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diff --git a/8101-8.txt b/8101-8.txt deleted file mode 100644 index b15c0f1..0000000 --- a/8101-8.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,9279 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of Bertram Cope's Year, by Henry Blake Fuller - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with -almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or -re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included -with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org - - -Title: Bertram Cope's Year - -Author: Henry Blake Fuller - -Posting Date: August 4, 2012 [EBook #8101] -Release Date: May, 2005 -First Posted: June 14, 2003 - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BERTRAM COPE'S YEAR *** - - - - -Produced by Eric Eldred, Jerry Fairbanks, Charles Franks -and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team. - - - - - - - - - - - -BERTRAM COPE'S YEAR - -Henry Blake Fuller - - -CONTENTS - - -_1. Cope at a College Tea - -2. Cope Makes a Sunday Afternoon Call - -3. Cope Is "Entertained" - -4. Cope Is Considered - -5. Cope Is Considered Further - -6. Cope Dines--and Tells About It - -7. Cope Under Scrutiny - -8. Cope Undertakes an Excursion - -9. Cope on the Edge of Things - -10. Cope at His House Party - -11. Cope Enlivens the Country - -12. Cope Amidst Cross-Purposes - -13. Cope Dines Again--and Stays After - -14. Cope Makes an Evasion - -15. Cope Entertains Several Ladies - -16. Cope Goes A-Sailing - -17. Cope Among Cross-Currents - -18. Cope at the Call of Duty - -19. Cope Finds Himself Committed - -20. Cope Has a Distressful Christmas - -21. Cope, Safeguarded, Calls Again - -22. Cope Shall Be Rescued - -23. Cope Regains His Freedom - -24. Cope in Danger Anew - -25. Cope in Double Danger - -26. Cope as a Go-Between - -27. Cope Escapes a Snare - -28. Cope Absent From a Wedding - -29. Cope Again in the Country - -30. Cope as a Hero - -31. Cope Gets New Light on His Chum - -32. Cope Takes His Degree - -33. Cope in a Final View_ - -AFTERWORD - - - - -1 - -_COPE AT A COLLEGE TEA_ - - -What is a man's best age? Peter Ibbetson, entering dreamland with -complete freedom to choose, chose twenty-eight, and kept there. But -twenty-eight, for our present purpose, has a drawback: a man of that -age, if endowed with ordinary gifts and responsive to ordinary -opportunities, is undeniably--a man; whereas what we require here is -something just a little short of that. Wanted, in fact, a young male -who shall seem fully adult to those who are younger still, and who may -even appear the accomplished flower of virility to an idealizing maid -or so, yet who shall elicit from the middle-aged the kindly indulgence -due a boy. Perhaps you will say that even a man of twenty-eight may -seem only a boy to a man of seventy. However, no septuagenarian is to -figure in these pages. Our elders will be but in the middle forties and -the earlier fifties; and we must find for them an age which may evoke -their friendly interest, and yet be likely to call forth, besides that, -their sympathy and their longing admiration, and later their tolerance, -their patience, and even their forgiveness. - -I think, then, that Bertram Cope, when he began to intrigue the little -group which dwelt among the quadruple avenues of elms that led to the -campus in Churchton, was but about twenty-four,--certainly not a day -more than twenty-five. If twenty-eight is the ideal age, the best is -all the better for being just a little ahead. - -Of course Cope was not an undergraduate--a species upon which many of -the Churchtonians languidly refused to bestow their regard. "They come, -and they go," said these prosperous and comfortable burghers; "and, -after all, they're more or less alike, and more or less unrewarding." -Besides, the Bigger Town, with all its rich resources and all its -varied opportunities, lay but an hour away. Churchton lived much of its -real life beyond its own limits, and the student who came to be -entertained socially within them was the exception indeed. - -No, Bertram Cope was not an undergraduate. He was an instructor; and he -was working along, in a leisurely way, to a degree. He expected to be -an M.A., or even a Ph.D. Possibly a Litt.D. might be within the gift of -later years. But, anyhow, nothing was finer than "writing"--except -lecturing about it. - -"Why haven't we known you before?" Medora T. Phillips asked him at a -small reception. Mrs. Phillips spoke out loudly and boldly, and held -his hand as long as she liked. No, not as long as she liked, but longer -than most women would have felt at liberty to do. And besides speaking -loudly and boldly, she looked loudly and boldly; and she employed a -determined smile which seemed to say, "I'm old enough to do as I -please." Her brusque informality was expected to carry itself off--and -much else besides. "Of course I simply _can't_ be half so intrepid as I -seem!" it said. "Everybody about us understands that, and I must ask -your recognition too for an ascertained fact." - -"Known me?" returned Cope, promptly enough. "Why, you haven't known me -because I haven't been here to _be_ known." He spoke in a ringing, -resonant voice, returning her unabashed pressure with a hearty good -will and blazing down upon her through his clear blue eyes with a high -degree of self-possession, even of insouciance. And he explained, with -a liberal exhibition of perfect teeth, that for the two years following -his graduation he had been teaching literature at a small college in -Wisconsin and that he had lately come back to Alma Mater for another -bout: "I'm after that degree," he concluded. - -"Haven't been here?" she returned. "But you _have_ been here; you must -have been here for years--for four, anyhow. So why haven't we...?" she -began again. - -"Here as an undergraduate, yes," he acknowledged. "Unregarded dust. -Dirt beneath your feet. In rainy weather, mud." - -"Mud!" echoed Medora Phillips loudly, with an increased pressure on his -long, narrow hand. "Why, Babylon was built of mud--of mud bricks, -anyway. And the Hanging Gardens...!" She still clung, looking up his -slopes terrace by terrace. - -Cope kept his self-possession and smiled brilliantly. - -"Gracious!" he said, no less resonant than before. "Am I a landscape -garden? Am I a stage-setting? Am I a----?" - -Medora Phillips finally dropped his hand. "You're a wicked, -unappreciative boy," she declared. "I don't know whether to ask you to -my house or not. But you may make yourself useful in _this_ house, at -least. Run along over to that corner and see if you can't get me a cup -of tea." - -Cope bowed and smiled and stepped toward the tea-table. His head once -turned, the smile took on a wry twist. He was no squire of dames, no -frequenter of afternoon receptions. Why the deuce had he come to this -one? Why had he yielded so readily to the urgings of the professor of -mathematics?--himself urged in turn, perhaps, by a wife for whose -little affair one extra man at the opening of the fall season counted, -and counted hugely. Why must he now expose himself to the boundless -aplomb and momentum of this woman of forty-odd who was finding -amusement in treating him as a "college boy"? "Boy" indeed she had -actually called him: well, perhaps his present position made all this -possible. He was not yet out in the world on his own. In the background -of "down state" was a father with a purse in his pocket and a hand to -open the purse. Though the purse was small and the hand reluctant, he -must partly depend on both for another year. If he were only in -business--if he were only a broker or even a salesman--he should not -find himself treated with such blunt informality and condescension as a -youth. If, within the University itself, he were but a real member of -the faculty, with an assured position and an assured salary, he should -not have to lie open to the unceremonious hectorings of the socially -confident, the "placed." - -He regained his smile on the way across the room, and the young -creature behind the samovar, who had had a moment's fear that she must -deal with Severity, found that a beaming Affability--though personally -unticketed in her memory--was, after all, her happier allotment. In her -reaction she took it all as a personal compliment. She could not know, -of course, that it was but a piece of calculated expressiveness, fitted -to a 'particular social function and doubly overdone as the wearer's -own reaction from the sprouting indignation of the moment before. She -hoped that her hair, under his sweeping advance, was blowing across her -forehead as lightly and carelessly as it ought to, and that his taste -in marquise rings might be substantially the same as hers. She faced -the Quite Unknown, and asked it sweetly, "One lump or two?" - -"The dickens! How do _I_ know?" he thought. "An extra one on the -saucer, please," he said aloud, with his natural resonance but slightly -hushed. And his blue eyes, clear and rather cold and hard, blazed down, -in turn, on her. - -"Why, what a nice, friendly fellow!" exclaimed Mrs. Phillips, on -receiving her refreshment. "Both kinds of sandwiches," she continued, -peering round her cup. "Were there three?" she asked with sudden -shrewdness. - -"There were macaroons," he replied; "and there was some sort of -layer-cake. It was too sticky. These are more sensible." - -"Never mind sense. If there is cake, I want it. Tell Amy to put it on a -plate." - -"Amy?" - -"Yes, Amy. _My_ Amy." - -"Your Amy?" - -"Off with you,--parrot! And bring a fork too." - -Cope lapsed back into his frown and recrossed the room. The girl behind -the samovar felt that her hair was unbecoming, after all, and that her -ring, borrowed for the occasion, was in bad taste. Cope turned back -with his plate of cake and his fork. Well, he had been promoted from a -"boy" to a "fellow"; but must he continue a kind of methodical dog-trot -through a sublimated butler's pantry? - -"That's right," declared Mrs. Phillips, on his return, as she looked -lingeringly at his shapely thumb above the edge of the plate. "Come, we -will sit down together on this sofa, and you shall tell me all about -yourself." She looked admiringly at his blue serge knees as he settled -down into place. They were slightly bony, perhaps; "but then," as she -told herself, "he is still quite young. Who would want him anything but -slender?--even spare, if need be." - -As they sat there together,--she plying him with questions and he, -restored to good humor, replying or parrying with an unembarrassed -exuberance,--a man who stood just within the curtained doorway and -flicked a small graying moustache with the point of his forefinger took -in the scene with a studious regard. Every small educational community -has its scholar _manqué_--its haunter of academic shades or its -intermittent dabbler in their charms; and Basil Randolph held that role -in Churchton. No alumnus himself, he viewed, year after year, the -passing procession of undergraduates who possessed in their young -present so much that he had left behind or had never had at all, and -who were walking, potentially, toward a promising future in which he -could take no share. Most of these had been commonplace young fellows -enough--noisy, philistine, glaringly cursory and inconsiderate toward -their elders; but a few of them--one now and then, at long -intervals--he would have enjoyed knowing, and knowing intimately. On -these infrequent occasions would come a union of frankness, comeliness -and _élan_, and the rudiments of good manners. But no one in all the -long-drawn procession had stopped to look at him a second time. And now -he was turning gray; he was tragically threatened with what might in -time become a paunch. His kind heart, his forthreaching nature, went -for naught; and the young men let him, walk under the elms and the -scrub-oaks neglected. If they had any interest beyond their egos, their -fraternities, and (conceivably) their studies, that interest dribbled -away on the quadrangle that housed the girl students. "If they only -realized how much a friendly hand, extended to them from middle life, -might do for their futures...!" he would sometimes sigh. But the -youthful egoists, ignoring him still, faced their respective futures, -however uncertain, with much more confidence than he, backed by -whatever assurances and accumulations he enjoyed, could face his own. - -"To be young!" he said. "To be young!" - -Do you figure Basil Randolph, alongside his portière, as but the -observer, the _raisonneur_, in this narrative? If so, you err. -What!--you may ask,--a rival, a competitor? That more nearly. - -It was Medora Phillips herself who, within a moment or two, inducted -him into this role. - -A gap had come in her chat with Cope. He had told her all he had been -asked to tell--or all he meant to tell: at any rate he had been given -abundant opportunity to expatiate upon a young man's darling -subject--himself. Either she now had enough fixed points for securing -the periphery of his circle or else she preferred to leave some portion -of his area (now ascertained approximately) within a poetic penumbra. -Or perhaps she wished some other middle-aged connoisseur to share her -admiration and confirm her judgment. At all events---- - -"Oh, Mr. Randolph," she cried, "come here." - -Randolph left his doorway and stepped across. - -"Now you are going to be rewarded," said the lady, broadly generous. -"You are going to meet Mr. Cope. You are going to meet Mr.----" She -paused. "Do you know,"--turning to the young man,--"I haven't your -first name?" - -"Why, is that necessary?" - -"You're not ashamed of it? Theodosius? Philander? Hieronymus?" - -"Stop!--please. My name is Bertram." - -"Never!" - -"Bertram. Why not?" - -"Because that would be too exactly right. I might have guessed and -guessed----!" - -"Right or wrong, Bertram's my name." - -"You hear, Mr. Randolph? You are to meet Mr. Bertram Cope." - -Cope, who had risen and had left any embarrassment consequent upon the -short delay to Basil Randolph himself, shot out a hand and summoned a -ready smile. Within his cuff was a hint for the construction of his -fore-arm: it was lean and sinewy, clear-skinned, and with strong power -for emphasis on the other's rather short, well-fleshed fingers. And as -he gripped, he beamed; beamed just as warmly, or just as coldly--at all -events, just as speciously--as he had beamed before: for on a social -occasion one must slightly heighten good will,--all the more so if one -be somewhat unaccustomed and even somewhat reluctant. - -Mrs. Phillips caught Cope's glance as it fell in all its glacial -geniality. - -"He looks down on us!" she declared. - -"How down?" Cope asked. - -"Well, you're taller than either of us." - -"I don't consider myself tall," he replied. "Five foot nine and a -half," he proceeded ingenuously, "is hardly tall." - -"It is we who are short," said Randolph. - -"But really, sir," rejoined Cope kindly, "I shouldn't call you short. -What is an inch or two?" - -"But how about me?" demanded Mrs. Phillips. - -"Why, a woman may be anything--except too tall," responded Cope -candidly. - -"But if she wants to be stately?" - -"Well, there was Queen Victoria." - -"You incorrigible! I hope I'm not so short as that! Sit down, again; we -must be more on a level. And you, Mr. Randolph, may stand and look down -on us both. I'm sure you have been doing so, anyway, for the past ten -minutes!" - -"By no means, I assure you," returned Randolph soberly. - -Soberly. For the young man had slipped in that "sir." And he had been -so kindly about Randolph's five foot seven and a bit over. And he had -shown himself so damnably tender toward a man fairly advanced within -the shadow of the fifties--a man who, if not an acknowledged outcast -from the joys of life, would soon be lagging superfluous on their rim. - -Randolph stood before them, looking, no doubt, a bit vacant and -inexpressive. "Please go and get Amy," Mrs. Phillips said to him. "I -see she's preparing to give way to some one else." - -Amy--who was a blonde girl of twenty or more--came back with him -pleasantly and amiably enough; and her aunt--or whatever she should -turn out to be--was soon able to lay her tongue again to the syllables -of the interesting name of Bertram. - -Cope, thus finally introduced, repeated the facial expressions which he -had employed already beside the tea-table. But he added no new one; and -he found fewer words than the occasion prompted, and even required. He -continued talking with Mrs. Phillips, and he threw an occasional remark -toward Randolph; but now that all obstacles were removed from free -converse with the divinity of the samovar he had less to say to her -than before. Presently the elder woman, herself no whit offended, began -to figure the younger one as a bit nonplused. - -"Never mind, Amy," she said. "Don't pity him, and don't scorn him. He's -really quite self-possessed and quite chatty. Or"--suddenly to Cope -himself--"have you shown us already your whole box of tricks?" - -"That must be it," he returned. - -"Well, no matter. Mr. Randolph can be nice to a nice girl." - -"Oh, come now,----" - -"Well, shall I ask you to my house, after this?" - -"No. Don't. Forbid it. Banish me." - -"Give one more chance," suggested Randolph sedately. - -"Why, what's all this about?" said the questioning glance of Amy. If -there was any offense at all, on anybody's part, it lay in making too -much of too little. - -"Take back my plate, somebody," said Mrs. Phillips. - -Randolph put out his hand for it. - -"This sandwich," said Amy, reaching for an untouched square of wheat -bread and pimento. "I've been so busy with other people...." - -"I'll take it myself," declared Mrs. Phillips, reaching out in turn. -"Mr. Randolph, bring her a nibble of something." - -"_I_ might----" began Cope. - -"You don't deserve the privilege." - -"Oh, very well," he returned, lapsing into an easy passivity. - -"Never mind, anyway," said Amy, still without cognomen and connections; -"I can starve with perfect convenience. Or I can find a mouthful -somewhere, later." - -"Let us starve sitting," said Randolph, "Here are chairs." - -The hostess herself came bustling up brightly. - -"Has everybody...?" - -And she bustled away. - -"Yes; everybody--almost," said Mrs. Phillips to her associates, behind -their entertainer's back. "If you're hungry, Amy, it's your own fault. -Sit down." - -And there let us leave them--our little group, our cast of characters: -"everybody--almost," save one. Or two. Or three. - - - - -2 - -_COPE MAKES A SUNDAY AFTERNOON CALL_ - - -Medora Phillips was the widow of a picture-dealer, now three years -dead. In his younger days he had been something of a painter, and later -in life as much a collector as a merchandizer. Since his death he had -been translated gradually from the lower region proper to mere -traffickers on toward the loftier plane which harbored the more select -company of art-patrons and art-amateurs. Some of his choicer ventures -were still held together as a "gallery," with a few of his own canvases -included; and his surviving partner felt this collection gave her good -reason for holding up her head among the arts, and the sciences, and -humane letters too. - -Mrs. Phillips occupied a huge, amorphous house some three-quarters of a -mile to the west of the campus. It was a construction in wood, with -manifold "features" suggestive of the villa, the bungalow, the chateau, -the palace; it united all tastes and contravened all conventions. In -its upper story was the commodious apartment which was known in quiet -times as the picture-gallery and in livelier times as the ball-room. It -was the mistress' ambition to have the lively times as numerous as -possible--to dance with great frequency among the pictures. Six or -eight couples could gyrate here at once. There was young blood under -her roof, and there was young blood to summon from outside; and to set -this blood seething before the eyes of visiting celebrities in the arts -and letters was her dearest wish. She had more than one spare bedroom, -of course; and the Eminent and the Queer were always welcome for a -sojourn of a week or so, whether they came to read papers and deliver -lectures or not. She was quite as well satisfied when they didn't. If -they would but sit upon her wide veranda in spring or autumn, or before -her big open fireplace in winter and "just talk," she would be as -open-eyed and open-eared as you pleased. - -"This is much nicer," she would say. Nicer than what, she did not -always make clear. - -Yes, the house was nearly three-quarters of a mile to the west of the -campus, but it was twice as far as if it had been north or south. -Trains and trolleys, intent on serving the interests of the great -majority, took their own courses and gave her guests no aid. If the -evening turned cold or blustery or brought a driving rain she would say: - -"You can't go out in this. You must stay all night. We have room and to -spare." - -If she wanted anybody to stay very much, she would even add: "I can't -think of your walking toward the lake with such a gale in your -face,"--regardless of the fact that the lake wind was the rarest of -them all and that in nine cases out of ten the rain or snow would be -not in people's faces but at their backs. - -If she didn't want anybody to stay, she simply ordered out the car and -bundled him off. The delay in the offer of the car sometimes induced a -young man to remain. Tasteful pajamas and the promise of a suitably -early breakfast assured him that he had made no mistake. - -Cope's first call was made, not on a tempestuous evening in the winter -time, but on a quiet Sunday afternoon toward the end of September. The -day was sunny and the streets were full of strollers moving along -decorously beneath the elms, maples and catalpas. - -"Drop in some Sunday about five," Medora Phillips had said to him, "and -have tea. The girls will be glad to meet you." - -"The girls"? Who were they, and how many? He supposed he could account -for one of them, at least; but the others? - -"You find me alone, after all," was her greeting. "The girls are out -walking--with each other, or their beaux, or whatever. Come in here." - -She led him into a spacious room cluttered with lambrequins, stringy -portieres, grilles, scroll-work, bric-a-brac.... - -"The fine weather has been too much for them," she proceeded. "I was -relying on them to entertain you." - -"Dear me! Am I to be entertained?" - -"Of course you are." Her expression and inflection indicated to him -that he had been caught up in the cogs of a sizable machine, and that -he was to be put through it. Everybody who came was entertained--or -helped entertain others. Entertainment, in fact, was the one object of -the establishment. - -"Well, can't you entertain me yourself?" - -"Perhaps I can." And it almost seemed as if he had been secured and -isolated for the express purpose of undergoing a particular course of -treatment. - -"----in the interval," she amended. "They'll be back by sunset. They're -clever girls and I know you'll enjoy them." - -She uttered this belief emphatically--so emphatically, in truth, that -it came to mean: "I wonder if you will indeed." And there was even an -overtone: "After all, it's not the least necessary that you should." - -"I suppose I have met one of them already." - -"You have met Amy. But there are Hortense and Carolyn." - -"What can they all be?" He wondered to himself: "daughters, nieces, -cousins, co-eds, boarders...?" - -"Amy plays. Hortense paints. Carolyn is a poet." - -"Amy plays? Pardon me for calling her Amy, but you have never given me -the rest of her name." - -"I certainly presented you." - -"To 'Amy'." - -"Well, that was careless, if true. Her name is Amy Leffingwell; and -Hortense's name is----" - -"Stop, please. Pay it out gradually. My poor head can hold only what it -can. Names without people to attach them to...." - -"The people will be here presently," Medora Phillips said, rather -shortly. Surely this young man was taking his own tone. It was not -quite the tone usually taken by college boys on their first call. Her -position and her imposing surroundings--yes, her kindliness in noticing -him at all--might surely save her from informalities that almost shaped -into impertinences. Yet, on the other hand, nothing bored one more than -a young man who openly showed himself intimidated. What was there -behind this one? More than she had thought? Well, if so, none the -worse. Time might tell. - -"So Miss Leffingwell plays?" He flared out his blue-white smile. "Let -me learn my lesson page by page." - -"Yes, she plays," returned Medora Phillips briefly. "Guess what," she -continued presently, half placated. - -They were again side by side on a sofa, each with an elbow on its back -and the elbows near together. Nor was Medora Phillips, though plump, at -all the graceless, dumpy little body she sometimes taxed herself with -being. - -"What? Oh, piano, I suppose." - -"Piano!" - -"What's wrong?" - -"The piano is common: it's assumed." - -"Oh, she performs on something unusual? Xylophone?" - -"Be serious." - -"Trombone? I've seen wonders done on that in a 'lady orchestra'." - -"Don't be grotesque." She drew her dark eyebrows into protest. "What a -sight!--a delicate young girl playing a trombone!" - -"Well, then,--a harp. That's sometimes a pleasant sight." - -"A harp needs an express wagon. Though of course it is pretty for the -arms." - -"Arms? Let me see. The violin?" - -"Of course. And that's probably the very first thing you thought of. -Why not have mentioned it?" - -"I suppose I've been taught the duty of making conversation." - -"The duty? Not the pleasure?" - -"That remains to be...." He paused. "So she has arms," he pretended to -muse. "I confess I hadn't quite noticed." - -"She passed you a cup of tea, didn't she?" - -"Oh, surely. And a sandwich. And another. And a slice of layer cake, -with a fork. And another cup of tea. And a macaroon or two----" - -"Am I a glutton?" - -"Am I? Some of all that provender was for me, as I recall." - -They were still side by side on the sofa. Both were cross--kneed, and -the tip of her russet boot almost grazed that of his Oxford tie. He did -not notice: he was already arranging the first paragraph of a letter to -a friend in Winnebago, Wisconsin. "Dear Arthur: I called,--as I said I -was going to. She is a scrapper. She goes at you hammer and -tongs--pretending to quarrel as a means of entertaining you..." - -Medora Phillips removed her elbow from the back of the sofa, and began -to prod up her cushions. "How about your work?" she asked. "What are -you doing?" - -He came back. "Oh, I'm boning. Some things still to make up. I'm -digging in the poetry of Gower--the 'moral Gower'." - -"Well, I see no reason why poetry shouldn't be moral. Has he been -publishing anything lately that I ought to see?" - -"Not--lately." - -"I presume I can look into some of his older things." - -"They are all old--five hundred years and more. He was a pal of -Chaucer's." - - -She gave him an indignant glance. "So that's it? You're laying traps -for me? You don't like me! You don't respect me!" - -One of the recalcitrant cushions fell to the floor. They bumped heads -in trying to pick it up. - -"Traps!" he said. "Never in the world! Don't think it! Why, Gower is -just a necessary old bore. Nobody's supposed to know much about -him--except instructors and their hapless students." - -He added one more sentence to his letter to "Arthur": "She pushes you -pretty hard. A little of it goes a good way..." - -"Oh, if _that's_ the case..." she said. "How about your thesis?" she -went on swiftly. "What are you going to write about?" - -"I was thinking of Shakespeare." - -"Shakespeare! There you go again! Ridiculing me to my very face!" - -"Not at all. There's lots to say about him--or them." - -"Oh, you believe in Bacon!" - -"Not at all--once more. I should like to take a year and spend it among -the manor-houses of Warwickshire. But I suppose nobody would stake me -to that." - - -"I don't know what you have in mind; some wild goose chase, probably. I -expect your friends would like it better if you spent your time right -here." - -"Probably. I presume I shall end by doing a thesis on the 'color-words' -in Keats and Shelley. A penniless devil was no luck." - -"Anybody has luck who can form the right circle. Stay where you are. A -circle formed here would do you much more good than a temporary one -four thousand miles away." - -Voices were heard in the front yard. "There they come, now," Mrs. -Phillips said. She rose, and one more of the wayward cushions went to -the floor. It lay there unregarded,--a sign that a promising -tête-à-tête was, for the time being, over. - - - - -3 - -_COPE IS "ENTERTAINED"_ - - -Mrs. Phillips stepped to the front door to meet the half dozen young -people who were cheerily coming up the walk. Cope, looking at the -fallen cushions with an unseeing eye, remained within the drawing-room -door to compose a further paragraph for the behoof of his correspondent -in Wisconsin: - -"Several girls helped entertain me. They came on as thick as spatter. -One played a few things on the violin. Another set up her easel and -painted a picture for us. A third wrote a poem and read it to us. And a -few sophomores hung about in the background. It was all rather too -much. I found myself preferring those hours together in dear old -Winnebago...." - -Only one of the sophomores--if the young men were really of that -objectionable tribe--came indoors with the young ladies. The -others--either engaged elsewhere or consciously unworthy--went away -after a moment or two on the front steps. Perhaps they did not feel -"encouraged." And in fact Mrs. Phillips looked back toward Cope with -the effect of communicating the idea that she had enough men for -to-day. She even conveyed to him the notion that he had made the others -superfluous. But-- - -"Hum!" he thought; "if there's to be a lot of 'entertaining,' the more -there are to be entertained the better it might turn out." - -He met Hortense and Carolyn--with due stress laid on their respective -patronymics--and he made an early acquaintance with Amy's violin. - -And further on Mrs. Phillips said: - -"Now, Amy, before you really stop, do play that last little thing. The -dear child," she said to Cope in a lower tone, "composed it herself and -dedicated it to me." - -The last little thing was a kind of "meditation," written very simply -and performed quite seriously and unaffectedly. And it gave, of course, -a good chance for the arms. - -"There!" said Mrs. Phillips, at its close. "Isn't it too sweet? And it -inspired Carolyn too. She wrote a poem after hearing it." - -"A copy of verses," corrected Carolyn, with a modest catch in her -breath. She was a quiet, sedate girl, with brown eyes and hair. Her -eyes were shy, and her hair was plainly dressed. - -"Oh, you're so sweet, so old-fashioned!" protested Mrs. Phillips, -slightly rolling her eyes. "It's a poem,--of course it's a poem. I -leave it to Mr. Cope, if it isn't!" - -"Oh, I beg--" began Cope, in trepidation. - -"Well, listen, anyway," said Medora. - -The poem consisted of some six or seven brief stanzas. Its title was -read, formally, by the writer; and, quite as formally, the dedication -which intervened between title and first stanza,--a dedication to -"Medora Townsend Phillips." - -"Of course," said Cope to himself. And as the reading went on, he ran -his eyes over the dusky, darkening walls. He knew what he expected to -find. - -Just as he found it the sophomore standing between the big padded chair -and the book-case spatted his hands three times. The poem was over, the -patroness duly celebrated. Cope spatted a little too, but kept his eye -on one of the walls. - -"You're looking at my portrait!" declared Mrs. Phillips, as the poetess -sank deeper into the big chair. "Hortense did it." - -"Of course she did," said Cope under his breath. He transferred an -obligatory glance from the canvas to the expectant artist. But-- - -"It's getting almost too dark to see it," said his hostess, and -suddenly pressed a button. This brought into play a row of electric -bulbs near the top edge of the frame and into full prominence the dark -plumpness of the subject. He looked back again from the painter (who -also had black hair and eyes) to her work. - -"I am on Parnassus!" Cope declared, in one general sweeping compliment, -as he looked toward the sofa where Medora Phillips sat with the three -girls now grouped behind her. But he made it a boreal Parnassus--one -set in relief by the cold flare and flicker of northern lights. - -"Isn't he the dear, comical chap!" exclaimed Mrs. Phillips, with -unction, glancing upward and backward at the girls. They smiled -discreetly, as if indulging in a silent evaluation of the sincerity of -the compliment. Yet one of them--Hortense--formed her black brows into -a frown, and might have spoken resentfully, save for a look from their -general patroness. - -"Meanwhile, how about a drop of tea?" asked Mrs. Phillips suddenly. -"Roddy"--to the sophomore--"if you will help clear that table...." - -The youth hastened to get into action. Cope went on with his letter to -"Arthur": - -"It was an afternoon in Lesbos--with Sappho and her band of -appreciative maidens. Phaon, a poor lad of nineteen, swept some -pamphlets and paper-cutters off the center-table, and we all plunged -into the ocean of Oolong--the best thing we do on this island...." - -He was lingering in a smiling abstractedness on his fancy, when-- - -"Bertram Cope!" a voice suddenly said, "do you do nothing--nothing?" - -He suddenly came to. Perhaps he had really deserved his hostess' -rebuke. He had not offered to help with the tea-service; he had -preferred no appropriate remark, of an individual nature, to any of the -three _ancillae_.... - -"I mean," proceeded Mrs. Phillips, "can you do nothing whatever to -entertain?" - -Cope gained another stage on the way to self-consciousness and -self-control. Entertainment was doubtless the basic curse of this -household. - -"I sing," he said, with naïf suddenness and simplicity. - -"Then, sing--do. There's the open piano. Can you play your own -accompaniments?" - -"Some of the simpler ones." - -"Some of the simpler ones! Do you hear that, girls? He is quite -prepared to wipe us all out. Shall we let him?" - -"That's unfair," Cope protested. "Is it my fault if composers _will_ -write hard accompaniments to easy airs?" - -"Will you sing before your tea, or after it?" - -"I'm ready to sing this instant,--during it, or before it." - -"Very well." - -The room was now in dusk, save for the bulbs which made the portrait -shine forth like a wayside shrine. Roddy, the possible sophomore, -helped a maid find places for the cups and saucers; and the three -girls, still formed in a careful group about the sofa, silently waited. - -"Of course you realize that this is not such a very large room," said -Mrs. Phillips. - -"Meaning....?" - -"Well, your speaking voice _is_ resonant, you know." - -"Meaning, then, that I am not to raise the roof nor jar the china. I'll -try not to." - -Nor did he. He sang with care rather than with volume, with discretion -rather than with abandon. The "simple accompaniments" went off with but -a slight hitch or two, yet the "resonant voice" was somehow, somewhere -lost. Possibly Cope gave too great heed to his hostess' caution; but it -seemed as if a voice essentially promising had slipped through some -teacher's none too competent hands, or--what was quite as serious--as -if some temperamental brake were operating to prevent the complete -expression of the singer's nature. Lassen, Grieg, Rubinstein--all these -were carried through rather cautiously, perhaps a little mechanically; -and there was a silence. Hortense broke it. - -"Parnassus, yes. And finally comes Apollo." She reached over and -murmured to Mrs. Phillips: "None too skillful on the lyre, and none too -strong in the lungs...." - -Medora spoke up loudly and promptly. - -"Do you know, I think I've heard you sing before." - -"Possibly," Cope said, turning his back on the keyboard. "I sang in the -University choir for a year or two." - -"In gown and mortar-board? 'Come, Holy Spirit,' and all that?" - -"Yes; I sang solos now and then." - -"Of course," she said. "I remember now. But I never saw you before -without your mortar-board. That changes the forehead. Yes, you're -yourself," she went on, adding to her previous pleasure the further -pleasure of recognition. "You've earned your tea," she added. -"Hortense," she said over her shoulder to the dark girl behind the -sofa, "will you--? No; I'll pour, myself." - -She slid into her place at table and got things to going. There was an -interval which Cope might have employed in praising the artistic -aptitudes of this variously gifted household, but he found no -appropriate word to say,--or at least uttered none. And none of the -three girls made any further comment on his own performance. - -Mrs. Phillips accompanied him, on his way out, as far as the hall. She -looked up at him questioningly. - -"You don't like my poor girls," she said. "You don't find them clever; -you don't find them interesting." - -"On the contrary," he rejoined, "I have spent a delightful hour." Must -he go on and confess that he had developed no particular dexterity in -dealing with the younger members of the opposite sex? - -"No, you don't care for them one bit," she insisted. She tried to look -rebuking, reproachful; yet some shade of expression conveyed to him a -hint that her protest was by no means sincere: if he really didn't, it -was no loss--it was even a possible gain. - -"It's you who don't care for me," he returned. "I'm _vieux jeu_." - -"Nonsense," she rejoined. "If you have a slight past, that only makes -you the more atmospheric. Be sure you come again soon, and put in a -little more work on the foreground." - -Cope, on his way eastward, in the early evening, passed near the -trolley tracks, the Greek lunch-counter, without a thought; he was -continuing his letter to "Dear Arthur": - -"I think," he wrote, with his mind's finger, "that you might as well -come down. I miss you--even more than I thought I should. The term is -young, and you can enter for Spanish, or Psychology, or something. -There's nothing for you up there. The bishop can spare you. Your father -will be reasonable. We can easily arrange some suitable quarters..." - -And we await a reply from "Dear Arthur"--the fifth and last of our -little group. But no; there are two or three others--as you have just -seen. - - - - -4 - -_COPE IS CONSIDERED_ - - -A few days after the mathematical tea, Basil Randolph was taking a -sedate walk among the exotic elms and the indigenous oaks of the -campus; he was on his way to the office of the University registrar. He -felt interested in Bertram Cope and meant to consult the authorities. -That is to say, he intended to consult the written and printed data -provided by the authorities,--not to make verbal inquiries of any of -the college officials themselves. He was, after all, sufficiently in -the academic tradition to prefer the consultation of records as against -the employment of _viva voce_ methods; and he saw no reason why his new -interest should be widely communicated to other individuals. There was -an annual register; there was an album of loose sheets kept up by the -members of the faculty; and there was a card-catalogue, he remembered, -in half a dozen little drawers. All this ought to remove any necessity -of putting questions by word of mouth. - -The young clerk behind the broad counter annoyed him by no offer of -aid, but left him to browse for himself. First, the printed register. -This was crowded with professors--full, head, associate, assistant; -there were even two or three professors emeritus. And each department -had its tale of instructors. But no mention of a Bertram Cope. Of -course not; this volume, it occurred to him presently, represented the -state of things during the previous scholastic year. - -Next the card-catalogue. But this dealt with the students -only--undergraduate, graduate, special. No Cope there. - -Remained the loose-leaf faculty-index, in which the members of the -professorial body told something about themselves in a great variety of -handwriting: among other things, their full names and addresses, and -their natures in so far as penmanship might reveal it. Ca; Ce; Cof; -Collard, Th. J., who was an instructor in French and lived on Rosemary -Place; Copperthwaite, Julian M., Cotton ... No Cope. He looked again, -and further. No slightest alphabetical misplacement. - -"You are not finding what you want?" asked the clerk at last. The -search was delaying other inquirers. - -"Bertram Cope," said Randolph. "Instructor, I think." - -"He has been slow. But his page will be in place by tomorrow. If you -want his address...." - -"Yes?" - -"--I think I can give it to you." The youth retired behind a screen. -"There," he said, returning with a bit of pencilling on a scrap of -paper. - -Randolph thanked him, folded up the paper, and put it in his pocket. A -mere bit of ordinary clerkly writing; no character, no allure. Well, -the actual chirography of the absentee would be made manifest before -long. What was it like? Should he himself ever have a specimen of it in -a letter or a note? - -That evening, with his after-dinner cigarette, he strolled casually -through Granville Avenue, the short street indicated by the address. It -was a loosely-built neighborhood of frame dwellings, with yards and a -moderate provision of trees and shrubs--a neighborhood of people who -owned their houses but did not spend much money on them. Number 48 was -a good deal like the others. "Decent enough, but commonplace," Randolph -pronounced. "Yet what could I have been expecting?" he added; and his -whimsical smile told him not to let himself become absurd. - -There were lighted windows in the front and at the side. Which of these -was Cope's, and what was the boy doing? Was he deep in black-letter, or -was he selecting a necktie preliminary to some evening diversion -outside? Or had he put out his light--several windows were dark--and -already taken the train into town for some concert or theatre? - -"Well," said Randolph to himself, with a last puff at his cigarette, -"they're not likely to move out and leave him up in the air. I hope," -he went on, "that he has more than a bedroom merely. But we know on -what an incredibly small scale some of them live." - -He threw away his cigarette and strolled on to his own quarters. These -were but ten minutes away. In his neighborhood, too, people owned their -homes and were unlikely to hurry you out on a month's notice. You could -be sure of being able to stay on; and Randolph, in fact, had stayed on, -with a suitable family, for three or four years. - -He had a good part of one floor: a bedroom, a sitting room, with a -liberal provision of bookshelves, and a kind of large closet which he -had made into a "cabinet." There are all sorts of cabinets, but this -was a cabinet for his "collection." His collection was not without some -measure of local fame; if not strictly valuable, it was at least -comprehensive. After all, he collected to please himself. He was a -collector in Churchton and a stockbroker in the city itself. The -satirical said that he was the most important collector in "the -street," and the most important stockbroker in the suburbs. He was a -member of a somewhat large firm, and not the most active one. His -interest had been handed down, in a manner, from his father; and the -less he participated the better his partners liked it. He had no one -but himself, and a sister on the far side of the city, miles and miles -away. His principal concern was to please himself, to indulge his -nature and tastes, and to get, in a quiet way, "a good deal out of -life." But nobody ever spoke of him as rich. His collection represented -his own preferences, perseverance and individual predilections. Least -of all had it been brought together to be "realized on" after his death. - -"I may be something of a fool, in my own meek fashion," he -acknowledged, "but I'm no such fool as that." - -He had a few jades and lacquers--among the latter, the ordinary -inkwells and sword-guards; a few snuff-boxes; some puppets in costume -from Mexico and Italy; a few begrimed vellum-bound books in foreign -languages (which he could not always read); and now and then a friend -who was "breaking up" would give him a bit of Capo di Monte or an -absurd enigmatic musical instrument from the East Indies. And he had a -small department of Americana, dating from the days of the Civil War. - -"Miscellaneous enough," pronounced Medora Phillips, on once viewing his -cabinet, "but not altogether"--she proceeded charitably--"utter -rubbish." - -And it was felt by others too that, in the lack of any wide -opportunity, he had done rather well. Churchton itself was no nest of -antiquities; in 1840 it had consisted merely of a log tavern on the -Green Bay road, and the first white child born within its limits had -died but recently. Nor was the Big Town just across the "Indian -Boundary" much older. It had "antique shops," true; but one's best -chances were got through mousing among the small scattered troups of -foreigners (variegated they were) who had lately been coming in -pell-mell, bringing their household knick-knacks with them. There was a -Ghetto, there was a Little Italy, there were bits of Bulgaria, Bohemia, -Armenia, if one had tired of dubious Louis Quinze and Empire. In an -atmosphere of general newness a thing did not need to be very old to be -an antique. - -The least old of all things in Randolph's world were the students who -flooded Churchton. There were two or three thousand of them, and -hundreds of new ones came with every September. Sometimes he felt -prompted to "collect" them, as contrasts to his older curios. They were -fully as interesting, in their way, as brasswork and leatherwork, those -products of peasant natures and peasant hands. But these youths ran -past one's eye, ran through one's fingers. They were not static, not -even stable. They were restless birds of passage who fidgeted through -their years, and even through the days of which the years were made: -intent on their own affairs and their own companions; thankless for -small favors and kind attentions--even unconscious of them; soaking up -goodwill and friendly offices in a fashion too damnably -taken-for-granted ... You gave them an evening among your books, with -discreet things to drink, to smoke, to play at, or you offered them a -good dinner at some good hotel; and you never saw them after ... They -said "Yes, sir," or "Yep;" but whether they pained you by being too -respectful or rasped you by being too rowdyish, it all came to the -same: they had little use for you; they readily forgot and quickly -dropped you. - -"I wonder whether instructors are a shade better," queried Basil -Randolph. "Or when do sense and gratitude and savoir-faire begin?" - -A few days later he had returned to the loose-leaf faculty. Cope's page -was now in place, with full particulars in his own hand: his interest -was "English Literature," it appeared. "H'm! nothing very special in -that," commented Randolph. But Cope's penmanship attracted him. It was -open and easy: "He never gave _his_ instructor any trouble in reading -his themes." Yet the hand was rather boyish. Was it formed or unformed? -"I am no expert," confessed Randolph. He put Cope's writing on a middle -ground and let it go at that. - -He recalled the lighted windows and wondered near which one of them the -same hand filled note-books and corrected students' papers. - -"Rather a dreary routine, I imagine, for a young fellow of his age. -Still, he may like it, possibly." - -He thought of his own early studies and of his own early -self-sufficiencies. He felt disposed to find his earlier self in this -young man--or at least an inclination to look for himself there. - -The next afternoon he walked over to Medora Phillips. Medora's upper -floor gave asylum to a half-brother of her husband's--an invalid who -seldom saw the outside world and who depended for solace and -entertainment on neighbors of his own age and interests. Randolph -expected to contribute, during the week, about so many hours of talk or -of reading. But he would have a few words with Medora before going up -to Joe. - -Medora, among her grilles and lambrequins, was only too willing to talk -about young Cope. - -"A charming fellow--in a way," she said judicially. "Frank, but a -little too self-assured and self-centered. Exuberant, but possibly a -bit cold. Yet--charming." - -"Oh," thought Randolph, "one of the cool boys, and one of the -self-sufficing. Probably a bit of an ascetic at bottom, with good -capacity for self-control and self-direction. Not at all an -uninteresting type," he summed it up. "An ebullient Puritan?" he asked -aloud. - -"That's it," she declared, "--according to my sense of it." - -"Yet hardly a New Englander, I suppose?" - -"Not directly, anyhow. From down state--from Freeford, I think he said. -I judge that there's quite a family of them." - -"Quite a family of them," he repeated inwardly. A drawback indeed. Why -could an interesting young organism so seldom be detached from its -milieu and enjoyed in isolation? Prosy parents; tiresome, detrimental -brothers ... He wondered if she had any idea what they were all like. -It might be just as well, however, not to know. - -"And, judging from the family name, and from their taste at -christenings, I should say there might be some slant toward England -itself. A nomenclature not without distinction. 'Bertram'; rather nice, -eh? And there is a sister who teaches in one of the schools, I -understand; and her name is Rosalind, or Rosalys. Think of that! I -gather that the father is in some business," she concluded. - -"Well, well," thought Randolph; "more than one touch of gentility, of -fine feeling." If the father was in "some business," most likely it was -some one else's business. - -"He sings," said Medora, further. "Entertained us the other Sunday -afternoon. Cool and correct, but pleasant. No warmth, no passion. No -special interest in any of my poor girls. I didn't feel that he was -drawing any of them too near the danger-line." - -"Mighty gratifying, that. Where does one learn to sing without -provoking danger?" - -"In a church choir, of course. He sang last year in the cathedral at -Winnebago." - -"Oh, in Wisconsin. And what took us to Winnebago, I wonder?" - -"We were teaching in a college there." - -"I see." - -The talk languished. Basil Randolph had learned most that he wanted to -know, and had learned it without asking too many direct questions. He -began to pick at the fussy fringe on the arm of his chair and to cast -an empty eye on the other fussy things that filled the room. The two -had exhausted long ago all the old subjects, and he did not care to -show an eagerness--still less, a continuing eagerness--for this new -one: much could be picked up by indirection, even by waiting. - -Medora felt him as distrait. "Do you want to go up and see Joe for a -little while before you leave us?" - -"I believe I will. Not that I've brought anything to read." - -"I doubt if he cares to be read to this time--Carolyn gave him the -headlines this forenoon. He's a bit restless; I think he'd rather talk. -If you have nothing more to say to me, perhaps you can find something -to say to him." - -"Oh, come! I'm sure we've had a good enough little chat. Aren't you a -bit restless yourself?" - -"Well, run along. I've heard his chair rolling about up there for the -last half hour." - - - - -5 - -_COPE IS CONSIDERED FURTHER_ - - -Randolph took the stairs to the second floor, and presently his -footfalls were heard on the bare treads that led from the second to the -third. At the top landing he paused and looked in through the open door -of the picture-gallery. - -Over the varnished oak floor of this roomy apartment a middle-aged man -who wore a green shade above his eyes was propelling himself in a -wheeled chair. Thus did Joseph Foster cover the space where the younger -and more fortunate sometimes danced, and thus did he move among works -of art which, even on the brightest days, he could barely see. - -He knew the step. "Brought anything?" he asked. - -He depended on Randolph for the latest brief doings in current fiction; -and usually in the background--and often long in abeyance--was -something in the way of memoirs or biography, many-volumed, which could -fill the empty hours either through retrospect or anticipation. - -"Only myself," replied the other, stepping in. Foster dextrously -manoeuvred his chair toward the entrance and reached out his hand. - -"Well, yourself is enough. It's good to have a man about the place once -in a while. Once in a while, I said. It gets tiresome, hearing all -those girls slithering and chattering through the halls." He put his -bony hands back on the rims of his wheels. "Where have you been all -this time?" - -"Oh, you know I come when I can." Randolph ran his eye over the walls -of the big empty room. The pictures were all in place--landscapes, -figure-pieces, what not; everything as familiar as the form of words he -had just employed to meet an oft repeated query implying indifference -and neglect. - -"How is it outside? I haven't been down on the street for a month." - -"Oh, things are bright and pleasant enough." Through the wide window -there appeared, half a mile away, the square twin towers of the -University library, reminiscent of Oxford and Ely. Round them lesser -towers and gables, scholastic in their gray stone, rose above the trees -of the campus. Beyond all these a level line of watery blue ran for -miles and provided an eventless horizon. A bright and pleasant enough -sight indeed, but nothing for Joe Foster. - -"Well, let me by," he said, "and we'll get along to my own room." The -resonant bigness of the "gallery" was far removed from the intimate and -the sociable. - -To the side of this bare place, with its canvases which had become -rather démodé--or at least had long ceased to interest--lay two -bed-chambers: Foster's own, and one adjoining, which was classed as a -spare room. It was sometimes given over to visiting luminaries of -lesser magnitudes. Real celebrities--those of national or international -fame--were entertained in a sumptuous suite on the floor below. Casual -young bachelors, who sometimes happened along, were lodged above and -were expected to adjust themselves, as regarded the bathroom, to the -use and wont of the occupant adjoining. - -Foster's own room was a cramped omnium gatherum, cluttered with the -paraphernalia of daily living. It was somewhat disordered and -untidy--the chamber of a man who could never see clearly how things -were, or be completely sure just what he was about. - -"There's Pepys up there," he said, pointing to his bookshelf, as he -worked out of his chair and tried to dispose himself comfortably on a -couch. "I hope we're going to get along a little farther with him, some -time." - -"As to that, I _have_ been getting along a little farther;--I've been -to the Library, looking somewhat ahead in the completer edition. I find -that 'Will,' who flung his cloak over his shoulder, 'like a ruffian,' -and got his ears boxed for it, was no mere temporary serving-man, but -lived on with Pepys for years and became the most intimate and trusted -of his friends. And 'Gosnell,' who lasted three days, you remember, as -Mrs. Pepys' maid, turns up a year or two later as an actress at 'the -Duke's house.' and 'Deb,' that other maid whose name we have noted -farther along--well, there's a deal more about her than exactly tends -to edification...." - -"Good. I hope we shall have some more of it pretty soon." - -"To-day?" - -"Not exactly to-day. I've got some other things to think about." - -"Such as?" - -"Well, I expect you're going to be invited here to dinner pretty soon?" - -"So? I've been invited here to dinner before this." - -"But another day has come. A new light has risen. I haven't seen it, -but I've heard it. I've heard it sing." - -"A light singing? Aren't you getting mixed?" - -"Oh, I don't know. There was Viollet-le-Duc and the rose-window of -Notre Dame. They took him there as a child for a choral service, and he -thought it was the rose itself that sang. And there was Petrarch, and -the young Milton--both talking about 'melodious tears'--and something -of the same sort in 'The Blessed Damosel.' And----" - -"A psychological catch for which there ought to be a name. Perhaps -there _is_ a name." - -"Well, as I say, the light rose, shone, and sang. I didn't see it--I -never see anybody. But his voice came up here quite distinctly. It -seemed good to have a man in the house. Those everlasting girls--I hope -he wasn't bothering to sing for _them_." - -"He probably was. How did it go?" - -"Very well indeed." - -"What kind of voice?" - -"Oh, baritone, I suppose you'd call it." - -"And he sang sentimental rubbish?" - -"Not at all. Really good things." - -"With passion?" - -"Well, hardly. With cool correctness. An icicle on Diana's temple--that -would be my guess." - -"An icicle? No wonder the young ladies don't quite fancy him." - -"I understand he took them all in a lump--so far as he took them at -all. Treated them all exactly alike; Hortense was quite scornful when -she brought up my lunch-tray. Of course that's no way for a man to do." - -"On the contrary. For certain purposes it might be a very good way." - -"'On the contrary,' if you like; since frost may perform the effects of -fire. Medora herself is beginning to see him as a tall, white candle, -burning in some niche or at some shrine. Sir Galahad--or something of -that sort." - -Randolph grimaced at this. - -"Oh, misery! I hope she hasn't mentioned her impression to _him_! -Imagine whether a man would enjoy being told a thing like that. I hope, -I'm sure, that no 'Belle Dame sans Merci' will get on his tracks!" - -"If he goes in too much for 'palely loitering' he may be snatched." - -"Poor fellow! They'd better leave him to his studies and his students. -He has his own way to make, I presume, and will need all his energies -to get ahead. For, as some one has said, 'There are no tea-houses on -the road to Parnassus.' Neither do tea-fights boost a man toward the -Porch or Academe." - -"He's going in for teas?" - -"I won't say that. But it was at a tea that I met him. A trigonometry -tea at little Mrs. Ryder's." - -"You've seen him then. You have the advantage of me. What's he like?" - -"Oh, he has points in his favor. He has looks; a trim figure, even if -spare; well-squared shoulders; and manners with a breezy, original -tang. The kind of young fellow that people are likely enough to like." - -"What kind of manners did he have for you?" - -"Well, there you rather get me. He called me 'sir,' with a touch of -deference; yet somehow I felt as if I were standing too close to an -electric fan." - -"Yes, even when they indulge a show of deference, they contrive to blow -our gray hairs about our wrinkled temples." - -"Don't talk about gray hairs. You have none; and mine are not always -seen at first glance." - -"Medora begins to tax me with a few. Don't you see any?" - -"Not one. I concentrate on my own. Tush, you're only forty-seven." - -"Or fifty-seven, or sixty-seven, or seventy-seven...." Foster adjusted -his green shade and attempted an easier disposition of his twisted -limbs on the couch. "Well, forty-seven, as you suggest,--as you insist. -How old is this young fellow?" - -"Twenty-four or twenty-five." - -"Well, they can make us seem either younger or older. That rests with -ourselves. It's all in how we take them, I expect." - -"Better take them so as to make ourselves younger." - -"Then the other question." - -"How they take us?" - -"Yes. We're lucky, in this day and generation, if they take us at all." - -"You may be right," assented Randolph ruefully. "Yet there are gleams -of hope. The more thoughtful among them have a kind of condescending -pity to bestow----" - -"And the thoughtless?" - -"They can find uses for us. One of the faculty was telling me how he -tried to give two or three of his juniors an outing at his cottage over -in Michigan. Everything he gave they took for granted. And if anything -was lacking they took--exceptions. Monopolized the boats; ignored the -dinner-hour.... Sometimes I think that even the thoughtless are -thoughtful in their own way and use us, if we happen to have lands and -substance, purely as practical conveniences. I've been almost glad to -think that I possess none myself." - -"Don't stay here and talk like that. This is one of my blue days." - -"I wish I had brought a novelette. Sure you don't want to hear a little -more about the Countess of Castlemaine and the rascalities of the Navy -Office?" - -"No; some other time, when I feel a bit more robust. It isn't every day -that the mind can digest such a period with comfort." - -"Are we two old fogies beginning to wear on each other?" - -"I hope not. But when you go down, stop for Medora a minute and see if -she hasn't got something to say." - -Medora--when he finally got down stairs--had. - -She laid some knitting on the drawing-room table and came out into the -hall. - -"No reading this afternoon, I judge. What I heard, or seemed to hear, -was a broken flow of talk." - -"No reading. Restless." - -"So I was afraid. I'd rather have one good steady voice purring along -for him, and then I know he's all right. Carolyn has been too busy -lately. What seems to have unsettled him?" - -"Oh, I don't know. Young life, possibly." - -"Well, I've asked and asked the girls not to be quite so gay and -chattery in the upper halls." - -"You can't keep girls quiet." - -"I don't want to--not everywhere and at all times." - -"I have an idea that a given number of girls make more noise in a house -than the same number of young fellows. I know that they do in -boarding-houses and rooming-houses, and I believe it's so as between -sororities and fraternities. Put a noise-gauge in the main hall of the -Alpha-Alpha house and another in the main hall of the Beta-Beta house, -and the girls would run the score above the boys every time. If ever I -build a sorority house, it will be for the Delta-Iota-Nus, and a statue -of the great goddess DIN herself shall stand just within the entrance." - -"You discourage me. I was going to give a dinner." - -"Go ahead. A few remarks from me won't stop the course of your -hospitality. Neither would a few orations. Neither would a few -deliberative bodies assembled for a month of sessions, with every -member talking from nine till six." - -"You think I indulge in too many?" - -"Too many what? Festivals? Puns?" - -Medora paused, a bit puzzled. - -"Puns? Why, I never, never----Oh, I see!" - -"Too many dinners? No. Who could?" - -"This one was to be a young people's dinner. I was going to invite you." - -"Thanks. Thanks. Thanks." - -"Still, if you think my girls are noisy...." - -"I was speaking of girls in numbers." - -"Well, Bertram Cope didn't find them so." - -"Why not?" - -"Why not, indeed? They collected in a silent little group behind my -sofa...." - -"Puzzled? Awed?" - -"Fudge! Well, save Thursday." - -"Is he coming?" - -"I trust so." - -"Then they do need a constabulary to keep them quiet?" - -"Oh, hush!" - -"How many are you expecting to have? You know I don't enjoy large -parties." - - -"Could you stand ten?" - -"I think so." - -"Thursday, then," she said, with a definitive hand on the knob of the -door. - -Randolph went down the front walk with a slight stir of elation--a -feeling that had come to be an infrequent visitor enough. He hoped that -the company would be not only predominantly youthful, but exclusively -so--aside from the hostess and himself. And even she often had her -young days and her young spots. It would doubtless be clamorous; yet -clamor, understood and prepared for, might be met with composure. - - - - -6 - -_COPE DINES--AND TELLS ABOUT IT_ - - -Cope pushed away the last of the themes and put the cork back in the -red-ink bottle. Here was a witless girl who seemed to think that -Herrick and Cowper were contemporaries. The last sense to develop in -the Western void was apparently the sense of chronology--unless, -indeed, it were a sense for the shades of difference which served to -distinguish between one age and another and provided the raw material -that made chronology a matter of consequence at all. - -"If there were only one more," muttered Cope, looking at the pile of -sheets under the gas-globe, "I should probably learn that Chaucer -derived from Beaumont and Fletcher." - -He reached up and jerked the gas-jet to a different angle. The flame -lit, through its nicked, pale-pink globe, a bedroom cramped in size and -meagre in furnishings: a narrow bed, dressed to look like a lounge; two -stiff-backed oak chairs, not lately varnished; a bookshelf overhead, -with some dozen of the more indispensable aids to our tongue's -literature. The table at which he sat was one of plain deal, covered -with some Oriental-seeming fabric which showed here and there inkspots -that antedated his own pen. He threw up this covering as it fell over -the front edge of the table, pulled out a drawer, laid a sheet of paper -in the bettered light, and uncorked a black-ink bottle. - -"Dear Arthur," he began. - -He looked across to the other chair, with its broken spindles and -obfuscated varnish. With things as he wanted them, his correspondent -would be sitting there and letter-writing would be unnecessary. - -"Dear Arthur," he repeated aloud, and set himself to a general sketch -of the new land and the "lay" of it. - -"Three-quarters of them are of course girls," he presently found -himself writing, "which is the common proportion almost everywhere, I -presume, except in engineering and dentistry. However, there are four -or five men. I've been pretty careful, and they still treat me with -respect. I'm afraid my course is regarded as a 'snap.' Everybody, it -seems, can grasp English literature (and produce it). And almost -anybody, I begin to fear, can teach it. Judging, that is, from the pay. -I'm afraid the good folks at Freeford will find themselves pinched for -another year still." - -He glanced across toward the pile of corrected themes. He felt that not -everybody was "called," as a matter of course, to write English, and he -stubbornly nourished the belief that toiling over others' imperfections -was more of a job than boards of trustees always realized. - -"Of course," he presently resumed, "things are rather changed from what -they were before. I find more in the way of social opportunities and -greater interest shown by the middle-aged. It is no disadvantage to -cultivate people who have their own homes; the lunch-rooms round the -fountain-square are numerous enough, but not so good as they might be. -And I don't know but that an instructor may lose caste by eating among -a miscellany of undergraduates. Anyhow, it's no plan to pursue for -long." - -He sat for a moment, lost in thought over recent social experiences. - -"One very good house has lately been opened to me," he continued. "I -dined there last Thursday evening. It's really quite a mansion--a great -many large rooms: picture-gallery, ballroom, and all that; and the -dinner itself was very handsomely done. You know my theory,--a theory -rather forced upon me, in truth, by circumstances,--that the best way -to enjoy a good meal is to have had a string of poor ones. Well, since -coming back, and with no permanent arrangements made, I have had plenty -of chance for getting into position to appreciate the really -first-class. There was a color-scheme in pale pink--ribbons of that -color, pink icing on the cakes, and so on. The same thing could be -done, and done charmingly, in light green--with pistache ice-cream. Of -course the candle-shades were pink too." - -His eye wandered toward a small triangular closet, made off from the -room by a flimsy and faded calico-print curtain. - -"I had my dress-suit cleaned and pressed, but the lapels of the coat -came out rather shiny, and I thought it better to hire one for the -occasion. There was no trouble about a fit--I have standardized -shoulders, as you know. - -"Of course I miss you all the time, and I assuredly missed you just -here. If it is really true, as you write, that you are holding your -summer gains and weigh twelve pounds more than you did at the end of -June, and if you are thinking of getting a new suit, please bear in -mind that my own won't last much longer. I have the chance, now, to go -out a good deal and to meet influential, worth-while people. In the -circumstances I ask you not to bant. One rather spare man in a pair of -men is enough. - -"My hostess, a Mrs. Phillips, I met at a tea during my first week. This -tea was given by a lady in the mathematical department, and she and her -husband were at the dinner. They are people in the early or middle -thirties, I judge, and were probably put in as a connecting link -between the two sections of the party. Mrs. Phillips herself is a rich -widow of forty-odd--forty-five or six, possibly,--though I am not the -very best judge in such matters: no need to tell you that, on such a -point, my eye and my general sense are none too acute. The only other -middle-aged (or elderly) person present was a Mr. Randolph, who is -perhaps fifty, or a little beyond, yet who appears to have his younger -moments. There were some girls, and there were two young men in -business in the city--neighbors and not connected with the University -at all. 'For which relief,' etc.,--since it _is_ a bit benumbing to -move in academic circles exclusively;--I should hate to feel that a -really professorial manner was stealing over me. Well, everybody was -lively and gay, except at first Ryder (he's the math. man); but even he -limbered up finally. Mrs. Phillips herself has a great deal of action -and vivacity--seemed hardly more than thirty. Well, I could be pretty -gay too with a lot of money behind me; and I think that, for another -year or so, I can contrive to be gay without it. But after that.... - -"I wish you had been there instead of Ryder. If you are really going to -be twenty-seven in November--as I figure it--you might yourself have -served as a connecting link between youth and age. No, no; I take it -back; I didn't mean it. I wouldn't have you seem older for anything, -and you know it. - -"There were three girls. They all live in the house itself, forming a -little court: Mrs. P. seems to need young life and young attentions. So -not one of them had to be taken home--there's usually _that_ to do, you -know. Not that it would have mattered much, as the distances would have -been short and the night was clear starlight. But they could all stay -where they were, and I walked home in quite different company." - -Cope threw back his Oriental table-cover once more and drew out a few -additional sheets of paper. - -"One of them is an artist. She paints portraits, and possibly other -things. Oh, I was going to say there is an art-gallery at the top of -the house. Her husband--I mean Mrs. Phillips'--was a painter and -collector himself; and after dinner we went up there, and a curious man -came in, propelling a wheeled chair--a sort of death's-head at the -feast.... But don't let me get too far away from the matter in hand. -She is dark and a bit tonguey--the artist-girl; and I believe she would -be sarcastic and witty if she weren't held down pretty well. I think -she's a niece: the relationship leaves her free, as I suppose she -feels, to express herself. If you like the type you may have it; but -wit in a woman, or even humor, always makes me uncomfortable. The -feminine idea of either is a little different from ours. - -"Another girl is a musician. She plays the violin--quite tolerably. -Yes, yes, I recall your views about violin-playing: it's either good or -bad--nothing between. I'll say this, then: she played some simple and -unpretentious things and did them very deftly. Simple, unpretentious: -oddest thing in the world, for she is a recent graduate of our school -of music and began this fall as an instructor. Wouldn't you have -expected to find her demanding a chance to perform a sonata at the -least, or pining miserably for a concerto with full orchestra? Well, -this young lady I put down as a plain boarder--you can't maintain a big -house on memories and a collection of paintings. She's a nice child, -and I dare say makes as good a boarder as any nice child could. - -"The third girl--if you want to hear any more about them--seems to be a -secretary. Think of having the run of a house where a social secretary -is required! I'm sure she sends out the invitations and keeps the -engagement-book. Besides all that, she writes poetry--she is the -minstrel of the court. She does verses about her chatelaine--is quite -the mistress of self-respecting adulation. _She_ would know the -difference between Herrick and Cowper!"... - -Cope pulled out his watch. Then he resumed. - -"It's half past ten, but I think I'll run on for a few moments longer. -If I don't finish, I can wind up to-morrow.--Mr. Randolph sat opposite -me. He looked at me a lot and gave attention to whatever I -said--whether said to him, or to my neighbors right and left, or to the -whole table. I didn't feel him especially clever, but easy and -pleasant--and friendly. Also a little shy--even after we had gone up to -the ball-room. I'm afraid that made me more talkative than ever; you -know how shyness in another man makes me all the more confident and -rackety. Be sure that voice of mine rang out! But not in song. There -was a piano up stairs, of course, and that led to a little dancing. -Different people took turns in playing. I danced--once--with each of -the three girls, and twice with my hostess; then I let Ryder and the -two young business-men do the rest. Randolph danced once with Mrs. -Phillips, and that ended it for him. My own dancing, as you know, is -nothing to brag of: I think the young ladies were quite satisfied with -the little I did. I'm sure _I_ was. You also know my views on round -dances. Why dancing should be done exclusively by couples arranged -strictly on the basis of contrasted sexes...! I think of the good old -days of the Renaissance in Italy, when women, if they wanted to dance, -just got up and danced--alone, or, if they didn't want to dance alone, -danced together. I like to see soldiers or sailors dance in pairs, as a -straightforward outlet for superfluous physical energy. Also, peasants -in a ring--about a Maypole or something. Also, I very much like square -dances and reels. There were enough that night for a quadrille, with -somebody for the piano and even somebody to 'call off,'--but whoever -sees a quadrille in these days? However, I mustn't burn any more gas on -this topic. - -"I sat out several dances between Mrs. Phillips and Mr. Randolph. He -thought he had done enough for her, and she thought I had done enough -for them all. And one of the young business-men did enough for that -springy, still-young Mrs. Ryder. Once, indeed, Mrs. Phillips asked me -if I wouldn't like to try a third dance with her (she goes at it with a -good deal of old-time vivacity and vim); but I told her she must know -by this time that I was something of a bungler. 'I wouldn't quite say -that,' she returned, smiling; but we continued to sit there side by -side on a sort of bench built against the wall, and she seemed as well -pleased to have it that way as the other. She did, however, speak about -a little singing. I told her that she must have found me something of a -bungler there, too, and reminded her that I couldn't play the -accompaniments of my best songs at all. Arthur, my dear boy, I depend -on _you_ for that, and you must come down here and do it. No singing, -then. But Mrs. Phillips was not quite satisfied. Wouldn't I recite -something? Heavens! Well, of course I know lots of poems--_c'est mon -metier_. I repeated one. Then other volunteers were called upon--it was -entertaining with a vengeance! The young ladies had to chip in -also--though they, of course, were prepared to. And one of the young -business-men did some clever juggling; and Mrs. Ryder sang a little -French ballade; and Mr. Randolph--poor man!--was suddenly routed out of -his placidity, and responded as well as he could with one or two little -stories, not very pointed and not very well told. But I judge he makes -no great claim to being a _raconteur_--he was merely paying an -unexpected tax as gracefully as he could. - -"Well, as I was saying, the man in the wheeled chair came in. Of course -he hadn't been down to dinner--I think I saw a tray for him carried -along the hall. As he was working his way through the door, I suppose I -must have been talking and laughing at my loudest; and that big, bare -room, done in hard wood, made me seem noisier still. He sort of stopped -and twitched, and appeared to shrink back in his chair: I presume my -tones went straight through the poor twisted invalid's head. He must -have fancied me (from the racket I was making) as a sort of -free-and-easy Hercules (which is not quite the case), if not as the -whole football squad rolled into one. Whether he really saw me, then or -thereafter, I don't know; he wore a sort of green shade over his eyes. -Of course I met him in due form. I tried not to give his poor hand too -much of a wring (another of my bad habits); but he took all I gave and -even seemed to hang on for a little more. He sat quietly to one side -for a while, and I tried not to act the bull of Bashan again. Anyhow, -he didn't start a second time. Presently he pulled out rather -unceremoniously: the two young business-men had begun a sort of -burlesque fandango, and their feet were pretty noisy on the bare floor. -He started off after looking toward the piano and then toward me; and -Mrs. Phillips glanced about as if to hint that any display of surprise -or of indulgence would be misplaced. Poor chap!--well, I'm glad he -didn't see me dancing. - -"We broke up about eleven, and Mr. Randolph suggested that, as we lived -in the same general direction, we might walk homeward together. Great -heaven! it's eleven--and five after--now! Enough, in all conscience, -for to-night. You shall have the rest to-morrow." - - - - -7 - -_COPE UNDER SCRUTINY_ - - -An evening or two later Cope again corked his red ink and uncorked his -black. - -"As I have said, Mr. Randolph and I walked home together. He stopped -for a moment in front of his place. Another large, handsome house. He -told me he had the use of his quarters as long as his landlord's lease -ran, and asked me to come round some time and see how he was fixed. -Then he said suddenly that the evening was fine and the night young and -that he would walk on with me to _my_ quarters, if I didn't mind. Of -course I didn't--he seemed so friendly and pleasant; but I let him -learn for himself that I was far from being lodged in any architectural -monument. Well, we went on for the necessary ten minutes, and he didn't -seem at all put out by the mediocre aspect of the house where I have -put up. He sort of took it all for granted--as if he knew about it -already. In fact, on the way from his place to mine, I no more led him -(as I sense it now) than he led me. He hesitated at no corner or -crossing. 'I am an old Churchtonian,' he said incidentally--as if he -knew everything and everybody. He also mentioned, just as incidentally, -that he had a brother-in-law on our board of trustees. Of course I -promised to go round and see him. I presume that I shall drop in on him -some time or other. Come down here, and you shall have one more house -of call. - -"He stopped for a moment in front of my diggings, taking my hand to say -goodnight and taking his own time in dropping it. Enough is enough. -'You have the small change needed for paying your way through society,' -he said, with a sort of smile. 'I must cultivate a few little arts -myself,' he went on; 'they seem necessary in some houses. But I'm glad, -after all, that I didn't remember to-night that a tribute was likely to -be levied; it would have taken away my appetite and have made the whole -evening a misery in advance. As things went, I had, on the whole, a -pleasant time. Only, I understood that you sang; and I was rather -hoping to hear you.' 'I do best with my regular accompanist,' I -returned--meaning you, of course. I hope you don't mind being degraded -to that level. 'And your regular accompanist is not--not----?' 'Is -miles away,' I replied. 'A hundred and fifty of them,' I might have -added, if I had chosen to be specific. Now, if he had wanted to hear -me, why hadn't he asked? He would have needed only to second Mrs. -Phillips herself; and there he was, just on the other side of me. In -consequence of his reticence I was driven--or drove myself--to blank -verse. And that other man, the one in the chair; he may have had his -expectations too. Arthur, Arthur, try to grasp the situation! You must -come down here, and you must bring your hands with you. Tell the bishop -and the precentor that you are needed elsewhere. They will let you off. -Of course I know that a village choir needs every tenor it can get--and -keep; but come. If they insist, leave your voice behind; but do bring -your hands and your reading eye. Don't let me go along making my new -circle think I'm an utter dub. Tell your father plainly that he can -never in the world make a wholesale-hardware-man out of you. Force him -to listen to reason. What is one year spent in finding out just what -you are fit for? Come along; I miss you like the devil; nobody does my -things as sympathetically as you do. Give up your old anthems and your -old tinware and tenpennies and come along. I can bolt from this hole at -a week's notice, and we can go into quarters together: a real bed -instead of an upholstered shelf, and a closet big enough for two -wardrobes (if mine really deserves the name). We could get our own -breakfast, and you could take a course in something or other till you -found out just what the Big Town could do for you. In any event you -would be bearing me company, and your company is what I need. So pack -up and appear." - -The delay in the posting of this appeal soon brought from Winnebago a -letter outside the usual course of correspondence. It was on a fresh -sheet and under a new date-line that Cope continued. After a page of -generalities and of attention to particular points in the letter from -Wisconsin, Cope took up his own line of thought. - -"I had meant, of course, to look in on him within a few days,--no great -hurry about it. But on Sunday evening he wrote and asked if he might -not call round on me instead. My name is not in the telephone-book; -neither, as I found out, was his. So I used up a sheet of paper, an -envelope, and a stamp--just such as I am now using on you--to tell him -that he might indeed. I put in the 'indeed' for cordiality, hoping he -wouldn't think I had slighted _his_ invitation. On Monday evening he -came round--I must have reached him by the late afternoon delivery. -Need I say that he had to take this poor place as he found it? But -there was no sign of the once-over--no tendency to inventory or -appraise. He sat down beside me on the couch just as if he had no -notion that it was a bed (and a rather rocky one, at that), and talked -about my row of books, and about music and plays, and about his own -collection of curios--all in a quiet, contained way, yet intent on me -if not on my outfit. Well, it's pleasant to be considered for what you -are rather than for what you have (or for what few poor sticks your -landlady may have); and I rather liked his being here. Certainly he was -a change from my students, who sometimes seem to exclude better timber. - -"Needless to say, he repeated his invitation, and last evening I -shunted Middle English (in which I have a lot to catch up) and walked -round to him. Very adequately and handsomely lodged. Really good -bachelor quarters (I hadn't known for certain whether he was married or -not). A stockbroker of a sort, I hear,--but not enough to hurt, I -should guess. He has a library and a sitting-room. Like me, he sleeps -three-quarters, but he doesn't have to sit on his bed in the daytime. -And he has a bathrobe of just the sort I shall have, when I can afford -it. He has got together a lot of knick-knacks and curios, but takes -them lightly. - -"'Sorry I've only one big arm-chair,' he said, handing me his -cigarette-case and settling me down in comfort; 'but I entertain very -seldom. I should like to be hospitable,' he went on; '--I really think -it's in me; but that's pretty much out of the question here. I have no -chef, no dining-room of my own, no ball-room, certainly.... Perhaps, -before very long, I shall have to make a change.' - -"He asked me about Freeford, and I didn't realize until I was on my way -back that he had assumed my home town just as he had assumed my -lodging. Well, all right; I never resent a friendly interest. He sat in -a less-easy chair and blew his smoke-rings and wondered if I had been a -small-town boy. 'I'm one, too,' he said; '--at least Churchton, forty -years--at least Churchton, thirty years ago, was not all it is to-day. -It has always had its own special tone, of course; but in my young--in -my younger days it was just a large country village. Fewer of us went -into town to make money, or to spend it.'... - -"And then he asked me to go into town, one evening soon, and help him -spend some. He suggested it rather shyly; _à tâtons_, I will -say--though French is not my business. He offered a dinner at a -restaurant, and the theatre afterwards. Did I accept? Indeed I did. -Think, Arthur! after all the movies and restaurants round the elms and -the fountain (tho' you don't know them yet)! I will say, too, that his -cigarettes were rather better than my own.... - -"I suppose he is fully fifty; but he has his young days, I can see. -Certainly his age doesn't obtrude,--doesn't bother me at all, though he -sometimes seems conscious of it himself. He wears eye-glasses part of -the time,--for dignity, I presume. He had them on when I came in, but -they disappeared almost at once, and I saw them no more. - -"He asked me about my degree,--though I didn't remember having spoken -of it. I couldn't but mention 'Shakespeare'--as the word goes; and you -know that when I mention him, it always makes the other man mention -Bacon. He did mention Bacon, and smiled. 'I've studied the cipher,' he -said. 'All you need to make it go is a pair of texts--a long one and a -short one--and two fonts of type, or their equivalent in penmanship. -Two colors of ink, for example. You can put anything into anything. See -here.' He reached up to a shelf and brought down a thin brown square -note-book. 'Here's the alphabet,' he said; 'and here'--opening a little -beyond--'is my use of it: one of my earliest exercises. I have put the -first stanza of "Annabel Lee" into the second chapter of "Tom Jones."' -He ignored the absent eye-glasses and picked out the red letters from -the black with perfect ease. 'Simplest thing in the world,' he went on; -'anybody can do it. All it needs is time and patience and care. And if -you happen to be waggishly or fraudulently inclined you can give -yourself considerable entertainment--and can entertain or puzzle other -people later. You don't really believe that "Bacon wrote Shakespeare"?' - -"Of course I don't, Arthur,--as you very well know. I picked out the -first line of 'Annabel Lee' by arranging the necessary groupings among -the odd mixture of black and red letters he exhibited, and told him I -didn't believe that Bacon wrote Shakespeare--nor that Shakespeare did -either. 'Who did, then?' he naturally asked. I told him that I would -grant, at the start and for a few seasons, a group of young noblemen -and young gentlemen; but that some one of them (supposing there to have -been more than that one) soon distanced all the rest and presently -became the edifice before which the manager from Stratford was only the -facade. He--this 'someone'--was a noble and a man of wide reach both in -his natural endowments and in his acquired culture. But he couldn't dip -openly into the London cesspool; he had his own quality to safeguard -against the contamination of a new and none too highly-regarded trade. -'I don't care for your shillings,' he said to Shaxper, 'nor for the -printed plays afterward; but I do value your front and your footing and -the services they can render me on my way to self-expression.' He was -an earl, or something such, with a country-seat in Warwick, or on the -borders of Gloucestershire; 'and if I only had a year and the money to -make a journey among the manor-houses of mid-England,' I said, 'and to -dig for a while in their muniment-rooms....' Well, you get the idea, -all right enough. - -"He came across and sat on the arm of the big easy-chair. 'If you went -over there and discovered all that, the English scholars would never -forgive you.' As of course they wouldn't: look at the recent Shaxper -discoveries by Americans in London! 'And wouldn't that be a rather -sensational thesis,' he went on, 'from a staid candidate for an M.A., -or a Ph.D., or a Litt.D., or whatever it is you're after?' It would, of -a verity; and why shouldn't it be? 'Don't go over there,' he ended with -a smile, as he dropped his hand on my shoulder; 'your friends would -rather have you here.' 'Never fear!' I returned; 'I can't possibly -manage it. I shall just do something on "The Disjunctive Conjunctions -in 'Paradise Lost,'" and let it go at that!' - -"He got up to reach for the ash-receiver. 'They tell me,' he said, -'that a degree isn't much in itself--just an _étape_ on the journey to -a better professional standing.' 'Yes,' said I, '--and to better -professional rewards. It means so many more hundreds of dollars a year -in pay.' But you know all about that, too. - -"I'm glad your dramatic club is getting forward so well with the -rehearsals for its first drive of the season; glad too that, this time -at least, they have given you a good part. Tell me all about it before -the big stars in town begin to dim your people in my eyes--and in your -own; and don't let them cast you for the next performance in January. -You will be here by then. - -"Yours, - -"B.L.C." - - - - -8 - -_COPE UNDERTAKES AN EXCURSION_ - - -Two or three days later, Randolph met Medora Phillips in front of the -bank. This was a neat and solemn little edifice opposite the elms and -the fountain; it was neighbored by dry-goods stores, the offices of -renting agencies, and the restaurants where the unfraternized -undergraduates took their daily chances. Through its door passed -tradesmen's clerks with deposits, and young housewives with babies in -perambulators, and students with their small financial problems, and -members of the faculty about to cash large or small checks. Mrs. -Phillips had come across from the dry-goods store to pick up her -monthly sheaf of vouchers,--it was the third of October. - -"Don't you want to come in for a minute?" she asked Randolph. "Then you -can walk on with me to the stationer's. Carolyn tells me that our last -batch of invitations reduced us to nothing. How did _your_ dinner go?" - -Randolph followed her into the cool marble interior. "Oh, in town, you -mean? Quite well, I think. I'm sure my young man took a good honest -appetite with him!" - -"I know. We don't do half enough for these poor boys." - -"Yes, he rose to the food. But not to the drinks. I took him, after -all, to my club. I innocently suggested cocktails; but, no. He -declined--in a deft but straightforward way. Country principles. -Small-town morals. He made me feel like a--well, like a corrupter of -youth." - -"You didn't mind, though,--of course you didn't. You liked it. Wasn't -it noble! Wasn't it charming! So glad that _we_ had nothing but -Apollinaris and birch beer! Still, it would have been a pleasure to -hear him refuse." - -The receiving-teller gave her her vouchers. She put them in her handbag -and somehow got round a perambulator, and the two went out on the -street. - -"And how did your 'show' go?" she continued. "That's about as much as -we can call the drama in these days." - -"That, possibly, didn't go quite so well. I took him to a 'comedy,'--as -they nowadays call their mixture of farce and funniment. 'Comedy'!--I -wish Meredith could have seen it! Well, he laughed a little, here and -there,--obligingly, I might say. But there was no 'chew' in the thing -for him,--nothing to fill his intellectual maw. He's a serious -youngster, after all,--exuberant as he seems. I felt him appraising me -as a gay old irresponsible...." - -"'Old'--you are not to use that word. Come, don't say that he--that he -venerated you!" - -"Oh, not at all. During the six hours we were together--train, club, -theatre, and train again--he never once called me 'sir'; he never once -employed our clumsy, repellent Anglo-Saxon mode of address, 'mister'; -in fact, he never employed any mode of address at all. He got round it -quite cleverly,--on system, as I soon began to perceive; and not for a -moment did he forget that the system was in operation. He used, -straight through, a sort of generalized manner--I might have been -anywhere between twenty and sixty-five." - -They were now in front of the stationer's show-window, and there were -few people in the quiet thoroughfare to jostle them. - -Medora smiled. - -"How clever; how charming!" she said. "Leaving you altogether free to -pick your own age. I hope you didn't go beyond thirty-five. You must -have been quite charming in your early thirties." - -"That's kind of you, I'm sure; but I don't believe that I was ever -'charming' at _any_ age. I think you've used that word once too often. -I was a quiet, studious lad, with nice notions, but possibly something -of a prig. I was less 'charming' than correct. The young ladies had the -greatest confidence in me,--not one of them was ever 'afraid'." - -"Why, how horrid! How utterly unsatisfactory! Nor their mothers?" - -"No. And I'm still single, as you're advised. And I'm not sure that the -young gentlemen cared much more for me. If I had had a little more -'gimp' and _verve_, I might have equalled the particular young -gentleman of whom we have been discoursing. But...." - -His obviously artificial style of speech concealed, as she guessed, -some real feeling. - -"Oh, if you insist on disparaging yourself...!" - -"I was quite as coolly correct as I apprehend him to be; and if I could -only have contrived to compass the charming, as well, who knows -what----?" - -"You don't like my word. Is there a better, a more suitable?" - -"No. You have the _mot juste_." - -He threw a finger through the wide pane of glass. "Is that the sort of -thing you are after? Those boxes of pale gray are rather good." - -"I never buy from the show-window. Come in, and help me choose." - -"I love to shop," he said, in a mock ecstasy. "With others," he added. -"I like to follow money in--and to contribute taste and experience." - -Over the stationer's counter she said: - -"Save Sunday. We are going out to the sand-hills." - -"Thank you. Very well. Most glad to." - -"And you are to bring him." - -"Him?" - -"Bertram Cope." - -"Why, I've given him six hours within two or three days. And now you're -asking me to give him sixteen." - -"Sixteen--or more. But you're not giving them to him. You're giving -them to all of us. You're giving them to me. The day is likely to be -fine and settled, and I'd recommend your catching the 8:30 train. I -shall have my full load in the car. And more, if I have to take along -Helga. Try to reach us by one, or a quarter past." - -Mrs. Phillips had lately taken on a house among the sand dunes beyond -the state line. This singular region had recently acquired so wide a -reputation for utter neglect and desolation that--despite its distance -from town, whether in miles or in hours--no one could quite afford to -ignore it. Picnics, pageants, encampments and excursions all united in -proclaiming its remoteness, its silence, its vacuity. Along the rim of -ragged slopes which put a term to the hundreds of miles of water that -spread from the north, people tramped, bathed, canoed, motored and -week-ended. Within a few seasons Duneland had acquired as great a -reputation for "prahlerische Dunkelheit"--for ostentatious -obscurity--as ever was enjoyed even by Schiller's Wallenstein. "Lovers -of Nature" and "Friends of the Landscape" moved through its distant and -inaccessible purlieus in squads and cohorts. Everybody had to spend -there at least one Sunday in the summer season. There were enthusiasts -whose interest ran from March to November. There were fanatics who -insisted on trips thitherward in January. And there were one or two -super-fanatics--ranking ahead even of the fishermen and the -sand-diggers--who clung to that weird and changing region the whole -year through. - -Medora Phillips' house was several miles beyond the worst of the -hurly-burly. There were no tents in sight, even in August. Nor was the -honk of the motor-horn heard even during the most tumultuous Sundays. -The spot was harder to reach than most others along the twenty miles of -nicked and ragged brim which helped enclose the wide blue area of the -Big Water, but was better worth while when you got there. Her little -tract lay beyond the more prosaic reaches that were furnished chiefly -in the light green of deciduous trees; it was part of a long stretch -thickly set for miles with the dark and sombre green of pines. Our -nature-lover had taken, the year before, a neglected and dilapidated -old farmhouse and had made it into what her friends and habitues liked -to call a bungalow. The house had been put up--in the rustic spirit -which ignores all considerations of landscape and outlook--behind a -well-treed dune which allowed but the merest glimpse of the lake; -however, a walk of six or eight minutes led down to the beach, and in -the late afternoon the sun came with grand effect across the gilded -water and through the tall pine-trunks which bordered the zig-zag path. -Medora had added a sleeping porch, a dining-porch and a lean-to for the -car; and she entertained there through the summer lavishly, even if -intermittently and casually. - -"No place in the world like it!" she would declare enthusiastically to -the yet inexperienced and therefore the still unconverted. "The spring -arrives weeks ahead of our spring in town, and the fall lingers on for -weeks after. Come to our shore, where the fauna and flora of the whole -country meet in one. All the wild birds pass in their migrations; and -the flowers!" Then she would expatiate on the trailing arbutus in -April, and the vast sheets of pale blue lupines in early June, and the -yellow, sunlike blossoms of the prickly-pear in July, and the red -glories of painter's-brush and bittersweet and sumach in September. "No -wonder," she would say, "that they have to distribute handbills on the -excursion-trains asking people to leave the flowers alone!" - -"How shocking!" Cope had cried, with his resonant laugh, when this -phase of the situation was brought to his attention. "Are the -automobile people any better?" - -Randolph had told him of some of the other drawbacks involved in the -excursion. "It's a long way to go, even when you pass up the trolley -and make a single big bolt by train. And it leads through an industrial -region that is mighty unprepossessing--little beauty until almost the -end. And even when you get there, it may all seem a slight and simple -affair for the time and trouble taken--unless you really like Nature. -And lastly," he said, with a sidelong glance at Cope, "you may find -yourself, as the day wears on, getting a little too much of my company." - -"Oh, I hope that doesn't mean," returned Cope, with another ingenuous -unchaining of his native resonance, "that you are afraid of getting a -little too much of mine! I'm fond of novelty, and nobody can frighten -me." - -"If that's the case, let's get away as early in the day as we can. -Breakfasts, of course, are late in every household on Sunday. So let's -meet at the Maroon-and-Purple Tavern at seven-thirty, and make a flying -start at eight." - -Sunday morning came clear and calm and warm to the town,--a belated -September day, or possibly an early intimation of Indian summer,--and -it promised to be even more delightful in the favored region toward -which our friends were journeying. After they had cleared many miles of -foundries and railroad crossings, and had paralleled for a last -half-hour a distant succession of sandhills, wooded or glistening -white, they were set down at a small group of farmhouses, with a varied -walk of five miles before them. Half a mile through a shaded country -lane; another half-mile along a path that led across low, damp ground -through thickets of hazel and brier; a third half-mile over a light -soil, increasingly sandy, beneath oaks and lindens and pines which -cloaked the outlines of the slopes ahead; and finally a great mound of -pure sand that slanted up into a blue sky and made its own horizon. - -"We've taken things easy," said Randolph, who had been that way before, -"and I hope we have enough breath left for our job. There it lies, -right in front of us." - -"No favor asked here," declared Cope. He gave a sly, sidewise glance, -as if to ask how the other might stand as to leg-muscles and wind. - -"Up we go," said Randolph. - - - - -9 - -_COPE ON THE EDGE OF THINGS_ - - -The adventurer in Duneland hardly knows, as he works his way through -one of the infrequent "blow-outs," whether to thank Nature for her aid -or to tax her with her cruelty. She offers few other means of reaching -the water save for these nicks in the edges of the great cup; yet it is -possible enough to view her as a careless and reckless handmaiden -busily devastating the cosmical china-closet. The "blow-out" is a -tragedy, and the cause of further tragedy. The north winds, in the -impetus gathered through a long, unimpeded flight over three hundred -miles of water, ceaselessly try and test the sandy bulwarks for a -slightest opening. The flaw once found, the work of devastation and -desolation begins; and, once begun, it continues without cessation. -Every hurricane cuts a wider and deeper gash, fills the air with clouds -of loose sand, and gives sinister addition to the white shifting heaps -and fields that steal slowly yet unrelentingly over the green -hinterland of forest which lies below the southern slopes. Trees yet to -die stand in passive bands at their feet; the stark, black trunks of -trees long dead rise here and there in spots where the sand-glacier has -done its work of ruin and passed on. - -After some moments of scrambling and panting our two travelers gained -the divide. Below them sloped a great amphitheatre of sand, falling in -irregular gradations; and at the foot of all lay the lake, calmly -azure, with its horizon, whether near or far for it was almost -impossible to say--mystically vague. On either hand rose other hills of -sand, set with sparse pines and covered, in patches, with growths of -wild grape, the fruit half ripened. Within the amphitheatre, at various -levels, rose grimly a few stumps and shreds of cedars long dead and -long indifferent to the future ravages of the enemy. The whole scene -was, to-day, plausibly gentle and inert. It was indeed a bridal of -earth and sky, with the self-contained approval of the blue deep and no -counter-assertion from any demon wind. - -"So far, so good," said Randolph, taking off his hat, wiping his -forehead, and breathing just a little harder than he liked. "The rest -of our course is plain: down those slopes, and then a couple of miles -along the shore. Easy walking, that; a mere promenade on a boulevard." - -Cope stood on the height, and tossed his bare head like a tireless -young colt. The sun fell bright on his mane of yellow hair. He took in -a deep breath. "It's good!" he declared. "It's great! And the water -looks better yet. Shall we make it in a rush?" - -He began to plunge down the long, broken sand-slope. Each step was -worth ten. Randolph followed--with judgment. He would not seem young -enough to be a competitor, nor yet old enough to be a drag. On the -shore he wiped and panted a little more--but not to the point of -embarrassment, and still less to the point of mortification. After all, -he was keeping up pretty well. - -At the bottom Cope, with his shoes full of sand, turned round and -looked up the slope down which his companion was coming. He waved his -arms. "It's almost as fine from here!" he cried. - -The beach, once gained, was in sight both ways for miles. Not a human -habitation was visible, nor a human being. Two or three gulls flew a -little out from shore, and the tracks of a sandpiper led from the wet -shingle to the first fringe of sandgrass higher up. - -"Where are the crowds?" asked Cope, with a sonorous shout. - -"Miles behind," replied Randolph. "We haven't come this long distance -to meet them after all. Besides," he continued, looking at his watch, -"this is not the time of day for them. At twelve-fifteen people are not -strolling or tramping; they're thinking of their dinner. We have a full -hour or more for making less than two easy miles before we reach -_ours_." - -"No need to hurry, then." - -The beach, at its edge, was firm, and they strolled on for half a mile -and cooled off as they went. The air was mild; the noonday sun was -warm; both of them had taken off their coats. - -They sat down under a clump of basswoods, the only trees beyond the -foot of the sand-slope, and looked at the water. - -"It's like a big, useless bathtub," observed Randolph. - -"Not so much useless as unused." - -"Yes, I suppose the season _is_ as good as over,--though this end of -the lake stays warm longer than most other parts." - -"It isn't so much the warmth of the water," remarked Cope -sententiously. "It's more the warmth of the air." - -"Well, the air seems warm enough. After all, the air and the sun are -about the best part of a swim. Do you want to go in?" - -Cope rose, walked to the edge of the water, and put in a finger or two. -"Well, it might be warmer; but, as I say...." - -"We could try a ten-minute dip. That would get us to our dinner in good -time and in good trim." - -"All right. Let's, then." - -"Only, you'll have to do most of the swimming," said Randolph. "My few -small feats are all accomplished pretty close to shore." - -"Never mind. Company's the thing. A fellow finds it rather slow, going -in alone." - -Cope whisked off his clothes with incredible rapidity and piled -them--or flung them--under the basswoods: the suddenly resuscitated -technique of the small-town lad who could take avail of any pond or any -quiet stretch of river on the spur of the moment. He waded in quickly -up to his waist, and then took an intrepid header. His lithe young legs -and arms threw themselves about hither and yon. After a moment or two -he got on his feet and made his way back across a yard of fine shingle -to the sand itself. He was sputtering and gasping, and the long yellow -hair, which usually lay in a flat clean sweep from forehead to occiput, -now sprawled in a grotesque pattern round his temples. - -"B-r-r! It _is_ cold, sure enough. But jump in. The air will be all -right. I'll be back with you in a moment." - -Randolph advanced to the edge, and felt in turn. It _was_ cold. But he -meant to manage it here, just as he had managed with the sand-slopes. - -Two heads bobbed on the water where but one had bobbed before. -Ceremonially, at least, the rite was complete. - -"It's never so cold the second time," declared Cope encouragingly. "One -dip doesn't make a swim, any more than one swallow--" - -He flashed his soles in the sunlight and was once again immersed, -gulping, in a maelstrom of his own making. - -"Twice, to oblige you," said Randolph. "But no more. I'll leave the -rest to the sun and the air." - -Cope, out again, ran up and down the sands for a hundred feet or so. "I -know something better than this," he declared presently. He threw -himself down and rolled himself in the abundance of fine, dry, clean -sand. - -"An arenaceous ulster--speaking etymologically," he said. He came back -to the clump of basswoods near which Randolph was sitting on a short -length of drift wood, with his back to the sun, and sat down beside him. - -"You're welcome to it," said Randolph, laughing; "but how are you going -to get it off? By another dip? Certainly not by the slow process of -time. We have some moments to spare, but hardly enough for that. -Meanwhile...." - -He picked up a handful of sand and applied it to a bare shoulder-blade -which somehow had failed to get its share of protection. - -"Thanks," said Cope: "the right thing done for Polynices. Yes, I shall -take one final dip and dry myself on my handkerchief." - -"I shall dry by the other process, and so shall be able to spare you -mine." - - -"How much time have we yet?" - -Randolph reached for his trousers, as they hung on a lower branch of -one of the basswoods. "Oh, a good three-quarters of an hour." - -"That's time enough, and to spare. I wonder whom we're going to meet." - -"There's a 'usual crowd': the three young ladies, commonly; one or two -young men who understand how to tinker the oil-stove--which usually -needs it--and how to prime the pump. They once asked me to do these -things; but I've discovered that younger men enjoy it more than I do, -so I let them do it. Besides these, a number of miscellaneous people, -perhaps, who come out by trolley or in their own cars." - -"The young ladies always come?" asked Cope, brushing the sand from his -chest. - -"Usually. Together. The Graces. Otherwise, what becomes of the Group?" - -"Well, I hope there'll be enough fellows to look after the stove and -the pump--and them. I'm not much good at that last." - -"No?" - -"There's a knack about it--a technique--that I don't seem to possess. -Nor do I seem greatly prompted to learn it." - -"Of course, there is no more reason for assuming that every man will -make a good lover than that every woman will make a good mother or a -good housekeeper." - -"Or that every adult male will make a good citizen, desiring the -general welfare and bestirring himself to contribute his own share to -it. I don't feel that I'm an especially creditable one." - -"So it runs. We ground our general life on theories, and then the facts -come up and slap us in the face." Randolph rose and relieved the -basswood of the first garments. "Are you about ready for that final -dip?" - -Cope made his last plunge and returned red and shivering to use the two -handkerchiefs. - -"Well, we have thirty minutes," said Randolph, as they resumed their -march. On the one hand the ragged line of dunes with their draping, -dense or slight, of pines, lindens and oaks; on the other the unruffled -expanse of blue, spreading toward a horizon even less determinate than -before. - -"No, I'm not at all apt," said Cope, returning to his theme; "not even -for self-defense. I suppose I'm pretty sure to get caught some time or -other." - -"Each woman according to her powers and gifts. Varying degrees of -desire, of determination, of dexterity. To be just, I might add a -fourth _d_--devotion." - -"You've run the gauntlet," said Cope. "You seem to have come through -all right." - -"Well," Randolph returned deprecatingly, "I can't really claim ever to -have enlisted any woman's best endeavors." - -"I hope I shall have the same good luck. Of your four _d_'s, it's the -dexterity that gives me the most dread." - -"Yes, the appeal (not always honest) to chivalry,--though devotion is -sometimes a close second. You're manoeuvred into a position where -you're made to think you 'must.' I've known chaps to marry on that -basis.... It's weary waiting until Madame dies and Madonna steps into -her place." - -"Meanwhile, safety in numbers." - -"Yes, even though you're in the very midst of wishing or of -wondering--or of a careful concern to cloak either." - -"Don't dwell on it! You fill me with apprehensions." - -Randolph put up his arm and pointed. A roof through a notch between two -sandhills beyond a long range of them, was seen, set high and half -hidden by the spreading limbs of pines. "There it is," he said. - -"So close, already?" Such, indeed, it appeared. - -"Not so close as it seems. We may just as well step lively." - -Cope, with an abundance of free action, was treading along on the very -edge of things, careless of the rough shingle and indifferent to the -probability of wet feet, and swinging his hat as he went. In some such -spirit, perhaps, advanced young Stoutheart to the ogre's castle. He -even began to foot it a little faster. - -"Well, I can keep up with you yet," thought Randolph. Aloud, he said: -"You've done very well with your hair. Quite an inspiration to have -carried a comb." - -Cope grimaced. - -"I trust I'm free to comb myself on Sunday. There are plenty of others -to do it for me through the week." - - - - -10 - -_COPE AT HIS HOUSE PARTY_ - - -"You look as fit as two fiddles," said Medora Phillips, at the top of -her sandhill. - -"We are," declared Randolph. "Have the rest of the orchestra arrived?" - -"Most of us are here, and the rest will arrive presently. Listen. I -think I hear a honk somewhere back in the woods." - -The big room of the house, made by knocking two small rooms together, -seemed fairly full already, and other guests were on the back porch. -The Graces were there, putting the finishing-touches to the -table--Helga had not come, after all, but had gone instead, with her -young man, to spend a few sunny afternoon hours among the films. And -one of the young business-men present at Mrs. Phillips' dinner was -present here; he seemed to know how to handle the oil-stove and the -pump (with the cooperation of the chauffeur), and how to aid the three -handmaidens in putting on the knives, forks, plates and napkins that -Helga had decided to ignore. The people in the distant motor-car became -less distant; soon they stopped in a clearing at the foot of the hill, -and before long they appeared at the top with a small hamper of -provisions. - -"Oh, why didn't you ask _us_ to bring something!" cried Cope. Randolph -shrugged his shoulders: he saw himself lugging a basket of eatables -through five miles of sand and thicket. - -"You've brought yourself," declared Mrs. Phillips genially. "That's -enough." - -There was room for the whole dozen on the dining-porch. The favored few -in one corner of it could glimpse the blue plane of the lake, or at -least catch the horizon; the rest could look over the treetops toward -the changing colors of the wide marshes inland. And when the feast was -over, the chauffeur took his refreshment off to one side, and then -amiably lent a hand with the dishes. - -"Let me help wipe," cried Cope impulsively. - -"There are plenty of hands to help," returned his hostess. She seemed -to be putting him on a higher plane and saving him for better things. - -One of the better things was a stroll over her tumultuous domain: the -five miles he had already covered were not enough. - -"I'll stay where I am," declared Randolph, who had taken this -regulation jaunt before. He followed Cope to the hook from which he was -taking down his hat. "Admire everything," he counselled in a whisper. - -"Eh?" - -"Adjust yourself to our dominant mood without delay or reluctance. -Praise promptly and fully everything that is ours." - -The party consisted of four or five of the younger people and two or -three of the older. Most of them had taken the walk before; Cope, as a -novice, became the especial care of Mrs. Phillips herself. The way led -sandily along the crest of a wooded amphitheatre, with less stress on -the prospect waterward than might have been expected. Cope was not -allowed, indeed, to overlook the vague horizon where, through the pine -groves, the blue of sky and of sea blended into one; but, under Medora -Phillips' guidance, his eyes were mostly turned inland. - -"People think," she said, "that 'the Dunes' means nothing beyond a -regular row of sandhills following the edge of the water; yet half the -interest and three-quarters of the variety are to be found in behind -them. See my wide marsh, off to the southeast, with those islands of -tamarack here and there, and imagine how beautiful the shadows are -toward sunset. Look at that thick wood at the foot of the slope: do you -think it is flat? No, it's as humpy and hilly as anything ever -traversed. Only this spring a fascinating murderer hid there for weeks, -and last January we could hear the howls of timber-wolves driven down -from Michigan by the cold. And see those tall dead pines rising above -it all. I call them the Three Witches. You'll get them better just a -few paces to the left. This way." She even placed her hand on his elbow -to make sure that her tragic group should appear to highest advantage. -Yes, he was an admirable young man, giving admirable attention; -thrusting out his hat toward prospects of exceptional account and -casting his frank blue eyes into her face between-times. Charmingly -perfect teeth and a wonderful sweep of yellow hair. A highly civilized -faun for her highly sylvan setting. Indifferent, perhaps, to her -precious Trio; but there were other young fellows to look after _them_. - -Cope praised loudly and readily. The region was unique and every view -had its charm--every view save one. Beyond the woods and the hills and -the distant marshes which spread behind all these, there rose on the -bluish horizon a sole tall chimney, with its long black streak of -smoke. Below it and about it spread a vast rectangular structure with -watch-towers at its corners. The chimney bespoke light and heat and -power furnished in quantities--power for many shops, manned by -compulsory workers: a prison, in short. - -"Why, what's that?" asked Cope tactlessly. - -Medora Phillips withheld her eyes and sent out a guiding finger in the -opposite direction. "Only see the red of those maples!" she said; "and -that other red just to the left--the tree with the small, fine leaves -all aflame. Do you know what it is?" - -"I'm afraid not." - -"It's a tupelo. And this shrub, right here?" She took between her -fingers one large, bland indented leaf on a small tree close to the -path. - -Cope shook his head. - -"Why, it's a sassafras. And this?"--she thrust her toe into a thick, -lustrous bed of tiny leaves that hugged the ground. "No, again? That's -kinnikinnick. Oh, my poor boy, you have everything to learn. Brought up -in the country, too!" - -"But, really," said Cope in defense, "Freeford isn't so small as -_that_. And even in the country one may turn by preference to books. -Try me on primroses and date-palms and pomegranates!" - -Medora broke off a branch of sassafras and swished it to and fro as she -walked. "See," she said; "three kinds of leaves on the same tree: one -without lobes, one with a single lobe, and one with two." - -"Isn't Nature wonderful," replied Cope easily. - -Meanwhile the young ladies sauntered along--before or behind, as the -case might be--in the company of the young business-man and that of -another youth who had come out independently on the trolley. They -appeared to be suitably accompanied and entertained. But shiftings and -readjustments ensued, as they are sure to do with a walking-party. Cope -presently found himself scuffling through the thin grass and the briery -thickets alongside the young business-man. He was a clever, -companionable chap, but he declared himself all too soon, even in this -remote Arcadia, as utterly true to type. Cope was not long in feeling -him as operating on the unconscious assumption--unconscious, and -therefore all the more damnable--that the young man in business -constituted, ipso facto, a kind of norm by which other young men in -other fields of endeavor were to be gauged: the farther they deviated -from the standard he automatically set up, the more lamentable their -deficiencies. A few condescending inquiries as to the academic life, -that strange aberration from the normality of the practical and -profitable course which made the ordinary life of the day, and the -separation came. "Enough of _him_!" muttered Cope to himself presently, -and began to cast about for other company. Amy Leffingwell was -strolling along alone: he caught a branch of haw from before her -meditative face and proffered a general remark about the beauty of the -day and the interest in the changing prospect. - -Amy's pretty pink face brightened. "It _is_ a lovely day," she said. -"And the more of this lovely weather we have in October--and especially -in November--the more trouble it makes." - -"Surely you don't want rain or frost?" - -"No; but it becomes harder to shut the house up for good and all. Last -fall we opened and closed two or three times. We even tried coming out -in December." - -"In mackintoshes and rubber boots?" - -"Almost. But the boots are better for February. At least, they would -have been last February." - -"It seems hard to imagine such a future for a place like this,--or such -a past." - -"Things can be pretty rough, I assure you. And the roads are not always -as good as they are to-day." And when the pump froze, she went on, they -had to depend upon the lake; and when the lake froze they had to fall -back on melted snow and ice. And even when the lake didn't freeze, the -blowing waters and the flying sands often heaped up big ridges that -quite cut them off from the open sea. Then they had to prospect along -those tawny hummocks for some small inlet that would yield a few -buckets of frozen spray, keeping on the right side of the deep fissures -that held the threat of icebergs to be cast loose at any moment; "and -sometimes," she added, in search of a little thrill, "we would get back -toward shore to find deep openings with clear water dashing beneath--we -had been walking on a mere snow-crust half the time." - -"Most interesting," said Cope accommodatingly. He saw no winter shore. - -"Yes, February was bad, but Mrs. Phillips wanted to make sure, toward -the end of the winter, that the house hadn't blown away,--nor the -contents; for we have housebreakers every so often. And Hortense wanted -to make some 'color-notes.' I believe she's going to try for some more -to-day." - -"To-day is a good day--unless the October tints are too obvious." - -"She says they are not subtle, but that she can use them." - -Well, here he was, talking along handily enough. But he had no notion -of talking for long about Hortense. He preferred returning to the -weather. - -"And what does such a day do for you?" he asked. - -"Oh, I suppose it helps me in a general way. But _my_ notes, of course, -are on paper already." - -Yes, he was walking alongside her and holding his own--thus far. She -seemed a pretty enough, graceful enough little thing; not so tall by an -inch or so as she appeared when seated behind that samovar. On that day -she had been reasonably sprightly--toward others, even if not toward -him. To-day she seemed meditative, rather; even elegiac--unless there -was a possible sub-acid tang in her reference to Hortense's -color-notes. Aside from that possibility, there was little indication -of the "dexterity" which Randolph had asked him to beware. - -"On paper already?" he repeated. "But not all of them? I know you -compose. You are not saying that you are about to give composition up?" -A forced and awkward "slur," perhaps; but it served. - -She gave a little sigh. "Pupils don't want _my_ pieces," she said. -"Scales; exercises..." - -"I know," he returned. "Themes,--clearness, mass, unity.... It's the -same." - - -They looked at each other and smiled. "We ought not to think of such -things to-day," she said. - -Mrs. Phillips came along, shepherding her little flock for the return. -"But before we _do_ turn back," she adjured them, "just look at those -two lovely spreading pines standing together alone on that far hill." -The small group gazed obediently--though to many of them the prospect -was a familiar one. Yes, there stood two pines, one just a little -taller than the other, and just a little inclined across the other's -top. "A girl out here in August called them Paolo and Francesca. Do you -think," she asked Cope, "that those names are suitable?" - -"Oh, I don't know," he replied, looking at the trees thoughtfully. -"They seem rather--static; and Dante's lovers, if I recollect, had -considerable drive. They were '_al vento_'--on the wind--weren't they? -It might be less violent and more modern to call your trees Pelleas and -Melisande, or--" - -"That's it. That's the very thing!" said Medora Phillips heartily. -"Pelleas and Melisande, of course. That girl had a very ordinary mind." - -"I've felt plenty of wind on the dunes, more than once," interjected -Hortense. - -"Or Darby and Joan," Cope continued. "Not that I'm defending that poor -creature, whoever she was. They seem to be a pretty staid, steady-going -couple." - -"Don't," said Medora. "Too many ideas are worse than too few. They -confuse one." - -And Amy Leffingwell, who had seemed willing to admire him, now looked -at him with an air of plaintive protest. - -"'Darby and Joan'!" muttered Hortense into a sumach bush. "You might as -well call them Jack and Jill!" - -"They're Pelleas and Melisande," declared Mrs. Phillips, in a tone of -finality. "Thank you so much," she said, with a smile that reinstated -Cope after a threatened lapse from favor. - - - - -11 - -_COPE ENLIVENS THE COUNTRY_ - - -As they drew near the house they heard the tones of a gramophone. This -instrument rested flatly on a small table and took the place of a -piano, which would have been a fearful thing to transport from town and -back. It was jigging away merrily enough, with a quick, regular rhythm -which suggested a dance-tune; and when the party re-entered the big -room it was seen that a large corner of the center rug was still turned -back. Impossible that anybody could have been dancing on the Sabbath; -surely everybody understood that the evangelical principles of -Churchton were projected on these occasions to the dunes. Besides, the -only women left behind had been two in their forties; the men in their -company were even older. Medora Phillips looked at Randolph, but he was -staring inexpressively at the opposite wall. She found herself -wondering if there were times when the mere absence of the young served -automatically to make the middle-aged more youthful. - -"Well, we've had a most lovely walk," she declared. She crossed to the -far corner of the room, contriving to turn down the rug as she went, -and opened up a new reservoir of records. She laid them on the table -rather emphatically, as if to say, "_These_ are suited to the day." - -"I hope you're all rested up," she continued, and put one of the new -records on the machine. The air was from a modern opera, true; but it -was slow-going and had even been fitted out with "sacred" words. -Everybody knew it, and presently everybody was humming it. - -"It ought not to be hummed," she declared; "it ought to be sung. You -can sing it, Mr. Cope?" - -"Oh yes, indeed," replied Cope, readily enough. "I have the breath -left, I think,--or I can very soon find it." - -"Take a few minutes. I'll fill in with something else." - -They listened to an inconclusive thing by a wobbling soprano, and then -Mrs. Phillips put the other record back. - -The accompaniment to the air was rather rich and dense, and the general -tone-quality was somewhat blatant. But Cope stood up to it all, and had -the inspiration to treat the new combination as a sort of half-joke. -But he was relieved from the bother of accompanying himself; his -resonance overlaid in some measure the cheap quality of the record's -tone; he contrived to master a degree of momentum to let himself go; -and the general result was good,--much better than his attempt at that -tea. Hortense and Carolyn looked at him with a new respect; and Amy, -who had been willing to admire, now admired openly. Cope ended, gave a -slight grimace, and sauntered away from the table and the instrument. -He knew that he had done rather well. - -"Bravo!" loudly cried one of the ladies, who felt that she was under -suspicion of having taken a step or two in the dance. And, "Oh, my -dear," said Mrs. Phillips to her, sotto voce, "isn't he utterly -charming!" - -Cope wiped his brow. The walk had made him warm, and the singing had -made him warmer. One or two of the women were using chance pamphlets as -fans (despite Mrs. Phillips' ill-concealed doubts), and everybody -showed a willingness to keep in the draught from the open windows. - -"Is it close here?" asked the hostess anxiously. "The day is almost -like summer. If the water is anywhere nearly as warm as the air is.... -Let me see; it's a quarter to four. I have a closetful of bathing -suits, all sizes and shapes and several colors, if anybody cares to go -in." - -"Don't!" cried Cope explosively. - -She looked at him with interest. "Have you been trying it?" - -"I have. On the way along the shore. I assure you, however warm the air -may be, the bathing season is over." - -"Well, I rather thought something had been happening to you. Mr. -Randolph, is it as bad as he says?" - -"I'll take his word," replied Randolph. "And I think all of us had -better do the same." - -"We might go down to the beach, anyway," she said. "Hortense wants to -make her color-notes, and the color will be good from now on." - -Several of the party threaded their way down over the sliding sandy -path which led through the pines and junipers. Cope was willing to go -with the others--on the present understanding. He objected to -promiscuous bathing even more strongly than he objected to promiscuous -dancing. - -There were some new cumuli in the east, out above the water, and they -began to take the late afternoon sun. Hortense cast about for just the -right point of view, with Carolyn to help on "atmosphere" and two young -men to be superserviceable over campstool, sketch-block and box of -colors. She brought back a few dabs which may have served some future -use;--at all events they served as items in a social record. - -Cope and Amy, with some of the others, strolled off in the opposite -direction. The water remained smooth, and some of the men idly skipped -stones. One of them dipped in his hand. "Cold?" he exclaimed; "I should -say!" - -Amy looked admiringly at Cope, as one who had braved, beyond season, -the chill of the great deep, and he tried to reward her with a -"thought" or two. He had skipped stones himself between dips, and -Randolph had made a reflection which he could now revise and employ. - -"See!" he said, as a flat, waveworn piece of slate left the hand of the -young business-man and careered over the water; "one, two, three--six, -eight--ten, thirteen; and then down, down, after all,--down to the -bottom. And so we end--every one of us. The great thing is to crowd in -all the action we can before the final plunge comes--to go skipping and -splashing as hard and long and fast and far as we may!" - -A valuable thought, possibly, and elaborated beyond Randolph's sketchy -and casual utterance; but Amy looked uncomfortable and chilled and -glanced with little favor at a few other flat stones lying at her feet. -"Please don't. Please change the subject," she seemed to ask. - -She changed it herself. "You sang beautifully," she said, with some -return of warmth--even with some approach to fervor. - -"Oh, I can sing," he returned nonchalantly, "if I can only have my -hands in my pockets, or waving in the air, or anywhere but on a -keyboard." - -"I wish you had let them persuade you to sing another." She was not -only willing to admire, but desirous: conscientious amends, perhaps, -for an earlier verdict. "One or two more skips, you know, after getting -started." - -"Oh, once was enough. A happy coincidence. The next might have been an -unhappy one." - -"You have never learned to accompany yourself?" - -"As you've seen, I'm a rather poor hand at it; I've depended a good -deal on others. Or, better, on another." - -She looked at him earnestly. "Have you ever sung to an obbligato?" - -"None of my songs, thus far, has called for one. An obbligato? Never so -much honored. No, indeed. Why, to me it would seem almost like singing -with an orchestra. Imagine a 'cello. Imagine a flute--still I'm not a -soprano going mad. Or imagine a saxophone; that might be droll." - -He gave out a sort of dragging bleat. She did not smile; perhaps she -felt such an approach to waggery unworthy of him. Perhaps she was -holding him up to the dignity of the natural scene, and to the -importance of the occasion as she conceived it. - -Cope had no desire to figure as a comique, and at once regained -sobriety. "Of course," he admitted, "we are not at a _thé dansant_ or a -cabaret. Such things ought not to be thought of--here." - -She turned her eyes on him again, with a new look of sympathy and -understanding. Perhaps understanding between them had failed or lapsed -but a moment before. - -"How all of this shames the town!" she said. - -"And us--if we misbehave," he added. - -Mrs. Phillips came scurrying along, collecting her scattered guests, as -before. "Tea!" she said. "Tea for one or two who must make an early -start back to town. Also a sip and a bite for those who stay." - -She moved along toward Hortense and her little group. Hortense's -"color-notes" did not appear to amount to much. Hortense seemed to have -been "fussed"--either by an excess of company and of help, or by some -private source of discontent and disequilibrium. - -"Come," Mrs. Phillips cried to her, "I need every Martha to lend a -hand." Hortense rose, and one of her young men picked up her campstool. - -"So glad you haven't got to go early," said Mrs. Phillips to Randolph -and Cope. "In fact, you might stay all night. It will be warm, and -there are cots and blankets for the porch." - -"Thanks, indeed," said Cope. "But I have a class at eight-fifteen -to-morrow morning, and they'll be waiting to hear about the English -Novel in the Eighteenth Century, worse luck! Fielding and Richardson -and--" - -"Are you going to explain Pamela and Clarissa to them?" asked Hortense. -She was abrupt and possibly a bit scornful. - -Cope seemed to scent a challenge and accepted it. "I am. The women may -figure on the covers, but the men play their own strong part through -the pages." - -"I seem to recall," contributed Mrs. Phillips, "that Sir Charles -Grandison figured both ways." - -"That prig!" said Hortense. - -"Well, if you can't stay overnight," Mrs. Phillips proceeded, "at least -stay a few hours for the moonlight. The moon will be almost full -to-night, and the walk across the marshes to the trolley-line ought to -be beautiful. Or Peter could run you across in eight or ten minutes." - -She did not urge Randolph to remain in the absence of Cope, though -Randolph's appearance at his office at ten in the morning would have -surprised no one, and have embarrassed no one. - -Tea was served before the big fireplace in which a small flame to heat -the kettle was rising. Randolph set his empty cup on the shelf above. - -"Notice," said Mrs. Phillips to him, "that poem of Carolyn's just -behind your cup: 'Summer Day in Duneland'." It was a bit of verse in a -narrow black frame, and the mat was embellished with pen-and-ink -drawings of the dunes, to the effect of an etching. An etcher, in fact, -a man famous in his field, had made them, Mrs. Phillips explained. - -"And at the other end of the shelf," she advised him, "is a poem in -free verse, done by a real journalist who was here in June. See: -'Homage to Dunecrest'--written with a blue pencil on a bit of -driftwood." - -"Sorry _we_ can't leave any souvenir behind," said Cope, who had stolen -up and was looking at the "poem" over Randolph's shoulder. "But one -must (first) be clever; and one must (second) know how to put his -cleverness on record." - -"I shall remember _your_ record," she returned with emphasis. Cope -smiled deprecatingly; but he felt sure that he had sung well. - -The moonlight, when it came, was all that Medora Phillips had promised. -There was another stroll on the beach, with Cope between Medora and -Carolyn. Then he and Randolph took the causeway across the marsh, -stopped the trolley by burning a newspaper on the track, and started on -the long trip home. - -As the car ran along jerkily from station to station, the earlier void -of Duneland became peopled indeed. The extraordinarily mild day had -drawn out hundreds--had given the moribund summer-excursion season a -new lease of life. Every stoppage brought so many more young men in -soiled khaki, with shapeless packs on their backs, and so many more wan -maidens, no longer young, who were trying, in little bands, to capture -from Nature the joys thus far denied by domestic life; and at one -station a belated squad of the "Lovers of Landscape"--some forty or -fifty in all--came flooding in with the day's spoils: masses of asters -and goldenrod, with the roots as often as not; festoons of bittersweet, -and sheaves of sumach and golden glow; and one ardent spirit staggered -in under the weight of an immense brown paper bag stuffed with prickly -pear. As the tight-packed company slid along, children drowsed or -whimpered, short-tempered young men quarreled with the conductor, -elderly folk sat in squeezed, plaintive resignation.... Soon the lights -of foundry fires began to show on the sky; then people started dropping -off in the streets of towns enlivened by the glitter of many saloons -and an occasional loud glare from the front of a moving-picture -theater.... - -Through these many miles Randolph and Cope sat silent: there seemed to -be a tacit agreement that they need no longer exert themselves to -entertain each other. Cope reached home shortly before midnight. By -next morning many of the doings of the previous day had quite passed -from his mind. Yet a few firm impressions remained. He had had a good -swim, if but a brief one, with a companion who had been willing, even -if not bold; he had imposed an acceptable nomenclature upon a somewhat -anonymous landscape; and, in circumstances slightly absurd, or at least -unfavorable, he had done his voice and his method high credit in song. -All else went for next to nothing. - - - - -12 - -_COPE AMIDST CROSS-PURPOSES_ - - -Next morning's mail brought Cope a letter from Arthur Lemoyne. The -letter was short--at least when compared with Cope's own plentiful -pennings; but it gave our young instructor a few points to think about -while he was illuminating Clarissa Harlowe and making some careful -comments on Joseph Andrews. Released toward noon, he read the letter -over again; and he ran over it again during lunch. Lemoyne possessed a -variety of gifts, but the gift of letter-writing, in an extended form, -was not among them. He said all he had to say in four moderate pages. - -"Yours received," he wrote. "Am glad the year has opened up so -interestingly for you. Of course I want to come down as soon as I can, -_if_ I can, and be with you." - -Well, the "if," as the latter part of the letter indicated, was not -likely to prove insurmountable. The assurance that he wanted to come -was grateful, though superfluous: who had supposed for a moment that he -didn't? Still, the thing, put down in plain black and white, had its -look of comfort. - -"Of course the business is not gaining much through my connection with -it. I expect father begins to see _that_, pretty plainly. As for the -cathedral choir and the dramatic club and all the rest, I am willing to -throw them over--expecting that larger interests can be opened to me by -you."... - -Cope paused on these points. He had suggested that Lemoyne enroll as a -student in some slight course or other, with the hope that his voice -might lead to his wearing cap and gown at chapel services and that his -dramatic experience might give him some role in the annual operetta. In -either of these quarters a good tenor voice was usually to seek. And as -for the business.... Well, he had once overheard the elder Lemoyne's -partner audibly wonder whether Arthur would ever learn how to ship a -keg of nails out of their back door, even. - -Cope pushed away his coffee-cup and asked the young Greek for a cut of -pie. - - -"I sort of sounded father the other day, but he was pretty huffy. I'll -try again, soon; but I doubt if I can manage to come down until after -the holidays. You begin a new term, then, I suppose. The fact is, I -took a week off in the middle of September, and father hasn't forgiven -it. One of our fellows in the choir had just bought a little roadster, -and he invited me for a trip to Green Bay and beyond. We dipped along -through Fish Creek, Ephraim, and so on. Good weather, good roads, good -scenery, good hotels; and a pleasant time was had by all--or, rather, -by both."... - -Cope dwelt darkly on this passage. Arthur was flighty; Arthur was -volatile; Arthur was even fickle, when the mood took him. Some -arrangement that partook more of the hard-and-fast was needed. But -there was comfort--of a kind--in the next passage. - -"Though father, at best, will do very little, and though I have just -now little enough of my own, there may be somebody or other among your -faculty or trustees who could find me a niche in the college library or -in the registrar's office. Or have all such posts been snapped up by -Johnnys-on-the-spot? A small weekly stipend would rather help our -_ménage,--hein_?" - -This definite inquiry (which carried its own answer) seemed to drive -one or two brass tacks with some definiteness. Cope himself was eking -out his small salary with a small allowance from home; next year, with -the thesis accomplished, better pay in some better place. A present -partner and pal ought to be a prop rather than a drag: however welcome -his company, he must bear his share. - -"Look about a bit for quarters," Lemoyne went on, drawing toward his -conclusion. "I presume room-rent is little more for two than for one. -Possibly," he put down in an afterthought, "I might get a job in the -city;" and then, "with warm regards," he came to a close as "Art." - -Cope finished his lunch and walked out. If Arthur could do one thing -better than another, it was to make coffee; his product was assuredly -better than the Greek's. The two had camped out more than once on the -shores of Lake Winnebago, and Arthur had deftly managed the -commissariat. They had had good times together and had needed no other -company. How had it been on Green Bay--at Eagle Cliff and Apron Bluff -and all the other places lately celebrated in lithographed "folders" -and lately popularized by motorists? And who was the particular -"fellow" who ran the roadster? - -Late that afternoon Cope chanced upon Randolph among the fantastic -basins and floral parterres of the court in front of the Botany -building: Randolph had had a small matter for one of the deans. -Together they sauntered over to the lake. From the edge of the bluff -they walked out upon the concrete terrace above the general boiler-room -and its dynamos. Alongside this, the vast tonnage of coal required for -the coming winter was beginning to pile up. The weather was still mild -and sunny and the lake was as valiantly blue as ever. - -"It doesn't look like the same body of water, does it?" said Cope. - -"It might be just as beautiful in its own way, here, as we found it -yesterday, out there," returned Randolph. "I've asked my -brother-in-law, I don't know how many times, why they can't do better -by this unfortunate campus and bring it all up to a reasonable level of -seemliness. But----" - -"You have a relative among the----?" - -"Yes, my sister's husband is one of the University trustees. But he -lives miles from this spot and hardly ever sees it. Besides, his -aesthetic endowments are not beyond those of the average university -trustee. Sometimes they're as hard on Beauty as they are on Free -Speech." - -"I see they're hard on beauty; and I may live to find free speech -mauled, too." - -"Well, you're not in Sociology or Economics. Still, don't trifle with a -long-established aesthetic idol either. Trustees--and department -heads--are conservative." - -"Oh, you mean about----?" - -"About your immortal William. He wrote them. Don't try to rob him. -Don't try to knock him off his pedestal." - -"Oh, you're thinking about my thesis. What I said about Warwickshire -was just a little flight of fancy, I guess,--a bit of doorstep travel. -I'm likely enough to stay where I am." - -"Well, how about the thesis, really?" - -"I think I shall end by digging something out of Here and Now. 'Our -Middle-West School of Fiction,'--what would you think of that?" - -"H'm! If you can make it seem worth while...." - -"Well, can't I?" - -"Your work, from the very nature of it, must be critical. Now the -critic, nine times out of ten, takes down a volume from its established -shelf, dusts it off, ruffles the leaves a bit, and then puts it back -where it was. The ruffling is sometimes very nice and interesting and -often gives the ruffler a good position in the glorious company of -earlier rufflers----" - -"I shouldn't be satisfied with anything like that. Things have got to -move. I want to take some recent, less-known men and put _them_ on the -shelves." - -"Yet you don't want to waste work on material which time may show as of -transient value, or of none." - -"A fellow must chance it. Who gives quickly gives twice;--I suppose -that applies to praise as well as to money. It irks me to find more -praise bestowed on the praised-enough,--even on groups of secondary -importance, sometimes just because they are remote (in England, -perhaps), and so can be treated with an easy objectivity. To dig in -your own day and your own community is harder, but I should feel it -more rewarding." - -"But aren't the English books really better? Haven't they more depth, -substance and background?" - -"Possibly,--according to the conventions they themselves have -established--and according to the society they depict." - -"Well, Academe hasn't nailed you yet!" - -"No; and I hope it won't. I should like to write a whole book about our -new men." - -"But don't write a thesis and then expect to publish it with profit -_as_ a book. That's a common enough expectation--or temptation." - -They turned away from the lake terrace and the imposing coal-pile. -Cope, Randolph saw, was in quite a glow; a generous interest had -touched him, putting fresh light into his eyes and a new vigor into his -step. He had displayed a charming enthusiasm, and a pure, disinterested -one. Randolph, under a quiet exterior, was delighted. He liked the boy -better than ever, and felt more than ever prompted to attach him to -himself. - -"How are you pleased with your present quarters?" he asked, as they -returned through the Botany court. He thought of the narrow couch, the -ink-spotted cover on the deal table, the few coats and shoes (they -_couldn't_ be many) behind that calico curtain. - -"None too well," replied Cope. "I shall soon begin to look for another -room. I rather expect to change about holiday time." - -"I am thinking of making a change too," declared Randolph. - -"Why, could you better yourself?" asked Cope, in a tone of surprise. "I -never knew a bachelor to be better fixed." - -"I need a little wider margin of room. I can afford it, and ought to -have had it long ago. And I learn that the lease of the people I'm with -expires in the spring. My collection is growing; and I ought to have -another bedroom. Think of not being able to put a man up, on occasion! -I shall take a small apartment on my own account, catch some Oriental -who is studying frogs' legs or Occidental theology; and then--open -house. In a moderate measure, of course." - -"That listens good--as the young fellows say," replied Cope. "A not -uncommon ideal, possibly; but I'm glad that some man, now and then, is -able to realize it." - -"I should hope to see you there," said Randolph intently. - -"Thank you, indeed. Yes, while my time lasts. But my own lease is like -your landlord's--short. Next year,--who knows where?" - -"Why not here?" - -"Oh!" Cope shrugged, as if conscious of the need of something better, -and of presently deserving it. "Some big university in the East?" -wondered Randolph to himself. Well, the transfer, if it came, was still -a long way ahead. - -As he walked home to dinner he entertained himself by imagining his new -regime. There would be an alert, intelligent Jap, who, in some -miraculous way, could "do for him" between his studies. There would be -a cozy dining-room where three or four fellows could have a snug little -dinner, with plenty of good talk during it and after it. There would -be, finally, a convenient little spare room, wherein a young knight, -escaped from some "Belle Dame sans Merci," might lean his sword against -the wardrobe, prop his greaves along the baseboard, lay his steel -gauntlets neatly on the top of the dresser, fold his hands over the -turned-down sheet of a neat three-quarter-width brass bedstead, and -with a satisfied sigh of utter well-being pass away into sleep. Such -facilities, even if they scarcely equaled a chateau on the Ridge or a -villa among the Dunes, might serve. - -Cope, on his own way to dinner, indulged in parallel imaginings. He saw -a larger room than his present, with more furniture and better; a -bookcase instead of a shelf; a closet, and hot and cold water in some -convenient alcove; a second table, with a percolator on it, at which -Arthur, who was a light sleeper and willingly an early riser, might -indulge his knack for coffee-making to the advantage of them both. And -Arthur had the same blessed facility with toast. - -Then his thoughts made an excursion toward Randolph. Here was a man who -was in business in the city, and who was related, by marriage, to the -board of trustees. How soon might one feel sufficiently well acquainted -with him to ask his friendly offices in behalf of the new-comer,--the -man who might reasonably be expected the first week in January? - - - - -13 - -_COPE DINES AGAIN--AND STAYS AFTER_ - - -Medora Phillips' social activities ran through several social strata -and her entertainments varied to correspond. Sometimes she contented -herself with mere boy-and-girl affairs, which were thrown together from -material gathered within her own household and from the humbler walks -of undergraduate life. Sometimes she entertained literary celebrities, -and invited the head professors and their wives to meet them. And two -or three times a season she gave real dinners to "society," summoning -to Ashburn avenue, from homes even more architectural than her own, the -banking and wholesale families whose incomes were derived from the -city, but who pillared both the university and the many houses of -worship in Churchton itself. And sometimes, when she passed over the -older generation of these families in favor of the younger, her courses -were more "liberal" than Churchton's earlier standards quite approved. - -On such formal occasions her three young ladies were dispensed with. -They were encouraged to go to some sorority gathering or to some -fudge-party. On the occasion now meditated she had another young person -in mind. This was the granddaughter of one of the banking families; the -girl might come along with her father and mother. She was not very -pretty, not very entertaining; however, Mrs. Phillips needed one girl, -and if she were not very attractive, none the worse. The one girl was -for the one young man. The one young man was to be Bertram Cope. Our -fond lady meant to have him and to show him off, sure that her choicest -circle could not but find him as charming as she herself did. Most of -us, at one time or another, have thrust forward our preferences in the -same confident way. - -Cope made less of an impression than his patroness had hoped for. -Somehow his lithe youthfulness, his fine hair and teeth and eyes, the -rich resonance of his voice counted for little--except, perhaps, with -the granddaughter. The middle-aged people about him were used to young -college men and indifferent to them. Cope himself felt that he was in a -new environment, and a loftier one. Several of these were important -people, with names familiar through the town and beyond. He employed a -caution that almost became inexpressiveness. He also found Mrs. -Phillips a shade more formal and stately than her wont. She herself, in -her furtive survey of the board, was disappointed to find that he was -not telling. "Perhaps it's that girl," she thought; "she may be even -duller than I supposed." But never mind; all would be made right later. -Some music had been arranged and there would be an accompanist who -would help him do himself full justice. - -"They'll enjoy him," she thought confidently. - -She had provided an immensity of flowers. There was an excess of light, -both from electric bulbs and from candles. And there was wine. - -"I think I can have just one kind, for once," she had said to herself. -"I know several houses where they have two,--Churchton or not,--and at -least one where they sometimes have three. If this simple town thinks I -can put grape-juice and Apollinaris before such people as these...." -Besides, the interesting Cope might interestingly refuse! - -As the many courses moved on, Cope smelt the flowers, which were too -many, and some of them too odoriferous; he blinked at the lights and -breathed the heavy thickening air; and he took--interestingly--a few -sips of burgundy,--for he was now in Rome, and no longer a successful -Protestant in some lesser town of the empire. He had had a hard, close -day of it, busy indoors with themes and with general reading; and he -recalled being glad that the dinner had begun with reasonable -promptitude,--for he had bothered with no lunch beyond a glass of milk -and a roll. To-night there had been everything,--even to an unnecessary -entree. He laid down a spoon on his plate, glad that the frozen -pudding--of whatever sort--was disposed of. Too much of everything -after too little. The people opposite were far away; their murmuring -had become a mumbling, and he wished it was all over. The granddaughter -at his elbow was less rewarding than ever, less justificatory of the -effortful small-talk which he had put forth with more and more labor, -and which he could scarcely put forth now at all. What was it he was -meaning to do later? To sing? Absurd! Impossible! His head ached; he -felt faint and dizzy.... - -"We will leave you gentlemen to your cigars," he heard a distant voice -saying; and he was conscious for an instant that his hostess was -looking down the table at him with a face of startled concern.... - -"Don't try to lead him out," a deep voice said. "Lay him on the floor." - -He felt himself lowered; some small rug was doubled and redoubled and -placed under his head; a large, firm hand was laid to his wrist; and -something--a napkin dipped in a glass of water and then folded?--was -put to his forehead. - -"His pulse will come up in a minute," he heard the same deep voice say. -"If he had taken a step he would have fainted altogether." - -"My poor, dear boy! Whatever in the world...!" Thus Medora Phillips. - -"Better not be moved for a little," was the next pronouncement. - -Cope lay there inert, but reasonably conscious of what was going on. -His eyes gave him no aid, but his ears were open. He heard the alarmed -voice of Medora Phillips directing the disconcerted maids, and the -rustle and flutter of the garments of other daughters of Eve, who had -found him interesting at last. They remarked appreciatively on his -pallor; and one of them said, next day, before forgetting him -altogether, that, with his handsome profile (she mentioned especially -his nose and chin) and with his colorlessness, he looked for a moment -like an ancient cameo. - -He knew, now, that he was not going to faint, and that he was in better -case than he seemed. In the circumstances he found nothing more -original to say than: "I shall be all right in no time; just a touch of -dizziness...." He was glad his dress-coat could stand inspection, and -hoped nobody would notice that his shoes had been half-soled.... - -After a little while he was led away to a couch in the library. The -deep-voiced doctor was on one side of him and Medora Phillips on the -other. Soon he was left alone to recuperate in the dark,--alone, save -for one or two brief, fluttery appearances by Mrs. Phillips herself, -who allowed the coffee to be passed without any supervision on her own -part. - -On the second of these visitations he found voice to say: - -"I'm so sorry for this--and so ashamed. I can't think how it could have -happened." - -He _was_ ashamed, of course. He had broken up an entertainment pretty -completely! Servants running about for him when they had enough to do -for the company at large! All the smooth conventions of dinner-giving -violently brushed the wrong way! He had fallen by the roadside, a young -fellow who had rather prided himself on his health and vigor. Pitiful! -He was glad to lie in the dark with his eyes shut tight, tight. - -If he had been fifteen or twenty years older he might have taken it all -rather more lightly. Basil Randolph, now----But Randolph had not been -invited, though his sister and her husband were of the company. Yet had -it been Randolph, he would have smiled a wan smile and tried for a mild -joke, conscious that he had made an original and picturesque -contribution to the affair,--had broken the bland banality of routined -dinner-giving and had provided woman with a mighty fine chance to -"minister" and fuss: a thing she rather enjoyed doing, especially if a -hapless, helpless man had been delivered into her hands as a subject. - -But there was no such consolation for poor abashed Cope. He had -disclosed himself, for some reason or other, a weakling; and he had -weakened at a conspicuously wrong time and in a conspicuously mistaken -place. He had hoped, over the cigars and coffee, to lay the foundation -of an acquaintance with the brother-in-law who was a trustee,--to set -up an identity in this influential person's mind as a possible help to -the future of Arthur Lemoyne. But the man now in the dining-room, or -the drawing-room, or wherever, might as well be in the next state. - -There came a slight patter of rain on the bay-window near his head. He -began to wonder how he was to get home. - -Meanwhile, in the drawing-room, among the ladies, Mrs. Phillips was -anxiously asking: "Was the room too warm? Could the wine have been too -much for him?" And out in the dining-room itself, one man said, "Heaven -knows just how they live;" and another, "Or what they eat, or don't -eat;" and a third, "Or just how hard these young beginners are driven." - -"Ought he to go out to-night, Doctor?" asked Mrs. Phillips in a -whisper, appearing in the dining-room door. - -"He might better stay if he can," replied the authority, who happened -to be at the nearer end of the table. - -"Of course he can," she returned. Of course there was a room for him. - -When the party finally reassembled in the drawing-room Cope had -disappeared. Mrs. Phillips could now enlarge on his attractiveness as a -singer, and could safely assure them--what she herself believed--that -they had lost a really charming experience. "If you could only have -heard him that Sunday!" she concluded. - -Cope had said, of course, "I can get home perfectly well," and, "It's a -shame for me to be putting you out this way," and so on and on,--the -things you yourself would have said in the circumstances; but he said -them with no particular spirit, and was glad, as he walked uncertainly -up stairs, that he had not far to go. - -Mrs. Phillips indeed "had a room for him." She had rooms a-plenty. -There was the chintz chamber on the third floor, where the Irish poet -(who seemed not to expect very much for himself) had been put; and -there was the larger, handsomer chamber on the second floor, where the -Hindoo philosopher (who had loomed up big and important through a vague -Oriental atmosphere) had been installed in state. It was a Louis Quinze -room, and the bed had a kind of silken canopy and a great deal too much -in the way of bolsters and lace coverings. It was thought that the -Hindoo, judging from the report of the maid next morning, had been -moved by some ascetic impulse to sleep not in the bed but on the floor -beside it. This was the room now destined for Cope; surely one flight -of stairs was enough. But there must be no further practice of -asceticism,--least of all by a man who was really ill; so Mrs. -Phillips, snatching a moment from her guests, herself saw the maid -remove the lace pillow-shams and coverlet, and turn down the sheets, -and set the thermos-bottle on the stand beside the reading lamp.... - -"Don't get up a moment earlier than you feel like doing," she said, at -the door. "Breakfast----" - -"To-morrow is one of my busy days," replied Cope wanly. "Goldsmith, -Sheridan...." - -"Well, we have other wage-workers in the house, you know. At -seven-thirty, then, if you must." - -"Seven-thirty, if you please. Thank you." - -By the time Mrs. Phillips had returned to her guests, the first of the -limousines was standing before the house; its wet top shone under an -electric globe. Her own car, meanwhile, obdurately reposed in its -garage. Presently a second limousine joined the first, and a third the -second; and in another quarter of an hour her guests were well on their -way to dispersal. She bade them all goodnight in the best of good humor. - -"You've never before had quite such an evening as this, I'm sure!" she -said, with great gaiety. - -"Isn't it wonderful how she took it all!" said one lady to another, on -the back seat of her car. "Anything like that would have thrown me off -completely." - -The other lady laughed amusedly. She often found our Medora "great fun." - -Meanwhile, Cope, up stairs, was sinking deeper and deeper into his big, -wide, overupholstered bed. And as his body sank, his spirit sank with -it. He felt poor, unimportant, ill at ease. In especial, he felt -greatly subordinated; he wished that he might have capitulated to a -man. Then the mystery of handsome houses and of handsome furnishings -came to harass him. Such things were everywhere: how were they got, how -were they kept? Should he himself ever----? But no; nothing ahead for -years, even in the most favorable of circumstances, save an assistant -professorship, with its inconceivably modest emoluments.... - -And Medora Phillips, in the stir of getting her guests out of the -house, had her first vision of him as sinking off to sleep. Somehow or -other his fine, straight yellow hair retained its backward sweep with -no impairment by reason of turnings and tossings; his clear profile -continued to keep itself disengaged from any depression in the pillows; -his slender hands were laid in quiet symmetry over the wide edge of the -down-turned coverlet. A decorous, unperturbed young old-master ... Van -Eyck ... Carpaccio.... - -Cope came down to breakfast a little pale, a little shamefaced; but he -felt pretty well revived and he made up in excess of speech and action -what he essentially lacked in spirit. Mrs. Phillips descended as early -as the three girls,--earlier, in fact, than Hortense, who entered -informally through the butler's pantry and apparently in full -possession of last night's facts. Carolyn inquired civilly after his -condition; Amy Leffingwell, with her blue eyes intent upon him, -expressed concern and sympathy; Hortense, with her lips closely shut in -a satirical smile, said nothing at all: a possible exhibition of -self-control which gave her aunt some measure of solicitude. It was not -always well when she talked, and it was not always well when she kept -silent. Mrs. Phillips pressed the toast upon him and recommended the -grape-fruit. He took both with satisfaction, and a second cup of -coffee. With that he felt he could easily walk to his class-room; and -the walk itself, in the fresh morning air, would brace him further for -his hours of routine with his students. - -"What a regular nuisance I've made of myself!" he said, on leaving the -house. - -"Oh, haven't you, just!" exclaimed Mrs. Phillips joyously. - -"Your name as an entertainer will be all over town! I'm sure you gave -some of those poky people a real touch of novelty!" - -Amy Leffingwell was in the front hall at the same time, with her -music-roll. They were going the same way, to substantially the same -place, to meet about the same hour in the day's schedule. They went -along the street together. - -The morning air was brisk and cool after last night's shower. Like the -trees under which they passed, it gave the first decided intimation of -autumn. They set off at a lively pace toward the college towers and the -lake. - -Cope was soon sailing along with his head high, his trim square -shoulders much in action, and his feet throwing themselves spiritedly -here and there. Amy, who was not very tall, kept up as well as she -could. - -"This isn't too fast for you...?" she asked presently. - -"No; but it may be a little too fast for you. Excuse me; I've never -learned to keep pace with a woman. But as for myself, I never felt -better in my life. Every yard toward the good old lake"--the wind was -coming down from the north in a great sweep--"makes me feel finer." - -He slowed up appreciably. - -"Oh, not for me!" she said in deprecation. "I like a brisk morning walk -as well as anybody. Did you sing at all?" she asked. - -"Not a note. They put the soft pedal on me. They 'muted' me," he -amended, in deference to her own branch of the profession. - -"We came in by the side door about half past nine. It was a dull -meeting. I listened for you. Somebody was playing." - -Cope gave a sly smile. - -"It must have been the poor disappointed woman who was to have -accompanied me. She had had a list of three or four of my things--to -run them over in her own album, I suppose. Think just how disappointed -she must have been to find that she had the whole field to herself!" - -"Oh, musicians--even we poor, despised professionals--are not all like -that. If it had been arranged for me to accompany you with an -obbligato, I shouldn't have been pleased if opportunity had failed me." - -"Your contribution would have been more important than hers. And your -substitution for my failure would have given added interest." - -The talk, having reached the zone of arid compliment, tended to -languish. They had now reached Learning's side of the trolley-tracks, -and rills in the great morning flood of the scholastic life were -beginning to gather about them and to unite in a rolling stream which -flowed toward the campus. - - -Two or three streets on, the pair separated, she to her work, he to -his. For him the walk had been a nothing in particular--he would a -little have preferred taking it alone. For her it had been--despite the -low level of expressiveness reached on either side--a privilege which -had been curtailed much too soon. - -Meanwhile, back in the house, Hortense was detailing the events of the -previous evening to Joe Foster; the general access of activity on the -morning after had made it desirable that she help with his breakfast. - -She went at it with a will. - -"Why," she said, as Foster sat at his coffee, boiled egg and toast, "he -keeled over like a baby." - -"Hum!" said Foster darkly. It was as if a shaping ideal had dissipated. -Or as if a trace of weakness in one seemingly so young and strong was -not altogether unacceptable as a source of consolation. - -However, Cope, at half past four that afternoon, was on the faculty -tennis-courts, with a racquet in his hand. But one set was enough. "I -seem to be a day ahead of my schedule," he said, pulling out and -strolling along homeward. - - - - -14 - -_COPE MAKES AN EVASION_ - - -Two or three days later, Randolph put a book of essays in his pocket -and went round to spend an hour with Joseph Foster. Foster sat in his -wheeled chair in his own room. He was knitting. The past year or two -had brought knitting-needles into countenance for men, and he saw no -reason why he should not put a few hanks of yarn into shape useful for -himself. He might not have full command of his limbs nor of his eyes, -but he did have full command of his fingers. He had begun to knit socks -for his own use; and even a muffler, in the hope that on some occasion, -during the coming months, he might get outside. - -As Randolph entered, Foster looked up from under his green shade with -an expression of perplexity. "Have I dropped a stitch here or not?" he -asked. "I wish you knew something about knitting; I don't like to call -Medora or one of the girls away up here to straighten me out. Look; -what do you think?" - -"They count all right," said Randolph; and he sat down on the couch -opposite. "I've brought a book." - -"I hope it's poetry!" said Foster, with a fierce promptness. "I hope -it's about Adonis, or Thammuz, whose mishap 'in Lebanon' set all the -Syrian females a-going. I could stand a lot more of that,--or perhaps I -couldn't!" - - -"Why, Joe, what's gone wrong?" - -"I suppose you know that your young friend got up a great to-do for us -the other evening?" - -"Yes; I've heard something about it." He looked at Foster's drawn face, -and heard with surprise the rasping note in his voice. "Was it as bad -as that?" - - -Foster drew his shade down farther over his eyes and clashed his -needles together. - -"I remember how, when I was in Florence, we went out to a religious -festival one evening at some small hill-town near by. This was twenty -years ago, when I _could_ travel. There was a kind of grotto in the -church, under the high altar; and in the grotto was a full-sized figure -of a dead man, carved and painted--and covered with wounds; and round -that figure half the women and girls of the town were collected, -stroking, kissing ... Adonis all over again!" - -"Oh, come, Joe; don't get morbid." - -Foster lifted one shoulder. - -"Well, the young fellow began by roaring through the house like a bull -of Bashan, and he ended by toppling over like a little wobbly calf." - -He spoke like a man who had imagined a full measure of physical powers -and had envied them ... had been exasperated by the exuberant -presentation of them... had felt a series of contradictory emotions -when they had seemed to fail.... - -"It was only a moment of dizziness," said Randolph. "I imagine he was -fairly himself next day." - -"Well, I've heard too much about it. Medora came up here and----" - -"Need we go into that?" - -"There were plenty more to help," Foster went on doggedly. "One dear -creature, who was old enough to be more cautious, spilt water down the -whole front of her dress----" - -"I expect," said Randolph, "that the poor chap has been overworked; or -careless about his meals; or worried in his classes--for he may not be -fully settled in his new place; or some emotional strain may have set -itself up----" - -"I vote for the emotional strain," said Foster bluntly. - -"A guess in the dark," commented Randolph, and paused. He himself knew -little enough of Cope as a complex. He had met him but a few times, and -could not associate him with his unknown background. He knew next to -nothing of Cope's family, his connections, his intimates, his early -associations and experiences. Nor had he greatly bestirred himself to -learn. He had done little more than go to a library in the city and -turn over the leaves of the Freeford directory. This publication, like -most of those dealing with the smaller cities, gave separately the -names of all the members of a family; and repetitions of the same -address helped toward the arrangement of these individuals (disposed -alphabetically) into family groups. Freeford had no great number of -Copes, and several of them lived at 1636 Cedar Street. "Elm, Pine, -Locust, Cedar," had thought Randolph; "the regular set." And, "One of -the good streets," he surmised, "but rather far out. Cedar!" he -repeated, and thought of Lebanon and the Miltonic Adonis. Of these -various Copes, "Cope, David L., bookpr," might be the father,--unless -"Cope, Leverett C., mgr" were the right man. If the former, he was -employed by the Martin & Graves Furniture Company, and the Martins were -probably important people who lived far out--and handsomely, one might -guess--on a Prospect Avenue.... Then there was "Cope, Miss Rosalys M., -schooltchr," same address as "David": she was likely his daughter. -"H'm!" Randolph had thought, "these pickings are scanty,--enough -anatomical reconstruction for to-day...." And now he was thinking, as -he sat opposite Foster, "If I had only picked up another bone or two, I -might really have put together the domestic organism. Yet why should I -trouble? It would all be plain, humdrum prose, no doubt. Glamour -doesn't spread indefinitely. And then--men's brothers...." - -"Well," asked Foster sharply, "are you mooning? Medora sat in the same -place yesterday, and she talked for awhile too and then fell into a -moonstruck silence. What's it all about?" - -Randolph came out of his reverie. "Oh, I was just hoping the poor boy -was back on his pins all right again." - -Then he dropped back into thought. He was devising an outing designed -to restore Cope to condition. If Cope could arrange for a free -Saturday, they might contrive a week-end from Friday afternoon to -Monday morning. It was too late for the north and too late for the -opposite Michigan shore; but there was "down state" itself, where the -days grew warmer and the autumn younger the farther south one went. -There was a trip down a certain historic river,--historic, as our -rivers went, and admirably scenic always. He recalled an exceptional -hotel on one of its best reaches; one overrun in midsummer, but -doubtless quiet at this season. It stood in the midst of some striking -cliffs and gorges; and possibly one of the little river-steamers was in -commission, or could be induced to run.... - -Foster dropped his muffler pettishly. "Read,--if you won't talk!" - -"I can talk all right," returned Randolph. "In fact, I have a bit of -news for you." - -"What is it?" - -"I'm going to move." - -Foster peered out from under his shade. - -"Move? What for? I thought you were all right where you are. - -"All right enough; except that I want more room--and a house of my own." - -"Have you found one?" - -"I've about decided on an apartment. And I expect to move into it early -next month." - -"Top floor, of course?" - -"No; first floor, not six feet above the street level." - -"Good. If they'll lend me a hand here, to get down and out, I'll come -and see you, now and then." - -"Do so." - -"That will give me a chance to wear this muffler, after all." - -"So it will." - -"Well, be a little more cordial. You expect to see your friends, don't -you?" - -"Of course. That's what it's for. Have I got to exert myself," he -added, "to be cordial with _you_?" - -"What's the neighborhood?" - -"Oh, this one, substantially. The next street from where I am now." - -"Housekeeper?" - -"I think I'll have a Jap alone, at first." - -"Dinners?" - -"A few small try-outs, perhaps." - -"Mixed parties?" - -"Not at the beginning, anyhow." - -"Oh; bachelor's hall." - -"About that." - -Foster readjusted his shade, and drove his needles into his ball of -yarn. - -"Complete new outfit?" - -"Well, I have some things in storage." - -"How about the people you're with now?" - -"Their lease is up in the spring. They may go on; they may not. Fall's -the time to change." - -Foster drew out his needles again and fell to work. - -"You ought to have seen Hortense the next morning. She put my tray on -the table, and then went down in a heap on the floor--or it sounded -like that. She was fainting away at dinner, she said." - -"She found it amusing?" - -"I don't know _how_ she found it," returned Foster shortly. "If ever -_I_ do anything like that at your house, run me home." - -"Not if it's raining. I shall be able to tuck you away somewhere." - -"Don't. I never asked to be a centre of interest." - -"Well," returned Randolph merely, and fell silent. - -Foster resumed work with some excess of vigor, and presently got into a -snarl. "Dammit!" he exclaimed, "have I dropped another?" - -Randolph leaned over to examine the work. "Something's wrong." - -"Well, let it go. Enough for now. Read." - -There followed a half hour of historical essay, during which Foster a -few times surreptitiously fingered his needles and yarn. - -"Shall you have a reading-circle at your new diggings?" he asked after -a while. - -"If two can be said to make a circle,--and if you will really come." - -"I'm coming. But I never understood that only two points could -establish a circle. Three, anyway." - -"Circle!" exclaimed Randolph. "Don't worry the word to death." - -He went away presently, and as he walked his thoughts returned to -Indian Rock. The excursion seemed a valid undertaking at an -advantageous time; and he could easily spare a couple of days from the -formation of his new establishment. He called on Cope that evening. -Cope felt sure he could clear things for Saturday, and expressed -pleasure at the general prospect. He happened to be writing to Lemoyne -that evening and passed along his pleasure at the prospect to his -friend. A few jaunts, outings or interludes of that kind, together with -his week at his home in Freeford, over Christmas, would agreeably help -fill in the time before Arthur's own arrival in January. - -Randolph received Cope's response with gratification; it was pleasant -to feel oneself acceptable to a younger man. In the intervals between -his early looking at rugs and napery he collected timetables and -folders, made inquiries, and had some correspondence with the manager -of the admirable hotel. He had a fondness for well-kept hostelries just -before or just after the active season. It was a pleasure to breakfast -or dine in some far corner of a large and almost empty dining-room. It -would be a pleasure to stroll through those gorges, which would be -reasonably certain to be free from litter, and to perch on the crags, -which would be reasonably certain to be free from picnic parties. It -would be agreeable also to sleep in a chamber far from town noises and -grimes, with few honks from late excursionists and but little early -morning clatter from a diminished staff. And the river boats were still -running on Sunday. - -"It will brace him for the rest of his fall term," thought Randolph, -"and me for my confounded shopping. And during some one of our -boat-rides or rambles, I shall tell him of my plans for the winter." - -The departure, it was agreed upon, should take place late on Friday -afternoon. On Friday, at half past eleven, Randolph at his office in -the city, received a long-distance call from Churchton. Cope announced, -with a breathless particularity not altogether disassociated from -self-conscious gaucherie, that he should be unable to go. Some -unexpected work had been suddenly thrown upon him.... He rather thought -that one or two of his family might be coming to town for over -Sunday.... - -The telephone, as a conveyor of unwelcome message, strikes a medium -between the letter by mail and the face-to-face interview. If it does -not quite give chance for the studied guardedness and calculated -plausibility of the one, it at least obviates some of the risk involved -in personal presence and in the introduction of contradictory evidence -often contributed by manner and by facial expression. And a long -distance interview must be brief,--at least there can be no surprise, -no indignation, if it is made so. - -"Very well," said Randolph, in reply to Cope's hurried and indistinct -words. "I'm sorry," he added, and the brief talk was over. "You are -feeling all right, I hope," he would have added, as the result of an -afterthought; but the connection was broken. - -Randolph left the instrument. He felt dashed, a good deal disappointed, -and a little hurt. He took two or three folders from a pigeon-hole and -dropped them into a waste-basket. Well, the boy doubtless had his -reasons. But a single good one, frankly put forth, would have been -better than duplicate or multiple reasons. He hoped that, on Sunday, a -cold drizzle rather than a flood of sunlight might fall upon the autumn -foliage of Indian Rock. And he would turn to-morrow to good account by -looking, for an hour or two, at china. - -Sunday afternoon was gorgeously bright and autumnal in Churchton, -whatever it may have been along the middle reaches of the Illinois -river; and at about four o'clock Randolph found himself in front of -Medora Phillips' house. Medora and her young ladies were out strolling, -as was inevitable on such a day; but in her library he found Foster -lying on a couch--the same piece of furniture which, at a critical -juncture, had comforted Cope. - -"Peter brought me down," said the cripple. "I thought I'd rather look -at the backs of books than at the fronts of all those tedious pictures. -Besides, I'm beginning to practice for my call at your new quarters." -Then, with a sudden afterthought: "Why, I understood you were going -somewhere out of town. What prevented?" - -"Well, I changed my plans. I needed a little more time for my -house-furnishing. I was looking yesterday at some table-ware for your -use; am wondering, in fact, if Mrs. Phillips couldn't arrange to give -me the benefit of her taste to-morrow or Tuesday...." - -"She likes to shop," replied Foster, "and taste is her strong suit. -I'll speak to her,--she's gone off to some meeting or other. Isn't this -just the afternoon to be spending indoors?" he commented brusquely. -"What a day it would be for the country," he added, sending his -ineffectual glance in the direction of Randolph's face. - -"We Churchtonians must take what we can get," Randolph replied, with an -attempt at indifference. "Our _rus in urbs_ isn't everything, but there -are times when it must be made to serve." - -Foster said nothing. Silent conjecture, seemingly, was offered him as -his part. - - - - -15 - -_COPE ENTERTAINS SEVERAL LADIES_ - - -Cope's excuse, involving the expected visit of a relative, may not have -been altogether sincere, but it received, within a week or so, the -substantial backing of actuality: a relative came. She was an -aunt,--his father's sister,--and she came at the suggestion of a -concerned landlady. This person, made anxious by a languid young man -who had begged off from his classes and who was likely to need more -attention than her scanty margin of leisure could grant, had even -suggested a hospital while yet it was easy for him to reach one. Though -Cope meant to leave her soon, it did not suit him to leave her quite as -soon as this; and so Aunt Harriet came in from Freeford to look the -situation over and to lend a hand if need be. She spent two nights in a -vacant chamber at transient rates; was grudgingly allowed to prepare -his "slops," as he called them, in the kitchen; and had time to satisfy -herself that, after all, nothing very serious was the matter. - -Randolph did not meet this relative, but he heard about her; and her -coming, as a sort of family representative, helped him still further in -his picture of the _res angusta_ of a small-town household: a father -held closely to office or warehouse--his own or some one else's; a -sister confined to her school-room; a mother who found the demands of -the domestic routine too exacting even to allow a three-hour trip to -town; and a brother--Randolph added this figure quite gratuitously out -of an active imagination and a determined desire not to put any of the -circle to the test of a personal encounter--and a brother who was -perhaps off somewhere "on the road." - -The one who met Aunt Harriet was Medora Phillips, and the meeting was -brief. Medora had heard from Amy Leffingwell of Cope's absence from his -class-room. She herself became concerned; she felt more or less -responsible and possibly a bit conscience-stricken. "Next time," she -said, "I shall try to have the ventilation right; and I think that, -after this, I shall keep to birch beer." - -Medora called up Amy at the music-school, one afternoon, at about four. -She assumed that the day's work was over, told Amy she was "going -around" to see Bertram Cope, and asked her to go with her. "You may act -as my chaperon," she said; "for who knows where or how I shall find -him?" - -As they neared the house a colored man came out, carrying a small trunk -to a mud-bespattered surrey. "What! is he going?" said Medora, with a -start. "Well, anyway, we're in time to say good-bye." Then, "What's the -matter, Jasper?" she asked, having now recognized the driver and his -conveyance. - -"Got a lady who's gettin' away on the four forty-three." - -"Oh!" said Medora, with a gasp of reassurance. - -Cope's aunt said good-bye to him up stairs and was now putting on her -gloves in the lower hall, in the company of the landlady. Medora -appraised the visitor as a semi-rustic person--one of some substance -and standing in her own community; marriage, perhaps, had provided her -with means and leisure. She had been willing to subordinate herself to -a university town apprehended as a social organism, and she now seemed -inclined to accept with docility any observations made by a confident -urbanite with a fair degree of verve. - -"These young men," said Medora dashingly, "are too careless and proud." - -"Proud?" asked the other. She felt clearly enough that her nephew had -been careless; but pride is not often acknowledged among the members of -an ordinary domestic circle. - -"They're all mind," Medora went on, with no lapse of momentum. She knew -she must work in brief, broad effects: the surrey was waiting and the -train would not delay. "They sometimes forget that their intellectual -efforts must rest, after all, on a good sensible physical basis. They -mustn't scorn the body." - -The departing visitor gave a quick little sigh of relief. The views of -this fashionable and forthputting woman were in accord with her own, -after all. - -"Well, I've told Bert," she said, buttoning her second glove, "that he -had better take all his meals in one place and at regular hours. I've -told him his health is of just as much account as his students and -their studies." She seemed gratified that, on an important point, she -had reached unanimity with an influential person who was to remain -behind; and she got away without too long delaying the muddy surrey and -the ungroomed sorrel. - -Medora Phillips looked after her with a grimace. "Think of calling him -'Bert'!" - -Cope, when advised, came down in a sort of bathrobe which he made do -duty as a dressing-gown. He took the stairs in a rapid run, produced an -emphatic smile for the parlor threshold, and put a good measure of -energy into his handshakes. "Mighty good of you to call," he said to -Mrs. Phillips. "Mighty good of you to call," he said to Amy Leffingwell. - -Well, he was on his feet, then. No chance to feel anxiously the brow of -a poor boy in bed, or to ask if the window was right or if he wouldn't -like a sip of water. Life's little disappointments...! - -To Amy Leffingwell he seemed pale, and she felt him as glad to sit down -at once in the third and last chair the little room offered. She -noticed, too, an inkstain on his right forefinger and judged that the -daily grind of theme-correction was going on in spite of everything. - -"Did you meet my aunt before she got away?" he asked. - -"We did," said Medora, "and we are going to add our advice to hers." - -"That's very nice of you," he rejoined, flattered. "But within a couple -of months," he went on, with a lowered voice and an eye on the parlor -door, "I shall be living in a different place and in quite a different -way. Until then...." He shrugged. His shrug was meant to include the -scanty, unpretending furnishings of the room, and also the rough casual -fare provided by many houses of entertainment out of present sight. - -"I almost feel like taking you in myself," declared Medora boldly. - -"That's still nicer of you," he said very promptly and with a -reinforcement of his smile. "But I'm on the up-grade, and pretty soon -everything will come out as smooth as silk. I shall have ten days at -home, for the holidays; then, after that, the new dispensation." - -Amy Leffingwell tempered her look of general commiseration with a -slight lapse into relief. There was no compelling reason why she should -have commiserated; perhaps it all came from a desire to indulge in an -abandonment to gentleness and pity. - -"Do you know," said Cope, with a sort of embarrassed laugh, "I feel as -if I were letting myself become the focus of interest. Oughtn't I to do -something to make the talk less personal?" - -He glanced about the meagre little room. It gave no cue. - -"I'm sure Amy and I are satisfied with the present subject," returned -Medora. - -But Cope rose, and gathered his bathrobe--or dressing-gown--about him. -"Wait a moment. I have some photographs I can show you--several of them -came only yesterday. I'll bring them down." - -As soon as he had disappeared into the hall, Mrs. Phillips gave a -slight smile and said quickly: - -"For heaven's sake, Amy, don't look so concerned, and mournful, and -sympathetic! Anybody might think that, instead of your being my -chaperon, I was yours!" - -"He doesn't look at all well," said Amy defensively. - -"He might look better; but we can't pity a young man too openly. Pity -is akin to embarrassment, for the pitied." - -Cope came down stairs the second time at a lesser pace. He carried a -sheaf of photographs. Some were large and were regularly mounted; -others were but the informal products of snap-shottery. - -He drew up his chair nearer to theirs and began to spread his pictures -over the gray and brown pattern on his lap. - -"You know I was teaching, last year, at Winnebago," he said. "Here are -some pictures of the place. Science Hall," he began, passing them. -"Those fellows on the front steps must be a graduating class. - -"The Cathedral," he continued. "And I think that, somewhere or other, I -have a group-picture of the choir. - -"Sisterhood house," he went on. "Two or three of them standing out in -front." - -"Sisterhood?" asked Mrs. Phillips, with interest. "What do they do?" - -Cope paused. "What do they do, indeed? Well, for one thing, they -decorate the altar--Easter, Harvest home, and so on." - -"That isn't much. That doesn't take a house." - -"Well, I suppose they visit, and teach. Sort of neighborhood centre. -Headquarters. Most of them, I believe, live at home." - -"Dear me! Is Winnebago large enough to require settlement-work?" - -"Don't drive me so! I suppose they want to tone in with the cathedral -as a special institution. 'Atmosphere,' you know. Some tracts of our -great land are rather drab and vacant, remember. Color, stir,--and -distinction, you understand." - -"Is Winnebago ritualistic?" - -"Not very. While I was there a young 'priest,' an offshoot from the -cathedral, started up a new parish in one of the industrial outskirts. -He was quite earnest and eloquent and put up a fine service; but nobody -except his own father and mother went to hear him preach." - -Mrs. Phillips returned to the Sisterhood house. - -"Are they nice girls?" she asked acutely. - -"Oh, I guess so. I met two or three of them. Nice girls, yes; just -trying to be a little different. Here's the boat-house, and some of the -fellows in their rowing-clothes. Some sail-boats too." - -"Can you sail?" asked Amy. She had the cathedral-choir in one hand and -now took the boat-club in the other. She studied both pictures -intently, for both were small and crowded. - -"Why, I have all the theory and some of the practice. Those small -inland lakes are tricky, though." - -"Probably no worse than ours," said Mrs. Phillips. "Do help poor Amy," -she went on. "_Are_ you in either of these groups?" - -"No. Didn't I tell you I was trying to get away from the personal? I'm -not in any of these pictures." Amy unconsciously let both half-drop, as -if they held no particular interest, after all. And the hand into which -the next photograph was put gave it but lukewarm welcome. - -Mixed in with these general subjects were several of a more personal -nature: groups of twos and threes, and a number of single figures. One -face and figure, as Mrs. Phillips presently came to notice, occurred -again and again, in various attitudes and costumes. It was a young man -of Cope's own age--or perhaps two or three years older. He was of -Cope's own height, but slightly heavier, with a possible tendency to -plumpness. The best of the photographs made him dark, with black, wavy -hair; and in some cases (where sunlight did not distort his expression) -he indulged a determined sort of smile. He figured once, all by -himself, in choir vestments; again, all by himself, in rowing toggery; -a third time, still by himself, in a costume whose vague inaccuracy -suggested a character in amateur theatricals. - -"Who is this?" inquired Mrs. Phillips, with the last of these in hand. - -Cope was prompt, but vague. - -"Oh, that's a chum of mine, up there. He belongs to a dramatic club. -They give 'The School for Scandal' and 'Caste,' and--well, more modern -things. They have to wear all sorts of togs." - -"And here he is again? And here? And here?"--shuffling still another -picture into view. - -"Yes." - -"He's fond of costume, isn't he?" - -"Very versatile," returned Cope, lightly and briefly. "Clothes to -correspond." - -Mrs. Phillips began to peer again at the picture of the choir-group. -"Isn't he here too?" - -"Yes. With the first tenors. There you have him,--third from the left, -just behind that row of little devils in surplices." - -"You and he sing together?" - -"Sometimes--when we _are_ together." - -"'Larboard Watch' and 'Suona la Tromba' and----?" - -"Oh, heavens!" said Cope. He threw up his head quite spiritedly. There -was now more color in his cheeks, more sparkle in his eyes, more -vibration in his voice. Amy looked at him with a vanishing pity and a -growing admiration. - -"Let us fellows be of our own day and generation," he added. - -"Willingly," said Mrs. Phillips. "But my husband was fond of 'Larboard -Watch'; I heard him sing in it before we were married. Shall I ever -hear you sing together?" she asked. - -"Possibly. He is coming down here early in January. To look after me." - -"After you?" Mrs. Phillips reviewed the photographs once more. "I -imagine you may sometimes have to look after him." - -Cope sobered a little. "Sometimes," he acknowledged. "We shall look -after each other," he amended. "We are going to live together." - -"Oh, then, he is coming to _stay_? You've been a long time in reaching -the point. And why do you say 'possibly' when I ask about your singing -together? Aren't you coming to my house 'together'?" - -"I withdraw the 'possibly.' Probably." - -"And now withdraw the 'probably.' Make it 'certainly.'" - -"Certainly." - -"'Certainly,'--of course." - -"That's better," murmured her companion. - -Then Mrs. Phillips must know the new-comer's name, and must have an -outline of the proposed plan. And Amy Leffingwell began to look with -renewed interest on the counterfeit form and features of the young man -who enjoyed Bertram Cope's friendly regard. And so the moments of -"entertainment"--Cope's in turn--went on. - -"I'm glad he really appears to like _somebody_," declared Mrs. -Phillips, on the way home; "it makes him seem quite human." Inwardly, -she was resolving to have both the young men to dine at the earliest -possible date. It was not always practicable to invite a single young -man as often as you wished. Having two to ask simplified the problem -considerably. - -Cope, flushed and now rather tired, walked up stairs with his -photographs, took a perfunctory sip from a medicine-glass, looked at -the inkstain on his finger, and sat down at his table. Two or three -sheets of a letter were lying on it, and he re-read a paragraph or so -before dipping his pen. - -"You were rather exacting about that week-end excursion. Mr. R. was all -right, and a few days of new air and new scenes would have done me a -lot of good. Still, I acknowledge your first claim. But remember that I -gave up Indian Rock for you, even if you didn't give up Green Bay for -me. I hope the fellow who took you hasn't got anything further to -propose. If he has, I ask for a tip in turn. - -"Naturally it wasn't the easiest thing in the world to explain to him, -and I haven't seen him since. But I can truly say that a relative _did_ -come, and that she was needed--or thought she was." - -He picked up his pen for a fresh paragraph. - -"The new photos--added to those I had--have come in quite nicely. They -have just helped me entertain a couple of callers. Women have abounded -in these parts to-day: Mrs. Peck, scurrying about more than usual; an -aunt from home, getting away with her baggage--more than she needed to -bring; and then the two who have just gone. It all makes me feel like -wanting to take part in a track-meet or a ball-game--though, as I am -now, I might not last two minutes at either. The lady who called was -Mrs. Phillips. I thought she might as well know that you were coming. -Of course you are already invited, good and plenty, to her house. Look -in old music-books and see if you can't find 'Larboard Watch.' If it -turns out you can get away _before_ the holidays, come down and go out -with me to Freeford for Christmas. I have had some rather glum hours -and miss you more than ever. I have been within arm's length of one of -the University trustees (who can probably place me _now_!)--but I don't -know just how much that can be counted upon for, if for anything. Show -yourself,--that will help. - -"B." - - - - -16 - -_COPE GOES A-SAILING_ - - -Cope was himself in a few days. He set aside his aunt's counsel in -regard to a better regimen, as well as her more specific hints, made in -view of the near approach of rough weather, that he provide himself -with rubbers and an umbrella, even if he would not hear of a rain-coat. -"Am I made of money?" he asked. He gave a like treatment to some -intimations contributed by Medora Phillips during her call: he met them -with the smiling, polite, half-weary patience which a man sometimes -employs to inform a woman that she doesn't quite know what she is -talking about. He presently in as active circulation, on the campus and -elsewhere, as ever. The few who looked after him at all came to the -view that he possessed more mettle than stamina. He had no special -fondness for athletics; he was doing little to keep--still less to -increase--a young man's natural endowment of strength and vigor. -Occasional tennis on the faculty courts, and not much else. - -So the vast gymnasium went for little with him, and the wide football -field for less, and the great lake, close by, for nothing. This last, -however, counted for little more with any one else. Those who knew the -lake best were best content to leave it alone. As a source of pleasure -it had too many perils: "treacherous" was the common word. Its -treachery was reserved, of course, for the smiling period of summer; -especially did the great monster lie in wait on summer's Sunday -afternoons. Then the sun would shine on its vast placid bosom and the -breeze play gently, tempting the swimmer toward its borders and the -light pleasure craft toward its depths. And then, in mid-afternoon, a -sudden disastrous change; a quick gale from the north, with a wide -whipping-up of white caps; and the morrow's newspapers told of bathers -drowned in the undertow, of frail canoes dashed to pieces against piers -and breakwaters, and of gay, beflagged steam-launches swamped by the -newly-risen sea miles from shore: the toll of fickle, superheated -August. But in the late autumn the immense, savage creature was more -frankly itself: rude, blustery, tyrannical,--no more a smiling, cruel -hypocrite. It warned you, often and openly, if warning you would take. - -It was on the last Sunday afternoon in October that Cope and Amy -Leffingwell were strolling along its edge. They had met casually, in -front of the chapel, after a lecture--or a service--by an eminent -ethical teacher from abroad,--a bird of passage who must pipe on this -Sunday afternoon if he were to pipe at all. Cope, who had lain abed -late, made this address a substitute for the forenoon service he had -missed. And Amy Leffingwell had gone out somewhat for the sake, -perhaps, of walking by the house where Cope lived. - -They passed the Science building, with its tower crowned by an -ornamental open-work iron pyramid for wireless, and the segregated -group of theological dormitories through whose windows earnest ringing -young voices were sometimes heard at the practice of sermon-delivery, -and the men's club where the billiard tables were doubtless decorously -covered with their customary Sunday sheets of black oilcloth, and took -intuitively the path which led along the edge of the bluff. Beyond -them, further bluffs and a few low headlands; here a lighthouse, there -a water-tower; elsewhere (and not so far) the balconied roof of the -life-saving station, where the boats, light and heavy, were manned by -muscular students: their vigilance and activity, interspersed with long -periods of leisure or of absence, helped them to "pay their way." Out -toward the horizon a passenger steamer en route to some port farther -north, or a long ore-freighter, singularly uneventful between bow and -far-distant afterhouse, on its way down from the iron-ranges of -Superior. - -The path was narrow, but Cope, unexpectedly to himself, had no -complaint to make. Really, the girl did better here, somehow, than lots -of other girls would have done on a wide sidewalk. Most of them walked -too close to you, or too far from you, altering the interval suddenly -and arbitrarily, and tending to bump against you when you didn't expect -it and didn't want it. They were uncertain at crossings; if it was -necessary for them to take your arm, as it sometimes became, in the -evening, on a crowded street, why, they were too gingerly or else -pressed too close; and if it happened to rain, you sometimes had to -take a cab, trafficking with a driver whose tariff and whose -disposition you did not know: in fact, a string of minor embarrassments -and expenses.... - -But the way, this afternoon, was clear and easy; and there were no -annoyances save from other walkers along the same path. The sun shone -brightly at intervals. A fresh breeze swept the wide expanse streaked -with purple and green and turned an occasional broken wave-crest toward -the western light. Some large cumuli were abroad--white, or less white, -or even darkling,--the first windy sky of autumn. - -Cope and Amy passed the life-saving station, where a few people sat -about idly and where one or two visitors pressed noses against glass -panes to view the boats within; and they reached presently a sort of -little public park which lay along the water. Here a small pier ran out -past the shallows, and in front of a shack close by it a man sat -resignedly near a group of beached and upturned row-boats. One or two -others were still in the water, as was a small sloop. The fellow sat -there without expectations: the season was about over; the day was none -too promising for such as knew. His attitude expressed, in fact, the -accumulated disappointment and resignation of many months. Perhaps he -was a new-comer from the interior--some region of ponds and rivers--and -had kept through an uneventful summer the notion that so big a spread -of water would surely be put to use. The sail of the sloop, -half-lowered, flapped in the breeze, and little else stirred. - -Our young people overlooked both man and boat. - -"It's the same lake," said Amy Leffingwell, rather dreamily, after a -common silence of several minutes. - -"The same," returned Cope promptly. "It's just what it was a year ago, -a century ago; and a millennium ago, I suppose,--if there was anyone -here to notice." - -She turned on him a rueful, half-protesting smile. "I wasn't thinking -of a century ago. I was thinking of a month ago." - -"A month ago?" - -"Yes; when we were walking along the dunes." - -"Oh, I see. Why, yes, it is the same old lake, though it seems hard to -realize it. Foreground makes so much difference; and so does--well, -population. I mean the human element, or the absence of it." - -Amy pondered. - -"The one drawback, there, was that we couldn't go out on the water." - -"Go out? I should say not. No pier for miles, and the water so shallow -that hardly more than a canoe could land. Still, those fishermen out -there manage it. But plain summerites, especially if not dressed for -it, would have an unpleasant time imitating them." - -Amy cast her eye about. Here was a shore, a pier, a boat, a man to let -it.... - -"Would you like to go out?" asked the man himself perfunctorily, as -from the depths of a settled despair. He pointed a thumb over his -shoulder toward the sloop. - -The two young people looked at each other. Neither looked at the sky. -"Well, I don't know," replied Cope slowly. The sloop was on a pretty -small scale; still, it was more to manage than a cat-boat. - -"You have the theory, you know," said Amy demurely, "and some practice." - -Cope looked at her in doubt. "Can you swim?" he asked. - -"Yes," she returned. "I have some practice, if not much theory." - -"Could you handle a jib?" - -"Under direction." - -"Well, then, if you really wish ..." - -The misanthrope, with a twisted smile, helped them get away. The -mainsail took a steady set; but the jib, from the first, possessed an -active life of its own. - -"Not that rope," cried Cope; "the other." - -"Very well," returned Amy, scrambling across the cockpit. And so it -went. - -In six or eight minutes their small catastrophe overtook them. There -came a sudden flaw from out one of the racing gray cumuli, and a faint -cry or two from the distant shore. Theory had not put itself into -practice as quickly as the emergency required,--all the less so in that -it had to work through a crew encumbered with a longish skirt and a -close jacket. The sloop keeled over; Cope was instantly entangled with -the mainsail and some miscellaneous cordage; and Amy, with the water -soaking her closely-fitting garments, found herself clutching the -cockpit's edge. - -She saw Cope's predicament and let go her hold to set him free. He -helped shake himself loose with a loud forced laugh and a toss of the -head to get his long hair out of his eyes. "We'll leave the wreck," he -spluttered, "and make for the shore." The shore, fortunately, was -scarcely more than a hundred yards away,--yet never had the great twin -towers of the library seemed so distant or the wireless cage on Science -hall so futile. - -They swam, easily, side by side, he supporting her in her cramped -clothes at the start, and she, a bit concerned, somewhat supporting him -toward the end. Meanwhile, there was some stir at the life-saving -station, a quarter of a mile down the shore. - -The last hundred feet meant mere wading, though there was some -variability among the sand ridges of the bottom; but the water, at its -deepest, never reached their shoulders. Their small accident now began -to take on the character of a ceremonial--an immersion incident to some -religious rite or observance; and the little Sunday crowd collecting on -the water's edge might have been members of some congregation -sympathetically welcoming a pair of converts to the faith. - -"Let's hold our heads high and walk straight," said Cope, his arm in -hers; "heaven knows whom we are likely to meet. And throw your hat -away--you'll look better without it. Lord knows where mine is," he -added, as he ran a smoothing hand over his long locks. - -"Very well," she said, casting away her ruined, ridiculous headgear -with her free arm. The other, in his, was giving more support to him, -she felt, than he was giving to her. - -Just as they were about to reach dry land, amidst the congratulations -and the amused smiles of the little group at the foot of the bluff, the -belated crew of life-savers swept up in their smallest boat and -insisted on capturing them. - -"Oh, Mr. Cope," said a familiar voice, "please let us save you. We -haven't saved a soul for months." - -Cope recognized one of his own students and surrendered, though a -kindly house-owner on the bluff had been quick to cry across the -intervening yards of water his offer of hospitality. "All right," he -said; "take us back to your place, where we can dry and telephone." He -hoped, too, that they might have to encounter fewer people at the other -spot than at this. - -Meanwhile, another boat belonging to the station had set out to aid the -owner of the sloop in its recovery. It was soon righted and was brought -in. There was no damage done, and there was no charge that Cope could -not meet, as he learned next day to his great relief. - -The station gave him a dry outfit of clothes, assembled from here and -there, and telephoned to Mrs. Phillips to bring fresh garments for Amy. -Neither had time to get a chill. A pair of kindly servant-maids, who -were loitering on the shore with their young men, insisted on carrying -the heroine of the afternoon into retirement, where they expeditiously -undressed her, rubbed her, and wrapped her in a quilt snatched from a -life-saving bed. Amy was cold indeed, and inclined to shiver. She -understood, now, why Cope had not encouraged that bathing party at the -dunes. - -In a few minutes Medora Phillips tore up in her car, with Helga and a -mountain of clothing and wraps. She was inclined to make the most of -the occasion, and she did so. With Helga she quickly superseded the -pair of sympathetic and ready maids, whom she allowed to fade into the -background with too scant recognition of their services; and when she -had got Amy thoroughly warmed and rehabilitated she turned her thought -toward Cope. Here, certainly, was a young scholastic recluse who had an -admirable faculty for getting into the public eye. If one section of -Churchton society had talked about his performance at her dinner, all -sections of it would now be discussing his new performance on the high -seas. Suddenly she was struck with the notion that possibly his first -lapse had not left him in condition to stand this second one. - -"How are you feeling?" she asked anxiously. "No chill? No shock?" - -"I'm all right," he declared. "One of the boys has just given me a -drink of--of----" But it was a beverage the use of which was not -generally approved in Churchton. - -Mrs. Phillips turned round suddenly. "Amy, did you have a drink, too, -of--of--of--if 'Of' is what you call it?" - -"I did," said Amy firmly; "and I feel the better for it." - -"Well, get in, then, and I'll take you home." - -Peter grinned from the front seat of the car; Mrs. Phillips placed -herself between the two victims on the back one; the life-savers, who -had kept the discarded garments to dry, gave them all a few smiles and -hand wavings; the two young women and their two young men looked on -with some deference; the general crowd gave a little mock-cheer before -turning its Sunday leisure to other forms of interest; and the small -party whirled away. - -Amy leaned a tired, moist head, but a happy one, on Mrs. Phillips' -shoulder. "He was so quick," she breathed, "and so brave, and so -strong." She professed to believe that he had saved her life. Cope, -silent as he looked straight ahead between Peter and Helga, was almost -afraid that she had saved his. - - - - -17 - -_COPE AMONG CROSS-CURRENTS_ - - -Next morning, at breakfast, Amy Leffingwell kept, for the most part, a -rapt and meditative eye on her plate. Hortense gave her now and then an -impatient, half-angry glare, and had to be cut short in some stinging -observations on Cope. "But it _was_ foolish," Medora Phillips felt -obliged to concede. "What in the world made you do it?" - -But Amy continued to smile at the table-cloth. She seemed to be -intimating that there was a special folly which transcended mere -general folly and approximated wisdom. - -After breakfast she spoke a few words to Carolyn. She had had all night -to think the matter over; she now saw it from a new angle and in a new -light. - -"You should have seen how he shook himself free from that sail, and -all," she said. "And while we were swimming in he held his hand under -my chin--at least part of the time. And when we reached the sandbars he -put his arm through mine and helped me over every one." And in this -state of mind she went off to her class. - -Cope was received by his own class with a subdued hilarity. His young -people felt that he had shown poor judgment in going out on the water -at all,--for the University, by tacit consent, left the lake pretty -well alone. They thought that, once out, he had shown remarkably inept -seamanship. And they thought that he had chosen a too near and too -well-lighted stage for the exhibition of both. This forenoon the -"Eighteenth Century Novelists" involved Smollett, and with every -reference to the water looks of understanding traveled from student to -student: that the class was of both sexes made the situation no better. -Cope was in good enough physical condition,--the unspeakable draught -from the unspeakable flask had ensured that,--but he felt what was in -the air of the classroom and was correspondingly ill at ease. - -He had had, for several days, an understanding with Basil Randolph that -they were to go together to the next weekly reception of the -president's wife. Randolph wished to push Cope's fortunes wherever he -might, and to make him stand out from the general ranks of the young -instructors. He had the entrée to the Thursdays at the president's -house, and he wanted Cope to meet personally and intimately, under the -guidance he could provide, a few of the academic dignitaries and some -of the wealthier and more prominent townspeople. Notwithstanding Mrs. -Phillips' confident impression, Cope's exploit at her own table had -gained no wide currency. The people she had entertained were people who -expected and commanded a succession of daily impressions from one -quarter or another. With them, a few light words on Cope's achievement -were sufficient; they walked straight on toward the sensation the next -day was sure to bring. But of course the whole University knew about -his second performance. Some of its members had witnessed it, and all -of them had read about it, next day, in Churchton's four-page "Index." - -The president's wife was a sprightly lady, who believed in keeping up -the social end of things. Her Thursdays offered coffee and chocolate at -a handsomely appointed table, and a little dancing, now and then, for -the livelier of the young professors and the daughters of the town's -best-known families; above all, she insisted on "receiving"--even on -having a "receiving line." She would summon, for example, the wife of -one of the most eminent members of the faculty and the obliging spouse -of some educationally-minded banker or manufacturer; and she herself -always stood, of course, at the head of her line. When Cope came along -with Randolph, she intercepted the flow of material for her several -assistants farther on, and carried congestion and impatience into the -waiting queue behind by detaining him and "having it out." - -She caught his hand with a good, firm, nervous grasp, and flashed on -him a broad, meaningful smile. - -"Which saved which?" she asked heartily. - -Mrs. Ryder, who was farther along in the line, but not too far, beamed -delightedly, yet without the slightest trace of malice. An eminent -visiting educator, five or six steps behind our hero, frowned in -question and had to have the situation explained by the lady in his -company. - -Cope, a trifle embarrassed, and half-inclined to wish he had not come, -did what he could to deprive the episode of both hero and heroine. It -was about an even thing, he guessed,--a matter of cooperation. - -"Isn't that delightful!" exclaimed the president's wife to the wife of -the banker, before passing Cope on. "And so modern! Equality of the -sexes.... Woman doing her share, et cetera! For this," she presently -said to the impatient educator from outside, "are we co-educational!" -And, "Good teamwork!" she contrived to call after Cope, who was now -disappearing in the crowd. - -Cope lost himself from Randolph, and presently got away without seeing -who was pouring coffee or who was the lightest on foot among the -younger professors. The president's wife had asked him, besides, how -the young lady had got through it, and had even inquired after her -present condition. Well, Amy Leffingwell was enrolled among the -University instructors, and doubtless the wife of the institution's -head had been well within her rights,--even duly mindful of the -proprieties. But "The Index"! That sheet, staid and proper enough on -most occasions, had seemed, on this one, to couple their names quite -unwarrantably. "Couple!" Cope repeated the word, and felt an injury. If -he had known that Amy had carefully cut out and preserved the offending -paragraph, his thought would have taken on a new and more disquieting -tone. - -In the inquiry of the president's wife about the condition of his -copartner in adventure he found a second source of dissatisfaction. He -had not called up to ask after Amy; but Mrs. Phillips, with a great -show of solicitude, had called up early on Monday morning to ask after -him. He had then, in turn, made a counter-inquiry, of course; but he -could take no credit for initiative. Neither had he yet called at the -house; nor did he feel greatly prompted to do so. That must doubtless -be done; but he might wait until the first fresh impact of the event -should somewhat have lost its force. - -Mrs. Phillips' voice had kept, over the telephone, all its vibratory -quality; its tones expressed the most palpitating interest. It was -already clear--and it became even clearer when he finally called at the -house--that she was poetizing him into a hero, and that she regarded -Amy herself as but a means, an instrument. At this, Cope felt a little -more mortified than before. He knew that he had done poorly in the -boat, and he was not sure that, in the first moment of the upset, he -should have freed himself unaided; and he confessed that he had not -been quite in condition to do very well on the way landward. However, -all passed.... Within a fortnight or less the incident would have -dropped back into its proper perspective, and his students would have -found some other matter for entertainment. In the circumstances he -grasped at the first source of consolation that came. Randolph was now -installed in his new apartment and felt that, though not fully settled, -he might risk asking Cope to dinner. "You are the first," Randolph had -said. Cope could not escape the flattery; it was almost comfort. - -His prompt acceptance was most welcome to Randolph. Cope had dwelt, for -a moment, on the actual presence of Aunt Harriet and on his need of -her. Randolph had made no precise study of recent chronology, taking -the reason given over the wire as a valid one and feeling glad that -there was no hitch this time. - -Randolph gave Cope a rapid view of the apartment before they sat down -to dinner. There were fewer pictures on the newly-papered walls than -there were to be, and fewer rugs on the freshly-varnished floors. "My -standing lamp will be in that corner," said Randolph, in the -living-room, "--when it comes." He drew attention to a second bedroom -where a man could be put up on occasion: "you, for example, if you ever -find yourself shut out late." He saw Sir Galahad's gauntlets on the -dresser. He even gave Cope a glimpse of his kitchen, where a -self-contained Oriental, slightly smiling but otherwise inexpressive, -seemed to be dealing competently with the gas-range. But Cope was -impressed, most of all, by the dining-room table and its paraphernalia. -At Mrs. Phillips' he had accepted the china, silver and napery as a -matter of course--an elaborate entity quite outside his own thoughts -and calculations: it was all so immensely far beyond his reach and his -needs. Randolph, however, had dealt as a bachelor with a problem which -he himself as a bachelor must soon take up, on however different a -scale and plane. For everything here was rich and handsome; he should -not know how to select such things--still less how to pay for them. He -felt dashed; he felt depressed; once more the wonder of people's -"having things." He sipped his soup in the spirit of humility, and did -not quite recover with the chops. - -Randolph made little talk; he was glad merely to have Cope there. He -indulged no slightest reference to the accident; he assumed, willingly -enough, that Cope had done well in a sudden emergency, but did not care -to dwell on his judgment at the beginning. Still, a young man was -properly enough experimental, venturesome... - -Cope had recovered himself by the time dessert was reached. He -accomplished an adjustment to his environment, and Randolph was glad to -feel his unaffected response to good food properly cooked and served. -"He sha'n't gipsy _all_ the time," Randolph said to himself. "I shall -try to have him here at least twice a week." Once in a while the -evening might be stormy, and then the gauntlets would be laid on the -dresser--perhaps after an informal smoke in pajamas among the curios -ranged round the small den. - -Cope set down his demi-tasse with a slight sigh. "Well," he said, "I -suppose that, before long, I shall have to buy a few sticks of -furniture myself and a trifle of 'crockery.' And a percolator." -Randolph looked across at him in surprise. - -"You are moving, then,--you too?" Not to greatly better quarters, he -almost hoped. - -"Yes; and we shall need a few small things by way of outfit." "We." -Randolph looked more intently. Housekeeping _à deux_? A roommate? -Matrimony? Here was the intrusion of another piece on the board--a -piece new and unexpected. Would it turn out to be an added interest for -himself, or a plain source of disconcertment? Cope, having -unconsciously set the ball rolling, gave it further impetus. He -sketched his absent friend and told of their plans for the winter and -spring terms. "I shall try for a large easy chair," he concluded, -"unless Arthur can be induced to bring one with him." - -Randolph, by this time, had led Cope into the den, established him -between padded arms, and given him a cigar. He drew Cope's attention to -the jades and swordguards, to the odd assortment of primitive musical -instruments (which would doubtless, in time, find a place at the Art -Museum in the city), and to his latest acquisition--a volume of Bembo's -"Le Prose." It had reached him but a week before from Venice,--"_in -Venetia, al segno del Pozzo_, MDLVII," said the title-page, in fact. It -was bound in vellum, pierced by bookworms, and was decorated, in quaint -seventeenth-century penmanship, with marginal annotations, and also, on -the fly leaves, with repeated honorifics due to a study of the forms of -address by some young aspirant for favor. Randolph had rather depended -on it to take Cope's interest; but now the little _envoi_ from the -Lagoons seemed lesser in its lustre. Cope indeed took the volume with -docility and looked at its classical title-page and at its quaint -Biblical colophon; but, "Just who _was_ 'Pietro Bembo'?" he asked; and -Randolph realized, with a slight shock, that young instructors teach -only what they themselves lately have learned, and that, in many cases, -they have not learned much. - -But in truth neither paid much heed to the tabulated vocables of the -Venetian cardinal--nor to any of the other rarities near by. Basil -Randolph was wondering how he was to take Arthur Lemoyne, and was -asking himself if his trouble in setting up a new ménage was likely to -go for nothing; and Bertram Cope, while he pursued the course of the -bookworm through the parchment covers and the yellowed sheets within, -was wondering in what definite way his host might aid the fortunes of -Arthur Lemoyne and thus make matters a little easier for them both. -"_All' ill.'mo Sig.'r paron ossevnd.'mo.... All' ill.'mo et ecc.'mo -Sig.'r paron... All' ill'mo et R.R.d.'mo Sig.'r, Sig.'r Pio. Francesco -Bembo, Vesco et Conte di Belluno_"--thus ran the faded brown lines on -the flyleaf, in their solicitous currying of favor; but these -reiterated forms of address conveyed no meaning to Cope, and offered no -opening: now, as once before, he let the matter wait. - -Randolph thought over Cope's statement of his plans, and his slight -touch of pique did not pass away. Toward the end of the evening, he -spoke of the wreck and the rescue, after all. - -"Well," he said, "you are not so completely committed as I feared." - -"Committed?" - -"By your new household arrangements." - -"Well, I shall have back my chum." - -Randolph put forward the alternative. - -"I was afraid, for a moment, that you might be taking a wife." - -"A wife?" - -"Yes. Such a rescue often leads straight to matrimony--in the -story-books, anyhow." - -Cope laughed, but with a slight disrelish. "We're in actual life still, -I'm glad to think. What I said on one stretch of the shore goes on the -other," he declared. "I don't feel any more inclination to wedded life -than ever, nor any likelihood"--here he spoke with effort, as if -conscious of a possible danger on some remote horizon--"of entering it." - -"It _would_ have been sudden, wouldn't it?" commented Randolph, with a -short laugh. "Well," he went on, "one who inclines to hospitality must -work with the material at his disposal. I shall be glad, on some -occasion or other," he proceeded, with a slight trace of formality -creeping into his tone, "to entertain your friend." - -"I shall be more than glad," replied Cope, "to have you meet." - - - -18 - - -_COPE AT THE CALL OF DUTY_ - -Cope took his own time in calling upon the Ashburn Avenue circle; but -he finally made, in person, the inquiries for which those made by -telephone were an inadequate substitute. Yet he waited so long that, -only a few hours before the time he had set, he received a sweet but -somewhat urgent little note from Amy Leffingwell suggesting his early -appearance. He felt obliged to employ the first moments of his call in -explaining that he had been upon the point of coming, anyway, and that -he had set aside the present hour two or three days before for this -particular purpose: an explanation, he acknowledged inwardly, which -held no great advantage for him. - -"Why am I spinning such stuff?" he asked himself impatiently. - -Amy's note of course minimized her aid to him and magnified his aid to -her. All this was in accord with established form, but it was in still -stronger accord with her determination to idealize his share in the -incident. His arm _had_ grasped hers firmly--and she felt it yet. But -when she went on to say--not for the first time, nor for the -second--how kind and sympathetic he had been in supporting her chin -against those slapping waves when the shore had seemed so far away, he -wondered whether he had really done so. For a moment or two, possibly; -but surely not as part of a conscious, reasoned scheme to save. - -"She was doing all right enough," he muttered in frowning protest. - -Neither did he welcome Mrs. Phillips' tendency to make him a hero. She -was as willing as the girl herself to believe that he had kept Amy's -chin above water--not for a moment merely, but through most of the -transit to shore. He sat there uneasily, pressing his thumbs between -his palms and his closed fingers and drawing up his feet crampingly -within their shoes; yet it somewhat eased his tension to find that -Medora Phillips was disposed to put Amy into a subordinate place: Amy -had been but a means to an end--her prime merit consisted in having -given him a chance to function. Any other girl would have done as well. -A slight relief, but a welcome. - -Another mitigation: the house, the room, was full of people. The other -young women of the household were present; even the young business-man -who had understood the stove and the pump had looked in: no chance for -an intense, segregated appreciation. There had been another weekend at -the dunes, when this youth had nimbly ranged the forest and the beach -to find wood for the great open fireplace; and he had come, now, at the -end of the season, to make due acknowledgments for privileges enjoyed. -He, for his part, was willing enough to regard Amy as a heroine; but he -considered her as a heroine linked with the wrong man and operative in -the wrong place. He cared nothing in the world for Cope, and disparaged -him as before--when he did not ignore him altogether. If Amy had but -been rescued by him, George F. Pearson, instead of by this Bertram -Cope, and if she had been snatched from a disorderly set of breakers at -the foot of those disheveled sandhills instead of from the prim, prosy, -domestic edge of Churchton--well, wouldn't the affair have been better -set and better carried off? In such case it might have been picturesque -and heroic, instead of slightly silly. - -Yes, the room was full. Even Joseph Foster had contrived to get himself -brought down by Peter: further practice for the day when he should make -a still more ambitious flight and dine at Randolph's new table. He sat -in a dark corner of the room and tried to get, as best he might, the -essential hang of the situation: the soft, insidious insistence of Amy; -the momentum and bravado of his sister-in-law; the veiled disparagement -of Cope in which George F. Pearson, seated on a sofa between Carolyn -and Hortense, indulged for their benefit, or for his own relief; above -all, he listened for tones and undertones from Cope himself. He had -never seen Cope before (if indeed it could be said that he really saw -him now), and he had never heard his speaking voice save at a remove of -two floors. Cope had taken his hand vigorously, as that of the only man -(among many women) from whom he had much to expect, and had given him a -dozen words in a loud tone which seemed to correspond with his -pressure. But Cope's voice, in his hearing, had lapsed from resonance -to non-resonance, and from that to tonelessness, and from that to -quietude.... Was the fellow in process of making a long diminuendo--a -possible matter of weeks or of months? As before, when confronted by -what had once seemed a paragon of dash and vigor, he scarcely knew -whether to be exasperated or appeased. - -Through this variety of spoken words and unspoken thoughts Hortense sat -silent and watchful. Presently the talk lapsed: with the best will in -the world a small knot of people cannot go on elaborately embroidering -upon a trivial incident forever. There was a shifting of groups, a -change in subjects. Yet Hortense continued to glower and to meditate. -What had the incident really amounted to? What did the man himself -really amount to? She soon found herself at his side, behind the -library-table and its spreading lamp-shade. He was silently handling a -paper-cutter, with his eyes cast down. - -"See me!" she said, in a tense, vibratory tone. "Speak to me!"--and she -glowered upon him. "I am no kitten, like Amy. I am no tame tabby, like -Carolyn, sending out written invitations. Throw a few poor words my -way." - -Cope dropped the paper-cutter. Her address was like a dash of brine in -the face, and he welcomed it. - -"Tell me; did you look absurd--then?" she dashed ahead. - -A return to fresh water, after all! "Why," he rejoined reluctantly, "no -man, dressed in all his clothes, looks any the better for being soaked -through." - -"And Amy,--she must have looked absolutely ridiculous! That wide, -flapping hat, and all! I had been telling her for weeks that it was out -of style." - -"She threw it away," said Cope shortly. "And I suppose her hair looked -as well as a woman's ever does, when she's in the water." - -"Well," she observed, "it's one thing to be ridiculous and another to -go on being ridiculous. I hope you don't mean to do that?" - -The pronoun "you" has its equivocal aspects. Her expression, while -marked enough, threw no clear light. Cope took the entire onus on -himself. - -"Of course no man would choose to be ridiculous--still less to stay so. -Do, please, let me keep on dry land; I'm beginning to feel -water-logged." He shifted his ground. "Why do you try to make it seem -that I don't care to talk with you?" - -"Because you don't. Haven't I noticed it?" - -"I haven't. It seems to me that I----" - -"Of course you haven't. Does that make it any better?" - -"I'm sure the last thing in the world I should want to do would be -to----" - -"I know. Would be to show partiality. To fail in treating all alike. -Even that small programme isn't much--nor likely to please any girl; -but you have failed to carry it out, small as it is. Here in this -house, there on the dunes, what have I been--and where? Put into any -obscure corner, lost in the woods, left off somewhere on the edge of -things...." - -Cope stared and tried to stem her protests. She was of the blood,--her -aunt's own niece. But whereas Medora Phillips sometimes "scrapped," as -he called it, merely to promote social diversion and to keep the -conversational ball a-rolling, this young person, a more vigorous -organism, and with decided, even exaggerated ideas as to her dues... -Well, the room was still full, and he was glad enough of it. - -"I don't know whether I like you or not," she went on, in a low, rapid -tone; "and I don't suppose you very much like me; but I won't go on -being ignored.... - -"Ignored? Why," stammered Cope, "my sense of obligation to this -house----" - -She shrugged scornfully. His sense of obligation had been made none too -apparent. Certainly it had not been brought into line with her deserts -and demands. - -Cope took up the paper-cutter again and looked out across the room. Amy -Leffingwell, questioningly, was looking across at him. He could change -feet--if that made the general discomfort of his position any less. He -did so. - -Amy was standing near the piano and held a sheet or two of new music in -her hands. And Medora Phillips, with a word of general explication and -direction, made the girl's intention clear. Amy had a new song for -baritone, with a violin obbligato and the usual piano accompaniment, -and Cope was to sing it. 'Twas an extremely simple thing, quite within -his compass; and Carolyn, who could read easy music at sight ("It's -awfully easy," declared Amy), would play the piano part; and Amy -herself would perform the obbligato (with no statement as to whether it -was simple or not). - -Carolyn approached the task and the piano in the passive spirit of -accommodation. Cope came forward with reluctance: this was not an -evening when he felt like singing; besides, he preferred to choose his -own songs. Also, he would have preferred to warm up on something -familiar. Amy took her instrument from its case with a suppressed sense -of ecstasy; and it is the ecstatic who generally sets the pace. - -The thing went none too well. Amy was the only one who had seen the -music before, and she was the only one who particularly wanted to make -music now. However, the immediate need was not that the song should go -well, but that it should go: that it should go on, that it should go on -and on, repetitiously, until it should come (or even not come) to go -better. She slid her bow across the strings with tasteful passion. She -enjoyed still more than her own tones the tones of Cope's voice,--tones -which, whether in happy unison with hers or not, were, after all, -seldom misplaced, whatever they may have lacked in heartiness and -confidence. It was a short piece, and on the third time it went rather -well. - -"How perfectly lovely!" exclaimed Mrs. Phillips, at the right moment. - -Cope smiled deprecatingly. "It might be made to go very nicely," he -said. - -"It _has_ gone very nicely," insisted Amy; "it did, this last time." -She waved her bow with some vivacity. She had heaved the whole of her -young self into the work; she had been buoyed up by Cope's tones, -which, with repetition, had gathered assurance if not expressiveness; -and she based her estimate of the general effect on the impression -which her own inner nature had experienced. And her impression was -heightened when Pearson, forging forward, and ignoring both Cope and -Carolyn, thanked her richly and emphatically for her part--a part -which, to him, seemed the whole. - -Hortense, who had kept her place behind the large lampshade, twisted -her interlocked fingers and said no word. Foster, who had disposed -himself on an inconspicuous couch, kept his own counsel. After all, -_omne ignotum_: Cope's singing had sounded better from upstairs. At -close range a ringing assertiveness had somehow failed. - -Cope had come with no desire to extend his stay beyond the limits of an -evening call. He declined to sing on his own account, and soon rose as -if to make his general adieux. - -"You won't give us one of your own songs, then?" asked Medora Phillips, -in a disappointed tone. "And at my dinner----" - -No, she could not quite say that, at her dinner, Cope, whatever he had -failed to do, had contributed no measure of entertainment for her -guests. - -"Give us a recitation, then," persisted Medora; "or tell us a story. Or -make up"--here she indulged herself in an airily imperious flight--"a -story of your own on the spot." - -A trifling request, truly. But---- - -"Heavens!" said Cope. "I am not an author--still less an -_improvvisatore_." - -"I am sure you could be," returned Medora fondly. "Just try." - -Cope sat down again and began to run his eye uncomfortably about the -room, as if dredging the air for an idea. Behind one corner of a mirror -was a large bunch of drying leaves. They had been brought in from the -sand dunes as a decorative souvenir of the autumn, and had kept their -place through mere inertia: an oak bough, once crimson and russet; a -convoluted length of bittersweet, to which a few split berries still -clung; and a branch of sassafras, with its intriguing variety of -leaves--a branch selected, in fact, because it gave, within narrow -compass, the plant's entire scope and repertoire as to foliage. - -Cope caught at the sassafras as a falling balloonist catches at his -parachute. - -"Well," he said, still reluctant and fumbling, "perhaps I can devise a -legend: the Legend, let us say, of the Sassafras Bush." - -"Good!" cried Medora heartily. - -Pearson, whispering to Amy Leffingwell, gave little heed to Cope and -his strained endeavor to please Mrs. Phillips. Foster, quite passive, -listened with curiosity for what might come. - -"Or perhaps you would prefer folk-lore," Cope went on. "Why the -Sassafras has Three Kinds of Leaves, or something like that." - -"Better yet!" exclaimed Medora. "Listen, everybody. Why the Sassafras -has Three Kinds of Leaves." - -Pearson stopped his buzzings, and Cope began. "The Wood-nymphs," he -said slowly, "were a nice enough lot of girls, but they labored under -one great disadvantage: they had no thumbs." - -Hortense pricked up her ears. Did he mean to be personal? If so, he -should find that one of the nymphs had a whole hand as surely as he -himself had a cheek. - -Cope paused. "Of course you've got to postulate _something_," he -submitted apologetically. - -"Of course," Medora agreed. - -"So when they bought their gloves, or mittens, or whatever their -handgear might be called, they usually patronized the hickory or the -beech or some other tree with leaves that were----" - -"Ovate!" cried Medora delightedly. - -"Ovate, yes; or whatever just the right word may be. But a good many of -them traded at the Sign of the Sassafras, where they found leaves that -were similar, but rather more delicate." - -"I believe he's going to do it," thought Foster. - -"Yet the nymphs knew that they lacked thumbs and kept on wanting them. -So, during the long, dull winter, they put their minds to it, and -finally thumbs came." - -"Will-power!" said Medora. - -"And early in April they went to the Sassafras and said: 'We have -thumbs! We have thumbs! So we need a different sort of mitten.' - -"The Sassafras was only half awake. 'Thumbs?' he repeated. 'How many?' - -"'Two!' cried the nymphs. 'Two!' - -"A passing breeze roused the Sassafras. He became at least -three-quarters awake." - -"I doubt it," muttered Hortense. - -"'That's interesting,' he said. 'I aim to supply all new needs. Come -back in a month or so, and meanwhile I'll see what I can do for you.' - -"In May the nymphs returned with their thumbs and asked, 'How about our -new mittens?'" - -The story was really under way now, and Cope went on with more -confidence and with greater animation. - -"'Look and see,' said the Sassafras. - -"They looked and saw. Among its simple ordinary leaves were several -with two lobes--one on each side. 'Will these do?' - -"'Do?' said the nymphs. 'We said we had two thumbs, but we meant one on -each hand, stupid. Do? We should say not!' - -"The Sassafras was mortified. 'Well,' he said, 'that's all I can manage -this season. I'm sorry not to have understood you young ladies and your -needs. Come back again next spring.' - -"It was a long time to wait, but they waited. Next May----" - -Amy, now unworried by George Pearson, began to get the thread of the -thing. Foster was sure the thread would run through. Hortense was still -alert for ulterior meanings. Poor Cope, however, had no ambition to -spin a double thread,--a single one was all he was equal to. - -"Next May the nymphs, after nursing their thumbs for a year----" - -Hortense frowned. - -"----came back again; and there, among the plain leaves and the -double-lobed leaves, were several fresh bright, smooth ones with a -single lobe well to one side,--the very thing for mittens. And------" - -"Yes, he has done it," Foster acknowledged. - -"And that," ended Cope rather stridently, as he rose to go on the flood -of a sudden yet unexpected success, "is Why the Sassafras----" - -"Why the Sassafras has Three Kinds of Leaves!" cried Medora in triumph. -Mittens for midsummer made no difficulty. - -Cope gave Carolyn careful thanks for her support at the piano, and did -not see that she felt he too could be a poet if he only would. He went -out of his way to shake hands with Hortense, and did not realize how -nearly a new quarrel had opened. He stepped over to do the like with -Amy; but she went out with him into the hall,--the only one of the -party who did,--and even accompanied him to the front door. - -"Thank you so much," she said, looking up into his face smilingly and -holding his hand with a long, clinging touch. "It went beautifully; and -there are others that will go even better." - -"Others?" He thought, for an instant, that she was thanking him for his -Legend and was even threatening to regard him as a flowing fount of -invention; but he soon realized that her mind was fixed exclusively on -their duet--if such it was to be called. - -"The deuce!" he thought. "Enough is enough." - -Despite his success with the Sassafras, he went home discomforted and -even flustered. That hand was too much like the hand of possession. The -girl was stealing over him like a light, intangible vapor. He struck -ahead with a quicker gait, as if trying to outwalk a creeping fog. One -consolation, however: Hortense had come like a puff of wind. Even a -second squall from the same quarter would not be altogether amiss. - -And had there not been one further fleeting source of reassurance? Had -he not, on leaving, caught through the open door of the drawing room an -elevation of Medora Phillips' eyebrows which seemed to say fondly, -indulgently, yet a bit ironically, "Oh, you foolish girl!"? Yet if a -girl is foolish, and is going to persist in her folly, a lightly lifted -pair of eyebrows will not always stay her course. Her gathering -momentum is hardly to be checked by such slender means. - - - - -19 - -_COPE FINDS HIMSELF COMMITTED_ - - -Amy Leffingwell, having written once, found it easier to write again. -And having strolled along the edge of the bluff with Cope on that -fateful Sunday, she found it natural to intercept him on other parts of -the campus (where their paths might easily cross), or to stroll with -him, after casual encounters carefully planned, through sheets of -fallen leaves under the wide avenues of elms just outside. Her third -note almost summoned him to a rendezvous. It annoyed him; but he might -have been more than annoyed had he known of her writing, rather simply, -to a rather simple mother in Fort Lodge, Iowa, about her hopes and her -expectations. Her mother had, of course, heard in detail of the rescue; -and afterward had heard in still greater detail, as the roseate -lime-light of idealization had come to focus more exactly on the scene. -She had had also an unaffected appreciation--or several--of Cope's -personal graces and accomplishments. She had heard, lastly, of Cope's -song to her daughter's obbligato: a duet _in vacuo_, since Carolyn had -been suppressed and the surrounding company had been banished to a -remote circumference. What wonder that she began to see her daughter -and Bertram Cope in an admirable isolation and to intimate that she -hoped, very soon, for definite news? - -Well, not a few of us have met an Amy Leffingwell: some plump-faced, -pink-cheeked child, with a delicate little concave nose not at all -"strong," and a fine little chin none too vigorously moulded, and a -pair of timid candid blue eyes shadowed by a wisp or so of fluffy -hair--and have not always taken her for what she was. She "wouldn't -hurt a kitten," we say; and we assume that her "striking out a line for -herself" is the last thing she would try to do. Yet such an -unimpressive and disarming façade may mask large chambers of -stubbornness and tenacity. - -Amy knew how long and hard she had thought of Cope, and she asked for -some evidence that he had been thinking long and hard of her. She -desired a "response." But, in fact, he had been thinking of her only -when he must. He thought of her whenever he saw himself caught in that -flapping sail, and he thought of her whenever he recalled that she had -taken it on herself to select his songs. But he did not want her to -make out-and-out demands on his time and attention. Still less did he -want her to talk about "happiness." This had come to be her favorite -topic, and she discoursed on it profusely: he was almost ungracious -enough to say that she did so glibly. "Happiness"--that conventional -bliss toward which she was turning her mind as they strolled together -on these late November afternoons--was for him a long way ahead. How -furnish a house, how clothe and feed a wife?--at least until his thesis -should be written and a place, with a real salary, found in the -academic world. How, even, buy an engagement ring--that costly -superfluity? How even contrive to pay for all the small gifts and -attentions which an engagement involved? Yet why ask himself such -questions? For he was conscious of a fundamental repugnance to any such -scheme of life and was acutely aware that--for awhile, at least, and -perhaps for always--he wanted to live in quite a different mode. - -Amy's confident assumptions began to fill the house, to alter its -atmosphere. Medora Phillips, who had begun by raising her eyebrows in -light criticism, now lowered them in frowning protest. She had found -Cope "charming"; but this charm of his was to add to the attractiveness -of her house and to give her a high degree of personal gratification. -It was not to be frittered away; still less was it to be absorbed -elsewhere. Hortense, who had been secretly at work on a portrait-sketch -of Cope in oil, and rather despising herself for it, now began to make -another bold picture in her own mind. She saw herself handing out the -sketch to Cope in person, with an air of high bravado; she might say, -if bad came to worse, that she had found some professional interest in -his color or in his "planes." On one occasion Medora hardily -requisitioned Cope for an evening at the theatre, in the city; miles in -and miles back she had him in her car all to herself; and if Amy, next -day, appeared to feel that wealth and organization had taken an unfair -advantage of simple, honest love, Medora herself was troubled by no -stirrings of conscience. - -The new atmosphere reached even Foster on the top floor; and when, one -evening in mid-December, he finally carried out his long-meditated plan -to dine with Randolph, the household situation was uppermost in his -mind. That he had not the clearest understanding of the situation did -not diminish his interest in it. Though he sat in the dark, and far -apart, some sense all his own, cultivated through years of deprivation, -came to his aid. Peter brought him down the street and round the -corner; and Randolph's Chinaman, fascinated by his green shade and his -tortuous method of locomotion (once out of his wheeled-chair), did the -rest. "You had better stay all night," Randolph had suggested; and he -was glad to avoid a second awkward trip on the same evening. - -Foster had wondered whether Cope would be present. He had not asked to -meet him--for he hardly knew whether he wished to or not. Though this -was an "occasion,"--and his,--he had left Randolph to act quite as he -might choose. There was a third chair at table and Randolph delayed -dinner ten minutes while waiting for it to be filled. - -"Well, let's go in and sit down," he said presently, with a slight -twist of the mouth. He spoke lightly, as if it were as easy for Foster -to sit down as for himself. But Foster got into his place after a -moment and contrived to spread his napkin over his legs. - -"I expected Bertram Cope," Randolph went on; "but he isn't here, and I -have no word from him and do not know whether----" - -He paused, obviously at a loss. - -"Not here?" repeated Foster. "Is there, then, one place where he is -not?" - -"Why, Joe----!" - -"Our house is full of him!" Foster burst out raucously. He had removed -the green _abat-jour_, for the candle-shades (as they sometimes will) -were performing their office. In the low but clear light his face -seemed distorted. - -"He rises to my floor like incense. The very halls and stairways reek -with his charms and perfections." - -"Well, you escape him here," said Randolph ruefully. - -"The whole miserable place is steaming with expectation,--with the -deadly aroma of a courtship going stale. I can't stand it! I can't -stand it!" - -"Courtship?" - -"You may think it takes two, but it doesn't. That foolish girl has -thrown the whole place into discomfort and confusion; and I don't know -who's for or who's against----" - -"What foolish girl?" asked Randolph quickly. Sing-Lo was at his elbow, -changing plates: it was assumed, justly enough, that he would not be -able to follow the intricacies of a situation purely occidental. - -"Our Amy," replied Foster, with a dash of bitterness. - -"Amy Leffingwell?" asked Randolph, still more quickly. - -Foster had blind eyes, but alert ears. He felt that Randolph was -surprised and displeased. And indeed his host was both. That boy fallen -maladroitly in love? thought Randolph. It was a second check. He had -exerted himself to show a friendliness for Cope, had expected to enjoy -him while he stayed on for his months in town, and had hoped to help -push his fortunes in whatever other field he might enter. He had even -taken his present quarters--no light task, all the details -considered--to make Cope's winter agreeable, no less than his own. And -now? First the uncounted-upon friend from Wisconsin with whom Cope was -arranging to live; next, this sudden, unexpected affair with that girl -at Medora's. Did the fellow not know his own mind? Could he formulate -no hard-and-fast plan? Here Randolph, in his disappointment, -inconsistently forgot that a hard-and-fast plan was largely his real -annoyance and grievance. Then he remembered. He looked at the vacant -place, and tried for composure and justice. - -"I shall probably hear some good reason, in due time," he said. - -"I hope so," rejoined Foster; "but it takes these young fellows to be -careless--and ungrateful." He made no pretense of ignoring the fact -that Randolph had moved into this apartment more on account of Cope -than for any other reason. - -"H'm, yes," responded Randolph thoughtfully. "I suppose it is the -tendency of a young fellow who has never quite stood on his own legs -financially to accept about everything that comes his way, and to -accept it as a matter of course." - -"It is," said Foster. - -"I know that _I_ was that way," continued Randolph, looking studiously -at the nearest candle-shade. "I was beyond the middle twenties before I -quite launched out for myself, and any kindness received was taken -without much question and without much thanks. I presume that he still -has some assistance from home...." - -He dropped youthful insouciance over favors received to consider the -change that marriage makes in a young man's status. "I wouldn't go so -far as to assert that a young man married is a man that's marred----" - -"This _is_ stiff doctrine," Foster acknowledged. - -"But somehow he does seem done for. He is placed; he is cut off from -wide ranges of interesting possibilities; he offers himself less -invitingly to the roving imagination...." - -Meanwhile Cope, with Randolph's invitation driven altogether from his -mind by more urgent matters, was pacing the streets, through the first -snow-flurries of the winter, and was wondering, rather distractedly, -just where he stood. Precisely what words, at a very brief yet critical -juncture, had he said, or not said? Exactly how had he phrased--or -failed to phrase--the syllables which constituted, perhaps, a -turning-point in his life? - -Amy Leffingwell had demanded his attendance for one more walk, that -afternoon, and he had not been dextrous enough, face to face with her, -to refuse. She had expressed herself still more insistently on -"happiness"--(on hers, his, theirs; the two were one, in her view)--and -on a future shared together. In just what inadequate way had he tried -to fend her off? Had he said, "I shall have to wait?" Or had his -blundering tongue said, instead, "We should have to wait?"--or even -worse, "We shall have to wait?" In any event, he had used that -cowardly, temporizing word "wait"--for she had instantly seized upon -it. Why, yes, indeed; she was willing to wait; she had expected to -wait.... - -He turned out from an avenue lighted with electric globes, past which -the snowflakes were drifting, and entered a quieter and darker -side-street. In the dusk she had put up her face, expecting to be -kissed; and he, partly out of pity for the expression that came when he -hesitated, and partly out of pure embarrassment and inexpertness, had -lightly touched her lips. That had sealed it, possibly. He saw her -sitting in rapt fancy in her bedroom--if not more vocal in the rooms -below. He saw her writing to an unseen mother in a tone of joyful -complacency, and looking at her finger for a ring which he could not -place there. He saw the distaste of his own home circle, to which this -event had come at least a year too soon. He saw the amazement, and -worse, of Arthur Lemoyne, whose plans for coming to town were now all -made and to whom this turn would prove a psychological shock which -might deter him from coming at all. But, most of all, he saw--and felt -to the depths of his being--his own essential repugnance to the life -toward which he now seemed headed. What an outlook for Christmas! What -an unpleasant surprise for his parents! What opportunity in Amy -Leffingwell's holiday vacation at Fort Lodge to reinforce the written -page by the spoken word! Still forgetful of his engagement with -Randolph, he continued to walk the streets. He turned in at midnight, -hoping he might sleep, and trusting that morning would throw a less -sinister light on his misadventure. - -Long before this, Joseph Foster had been put to bed, by Sing-Lo, in -this spare room. It was Foster's crutch, rather than a knightly sword, -which leaned against the door-jamb; and it was Foster's crooked -members, rather than the straight young limbs of Cope, which first -found place among the sheets and blankets of that shining new brass -bedstead. - - - - -20 - -_COPE HAS A DISTRESSFUL CHRISTMAS_ - - -Cope awakened at seven. After an early interval of happy lightness, -there came suddenly and heavily the crushing sense of his predicament. -How monstrous it was that one instant of time, one ill-considered -action, one poorly-chosen word could clamp a repellent burden on a man -for the rest of his life! - -Well, he must expect telephone messages and letters. They came. That -afternoon Mrs. Peck had "a lady's voice" to report: "It sounded like a -_young_ lady's voice," she added. And she looked at Cope with some -curiosity: a "young lady" asking for him over the wire was the rarest -thing in the world. - -Next day came the first note. The handwriting was utterly new to him; -but his intuition, applied instantly to the envelope, told him of the -source. The nail, driven, was now to be clinched. She had the right to -ask him to come; and she did ask him to come--"soon." - -Cope's troubled eyes sought the calendar above his table. How many days -to Christmas? How much time might he spend in Freeford? How long before -Christmas might he arrange to leave Churchton? The holidays at home -loomed as a harbor of refuge. By shortening as far as possible the -interval here and by lengthening as far as possible the stay with his -family, he might cut down, in some measure, the imminent threatenings -of awkwardness and constraint; then, beyond the range of anything but -letters, he might study the unpleasant situation at his leisure and -determine a future course. - -He set himself to answer Amy's note. He hoped, he said, to see her in a -few days, but he was immensely busy in closing the term-work before the -holidays; he also suggested that their affair--"their" affair!--be kept -quiet for the present. Yet he had all too facile a vision of beatific -meditations that were like enough to give the situation away to all the -household; and he was nervously aware of Amy Leffingwell as continually -on the verge of bubbling confidences. - -He also wrote to Lemoyne. His letter was less an announcement than a -confession. - -"I like this!" began Lemoyne's reply, with abrupt, impetuous sarcasm. -"You have claimed, more than once," he went on, "to have steadied me -and kept me out of harm's way; but I've never yet made any such demands -on you as you are making on me. This thing can't go on, and you know it -as well as I do. Nip it. Nip it now. Don't think that our intimacy is -to end in any such fashion as this, for it isn't--especially at this -particular time."... - -Lemoyne proceeded to practical matters. "If that room is still free, -engage it from the first of January. I will have a few things sent -down. Father is weakening a little. Anyhow, I've got enough money for a -couple of months. I will join you in Freeford between Christmas and New -Year's (nearer the latter, probably), and we will go back together."... - -Cope rather took heart from these rough, outspoken lines. Lemoyne was -commonly neither rough nor outspoken; but here was an emergency, -involving his own interests, which must be dealt with decisively. Cope -seemed to feel salvation on the way. Perhaps that was why he still did -so little to save himself. He took the new room; he had one meeting -with Amy; and he left for home at least two days before he was strictly -entitled to do so. - -The meeting took place in Mrs. Phillips' drawing-room; he would trust -himself to no more strolls on the campus, to no more confabs in college -halls. There was protection in numbers, and numbers seldom failed -beneath Medora Phillips' roof. They failed this time, however. Mrs. -Phillips and Hortense were away at a reading; only Amy and Carolyn were -at home. Cope seized on Carolyn as at a straw. He thanked her warmly -again for her halting offices in the matter of that last song, and he -begged that he might hear some of her recent verse. His appeal was -vehement, almost boisterous: Carolyn, surprised, felt that he was ready -at last to grant her a definite personality. - -Amy tried in vain to remove Carolyn from the board. But Carolyn, like -Hortense, had finally joined the ranks of the "recognized"; she was -determined (being still ignorant, Cope was glad to see, regarding Amy's -claims) to make this recognition so marked as to last beyond the -moment. She played a little--not well. She read. She even accompanied -Amy to the door at the close of Cope's short stay. He shook hands with -them both. He had decided that he would do no more than this with Amy, -in any event, and Carolyn's presence made his predetermined course -easy, even obligatory. Yet he went out into the night feeling, somehow, -that he had acted solely on his resolution and that he might consider -himself a man of some decisiveness, after all. Amy had looked -disappointed, but had contrived to whisper that she would write from -Iowa. That, of course, was to be looked for, and would represent the -combined efforts of herself and her home circle; yet he had a fortnight -for consideration and counsel. - -Cope, during his first few days at home, was moody and abstracted: his -parents found him adding little to the Christmas cheer. His mother, -always busy over domestic cares and now busier than ever, thought that -he must have been working too hard. She would stand in the kitchen door -with a half-trimmed pie on one hand and ponder him as he sat in the -dining-room, staring absorbedly at the Franklin stove. His father, who -saw him chiefly in the evening, by the gas-light of the old-fashioned -house, found his face slightly pinched: was his pocket pinched too, and -would he be likely, before leaving, to ask help toward making up a -deficit? His sister Rosalys, who lived a life of dry routine, figured -him as deep in love. He let several days pass without hinting what the -real situation was. - -There was interest all round when, the day before Christmas, the -postman came along the bleak and flimsy street and left a letter for -him. Cope was away from the house, and Rosalys, studying the envelope's -penmanship and even its postmark, found vague confirmation of her -theory: some college girl--one of his own students, probably--was home -on vacation just as he was. If so, a "small town" person of caste and -character like themselves; not brilliant, but safe. She set up the -letter edgewise on the back parlor mantelpiece. - -When Cope came in at noon and saw the letter, his face fell. He put it -in his pocket, sat silent at table, and disappeared as soon as the meal -was over. Rosalys, whose pupils were off her mind for a few days and -who had thought to spare, began to shade her theory. - -Cope read the letter in the low-ceiled back bedroom (the ceiling sloped -away on one side) which had been his for so many years. Those years of -happy boyhood--how far away they seemed now, and how completely past! -Surely he had never thought to come back to these familiar walls to -such effect as this.... Well, what did it say? - -It said, in its four pages (yes, Amy had really limited herself thus), -how joyous she was that the dear Christmas season had brought her such -a beautiful love-gift; it said that mother was so pleased and -happy--and even mentioned a sudden aunt; it said how willingly she -would wait on until.... - -That evening Cope made his announcement. They were all seated round the -reading-lamp in the back parlor, where the old Brussels carpet looked -dim and where only venerated age kept the ornate French clock from -seeming tawdry. Cope looked down at the carpet and up at the clock, and -spoke. - -Yes, they must have it. - -His mother took the shock first and absorbed most of it. She led a -humdrum life and she was ready to welcome romance. To help adjust -herself she laid her hands, with a soft, sweeping motion, on the two -brown waves that drew smoothly across her temples, and then she -transferred them to his, held his head, and gave him a kiss. Rosalys -took his two hands warmly and smiled, and he tried to smile back. His -father twisted the tip of his short gray beard, watched his son's mien, -and said little. Day after to-morrow, with the major part of their -small Christmas festivities over, he would ask how this unexpected and -unwarranted situation had come about, and how, in heaven's name, the -thing was to be carried through: by what means, with whose help?... In -his complex of thought the word "thesis" came to his tongue, but he -kept from speaking it. He had been advised that his son had at last -struck out definitely into some bookish bypath--just what bypath -mattered little, he gathered, if it were but followed to the end. Yet -the end was still far--and the boy evidently realized this. He was glad -that Bertram was sober over the prospect and over his present -plan--which was a serious undertaking, just now, in truth. - -Cope had to adjust himself to all this, and to endure, besides, the -congratulations--or the comments--of a number of tiresome relatives; -and it was a relief when, on the twenty-ninth, Arthur Lemoyne finally -arrived. - -Lemoyne had been heralded as a young man of parts, and as the son of a -family which enjoyed, in Winnebago, some significant share of worldly -prosperity, and, therefore, of social consideration. The simpler Copes, -putting him in the other back bedroom, the ceiling of which sloped the -opposite way, wondered if they were quite giving him his just dues. -When Rosalys came to set away his handbag and to rearrange, next -morning, his brushes on the top of the dresser, she gathered from -various indications supplied by his outfit that the front chamber, at -whatever inconvenience to whomever, would have been more suitable. But, -"Never mind," said her mother; "they'll do very well as they are--side -by side, with the door conveniently between. Then Bert can look after -him a little more and we a little less." - -Lemoyne presented himself to the combined family gaze as a young man of -twenty-seven or so, with dark, limpid eyes, a good deal of dark, wavy -hair, and limbs almost too plumply well-turned. In his hands the flesh -minimized the prominence of joints and knuckles, and the fingers -(especially the little fingers) displayed certain graceful, slightly -affected movements of the kind which may cause a person to be -credited--or taxed--with possessing the "artistic temperament." To end -with, he carried two inches of short black stubble under his nose. He -was a type which one may admire--or not. Rosalys Cope found in him a -sort of picturesque allure. Rather liking him herself, she found a -different reason for her brother's liking. "If Bert cares for him," she -remarked, "I suppose it's largely by contrast--he's so spare and -light-colored himself." - -It was evident that, on this first meeting, Lemoyne meant to ingratiate -himself--to make himself attractive and entertaining. He had determined -to say a thing or two before he went away, and it would be advantageous -to consolidate his position. - -He had had five or six hours of cross-country travel, with some tedious -waits at junctions, and at about ten o'clock, after some showy -converse, he acknowledged himself tired enough for bed. Cope saw him -up, and did not come down again. The two talked till past eleven; and -even much later, when light sleepers in other parts of the house were -awake for a few minutes, muffled sounds from the same two voices -reached their ears. - -But Cope's words, many as they were, told Lemoyne nothing that he did -not know, little that he had not divined. The sum of all was this: Cope -did not quite know how he had got into it; but he knew that he was -miserable and wanted to get out of it. - -Lemoyne had asked, first of all, to see the letter from Iowa. "Oh, -come," Cope had replied, half-bashful, half-chivalrous, "you know it -wasn't written for anybody but me." - -"The substance of it, then," Lemoyne had demanded; and Cope, reluctant -and shame-faced, had given it. "You've never been in anything of this -sort, you know," he submitted. - -"I should say not!" Lemoyne retorted. "Nor you, either. You're not in -it now,--or, if you are, you're soon going to be out of it. You would -help me through a thing like this, and I'm going to help you." - -The talk went on. Lemoyne presented the case for a broken engagement. -Engagements, as it was well known to human experience, might, if -quickly made, be as quickly unmade: no novelty in that. "I had never -expected to double up with an engaged man," Lemoyne declared further. -"Nothing especially jolly about that--least of all when the poor wretch -is held dead against his will." As he went on, he made Cope feel that -he had violated an _entente_ of long standing, and had almost brought a -trusting friend down from home under false pretenses. - -But phrases from Amy's letter continued to plague Cope. There was a -confiding trust, a tender who-could-say-just-what?... - -"Well," said Lemoyne, at about two o'clock, "let's put it off till -morning. Turn over and go to sleep." - -But before he fell asleep himself he resolved that he would make the -true situation clear next day. He would address that sympathetic mother -and that romantic sister in suitably cogent terms; the father, he felt -sure, would require no effort and would even welcome his aid with a -strong sense of relief. - -So next day, Lemoyne, deploying his natural graces and his dramatic -dexterities, drew away the curtain. He did not go so far as to say that -Bertram had been tricked; he did not even go so far as to say that he -had been inexpert: he contented himself with saying that his friend had -been over-chivalrous and that his fine nature had rather been played -upon. The mother took it all with a silent, inexpressive -thoughtfulness, though it was felt that she did not want her boy to be -unhappy. Rosalys, if she admired Lemoyne a little more, now liked him -rather less. Her father, when the declaration reached him by secondary -impact, did feel the sense of relief which Lemoyne had anticipated, and -came to look upon him as an able, if somewhat fantastic, young fellow. - -Cope himself, when his father questioned him, said with frank -disconsolateness, "I'm miserable!" And, "I wish to heaven I were out of -it!" he added. - -"_Get_ out of it," his father counselled; and when Cope's own feelings -were clearly known through the household there was no voice of dissent. -"And then buckle down for your degree," the elder added, to finish. - -"If I only could!" exclaimed Cope, with a wan face,--convinced, -youthfully, that the trouble through which he was now striving must -last indefinitely. "I should be glad enough to get my mind on it, I'm -sure." - -He walked away to reconstruct a devastated privacy. "Arthur, I'm not -quite sure that I thank you," he said, later. - -"H'm!" replied Lemoyne non-committally. "I hope," he added, more -definitely articulate, "that we're going to have a pleasanter life in -our new quarters. I'm getting mighty little pleasure--if you'll just -understand me--here!" - - - - -21 - -_COPE, SAFEGUARDED, CALLS AGAIN_ - - -If Cope came back from Freeford with the moral support of one family, -Amy Leffingwell came back from Fort Lodge with the moral support of -another. Hers was a fragmental family, true; but its sentiment was -unanimous; she had the combined support of a pleased mother and of an -enthusiastic maiden aunt. - -Amy reached Churchton first, and it soon transpired through the house -in which she lived that she was engaged to Bertram Cope. Cope, -returning two days later, with Lemoyne, found his new status an open -book to the world--or to such a small corner of the world as cared to -read. - -Cope had written from Freeford, explaining to Randolph the broken -dinner-engagement: at least he had said that immediate concerns of -importance had driven the date from his mind, and that he was sorry. -Randolph, only too willing to accept any fair excuse, good-naturedly -made this one serve: the boy was not so negligent and ungrateful, after -all. He got the rest of the story a few days later, in a message from -Foster. What _was_ the boy, then? he asked himself. He recalled their -talk as they had walked past the sand-hills on that October Sunday. -Cope had disclaimed all inclination for matrimony. He had confessed a -certain inability to safeguard himself. Was he a victim, after all? A -victim to his own ineptitude? A victim to his own highmindedness? Well, -whatever the alternative, a field for the work of the salvage-corps had -opened. - -At the big house on Ashburn Avenue a like feeling had come to prevail. -Medora Phillips herself had passed from the indulgently satirical to -the impatient, and almost to the indignant. Her niece thought the new -relation clearly superfluous. She put away the portrait in oil, but she -rather hoped to resume work on it, some time. Meanwhile, she was far -from kind to Amy. - -Cope soon made an obligatory appearance at the house. He was glad -enough to have the presence and the support of Arthur Lemoyne. The call -came on a rigorous evening at the beginning of the second week in -January. The two young men had about brought their new quarters to -shape and subjection. They had spent two or three evenings in shifting -and rearranging things--trifling purchases in person and larger things -sent by express. They had reached a good degree of snugness and -comfort; but---- - -"We've got to go tonight!" said Cope firmly. - -"Tonight?" repeated Lemoyne. "Unless I'm mistaken, we're in for a deuce -of a time." He snuggled again into the big easy chair that had just -arrived from Winnebago. - -"We are!" returned Cope, with unhappy mien. "But it's got to be gone -through with." - -"I'm talking about the weather," rejoined Lemoyne plumply. He was -versed in the reading of signs as they presented themselves a hundred -and fifty miles to the north, and he thought he could accurately apply -his experience to a locale somewhat beyond his earlier ken. The vast -open welter of water to the east would but give the roaring north wind -a greater impetus. "We're going to have tonight, the storm of the -season." - -"Storm or no storm, I can't put it off any longer. I've got to go." - -As they started out the wind was keen, and a few fine flakes, driven -from the north, flew athwart their faces. When they reached Mrs. -Phillips' house, Peter, wrapped in furs, was sitting in the limousine -by the curb, and two or three people were seen in the open door of the -vestibule. - -"Well, the best of luck, _cher Professeur_," Cope heard the voice of -Mrs. Phillips saying, in a quick expulsion of syllables. "This is going -to be a bad night, I'm afraid; but I hope your audience will get to the -hall to hear you, and that our Pierre will be able to get you back to -us." - -"Oh, Madame," returned the plump little man, "what a climate!" And he -ran down the walk to the car. - -Yes, Mrs. Phillips had another celebrity on her hands. It was an -eminent French historian who was going across to the campus to deliver -the second lecture of his course. "How lucky," she had said to -Hortense, just after dinner, "that we went to hear him _last_ night!" -Their visitor was handsomely accommodated--and suitably, too, she -felt--in the Louis Quinze chamber, and he was expected back in it a -little after ten. - -"Why, Bertram Cope!" she exclaimed, as the two young men came up the -walk while the great historian ran down; "come in, come in; don't let -me stand here freezing!" - -It turned out to be a young man's night. Mrs. Phillips had invited a -few "types" to entertain and instruct her Frenchman. They had come to -dinner, and they had stayed on afterward. - -Among them was the autumn undergraduate whom Cope, at an earlier day, -had disdainfully called "Phaon," a youth of twenty. "You know," said -Medora Phillips to Randolph, a few days later, when reviewing the stay -of her newest guest, "Those sophisticated, world-worn people so -appreciate our fresh, innocent, ingenuous boys. M. Pelouse told me, on -leaving, that Roddy quite met his ideal of the young American. So -open-faced, so inexperienced, so out of the great world...." - -"Good heavens!" said Randolph impatiently. "Do they constitute the -world? You might think so,--going about giving us awards, and hanging -medals on us, and certifying how well we speak French! Fudge! The world -is changing. It would be better," he added, "if more of us--college -students included--learned how to speak a decenter English. I went to -their dramatic club the other evening. Such pronunciation! Such -delivery! I almost longed for the films." - -A second "young American" was present--George F. Pearson. Pearson lived -with his parents in another big house a block down the street. Mrs. -Phillips had summoned him as a type that was purely indigenous--the -"young American business man." Pearson had just made a "kill," as he -called it--a coup executed quite without the aid of his father, and he -was too full of his success to keep still; he was more typical than -ever. The Professor had looked at him in staring wonder. So had Amy -Leffingwell--in the absence of another target for her large, intent -eyes. - -But Medora Phillips knew all about George and Roddy. The novelty was -Lemoyne, and she must learn about him. She readily seized the points -that composed his personal aspect, which she found good: his general -darkness and richness made him a fine foil for Cope. She quickly -credited him with a pretty complete battery of artistic aptitudes and -apprehensions. She felt certain that he would appreciate her ballroom -and picture-gallery, and would figure well within it. The company was -young, the night was wild, and cheer was the word. She presently led -the way upstairs. Foster, as soon as he heard the first voices in the -hall and the first footfalls on the bare treads of the upper stairs, -shut his door. - -Lemoyne felt the big bare room--bare save for a piano and a fringe of -chairs and settles, large and small--as a stage; and he surmised that -he, the new-comer, was expected to exhibit himself on it. He became -consciously the actor. He tried now the assertive note, and now the -quiet note; somehow the quiet was the louder of the two. Pearson, who -was in a conquering mood tonight, scented a rival in the general -attention, and one not wholly unworthy. Pearson was the only one of the -four in evening dress, and he felt that to be an advantage. He, at -least, had been properly attired to meet the elegant visitor from -abroad. As for poor Roddy, he had come in an ordinary sack: perhaps it -was partly this which had prompted M. Pelouse (who was of course -dressed for the platform) to find the boy such a paragon of simple -innocence. - -All costumes were alike to Lemoyne; he had appeared in dozens. If he -lacked costume now, he made it up in manner. He had bestowed an -immensity of manner on Amy Leffingwell, downstairs: his cue had been a -high, delicate, remote gravity. "I know, I know," he seemed to say; -"and I make no comment." Upstairs he kept close by Cope: he was -proprietary; he was protective. If Cope settled down in a large chair, -Lemoyne would drape himself over the arm of it; and his hand would -fall, as like as not, on the back of the chair, or even on Cope's -shoulder. And when he came to occupy the piano-stool, Cope, standing -alongside, would lay a hand on his. Mrs. Phillips noticed these minor -familiarities and remarked on them to Foster, who had lately wheeled -his chair in. Foster, a few days later, passed the comment on to -Randolph, with an astringent comment of his own.--At all events, Amy -Leffingwell remained in the distance, and George Pearson shared the -distance with her. - -Foster had broken from his retirement on hearing the voices of Cope and -Lemoyne combined in song. The song was "Larboard Watch," and he -remembered how his half-brother had sung in it during courtship, with -the young fellow who had acted, later, as his best man. Lemoyne, at the -first word of invitation, had seated himself at the instrument--a -lesser than the "grand" downstairs, but not unworthy; then, with but a -measure or so of prelude, the two voices had begun to ring out in the -old nautical ballad. Lemoyne felt the composition to be primitive, -antiquated and of slight value; but he had received his cue, and both -his throat and his hands wrought with an elaborate expressiveness. He -sang and played, if not with sincerity, at least with effect. His voice -was a high, ringing tenor; not too ringing for Cope's resonant -baritone, but almost too sweet: a voice which might cloy (if used -alone) within a few moments. Cope was a perfect second, and the two -went at it with a complete unity of understanding and of sentiment. -Together they viewed--in thirds--"the gath'ring clouds"; -together--still in thirds--they roused themselves "at the welcome call" -of "Larboard watch, ahoy!" Disregarding the mere words, they attained, -at the finish, to something like feeling--or even like a touch of -passion. Medora Phillips had never heard Cope sing like that before; -had never seen so much animation in his singing face. By the fourth bar -there had been tears in her eyes, and there was a catch in her breath -when she exclaimed softly, "You dear boys!" It was too soon, of course, -to make Lemoyne "dear"--the one boy was Cope. It was really his voice -which she had heard through the soaring, insinuating tones of the -other. Foster, sitting beside her, suddenly raised his shade and peered -out questioningly, both at the singers and at his sister-in-law. He -seemed surprised--and more. - -Pearson was surprised too, but kept his applause within limits. -However, he praised Lemoyne for his accompaniment. Then he begged Amy -for an air on the violin; and while they were determining who should -play her accompaniment, the wind raged more wildly round the gables and -the thickening snow drove with a fiercer impetus against the windows. - -Lemoyne (who was a perfectly good sight-reader) begged that he might -not be condemned to spoil another's performance. This was the result of -an understanding between Cope and himself that neither was to -contribute further. Presently a simple piece was selected through which -the unskilled Carolyn might be trusted to pick her way. Cope listened -with a decorous attention which was designed to indicate the highest -degree of sympathetic interest; but his attitude, so finely composed -within, yet so ineffectively displayed without, was as nothing to the -loud promptness of Pearson's praise. Amy glanced at Cope with -questioning surprise; but she met Pearson's excesses of commendation -with a gratified smile. - -Shortly before ten o'clock there was a stir at the front door. Mrs. -Phillips rose hastily. "It is M. Pelouse; let me go down and pet him." - -Yes, it was M. Pelouse. "Oh, Madame!" he said, as before, but with an -expressiveness doubly charged, "what a climate!" He was panting and was -covered with fine snow. Behind him was Peter, looking very grave and -dour. - -"Shall I be wanted further?" asked Peter in a tense tone, and with no -trace of his usual good-natured smile. - -"What! Again?" cried Mrs. Phillips, while Helga, farther up the hall, -was undoing the Professor; "three times on a night like this? No, -indeed! Get back into the garage as fast as you can." - -"Oh, Madame!" said the Professor, now out of his wrappings and in -better control of his voice. "They were so faithful to our beautiful -France! The _salle_ was almost full!" - -"Well," said Mrs. Phillips to herself, "they got there all right, then. -I hope most of them will get back home alive!" - -"What a climate!" M. Pelouse was still saying, as he entered the -ball-room. He had not been there before. He ran an appraising eye over -the pictures and said little. But as soon as he learned that some of -them were the work of the late M. Phillips he found words. He led the -company through a tasteful jungle of verbosity, and left the ultimate -impression that Monsieur had been a remarkable man, whether as artist -or as collector. - -Yet he did not forget to say once more, "What a climate!" - -"Is it really bad outside?" asked Pearson. M. Pelouse shrugged his -shoulders. It was _affreux_. - -"It is indeed," corroborated Mrs. Phillips: she had spent her moment at -the front door. "Nobody that I can find room for leaves my house -tonight." This meant that Cope and Lemoyne were to occupy the chintz -chamber. - -M. Pelouse gradually regained himself. Cope interested him. Cope was, -in type, the more "American" of the two new arrivals. He was also, as -M. Pelouse had heard, the _pretendant_,--yes, the _fiance_. Well, he -was calm and inexpressive enough: no close and eager attendance; cool, -cool. "How interesting," said the observer to himself. "And -Mademoiselle, quite across the room, and quite taken up"--happily, too, -it seemed--"with another man: with the other man, perhaps?..." - -At half past ten Pearson rose to leave; Cope and Lemoyne rose at the -same time. "No," said Mrs. Phillips, stopping them both; "you mustn't -think of trying to go. I can't ask Peter to take you, and you could -never get across on foot in the world. I can find a place for you." - -"And about poor Roddy?" asked Hortense. - -"Roddy may stay with me," declared Pearson. "I can put him up. Come on, -Aldridge," he said; "you're good for a hundred yard dash." And down -they started. - -"I don't want to stay," muttered Cope to Lemoyne, under cover of the -others' departure. "Devil take it; it's the last thing in the world I -want to do!" - -"It's awkward," returned Lemoyne, "but we're in for it. After all, it -isn't _her_ house, nor her family's. Besides, you've got me." - -Mrs. Phillips summoned Helga and another maid, who were just on the -point of going to bed, and directed their efforts toward the chintz -chamber. "Ah, well," thought M. Pelouse, "the _fiance_, then, is going -to remain over night in the house of his _fiancee_!" It was droll; yet -there were extenuating circumstances. But--such a singular climate, -such curious temperaments, such a general chill! And M. Pelouse was -presently lost to view among the welcome trappings of Louis Quinze. - - - - -22 - -_COPE SHALL BE RESCUED_ - - -Next morning Cope left the house before breakfast. He had had the -forethought to plead an exceptionally early engagement, and thus he -avoided meeting, after the strain of the evening before, any of the -various units of the household. He and Lemoyne, draping their -parti-colored pajamas over the foot of the bedstead, left the chintz -chamber at seven and walked out into the new day. The air was cold and -tingling; the ground was white as a sheet; the sky was a strident, -implacable blue. The glitter and the glare assaulted their sleepy eyes. -They turned up their collars, thrust their hands deep into their -pockets, and took briskly the half mile which led to their own -percolator and electric toaster. - -Cope threw himself down on the bed and let Lemoyne get the breakfast. -Well, he had called; he had done the just and expected thing; he had -held his face through it all; but he was tired after a night of much -thought and little sleep. Possibly he might not have to call again for -a full week. If 'phone messages or letters came, he would take them as -best he could. - -Nor was Lemoyne very alert. He was less prompt than usual in gaining -his early morning loquacity. His coffee was lacking in spirit, and much -of his toast was burnt. But the two revived, in fair measure, after -their taxing walk. - -They had talked through much of the dead middle of the night. Foster, -wakeful and restless, had become exasperated beyond all power of a -return to sleep. Concerns of youth and love kept them murmuring, -murmuring in the acute if distant ears of one whom youth had left and -for whom love was impossible. Beyond his foolish, figured wall were two -contrasted types of young vigor, and they babbled, babbled on, in the -sensitized hearing of one from whom vigor was gone and for whom hope -was set. - -"What do you think of her?" Cope had asked. Then he had thrown his face -into his pillow and left one ear for the reply. - -"She is a clinger," returned Lemoyne. "She will cling until she is -loosened by something or somebody. Then she will cling to the second -somebody as hard as she did to the first. I'm not so sure that it's you -as an individual especially." - -Cope had now no self-love to consider, no self-esteem to guard. He did -not raise his face from out the pillow to reply. But he found Lemoyne -rather drastic. Arthur had shown himself much in earnest, of course; he -had the right, doubtless, to be reproachful; and he was fertile in -suggestions looking toward his friend's freedom. Yet his expedients -were not always delicate or fair: Cope would have welcomed a lighter -hand on his exacerbated spirit, a more disinterested, more impartial -touch. He was glad when, one afternoon at five, a few days later, he -met Randolph on the steps of the library. Randolph, by his estimate, -was disinterested and impartial. - - -The weather still held cold: it was no day for spending time, -conversationally, outside; and they stepped back for a little into a -recess of the vestibule. Cope found an opening by bolstering up his -previous written excuses. He was still very general. - -"That's all right," replied Randolph, in friendly fashion. "Some time, -soon, we must try again. And this time we must have your friend." His -glance was kind, yet keen; nor was it brief. - -Randolph had already the outlines of the situation as Foster understood -them. He sometimes slipped in, on Sunday forenoon, to read the -newspapers to Foster, instead of going to church. Hortense and Carolyn -came up now and then: indeed, this reading was, theoretically, a part -of Carolyn's duties, but she was coming less and less frequently, and -often never got beyond the headlines. So that, every other Sunday at -least, Randolph set aside prayer-book and hymnal for dramatic -criticisms, editorials, sports and "society." - -This time Foster was full of the events of Friday night. "As I make it -out, he kept away from her the whole evening, and that new man helped -him do it. Our friend down the street, Hortense says, showed every -disposition to cut in, and the girl showed at least some disposition to -let him. I don't wonder: when you come right down to it, he's twice the -man the other is." - -"Young Pearson?" - -"Yes." - -"Clever lad. Confident. But brash. Just what his father used to be." - -"He praised her playing. Cope sat dumb. And next morning he hurried -away before breakfast. You know what kind of a morning it was. Anything -very pressing at the University on a Saturday morning at eight?" - -"I hardly know." - -"How about this sudden new friend?" Foster twitched in his chair. -"Medora," he went on, "seems to have no special fancy for him. She even -objects to his calling Cope 'Bert.' Of course he sings. And he seems to -be self-possessed and clever. But 'self-possessed'--that doesn't -express it. He was so awfully, so publicly, at home; at least that's as -I gather it. Always hanging over the other man's chair; always finding -a reason to put his hand on his shoulder...." - -"Body-guard? No wonder Pearson came to the fore." - -"I don't know. What I've heard makes me think of----" - -And here, Foster, speaking with a keen and complicated acerbity, -recalled how, during earlier years of travel, he had had opportunity to -observe a young married couple at a Saratoga hotel. They had made their -partiality too public, and an elderly lady not far away in the vast -"parlor" had audibly complained that they brought the manners of the -bed-chamber into the drawing-room. - -"They talked half through the night, too," Foster added bitterly. - -"Young men's problems," said Randolph. "Possibly they were considering -Pearson." - -"Possibly," repeated Foster; and neither followed further, for a -moment, the pathway of surmise. - -Presently Randolph rose and scuffled through the ruck of newspapers, -with which no great progress had been made. "Is Medora at home?" he -asked. - -"I think she's off at church," said Foster discontentedly. "And -Hortense went with her." - -"I'll call her up later. If I can get her for Wednesday--and Pearson -too...." - -Foster, accustomed to piecing loose ends as well as he could, did not -ask him to finish. Randolph picked up a crumpled sheet from the floor, -reseated himself, and read out the account of yesterday's double -performance at the opera. - -When Randolph, then, met Cope in the vestibule of the library, on -Monday, he felt that he had ground under his feet. Just how solid, just -how extensive, he was not quite sure; but he could safely take a few -steps experimentally. Cope was a picture of uncertainty and woe; his -face was an open bid for sympathy and aid. - -"You are unhappy," said Randolph; "and I think I know why." He meant to -advance toward the problem as if it were a case of jealousy--a matter -of Pearson's intrusion and of Amy's seemingly willing acceptance of it. - -Cope soon caught Randolph's idea, and he stared. He did not at all -resent Randolph's advances; misapprehension, in fact, might serve as -fairly, in the end, as the clearest understanding. - -Randolph placed his hand on Cope's shoulder. "You have only to assert -yourself," he said. "The other man is an intruder; it would be easy to -warn him off before he starts in to win her." - -"George Pearson?" said Cope. "Win her? In heaven's name," he blurted -out, "let him!" - -It was a cry of distaste and despair, in which no rival was concerned. -Randolph now had the situation in its real lines. - -"Well, this is no place for a talk," he said. "If you should care to -happen in on me some evening before long...." - -"I have Wednesday," returned Cope, with eagerness. - -"Not Wednesday. I have an engagement for that evening. But any evening -a little later." - -"Friday? The worst of my week's work is over by then." - -"Friday will do." And they parted. - -Randolph had secured for his Wednesday evening Medora Phillips and -Hortense. Hortense was the young person to pair with Pearson, who had -thrown over an evening at his club for the dinner with Randolph. The -talk was to be--in sections and installments--of Amy Leffingwell, and -of Cope in so far as he might enter. Medora would speak; Hortense would -speak; Randolph himself should speak. To complete the party he had -asked his relations from the far side of the big city. His sister would -preside for him; and his brother-in-law might justify his expenditure -of time and trouble by stopping off in advance for a brief confab, as -trustee, at the administration building, with the president. A -compatriot had been secured by Sing-Lo to help in dining-room and -kitchen. - -Randolph had planned a short dinner. His sister, facing the long -return-drive, would doubtless be willing to leave by nine-thirty. Then, -with two extraneous pieces removed from the board, the real matter in -hand might be got under way. - -Mrs. Phillips was most lively from the start. She praised the house, -which she was seeing for the first time. She extolled Sing-Lo's -department, and Sing-Lo, who delighted in entertainments, was one broad -smile. She had a word of encouragement for his less smiling helper, -whom she informally christened Sing-Hi; and she chatted endlessly with -Mrs. Brackett--perhaps even helped tire her out. Yes, George Pearson -was to be urged forward for the rescue of Bertram Cope. - -Pearson spoke up loud and clear among the males. He was a business-man -among business-men, and during the very few moments formally allowed -for the cigars he made himself, as he felt, tell. And after the -Bracketts left--at nine twenty-five--he was easily content to stay on -for three-quarters of an hour longer. - -At nine-forty Pearson was saying, amidst the cigarette-smoke of the den: - -"Does she expect to teach the violin all her life?" - -He was both ironical and impatient. Clearly a charming, delicate -creature like Amy Leffingwell might better decorate the domestic scene -of some gentleman who enjoyed position and prosperity. - -"I hope not, indeed," said Hortense, in a deep contralto. - -Pearson cast on Hortense a look which rewarded such discernment. - -"Of course he has nothing, now," said Randolph, with deliberation. "And -he may be nothing but a poor, underpaid professor all his life." - -"No ring--yet," said Hortense, further. Her "yet" meant "not even yet." -Her deep tone was plausibly indignant. - -"I'm rather glad of that," remarked Mrs. Phillips, with an eye -pretendedly fixed on the Mexican dolls. "I can't feel that they are -altogether suited to each other." - -"He doesn't care for her," pursued Hortense. - -"Does she really care for him?" asked Pearson. - -No answer. One pair of eyes sought the floor; another searched the -ceiling; a third became altogether subordinate to questioning, -high-held brows. - -Pearson glanced from one face to another. The doubt as to her "caring" -seemed universal. The doubt that she cared deeply, essentially, was one -that he had brought away from the ball-room. And he went home, at ten -twenty-three, pretty well determined that he would very soon try to -change doubt to certainty. - -"Thank you so much," said Mrs. Phillips to Randolph, as he went out -with her and Hortense to put them in the car. "I'm sure we don't want -him to be burdened and miserable; and I'm sure we all do want her to be -happy. George is a lovely, capable chap,--and, really, he has quite a -way." - - - - -23 - -_COPE REGAINS HIS FREEDOM_ - - - -On Friday evening Randolph, at home, was glancing now and then at the -clock (as on a previous occasion), while waiting for Cope. At -eight-fifteen the telephone rang; it was Cope, with excuses, as before. -He was afraid he should be unable to come; some unexpected work... It -was that autumn excursion all over again. - -Randolph hung up the receiver, with some impatience. Still, never mind; -if Cope would make no effort to save himself, others were making the -effort for him. He had considerable confidence in George Pearson's -state of mind, as well as in George's egoism and drive. - -Foster heard of Cope's new delinquency, through Randolph's own -reluctant admission. "He is an ingrate, after all," said Foster -savagely, and gave his wheels an exceptionally violent jerk. And -Randolph made little effort, this time, toward Cope's defense. - -"You've done so much for him," Foster went on; "and you're willing to -do so much more." - -"I _could_ do a great deal, of course. There may be a good reason this -time, too," said Randolph soberly. - -"Humph!" returned Foster. - -Cope had hung up the receiver to turn toward Lemoyne and to say: "I -really ought to have gone." - -"Wait until I can go with you," Lemoyne insisted, as he had been -insisting just before. The still unseen man of Indian Rock was again -the subject of his calculations. - -"You've been asked," Cope submitted. "He has been very friendly to me, -and I am sure he would be the same to you." - -"I think that, personally, I can get along without him," the other -muttered ungraciously to himself. - -Aloud he said: "As I've told you, I've got the president of the -dramatic club to see tonight, and it's high time that I was leaving." -He looked with intention at the desk which had superseded that old -table, with ink-stained cover, at which Cope had once worked. "You can -use a little time to advantage over those themes. I'll be back within -an hour." - -Lemoyne had entered for Psychology, and was hoping that he now enjoyed -the status necessary for participation in the college theatricals. But -he was relying still more on a sudden defection or lapse which had left -the dramatic club without a necessary actor at a critical time. "It's -me, or postponement," he said; "and I think it's me." The new -opportunity--or bare chance--loomed before him with immensity. Cope's -affair might wait. He would even risk Cope's running over to Randolph's -place alone. - -Cope seated himself at his desk with loyalty, or at least with -docility; and Lemoyne, putting on his hat and coat, started out for the -fraternity house where the president of the club was in residence. - -Five minutes after Lemoyne's departure Cope heard the telephone ringing -downstairs, and presently a patient, middle-aged man knocked at the -door and told him the call was for him. - -Cope sighed apprehensively and went down. Of course it was Amy. Would -he not come over for an hour? Everybody was away, and they could have a -quiet talk together. - -Cope, conscious of others in the house, replied cautiously. Lemoyne, he -said, had gone out and left him with a deskful of themes: tiresome -routine work, but necessary, and immensely absorptive of time. He was -afraid that he could scarcely come this evening.... - -Amy's voice took on a new tone. Why, she seemed to be feeling, must -Arthur Lemoyne be mentioned, and mentioned so early? Yet Bertram had -put him--instinctively, unconsciously--at the head of the little verbal -procession just begun. - -Cope's response was dry and meagre; free speech was impossible over a -lodging-house telephone set in the public hall. Amy, who knew little of -Cope's immediate surroundings at the moment, went on in accents of -protest and of grievance, and Cope went on replying in a half-hushed -voice as non-committally as he was able. He dwelt more and more on the -trying details of his work in words which conveyed no additional -information to any fellow-dwellers who might overhear. - -"You haven't been to see me for a week," came Amy's voice petulantly, -indignantly. - -"I'm very sorry, I'm sure," returned Cope in a carefully generalized -tone of suavity. It was successful with the spinster in the side room -above, but it was no tone to use with a protesting _fiancee_. - -"Why do you neglect me so?" Amy's voice proceeded, with no shade of -appeasement. - -"There is no intention of that," replied Cope; "--so far as I know," he -added, for ears about or above. - -Again Amy's tone changed. It took on a tang of anger, and also a -curious ring of finality--as if, suddenly, a last resolution had been -reached. "Good night," she said abruptly, and the interview was over. - -Cope forgot Randolph, and Lemoyne, and his themes. Lemoyne, returning -within the hour, found him seated at his desk in self-absorbed -depression, his work untouched. - -"Well, they've taken me," he began; "and I shall have a fairly good -part." Cope made no effort to respond to the other's glowing -self-satisfaction, but sat with thoughtful, downcast eyes at his desk -before the untouched themes. "What's the matter?" asked Lemoyne. "Has -she been calling up again?" - -Cope raised his head and gave him a look. Lemoyne saw that his very -first guess had been correct. - -"This is a gay life!" he broke out; "just the life I have come down -here to lead. You're making yourself miserable, and you're making me -miserable. It's got to end." - -Cope gave him a second woeful glance. - -"Write to her, breaking it off," prompted Lemoyne. "Draft a letter -tonight." - -His mind was full of _cliches_ from his reading and his "scripts." He -had heard all the necessary things said: in fact, had said them -himself--now in evening dress, now in hunting costume, now in the loose -habiliments of Pierrot--time and time again. The dissatisfied _fiance_ -need but say that he could not feel, after all, that they were as well -suited to each other as they ought to be, that he could not bring -himself to believe that his feeling for her was what love really should -be, and that---- - -Thus, with a multiplicity of "that's," they accomplished a rough draft -which might be restudied and used on the morrow. "There!" said Lemoyne -to the weary Cope at eleven o'clock; "it ought to have been written a -month ago." - -Cope languidly slipped the oft-amended sheet under his pile of themes -and in a spent voice suggested bed. - -Over night and through the following forenoon the draft lay on his -desk. When he returned to his room at three o'clock a note, which had -been delivered by hand, awaited him. It was from Amy Leffingwell. - -Cope read it, folded his arms on his desk, bowed his head on his arms, -and, being alone, gave a half-sob. Then he lifted his head, with face -illumined and soul refreshed. Amy had asked for an end to their -engagement. - -"What does she say?" asked Lemoyne, an hour later. - -"She says what you say!" exclaimed Cope with shining eyes and a trace -of half-hysteric bravado. "She does not feel that we are quite so well -suited to each other as we ought to be, nor that her feeling toward me -is what love really... Can she have been in dramatics too!" - -"Your letter," returned Lemoyne, with dignity, "would have been -understood." - -"Quite so," Cope acknowledged, in a kind of exultant excitation. He -caught the rough draft from his desk--it was all seared with new -emendations--tore it up, and threw the fragments into the waste-basket. -"Thank Heaven, I haven't had to send it!" In a moment, "What am I to -write now?" he asked with irony. - -"The next will be easier," returned Lemoyne, still with dignity. - -"It will," replied Cope. - -It was,--so much easier that it became but an elegant literary -exercise. A few touches of nobility, a few more of elegiac regret, and -it was ready at nine that night for the letter-box. Cope dropped it in -with an iron clang and walked back to his quarters a free man. - -A few days later Lemoyne, working for his new play, met Amy Leffingwell -in the music-alcove of the University library. She had removed her -gloves with their furry wristlets, and he saw that she had a ring on -the third finger of her left hand. Its scintillations made a stirring -address to his eye. - -Cope heard about the ring that evening, and about Amy Leffingwell's -engagement to George Pearson the next day. - -He had no desire to dramatize the scene of Pearson's advance, assault -and victory, nor to visualize the setting up of the monument by which -that victory was commemorated. Lemoyne did it for him. - -Pearson had probably indulged in some disparagement of Cope--a phase on -which Lemoyne, as a faithful friend, did not dwell. But he clearly saw -George taking Amy's hand, on which there was still no ring, and -declaring that she should be wearing one before tomorrow night. He -figured both George and Amy as rather glad that Cope had not given one, -and as more and more inclining, with the passage of the days, to the -comfortable feeling that there had never been any real engagement at -all. - -Lemoyne attempted to put some of his visualizings before Cope, but Cope -cut him short. "Now I will settle down to work on my thesis," he said, -"and get my degree at the June convocation." - -"Good," said Lemoyne; "and now I can get my mind on the club." He went -to the window and looked out on the night. The stars were a-glitter. -"Let's take a turn round the block before we turn in." - -They spent ten minutes in the clear winter air. As Cope, on their -return, stooped to put his latch-key to use, Lemoyne impulsively threw -an arm across his shoulder. "Everything is all right, now," he said, in -a tone of high gratification; and Urania, through the whole width of -her starry firmament, looked down kindly upon a happier household. - - - - -24 - -_COPE IN DANGER ANEW_ - - -A similar satisfaction came to prevail in University circles, and in -the lesser circle which Cope had formed outside. His own classroom, -after a week, became a different place. There had been some disposition -to take a facetious view of Cope's adventure. His class had felt him as -cool and rather stiff, and comment would not be stayed. One bright girl -thought he had spoiled a good suit of clothes for nothing. The boys, -who knew how much clothes cost, and how much every suit counted, put -their comment on a different basis. The more serious among them went no -further, indeed, than to say that if a man had found himself making a -mistake, the sooner he got out of it the better. For weeks this affair -of Cope's had hung over the blackboard like a dim tapestry. Now it was -gone; and when he tabulated in chalk the Elizabethan dramatists or the -Victorian novelists there was nothing to prevent his students from -seeing them. - -Medora Phillips became sympathetic and tender. She let him understand -that she thought he had been unfairly treated. This did not prevent her -from being much kinder to Amy Leffingwell. Amy, earlier, had been so -affected by the general change of tone that, more than once, she had -felt prompted to take herself and her belongings out of the house. But -she still lingered on, as she was likely to do, during a short -engagement; and Mrs. Phillips was now amiability itself to George and -Amy both. - -Her method of soothing Cope was to take him to the theatre and the -opera in town: he could scarcely come to the house. It was now late in -January and the opera season was near its end. People were tiring of -their boxes, or had started South: it had become almost a work of merit -to fill a friend's box for her. During the last week of the season, -Mrs. Phillips was put in position to do this. She invited Cope, and -took along Hortense, and found in the city itself a married pair who -could get to the place and home again without her help. Lemoyne would -have made six, and the third man; but he was not bidden. Why pack the -box? A better effect was made by presenting, negligently, one empty -seat. Lemoyne dressed Cope, however. He had brought to Churchton the -outgrown evening clothes; and Cope, in his exuberance, bought a new -pair of light shoes and white gloves. He looked well as he sat on the -back seat of the limousine with Medora Phillips, during the long drive -in; and he looked well--strikingly, handsomely well--in the box itself. -Indeed, thought Medora, he made other young men in nearby boxes--young -men of "means" and "position"--look almost plebian. "He is charming," -she said to herself, over and over again. - -What about him "took" her? Was it his slenderness, his grace? Was it -his youthfulness, intact to this moment and promising an extension of -agreeable possibilities into an entertaining future? Or was it more -largely his fundamental coolness of tone? Again he was an icicle on the -temple--this time the temple of song. "He is glittering." said Medora, -intent on his blazing blue eyes, his beautiful teeth ever ready for a -public smile, and the luminous backward sweep of his hair; "and he is -not soft." She thought suddenly of Arthur Lemoyne; he, by comparison, -seemed like a dark, yielding plum-pudding. - -On the way into town Medora had had Hortense sit in front with Peter. -This arrangement had enabled her to lay her hand more than once on -Cope's, and to tell him again that he had been rather badly treated, -and that Amy, when you came to it, was a poor slight child who scarcely -knew her own mind. "I hope she had not made a mistake, after all," -breathed Medora. - -All this soothed Cope. The easy motion of the luxurious car -half-hypnotized him; a scene of unaccustomed splendor and brilliancy -lay just ahead... What wonder that Medora found him scenically -gratifying in her box (the dear creature's titillation made it seem -"hers" indeed), and gave his name with great gusto to the young woman -of the notebook and pencil? And the box was not at the back, but well -along to one side, where people could better see him. Its number, too, -was lower; so that, next morning, he was well up in the list, instead -of at the extreme bottom, where two or three of the young men of means -and position found themselves. Some of the girls in his class read his -name, and had no more to say about wet clothes. - -Hortense, on the front seat of the car, had had the good sense to say -little and the acumen to listen much. She knew that Cope must "call" -soon, and she knew it would be on some evening when he had been advised -that Amy was not at home. There came, before long, an evening when Amy -and George Pearson went into town for a musical comedy, and Cope walked -across once more to the familiar house. - -Hortense was in the drawing-room. She was brilliantly dressed, and her -dark aggressive face wore a look of bravado. In her rich contralto she -welcomed Cope with an initiative which all but crowded her aunt into -second place. Under the very nose of Medora Phillips, whom she breezily -seemed to regard as a chaperon, she brought forward the sketch of Cope -in oils, which she had done partly from observation and partly from -memory. She may have had, too, some slight aid from a photograph,--one -which her aunt had wheedled out of Cope and had missed, on one occasion -at least, from her desk in the library. Hortense now boldly asked his -cooperation for finishing her small canvas. - -Though the "wood-nymphs" of last autumn's legend might indeed be, as he -had broadly said, "a nice enough lot of girls," they really were not -all alike and indistinguishable: one of them at least, as he should -learn, had thumbs. - -Hortense wheeled into action. - -"The composition is good," she observed, looking at the canvas as it -stood propped against the back of a Chippendale chair; "and, in -general, the values are all right. But----" She glanced from the sketch -back to the subject of it. - -Cope started. He recognized himself readily enough. However, he had had -no idea that self-recognition was to be one of the pleasures of his -evening. - -"----but I shall need you yourself for the final touches--the ones that -will make all the difference." - -"It's pretty good as it is," declared Mrs. Phillips, who, privately, -was almost as much surprised as Cope. "When did you get to do it?" - -This inquiry, simple as it was, put the canvas in a new light--that of -an icon long cherished as the object of private devotion. Hortense -stepped forward to the chair and made an adjustment of the picture's -position: she had a flush and a frown to conceal. "But never mind," she -thought, as she turned the canvas toward a slightly different light; -"if Aunt Medora wants to help, let her." - -She did not reply to her aunt's question. "Retouched from life, and -then framed--who knows?" she asked. Of course it would look immensely -better; would look, in fact, as it was meant to look, as she could make -it look. - -She told Cope that she had set up a studio near the town square, not -far from the fountain-basin and the elms---- - -"Which won't count for much at this time of year," interjected her aunt. - -"Well, the light is good," returned Hortense, "and the place is quiet; -and if Mr. Cope will drop in two or three times, I think he will end by -feeling that I have done him justice." - -"This is a most kind attention," said Cope, slightly at sea. "I ought -to be able to find time some afternoon...." - -"Not too late in the afternoon," Hortense cautioned. "The light in -February goes early." - -When Lemoyne heard of this new project he gave Cope a _look_. He had no -concern as to Mrs. Phillips, who was, for him, but a rather dumpy, -over-brisk, little woman of forty-five. If she must run off with Bert -every so often in a motor-car, he could manage to stand it. Besides, he -had no desire to shut Cope--and himself--out of a good house. But the -niece, scarcely twenty-three, was a more serious matter. - -"Lookout!" he said to Cope. "Lookout!" - -"I can take care of myself," the other replied, rather tartly. - -"I wish you could!" retorted Lemoyne, with poignant brevity. "I'll go -with you." - -"You won't!" - -"I'd rather save you near the start, than have to try at the very end." - -Cope flung himself out; and he looked in at Hortense's studio--which -she had taken (or borrowed) for a month--before the week was half over. - -Hortense had stepped into the shoes of a young gentlewoman who had been -trying photography, and who had rather tired of it. At any rate, she -had had a chance to go to Florida for a month and had seized it. -Hortense had succeeded to her little north skylight, and had rearranged -the rest to her own taste; it was a mingling of order and disorder, of -calculation and of careless chance. She had a Victory of Samothrace and -a green-and-gold dalmatic from some Tuscan town----But why go on? - -Cope had not been in this new milieu fifteen minutes before Randolph -happened along. - -Randolph, as a friend of the family, could scarcely be other than -persona grata. Hortense, however, gave him no great welcome. She -stopped in the work that had but been begun. The winter day was none -too bright, and the best of the light would soon be past, she said. The -engagement could stand over. In any event, he was there ("he," of -course, meaning Cope), and a present delay would only add to the total -number of his calls. Hortense began to wipe her brushes and to talk of -tea. - -"I'll go, I'll go," said Randolph obligingly. "I heard about the new -shop only yesterday, and I wanted to see it. I don't exact that I shall -witness the mysteries in active operation." - -Cope's glance asked Randolph to remain. - -"There are no mysteries," returned Hortense. "It's just putting on a -few dabs of paint in the right places." - -She continued to take a few dabs from her brushes and to talk tea. -"Stay for a sip," she said. - -"Very well; thank you," replied Randolph, and wondered how long "a sip" -might mean. - -In the end it meant no longer for him than for Cope; they came away -together. Hortense held Cope for a moment to make a second engagement -at an earlier hour. - -Randolph had not met Cope for several days, except at the opera, where -he had left his regular Monday evening seat in the parquet to spend a -few moments in Mrs. Phillips' friend's box. He had never seen Cope in -evening dress before; but he found him handsome and distinguished, and -some of the glamour of that high occasion still lingered about the -young man as he now walked through High Street, in his rather shabby -tweeds, at Randolph's side. - -Randolph looked back upon his dinner as a complete success: Pearson was -engaged, and Cope was free. He now said to Cope: - -"Of course you must know I feel you were none too handsomely treated. -George is a pleasant, enterprising fellow, but somewhat sudden and -rapacious. If he is happy, I hope you are no less happy yourself...." -Thus he resumed the subject which had been dropped at the Library door. - -Cope shrank a little, and Randolph felt him shrinking. He fell silent; -he understood. Pain sometimes took its own time to travel, and reached -its goal by a slow, circuitous route. He thought suddenly of his -bullfight in Seville, twenty-five years before. He had sat out his six -bulls with entire composure; yet, back in America, some time later, he -had encountered a bullfight in an early film and had not been able to -follow it through. Cope, perhaps, was beginning to feel the edge of the -sword and the drag at his vitals. The thing was over, and his, the -elder man's, own part in it successfully accomplished; so why had he, -conventional commentator, felt the need of further words? - -He let the unhappy matter drop. When he spoke again he reminded Cope -that the invitation for himself and Lemoyne still held good. Amy had -been swept from the stage; but Lemoyne, a figure of doubt, was yet in -its background. "I must have a 'close-up'," Randolph declared to -himself, "and find out what he comes to." Cope had shown some -reluctance to meet his advances--a reluctance which, he felt, was not -altogether Cope's own. - -"I know we shall be glad to come sometime," replied Cope, with seeming -heartiness. This heartiness may have had its element of the genuine; at -any rate, here was another "good house," from which no one need shut -himself out without good cause. If Lemoyne developed too extreme a -reluctance, he would be reminded that he was cherishing the hope of a -position in the registrar's office, for at least half of the day; also, -that Randolph enjoyed some standing in University circles, and that his -brother-in-law was one of the trustees. - -"Yes, indeed," continued Cope, in a further corroboration which might -better have been dispensed with. - -"You will be welcome," replied Randolph quietly. He would have -preferred a single assurance to a double one. - - - - -25 - -_COPE IN DOUBLE DANGER_ - - -Meanwhile Cope and Lemoyne refined daily on the details of their new -menage and applied themselves with new single-mindedness to their -respective interests. Cope had found a subject for his thesis in the -great field of English literature,--or, rather, in a narrow bypath -which traversed one of its corners. The important thing, as he -frequently reminded Lemoyne, was not the thesis itself, but the aid -which it might give his future. "It will make a difference, in salary, -of three or four hundred dollars," he declared. - -Lemoyne himself gave a few hours a week to Psychology in its humbler -ranges. There were ways to hold the attention of children, and there -were forms of advertising calculated to affect favorably the man who -had money to spend. In addition, the University had found out that he -could sing as well as act, and something had been said about a place -for him in a musical play. - -Between-times they brought their quarters into better order; and this -despite numerous minor disputes. The last new picture did not always -find at once its proper place on the wall; and sometimes there were -discussions as to whether it should be toast or rolls, and whether -there should be eggs or not. Occasionally sharp tones and quivering -nostrils, but commonly amity and peace. - -They were seen, or heard of, as going about a great deal together: to -lectures, to restaurants, to entertainments in the city. But they went -no longer, for the present, to Ashburn Avenue; they took their time to -remember Randolph's repeated invitation; and there was, as yet, no -further attendance at the studio in the Square,--for any reference to -the unfinished portrait was likely to produce sharp tones and quivering -nostrils indeed. - -Other invitations began to come to Cope,--some of them from people he -knew but slightly. He wondered whether his swoon and his shipwreck -really could have done so much to make him known. Sometimes when these -cards seemed to imply but a simple form of entertainment, at a -convenient hour of the late afternoon, he would attend. It did not -occur to him to note that commonly Medora Phillips was present: she was -always in "active circulation," as he put it; and there he let things -lie. - -One of these entertainments was an afternoon reception of ordinary -type, and the woman giving it had thrown a smallish library into closer -communication with her drawing-room without troubling to reduce the -library to order: books, pamphlets, magazines lay about in profuse -carelessness. And it was in this library that Cope and Medora Phillips -met. - -"You've been neglecting me," she said. - -"But how can I----?" he began. - -"Yes, I know," she returned generously. "But after the first of -May--Well, he is a young man of decisiveness and believes in quick -action." She made a whiff, accompanied by an outward and forward motion -of the hands. She was wafting Amy Leffingwell out of her own house into -the new home which George Pearson was preparing for her. "After -that----" - -"Yes, after that, of course." - -Mrs. Phillips was handling unconsciously a small pamphlet which lay on -the library table. It was a magazine of verse--a monthly which did not -scorn poets because they happened to live in the county in which it was -published. The table of contents was printed on the cover, and the -names of contributors were arranged in order down the right-hand side. -Mrs. Phillips, carelessly running her eye over it while thinking of -other things, was suddenly aware of the name of Carolyn Thorpe. - -"What's this?" she asked. She ran her eye across to the other edge of -the cover, and read, "Two Sonnets." - -"Well, well," she observed, and turned to the indicated page. And, -"When in the world----?" she asked, and turned back to the cover. It -was the latest issue of the magazine, and but a day or two old. - -"Carolyn in print, at last!" she exclaimed. "Why, isn't this splendid!" - -Then she returned to the text of the two sonnets and read the first of -them--part of it aloud. - -"Well," she gasped; "this is ardent, this is outspoken!" - -"That's the fashion among woman poets today," returned Cope, in a -matter-of-fact tone. "They've gone farther and farther, until they -hardly realize how far they _have_ gone. Don't let them disturb you." - -Mrs. Phillips reread the closing lines of the first sonnet, and then -ran over the second. "Good heavens!" she exclaimed; "when _I_ was a -girl----!" - -"Times change." - -"I should say so." She looked from the magazine to Cope. "I wonder who -'the only begetter' may be." - -"Is that quite fair? So many writers think it unjust--and even obtuse -and offensive--if the thing is put on too personal a basis. It's all -just an imagined situation, manipulated artistically...." - -Mrs. Phillips looked straight at him. "Bertram Cope, it's _you_!" She -spoke with elation. These sonnets constituted a tribute. Cope, she -knew, had never looked three times, all told, at Carolyn Thorpe; yet -here was Carolyn saying that she... - -Cope dropped his eyes and slightly flushed. - -"I wonder if she knows it's out?" Mrs. Phillips went on swiftly. "Did -you?" - - -"I?" cried Cope, in dismay. - -"You were taking it all so calmly." - -"'Calmly'? I don't take it at all! Why should I? And why should you -think there is any ref----?" - -"Because I'm so 'obtuse' and 'offensive,' I suppose. Oh, if _I_ could -only write, or paint, or play, or something!" - -Cope put his hand wearily to his forehead. The arts were a curse. So -were gifted girls. So were over-appreciative women. He wished he were -back home, smoking a quiet cigarette with Arthur Lemoyne. - -Mrs. Ryder came bustling up--Mrs. Ryder, the mathematical lady who had -given the first tea of all. - -"I have just heard about Carolyn's poems. What it must be to live in -the midst of talents! And I hear that Hortense has finally taken a -studio for her portraits." - -"Yes," replied Mrs. Phillips. "And she"--with a slight emphasis--"is -doing Mr. Cope's picture,"--with another slight emphasis at the end. - -Cope felt a half-angry tremor run through him. He was none the less -perturbed because Medora Phillips meant obviously no offense. Hortense -and Carolyn were viewed as but her delegates; they were doing for her -what she would have been glad to be able to do for herself. Clearly, in -her mind, there was not to be another Amy. - -Well, that was something, he thought. He laughed uneasily, and gave the -enthusiastic Mrs. Ryder a few details of the art-world (as she called -it),--details which she would not be denied. - -"I must call on dear Hortense, some afternoon," she said. - -"Do," returned Hortense's aunt. "And mention the place. Let's keep the -dear girl as busy as possible." - -"If it were only photographs...." submitted Mrs. Ryder. - -"That's a career too," Mrs. Phillips acknowledged. - -They all drifted out into the larger room. Mrs. Ryder left -them,--perhaps to distribute her small change of art and literature -through the crowd. - -"You're not forgetting Hortense?" Mrs. Phillips herself said, before -leaving him. - -"By no means," Cope replied. - -"I hear you didn't make much of a start." - -"We had tea," returned Cope, with satirical intention. - -This left Medora Phillips unscathed. "Tea puts on no paint," she -observed, and was lost in the press. - -It need not be assumed that knowledge of Carolyn Thorpe's verse gained -wide currency through University circles, but there was a copy of the -magazine in the University library. Lemoyne saw it there. He scarcely -knew whether to be pleased or vexed. Finally he decided that there was -safety in numbers. If Cope really intended to go to that studio, it was -just as well that there should be an impassioned poetess in the -background. And it was just as well that Cope should know she was -there. Lemoyne took a line not unlike Mrs. Phillips' own. - -"I only wish there were more of them," he declared, looking up from his -desk. "I'd like a lady barber for your head, a lady shoemaker for your -feet, a lady psychologist for your soul----" - -"Stop it!" cried Cope. "I've had about all I can stand. If you want to -live in peace, as you sometimes say, do your share to keep the peace." - -"You _are_ going to have another sitting?" - -"I am. How can I get out of it?" - -"You don't want to get out of it." - -"Well, after all the attentions they've shown us----" - -"Us? You." - -"Me, then. Shall I be so uncivil as to hold back?" - -"It might not displease her if you did." - -"Her?" - -"Your Mrs. Phillips. If I may risk a guess------" - -"You may not. Your precious 'psychology' can wait. Don't be in such a -damned hurry to use it." - -"It had better be used in time." - -"It had better not be used at all. Drop it. Think about your new play, -or something." - -"Oh, the devil!" sighed Lemoyne. "Winnebago seems mighty far off. We -got on there, at least." He bent again over his desk. - -Cope put down his book and came across. There were tears, perhaps, in -his eyes--the moisture of vexation, or of contrition, or of both. "We -can get along here, too," he said, with an arm around Lemoyne's -shoulder. - -"Let's hope so," returned Lemoyne, softening, with his hand pressed on -Cope's own. - - - - -26 - -_COPE AS A GO-BETWEEN_ - - -This brief exchange might have passed for a quarrel and a -reconciliation; and the reconciliation seemed to call for a seal. That -was soon set by another of Randolph's patient invitations to dinner. - -"Let's go," said Cope; "I've got to go again--sometime." - -"I don't care about it, very much," replied Lemoyne. - -"If you want any help of his toward a position.... Time's passing. And -a man can't be expected to bestir himself much for another man he's -never even seen." - -"All right. I'll go with you." - -Randolph was glad to see Cope again, whom he had not met since the half -hour in Hortense Dunton's studio. He was also glad to secure, finally, -a close and leisurely look at Lemoyne. Lemoyne took the same occasion -for a close and leisurely look at Randolph. Each viewed the other with -dislike and distrust. Each spoke, so far as might be, to Cope--or -through him. Sing-Lo, who was prepared to smile, saw few smiles -elsewhere, and became sedate, even glum. - -Randolph felt a physical distaste for Lemoyne. His dark eyes were too -liquid; his person was too plump; the bit of black bristle beneath his -nose was an offense; his aura----Yet who can say anything definite -about so indefinite a thing as an aura, save that one feels it and is -attracted or repelled by it? Lemoyne, on his side, developed an equal -distaste (or repugnance) for the "little gray man"--as he called -Randolph to himself and, later, even to Cope; though Randolph, speaking -justly, was exactly neither gray nor little. Lemoyne noted, too, the -early banishment of Randolph's eyeglasses, which disappeared as they -had disappeared once or twice before. He felt that Randolph was trying -to stay young rather late, and was showing himself inclined to "go" -with younger men longer than they would welcome him. Why didn't he -consort with people of his own age and kind? He was old; so why -couldn't he _be_ old? - -The talk led--through Cope--to reminiscences of life in Winnebago. -Randolph presently began to feel Lemoyne as a variously yet equivocally -gifted young fellow--one so curiously endowed as to be of no use to his -own people, and of no avail for any career they were able to offer him. -A bundle of minor talents; a possible delight to casual acquaintances, -but an exasperation to his own household; an ornamental skimmer over -life's surfaces, when not a false fire for other young voyagers along -life's coasts. Yet Bertram Cope admired him and had become absorbed in -him. Their life in that northern town, with its fringe of -interests--educational, ecclesiastical, artistic and aquatic--had been -intimate, fused to a degree. Randolph began to realize, for the first -time, the difficulties in the way of "cultivating" Cope. Cope was a -field already occupied, a niche already filled. - -While Randolph was gathering (through Cope) details of the life in -Winnebago, Lemoyne was gathering (through Cope) details of the life in -Churchton during the past autumn. He began to reconstruct that season: -the long range of social entertainments, the proposed fall excursions, -the sudden shifting of domicile. Randolph, it was clear, had tried to -appropriate Cope and to supplant (knowingly or unknowingly) Cope's -closest friend. Lemoyne became impatient over the fact that he was now -sitting at Randolph's table. However, if Randolph could help him to a -place and a salary, that would make some amends. - -Presently Cope, having served as an intermediary, became the open -centre of interest. His thesis was brought forward as a suitable -subject of inquiry and comment. It was a relief to have come to a final -decision; but no relief was in sight for a long time from the slavery -of close reading. Every moment that could be spared from his classroom -was given up to books--authors in whom he might be interested or not -interested, but who must be gone through. - -"A sort of academic convention," said Cope, rather wanly; "but a -necessary one." - -His eyes had begun to show excessive application; at least they looked -tired and dim. His color, too, was paler. He had come to suggest again -the young man who had been picked up from Medora Phillips' dining-room -floor and laid out on the couch in her library, and who had shown a -good deal of pallor during the few days that followed. "Take a little -more air and exercise," Randolph counselled. - -"A good rule always, for everybody," said Lemoyne, with a withholding -of all tone and expression. - -"I believe," Randolph continued, "that you are losing in both weight -and color. That would be no advantage to yourself--and it might -complicate Miss Dunton's problem. It's perplexing to an artist when -one's subject changes under one's very eye." - -"There won't be much time for sitting, from now on," observed Lemoyne -concisely. - -"I might try to go round once more," said Cope, "--in fairness. If -there are to be higher lights on my cheekbones and lower lights for my -eyes, an hour or so should serve to settle it." - -"I wouldn't introduce many changes into my eyes and cheekbones, if I -were you," said Randolph. Lemoyne was displeased; he thought that -Randolph was taking advantage of his position as host to make an -observation of unwarranted saliency, and he frowned at his plate. - -Cope flushed, and looked at his. - -The talk drifted toward dramatics, with Winnebago once more the -background; but the foreground was occupied by a new musical comedy -which one of the clubs might try in another month, and the tone became -more cheery. Sing-Lo, who had come in with a maple mousse of his own -making, smiled at last; and he smiled still more widely when, at the -end of the course, his chief occidental masterpiece was praised. -Sing-Lo also provided coffee and cigars in the den; and it was here -that Cope felt the atmosphere right for venturing a word in behalf of -Lemoyne. There had been few signs of relenting in Winnebago; and some -modest source of income would be welcome--in fact, was almost necessary. - -"Of course work _is_ increasing in the offices," said Randolph, looking -from one young man to the other; "and of course I have, directly or -indirectly, some slight 'influence.'" - -He felt no promptings to lend Lemoyne a hand; yet Cope himself, even if -out of reach, might at least remain an object of continuing kindness. - -"But if you are to interest yourself in some new undertaking by 'The -Grayfriars,'" he said to Lemoyne, "will you have much time and -attention to give to office-work?" - -"Oh, I have time," replied Lemoyne jauntily, "and not many studies. -Half a day of routine work, I thought.... Of course I'm not a manager, -or director, or anything like that. I should just have a part of -moderate importance, and should have only to give good heed to -rehearsals...." - -"Well," said Randolph thoughtfully. - -"I hope you can do something," put in Cope, with fervor. - -"Well," said Randolph again. - -This uncomfortable and unsatisfactory dinner of three presently drew to -its end. "I'd have made it four," said Randolph to Foster, a day or two -later, "if I'd only thought of it in time." - -"_I_ don't want to meet them again," returned Foster quickly. - -"Well," said Randolph, "I've no fondness for the new fellow, myself; -but----" - -"And I don't care about the other, either." - -Randolph sighed. This was plainly one of Foster's off days. The only -wonder was he had not more of them. He sat in darkness, with few -diversions, occupations, ameliorations. His mind churned mightily on -the scanty materials that came his way. He founded big guesses on -nothings; he raised vast speculative edifices on the slightest of -premises. To dislike a man he could not even see! Well, the blind--and -the half-blind--had their own intuitions and followed their own -procedures. - -"Then you wouldn't advise me to speak a word for him?--for them?" - -"Certainly not!" rejoined Foster, with all promptness. "They've treated -you badly. They've put you off; and they came, finally, only because -they counted on getting something out of you. - -"Oh, I wouldn't say that of Cope." - -"I would. And I do. They're completely wrapped up in their own -interests, and in each other; and they're coupled to get anything they -can out of Number Three. Or out of Number Four. Or Five. Or out of -X,--the world, that is to say." - -Randolph shrugged. This was one of Foster's bad days indeed. - -"And what's this I hear about Hortense?" asked Foster, with bitterness. - -"That won't amount to much." - -"It won't? She's out in the open, finally. She took that place for a -month with one express object--to get him there, paint or no paint. -She's fretful and cantankerous over every day of delay, and soon she'll -be in an undisguised rage." - -"What does her aunt say to it?" - -"She's beginning to be vexed. She's losing patience. She thinks it's a -mistake--and an immodest one. She wants to send her away for a visit. -To think of it!--as soon as one girl lets go another takes hold,--and a -third person holds on through all!" - -"Joe! Joe!" - -But Foster was not to be stayed. - -"And that poetry of Carolyn's! Medora herself came up and read it to -me. It was a 'tribute,' she thought!" - -"That won't amount to anything at all." - -"It won't? With Hortense scornfully ridiculing it, and Carolyn bursting -into tears before she can make her bolt from the room, and Amy -wondering whether, after all...! If things are as bad as they are for -me up here, how much worse must they be for the rest of them below! And -that confounded engagement has made it still worse all round!" - -Randolph ran his palms over his perplexed temples. "Whose?" - -"Whose? No wonder you ask! Engagements, then." - -"When are they going to be married?" - -"The first week in May, I hear. But Pearson is trying for the middle of -April. His flat is taken." Foster writhed in his chair. - -"Why do they care for him?" he burst out. "He's nothing in himself. And -he cares nothing for them. And he cares nothing for you," Foster added -boldly. "All he has thought for is that fellow from up north." - -"Don't ask me why they care," replied Randolph, with studied sobriety. -"Why does anybody care? And for what? For the thing that is just out of -reach. He's cool; he's selfish; he's indifferent. Yet, somehow, frost -and fire join end to end and make the circle complete." He fell into -reflection. "It's all like children straining upward for an icicle, and -presently slipping, with cracked pates, on the ice below." - -"Well, _my_ pate isn't cracked." - -"Unless it's the worst cracked of all." - -Foster tore off his shade and threw it on the floor. "Mine?" he cried. -"Look to your own!" - -"Joe!" said Randolph, rising. "That won't quite do!" - -"Be a fool along with the others, if you will!" retorted Foster. "Oh!" -he went on, "Haven't I seen it all? Haven't I felt it all? You, Basil -Randolph, mind your own ways too!" - -Randolph thought of words, but held his tongue. Words led to other -words, and he might soon find himself involved in what would seem like -a defense--an attitude which he did not relish, a course of which he -did not acknowledge the need. "Poor Joe!" he thought; "sitting too much -by himself and following over-closely the art of putting things -together--anyhow!" Joe Foster must have more company and different -things to consider. What large standard work--what history, biography, -or bulky mass of memoirs in from four to eight volumes--would be the -best to begin on before the winter should be too far spent? - -Four or five days later, Randolph wrote to Cope that there was a good -prospect for a small position in the administration offices of the -University, and a week later Lemoyne was in that position. Cope, who -recognized Randolph's handling of the matter as a personal favor, -replied in a tone of some warmth. "He's really a very decent fellow, -after all,--of course he is," pronounced Randolph. Lemoyne himself -wrote more tardily and more coolly. He was taking time from his -Psychology and from "The Antics of Annabella," it appeared, to acquaint -himself with the routine of his new position. Randolph shrugged: he -must wait to see which of the three interests would be held the most -important. - - - - -27 - -_COPE ESCAPES A SNARE_ - - -Lemoyne's first week in his new berth held him rather close, and Cope -was able to move about with less need of accounting for his every hour. -One of his first concerns was to get over his sitting with Hortense -Dunton. His "sitting," he said: it was to be the first, the only and -the last. - -He came into her place with a show of confidence, a kind of blustery -bonhomie. "I give you an hour from my treadmill," he declared brightly. -"So many books, and such dry ones!" - -Hortense, who had been moping, brightened too. "I thought you had -forgotten me," she said chidingly. Yet her tone had less acerbity than -that which she had employed, but a few moments before, to address him -in his absence. For she often had in mind, at intervals longer or -shorter, Cope's improvisation about the Sassafras--too truly that -dense-minded shrub had failed to understand the "young ladies" and -their "needs." - -"My thesis," he said. "From now on, it must take a lot of my thought -and every moment of my spare time." He looked at the waiting canvas. -"Clinch it to-day. Hurry it through." - -He spoke with a factitious vivacity which almost gave a sense of chill. -She looked at him with a shade of dissatisfaction and discomfort. - -"What! must it all be done in a drive?" she asked. - -"By no means. Watch me relax. Is that my chair? See me drop into -complete physical and mental passivity--the _kef_ of the Arabs." - -He mounted the model-throne, sank into the wide chair, and placed his -hands luxuriously on its arms. His general pose mattered little: she -had not gone beyond his head and shoulders. - -Hortense stared. Would he push her on the moment into the right mood? -Would he have her call into instant readiness her colors and brushes? -Why, even a modest amateur must be allowed her minutes of preparation -and approach. - -"Passivity?" she repeated, beginning to get under way. "Shall I find -you very entertaining in that condition?" - -"Entertaining? Me, the sitter? Why, I've always heard it was an -important part of a portrait-painter's work to keep the subject -interested and amused." - -He smiled in his cold, distant way. The north light cut across the -forehead, nose and chin which made his priceless profile. The canvas -itself, done on theory in a lesser light, looked dull and lifeless. - -Hortense felt this herself. She did not see how she was going to key it -up in a single hour. As she considered among her brushes and tubes, she -began to feel nervous, and her temper stirred. - -"You have a great capacity for being interested and amused," she said. -"Most men are like you. Especially young ones. They are amused, -diverted, entertained--and there it ends." - -Cope felt the prick. "Well, we are bidden," he said; "and we come. Too -many of us have little to offer in return, except appreciation and -goodwill. How better appreciate such kindness as Mrs. Phillips' than by -gratefully accepting more of it?" (Stilted copy-book talk; and he knew -it.) - -"You haven't been accepting much of it lately," she returned, feeling -the point of a new brush. She spoke with the consciousness of empty -evenings that might have been full. - -"Hardly," he replied. And he felt that this one word sufficed. - -"Well, the coast will be clear after the twentieth of April." - -"That is the date, then, is it?" The more he thought of the impending -ceremony, the more grateful he was for his escape. Thankfulness had -salved the earlier wound; no pain now came from his touching it. - -"Yes; on that day the house will see the last of them." - -"The wedding, then, will----?" - -"Yes. Aunt Medora says, 'Why go to Iowa?--you're at home here.' Why, -indeed, drag George away out to Fort Lodge? Let her own people, who are -not many, come to us. Aunt will do everything, and do it handsomely." - -She slanted her palette and looked toward the skylight. Cope's own -glance swept non-committally the green burlap walls. Both of them were -seeing pictures of the wedding preparations. Hortense saw delivery-boys -at the front door, with things that must be held to the light or draped -over chairs. She saw George haling Amy to the furniture-shops and to -the dealers in wall-paper. She saw them in cosy shaded confab evening -after evening, in her aunt's library. It was a period of joy, of -self-absorption, of unsettlement, of longing, of irritation, of -exasperation--oh, would it never end! Cope saw a long string of gifts -and entertainments, a diamond engagement-ring, a lavishly-furnished -apartment ... How in the world could he himself have compassed all -this? And how blessed was he among men that he had not been obliged to -try! - -Hortense went through some motions with her brush, yet seemed to be -looking beyond him rather than at him. - -"There will be a bridal-trip of a week or so," she concluded; "and they -will be in their new home on the first of May." - -"Very good," said Cope. He thought he was thinking to himself, but he -spoke aloud. "And that ends it." This last he really did say to himself. - -He sank more comfortably into his chair, kept his face properly -immobile, and spoke no further word. Hortense brought back her gaze to -focus and worked on for a little time in silence. The light was good, -her palette was full, her brushes were well-chosen, her eyes were -intent on his face. It was a handsome face, displayed to the best -advantage. She might look as long as she liked, and a long look -preceded every stroke. - -Presently she paused, opening her eyes wider and holding aloft her -brush. "There will be a bride's-maid," she said. - -"The deuce!" he thought. "That didn't end it!" But he said no thing -aloud. - -"Guess who!" - -"Why, how should _I_----?" - -"Guess!" she cried peremptorily, in a tone of bitter derision. "You -won't? Well, it's Carolyn--our poor, silly Carolyn! And what do you -suppose she has started in to do? She is writing an epitha--an -epithal----" - -"----amium," contributed Cope. "An epithala-mium." - -"Yes, an epithala-mium!" repeated Hortense, with an outburst of jarring -laughter. "Isn't she absurd! Isn't she ridiculous!" - -"Is she? Why, it seems to me a delicate attention, a very sweet -thought." If Carolyn could make anything out of Amy--and of -George--why, let her do it. - -"You _like_ her poetry!" cried Hortense in a high, strained voice. "You -enjoy her epithalamiums, and her--sonnets...." - -Cope flushed and began to grow impatient. "She is a sweet girl," he -said; "and if she wishes to write verse she is quite within her rights." - -"'Sweet'! There you go again! 'Sweet'--twice. She ought to know!" - -"Perhaps she does know. Everybody else knows." - -"And perhaps she doesn't!" cried Hortense. "Tell her! Tell her!" - -Cope stared. "She is a sweet girl," he repeated; "and she has been -filling very discreetly a somewhat difficult position----" - -He knew something of the suppressed bitterness which, in subordinate -places, was often the lot of the pen. He found himself preferring, just -here, "pen" to "typewriter": he would give Carolyn a touch of -idealization--though she had afflicted him with a heavy stroke of -embarrassment. - -"'Difficult position'?" shrilled Hortense. "With Aunt Medora the very -soul of kindness? I like that! Well, if you want to rescue her from her -difficult position, do it. If you admire her--and love her--tell her -so! _She'll_ be grateful--just read those sonnets over again!" - -Hortense dropped her palette and brushes and burst into outrageous -tears. - -Cope sat bolt upright in that spacious chair. "Tell her? I have nothing -to tell her. I have nothing to tell anyone!" - -His resonant words cut the air. They uttered decision. He did not mean -to make the same mistake twice. - -Hortense drew across her eyes an apron redolent of turpentine and -stepped toward the throne. - -"Nothing? Why this sudden refuge in silence?" she asked, almost -truculently, even if tremulously. "You usually find enough words--even -though they mean little." - -"I'm afraid I do," he admitted cautiously. - -"You have nothing to tell anyone? Nothing to tell--me?" - -Cope rose. "Nothing to tell anyone," he repeated. "Noth-ing." - -"Then let me tell you something." There was an angry thrill in her -voice. "For I am not so selfish and cold-hearted as you are. I have -seen nobody but you all these months. I have never tried harder to -please anybody. You have scarcely noticed me--you have never given me a -glance or a thought. You could interest yourself in that silly Amy and -in our foolish Carolyn; but for me--me--Nothing!" - -Cope came down from the throne. If she had lavished her maiden thoughts -on him, by day or evening or at night, he had not known and could -hardly be supposed to know. Indeed, she had begun by treating him with -a cursory roughness; nor had he noticed any great softening later on. - -"Listen," he said. Under the stress of embarrassment and alarm his cold -blue eyes grew colder and his delicate nostrils quivered with an effect -a little too like disdain. "I like you as well as another; no more, no -less. I am in no position to think of love and marriage, and I have no -inclination that way. I am willing to be friends with everybody, and -nothing more with anybody." The sentences came with the cruel -detachment of bullets; but, "Not again, not twice," was his uppermost -thought. Any bluntness, any ruggedness, rather than another month like -that of the past holiday season. - -He took a step away and looked to one side, toward the couch where his -hat and coat were lying. - -"Go, if you will," she said. "And go as soon as you like. You are a -contemptible, cold-hearted ingrate. You have grudged me every minute of -your company, everywhere--and every second you have given me here. If I -have been foolish it is over now, and there shall be nothing to record -my folly." She stepped to the easel and hurled the canvas to the floor, -where it lay with palette and brushes. - -Cope stood with his hat in his hand and his coat over his arm. He -seemed to see the open volume of some "printed play." After all, there -was a type which, even under emotional stress, gave a measure of -instinctive heed to structure and cadence. Well, if there was relief -for her in words, he could stand to hear her speak for a moment or two -more, not longer. - -"One word yet," she said in a panting voice. "Your Arthur Lemoyne. That -preposterous friendship cannot go on for long. You will tire of him; or -more likely he will tire of you. Something different, something better -will be needed,--and you will live to learn so. I should be glad if I -never saw either one of you again!" - -She turned her stormy face away, and Cope slipped out with a blended -sense of mortification, pain and relief. - - - - -28 - -_COPE ABSENT FROM A WEDDING_ - - -Cope went out on the square with his being a-tingle. If Hortense, on -another occasion, had thrown a dash of brine, on this occasion she had -rubbed in the salt itself. And he had struck a harsh blow in turn; the -flat of his mind was still stinging, as if half the shock of the blow -had remained behind. "But it was no time for half-measures," he -muttered to himself. "Not again; not twice!" he repeated. - -Hortense remained for several days in a condition of sullen anger--she -was a cloud lit up by occasional unaccountable flashes of temper. -"Whatever in the world is the matter with her?" asked her aunt in more -directions than one. And Amy Leffingwell, blissfully busy over her -little trousseau and her selection of china-patterns, protested and -opened wide, inquiring blue eyes against the intrusion of such a spirit -at such a joyous time. - -But Hortense, though better days intervened now and then, did not -improve essentially; and she contrived at the climacteric moment of -Amy's career to make herself felt--unduly felt--after all. - -The wedding took place during the latter half of April, as demanded by -the enterprising wooer. Then there would be a rapid ten-day -wedding-journey, followed by a prompt, business-like occupancy of the -new apartment on the first of May exactly. - -Pearson's parents prepared to welcome Amy handsomely; and her own -people--some of them--came on from Iowa to attend the ceremony. There -was her mother, who had been rather disconcerted by the sudden shift, -but who was satisfied with George Pearson the moment she saw him, and -who found him even more vivid and agreeable than Amy's photograph of -him had led her to expect. There was the aunt, who had lived a bare, -starved life, and who luxuriated, along with her sister, in the -splendor of the Louis Quinze chamber. And there was a friendly, -wide-awake brother of fourteen who was tucked away in the chintz room -up stairs, whence he issued to fraternize in the ball-room with Joe -Foster, whose exacerbated spirit he did much to soothe. - -This young brother was alert, cheery, chatty. He was not at all put out -by Foster's wheeled chair and eyeshade, nor by the strange contortions -which Foster went through when, on occasion, he left the chair for a -couch or for some chair of ordinary type. He got behind the wheels, and -together they made the tour of the landscapes, marines, and -genre-pieces which covered the walls. The boy was sympathetic, without -being obtrusively so, and his comments on the paintings were confident -and unconventional. "So different from _ce cher_ Pelouse," said Foster, -with a grimace. He enjoyed immensely the fragmental half-hours given -him through those two days. His young companion was lavish in his -reports on life's vast vicissitudes at Fort Lodge, and was always ready -with comparisons between things as observed in his home town and in -Churchton itself. He came as a tonic breeze; and the evening after he -departed, Foster, left moping alone in the let-down which followed the -festivities, said to himself more than once, "If I had had a boy, I -should have wanted him just like Dick." - -Dick's mother and aunt stood up as well as they could against the -bustling, emphatic geniality of Medora Phillips; and they were able, -after a little, to adjust themselves to the prosperity of the Pearsons. -These, they came to feel, were essentially of the same origin and -traditions as themselves: just plain people who, however, had settled -on the edge of the Big Town to make money and had made it. Pearson the -elder was hardly more prepotent than Mr. Lusk, the banker at home. -George himself was a dashing go-ahead: if he turned into a tired -business-man his wife would know how to divert him. - -Medora Phillips provided rice. Also she satisfied herself as to where, -if the newer taste were not too delicate, she could put her hand on an -old shoe. She was happy to have married off Amy; she would be still -happier once Amy got away. More room would be left for other young -people. By "other young people" she meant, of course, certain young -men. By "certain young men" she thought she meant Cope and Lemoyne. Of -course she meant Cope only. - -"If Carolyn keeps amiable and if Hortense contrives to regain her -good-nature, we may have some pleasant days yet," she mused. - -But Hortense did not regain her good-nature; she did not even maintain -her self-control. In the end, the ceremony was too much for her. George -and Amy had plighted their troth in a floral bower, which ordinarily -was a bay window, before a minister of a denomination which did not -countenance robes nor a ritual lifted beyond the chances of wayward -improvisation; and after a brief reception the new couple prepared for -the motor-car dash which was to take them to a late train. In the big -wide hallway, after Amy had kissed Carolyn and thanked her for her poem -and was preparing for the shower of rice which she had every reason to -think she must face, there was a burst of hysterical laughter from -somewhere behind, and Hortense Dunton, to the sufficing words, "O -Bertram, Bertram!" emitted with sufficing clearness, fainted away. - -Her words, if not heard by all the company, were heard by a few to whom -they mattered; and while Hortense, immediately after the departure of -the happy pair, was being revived and led away, they left occasion for -thought. Carolyn Thorpe cast a startled glance. The aunt from Iowa, who -knew that Bertrams did not grow on every bush, and whose senses the -function had preternaturally sharpened for any address from Romance, -seized and shook her sister's arm; and, later on, in a Louis Quinze -_causeuse_, up stairs, they agreed that if young Cope really had had -another claimant on his attention, it was all the better that their Amy -had ended by taking George. And Medora Phillips, in the front hall -itself---- - -Well, to Medora Phillips, in the front hall, much was revealed as in a -lightning-flash, and the revelation was far from agreeable. What -advantage in Amy's departure if Hortense continued to cumber the -ground? Hortense must go off somewhere, for a sojourn of a month or -more, to recover her health and spirits and to let the house recover -its accustomed tone of cheer. - -Medora forced these considerations to the back of her mind and saw most -of her guests out of the house. Toward the end of it all she found -herself relaxing in the library, with Basil Randolph in the opposite -chair. Randolph himself had figured in the ceremony. This had been a -crude imitation of a time-hallowed form and had allowed for an -extemporaneous prayer and for a brief address to the young couple; but -it had retained the familiar inquiry, "Who giveth--?" "Who _can_ give?" -asked Medora of Amy. Poor Joe was rather out of the question, and -Brother Dick was four or five years too young. Was there, then, anyone -really available except that kind Mr. Randolph? So Basil Randolph, -after remembering Amy with a rich and handsome present, had taken on a -paternal air, had stepped forward at the right moment, and was now -recovering from his novel experience. - -The two, as they sat there, said little, though they looked at each -other with half-veiled, questioning glances. Medora, indeed, improvised -a little stretch of silent dialogue, and it made him take his share. -She felt dislocated, almost defeated. Hortense's performance had set -her to thinking of Bertram Cope, and she figured the same topic as -uppermost in the mind of Basil Randolph. - -"Well, you have about beaten me," she said. - -"How so?" she made him ask, with an affectation of simplicity. - -"You know well enough," she returned. "You have played off the whole -University against my poor house, and you have won. Your influence with -the president, your brother on the board of trustees ... If Bertram -Cope has any gratitude in his composition...." - -"Oh, well," she let him say, "I don't feel that I did much; and I'm not -sure I'm glad for what I did do." - -"You may regret it, of course. That other man is an uncertain quantity." - -"Oh, come," he said; "you've had the inside track from the very start: -this house and everything in it...." - -"You have a house of your own, now." - -"Your dinners and entertainments...." - -"You have your own dinner-table." - -"Your limousine, your chauffeur,--running to the opera and heaven knows -where else...." - -"Taxis can always be had. Yes," she went on, "you have held the -advantage over a poor woman cooped up in her own house. While I have -had to stick here, attending to my housekeeping, you have been -careering about everywhere,--you with a lot of partners and clerks in -your office, and no compulsion to look in more than two or three times -a week. Of _course_ you can run to theatres and clubs. I wonder they -don't dispense with you altogether!" - -"There's the advantage of a business arranged to run itself--so far as -_I_ am concerned." - -"Yes, you have had the world to range through: shows and restaurants; -the whole big city; strolls and excursions, and who knows what -beside...." - -Thus Medora Phillips continued silently, and with no exact sense of -justice, to work up her grievance. Presently she surprised Randolph -with a positive frown. She had made a quick, darting return to Hortense. - -"I shall send her away," she said aloud. The girl might join her studio -friend, who had stopped at Asheville on her way North, and stay with -her for a few weeks. Yes, Hortense might go and meet the spring--or -even the summer, if that must be. The spring here in town she herself -would take as it came. "I shall welcome a few free, easy breaths after -this past fortnight," she finished audibly. - -Randolph squared himself with her mood as best he could. "You are tired -and nervous," he said with banality. "Get the last of us out and go to -bed. I'll lead the way, and will give these loiterers as marked an -example as possible." - -Medora Phillips hushed down her house finally and went thoughtfully up -stairs to her room. Amy had gone off, and Hortense was sentenced to go. -There remained only Carolyn. Was there any threat in her and her -sonnets? - - -29 - -_COPE AGAIN IN THE COUNTRY_ - - -Medora treated Hortense to a few cautious soundings, decided that -another locale was the thing to do her good, and sent her South -forthwith. - -"It's a low latitude," she said to herself; "but it's a high altitude. -The season is late, but she won't suffer." - -Hortense, who had been sullen and fractious, met her aunt half-way, and -agreed passively when Medora said: - -"It will benefit you to see the spring come on in a new scene and in a -new fashion. You will find the mountains more interesting than the -dunes." So Hortense packed her things and joined her friend for a brief -sojourn in sight of the Great Smokies. - -Thus, when Medora herself went forth to meet the spring among the -sand-hills, she had only Carolyn and the other members of her domestic -staff. Yet no simplest week-end without a guest or so, and she asked -Cope to accompany them. - -"You need it," she told him bluntly; "--you need a change, however -slight and brief. You are positively thin. You make me wish that -thesises----" - -"Theses," Cope corrected her, rather spiritlessly. - -"----that theses, then, had never been invented. To speak familiarly, -you are almost 'peakèd.'" - -Cope, with the first warm days, had gone back to the blue serge suit of -the past autumn, and he filled it even less well than before. And his -face was thin to correspond. - -"Besides," she went on, "we need you. It will be a kind of camping-out -for a day or two--merely that. We must have your help to pitch the -tent, so to speak, and to pick up firewood, and to fry the bacon.... -And this time," she added, "you shall not have that long tiresome trip -by train. There will be room in the car." - -She did not attempt to make room for Lemoyne. She was glad to have no -need to do so; Lemoyne was deeply engrossed otherwise--"Annabella" and -her "antics" were almost ready for the public eye. The first of May -would see the performance, and the numerous rehearsals were exacting, -whether as regarded the effort demanded or the time. Every spare hour -was going into them, as well as many an hour that could hardly be -spared. Lemoyne, who had been cast originally for a minor female part, -now found himself transferred, through the failure of a principal, to a -more important one. For him, then, rehearsals were more exigent than -ever. He cut his Psychology once or twice, nor could he succeed, during -office hours, in keeping his mind on office-routine. His superiors -became impatient and then protestant. The annual spring dislocation of -ordered student life was indeed a regular feature of the year's last -term; yet to push indulgence as far as Arthur Lemoyne was pushing -it----! - -Cope was concerned; then worried. "Arthur," he said, "be reasonable -about this. You've got real work to do, remember." - -But Lemoyne's real work was in the musical comedy. "This is the biggest -chance I've ever had in my life," he declared, "and I don't want to -lose out on it." - -So Cope rolled away to the dunes and left Lemoyne behind for one -Saturday night rehearsal the more. - -Duneland gave him a tonic welcome. Under a breezy sky the far edge of -the lake stood out clear. Along its nearer edge the vivacious waves -tumbled noisily. The steady pines were welcoming the fresh early -foliage of such companions as dressed and undressed in accord with the -calendar; the wrecked trunks which had given up life and its leafy -pomps seemed somehow less sombre and stark; and in the threatened -woodlands behind the hills a multiplicity of small new greeneries -stirred the autumn's dead leaves and brightened up the thickets of -shrubbery. The arbutus had companioned the hepatica, and the squads of -the lupines were busily preparing their panoply of lavender-blue -racemes. Nature was breaking bounds. On the inland horizon rose the -vast bulk of the prison. As on other excursions, nobody tried too hard -to see it. - -"It's all too lovely," exclaimed Medora Phillips. "And what is quite as -good," she was able to declare, "the house itself is all right." Winter -had not weakened its roof nor wrenched away its storm-windows; no -irresponsible wayfarer had used it for a lodging, nor had any casual -marauder entered to despoil. Medora directed the disposition of the -hamper of food with a relieved air and sent Cope down with Peter for an -armful or two of driftwood from the assertive shore. - -"And you, Carolyn," she said, "see if the oil-stove will really go." - -Down on the beach itself, where the past winter's waste was still -profusely spread, Cope rose to the greening hills, to the fresh sweep -of the wind, and to the sun-shot green and purple streakings over the -water. The wind, in particular, took its own way: dry light sand, blown -from higher shelvings, striped the dark wet edges of the shore; and -every bending blade of sandgrass drew a circle about itself with its -own revolving tip. - -Cope let the robust and willing Peter pick up most of the firewood and -himself luxuriated in the spacious world round about him. Yes, a winter -had flown--or, at any rate, had passed--and here he was again. There -had been annoyances, but now he felt a wide and liberal relief. Here, -for example, was the special stretch of shore on which Amy Leffingwell -had praised his singing and had hinted her desire to accompany -him,--but never mind that. Farther on was the particular tract where -Hortense Dunton had pottered with her water-colors and had harried him -with the heroines of eighteenth century fiction,--but never mind that, -either. All those things were past, and he was free. Nobody remained -save Carolyn Thorpe, an unaggressive girl with whom one could really -trust oneself and with whom one could walk, if required, in comfort and -content. Cope threw up his head to the hills and threw out his chest to -the winds, and laid quick hands on a short length of weather-beaten -hemlock plank. "Afraid I'm not holding up my end," he said to Peter. - -At the house again, he found that Carolyn had brought the oil-stove -back into service, and, with Helga, had cast the cloth over the table -and had set some necessary dishes on it. He fetched a pail or two of -water from the pump, and each time placed a fresh young half-grown -sassafras leaf on the surface. "The trade-mark of our bottling-works," -he said facetiously; "to show that our products are pure." And Carolyn, -despite his facetiousness, felt more than ever that he might easily -become a poet. Medora viewed the floating leaves with indulgent -appreciation. "But don't let's cumber ourselves with many cares," she -suggested; "we are here to make the best of the afternoon. Let's out -and away,--the sooner the better." - -The three soon set forth for a stroll through spring's reviving domain. -Cope walked between Medora and Carolyn, or ahead of them, impartially -sweeping away twigs and flowering branches from before their faces. The -young junipers were putting forth tender new tips; the bright leaves of -the sassafras shone forth against the pines. Above the newly-rounded -tops of the oaks and maples in the valley below them the Three Witches -rose gauntly; and off on their far hill the two companion pines--(how -had he named them? Romeo and Juliet? Pelleas and Melisande?)--still lay -their dark heads together in mysterious confidences under the -heightening glow of the late afternoon sun. Carolyn looked from them -back to Cope and gave him a shy smile. - -He did not quite smile back. Carolyn was well enough, however. She was -suitably dressed for a walk. Her shoes were sensible, and so was her -hair. Amy had run to fluffiness. Hortense had often favored heavy waves -and emphatic bandeaux. But Carolyn's hair was drawn back plainly from -her forehead, and was gathered in a small, low-set knot. "Still, it's -no concern of mine," he reminded himself, and walked on ahead. - -Carolyn's sensible shoes brought her back, with the others, at -twilight. The three took up rather ornamentally (with aid from Peter -and Helga) the lighter details of housekeeping. Toward the end of the -stroll, Cope and Carolyn,--perhaps upon the mere unconscious basis of -youth,--had rather fallen in together, and Medora Phillips, once or -twice, had had to safeguard for herself her face and eyesight from the -young trees that bordered their path. But that evening, as they sat on -a settle before the driftwood fire, Medora took pains to place herself -in the middle. Carolyn was a sweet young flower, doubtless--humbler, -possibly, than Amy or Hortense; yet she too perhaps must be extirpated, -gently but firmly, from the garden of desire. - -"You look better already," Medora said to Cope. "You'll go back -to-morrow a new man." - -Her elbow was on the back of the settle and close to his shoulder. His -face caught the glow from the fire. - -"Oh, I'm all right, I assure you," he said. - -"You _do_ look better," observed Carolyn on her own account. "This air -is everything. Only a few hours of it----" - -"Another bit of wood on the fire, if you please, Carolyn," said her -patroness. - -"Let me do it," said Cope. He rose quickly and laid on a stick or two. -He remained standing on the edge of the glow. He hoped nobody would say -again that he was looking rather thin and pale. - -"And what is Mr. Lemoyne doing this evening?" presently asked Mrs. -Phillips in a dreamy undertone. Her manner was casual and negligent; -her voice was low and leisurely. She seemed to place Lemoyne at a -distance of many, many leagues. "Rehearsing, I suppose?" - -"Yes," replied Cope. "This new play has absorbed him completely." - -"He will do well?" - -"He always does. He always has." - -"Men in girls' parts are so amusing," said Carolyn. "Their walk is so -heavy and clumsy, even if their dancing isn't. And when they speak up -in those big deep bass and baritone voices...!" - -"Arthur will speak in a light tenor." - -"Will his walk be heavy and clumsy?" asked Mrs. Phillips. - -"He is an artist," replied Cope. - -"Not too much of one, I trust," she returned. "I confess I like boys -best in such parts when they frankly and honestly seem to be boys. -That's half the fun--and nine-tenths of the taste." - -"Taste?" - -"Yes, taste. Short for good taste. There's a great deal of room for -bad. A thing may be done too thoroughly. Once or twice I've seen it -done that way, by--artists." - -Cope, in the half-light, seemed rather unhappy. - -"He finds time for--for all this--this technique?" Mrs. Phillips asked. - -"He's very clever," replied Cope, rather unhappy still. "It does take -time, of course. I'm concerned," he added. - -"About his other work?" - -"Yes." He stepped aside a little into the shadow. - -"Come back to your place," said Medora Phillips. "You look quite -spectral." - -Cope, with a light sigh, returned to his post on the settle and to his -share in the firelight. Silence fell. From far below were heard the -active waves, moaning themselves to rest. And a featureless evening -moved on slowly. - - - - -30 - -_COPE AS A HERO_ - - -At ten o'clock Cope found himself tucked away in a small room on the -ground floor. It had been left quite as planned and constructed by the -original builder of the house. It was cramped and narrow, with low -ceiling and one small window. It gave on a short side-porch which was -almost too narrow to sit on and which was apropos of no special -prospect. Doubtless more than one stalwart youth had slept there before -him,--a succession of farmers' sons who fed all day on the airs and -spaces of the great out-of-doors, and who needed little of either -through a short night's rest. It was more comfortable at the end of -April than other guests had found it in mid-August. - -A little before eleven he awoke the house with a loud, ringing cry. -Some one outside had passed his narrow window; feet were heard on the -back porch and hands at the kitchen door. Peter was out as quickly as -Cope himself; and the women, in differing stages of dress and -half-dress, followed at once. - -While Mrs. Phillips and Carolyn were clinging to Cope, who had rushed -out in undershirt and trousers, Peter had a short tussle on the porch -with the intruder. He came in showing a scratch or two on his face, and -he reported the pantry window broken open. - -"Some tramp along the beach saw our lights," suggested Carolyn. - -"What was he like, Peter?" asked Mrs. Phillips. - -"I couldn't make out in the dark," Peter replied. "But he fought hard -for what he took, and he got away with it." He felt the marks on his -face. "Must have been a pretty hungry man." - -"It was some refugee hiding in my woods," said Medora Phillips. She -made her real thought no plainer. She never liked to see, in her walks, -that distant prison, and she never spoke of it to her guests; but the -fancy of some escaped convict lurking below among her thickets was -often present in her mind. - -Her fancy was now busy with some burglar, or even some murderer, who -had made his bolt for liberty; and she clung informally to the -clarion-voiced Cope as to a savior. She saw, with displeasure, that -Carolyn was disposed to cling too. She asked Carolyn to control herself -and told her the danger was over; she even requested her to return to -her room. But Carolyn lingered. - -Medora herself stood with Cope in the light of the dying fire. She was -dressed almost as inadequately as he, but she felt that she must cling -tremblingly to him and thank him for something or other. - -"I don't know what you've saved us from," she panted. "We may owe our -very lives to you!" - -Peter, in the background, again thoughtfully felt his face and became -conscious of a growing ache in the muscles of his arms. He retired, -with a smile, to a still more distant plane. The regular did the work -and the volunteer got the praise. - -Mrs. Phillips presently gave up her drooping hold on the reluctant Cope -and called Peter forward. "Is anything missing?" she asked. - -"Only part of the breakfast, I expect," said Peter, with a grin. "And -maybe some of the lunch. He surely was a hungry man!" - -"Well, we sha'n't starve. See to all the doors and windows before you -go back to bed." - -But going back to bed was the one thing that she herself felt unable to -do. She asked Carolyn to bring her a wrap of some kind or other, and -sat down on the settle to talk it over. Cope had modestly slipped on a -coat. The fire was dying--that was the only difference between twelve -o'clock and ten. - -"If I had known what was going to happen," declared Medora volubly, "I -never could have gone to bed at all! And to think"--here she left -Carolyn's end of the settle and drew nearer to Cope's--"that I should -ever have even thought of coming out here without a man!" - -She now rated her midnight intruder as a murderer, and believed more -devoutly than ever that Cope had saved all their lives. Cope, who knew -that he had contributed nothing but a loud pair of lungs, began to feel -rather foolish. - -Nor did the anomalous situation commend itself in any degree to his -taste. But it hit Medora Phillips' taste precisely, and she continued -to sit there, pressing an emotional enjoyment from it. An hour passed -before her excitement--an excitement kept up, perhaps, rather -factitiously--was calmed, and she trusted herself back in her own room. - -Breakfast was a scanty affair,--it must be that if anything was to be -left over for lunch. While they were busy with toast and coffee voices -were heard in the woods--loud cries in call and answer. - -"There!" said Medora, setting down her cup; "I knew it!" - -Presently two men came climbing up to the house, while the voices of -others were still audible in the humpy thickets below. - -The men were part of a search-party, of course,--a posse; and they -wanted to know whether.... - -"He tried to break in," said Medora Phillips eagerly; "but this -gentleman...." - -She turned appreciatively to Cope. Carolyn, really impressed by her -well-sustained seriousness and ardor, almost began to believe that they -owed their lives to Bertram Cope alone. - -"Was he a--murderer?" asked Medora. - -The men looked serious, but made no categorical reply. They glanced at -the wrecked pantry window, and they looked with more intentness at the -long sliding footprints which led away, down the half-bare sand-slope. -Then they slid down themselves. - -Medora asked Carolyn to do what she could toward constructing a lunch -and then walked down to the shore with Cope to compose her nerves. No -stroll today along the ridged amphitheatre of the hills, whence the -long, low range of buildings, under that tall chimney, was so plainly -in view. Still less relishing the idea of a tramp through the woods -themselves, the certain haunt--somewhere--of some skulking desperado. -No, they would take the shore itself--open to the wide firmament, clear -of all snares, and free from every disconcerting sight. - -"Poor Carolyn!" said Medora presently. "How fluttered and inefficient -she was! A good secretary--in a routine way--but so lacking in -initiative and self-possession!" - -Cope's look tended to become a stare. He thought that Carolyn had been -in pretty fair control of herself,--had been less fluttery and excited, -indeed, than her employer. - -But Medora had been piqued, the night before, by Carolyn's tendency to -linger on the scene and to help skim the emotional cream from the -situation. - -"And in such dishabille, too! I hope you don't think she seemed -immodest?" - -But Cope had given small heed to their dress, or to their lack of it. -In fact, he had noticed little if any difference between them. He only -knew that he had felt a degree more comfortable after getting his own -coat on. - -"Carolyn understands her place pretty well," mused Medora. "Yet..." - -"Anybody might be excused for looking anyhow, at such a time," observed -Cope, fending off the intrusion of a new set of considerations; "and in -such a sudden stir. I hope nobody noticed how I looked!" - -"Well, you were noticeable," declared Medora, with some archness. She -had been conscious enough of his spare waist, his sinewy arms, his -swelling chest. "It was easy enough to see where the noise came from," -she said, looking him over. - -"Yes, I supplied the noise--and that only. It was Peter, please -remember, who supplied the muscle." - -She declined to let her mind dwell on Peter. Peter possessed no charm. -Besides, he was prosaically on the payroll. - -They continued to saunter along the sand. Yesterday's sparse clouds had -vanished, along with much of yesterday's wind. The waters that had -tumbled and vociferated now merely murmured. The lake stood calmly -blue, and the new green was thickening on the hills. Confident birds -flitted busily among the trees and shrubs. Spring was disclosed in its -most alluring mood. - -Suddenly three or four figures appeared on the beach, a quarter of a -mile away. They had descended through one of the sandy and ravaged -channelings which broke at intervals the regulated rim of the hills, -and they came on toward our two strollers. Medora closed her eyes to -peer at them. "Are they marching a prisoner?" she asked. - -"They all appear to be walking free." - -"Are they carrying knapsacks?" - -"Khaki, puttees,--and knapsacks, I think." - -"Some university men said they might happen along to-day. If they -really have knapsacks, and anything to eat in them, they're welcome. -Otherwise, we had better hide quick--and hope they'll lose the place -and pass us by." - -One of the advancing figures lifted a semaphoric arm. "Too late," said -Cope; "They recognize you." - -"Then we'll walk on and meet them," declared Medora. - -The new-comers were young professors and graduate students. They were -soon in possession of the thrilling facts of the past night, and one of -them offered to be a prisoner, if a prisoner was desired. When they -heard how Bertram Cope had saved the lives of defenseless women in a -lonely land, they inclined to smile. Two of them had been present on -another shore when Cope had "saved" Amy Leffingwell from a watery -death, and they knew how far heroics might be pushed by women who were -willing to idealize. Cope saw their smiles and felt that he had fumbled -an opportunity: when he might have been a truncheon, he had been only a -megaphone. - -The new arrivals, after climbing the sandy rise to the house, were -shown the devastated kitchen and were asked to declare what provisions -they carried. They had enough food for their own needs and a trifle to -spare. Lunch might be managed, but any thought of a later meal was out -of the question. "We'll start back at four-thirty," said Medora to -Peter. "Meanwhile"--to the college men--"the world is ours." - -After lunch the enlarged party walked forth again. Mrs. Phillips had -old things to show to fresh eyes: she formed the new visitors into a -compact little group and let them see how good a guide she could be. -Cope and Carolyn strolled negligently--even unsystematically--behind. -Once or twice the personally conducted looked back. - -"I hope she won't tell them again how I came to the rescue," said Cope. -"It makes a man feel too flat for words. Anybody might think, to hear -her go on, that I had saved you all from robbery and murder...." - -"Why, but didn't you?" inquired Carolyn seriously. - - - - -31 - -_COPE GETS NEW LIGHT ON HIS CHUM_ - - -Cope had the luck to get back to Churchton with little further in the -way of homage. He was careful with Carolyn; she had perhaps addressed -him in a sonnet, and she might go on and address him in an ode. He -thought he had done nothing to deserve the one, and he would do almost -anything to escape the other. She was a nice pleasant quiet girl; but -nice pleasant quiet girls were beginning to do such equivocal things in -poetical print! - -Having returned to town by a method that put the minimum tax on his -powers, Cope was in shape, next day, for an hour on the faculty -tennis-courts. He played with no special skill or vigor, but he made a -pleasing picture in his flannels; and Carolyn, who happened to -pass--who passed by at about five in the afternoon, lingered for the -spectacle and thought of two or three lines to start a poem with. - -Cope, unconscious of this, presently turned his attention to Lemoyne, -who was on the eve of his first dress rehearsal and who was a good deal -occupied with wigs and lingerie. Here one detail leads to another, and -anyone who goes in wholeheartedly may go in dreadfully deep. Their room -came to be strown with all the disconcerting items of a theatrical -wardrobe. Cope soon reached the point where he was not quite sure that -he liked it all, and he began to develop a distaste for Lemoyne's -preoccupation with it. He came home one afternoon to find on the corner -of his desk a long pair of silk stockings and a too dainty pair of -ladies' shoes. "Oh, Art!" he protested. And then,--not speaking his -essential thought,--"Aren't these pretty expensive?" - -"The thing has got to be done right," returned Lemoyne. "Feet are about -the first thing they notice." - -At the actual performance Lemoyne's feet were noticed, certainly; -though perhaps not more than his head. His wig, as is usually the case -with dark people, was of a sunny blond hue. Its curls, as palpably -artificial as they were voluminous, made his eyes look darker and -somehow more liquid than ever. The contrast was piquant, almost -sensational. Of course he had sacrificed, for the time, his small -moustache. Lemoyne was not "Annabella" herself, but only her chief -chum; yet shorter skirts and shorter sleeves and a deliberately assumed -feminine air helped distinguish him from the hearty young lads who -manoeuvred in the chorus. - -Just who are those who enjoy the epicene on the stage? Not many women, -one prefers to think; and surely it arouses the impatience, if not -worse, of many men. Most amateur drama is based, perhaps, on the -attempted "escape": one likes to bolt from his own day, his own usual -costume, his own range of ideas, and even from his own sex. Endeavors -toward this last are most enjoyable--or least offensive--when they show -frank and patent inadequacy. It was Arthur Lemoyne's fortune--or -misfortune--to do his work all too well. - -Mrs. Phillips found his performance as little to her taste as she had -anticipated. Carolyn Thorpe got as much enjoyment out of the gauche -carriage and rough voices of the "chorus girls" as she had expected, -but was not observed to warm toward "Annabella's" closest friend. The -Pearsons, back from their wedding trip, had seats near the big crimson -velvet curtain. Pearson himself openly luxuriated in the amusing -ineptitude of two or three beskirted acquaintances among the upper -classmen, but frowned at Lemoyne's light tenor tones and mincing ways. -Of course the right sort of fellow, even if he had to sing his solo in -the lightest of light tenors, would still, on lapsing into dialogue, -reinstate himself apologetically by using as rough and gruff a voice as -he could summon. Not so Lemoyne: he was doing a consistent piece of -"characterization," and he was feminine, even overfeminine, throughout. - -"I never liked him, anyway," said George to Amy. - -Amy gave a nod of agreement. Yet why this critical zeal? There was but -one man to like, after all. - -"That make-up! That low-cut gown!" said George, in further -condemnation. "There's such a thing as going too far." - -Basil Randolph met Cope in the back lobby at the close of the -performance. The dramatic season in the city itself had begun to -languish; besides that, Randolph, in order to maintain his place on the -edge of the life academical, always made it a point to remember the -Grayfriars each spring. - -"A very thorough, consistent piece of work--your friend's," said -Randolph. He spoke in a firm, net, withholding tone, looking Cope full -in the face, meanwhile. What he said was little, perhaps, of what was -in his mind; yet Cope caught a note of criticism and of condemnation. - -"Yes," he almost felt constrained to say in reply, "yes, I know what -you did for him--for me, rather; and possibly this is not the outcome -foreseen. I hope you won't regret your aid." - -Randolph went past him placidly. He seemed to have little to regret. On -the contrary, he almost appeared to be pleased. He may have felt that -Lemoyne had shown himself in a tolerably clear light, and that it was -for Cope, should he choose, to take heed. - -Two days later, Randolph gave his impression of the performance to -Foster. "It's just what I should have expected," declared the cripple -acrimoniously. "I'm glad you never had any taste for the fellow; and I -should have been quite as well pleased if I hadn't found you caring for -the other." - -Randolph took refuge in a bland inexpressiveness. There was no need to -school his face: he had only to discipline his voice. - -"Oh, well," he said smoothly, "it's only a passing _amitié_--something -soon to be over, perhaps." He used an alien word because he could not -select, on the instant, from his stock of English, the word he needed, -and because he was not quite sure what idea he wanted to express. "I -only wish," he went on, in the same even tone, "that this chap had been -doing better by his work. At one early stage of the rehearsals there -was a lot of registration and fee-paying for the new term. Well, if he -hasn't been satisfactory, they needn't blame me. Let them blame the -system that diverts so much time and attention to interests quite -outside the regular curriculum." - -"You talk like a book!" said Foster, with blunt disdain. - -"Language----" began Randolph. - -"----was made to conceal thought," completed the other. "Stop talking. -Stop thinking. Or, if you must think, just get your thoughts back on -your business." - -Foster might have expressed himself still more pungently if he had been -aware, as Cope was, of an episode which took place, behind the scenes, -at the close of the performance. Lemoyne's singing and dancing in the -last act had had a marked success: after all, people had come to enjoy -and to applaud. Following two or three recalls, a large sheaf of roses -had been passed over the footlights; for a close imitation of -professional procedure was held to give the advantage of strict -vraisemblance. This "tribute" Lemoyne took in character, with certain -graces, pirouettes and smiles. His success so mounted to his head (for -he was the one person in the case who approximated a professional -effect) that after he had retired he could not quiet down and leave his -part. He continued to act off-stage; and in his general state of -ebulliency he endeavored to bestow a measure of upwelling femininity -upon another performer who was in the dress of his own sex. This -downright fellow, in cutaway and silk hat, did not understand,--or at -least had no patience with a rôle carried too far. He brusquely cleared -himself of Lemoyne's arm with a good vigorous push. This effort not -only propelled Lemoyne against some scenery and left him, despite the -voluminous blond wig, with a bruise on his forehead; it immediately -pushed him out of his part, and it ended by pushing him out of the -organization and even out of the University. - -"Keep off, will you!" said the young _élégant_ crudely. - -Lemoyne's "atmosphere" dissipated suddenly. His art-structure -collapsed. As he looked about he saw plainly that the other man's act -was approved. He had carried things too far. Well, such are the risks -run by the sincere, self-revealing artist. - -When all this reached Cope, he felt a personal chagrin. Truly, the art -of human intercourse was an art that called for some care. Lemoyne's -slight wound left no trace after forty-eight hours--perhaps his -"notices" in "The Index" and "The Campus" had acted as a salve; but -certain sections of opinion remained unfriendly, and there was arising -a new atmosphere of distaste and disapproval. - -The college authorities had not been satisfied, for some time, with his -clerical labors, and some of them thought that his stage -performance--an "exhibition" one of them termed it--called for reproof, -or more. They laid their heads together and Lemoyne and Cope were not -long in learning their decision. Lemoyne was pronounced a useless -element in one field, a discrepant element in another, a detriment in -both. His essentially slight connection with the real life of the -University came to be more fully recognized. Alma Mater, in fine, could -do without him, and meant to. Censure was the lot of the indignant boys -who officered the society, and who asked Lemoyne to withdraw; and -complete scission from the nourishing vine of Knowledge was his final -fate. - -No occupation; no source of income. Winnebago was cold; nor was it to -be warmed into ardor by press-notices. It had seen too many already and -was tired of them. - -The two young men conferred. Again Basil Randolph was their hope. - -"He ought to be able to do something for me in the city," said Lemoyne. -"He's acquainted in business circles, isn't he?" - -Cope bent over him--paler, thinner, more solicitous. "I'll try it," he -said. - -Cope once more approached Randolph, but Randolph shook his head. He had -no faith in Lemoyne, and he had done enough already against his own -interests and desires. - -Lemoyne fluttered about to little effect for a few weeks, while Cope -was finishing up his thesis. Beyond an accustomed and desired -companionship, Lemoyne contributed nothing--was a drag, in truth. He -returned to Winnebago a fortnight before the convocation and the -conferring of degrees; and it was the understanding that, somehow, he -and Cope should share together a summer divided between Winnebago and -Freeford. Randolph was left to claim Cope's interest, if he could. - - - - -32 - -_COPE TAKES HIS DEGREE_ - - -Lemoyne's departure but a fortnight before Cope's small share in the -convocation seemed to hint at mutual dissatisfaction; it might even -stand for a disagreement, or possibly a quarrel. "It's just as well -that he went," said Randolph to himself. "His presence here was no -advantage to Bertram--nor to anybody else." And with another fortnight -Cope himself would be gone; and who knew in what distant quarter he -might take up his autumn work? His ambitions, as Randolph knew, pointed -to some important university in the East. Meanwhile, make the most of -the flying days. - -Medora Phillips took the same view. She let Carolyn Thorpe loose for a -week's spring vacation, and sent Cope word that she was alone in a -darkened, depopulated home. Amy married. Hortense banished. Carolyn -waved aside. With all such varying devotions removed, why should he not -look in on her loneliness, during these final days, for dinner or tea? -He was still "charming"--however difficult, however recalcitrant. And -he was soon to depart. And who could believe that the fall term would -bring his equal or his like? - -Randolph, still taking his business easily, had suggestions for walks -and lunches; he had also free time to make his suggestions operative. -But Cope, though frequently seen in active movement on the campus and -through the town, gave little heed to either of his elderly friends. He -met them both, in High Street, on different occasions, and thanked and -smiled and promised--and kept away. He was doubtless absorbed in his -special work, in the details of the closing year. He may have thought -(as young men have been known to think) that, in accepting their -invitations, he had done enough for them already. He had shown his good -will on several occasions; let that suffice. Or he may have thought (as -young men have been found capable of thinking) not at all: other -concerns, more pressing and more contemporaneous, may have crowded them -out of his mind altogether. - -"I wonder if it's sensitiveness?" asked Randolph of Foster. "His chum -didn't go away in the best of good odor...." - -"Settle it for yourself," returned Foster brusquely. "And recall that -you have an office--and might have office-hours. Still, if you insist -on asking me----" - -"I don't. But you may speak, if you like." - -"And if you will consent to be fobbed off with a short-measure -answer----" - -"That's right. Don't say all you think." - -"Then I would put it somewhere between indifference and ingratitude. -Nearer the latter. We know the young." - -"I don't feel that I've done so very much for him," said Randolph, -rather colorlessly. - -"You were inclined to." - -"H'm, yes. I could have opened up avenues that would have made his year -here a very different thing. Perhaps he didn't realize what I could do. -And perhaps he found me too old." - -"Shall you attend the convocation?" - -"I go usually. I'll push him off from shore and waft him good-bye." - -"Good-bye? Good riddance!" - -"You never liked him." - -"I never did. If he leaves town without showing up here, no loss." - -"Medora expects him here?" - -"I think so." - -Randolph descended to the lower floor. Mrs. Phillips was alone, seated -behind a tea-service that steamed with expectation. - -"Going?" she asked. - -"Going. Joe is grouchy and violent today. And he keeps on reminding me -that I have an office." - -Medora glanced at the clock. Expectation seemed to be simmering down. - -"Stay a few moments if you like. Forget the office a little longer. -I'll make some fresh." - -"Not all these preparations for me?" - -"Well, they're here. Take advantage." - -"You're all alone?" - -"Alone. The house is empty." - -Medora tried to look as if at the heart of a tremendous vacuum. - -"I can't fill it." - -"You can fill fifteen minutes." - -"Oh, if you're going to confound time and space...!" - -He sat down receptively. - -Medora rang a bell and harried Helga a little. - -She glanced at Randolph. He sat there as if less to fill than to be -filled. - -"Say something," she said. - -"Are you going to the convocation?" - -"No." - -He sat silent. - -"Does that exhaust the subjects of interest?" she asked. - -"Pretty nearly. Doesn't it?" - -Medora fell silent in turn,--let the light clatter of the tea things -speak for her. - -"Are you going to the convocation?" he presently asked again. - -"Such variety!" she mocked. - -"Are you?" - -She hesitated. - -"Yes," she said. - -"That's better. Let's go together--as friends." - -"Who would imagine us going as enemies?" - -"Who, indeed?" Yet if they went together they went as reconciled -competitors,--they went as the result of a truce. - -"I should like to see Bertram Cope in cap and gown," he said. - -"He has worn them before, he tells me." - -"As a----?" - -"As a member of the choir, during his undergraduate days." - -"I see." - -"I never noticed him especially, then," she acknowledged. - -"We can notice him now." - -Medora made a slight grimace. "Yes, we can notice." He the actor; they -the audience. "A farewell performance." - -"A final view." - -Convocation day came clear, fair, mild. The professors walked in -colorful solemnity beneath the elms and up the middle aisle of the -chapel, lending both to outdoors and indoors the enlivenment of hoods -red, yellow, purple. The marshals led strings of candidates--long -strings and short--to the platform where the president sat, and the -deans presented in due order their bachelors, masters and doctors. The -rapid handing out of the diplomas brought frequent applause--bits, -spatters, volleys, as the case might be. There was recognition for a -Chinaman, for a negro law-student, for a pair of Filipinos; there was a -marked outburst for a husky young man who was assumed by the uninformed -to have been a star in the university's athletic life; there was a -respectful but emphatic acknowledgment for a determined-looking -middle-aged woman with gray hair, who was led on with four men as a -little string of five; there was a salvo for a thoughtful, dignified -man of thirty-odd, who went up as a group in himself, attended by -marshals before and behind; and there was a slight spatter of applause -for Bertram Cope (one of a small procession of six), yet rather more -for a smiling young man who followed him.... - -Cope looked somewhat spare, despite his voluminous gown. The trying -lights added little color to his face, and brought his cheek-bones into -undue prominence. But he took his sheepskin with a bow and a gesture -that extinguished several of his companions; and he faced the audience, -on descending from the stage, with a composed effect gained by -experience in the choir. The lustre in the ceiling lit up his yellow -hair and his blue eyes: "He is as charming as ever!" thought Medora -Phillips. - -"He's had a hard pull of it," commented Randolph. - -"I hope his own people will feed him up this summer," said Medora. Her -emphasis was wayward; "He wouldn't let we do it," she seemed to mean. - -"Nor me," she almost made Randolph say. - -There was a recessional, and then the crowds of students flooded the -corridors and circulated under the fresh foliage of the campus. -Randolph and Medora Phillips passed out with the rest of the -assemblage. In the midst of one of the avenues of elms they noticed -Cope as the center of a little group: two plain, elderly people (his -parents, doubtless) and--and---- - -Medora Phillips looked twice. Yes, the other figure was Carolyn Thorpe, -offering congratulations. Carolyn had returned to her post and her work -the day before. "H'm," thought Medora, disposed to be miffed. Still, -Carolyn had, after all, the same right to attend as anyone else. - -Medora and Basil Randolph added their congratulations to Carolyn's. -Cope, still in academic garb, performed the necessary introductions. -His air was eager, but cursory; smiling and ready, yet impersonal and -cool; above all, expeditious. If his parents passed on with the -impression that Medora Phillips and Basil Randolph were but casual -acquaintances, worthy of nothing beyond brief formalities, the blame -was his own. - -"I'm showing father and mother over the campus," he said, with an open -smile and a wave with his diploma, as he edged away. - -The elders docilely took their cue, and moved away with him. - -"Well," said Randolph, "there _are_ buildings, of course; and -fountains, and sun-dials, and memorial benches; but..." - -"They add nothing to him," pronounced Medora, as she looked back on the -retiring party. - -"Did you expect them to?" he asked. "Charm, like guilt, is personal. -Anyhow, there seems to be no brother," he added. - -"Well, come, Carolyn," said Medora, to her returned secretary, who was -looking after the party too; "let's start for home. Good afternoon, -Basil." - - -"What nice, good, pleasant, friendly people they are!" breathed Carolyn. - -Randolph had strolled away, and Medora Phillips turned a studious -glance on her companion. Carolyn was conceivably in a state of -mind--keyed up to an all-inclusive appreciation. Did that foreshadow -further verse?--a rustic rhapsody, a provincial pantoum? But Medora -withheld question. Much as she would have enjoyed a well-consolidated -impression of the visitors, she did not intend to secure it by -interrogating Carolyn Thorpe. - - - - -33 - -_COPE IN A FINAL VIEW_ - - -Cope, after a few days, followed his parents back to Freeford. He may -have said good-bye to his landlady and to some of his associates in his -department; but he contrived no set adieux for the friends who had done -so much for him--or had tried to--through the past year. Basil Randolph -and Medora Phillips had their last view of him when, diploma in hand, -he led his parents away, over the campus. - -"Oh, well," said Randolph resignedly, "we were less important to him -than we thought. Only a couple of negligible items among many. Entered -in his ledger--if we _were_ entered--and now faded away to a dim, -rusty, illegible scrawl...." - -"Stop it, Basil! You make me feel old, antique, antediluvian. I don't -want to. I shan't let myself be pushed back and ignored. I'm going to -give Amy and George a rousing big dinner before long; and when the fall -term opens I shall entertain as never before. And if that young man -from the South turns up here during the summer to see Hortense, I shall -do a lot for them." - -Hortense Dunton had long since returned, of course, from the Tennessee -and North Carolina mountains; but she ignored the convocation. One drop -of bitterness, if tasted again--even reminiscently--would have turned -everything to gall. Instead, she found a measure of sweetness in the -letters which followed on her return from that region. They were -addressed in a bold, dashing young hand, and bore the postmark -"Nashville." Hortense was inclined to let them lie conspicuously on the -front-hall table, for half an hour or so, before she took them up. -Little might be absolutely known about her passage with Cope; but there -the letters lay, for her aunt's eye and for Carolyn Thorpe's. - -Carolyn prattled a little, not indiscreetly, about her meeting with the -Freeford family on the campus. As Basil Randolph himself had done -months before, she endeavored to construct a general environment for -them and to determine their place in the general social fabric. She -had, however, the advantage of having seen them; she was not called to -make an exiguous evocation from the void. She still held that they were -nice, good, pleasant, friendly people: if they had subordinated -themselves, docilely and automatically, to the prepotent social and -academic figures of the society about them, that in no wise detracted -from the favorable impression they had made on her. - -"Just the right parents for Bertram," she said fondly, to herself. She -made, almost unconsciously, the allowance that is still generally made, -among Americans, for the difference between two generations: the elder, -of course, continues to provide a staid, sober, and somewhat primitive -background for the brilliancy of the younger. Her own people, if they -appeared in Churchton, might seem a bit simple and provincial too. - -Hortense took Carolyn's slight and fond observations with a silent -scorn. When she spoke at all, she was likely to say something about -"family"; and it was gathered that the dashing correspondent at -Nashville was conspicuously "well-connected." Also, that he belonged to -the stirring New South and had put money in his purse. Hortense's -contempt for the semi-rustic and impecunious Cope became boundless. - -About the middle of July a letter lay on the front-hall table for -Carolyn. It was from Cope. - -"Only think!" said Carolyn to herself, in a small private ecstasy -within her locked bedchamber; "he wrote on his own account and of his -own accord. Not a line from me; not a suggestion!" - -The letter was an affair of two small pages. "Yours very sincerely, -Bertram L. Cope" simply told "My dear Miss Thorpe" that he had been -spending three or four days in Winnebago, Wisconsin, and that he had -now returned home for a month of further study, having obtained a post -in an important university in the East, at a satisfactory stipend. A -supplementary line conveyed regards to Mrs. Phillips. And that was all. - -Was it a handful of husks, or was it a banquet? Carolyn took it for the -latter and lived on it for days. Little it mattered what or how much he -had written: he had written, and of his own accord--as Carolyn made a -point of from the first. There is an algebraic formula expressive of -the truth that "1" is an infinitely greater number of times than "0." -And a single small taper is infinitely greater in point of light and -cheer than none at all. Carolyn's little world underwent illumination, -and she with it. She promptly soared to a shining infinity. - -Medora Phillips could not overlook Carolyn's general glow, nor the -sense of elevation she conveyed. Things became clearer still when -Carolyn passed on the scanty message which Cope had added at the end. -"Best regards to Mrs. Phillips"--there it was, so far as it went. And -Medora felt, along with Carolyn, that a slight mention was an immensity -of times greater than no mention at all. "Very kind, very thoughtful of -him, I'm sure," she said without irony. - -Carolyn let her read the letter for herself. It was a brief, cool, -succinct thing, and not at all unsuited for general circulation. "Best -regards to Mrs. Phillips. Yours very sincerely, Bertram L. Cope," she -read again; then, like Carolyn, she retired for meditation. - -Well, from its dozen or fifteen lines several things might fairly be -inferred. "Three or four days in Winnebago"--a scanty pattern for a -visit. Had three or four been enough? Had Lemoyne been found glum and -unpleasant? Had those months of close companionship brought about a -mutually diminished interest? Not a word as to Lemoyne's accompanying -him to Freeford, or joining him there later. On the contrary, a strong -implication that there would be sufficient to occupy him without the -company of Lemoyne or anybody else: evidences of an eye set solely on -the new opportunity in the East. - -"Well, if he is going to get along without him," said Medora to -herself, "it will be all the better for him. He was never any advantage -to him," she added, with an informal and irresponsible use of her -pronouns. But she knew what she meant and had no auditor to satisfy. - -When, however, she touched on the matter with Basil Randolph she showed -more exactitude. Randolph had lingered late upstairs with Foster, and -he had been intercepted, on his way out, with an invitation to remain -to dinner. "Very well," he said. "Sing-Lo is not invariably inspired on -Monday evening. I shall be glad to stay." - -He felt, in fact, the need of a little soothing. Foster had been taking -a farewell shot at Cope and had been rough and vindictive. He had heard -something of the antics of "Annabella's" partner and had magnified -characteristically the seriousness of the offense. "What hope for -him"--meaning Cope--"so long as he goes on liking and admiring that -fellow?" - -"Well," returned Randolph, in an effortless platitude, "liking is the -great mystery--whether you take its coming or its going." - -"The sooner this one goes, the better," snapped Foster. "Have you heard -from that fellow at all?" he inquired. - -"'That fellow'? What fellow--this time?" - -"The other one, of course. Cope." - -"No." - -Foster wiped out Cope with one question. - -"Likely to 'cultivate' some other young chap, next year?" - -Randolph had a moment of sober thoughtfulness. - -"No." - -"Good! Get back into harness; have 'hours' and all the rest of it. Best -thing in the world for you. The young care so much for us--the devil -they do!" - -Foster gave a savage, dragging clutch at his shade and twisted -rebelliously in his chair. - -Randolph left him to himself and went below. - -Downstairs dinner proceeded cautiously. There was no chance for an -interchange of thought until the two young women should have been got -out of the way. Hortense had her own affair at the back of her head, -and Carolyn hers. Neither could sympathize with the other. Hortense's -manner to Carolyn was one of half-suppressed insolence. Carolyn, buoyed -up interiorly, seemed able to endure it,--perhaps was not fully -conscious of it. There was relief when, after dessert, each arose and -went her respective way. - -Medora and Randolph settled down on a causeuse in the drawing-room. The -place was half-lighted, but Randolph made out that his companion was -taking on a conscious air of pseudo-melancholy. - -Her eyes roved the dim, cluttered room with studied mournfulness, and -she said, presently: - -"Dear old house! Undergoing depopulation, and soon to be a waste." - -"Depopulation?" - -"Yes; they're leaving it one by one. First, Amy. You remember Amy?" - -"I believe so." - -"She married George and went away. You recall the occasion?" - -"I think I was present." - -"And now it's Hortense." - -"Is it, indeed?" - -She told him about the gallant young Southerner in Tennessee, and gave -a forecast of a probable pairing. - -"And next it will be Carolyn." - -"Carolyn? Who has cast his eye on her?" - -Medora shot it out. - -"Bertram Cope!" - -"Cope!" Randolph gave himself another twist in that well-twisted sofa. - -"Cope," she repeated. If the boy were indeed beyond her own reach, she -would report his imminent capture by another with as much effect as she -could command. - -And she told of Carolyn's fateful letter. - -"So that's how it stands?" he said thoughtfully. - -"I don't say 'how' it stands. I don't say that it 'stands' at all. But -he has prospects and she has hopes." - -"Prospects and hopes,--a strong working combination." - -Medora took the leap. "She will marry him, of course," she said -decidedly. "After his having jilted Amy----" - -"'Jilted' her? Do you understand it that way?" - -"And trampled on Hortense----" - -"'Trampled'? Surely you exaggerate." - -"And ignored me----You will let me use that mild word, 'ignored'?" - -"Its use is granted. He has ignored others too." - -"After all that, who is there left in the house but Carolyn? Listen; -I'll tell you how it will be. She has answered his letter, of -course,--imagine whether or not she was prompt about it!--and he will -answer hers----" - -"_Will_ answer it?" - -"Not at once, perhaps; but soon: in the course of two or three weeks. -Then she will reply,--and there you have a correspondence in full -swing. Then, in the fall he will write her from his new post in the -East, and say: 'Dear Girl,--At last I can----,' and so on." - -"You mean that you destine poor Carolyn for a man who is so apt at -jilting and trampling and ignoring?" - -"Who else is there?" Medora continued to demand sturdily. "In October -they will be married----" - -"Heaven forbid!" ejaculated Randolph. - -"You have something better to suggest?" - -"Nothing better. Something different. Listen, as you yourself say. Next -October I shall call on you, put my hand in my inside pocket, bring out -a letter and read it to you. It will run like this: 'My dear Mr. -Randolph,--You will be pleased, I am sure, to hear that I now have a -good position at the university in this pleasant town. Arthur Lemoyne, -whom you recall, is studying psychology here, and we are keeping house -together. He wishes to be remembered. I thank you for your many -kindnesses,'--that is put in as a mere possibility,--'and also send -best regards to Mrs. Phillips and the members of her household. -Sincerely yours, Bertram L. Cope.'" - -"I won't accept that!" cried Medora. "He will marry Carolyn, and I -shall do as much for her as I did for Amy, and as much as I expect to -do for Hortense." - -"I see. The three matches made and the desolation of the house -complete." - -"Complete, yes; leaving me alone among the ruins." - -"And nothing would rescue you from them but a fourth?" - -"Basil, you are not proposing?" - -"I scarcely think so," he returned, with slow candor. "I shouldn't care -to live in this house; and you----" - -"I knew you never liked my furnishings!" - -"----and you, I am sure, would never care to live in any other." - -"I shall stay where I am," she declared. "Shall you stay where you -are?" she asked keenly. - -"Perhaps not." - -"Confess that housekeeping on your own account is less attractive than -it once was." - -"I do. Confess that you, with all your outfit and all your goings-on, -never quite--never quite--succeeded in..." - -Medora shrugged. "The young, at best, only tolerate us. We are but the -platform they dance on,--the ladder they climb by." - -"After all, he was a 'charming' chap. Your own word, you know." - -"Yet scarcely worth the to-do we made over him," said Medora, willing -to save her face. - -Randolph shrugged in turn, and threw out his hands in a gesture which -she had never known him to employ before. - -"Worth the to-do? Who is?" - - - - - - - - - - -End of Project Gutenberg's Bertram Cope's Year, by Henry Blake Fuller - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BERTRAM COPE'S YEAR *** - -***** This file should be named 8101-8.txt or 8101-8.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/8/1/0/8101/ - -Produced by Eric Eldred, Jerry Fairbanks, Charles Franks -and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team. - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions -will be renamed. - -Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no -one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation -(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without -permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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