soon as an opening was forced in his mind, a torrent would rush in. -He felt his heart striking hard and with rapidity. The floor heaved -windily, or was it the lightness of his limbs? He went about the things -to do with strange zeal, as if to keep his brain from a contemplation -so hideous that it could not be borne. - -He lit another paper, placed kindling upon it, poked the charred stubs -of wood free from the thick covering of white, and brought fresh fuel. -Then, as the fire kindled, he opened the door and windows, and swept -and swept.... But it encroached upon him.... The open wound was no -longer a mystery.... His dream of the river and the boat that was not -allowed to land; his dream of the cliff, and looking down into the life -of earth through the tree-tops ... the ferry-man of the Hun ... and now -yesterday with its two relations to the old cause. - -His whole nature was prepared for the revelation; yet it seemed to -require years in coming. Like the loss of the manuscript in the Liao -ravine, it was done before he knew. - -“Of course, they had to rush away, when they found out,” he mumbled. -“Of course, they couldn’t stay. Of course, they couldn’t be the ones to -tell me.” - -It might have been anywhere in China; the ferryman on the Hun ... -during the deck-passage.... It did not greatly matter. Some contact of -the Orient had started the slow virus on its long course in his veins. -He knew that it required from three to five years to reach the stage of -revealing itself as now. He saw it as the source of his various recent -indispositions, and realized that he could not remain in his cabin -indefinitely. It would be well for a while. Neither Duke Fallows nor -Betty Berry would tell. He could keep his secret, and then--to die in -some island quarantine? None of that. This was his life. He was master -of it. He should die when he pleased, and where. - -... Yes, she had her gloves on, when he came. She had not removed them -all day, not even at the very last.... How strange and frightened she -had been--how pitiful and hard for her! She could not have told him. -She had loved him--and had suddenly learned.... She had seen that he -did not know.... It must have come to her in the night--after the last -day of happiness. Perhaps the processes of its coming to her were like -his. He was sorry for Betty Berry. - -And he could not see her again; he could not see her again. He passed -the rest of the day with this repetition.... His life was over. That’s -what it amounted to. Of course, he would not let them segregate him. -His cabin would do for a while, until the secret threatened to reveal -itself, and then he would finish the business.... The two great issues -leaned on each other: The discovery of his mortal taint took the stress -from the tragedy of yesterday; and that he could not see Betty Berry -again kept madness away from the abominable death.... The worst of it -all was that the love-mating was ended. This brought him to the end of -the first day, when he began to think of the Play. - -The literary instinct, of almost equal disorder with dramatic instinct, -and which he had come to despise during the past year, returned with -the easy conformity of an undesirable acquaintance--that reportorial -sentence-making faculty, strong as death, and as uncentering to -the soul of man. Morning saw himself searching libraries for data -on leprosy, being caught by officials--the subject of nation-wide -newspaper articles and magazine specials, the pathos of his case -variously appearing--Liaoyang recalled--his own story--Reever Kennard -relating afresh the story of the stealing of _Mio Amigo_. What -a back-wash from days of commonness! The ego and the public eye--two -Dromios--equal in monkey-mindedness and rapacity. - -Morning was too shattered to cope with this ancient dissipation at -first. - -After the warring and onrushing of different faculties, a sort of -coma fell upon the evil part, and the ways of the woman came back to -him. He sat by his fire that night, the wound in his side forgotten, -the essence of Asia’s foulness in his veins, forgotten--and meditated -upon the sweetness of Betty Berry. He approached her image with a good -humility. He saw her with something of the child upon her--as if he -had suddenly become full of years. “How beautiful she was!” he would -whisper; and then he would smile sadly at the poor blind boy he had -been, not to see her beautiful at first.... To think, only three days -before, she had sent him away, because she could not endure, except -alone, the visitation of happiness that came to her. People of such -inner strength must have their secret times and places, for their -strength comes to them alone. To think that he had not understood this -at once.... He had been eloquent and did not know it. - -“Hell,” he said, “that’s the only way one can say the right thing--when -he doesn’t plan it.” - - * * * * * - -... If his illness had been any common thing she would not have been -frightened away. He was sure of this. It took Asia’s horror--to -frighten her away. He saw her now, how she must have fought with it. -He shuddered for her suffering on that day.... That day--why it was -only the day before yesterday.... He never realized before how the -illusion, Time, is only measurable by man’s feeling.... He was a little -surprised at Duke Fallows. He himself wouldn’t have been driven off, -if Duke had suddenly uncovered a leprous condition. He had been driven -off by Duke’s ideas, but no fear of contagion could do it. Yet Duke -was the bravest man he had ever known--in such deep and astonishing -ways courageous. Yet he had been brought up soft. He wasn’t naturally -a man-mingler. It had been too much for him. It was a staggerer--this. -Fallows was a Prince anyway. Every man to his own fear.... This was the -second morning. - -Old Jethro, the rural delivery carrier, drove by that morning -without stopping. She could not have mailed her letter until last -night--another day to wait for it. Morning tried to put away the -misery. Women never think of mail-closing times. They put a letter in -the box and consider it delivered.... He puzzled on, regarding the -action of Duke Fallows, in the light of what he would have done. No -understanding came. - -All thoughts returned in the course of the hours, his mind milling over -and over again the different phases, but each day had its especial -theme. The first was that he would not see Betty Berry again; that -Duke Fallows had been frightened away, the second; and on the third -morning, before dawn, he began to reckon with physical death, as if -this day’s topic had been assigned to him. - -Sister Death--she had been in the shadows before. Occasionally he had -shivered afterward, when he thought of some close brush with her. She -was all right, only he had thought of her as an alien before. It really -wasn’t so--a blood sister now.... He recalled scenes in the walled -cities of China.... She had certainly put over a tough one on him.... -It would be in this room. He wouldn’t wait until his appearance was -a revelation.... He would do the play. Something that he could take, -would free him from the present inertia, so he could work for a while, -a few hours a day. When the play was done--the Sister would come at -his bidding.... He had always thought of her as feminine. A line from -somewhere seemed to seize upon her very image--this time not sister, -but---- - -_Dark mother, always gliding near, with soft feet----_ - -He faced her out on that third morning. Physically there was but a -tremor about the coming. Not the suffering, but a certain touch and -shake of the heart, heaved him a little--the tough little pump stopped, -its fine incentive and its life business broken.... But that was only -the rattle of the door-knob of death. - -It was all right. He wasn’t afraid. The devil, Ambition, was pretty -well strangled. There must be something that lasts, in his late-found -sense of the utter unimportance of anything the world can give--the -world which appreciates only the boyish part of a real man’s work. So -he would take out with him a reality of the emptiness of the voice -of the crowd. Then the unclean desire for drink was finished--none -of that would cling to him; moreover, no fighting passion to live on -would hold him down to the body of things.... But he would pass the -door with the love of Betty Berry--strong, young, imperious, almost -untried.... Would that come back with him? Does a matter of such -dimension die? Does one come back at all?... - -Probably in this room.... - -Then he thought of the play that must be done in this room; and -curiously with it, identifying itself with the play and the re-forming -part of it, was the favorite word of Duke Fallows’--_Compassion_. -What a title for the play! Duke’s word and Duke’s idea.... All this -brought him to the thought of Service, as he had pictured it for Betty -Berry--a life together doing things for men--loving each other so much -that there were volumes to spare for the world--down among men--to the -deepest down man. - -His throat tightened suddenly. He arose. A sob came from him.... His -control broke all at once.... How a little run of thoughts could tear -down a man’s will! It wasn’t fear at all--but the same depiction -running in his mind that had so affected Betty Berry when she begged to -be alone.... - -“The deepest down man--the deepest down man.... It is I, Duke!... -Surely you must have meant me all the time!” - - * * * * * - -But it passed quickly, properly whipped and put away with other -matters--all but a certain relating together of the strange trinity, -Death, Service, and Betty Berry--which he did not venture to play -with, for fear of relapse.... He had been eating nothing. He must go -to Hackensack. The little glass showed him a haggard and unshaven John -Morning, but there was nothing of the uncleanness about the face in -reflection.... He heard the “giddap” of Jethro far on the road. The old -rig was coming.... It stopped at his box. He hurried down the hill. - - - 18 - -TWO letters; one from Duke Fallows. Morning opened this on -the way up the slope. He was afraid of the other. He wanted to be in -the cabin with the door shut--when that other was opened.... Fallows -was joyous and tender--just a few lines written on the way west: -“... I won’t be long in ’Frisco. I know that already. The _Western -States_ does very well without me.... Soon on the long road to Asia -and Russia. I must look up Lowenkampf again before going home. He was -good to us, wasn’t he, John?... And you, this old heart thrills for -you. You are coming on. I don’t know anything more you need. I say you -are coming on. You’ll do the Play and the Book.... John, you ought to -write the book of the world’s heart.... And then you will get so full -of the passion to serve men that writing won’t be enough. You will have -to go down among them again--and labor and lift among men. Things have -formed about you for this.... We are friends.... I am coming back for -the harvest.” - -The sun had come out. Morning was standing in the doorway as he -finished. The lemon-colored light fell upon the paper.... It wasn’t -like Duke to write in this vein--after running away. He repeated aloud -a sentence to this effect. Then he went in, shut the door, and, almost -suffocating from the tension, read the letter of Betty Berry. - -It was just such a letter as would have sent him to her, before his -realization of the illness.... He saw her torture to be kind, and yet -not to lift his hopes. It was different from Fallows’, in that it -fitted exactly to what he now knew about himself. And he had to believe -from the pages that she loved him. There was an eternal equality to -that.... The air seemed full of service. Two letters from his finest -human relations, each stirring him to service. He did not see this -just now with the touch of bitterness that might have flavored it all -another time.... What was there about him that made them think of him -so? If they only knew how meager and tainted so much of his thinking -was. Some men can never make the world see how little they are. - -He wrote to Betty Berry. Calm came to him, and much the best moments -that he had known in the three days. He was apt to be a bit lyrical -as a letter-lover--he whose words were so faltering face to face with -the woman. Thoughts of the play came to his writing. He was really in -touch with himself again. He would never lose that. He would work every -day. When a man’s work comes well--he can face anything.... The play -was begun the fourth day, and, on the fifth, another letter from Betty -Berry. This was almost all about his work. She had seized upon this -subject, and her letters lifted his inspiration. She could share his -work. There was real union in that.... - -He was forgetting his devil for an hour at a time. There were moments -of actual peace and well-being. He did not suffer more than the pain he -had been accustomed to so long. And then, a real spring day breathed -over the hill. - -That morning, without any heat of producing, and without any elation -from a fresh letter from the woman, he found that in his mind to say -aloud: - -“I’m ready for what comes.” - -By a really dramatic coincidence, within ten minutes after this -fruitage of fine spirit, John Morning found an old unopened envelope -from Nevin, the little doctor of the _Sickles_. He had recalled -some data on Liaoyang while inspecting the morning--something that -might prove valuable for the play, in the old wallet he had carried -afield. Looking for this in the moulded leather, he found the letter -Nevin had left in the Armory, before departing--just a little before -Betty Berry came that day.... Nevin had not come back. But Noyes and -Field had come. - -Morning remembered that Nevin had spoken that morning of finding -something for the wound that would not heal.... The remedy was Chinese. -The Doctor knew of its existence, but had procured the name with great -difficulty in the Chinese quarter.... Morning was to fast ten days -while taking the treatment. - - * * * * * - -He went about it with a laugh. The message had renewed his deep -affection for Nevin. It had come forth from the hidden place where -Nevin now toiled, (secretly trying, doubtless, to cover every -appearance of his humanity).... He remembered how Nevin had studied -the wound that refused to heal. The last thing had been his report on -that. When there was nothing more to be offered but felicities--he had -vanished. - -Morning did not leap into any expectancy that he was to be healed, -but thoughts of Nevin gave him another desire after the play and the -book--to trace the great-hearted little man before the end. Nevin would -be found somewhere out among the excessive desolations. If it may be -understood, the idea of mortal sickness remained in Morning’s mind at -this time, mainly as a barrier between him and Betty Berry. - -Nevin’s drug was procured in New York. Hackensack failed utterly in -this.... On the third day, Morning suffered keenly for the need of -food. A paragraph from Betty Berry on the subject of the fasting at -this time completely astonished him; indeed, shook the basic conviction -as to the meaning of her departure: - -“... I have often thought you did not seem so well after I returned -from Europe, as you were when we parted. But the ten days will do for -you, something that makes whatever might happen in the body seem so -little and unavailing.... Don’t you see, you are doing what every -one, destined to be a world-teacher, has done?... What amazes me -continually, is that you seem to be brought, one by one, to these -things by exterior processes, rather than through any will of your -own.... The Hebrew prophets were all called upon to do this in order to -listen better. Recall, too, the coming forth from the Wilderness of the -Baptist, and the forty days in the wilderness of the Master Himself. -Why, it is part of the formula! You will do more than improve the -physical health; you will hear your message more clearly.... I sit and -think--in the very hush of expectancy for you.” - -As the evidences came, so they vanished. She could not have fled -from him in the fear of leprosy and written in this way; nor could -Duke Fallows, who was first of all unafraid of fleshly things. The -conviction of his taint, and of its incurableness, daily weakened. -Before the ten days passed, the last vestige of the horror was cleaned -away. Illusion--and yet the mental battle through which he had passed, -and which, through three terrible days, had shaken him body and soul, -was just as real in the graving of its experience upon the fabric of -his being as was the journey to Koupangtse, done hand and foot and -horse. He perceived that man, farther advanced in the complications of -self-consciousness, covers ground in three days and masters a lesson -that would require a life to learn in the dimness and leisure of simple -consciousness. - -There was no way of missing this added fact: He, John Morning, was not -designed to lean. He had been whipped and spurred through another dark -hollow in the valley of the shadow, to show him again, and finally, -that he was not intended for leaning upon others, yet must have an -instant appreciation of the suffering of others. He had been forced to -fight his own way to a certain poise, through what was to him, at the -time, actual abandonment in distress, by the woman and the friend he -loved. Moreover, he had accepted death; resignation to death in its -most horrible form had been driven into his soul--an important life -lesson, which whole races of men have died to learn. - -He was seeing very clearly.... He bathed continually both in water and -sunlight, lying in the open doorway as the Spring took root on his hill -and below. Often he mused away the hours, with Betty Berry’s letters -in his hand--too weak almost to stir at last, but filled with ease and -well-being, such as he had never known. Water from the Spring was all -he needed, and the activity of mind was pure and unerring, as if he -were lifted above the enveloping mists of the senses, through which he -had formerly regarded life. - -Everything now was large and clear. Life was like a coast of splendid -altitude, from which he viewed the mighty distances of gilded and -cloud-shadowed sea, birds sailing vast-pinioned and pure, the breakers -sounding a part of the majestic harmony of granite and sea and sky; the -sun God-like, and the stars vast and pure like the birds. - -When he actually looked with his eyes, it was as if he had come back, -a man, to some haunt of childhood. The little hill was just as lovely, -a human delight in the unbudded elms, a soft and childish familiarity -in the new greens of the sun-slope grass. The yellow primrose was -first to come, for yellow answers the thinnest, farthest sunlight. The -little cabin was like a cocoon. He was but half-out. Soon the stronger -sunlight would set him free--then to the wings.... One afternoon he -stared across to the haze of the great city. His eyes smarted with the -thought of the Charleys and the sisters, of the _Boabdils_ and the -slums.... Then, at last, he thought of Betty Berry waiting and thinking -of him ... “in the very hush of expectancy.” The world was very dear -and wonderful, and his love for her was in it all. - - * * * * * - -It was the ninth day that the bandage slipped from him, as clean as -when he put it on the day before, and when he opened the door of the -cabin he heard the first robin.... There was a sweeping finality in -the way it had come from Nevin, and the quality of the man lived in -Morning’s appreciation. His friends were always gone before he knew how -fine they were. - -He was slow to realize that the days of earth-life were plentiful for -him, in the usual course. A man is never the same after he has accepted -death.... And it had all come in order.... He could look into her eyes -and say, “Betty Berry, whatever you want, is right for me, but I think -it would be best for you to tell me everything. We are strong--and if -we are not to be one together, we should talk it over and understand -perfectly.”... - -How strange he had missed this straight way. There had been so much -illusion before. His body was utterly weak, but his mind saw more -clearly and powerfully than ever. - -The Play was conceived as a whole that ninth day. The sun came warmly -in, while he wrote at length of the work, as he finally saw it.... On -the tenth day he drank a little milk and slept in his chair by the -doorway.... There was one difficult run that the robin went over a -hundred and fifty times, at least. - - - 19 - -BETTY BERRY watched the progress of the fasting with a mothering -intensity. She saw that which had been lyrical and impassioned -give way to the workman, the deeper-seeing artist. He was not -less human; his humanity was broadened. From one of his pages, -she read how he had looked across at the higher lights of New York -one clear March night. His mind had been suddenly startled by a swift -picture of the fighting fool he had been, and of the millions there, -beating themselves and each other to death for vain things.... She -saw his Play come on in the days that followed the fasting. There -was freshness in his voice. She did not know that he had accepted -death, but she saw that he was beginning to accept her will in their -separation. - -And this is what she had tried to bring about, but her heart was -breaking. Dully she wondered if her whole life were not breaking. The -something implacable which she had always felt in being a woman, held -her like a matrix of iron now. Her life story had been a classic of -suffering, yet she had never suffered before. - -A letter from him, (frequently twice a day, they came) and it was -her instant impulse to answer, almost as if he had spoken. And when -she wrote--all the woman’s life of her had to be cut from it--cut -again and again--until was left only what another might say.... She -was forced to learn the terrible process of elimination which only -the greater artists realize, and which they learn only through years -of travail--that selection of the naked absolute, according to their -vision, all the senses chiseled away. His work, his health, especially -the clear-seeing that came from purifying of the body, the detachment -of his thoughts from physical emotions--of these, which were clear to -her as the impulses of instinct--she allowed herself to write. But -the woman’s heart of flesh, which had fasted so long for love, so -often found its way to her pages, and forced them to be done again.... -Certain of his paragraphs dismayed her, as: - -“Does it astonish you,” he asked, almost joyously, “when I say there is -something about Betty Berry beyond question--such a luxurious sense -of truth?... I feel your silences and your listenings between every -sentence. It is not what you say, though in words you seem to know what -I am to-day, and what I shall be to-morrow--but all about the words, -are _you_--those perfect hesitations, the things which I seemed -to know at first, but could not express. They were much too fine for a -medium of expression which knew only wars, horses, and the reporting of -words and deeds of men.... Why, the best thing in my heart is its trust -for you, Betty Berry. Looking back upon our hours together, I can see -now that all the misunderstandings were mine and all the truth yours. -When it seems to me that we should be together, and the memories come -piling back--those perfect hours--I say, because of this trust, ‘Though -it is not as I would have it, her way is better. And I know I shall -come to see it, because she cannot be wrong.’” - -So she could not hide her heart from him, even though she put down what -seemed to her unworthiness and evasion, and decided through actual -brain-process what was best to say. A new conduct of life was not -carrying Betty Berry up into the coolness beyond the senses. Fasting -would never bring that to her. Fasting of the body was so simple -compared to the fasting of the heart which had been her whole life. Nor -could she ever rise long from the sense of the serpent in woman which -she had realized from the words of his Guardian--not a serpent to the -usual man, but to the man who was destined to love the many instead of -one.... She loved him as a woman loves--the boy, the lover, the man of -him--the kisses, the whispers, the arms of strength, the rapture of -nearness.... - -He must have been close to the spirit of that night at the theatre, -when this was written: - -“The letter to-day, with the plaintive note in it, has brought you -even closer. I never think of you as one who can be tried seriously; -always as one finished, with infinite patience, and no regard at all -for the encompassing common. Of course, I know differently, know that -you must suffer, you who are so keenly and exquisitely animate--but you -have an un-American poise.... You played amazingly. I loved that at -once. There was a gleam about it. Betty Berry’s gleaming. I faced you -from the wings that night. I wanted to come up behind you. You were all -music.... But I love even better the instrument of emotions you have -become. That must be what music is for--to sensitize one’s life, to -make it more and more responsive....” - -Then in a different vein: - -“... The long forenoons, wherein we grow.... Yes, I knew you were a -tree-lover; that the sound of running water was dear to you ... and -the things you dream of ... work and play and forest scents and the -wind in the branches.... Sometimes it seems to me--is it a saying of -lovers?--that we should be boy and girl together.... Why, I’ve only -just now learned to be a boy. There was so much of crudity and desire -and anguish-to-do-greatly-at-any-cost--until just a little ago. But -I’ve never had a boyhood that could have known you. I wasn’t ready for -such loveliness in the beginning.... I’ve wanted terribly to go to you, -but that is put away for the time.” - -These lines wrung her heart. “Oh, no,” she cried, “you have not learned -how to become a boy. There was never a time you were not ready--until -now! You are becoming a man--and the little girl--oh, she is a little -girl in her heart....” - -Everything his Guardian had promised was coming to be. He was changing -into a man. That would take him from her at the last--even letters, -this torrent of his thoughts of life and work. She saw the first -process of it--as the Play grasped him finally--the old tragedy of a -man turning from a woman to his work.... - -She built the play from the flying sparks.... He was thronged with -illusions of production. How badly he had done it before, he said, and -how perfect had proved the necessity to wait, and to do it a second -time.... Even the most unimaginative audience must build the great -battle picture from the headquarters scene; then the trampled arena of -the Ploughman, deep in the hollow of that valley, and his coming forth -through the millet.... - -“... It’s so simple,” he wrote in fierce haste. “You see, I remember -how hard it was for me to grasp that first night, when Fallows brought -in the story to the Russian headquarters.... I have remembered that. I -have made it _so that I could see it then_. And I was woven in and -fibred over with coarseness, from months of life in Liaoyang and from -the day’s hideous brutality. I have measured my slowness and written -to quicken such slowness as that. The mystery is, it is not spoiled by -such clearness. It is better--it never lets you alone. It won’t let you -lie to yourself. You can’t be the same after reading it.... And it goes -after the deepest down man.... Every line is involved in action. - -“The third act--sometime we’ll see it together--how the main character -leaves the field and goes out in search of the Ploughman’s hut, across -Asia and Europe; how he reaches there--the old father and mother, the -six children, the one little boy, who has the particular answer for -the man’s lonely love--the mother of the six, common, silent, angular, -her skirt hanging square, as Duke put it--but she is big enough for -every one to get into her heart. You will see the fear of her man’s -death, which the stranger’s presence brings to her, though he leaves it -to Russia to inform the family. You will see the beautiful mystery of -compassion that he brings, too. That’s the whole shine of the piece. -And it came from the ministry of pain. - -... “I’m not praising _my_ Play--it isn’t. It’s Duke’s almost -every word of it--every thought, the work of Duke’s disciple. I -have merely felt it all and made it clear--clear. You see it all. -Many thousands must see, and see what the name means. It’s the most -wonderful word in the world to me, _Compassion_.” - -Then came the break for a day, and the flash that his work on the Play -was finished. “The cabin will be harder for me now. The new work is -only a dream so far--and this goes to Markheim to-day.... It is very -queer that I should go back to Markheim, but somehow I want to pick up -that failure. There are other reasons.... I shall tell him that he can -have five days. I’m just getting ready to go across the River.... My -health was almost never better. I’m not tired. The work has seemed to -replenish me, as your letters do. But that last letter--yesterday’s--it -seems to come from behind a screen, where other voices were--the loved -tones troubled and crowded out by others. It left me restless and more -than ever longing to see you. It is as if there were centuries all -unintelligible, to be made clear only by being with you. The world and -the other voices drown yours----” - -She felt the instinct of centuries to hold out her arms to him--arms -of the woman, after man’s task in the world--home at evening with the -prize of the hunt and battle. The world for the day, the woman for the -night--that is man’s way. She seemed to know it now from past eternity. -And for woman--day and night the man of her thoughts.... She was afraid -of her every written word now. Her heart answered every thrill of his; -the murmuring and wrestling resistance of his against the miles, was -hers ten-fold.... The days of the fasting had not been like this, nor -the two weeks that followed in which he had completed the play.... -April had come. She was ill. Her music was neglected altogether. Her -friend, Helen Quiston, never faltered in her conception of the beauty -and the mystery of the separation. With all her will, Helen sustained -her against the relinquishing of the lofty ideal of sacrifice, and -tried to distract her impassioned turning to the east.... She would -hold to the death; Betty Berry knew this. - -“It’s harder now that the play is done,” Betty repeated. “He can’t be -driven instantly to work again. I can’t lie to him. He doesn’t fight -me--he thinks I’m right--that’s the unspeakable part of it. There is -nothing for me to write about except his work....” - -And Helen Quiston found her, a half-hour afterward, staring out of -the window, exactly as she had left--her hands in her lap exactly the -same.... Betty Berry was thinking unutterable things, having to do with -adorable meetings in the theatre-wings--of wonderful night journeys, -all night talking--of waiting in a little room, and at the head of the -stairs. There was an invariable coming back to the first kiss in the -wings of the theatre. - -“We were real--we were true to each other that night--true as little -children. We needed no words,” this was her secret story.... “Oh, I -waited so long for him ... and we could have gone out together and -served in a little way. But they would not let us alone.” - -He had been across to New York.... The second morning after the play -was finished, she received a letter with a rather indescribable ending. -He told her of fears and strangeness, of intolerable longing for -something to happen that would bring them together.... The rest is here: - -“I’m a bit excited by the thought that just came to me. And another, -but I won’t tell you yet, for fear.... I don’t quite understand myself. -I seem afraid. I think I would ask more of myself than I would of -another man just now. There seem all about me invisible restraints. -Something deep within recognizes the greatness and finality of your -meaning to me.... It is true, you do not leave the strength to me. -Did you ever--? No, I won’t ask that.... This letter isn’t kind to -you--unsettling, strange, full of an intensity to see and be with -you....” - -Moments afterwards, as she was standing at the piano--the letter -trailing from her hand--the telephone in the inner room startled her -like a human cry. - - - 20 - -IT was Morning. She did not remember his words nor her answers--only -that she had told him he might come up-town to her. He had dropped -the receiver then, as if it burned him. - -So, it was a matter of minutes. Nothing was ready. Least of all, was -she ready. She could hardly stand. She had forgotten at first, and it -had required courage, of late, to look in the mirror. She would have -given up, before what she saw now, but a robin was singing in the -foliage by the rear windows. She went out to open the studio door into -the hall, then retired to the inner room again.... “He can heal you, -and bring back the music,” her heart whispered, but her mind cowered -before herself, and this mate of herself, Helen Quiston, and before his -Guardian.... She heard his step on the stair ... called to him to wait -in the studio. He was pacing to and fro. - -Morning felt the light resistance in her arms. His kiss fell upon her -cheek. He held her at arm’s length, looking into her face. - -She laughed, repeating that she was not ill.... She was always thinner -in summer, she said. In her withholding, there was destructiveness for -the zeal he had brought; and that which she set herself resolutely to -impart--the sense of their separateness--found its lodgment in his -nature. It would always be there now, she thought; it would augment, -like ice about a spring in early winter, until the frost sealed the -running altogether. The lover was stayed, though his mind would not yet -believe. - -“Is it really possible,” he said, sitting before her restlessly, “that -I am here in your house, and that I can stay, and talk with you, and -see you and hear you play? I have thought about it so much that it’s -hard to realize.” - -“It is quite what a lover would say,” she thought.... She had to watch -her words. Her heart went out to him, but her mind remembered the work -to do.... Self-consciousness, and a weighing of words--how horrible -between _them_! - -“And what made you come? I had just read your letter, when the -telephone rang----” - -“I shouldn’t have sent that letter,” he answered. “I must have sent it -because of the things I thought, and didn’t write.... The night before, -I had come home to the cabin--after Markheim and the city. It was -dreadful--with the work gone. Yesterday was too much for me--the Spring -day--alone--not ready to begin again--you here.... I got to thinking -about you so fast--and the shame of it, for us to be apart--that I -couldn’t endure it.... I thought of going to you in a month--in a -week; and then when the letter was mailed, I thought of it being with -you this morning.... A thousand things poured into my mind. It seemed -finally as if everything was wrong between us; as if I had already -remained too long from you. It was like fighting devils.... And then I -tried to beat the letter to you, but it got here by an earlier train -this morning.” - -He was like a child to her, telling about something that had frightened -him. - -Their silences were strained. His eyes had a sleepless look. Betty -saw it working upon him--the repulsion that had gone from her. She -wished she might go to his arms and die. It suddenly came over her--the -uselessness of it all--the uselessness of being a woman, of waiting, of -final comprehension--all for this rending.... Yet she saw what would -happen if she followed her heart. He would take her. There would be a -radiant season, for the lover within him was not less because his work -was for other men. But there was also within him (his Guardian had -made her believe it) her rival, a solitary stranger come to the world -for service, who would not delay long to show him how he had betrayed -his real work, how he had caged his greater self, his splendid pinions -useless.... Morning would hear the world calling for work he could not -do. - -“_There seem all about me invisible restraints._” - -This from the letter of the morning--alone remained with her. It -expressed it all. The sentence uprose in her mind. It was more dominant -to her than if a father had forbade his coming, or even if by his -coming another was violated. - -All the forbiddings that Society can bring against desire are but -symbols compared to the invisible restraints of a full man’s nature. -Men who are held by symbols, ruled by exterior voices and fears, are -not finished enough to be a law unto themselves.... It wasn’t the -terror of these thoughts, but tenderness in answer to his hurried -tumble of explanation regarding his coming, that had filled Betty’s -eyes. He caught the sparkle of a tear in profile, and came to her. - -“It’s like creating--visibly, without hands, but with thoughts--creating -a masterpiece--to see the tears come like that----” - -He drew a chair to the bench where she sat, her back to the piano. -Helen Quiston was away, as usual, for the forenoon. - -“It is creating--another world,” she answered steadily. - -He stared at her. She saw again that sleepless look. - -“You’ve been a whole month on a lofty ridge--just think of it--fasting -and pure expression of self--spiritual self-revelation----” - -It seemed to him there was a suggestion in what she said for the new -book. - -“And now you are down in the meadows again,” she finished. - -“The earth-sweet meadows--with you.” - -He could not know what the words meant to her; that there was no -quarter in them for her. She did not belong to his ascents. - -“Somehow I always think of you as belonging best to the evenings, the -hushed earth, the sweetness of the rest-time. You make me remember what -to do, and how to do it well. Why, just now you made me see clearly for -a second what I must do next. You make me love people better--when I am -close to you.” - -She was not to be carried away by these givings which would have made -many a woman content. - -“Remember, I have had your letters every day. You are very dear to me -up there. You have been down in the meadows--and in the caverns--much. -You are not ready to return--even for the evenings. You stand now for -austere purity--for plain, ancient, mother’s knee ideals. You must not -delude yourself. A man must be apart in order to see. You did not begin -really to live--until you drew apart.” - -He felt her stripping his heart. His face lifted in agony, and his -eyes caught the picture on the wall of the meeting of Beatrice and -Dante. The Florentine woman seemed not to touch the earth; the poet was -awed, mystic in the fusion of their united powers. It was fateful that -Morning saw the picture at this instant. - -“Look,” he said, “what the world has from the meeting of that man and -woman--an immortal poem!” - -“But Beatrice passed on----” - -“She became identified with his greater power, Betty. She was one with -it----” - -“By passing on!” - -He arose and lifted her to her feet, and his arms did not relinquish -her. - -“And you mean that you would pass on?... You must not. You must not. We -would both be broken and bewildered. I love you. I have come to you. -I want to be near--and work with you. I know you all, and shall love -you always. I have come to you, and I must stay--or you must come with -me----” - -Her resistance was broken for the moment. An icy burden fell from her. -She clung to him, and tears helped her. - - * * * * * - -They were together again in the studio that afternoon. Betty Berry was -making tea, her strength renewed. Helen Quiston had come and gone. -Morning had been away for an hour. - -“Strange man,” she said, “let us reason together.... You are working -now for men. That is right, but when you are full of power, when you -come really into the finished man you are to be, and all these hard -years have healed beyond the last ache--you will work for women. Does -it sound strange from me, that the inspiration of the world to-day is -with the women? Why, it seems to me that men are caught in the very -science of cruelty. And then, the women of to-day represent the men of -the future. When one of the preparers of the way brings his gospel to -women, he kindles the inspiration of the next generation. But this fire -can only come from the solitary heights--never from the earth-sweet -meadows----” - -He shook his head. - -“The men who have done the most beautiful verses and stories about -children--have had no children of their own. A man cannot be the father -of his country and the father of a house. The man who must do the -greatest work for women must hunger for the _vision_ of Woman, and -not be yoked with one.... It is so clear. It is always so.” - -“All that you say makes me love you more, Betty----” - -“Don’t, dear. Don’t make it harder for me.... It is not I that thrills -you. It is my speaking of your work that fills your heart with -gladness--the things you feel to do----” - -“They are from you----” - -“Don’t say that. It is not true.” - -“But I never saw so clearly----” - -“Then go away with the vision. Oh, John Morning, you cannot listen to -yourself--with a woman in the room!” - -He lifted his shoulders, drawing her face to his. “I was going to -say, you are my wings,” he whispered. “But that is not it. You are my -fountain. I would come to you and drink----” - -“But not remain----” - -“I love your thoughts, Betty, your eyes and lips----” - -“Because you are athirst----” - -“I shall always be athirst!” - -“That is not nature.” - -He shuddered. - -“Do men, however athirst--remain at the oases? Men of strength--would -they not long to go? Would they not remember the far cities and the -long, blinding ways of the sun?” - -“But you could go with me--” he exclaimed. - -“That is not nature!” - -He was the weaker. “But you have gone alone to the far cities, and the -long, blinding ways of the sun----” - -“Yes, alone. But with you--a time would come when I could not. We are -man and woman. There would be little children. I would stay--and you -could not leave them.... Oh, they are not for you, dear. They would -weaken your courage. You would love them. At the end of the day, you -would want them, and the mother again.... The far cities would not hear -you; the long, blinding ways of the sun would know you no more----” - -“Betty,” he whispered passionately, “how wonderfully sweet that would -be!” - -“Yes ... to the mother ... but _you_--I can see it in your eyes. -You would remember Nineveh, that great city....” - - * * * * * - -Darkness was about them. - -“Betty Berry--you would rather I wouldn’t take the train to you -again--not even when it seems I cannot stay longer away?” - -She did not answer. - -“Betty----” - -“Yes....” - -She left him and crossed to the far window. - -“Would you not have me come to you again--at all?” - -She could not hold the sentence, and her answer. The room was terrible. -It seemed filled with presences that suffocated her--that cared nothing -for her. All day they had inspired her to speak and answer--and now -they wanted her death. She moved to the ’cello. Her hands fluttered -along the strings--old, familiar ways--but making hardly a sound.... If -she did not soon speak, he would come to her. She would fail again--the -touch of him, and she would fail. - -“Betty, is there never to be--the fountain at evening?” - -“You know--you know--” she cried out. Words stuck after that. She had -not a thought to drive them. - -He arose. - -“Don’t,” she implored. “Don’t come to me! I cannot bear it.” - -... It was his final rebellion. - -“I am not a preparer of the way. I have not a message. I am sick of the -thought. I am just a man--and I love you!” - -At last she made her stand, and on a different position. “I could not -love you--if that were true.” - - * * * * * - -She heard him speak, but not the words. She heard the crackling and -whirring of flames. He did not cross the room.... She had risen, her -arms groping toward him. She felt him approach, and the flames were -farther.... She must not speak of flames. - -“You will go away soon--won’t you?” she whispered, as he took her. - -“Yes, to-night----” - -“Yes--to-night,” she repeated. - -She was lying upon the couch in the studio, and his chair was beside -her. - -“No, don’t light anything--no light!... It is just an hour.... I could -not think of food until you go. But you may bring me a drink of water. -On the way to the train, you can have your supper.... I will play--play -in the dark, and think of you--as you go----” - -She talked evenly, a pause between sentences. There was a tensity in -the formation of words, for the whirring and crackling distracted, -dismayed her. Her heart was breaking. This she knew. When it was -finished, he would be free.... The flames were louder and nearer, as he -left for the drink of water. She called to him to light a match, if he -wished, in the other room.... He was in her room. She knew each step, -just where. He was there. It was as if he were finally materialized -from her thoughts in the night, her dreaming and writing to him. His -hand touched her dresser. She heard the running water ... and then it -was all red and rending and breathless, until she felt the water to her -lips. Always, as he came near, the flames receded. - -And out of all the chaos, the figure of the craftsman had returned -to him. The world had revealed itself to him as never before in the -passage of time. She had given him her very spirit that day, and the -strength of all her volition from the month of brooding upon the -conception of his Guardian. Literally on that day the new Book was -conceived, as many a man’s valorous work has begun to be, in a woman’s -house--her blood and spirit, its bounty. - -“This is a holy place to me, this room,” he said, the agonies of -silence broken. “I can feel the white floods of spirit that drive the -world.” - -She did not need to answer. She held fast to herself, lest something -betray her. Darkness was salvation. All that his Guardian had asked was -in her work. John Morning told it off, sentence by sentence. It took -her life, but he must not know. She thought she would die immediately -after he was gone--but, strangely, now the suffering was abated.... She -was helping.... Was not that the meaning of life--to give, to help, to -love?... Someone had said so. - -He lifted her, carried her in his arms, talked and praised her. - -“There’s something deathlessly bright about you, Betty Berry!” he -whispered. “I am going--but we are one! Don’t you feel it? You are -loving the world from my heart!” - -To the door, but not to the light, she walked with him.... Up the -stairs he strode a last time to take her in his arms. - -“We are one--a world-loving one--remember that!” - -She did not know why, but as he kissed her--she thought of the pitcher -broken at the fountain. - -It was all strange light and singing flame.... She was lost in the -hall. She laughed strangely.... She must play him on his way.... -Someone helped her through the raining light--until she could feel the -strings. - - - - -BOOK III. - -THE BARE-HEADED MAN - - - 1 - -THE red head of the little telephone-miss bowed over the -switch-board when Morning entered Markheim’s. She colored, smiled; all -metropolitan outrages of service forgotten. Charley waved furtively -from afar; the door to the inner office opened. - -“Well?” said the manager. - -“Well, Mr. Markheim?” - -“You have come too soon.” - -“I said--five days.” - -“We read no play in five days.” - -“It was left here on that basis.” - -“Nonsense.” - -“You can give it to me now.” - -“It is being read now. Your title is rotten. The old one was better.” - -“That title will grow on you,” said Morning, who began to like the -interview. “I shall come to take the play to-morrow--unless you decide -to keep it and bring it out this Fall----” - -“Why did you come to Markheim again? Have you tried all the rest?” - -“There was something unfinished about our former brush--I didn’t like -the feel of it.... My play is done over better. Neither copy has been -submitted--except to Markheim.” - -“Your play may be as bad as before.” - -“Yes. It looks better to me, however.” - -“You’ve got a war play again----” - -“That first and second act.” - -“You can’t write war. This is not war----” - -Morning did not realize the change that had come over him until he -recalled the shame and rebellion that had risen in his mind when -Markheim had said this before.... Something had come to him from Duke -Fallows, or from Betty Berry, or from the hill silences. He was a new -creature.... Must one be detached somewhat from the world in order to -use it? This was his sense at the moment: that he could compel the mind -before him, reinforced as it was by distaste for everything decent, -and manifesting the opinions of other men, including Reever Kennard’s. -There was no irritation whatsoever; no pride in being a war-writer, -good or bad. Markheim’s denial had no significance in the world above -or water beneath. He saw, however, that he must change Markheim’s idea, -and that he must do it by beating Markheim in his own particular zone -of activity. - -There was a certain fun in this. He arose and stood by the other’s -chair. The eye-balls showed wider and rolled heavily. The pistol or -bomb was never far from his mind. Morning looked down at him, saying -quietly: - -“You said something like that before, and it wasn’t your opinion--it -was Reever Kennard’s. I don’t object to it exactly, but I want to show -you something. You know Reever Kennard’s paper?” - -Markheim nodded. - -“You know the _World-News_ sent him out to the Russo-Japanese -war--big expense account, helpers, dress-suits, and all that?” - -“I know he was there.” - -“The same managing editor who sent Reever Kennard out is still on the -desk. He should be in the office now. The number is----” - -Morning found it for him hastily, and added: “You call him now.” - -“I don’t want to call him up----” - -“But you’d better. Twice you said something that someone told you--and -it’s troublesome. The short way out is to call him now----” - -Morning was tapping the desk lightly. Markheim reached for the -extension ’phone. Luckily, the thing was managed--luckily, and through -the name of Markheim. - -“Ask him who did the story of the battle of Liaoyang for the -_World-News_?” Morning ordered. - -The question was asked and the answer came back. - -“Ask him if it was a good story--and how long.” - -It was asked and answered. - -“Ask him if it was conceded to be the best story of the war published -in America.” - -The talk was extended this time, Markheim explaining why he asked. - -“What did he say?” Morning asked. - -“He said it was all right,” Markheim granted pertly. “Only that there -was a very good story from another man on Port Arthur--afterward.” - -“That is true. There was a heady little chap got into Port Arthur--and -came out strong.... Now, look here----” - -Morning went to the case where a particularly recent encyclopædia -was drawn forth. He referred to the war, but especially to the final -paragraph of the article, captioned “Bibliography.”... His own name and -the name of his book was cited as the principal American reference.... -It was all laughable. No one knew better than Morning that such action -would be silly among real people. - -“You don’t see Reever Kennard referred to, do you--as authority -of war-stuff?... The point is that you play people get so much -counterfeit color and office-setting--that you naturally can’t look -authoritatively on the real thing.... However, the fact that I know -more about the battle of Liaoyang than any other man in America would -never make a good play. There’s a lot beside in this play--a lot more -than at first----” - -“They have your play out now--reading it,” Markheim observed. - -Morning added: “It’s clear to you, isn’t it, why Mr. Reever Kennard -didn’t care for the John Morning play----?” - -Markheim’s eyes gleamed. This was pure business. “You had the goods and -delivered it in his own office----” - -“Exactly----” - -“You bother me too much about this play. The title is rotten----” - -“You’ll like that, when you see Markheim with it. There’s a -peculiar thing about the word--it doesn’t die. It never rests. It’s -human--divine, too. There’s a cry in it--to some happiness, to some -sorrow--to the many, hope.... It sings. I would rather have it than -glory.... Listen, ‘_Markheim Offers Compassion_’--why, that’s a -God’s business--offering compassion----” - -“You feel like a song-bird this afternoon, Mr. Morning----” - -“I’ll be back to-morrow----” - -“Too soon----” - -“Can’t help it. It’s ready. It will be the big word this Winter. You -can read it in an hour. I’m off to-morrow--from Markheim. The Winter -will clear my slate in this office, whether you take it or not----” - -“Come back at noon----” - -Charley’s sister looked up from her pad. Her swift change of expression -to a certain shyness and pleasure, too, in a sort of mutual secret, -added to Morning’s merriment as he left the building.... He wondered -continually that afternoon what had come over him. He had not been -able to do this sort of thing before. The astonishing thing was his -detachment from any tensity of interest. It was all right either way, -according to his condition of mind. The question was important: Must a -man be aloof from the fogging ruck of accepted activities in order to -see them, and to manage best among things as they are? - -There was the new book, too. Betty Berry had given him the new task. -A splendor had come to life--even with the unspeakable sadness of the -ending of that day. The beauty of that day would never die. Every phase -of her sacrifice revealed a subtle, almost superhuman, faith in him. -Was it this--her faith in him--that made him so new and so strong; -that made him know in his heart that if the Play were right--it would -go in spite of Markheim, in spite of all New York? And if it were not -right, certainly he did not want it to go.... Markheim and New York--he -regarded them that night from his doorstep; then turned his back to the -city, and faced the west and the woman. - -It broke upon him. She was mothering him. She was bringing to his -action all that was real and powerful--fighting for it, against every -desire and passion of her own. Her wish for his good was superior to -her own wish for happiness. She gave him his work and his dreams. He -knew not what mystery of prayer and concentration she poured upon -him.... This place in which she had never been was filled with her. The -little frail creature was playing upon him, as upon her instrument. -Moments were his in which she seemed a mighty artist. - -And then he saw men everywhere--just instruments--but played upon by -forces of discord and illusion.... He saw these men clearly, because -he had been of them. Such forces had played upon him.... He had been -buffeted and whipped along the rough ways. He had looked up to the -slaughterers of the wars as unto men of greatness. He had been played -upon by the thirsts and the sufferings, by greed and ambition. He had -hated men. He had fumed at bay before imagined wrongs; and yet no one -had nor could wrong him, but himself. - -One by one he had been forced to fight it out with his own devils--to -the last ditch. There they had quit--vanished like puffs of nasty -smoke. He had stood beneath Reever Kennard, almost poisoning himself -to death with hatred. Pure acknowledgment this, that his life moved -in the same scope of evil.... He had accepted the power of Markheim, -feared it, and suffered over the display of it. Now he found it puny -and laughable. He had worked for himself, and it had brought him only -madness and shattering of force. He had been brought to death, had -accepted it in its most hideous form--and risen over it.... His hill -was calm and sweet in the dusk. Though his heart was lonely--and though -all this clear-seeing seemed not so wonderful as it would be to have -the woman with him in the cabin--yet it was all very good. He felt -strong, his fighting force not abated. - -He had his work. She had shown him that. He would write every line to -her. His work would lift him up, as the days of the Play had lifted -him--out of the senses and the usual needs of man. He would be with -her, in that finer communion of instrument and artist.... The world -was very old and dear. Men’s hearts were troubled, but men’s evils -were very trifling, when all was understood. He would never forget his -lessons. He would tell everyone what miracles are performed in the -ministry of pain.... He looked into the dark of the west and loved her. - - * * * * * - -“Well, you are on time,” said Markheim the following noon. - -“Yes,” Morning said with calmness and cheer. - -“We will take the play. I have had it read.... We can do no more than -bust.” - -“This Fall--the production?” - -“I will give it the _Markheim_ in November.” - -He seemed to be surprised that Morning did not emotionalize in some -way. He had expected at least to be informed that “bust” was out of the -question, and missed this mannerism of the playwright, now that the -thing was his and not the other’s.... Moreover, Markheim was pleased -with the way he had reached the decision. He wanted Morning to know. - -“There was that difference of opinion.... Do you know what I did?” - -Morning couldn’t imagine. - -“Well,” said Markheim, sitting back, hands patting his girth, “those -who have nothing but opinions--read your play. They like it; they -like it not. It will pay. It will not pay. It is ‘revolutionary,’ -‘artistic,’ ‘well-knit,’ ‘good second act’--much rot it is, and is not. -Who do you think settled the question?” - -“Yourself?” - -“Not me--I have no opinion.” - -“Who then?” - -“The friend of no man.” It was said with grandeur. - -Morning waited. - -Markheim leaned forward, beaming not unkindly, and whispered: - -“The little one at the switch-board outside the door. She said it was -‘lovely.’... Oh, she’s a sharp little spider.” - - - 2 - -HERE is an extra bit of the fabric, that goes along with the garment -for mending.... Mid-May, and never a sign of the old wound’s reopening. -Something of Morning’s former robustness had spent itself, but he had -all the strength a man needs, and that light unconsciousness of the -flesh which is delightful to those who produce much from within. The -balance of his forces of development had turned from restoring his body -to a higher replenishment. - -The mystery of work broke upon him more and more, and the thrall of -it; its relation to man at his best; the cleansing of a man’s daily -life for the improvement of his particular expression in the world’s -service; the ordering of his daily life in pure-mindedness, the power -of the will habitually turned to the achieving of this pure-mindedness. -He saw that man is only true and at peace when played upon from -the spiritual source of life; therefore, all that perfects a man’s -instrumentation is vital, and all that does not is destructive. Most -important of all, he perceived that a real worker has nothing whatever -to do beyond the daily need, with the result of his work in a worldly -way; that any deep relation to worldly results of a man’s work is -contamination. - -He lost the habit and inclination to think what he wanted to say. He -listened. He became sceptical of all work that came from brain, in -the sense of having its origin in something he had actually learned. -He remembered how Fallows had spoken of this long ago; (he had not -listened truly enough to understand then); how a man’s brain is at his -best when used purely to receive--as a little finer instrument than the -typewriter. - -Except for certain moments on the borderland of sleep, Betty Berry -was closest to him during his work. His every page was for her eye--a -beloved revelation of his flesh and mind and spirit. And the thing had -to be plain, plain, plain. That was the law. - -How Fallows had fought for that. “Don’t forget the deepest down man, -John!”... Betty Berry and Fallows and Nevin were his angels--his cabin, -a place of continual outpouring to them. Few evils were powerful -enough to stem such a current, and penetrate the gladness of giving. - -He slept lightly, and was on the verge again and again, almost nightly, -in fact, of surprising his own greater activity that does not sleep. -He often brought back just the murmur of these larger doings; and on -the borderlands he sometimes felt himself in the throb of that larger -consciousness which moves about its meditations and voyagings, saying -to the body, “Sleep on.” It was this larger consciousness that used -him as he used the typewriter, when he was writing at his best and his -listening was pure.... He had been held so long to the ruck that he -would never forget the parlance of the people--and not fall to writing -for visionaries. - -... One night he dreamed he went to Betty Berry.... He was ascending -the stairs to her. She seemed smaller, frailer. Though he was a step -or two down, his eyes met hers equally. She was lovelier than anything -he had ever known or conceived in woman. Her smile was so wistful -and sweet and compassionate--that the hush and fervor of it seemed -everywhere in the world. There was a shyness in her lips and in the -turn of her head. Some soft single garment was about her--as if she had -come from a fountain in the evening.... And suddenly there was a great -tumult within him. He was lost in the battle of two selves--the man who -loved and destroyed, and the man who loved and sustained. - -The greater love only asked her there--loved her there, exquisite, -apart, found in her a theme for infinite contemplation, as she stood -smiling.... The other was the love of David, when he looked across -the house-tops at Bathsheba, bathing, and made her a widow to mother -Solomon. This human love was strong in the dream, for he caught her in -his arms, and kissed, and would not let her go, until her voice at last -reached his understanding. - -“_Oh, why did you spoil it all? Oh, why--when I thought it was safe -to come?_” - -He had no words, but her message was not quite ended: - -“_I should have come to you as before--and not this way--but you -seemed so strong and so pure.... It is my fault--all my fault._” - -She was Betty Berry--but lovelier than all the earth--the spirit of -all his ideals in woman. The marvelous thing about it was that he knew -after the dream that this was the Betty Berry that would live in spite -of anything that could happen to the Betty Berry in the world. He knew -that she waited for him--for the greater lover, John Morning, whose -love did not destroy, but sustained.... She who regarded him in “the -hush of expectancy” from the distance of a night’s journey, and he -who labored here stoutly in the work of the world, were but names and -symbols of the real creatures above the illusion of time.... So he came -to love death--not with eagerness, but as an ideal consummation. Such -a result were impossible had he not faced death as an empty darkness -first, and overcome the fear of it. - -These many preparations for real life on earth in the flesh he was to -put in his book--not his adventures, but the fruits of them--how he had -reached to-day, and its decent polarity in service. He had been hurled -like a top into the midst of men. After the seething of wild energy -and the wobblings, he had risen to a certain singing and aspiring -rhythm--the whir of harmony. He told the story in order, day by day. -Though it was done with the I’s, there was no self-exploitation. -John Morning was merely the test-tube, containing from time to time -different compounds of experience. And he did it plainly, plainly, -plainly, as is the writer’s business. - -As he watched for Jethro, one morning early in June, he perceived -a second figure in the old rig. At the box, the stranger got out -and followed Jethro’s arm, directed up the hill toward the cabin, -disappeared for a moment in the swail-thicket by the fence, and -presently began the ascent, bringing Morning’s papers and letters.... -The stranger was tall and tanned, wore a wide hat and approached with a -slim ease of movement. Morning knew he had seen him before, but could -not remember until the voice called: - -“Hullo--that you, John Morning?” - -It was Archibald Calvert, last met during the night-halt in Rosario, -Luzon, the correspondent who had ridden with Reever Kennard, and who -had lost _Mio Amigo_. He had always thought rather pleasantly of -Archibald Calvert when he thought at all. - -“Say--what are you getting set for out here?” - -“It’s better and cheaper than a hall-bedroom,” Morning answered. - -“That sounds good.... Well, I spent all day yesterday looking for -you--first clue, Boabdil--second at Markheim’s from a little red-haired -girl.... The rural man picked me up----” - -“I’ve got some cold buttermilk----” - -“Pure asceticism--also a pearl of an idea----” - -They sat down together. - -“So you made ten thousand dollars out of Liaoyang after you came -back.... I looked up the story. It was--say, it was a bride, Morning!” - -“Thanks. Duke Fallows did a better one in one-tenth the space. The -pay-end didn’t mean much. I’m not a good bed for money culture. Tell me -where you’ve been, Mr. Calvert.” - -“Oh, I’ve been around. Didn’t get up to the Russ-Jap stuff. I was down -among the Pacific Islands. You know I’m a better tramp than writer. -It’s five years since I hit New York.... They say old Reever Kennard is -doing politics. He’ll be back from Washington to-night----” - -“Politics, and an occasional dramatic criticism,” said Morning. - -“You know that never sat easy--that day in Rosario----” - -“Didn’t it?” - -“I was down to Batangas three days later--unpacking saddle-bags, and -found _Mio Amigo_ No. 1. Deeper down I found its mate.... They’re -common in Luzon as old Barlow knives when we were kids.... I made a -scene about that knife--with my own deep down in my own duffel.... I -suppose you’ve forgotten.” - -“No--I haven’t.” - -“You were pretty decent about it. It was a nasty thing--even to -speak about it as I did. You see, the inscription rather appealed to -kid-intelligence in my case, and I thought it was unique, instead of -the popular idea of a cheap Filipino knife.” - -“Kennard took it seriously, didn’t he?” said Morning. - -“You mean at the time?... Yes, I couldn’t understand that exactly.” - -Morning decided not to speak of that day’s relation to Tokyo five years -later. - -“Well,” said Calvert, after a pause, “I hunted you up to say I was an -ass, and to give you back your knife. The pair have been smelling up my -things around the world for a long time.” - -Morning grasped it eagerly. - -Some time afterward, when Calvert arose to go, Morning ventured this -much: - -“And so you’re going to see Reever Kennard?” - -“Yes, to-night.... I suppose you two and the others game together from -time to time?” - -“The fact is, New York isn’t very good anchorage for that sort of -thing,” Morning said. - -“... I was glad when they told me you had put over that big Liaoyang -stuff, Morning----” - -Morning smiled and took the quick brown hand of the other. Calvert -appealed to him, but it couldn’t be shown in any way. Calvert was like -a good horse, gladly giving evidence of fine feeling, but embarrassed -when made much of.... He went away blithely--off, for God knows -where--but fearlessly on his way. - -Morning held the little knife in his hand. - -He thought of that hard Philippine service which had seemed so big -at the time; of that day when he watched the fat shoulders of Reever -Kennard in the forward sets of horse, Kennard seeming all that -greatness can be. He thought of the halt in Rosario, of the lame woman. -He looked at the little knife again.... He had not really wanted it -then, and yet it had cut the strings of his Fates, turning them loose -upon him. It had knocked him out of the second Japanese column five -years afterward, and given him instead Duke Fallows and Liaoyang. It -had given him that great battle, Lowenkampf, the Ploughman, Eve, the -sorrel mare--the journey to Koupangtse--the blanket at Tongu--the -deck-passage--the _Sickles_, Ferry--and Nevin--even Noyes and -Field. - -It had given him the Armory, and Betty Berry. - -He held it fast. - -It had given him money, fame, and New York for a day--the opinion -from Kennard that killed the first writing of _Compassion_--the -mood to see Charley and his sister at the switch-board, which brought -him to Betty Berry again.... Out of these had come all that was real -and true of this hour. It had given him the slums and the leper -conflict--Nevin’s cure and the fasting--the real Ploughman--the better -_Compassion_--the cabin in which he sat, his place of Initiation. -It had given him the triumph over death--the illumination of love and -labor--the listening life of the soul, and the vision of its superb -immortality. - -He held it fast and looked hard at the little friend. The brass handle -sent up a smell of verdi-gris from his hot hand. - - - 3 - -THIS was John Morning’s splendid summer. He was up often at -two or three in the morning. Thoughts and sentences of yesterday, -now cleared and improved, thronged his mind, as he made coffee. He -learned that a man may write the first half of a book, but be used as -a mere slave of the last half. And yet, to be the instrument of a rush -of life and ideas, the latter becoming every hour more coherent and -effective, was a privilege to make a man sing. And to increase, at the -same time, in the realization of the courage and tenderness and faith -of a woman who waited; to feel the power of her in the work; to work -for her; to put his love for her in the work, all the strength of her -attraction--this was living the life of depth and fullness. - -Times when he looked out of the doorway, and the elms were shaping -against the flowery purple of daybreak, and the robin beginning -thirstily--his eyes smarted with tears at the beauty of it all, the -privilege of work, and the absolute rightness of the whole creation, -in which a man can’t possibly lose, after he has heard his real self -speak. He loved life and death in such moments, and knew there was a -Betty Berry in the waiting studio, and another over the Crossing. (Had -he not glimpsed her in his dream at the top of the stairway?) - -So his book prospered, enfolding the common man. It had something -for every man who had not come so far as he. He was _of_ them, -in every understanding among them, different only in that it was his -business to write by the way. His old failures furnished the studies of -distintegrating forces. Personally, he was detached from them, as his -writing showed, except for an intellectual familiarity--as detached as -from the worn clothing he had left here and there around the world. One -by one, the constructive and destructive principles of the average man -were shown divided against each other in the arena of mind--and how the -friends and loves had come to the balance. Nevin was in the fabric, the -little Englishman at Tongu, Fallows and the Woman--not in name, (there -was no name but John Morning’s), but they were all there, lifting and -laughing and drawing, as friends and loves do in the life of a man. -Again and again he cried out that the peace and sweet reason of things -he had found was of their bringing--that without them he would have -been lost again and again by the way. - -... The Summer days passed magically. Markheim was beginning to talk -rehearsals. He had found the right man to play the Ploughman.... -Late-September. The letters from Betty Berry were rarer, thinner. -They troubled him.... One morning he watched Jethro’s rig approach--a -golden morning, and the cattle were feeding down in the meadow. He had -seen the picture a thousand times--the cattle on the slope--yet it was -never so real to him, nor had he hungered for the face of Betty Berry -as now.... Jethro stopped at his box, and he hurried down. There was a -letter from her--and one from Russia, too. The first did not free his -mind from sorrow--though the effort was plain to do this very thing.... -The letter from Fallows filled the day: - -“... I knew, John, if I sat down to write, it would set free all my -longing to go back to you. So I have put it off from week to week.... -From the _Western States_ I followed our old trail to Tokyo, then -via Peking, to Shanhaikwan, Koupangtse, Liaoyang.... I stopped there, -and went around by the coal-fields, where the millet had been planted -all over again. I talked over the battle with the Japanese. They are -just as interested as ever in what the other man knows. Though the -big battle seemed like another life to me, it was their immediate -yesterday. They would do it all over again. The Ploughman seemed to -walk with me; the rest was boyish babble.... I found Lowenkampf--white -and quiet--but the woman loves him, if Russia does not. The little boy -is a man-soul. That’s the story--except that he sent his love to you. -The three are off to South America, and all is well.... Up in the Bosk -hills, I followed the Summer. The old man is gone. He had his sausages -at the last.... - -“I was needed, but the little farm was all right. The neighbor had -done his part. There was enough for all.... How simple, one little -vanity of a man such as I am, and this family has enough and to spare; -food and firelight, good-will, their hope of heaven brought down to -comprehension again--all for so little, John. If men only knew the joy -of it--how it lasts and augments, how it sustains the man who does -it--to weave a mesh of happiness for the poor. The fact is, he has to -watch very carefully, or he’ll get caught in the mesh himself. - -“The little boy came running to meet me. I think he ran to meet me -somewhere before. He is different from all the others--except for that -touch of the old mother which he has, and that something about the -Ploughman. He was white and all eyes when I picked him up. They said -he wasn’t well, but in three days he was sound again--color breaking -through. To think that my coming could do that for any living soul--I. - -“The old Mother.... She was just waiting for me--lingering until I -came--watching down the road in the sunlight. We talked a little. She -spoke softly of her soldier-son. It was only a few days.... It all -came from her, John--the battle of Liaoyang so far as its meaning to -me. She was the light on the Ploughman’s brow that made a different -man of me. He never dreamed of messages to the world of men, nor the -passion to serve men--but he had his mother’s faith and something of -her vision. That made him different from other Russian soldiers, so -that I could see. The little boy Jan will bring it to life again. Your -play goes straight back to her. There’s everlasting quality in being a -mother like that. I think it was the fourth morning--that I suddenly -began to listen attentively to what she was saying. It was about us -all--intimately about her soldier-son.... The younger mother came -in--her sad, weary face different.... She went out, and returned with -her shoes on.... Suddenly I knew that the old sweet flower was passing. -Why, she was gone before I knew it--smiling up at the saints from my -arms.... I heard the little boy coming quickly--knew his step as I -would know yours, John. I seemed to wait for his hand upon the door. -I saw him, and he saw us--came forward on tip-toe, and we were all -together----” - -Morning didn’t read the rest just then. It seemed one of the finest -things he had ever known--Duke Fallows preserving the old mother and -the others in their conviction that he was just a peasant like the -Ploughman. - - - 4 - -FROM that April night after Morning left, when Helen Quiston -found her wandering in the halls, and asking in a childish way to be -taken to the ’cello (saying that her father had hidden it from her in -a strange place), until now in mid-September, Betty Berry had not left -the studio-apartment. The real break-down had begun a month before -the high day in which Morning came; perhaps on the very night his -Guardian had called. She had scarcely played or practiced since then; -she read nothing, talked to no one except Helen. Morning had noted her -anxiously early on the day of his call at the studio, but such power -had come in the flashes of those hours, and so high was she enthroned -and illumined in his own mind at the end, (in which she had kept to the -darkness), that he had not realized the blight that had touched her -life. - -Helen Quiston had long loved the woman. She knew much that the Doctor -did not. It was she who read the letters which in certain moments of -the day Betty hastily penned. It was as if for a moment in a long -gray day, a ray of watery sunlight broke through the cloud-banks. In -the momentary shining of her mind, Betty would write to Morning. Many -of the letters were impossible. Certain of these letters would have -brought the lover by the first train. Even Betty had a sense of this -and relied upon the music-teacher. Here and there among the notes, too, -was a wisp of the old sweet spirit. It was a wonderful conception to -Helen Quiston: that all but these had gone to replenish the creative -fire of a lover who knew well what his lady had given, but not what it -meant to her. Just as surely as the Hindoo woman offers herself upon -the funeral pyre with the body of her mate, Betty Berry had given her -spirit to the living. A hundred times the singing teacher had heard -these words from white lips that smiled: - -“_We are one--a deathless, world-loving one!_” - -And often she heard this queer verse from the Persian: - - “_Four eyes met. There were changes in two souls. - And now I cannot remember whether he is a man and I a woman, - Or he a woman and I a man. All I know is, - There were two: Love came, and there is one...._” - -“Don’t forget to remind me that I must tell him I am happy,” Betty -would say.... When a letter was finally finished and sealed, she -would lean back, shutting her eyes with a sigh, saying: “Now read me -his that came to-day and yesterday.”... And afterward: “Isn’t it -wonderful, Helen, dear? Isn’t it quite wonderful? You are so dear to -understand.” - -“Self-destruction is the first danger,” the Doctor had said in -the early days. “That’s why she should be in a sanatorium under -professional vigilance. Each case is individual. She might take a -sudden dislike to the saintliest of nurses--even to you. The fever -will not last, but it is a long battle. Shock, overwork, a terrible -disappointment--such are the causes. Singular sweetness of disposition, -as in this case, is very rare. The thing that goes with this usually is -‘the frozen stare’--hours motionless, looking at the wall----” - - * * * * * - -Morning’s letters were like white-hot fragments from his forge--roughly -fashioned, but still seething with force. Helen Quiston felt that -there was a splendid singing in that forge; that a man’s voice attuned -with God and the world was raised in the morning; that silence drew on -as the concentration of the task deepened; that there was singing in -the evening again. Aliment for the soul of the music teacher, these -letters. She would have fought to obey Betty Berry against the will of -the Doctor and nurse had it been necessary. - -One of these September-morning letters was particularly joyous with -enthusiasm for Betty Berry’s gift to him. He told again how it wove -into, beautified and energized his work. - -“Literally I thank the stars for you,” Helen Quiston read. “Sometimes -it comes to me--as if straight from you--strength that I feel with my -limbs, strength that means health. It surges through my veins like -magic--so that my eyes smart with tears. I speak your name again and -again in thankfulness for love fresh every day, and for the pity for -men in my heart----” - -Betty was not following. It was frequently so in the first reading. - -“Free,” she repeated softly, from a thought of yesterday’s letter. “He -said I was free. He said I never explained----” - -“Yes, dear, he was writing of that night he came to the theatre. I’ll -get the letter for you to-night. He said that you belonged to the risen -world, the woman’s world--that you trusted your vision--did not seek -to explain, but rejoiced. He said you had no guile, that you asked -nothing, and were unafraid. He means to give the world a portrait of -the risen woman--a portrait of you.” - -Betty Berry did not answer. Mention of that night at the theatre -invariably affected her to silence. - -“I must hurry away for a little while, but I will finish this,” Helen -added, reading on: - -“In the evenings, the greater power of you comes over my life like a -spiritual rain. I remember the art of your hands, the sweet mystery of -your lips; the tenderness of your eyes and words; but over it all--the -inner power of you, strong as truth, pure as truth, wise as the East, -and sweet as the South. It is the spirit of you that has come to -me--your singing, winging, feminine spirit. It has made me whole.... -Do you know, I used to think the world would be made better by force, -by arraignment, by revelation of evil. You have shown me the better -way of making the world better by loving it. That’s woman’s way, the -Christ’s way.... And when I think that you have given me this blessed -thing, this finest fruit of earth--your love, created out of trial and -loneliness, your love, so pure and true and valorous--when I think -that it is mine, and how you fought through the long day to give me -this, _and only this_--when I think of the splendor of that day’s -work of yours, I kneel to you, and to the spirit of the world--in the -wood, in the hut, before the door, under my elms, under the stars,--I -kneel to you and the Source of you. The peace that comes, and the -power--this, is my passionate wish for you! I would restore it to you -magnified.” - -Helen Quiston read all this a second time that September morning, -although her pupils were waiting.... It was to her like the song from a -strong man’s house. - -“You are rich and elect, Betty!” she cried. “You have been a woman and -_wanted_ love. You have finished your work at night, alone, and -realized that there was no one--your arms tired, your throat tired, -your brain and soul tired and heart-lonely--and there was no one. How -rich you are now! I think a woman is rich who can say: ‘In London or -Tokyo or New South Wales there is one who loves me--who may be thinking -at this moment about me--who wishes I were there, or he were here; -whose heart’s warmth stretches across the distance and makes the world -a home, because he is in the world.... It would seem to me that I -should be exultant to-day--if there was such a one for me. It seems--if -I could see him in a year, even if I could not see him at all, _and -he were somewhere_--I should be all new and radiant, born again.... -But you, Betty dear--oh, think what you have--what you are giving!” - -Betty’s eyes were shut. There was a gray line around the faint color of -the lips, and she was pale as a candle-flame in the morning sun. - -“I wish you could stay with me, dearest,” she whispered. “It is too -much for me--when I am alone. But when you are here, what you say and -what you see--makes me believe.... And you must tell me what to write -in answer to this--to satisfy him. I shall hold it in my hand, and -rest----” - -“I’ll come back this afternoon. We’ll have supper, and the letter will -be mailed. You’ll know what to say then----” - -She hurried away, lest her heart break. The tired, emotionless -voice trailed after her. And all day she heard Betty’s voice among -the unfinished voices, and saw the spiritless clay of her heart’s -friend sitting in deathly labor below, tormented by the phantom of a -will--like a once glorious empire become desolate, a foolish scion upon -the throne. - - - 5 - -HELEN QUISTON was the brain of the studio, the eyes and fingers--even, -in part, the spirit of the place that John Morning loved. It was a -letter of hers that John Morning answered with this paragraph: - -“I shut my eyes after the first reading--and it seemed to me I went -sailing. There were many voyagers and many islands--but I found _my -Island_. It called to me and I knew it was for me. The voyagers -sailed on past the curving inlets and the arrowed points--but I sailed -home. I found the fountains, the crags, the echoes, the virgin springs, -the mysterious meeting places of the land and sea, the enchanted forest -where the fairies are--and the sun was rising. It was thus I answered -the calling mystery of your spirit....” - -She was glad that his mind turned to the actual memory picture of Betty -Berry, as he finished: - -“I do love the woman that moves about the world, the woman others -see--the lips that tremble, the eyes that fill with tears so swiftly -over some loveliness, and so rarely over her own sorrow; the -instant-enfolding mind, the listening and the vitality--but it seems -that I love in a greater way the heart that called to its lover without -words--who fared forth to meet her lover and gave her soul.” - -More and more Helen Quiston perceived that John Morning was becoming -sufficient unto himself--the larger lover, loving the world through -his lady, and needing less, even in thought, her hands and kisses and -emotions. She saw steadily that which Duke Fallows had made Betty -Berry see for a night. She did not see it as clearly as Betty Berry saw -it that night, but she beheld an enduring radiance from it, because -her body was not in the wreck of sacrifice. She had a woman’s sense of -the large relation of things, and a woman’s faith. The misery of life -as she had met it, the disorder, monotony, and gray sorrow of it all, -was her profound assurance of another and brilliant side to the shield. -She wanted nothing for herself in these particular instances. For Betty -Berry she saw a swift transfer to a certain indefinite perfection, no -less attractive because it was unlimned in her mind. Her own happiness, -her great privilege, was to be third in this miracle of a man and woman -passing beyond in a truly royal way. There was a mystic quality that -suited her mind in the coming of the Guardian to Betty Berry’s room, -and in the fact that John Morning would never know of this. It was -like the coming of some Michael or Gabriel. From what she knew of John -Morning’s work, she could believe in the planetary promise that the -Guardian seemed to see; indeed, she could have believed in it with less -evidence, because the Guardian said so.... Her particular dream was for -the man to appear who would make women see what it was in their hands -and hearts to do for the coming race. She dreamed of a man to come with -words to women that would be reflected upon the brows of children to -be, that would help to fashion the latent dreams into great children. -She believed it was the agony of being childless that put this dream -into her own mind, and she believed that the world-ignition could only -come from a man who knew the same agony.... So she listened raptly to -the singing from the forge; and more and more, with almost unspeakable -excitement, she realized that the voice of John Morning was slowly and -surely taking to itself the authority and harmony which his Guardian -had promised. - -He wrote often now of the rehearsals of _Compassion_, of his -large fears and small satisfactions in them. He was always glad to -get back to the cabin and the Book.... That book--some of her own -inner life would be in it. She had given in the letters everything she -dared. Her tears were all shed; there was dry burning in her eyes, -for what Betty Berry had given to that Book.... Now in mid-September -it was done, all but a month’s chiseling and polishing. It would -be given to the publisher two weeks before the first appearance of -_Compassion_ at the _Markheim_ the first week in November.... -She dared not think what would happen when the Book was done, and the -destiny of the play established.... A letter from Morning at this time -contained for Helen Quiston one winged, triumphant sentence. She was -reading aloud to Betty Berry: - -“It was straight, clean going, right to the end of the book.... It -is hard-held. It is kind. It laughs. It goes after the deepest-down -man.... You have to reach almost self-effacement to associate with fine -ideas and to get to the front in service.... How hard it was to make me -see that the real world is not over there among writers and publishers -and drama-producers, but everywhere among the hearts of the poor! - -“And, oh, Betty Berry, it isn’t the book--it’s the life that counts. -You have made me live. You earned your strength alone--suffering alone -through the years. That’s the highest honor that can come to man or -woman in this world--to be chosen for such years as you have known. It -comes only to the strong--the strength to stand alone. The world bows -sooner or later before such character. Men feel it, though their eyes -be shut. - -“There is a certain excellence in the honor of standing alone. Alone, -man or woman is either ahead or behind the crowd. In the latter case, -he is imbecile or defective, and God is with him.... God is in the -forward solitudes, too. What a splendor about standing in the full -light! The crowd cannot get it. The crowd keeps the light from itself. -There the maiming is, the suffering, the cruelty; there the light is -divided, and the warmth is the low heat of men, not the grand primal -vitality of the Sun. There in the crowd, Apparition and Appearance take -the place of the Real.... Now and then, in the torturing passage of the -crowd, the landmark of some pioneer is reached, and the cry goes up, -‘We are on the right road, for that man passed here!’ The name of the -pioneer becomes part of the crowd’s impedimenta. Perhaps he smiles from -the Other Side, not because the crowd has found _his_ trail--he -may have wanted that once, though not long--but looking back upon his -greater birth, he smiles--the place where he emerged and stood alone on -the grand frontier.... You have made me strong enough to believe that -you and I may go away up into the coolness beyond the senses--even in -this life----” - -Helen Quiston stopped. That last was the final sanction. The Guardian -knew, when he chose John Morning. It was the one thought she had hardly -dared formulate for him, and which she had awaited ardently during the -late weeks. - -“He means that a woman can go, too!” she cried, trembling, forgetful -even of Betty Berry; “he is on the path--higher, higher--and yet, he -says that women, too, can go that way alone----” - -Betty Berry frowned. “What does he mean by going alone--about a man and -a woman going alone?” She was suffering to understand, angry that the -other understood. - -“He says that the woman may also go alone to that Eminence! No man--no -human man--has ever said that before. Men think of _men passing_ -upward. People caught in their desires have forever lied to themselves, -trying to believe that man and woman can go _together_.... He says -here----” her eye darted on to read: - -“‘Men and women gain their strength to reach that Eminence by being -alone--by loving alone!’ You taught him that.... Don’t you see, -dearest, it is the beginning of his real message? You gave it to -him--and what a message it is for you and for--even for me----” - -“But woman is the serpent,” Betty Berry muttered. - -Helen arose to turn on a wall light. Her hand fumbled. Her eyes could -not be brought down from that lofty plateau. A strange peace had come -into the loneliness of her life. She wanted to tell it everywhere--to -Nuns of the World.... It had been a man’s world so long--that this -thought had never come. Always in the world’s thought and art--the -flesh of woman had kept her down in the dusks and valleys. Sons -climbed; lovers left their maids to climb ... but only the Gods knew -all the time _that daughters could go_. - -Betty was silent. It had become the habit of her life not to speak when -the mists thickened.... The picture of Dante and Beatrice was in the -light. Helen pointed to it: - -“Who would think of saying that Beatrice, who was the Way--did not -share the vision and the consciousness?” she asked softly. - -Betty shut her eyes. The other returned with eager love and sat down -at her knees. “And now I will read the last. Just think how clearly he -sees: - -“‘The world is so dear to me because of you. I am so freshly conscious -of its roundness, of the profile of its coasts as seen from above; of -its light and darkness, the sharpness of sun in the retreating gray, -of its skies and its peaks, the last to darken and the first to answer -the morn.... I put the candle away just now, and in the darkness I saw -the Earth from above--not from afar, but from some space nearer than -the moon. I saw it all at once. The moon shining upon one side, the -sun shining upon the other--a golden side, a silver side.... And I saw -you afterward--not as you are in the studio, but as a shadowed, quiet -figure among moonlit ruins. You were calm, and moved silently here and -there. Ruins were about you, yet you seemed to know the things to do.’ -What does it mean?” - -“What does it mean, Helen?” Betty repeated. - -The other’s eyes filled with tears. The question might have come from a -little old lady of eighty, whose house of life was locked, all but the -sitting-room. - -“It’s just a dream, dear,” she whispered. - -“There are no ruins about me--when you are here,” Betty said. - -“Ruins, dearest?... No, gardens and living temples----” - -Betty arose, and moved slowly up and down the studio, then stood by -her chair. The impulse even to lift her hand was unusual. She moved -now with difficulty, but was not conscious of it. The room was dark, -except for the one wall-light. Helen went to her side, helped her at -last to the chair. Betty’s face was deathly, but there was a mournful -reasonableness in her eyes, a faint grasp of actuality, that the other -had not seen for weeks. The old enemies, memory and hope, were in -feeble conflict. - -“Do you think he means that I am not well?” - -“He was only expressing a dream-picture.... I’m sure he hasn’t -interpreted it----” - -“But he will. That comes afterward----” - - * * * * * - -Betty was either better or worse.... The Doctor came. As he was -leaving, Helen walked to the stairs with him. - -“Yes, there is a change,” he said. - -“You think it is good?” - -“Yes.... It’s been nearly six months. Yes, I think it is good. She -would have been dead without you, Miss Quiston. I don’t know what you -do--but you keep her from the engrossing mania.” - -“She has some strength, Doctor?” - -“It is all a matter of will at this stage. All along we have battled to -keep her somehow nourished.” - -Helen went back to the studio. Betty was on her feet again. The nurse -was at hand, but she had never been able to involve herself in the -patient’s understanding. She left the room now, anticipating the -inevitable request. - -“Do you think, Helen--that as he finishes his work--more and more--the -ruins will come back to mind?” - - - 6 - -THE Summer was done; the book had been ten days out of Morning’s -hand; the final rehearsals were engrossing and painful, and the -letters from the hill-cabin, though buoyant, were not so frequent.... -Service for men--service for men! The words seemed integrated into -the life of the man. There was something herculean in his striving. -The long Summer had ripened the harvest. Conceptions which had been -vague and dreamy in the first letters were ready at his hand now, -daily expressions of his work. Helen Quiston, so long dream-fed, -trembled at the thought that she had something to do with a giant’s -making. - -It never occurred to her that the things so real in her mind were at -least an age distant from the interests of the world. She did not stop -to think that the drama so vital and amazing to her would be out of -the comprehension even of the decent doctor who came to the studio day -after day. Not once did it enter her mind that the world would regard -her as heartless and fanatic for her strength in so ruthlessly holding -her closest friend to the sacrifice. Her problem now was what to do -with John Morning after the first night of the play, and the report -upon his book was in. She was afraid he would come. He would see Betty -Berry--see what her giving had done. He would learn that it was she, -Helen Quiston, who had given him the peace in which to find the larger -consciousness; her letters, in Betty Berry’s hand, that had filled the -distances with peace for him. - -She had no thought for John Morning except as an instrument. It was -something the way Duke Fallows had thought of him at the last. Either -one would have sacrificed themselves, but they were not called. Only -Betty Berry loved him for himself, and to her was the altar. They loved -him for the future, and guarded him as the worker-bees guard the queen -because she is potentially the coming race. - -And this was the miracle: John Morning at his work had passed the need -of the kiss of woman. He had been tided over the grand crossing by the -love of Betty Berry. Receiving it now, he did not hold it for himself, -but gave it forth in service to men.... There was something cosmic -about this to Helen Quiston. - - * * * * * - -Breathless expectancy in the studio on the early November evening -of _Compassion’s_ first performance at the _Markheim_. Though nothing -of the sort had been arranged, Helen Quiston expected a telegram -after the Play. It was not yet cold, but an east wind had been rising -since dark, and there was tension in the sounds and shaking everywhere. -Betty had, for her, a very keen sense of the importance of the night -to the man in New York. - -“I feel as if I had lived, Betty,” her friend whispered. “Oh, what must -it be to you?” - -“I feel that I have died,” the other murmured. - -Though she rested better and accepted food with less reluctance, (the -doctor declaring himself satisfied with the progress of the past six -weeks), it had been the hardest period for Helen Quiston. Something -was in Betty’s mind that was not confided. Often in the evening she -showed a preference for being alone. Helen feared for a time that the -other might write a letter without her supervision, but as there was -no change in the tenor of Morning’s replies, the outpouring of his -thankfulness in no way diminished, the only conclusion was that Betty -at least had not mailed such a one. She had taken sudden dislikes to -several different nurses in turn. When she wanted anything there was a -terrible concentration about it. Helen and the doctor and all concerned -were drawn into the vortex. - -“It’s the way she used to practice,” her friend said. - -“Miss Quiston----” began the doctor. - -“Yes.” - -“Oh, it doesn’t matter. I was just thinking--are you so real to all -your friends?” - -“I have no friend like Betty.” - -“That eases my mind.” - -“Why?” - -“A few friends like that and there wouldn’t be any singing teacher.” - -Helen Quiston realized fully for the first time that the doctor was -exactly a human being, having the various features of the species. - - * * * * * - -They were startled by a crash in the inner room. The nurse entered -quickly to announce that a flower-pot containing a fuchsia had fallen -from the window-sill. - -“The plant is in ruins,” she said. - -Betty rose immediately. _Ruins_--the word was a fiery stimulant -to her. In a few moments she ceased her pacing, saying that she was -utterly weary. Helen, though leaving for the room she occupied, a -flight above, could but remark upon the gleaming intensity of Betty’s -eyes, and the restless leaping of her hands.... - -The nurse came to her. Betty went with her into the inner room. In the -next fifteen minutes, the patient was more or less alone, while the -studio couch, upon which the nurse was accustomed to rest, was being -prepared. Unwatched, her movements quickened, a queer, furtive smile -played upon her lips, and certain actions altogether uncommon occupied -her concentrated attention. The key was quietly removed from the door -between the studio and the living-room; a large bundle was carried -from a closet-shelf to the rear window and tossed out. From behind -the books in a small case near the reading-lamp a purse was produced; -and finally, when the nurse was at the farthest end of the studio, -Betty drew a large, sharp knife from the same hiding-place, and with -astonishing quiet and force severed the telephone wires just beneath -the bell-box, fastened to the wall close to the floor. The knife was -returned to its hiding-place. The nurse joined her, and Betty, at the -studio door, suddenly sank into a chair with a cry of exhaustion. The -other ran to her. - -“It is nothing! Bring some water----” - -The nurse had not reached the medicine-case in the bath, when the -patient sprang up and locked the intervening door of the apartment, -leaving the woman inside with a “dead” telephone. - -For the first time in half a year, Betty left the studio, carefully -closing the main door. Out the back way, she found her parcel, and in -the windy darkness put on the rain-coat, traveling hat, veil, gloves -and shoes it had contained, departing breathlessly through the alley -gate. - -For a long time the hammering upon floors and walls could not -be located in the studio-building. The outer floor of Betty’s -apartment was tried, but found locked; and since there was no -response to the bell, nothing came of the offerings of the earlier -Samaritans. Much time was occupied by the nurse in trying to call the -telephone-exchange. A stranger in the street was finally persuaded, -from the upper window, to find the janitor of the building and send him -to the Quiston studio. Master keys set the nurse free. - -Helen Quiston first notified the Doctor, who came hastily. The story -of the nurse was explicit as a hospital report. - -“Is your car here, Doctor?” Miss Quiston asked presently. - -“Yes.” - -“Will you take me down-town? I’ll be ready in a moment.” - -“Gladly.” - -The Doctor was informed in a tense but controlled voice that the -patient was doubtless at this moment upon a certain east-bound train. -“Betty left here a few minutes after nine,” Helen added. “The train I’m -thinking of left at ten-five. It is now eleven.... Oh, I wonder what -she had on? She was dressed when I left her--shirt-waist, black skirt, -house-slippers----” - -Five minutes’ search and thinking on the part of Miss Quiston uncovered -the fact that Betty’s rain-coat and a certain small traveling hat were -missing.... Nothing was positively established at the station. - -“I must send a telegram, Doctor,” Helen said. - -It was to Morning at his rural-delivery address. Her heart sank with -fear lest the message fail to reach him, until it was finally handled -by the post-office. - -“There’s nothing further to do,” she said hopelessly. - -Night brought no news, nor the early morning. At nine-thirty o’clock, -Helen Quiston was leaving the studio for the morning’s work, when -she heard a light, swift step on the stairs--someone coming up at -least three steps at a time. The hall-door was half-swung. Helen -stood waiting.... Now a stranger was at the doorway, hesitating, yet -expectant. His brow was tanned, as if he had walked bare-headed in the -sun. His gray eyes were remarkably clear and very kind. For a second or -two they stood face to face, forgetting to speak. - -“Where is Betty Berry?” It was a demand, yet gently spoken. - -“Are you--are you John Morning?” “Yes.... Where is she?” - -“I think she has gone to you--I do not know, but I think she has gone -to the hill-cabin----” - -“Are you her friend?” - -“Yes--I am Miss Quiston.” - -“When did she go?” - -“Last night. I telegraphed you----” - -He came close to her. His hand upon her shoulder drew her to a chair, -and he brought another near. “I will not stop to ask questions,” he -said heavily. “You tell me all----” - -“What of the play?” - -“I don’t know--I left before it was done to come here.... She is -ill--go on----” - -The story faltered at first, but the gray eyes steadied her. Toward the -end she talked swiftly, coherently. She winged over the one certain -cause of Betty’s illness.... When she stopped, it seemed to her that -some mighty machinery was whirring below, its vibrations in the floor -and walls. - -He arose, stood beside her--all the light and reason gone from his -face. For several seconds he stood there, his left hand swiftly tapping -her shoulder. The powers of the man were afar--miles away upon his -hill. This was just a tapping blind man in the room.... - -“I must go. I have no words now.... She is there. It must be nearly ten -now. I must hurry to her.” - -The engines in the house flagged and were silent. - -The woman stood where he had left her, smiling. - - - 7 - -BETTY held her purse tightly in her hand, and certain thoughts -were held as tightly in her brain, as she pressed against the wind.... -It was something like going to a distant concert engagement in the -night.... Her limbs were uncertain, and there was a constant winging -in her breast, as though it were the cage of a frantic bird. She did -not mind. She could forget it--if only her eyes remained true. For the -first time in months she was on her own strength, her own will. There -was a sharp distress in the responsibility, but also an awakening of -force. - -The wind whipped her breath away, yet she liked the wild freedom of -it--if only she could continue to see and remember what to say. The -studio was a hideous blackness that drove her from behind. This was a -new and consuming hatred. The two squares to the large uptown hotel -where a cab was readily obtainable were long as a winter night; and -the tension to remember seemed destroying her by the time she found a -driver. She told him the station and the train. - -“Plenty of time, Ma’am,” he said. - -Her eyes filled with tears. It was true, then, that there was such a -station, such a train, that there was time, and nothing had betrayed -her. “I must not speak; I must not speak,” kept warning in her mind; -“but he is so good to me!” - -Now she felt the cold, as she rested a moment before the new ordeal at -the station--destination, tickets, the Pullman, not to fall, not to -speak any but the exact words.... The driver helped her out. Everything -was familiar, but miraculously large.... She gave the man extra money, -and the faintest, humblest “Thank you!” escaped her. He whistled a -porter for her. - -“The ticket window,” she said. And now she need only follow. It was -warmer. It would be warm in the Pullman.... She took the young colored -man’s arm. He turned with good nature. - -“I have been ill,” she said. It was frightened from her lips. - -“There is plenty of time, Miss. I’ll see you through to the berth--the -ten-five--yes’m.” - -The quick tears started again, and an aching lump in her throat. She -wanted to cry out her thankfulness. She wanted to be told again and -again--that all this was not a dream, from which she would awaken -in that place of death. The value of her veil awed her; and it was -_she_ who had thought of it. Could it really be true that she had -forgotten nothing? Would she actually arrive at her journey’s end? - -The porter procured berth and tickets, and now he assured her that her -train was ready. She followed him through interminable distances, down -countless stairs; she watched and listened critically, as he delivered -both tickets to the Pullman conductor. All she had to do was to follow, -to say nothing and to pay. With what thankfulness did she pay; and with -what warming courtesy were her gifts received. Surely the world was -changed. It had become so dear and good.... She had a far-off vision of -a peremptory Betty Berry of another world, striding to and fro among -men and trains and cities, giving her commands, expecting obedience, -conferring gratuities according to rigid principle. - -The car-porter was more wonderful than any--an old Southern darkey, -with little patches of gray beard, absurdly distributed. A homing -gentleness was in his voice, and his smile was from a better world.... -There had been another porter like him somewhere. - -“She goes clear through,” the station porter said, “and she’s been -sick.” - -“Ah’ll see the young Miss clar’ through,” the old man drawled. “Just -depen’ on me, Miss. Sit right down here--berth’ll be ready right smaht.” - -She did not sleep, but she was warm and not uncomfortable. She dared -think a little of the end of the journey, but there was so much to do -in the morning, so much to keep in mind. She held fast to her purse. -In her dependence, the magic of it was like a strange discovery. In -the early morning, the porter brought her coffee with some hot milk and -toast. The wind had long since been left behind, but a cold rain was -falling. She would be cold. The terminal was reached. The old man bore -her forth. There was something merciful and restoring in his gentle -gratitude. A station porter led her to the Hackensack car. - -She thought of breakfast on the way, but forgot it again upon reaching -Hackensack, where she was directed to the post-office. - -She wrote the address of John Morning and asked shiveringly at the -stamp window if there was any way in which she could be delivered there. - -The clerk could not see if she were laughing under the veil. - -“The rural carrier knows the way,” she added. “I’d be willing to pay -well--” - -The clerk craned his head back through the office, and called: - -“Jethro!” - -A large, dusty man came forward with the air of having just -breakfasted. He took the slip containing the address from her hand. - -“The lady wants to go with you, Jethro----” - -The rural carrier tilted his spectacles benignly to regard her. - -“Bless me--ever been there?” - -“No--but letters go safely----” - -“I rather think they do--since I take ’em. Is this your writing?” - -The place was darkening, suffocating to her. “Yes ... if you would only -take me. Five, ten dollars--oh, I should be so glad to pay anything I -have----” - -The carrier penetrated the veil. - -“Just sit down by the heater, Lady,” he said in a lowered tone. “We’ll -get there, and it won’t cost you five or ten dollars, neither. I know -where you want to go, and I know who you are, if I’m not mistaken. -Lizzie and I will get you there----” - -She turned quickly, for the tears were coming.... Could it really be -that she had remembered everything? Was she really going to him, and -this the last stage of the journey? The heart of the large, dusty man -had radiated so suddenly upon her. She was not afraid of him, but she -must not faint nor speak until she was away from the others. Very still -she sat by the heater, praying for strength, praying that it was not -all a dream.... - -“Miss Betty Berry!” - -There was an instant in which the call had but a vague meaning; then -shot home to her the hideous fear of being taken back. She was close to -screaming, yet it was only the rural-carrier coming. - -“Yes?” she said, clearing her throat. - -“I thought I couldn’t be wrong,” he said. “I’ve brought a good many -letters addressed to you back to town from the place you’re going, and -carried a good many out yonder in this writing of yours.... Lizzie and -me are ready, Miss.” - -As they stepped out the rear door, he touched her arm reflectively, -and re-entered to bring a hairy black robe. The vehicle, of a vanished -type, was gray even in the rain, and cocked to one side from the -sagging of years, where the carrier sat. Betty’s weight did not -visibly impress the high side. He tucked the hairy robe about her, the -mail-bags at her feet, picked up the lines, and lo! they moved. - -“Lizzie ain’t very showy on knee action, Miss Berry,” he said, “but -along about half-past eleven, when we get there, you’ll remark she’s -stiddy.” - -It was only ten now.... Mud and miles and mail-boxes; dragging moments, -and miles and cold rain.... She had to talk a little. The journey of -the night was nearest, and she told how good the train-men had been to -her. - -“You haven’t traveled much, Miss, I take it?” he said softly. - -“Oh, no.” Then distantly again she remembered a Betty Berry of concert -seasons--on the wing from city to city. It was all too remote for -speech. At one house a woman came forth with tea and sandwiches. Betty -was grateful for the warm drink and wanted to pay, but the carrier -pushed back her hand and tucked her in again. - -“Guess this is going to be a surprise for the bare-headed man?” he -asked. - -“Yes.” - -“He’s your young man, then?” - -“Yes.” - -He seemed relieved. “He won’t be staying out here much longer--not -likely--though we do have a spell of good weather in November mostly.” - -Often she lost every sense of distance and identity. The lapses grew -longer toward the end, and when she did not answer, Jethro thought she -had fallen asleep.... A long stretch at last, barren of mail-boxes.... -When he finally drew up, she followed his eyes to her lover’s name upon -the tin by the roadside. Then he pointed beyond the low near trees and -hollows. It was all desolate; the Fall tints subdued in the pervading -gray. She saw a clump of greater trees in the upper middle distance. - -“’Bout a thousand feet straight in. Miss--and up--under them big trees. -You’ll see his shanty before you’re half-way. Just keep your eye on -them elms. He’d be down here if it was any kind of weather. Guess -you’re glad. D’ruther go alone and find him there, wouldn’t you?” - -“Yes.... And now I want to give you this, please.” - -He shook his head. - -She could not leave him so. “For Lizzie--she’s so steady. I’m rich ... -and I’ll be much happier--going to the bare-headed man. Please--for -me----” - -“Don’t you take that robe off!” he said suddenly. “I don’t want -it--jumpin’ in and out. I never take it out of the office till snow -flies. He’ll bring it down to the box, when I’m passin’ to-morrow. Why, -you’d get all soaked, Miss--a-goin’ up to him.... Well, I’ll take the -money for Lizzie--if you’re rich--but it’s ridiculous much, and I’d -have fetched you for nothin’.” - -She pressed his hand in both of hers and turned away through the break -in the fence.... It seemed darker; and when the grinding of the tires -on the wet gravel died away, the dripping silence came home to her, -alien and fearful.... She had seen the name; soon she would see his -house--but this was no man’s land, an after-death land; this was ‘the -hollows and the vagueness of light,’ of which he had written.... - -She saw the house and faltered on. She had not the strength to call.... -On the slope to the great trees the burden of the heavy robe would -have borne her to the ground, had she not let it fall from her.... She -could not believe the padlock on the door, felt it with her hands, the -weight and the brass of it. It was hard for her to understand the cruel -cold of it--as for a child that has never been hurt intentionally. She -sank to her knees and prayed that it was not there.... But it was. The -reality entered her brain, the thick icy metal of it. - - * * * * * - -“Betty Berry--Betty Berry, I am coming!” - -She lifted her head in the rain. His call was like a thought of her -own, but sharper, truer. This was his door. He was coming. It was still -light. She wanted to sleep again, but the death-like cold warned her. -She would die before he came.... - -She raised herself against the door. The black heap of the fur-robe on -the slope held her eyes.... On the way to it she fainted again; again -the cold rain roused her.... Always on the borders of the rousing, she -heard it: - -“Betty Berry--Betty Berry, I am coming!” - -She knelt in the wet leaves beside the robe ... her thoughts turned -back to the night--the goodness of the men, their tender voices.... -There was a calling up in the dusk among the trees. Yes, she must lie -at his door. Men were good; the lock alone had hurt her. His Guardian -had put it there.... Upward she crawled, dragging the robe. - -“Yes, you are coming!” she answered. Always when the cold rain roused -her, she would answer, and crawl a little farther with the robe. At the -door at last, she lay down beneath it.... - -Still again his calling roused her. It was darker--but not yet night.... - -“Betty Berry--Betty Berry, I am coming!” - -It was nearer. - -“I knew you would let me in,” she tried to say, and then--voices.... It -seemed as if the porter of the Old South had come.... His voice lulled -her, and his smile was the glow of the home-hearth. - - - 8 - -SHE was lying upon the single narrow bed.... Something long -ago had been premonitive of this. Morning’s mind, too, caught up the -remembrance of Moto-san and the Japanese Inn.... He watched. Sometimes -he said with all his will that she must not die. She could not die, -when his will was dominant, but he was exhausted; his will-power -flagged frequently. - -All day yesterday in the train he had held her in his mind--sent -his calls to her across the miles. From different stations he had -telegraphed to Jake at Hackensack, to Jethro at the post-office, and to -his neighbor, the dairyman, who had a telephone. Jethro had been the -first to reach the cabin, but it was nearly dusk then. The others were -quick to appear. Jethro found her at the door, partly covered in the -furry robe. That robe crowned him in Morning’s mind. They had broken in -the door, and lit the fire. Morning reached the cabin at nine. Jethro -spoke of a doctor. - -“I’m the doctor,” Morning said. The three had left him. - -It was now after midnight. She had not aroused. Old scenes quivered -across the surface of her consciousness, starting a faintly mumbled -sentence now and then: The Armory, the first kiss, the road to -Baltimore, letters, hurried journeys, the Guardian; and much about the -latest journey--from cab to station, from porter to Pullman, from car -to clerk to carrier. He saw how the night and the day had used her -final strength. Always the Guardian intervened to break her will, and -Morning did not understand. There were other enemies; the studio, the -nurse, the padlock, and the rain. After brief hushes, she would speak -of his coming, or answer his calling. - -It was the one theme of his life even now--the great thing Betty Berry -had done. It awed and chilled him to realize how coarse-fibered he -had been, so utterly impervious, not to sense the nature of the force -that had upheld him, nor the quality of the bestowals.... There was a -rending about it, and yet it was all so quiet now. It seemed to him -that a man’s life is husk after husk of illusion, that the illusions -are endless. He had torn them away, one after another, thinking each -time that he had come to the grain.... And what was the sum of his -finding so far? That good is eternal; that man loves God best by -serving men; that greatness is in the working, not in the result; that -a man who has found his work has found the soul’s sunlight, and that -service for men is its rain. Surely, these are not husks.... It had -been a hard, weary way. He was like a tired child now, and here was the -little mother--wearied with him unto death.... He had been so perverse -and headstrong. She had given him her love and guidance until her last -strength was spent. He must be the man now.... He wondered if his heart -would break, when he realized fully his own evil and her unfathomable -sweetness?... Must a woman always fall spent and near to death--before -a man can be finished? Or is it because her work is done that she falls? - -He knelt beside her. Sometimes, in the lamplight, she looked as he had -seen her at the Armory; again, as if she were playing; now, it was as -she had been to him in the dark of the Pullman seat.... Who was the -Guardian? - -... And this was what had come to her from teaching him the miracle -of listening alone.... It was true. He belonged to that life, as Duke -Fallows had always said. She had made him see it by going from him. He -would never be the same, after having tasted the greater love, in which -man and woman are one in the spirit of service, having renounced the -emblem of it. And with all her vision and leading--the glory of it had -not come to her as to him. It had all but killed her. She had come to -him--a forgotten purpose, a broken vessel. - -He would love her back to life. That was his work now. Everything -must stop for that--even truth.... He halted. If he loved her back to -full and perfect health again, would she not be the same as she had -been? Would she not take up her Cross again?... No, he would not let -her. He would destroy the results of his work if necessary. He would -force himself to forget, even in the spirit--this taste of the mystic -oneness that had come to him. He would show his need for her every -hour. That would make her happy--his leaning upon her word and thought -and action. He would show her his need of her presence in the long, -excellent forenoons, in the very processes of his task--and in the -evenings, her hands, her kisses, her step, her voice; he would make her -see that these were his perfect essentials. - -“I’ve talked and written a lot about how a man should live--in the past -six months,” he said grimly. “I’ve got to do a bit of real living in -the world now. God knows I love her--as I used to. That seemed enough -then!” - -He looked up from her face. The ghost of day had come softly to the -South. He arose, took the lamp across the room and blew it out. Then he -opened the door. The mingled night and dawn came in, a cool dimness, -but the rain had ceased. He replenished the fire, left the door open, -and returned to her. She had become quiet since the lamp had been taken -away.... A sense of the man and woman together, and of her strength -returning crept upon him. He welcomed it, though the deeps cried out. - -“When you are yourself, you will want to go away again--the long, -blinding ways of the sun,” he whispered. “But I will say, ‘I cannot -spare you, Betty Berry. This is the place for two to be. We will begin -again----’” - -His thought of what she would answer brought back to mind the play, -_Compassion_, and the Book of John Morning.... He smiled. He had -almost forgotten. Night before last, at the beginning of the third -act, he had left the _Markheim_. He had given way suddenly to -the thought that had pulled at him all day--to take the train to -Betty Berry that night.... The play had seemed good. Even to him -there had been moments of thrilling joy. It had been surprisingly -different, sitting in front with the audience, from the rehearsals. Of -yesterday’s notices he had not seen a single one. It was a far thought -to him even now of the play’s failure, but if it did fail, how easy -to say to Betty Berry, “You see, how mad I was alone--how mad in my -exaltation--how terribly out of tune? I needed you here. I need you -now----” - -Then he thought of the bigger thing--the Book. There wasn’t a chance -for that to fail. It would find its own. What would he say about -that?... He would say, “I love you, Betty Berry. It was loving you that -made the book. And when it was done--how I longed for you!” - -That was true--true now.... He kissed her shut eyelids. There was -blessedness in her being here--even shattered and so close to -death--blessedness and a dreadful fear. That fear was ever winging -around, but did not come home to him and fold its wings. He was not -himself.... “My God!” he cried out, “what folds upon folds and phases -upon phases of experience a man must pass to learn to live----” - -For an instant it all came back--that taste of the open road and larger -dimension of man--the listening, the labor, the sharpened senses, scant -diet, tireless service, ‘the great companions’--love of the world and -unfailing compassion.... It was as they had said. He had belonged -everywhere but in a woman’s arms.... - -It came clear as a vision, and he put it from him as an evil thing--and -all the voices. The red dawn was staring into his eyes, and afar off a -horse nickered. He held his hands against the light, as if to destroy -it. - -“I have said it in the Book, ‘We have all eternity to play in,’ and if -that is not a lie--this Call will come to me again!” - -And this was his renunciation. - - * * * * * - -Her stillness troubled him. - -“I am your lover,” he whispered. “I will not let you go, Betty Berry. -Don’t you hear--I love you?” - -He lifted her, walked to and fro between the fire and the cot. She -was so very little.... The day came up with a mystic shining, and the -warmth returned. These were the first hours of that fleeting Indian -summer, the year’s illumination--the serene and conscious death of -Summer.... The door was wide open to the light.... Morning put down his -burden, but could not be still. He brought water and scrubbed the floor -and door-step. The wood shone white as it dried--white as the square -table which was an attraction of daylight. He tossed the water away -down the hollow, drew more and washed as the countrymen do, lifting -handfuls to his head. Then he brought basin, soap, and towels--bathed -her face and hands, afterward carrying her forth to the sunlight. The -thin shade of the elms was far down the meadow, for the day was not -high. - -“I love you, Betty Berry,” he continued to repeat, as he turned again -and again to the cot. There was an hypnotic effect in the words; and -there was a certain numbed surface in his brain that refused to cope -with the immediate stresses in the room. - -Jethro came early, and was not content to leave the mail at the box. -He brought letters, a paper, and a large package. Jethro looked at the -face on the cot and at the bare-headed man. Words failed him to whom -words were so easy. He ventured to mention the name of a doctor, and -was answered furiously: - -“I am the doctor.” - -Jethro lingered. Morning turned suddenly to look at the cot, and -it seemed to the carrier that his eyes would have frightened away -death.... Morning caught him by the shoulders: - -“You’re a good man, Jethro,” he said hastily. “When I think of that fur -robe--it seems as if I’ve got to do something for you with my hands.” - -The carrier went his way. - - * * * * * - -This he found in the newspaper--a “follow” paragraph apparently to the -dramatic notice of the day before: - - “The second performance of _Compassion_ last night to a - fairly filled house is interesting in its relation to the fear - frankly expressed in this column yesterday, to the effect that - _Compassion_ is too good a play to get on well. The fear was well - founded upon experience; and yet we may have before us an exception--a - quality of excellence that will not be subdued. It is too much to hope - for, that at any other time this season we will be equally glad to - find our fear for a play’s future ill-founded.” - -Morning had not known of the doubt; and this was the rise of the -tide again from the doubt.... He glanced at the package. There was -a spreading cold in his vitals. It was from the publisher he had -chosen--the Book of John Morning returned. - -He was hostile for an instant--an old vindictive self resenting -this touch upon his gift of self-revelation. The protecting thought -followed quickly that the book was in no way changed by this accident -of encountering the wrong publisher. The really important part of the -incident followed these insignificant thoughts: Above all things, this -letter would help to prove to Betty Berry his need for her. He would -not send it out again at once. This refusal would weigh more than -anything he could say, to prove that loneliness had been too much, too -strong for him--that it had thrown his work out of reality, instead of -into it.... He was bending over her. A step at the door, and he turned -to find Helen Quiston there. - - - 9 - -SHE entered and went to the cot, without words, but pressed -his hand as she passed.... - -“You were there--and you let her get so low as this.” - -Helen turned to search his face. “Yes,” she said. - -“Who is this--Guardian?” - -“Some angel that came to her, I think.” - -“He seems very real to her----” - -“Angels are real.” - -“Angels do not make saints suffer----” - -“On the contrary, that appears to be the life-business of saints----” - -“She will never go back to that!” he said with low vehemence. - -Helen regarded her old comrade for a moment, kissed her reverently, and -then turned to the man. - -“You poor boy,” she said. - -There was something cold and rock-like about this slave of the future, -looking over and beyond the imminent tragedy. He was helpless, -maddened.... - -“She always said you loved her--that you were the one woman absolutely -true. How could you let her destroy herself?” - -“I knew her before you came, and loved her. I gave her my house. I -waited upon her night and morning. I love Betty Berry. You are torn and -tortured, but you will see----” - -“She will not be away from me again!... Bah! what is work--to this?” - -Helen smiled. “Do you think she would have come if she had been the -real Betty Berry?” - -“Do you think I would have been duped--had I been the real John -Morning?” - -“What do you mean?” - -“I mean a man is mad when he is doing a book. He may call it happiness, -but it is a kind of devil’s madness. He is open for anything to rush -in.... I am a common man. I do not belong to that visionary thing----” - -“You are caught in your emotions. I know your work----” - -He drew her to the door, saying excitedly: - -“_Compassion_ threatens to fail. My book has come back,” he said -triumphantly. “Look at this----” - -He gave her the publisher’s letter. - -“Your play has not failed,” she said.... “And this--why, this is just -a bit of the world. John Morning at thirty-three--talks of failure. -Let us talk over this day, when you are fifty-three.... What an empty -victory for her--if you failed now----” - -She was looking back at the cot. Morning whispered his reiteration: - -“I love her. I shall have her here. I shall make her see that I love -her. _That_ is my service. You are all mad conspirators against -us. We are man and woman. Our world is each other. She shall see and -believe this--if I write drivel----” - -Helen did not seem quite to hear him. She drew away from him as if -called in a trance to the bedside. - -“My little dearest--oh, Betty Berry--you have done so well. You have -paid the price for a World-Man----” - -Morning followed her.... Betty’s eyes were opened--fixed upon Helen -Quiston. - -“What did you say?” she questioned wonderingly. - -“God love you, Betty. I said you had paid the price for a World-Man----” - -She raised on her elbow alone, her eyes now looking beyond the woman to -Morning. - -“He is there,” she whispered. “He is there. He has come.” - -Her hand stretched toward him, and sank slowly to his brow as he knelt. - -“My love,” she said.... “It is all right. I see it all once more. It is -so good and right--just as your Guardian told me.... It was only the -birth-pangs I suffered. They were hard.... Birth is hard, but death is -easy. Don’t you see, Helen, he was my little baby?... Oh, you came so -hard, John Morning--and, oh, I love you so!” - -He saw the fact of her passing, but the deeper realization was slow. It -was much to him, for the instant, that she spoke and looked into his -eyes. - -“I love you, Betty Berry,” he said, his voice lifting. “I love you as a -saint, as a mother--as a child!” - -“But not as a woman,” she whispered. - - THE END. - - - - -TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES: - - --On page 9, oustide has been changed to outside. - --On page 28, redouts has been changed to redoubts. - --On page 43, foxtails has been changed to fox-tails. - --On page 60, Koupangtze has been changed to Koupangtse. - --On page 91, Nagaski has been changed to Nagasaki. - --On page 110, story--idea has been changed to story-idea. - --On page 126, “the the” has eliminated the second word. - --On page 191, altar has been changed to alter. - --On page 206, sorows has been changed to sorrows. - --On page 245, settle has been changed to settled. - --On page 246, wordly has been changed to worldly. - --On page 274, even has been changed to ever. - --On page 276, elums has been changed to elms. - --On page 279, cousciousness has been changed to consciousness. - --All other hyphenation and spelling has been retained. - -*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DOWN AMONG MEN *** - -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. 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