THE SECOND GENERATION

 BY DAVID GRAHAM PHILLIPS

AUTHOR OF "THE COST, " "THE PLUM TREE, " "THE SOCIAL SECRETARY, " "THEDELUGE, " ETC. 

 1906

CONTENTS

CHAPTER

 I. --"PUT YOUR HOUSE IN ORDER!" II. --OF SOMEBODIES AND NOBODIES III. --MRS. WHITNEY INTERVENES IV. --THE SHATTERED COLOSSUS V. --THE WILL VI. --MRS. WHITNEY NEGOTIATES VII. --JILTED VIII. --A FRIEND IN NEED IX. --THE LONG FAREWELL X. --"THROUGH LOVE FOR MY CHILDREN" XI. --"SO SENSITIVE" XII. --ARTHUR FALLS AMONG LAWYERS XIII. --BUT IS RESCUED XIV. --SIMEON XV. --EARLY ADVENTURES OF A 'PRENTICE XVI. --A CAST-OFF SLIPPER XVII. --POMP AND CIRCUMSTANCE XVIII. --LOVE, THE BLUNDERER XIX. --MADELENE XX. --LORRY'S ROMANCE XXI. --HIRAM'S SON XXII. --VILLA D'ORSAY XXIII. --A STROLL IN A BYPATH XXIV. --DR. MADELENE PRESCRIBES XXV. --MAN AND GENTLEMAN XXVI. --CHARLES WHITNEY'S HEIRS XXVII. --THE DOOR AJARXXVIII. --THE DEAD THAT LIVE

THE SECOND GENERATION

CHAPTER I

"PUT YOUR HOUSE IN ORDER!"

In six minutes the noon whistle would blow. But the workmen--the sevenhundred in the Ranger-Whitney flour mills, the two hundred and fifty inthe Ranger-Whitney cooperage adjoining--were, every man and boy of them, as hard at it as if the dinner rest were hours away. On the threshold ofthe long room where several scores of filled barrels were being headedand stamped there suddenly appeared a huge figure, tall and broad andsolid, clad in a working suit originally gray but now white with theflour dust that saturated the air, and coated walls and windows bothwithin and without. At once each of the ninety-seven men and boys wasaware of that presence and unconsciously showed it by putting on extra"steam. " With swinging step the big figure crossed the packing room. Thegray-white face held straight ahead, but the keen blue eyes paused uponeach worker and each task. And every "hand" in those two great factoriesknew how all-seeing that glance was--critical, but just; exacting, butencouraging. All-seeing, in this instance, did not mean merelyfault-seeing. 

Hiram Ranger, manufacturing partner and controlling owner of theRanger-Whitney Company of St. Christopher and Chicago, went on into thecooperage, leaving energy behind him, rousing it before him. Many times, each working day, between seven in the morning and six at night, he madethe tour of those two establishments. A miller by inheritance andtraining, he had learned the cooper's trade like any journeyman, when hedecided that the company should manufacture its own barrels. He was not arich man who was a manufacturer; he was a manufacturer who wasincidentally rich--one who made of his business a vocation. He had notheories on the dignity of labor; he simply exemplified it, and wouldhave been amazed, and amused or angered according to his mood, had itbeen suggested to him that useful labor is not as necessary andcontinuous a part of life as breathing. He did not speculate and talkabout ideals; he lived them, incessantly and unconsciously. The talker ofideals and the liver of ideals get echo and response, each after hiskind--the talker, in the empty noise of applause; the liver, in thesilent spread of the area of achievement. 

A moment after Hiram roused the packing room of the flour mill with themaster's eye, he was in the cooperage, the center of a group round one ofthe hooping machines. It had got out of gear, and the workman had bungledin shutting off power; the result was chaos that threatened to stop thewhole department for the rest of the day. Ranger brushed away thewrangling tinkerers and examined the machine. After grasping the problemin all its details, he threw himself flat upon his face, crawled underthe machine, and called for a light. A moment later his voice issuedagain, in a call for a hammer. Several minutes of sharp hammering; thenthe mass of iron began to heave. It rose at the upward pressure ofRanger's powerful arms and legs, shoulders and back; it crashed over onits side; he stood up and, without pause or outward sign of his exertionof enormous strength, set about adjusting the gearing to action, with thebroken machinery cut out. "And he past sixty!" muttered one workman toanother, as a murmur of applause ran round the admiring circle. ClearlyHiram Ranger was master there not by reason of money but because he wasfirst in brain and in brawn; not because he could hire but because hecould direct and do. 

In the front rank of the ring of on-looking workmen stood a young man, tall as himself and like him in the outline of his strong features, especially like him in the fine curve of the prominent nose. But indress and manner this young man was the opposite of the master workmannow facing him in the dust and sweat of toil. He wore a fashionable suitof light gray tweed, a water-woven Panama with a wine-colored ribbon, awine-colored scarf; several inches of wine-colored socks showed below hishigh-rolled, carefully creased trousers. There was a seal ring on thelittle finger of the left of a pair of large hands strong with thesymmetrical strength which is got only at "polite" or useless exercise. Resting lightly between his lips was a big, expensive-looking Egyptiancigarette; the mingled odor of that and a delicate cologne scented theair. With a breeziness which a careful observer of the niceties of mannermight have recognized as a disguise of nervousness, the young manadvanced, extending his right hand. 

"Hello, father!" said he, "I came to bring you home to lunch. "

The master workman did not take the offered hand. After a quick glance ofpride and pleasure which no father could have denied so manly andhandsome a son, he eyed the young man with a look that bit into every oneof his fashionable details. Presently he lifted his arm and pointed. Theson followed the direction of that long, strong, useful-lookingforefinger, until his gaze rested upon a sign: "No Smoking"--big, blackletters on a white background. 

"Beg pardon, " he stammered, flushing and throwing away the cigarette. 

The father went to the smoking butt and set his foot upon it. The son'sface became crimson; he had flung the cigarette among the shavings whichlittered the floor. "The scientists say a fire can't be lighted fromburning tobacco, " he said, with a vigorous effort to repair the rent inhis surface of easy assurance. 

The old man--if that adjective can be justly applied to one who had suchstrength and energy as his--made no reply. He strode toward the door, theson following, acute to the grins and winks the workmen were exchangingbehind his back. The father opened the shut street door of the cooperage, and, when the son came up, pointed to the big, white letters: "NoAdmittance. Apply at the Office. "

"How did you get in here?" he asked. 

"I called in at the window and ordered one of the men to open the door, "explained the son. 

"Ordered. " The father merely repeated the word. 

"Requested, then, " said the son, feeling that he was displayingpraiseworthy patience with "the governor's" eccentricities. 

"Which workman?"

The son indicated a man who was taking a dinner pail from under abench at the nearest window. The father called to him: "Jerry!" Jerrycame quickly. 

"Why did you let this young--young _gentleman_ in among us?"

"I saw it was Mr. Arthur, " began Jerry. 

"Then you saw it was not anyone who has any business here. Who gave youauthority to suspend the rules of this factory?"

"Don't, father!" protested Arthur. "You certainly can't blame him. Heknew I'd make trouble if he didn't obey. "

"He knew nothing of the sort, " replied Hiram Ranger. "I haven't beendealing with men for fifty years--However, next time you'll know what todo, Jerry. "

"He warned me it was against the rules, " interjected Arthur. 

A triumphant smile gleamed in the father's eyes at this vindication ofthe discipline of the mills. "Then he knew he was doing wrong. He must befined. You can pay the fine, young _gentleman_--if you wish. "

"Certainly, " murmured Arthur. "And now, let's go to lunch. "

"To dinner, " corrected the father; "your mother and I have dinner in themiddle of the day, not lunch. "

"To dinner, then. Anything you please, pa, only let's go. "

When they were at the office and the father was about to enter the innerroom to change his clothes, he wheeled and said: "Why ain't you atHarvard, passing your examinations?"

Arthur's hands contracted and his eyes shifted; in a tone to whichrepression gave a seeming lightness, he announced: "The exams, are over. I've been plucked. "

The slang was new to Hiram Ranger, but he understood. In importantmatters his fixed habit was never to speak until he had thought well;without a word he turned and, with a heaviness that was new in hismovements, went into the dressing room. The young man drew a cautious butprofound breath of relief--the confession he had been dreading was over;his father knew the worst. "If the governor only knew the world better, "he said to himself, "he'd know that at every college the best fellowsalways skate along the edge of the thin ice. But he doesn't, and so hethinks he's disgraced. " He lit another cigarette by way of consolationand clarification. 

When the father reappeared, dressed for the street, he was apparentlyunconscious of the cigarette. They walked home in silence--astriking-looking pair, with their great similar forms and their handsomesimilar faces, typical impersonations of the first generation that issowing in labor, and the second generation that is reaping in idleness. 

"Oh!" exclaimed Arthur, as they entered the Ranger place and began toascend the stone walk through the lawns sloping down from the big, substantial-looking, creeper-clad house. "I stopped at Cleveland half aday, on the way West, and brought Adelaide along. " He said this withelaborate carelessness; in fact, he had begged her to come that she mightonce more take her familiar and highly successful part of buffer betweenhim and his father's displeasure. 

The father's head lifted, and the cloud over his face also. "How is she?"he asked. "Bang up!" answered Arthur. "She's the sort of a sister a man'sproud of--looks and style, and the gait of a thoroughbred. " Heinterrupted himself with a laugh. "There she is, now!" he exclaimed. 

This was caused by the appearance, in the open front doors, of a strangecreature with a bright pink ribbon arranged as a sort of cockade aroundand above its left ear--a brown, hairy, unclean-looking thing that gazedwith human inquisitiveness at the approaching figures. As the elderRanger drew down his eyebrows the creature gave a squeak of alarm and, dropping from a sitting position to all fours, wheeled and shambledswiftly along the wide hall, walking human fashion with its hind feet, dog fashion with its fore feet or arms. 

At first sight of this apparition Ranger halted. He stared with anexpression so astounded that Arthur laughed outright. 

"What was that?" he now demanded. 

"Simeon, " replied Arthur. "Del has taken on a monk. It's the latest fad. "

"Oh!" ejaculated Ranger. "Simeon. "

"She named it after grandfather--and there _is_ a--" Arthur stoppedshort. He remembered that "Simeon" was his father's father; perhaps hisfather might not see the joke. "That is, " he explained, "she was lookingfor a name, and I thought of 'simian, ' naturally, and that, of course, suggested 'Simeon'--and--"

"That'll do, " said Hiram, in a tone of ominous calm which his familyknew was the signal that a subject must be dropped. 

Now there was a quick _froufrou_ of skirts, and from the sitting room tothe left darted a handsome, fair girl of nineteen, beautifully dressed ina gray summer silk with simple but effectively placed bands of pinkembroidery on blouse and skirt. As she bounded down the steps and intoher father's arms her flying skirts revealed a pair of long, narrow feetin stylish gray shoes and gray silk stockings exactly matching the restof her costume. "Daddy! Daddy!" she cried. 

His arms were trembling as they clasped her--were trembling with theemotion that surged into her eyes in the more obvious but lesssignificant form of tears. "Glad to see you, Delia, " was all he said. 

She put her slim white forefinger on his lips. 

He smiled. "Oh! I forgot. You're Adelaide, of course, since you'vegrown up. "

"Why call me out of my name?" she demanded, gayly. "You should havechristened me Delia if you had wanted me named that. "

"I'll try to remember, next time, " he said, meekly. His gray eyes weredancing and twinkling like sunbeams pouring from breaches in a spentstorm-cloud; there was an eloquence of pleasure far beyond laughter's inthe rare, infrequent eye smiles from his sober, strong face. 

Now there was a squeaking and chattering behind them. Adelaide whirledfree of her father's arms and caught up the monkey. "Put out your hand, sir, " said she, and she kissed him. Her father shuddered, so awful wasthe contrast between the wizened, dirty-brown face and her roselikeskin and fresh fairness. "Put out your hand and bow, sir, " she went on. "This is Mr. Hiram Ranger, Mr. Simeon. Mr. Simeon, Mr. Ranger; Mr. Ranger, Mr. Simeon. "

Hiram, wondering at his own weakness, awkwardly took the paw so uncannilylike a mummied hand. "What did you do this for, Adelaide?" said he, in atone of mild remonstrance where he had intended to be firm. 

"He's so fascinating, I couldn't resist. He's so wonderfully human--"

"That's it, " said her father; "so--so--"

"Loathsomely human, " interjected Arthur. 

"Loathsome, " said the father. 

"That impression soon wears off, " assured Adelaide, "and he's just like ahuman being as company. I'd be bored to death if I didn't have him. Hegives me an occupation. "

At this the cloud settled on Ranger's face again--a cloud of sadness. Anoccupation!

Simeon hid his face in Adelaide's shoulder and began to whimper. Shepatted him softly. "How can you be so cruel?" she reproached her father. "He has feelings almost like a human being. "

Ranger winced. Had the daughter not been so busy consoling her unhappypet, the father's expression might have suggested to her that there was, not distant from her, a being who had feelings, not almost, but quitehuman, and who might afford an occupation for an occupation-hunting youngwoman which might make love and care for a monkey superfluous. But hesaid nothing. He noted that the monkey's ribbon exactly matched theembroidery on Adelaide's dress. 

"If he were a dog or a cat, you wouldn't mind, " she went on. 

True enough! Clearly, he was unreasonable with her. 

"Do you want me to send him away?"

"I'll get used to him, I reckon, " replied Hiram, adding, with a faintgleam of sarcasm, "I've got used to a great many things these lastfew years. "

They went silently into the house, Adelaide and Arthur feeling that theirfather had quite unreasonably put a damper upon their spirits--a feelingwhich he himself had. He felt that he was right, and he was puzzled tofind himself, even in his own mind, in the wrong. 

"He's hopelessly old-fashioned!" murmured Arthur to his sister. 

"Yes, but _such_ a dear, " murmured Adelaide. 

"No wonder _you_ say that!" was his retort. "You wind him roundyour finger. "

In the sitting room--the "back parlor"--Mrs. Ranger descended upon themfrom the direction of the kitchen. Ellen was dressed for work; her oldgingham, for all its neatness, was in as sharp contrast to her daughter'sgarb of the lady of leisure as were Hiram's mill clothes to his son's"London latest. " "It's almost half-past twelve, " she said. "Dinner's beenready more than half an hour. Mary's furious, and it's hard enough tokeep servants in this town since the canning factories started. "

Adelaide and Arthur laughed; Hiram smiled. They were all thoroughlyfamiliar with that canning-factory theme. It constituted the chieffeature of the servant problem in Saint X, as everybody called St. Christopher; and the servant problem there, as everywhere else, was thechief feature of domestic economy. As Mrs. Ranger's mind was concentratedupon her household, the canning factories were under fire from her earlyand late, in season and out of season. 

"And she's got to wait on the table, too, " continued Ellen, toointerested in reviewing her troubles to mind the amusement of the rest ofthe family. 

"Why, where's the new girl Jarvis brought you?" asked Hiram. 

"She came from way back in the country, and, when she set the table, shefixed five places. 'There's only four of us, Barbara, ' said I. 'Yes, Mrs. Ranger, ' says she, 'four and me. ' 'But how're you going to wait onthe table and sit with us?' says I, very kindly, for I step mighty softwith those people. 'Oh, I don't mind bouncin' up and down, ' says she; 'Ican chew as I walk round. ' When I explained, she up and left in a huff. 'I'm as good as you are, Mrs. Ranger, I'd have you know, ' she said, asshe was going, just to set Mary afire; 'my father's an independentfarmer, and I don't have to live out. I just thought I'd like to visitin town, and I'd heard your folks well spoke of. I'll get a place in thecanning factory!' I wasn't sorry to have her go. You ought to have seenthe way she set the table!"

"We'll have to get servants from the East, " said Arthur. "They know theirplace a little better there. We can get some English that have just comeover. They're the best--thoroughly respectful. "

He did not see the glance his father shot at him from under his heavyeyebrows. But Adelaide did--she was expecting it. "Don't talk like a cad, Artie!" she said. "You know you don't think that way. "

"Oh, of course, I don't admire that spirit--or lack of it, " he replied. "But--what are you going to do? It's the flunkies or the Barbaras andMarys--or doing our own work. "

To Hiram Ranger that seemed unanswerable, and his resentment against hisson for expressing ideas for which he had utter contempt seemedunreasonable. Again reason put him in the wrong, though instinct wasinsisting that he was in the right. 

"It's a pity people aren't contented in 'the station to which God hascalled them, ' as the English prayer book says, " continued Arthur, notcatching sensitive Adelaide's warning frown. 

"If your mother and I had been content, " said Hiram, "you and Delia wouldbe looking for places in the canning factory. " The remark was doublystartling--for the repressed energy of its sarcasm, and because, as arule, Hiram never joined in the discussions in the family circle. 

They were at the table, all except Mrs. Ranger. She had disappeared inthe direction of the kitchen and presently reappeared bearing a souptureen, which she set down before her husband. "I don't dare ask Mary towait on the table, " said she. "If I did, she's just in the humor to upand light out, too; and your mother's got no hankering for hanging over ahot stove in this weather. "

She transferred the pile of soup plates from the sideboard and seatedherself. Her husband poured the soup, and the plates were passed fromhand to hand until all were served. "If the Sandyses could see us now, Del, " said Arthur. 

"Or the Whitneys, " suggested Adelaide, and both laughed as people laughwhen they think the joke, or the best part of it, is a secret betweenthemselves. 

Nothing more was said until the soup was finished and Mrs. Ranger roseand began to remove the dishes. Adelaide, gazing at the table, herthoughts far away, became uneasy, stirred, looked up; she saw that thecause of her uneasiness was the eyes of her father fixed steadily uponher in a look which she could not immediately interpret. When he saw thathe had her attention, he glanced significantly toward her mother, waitingupon them. "If the Sandyses or the Whitneys could see us _now_!" he said. 

She reddened, pushed back her chair, and sprang up. "Oh, I neverthought!" she exclaimed. "Sit down, mother, and let _me_ do that. Youand father have got us into awful bad ways, always indulging us andwaiting on us. "

"You let me alone, " replied her mother. "I'm used to it. I did my ownwork for fifteen years after we were married, and I'd have been doing ityet if your father hadn't just gone out and got a girl and brought herin and set her to work. No; sit down, Del. You don't know anything aboutwork. I didn't bring you up to be a household drudge. "

But Del was on her way to the kitchen, whence she presently reappearedwith a platter and a vegetable dish. Down the front of her skirt was astreak of grease. "There!" exclaimed Mrs. Ranger, coloring high withexasperation, "your dress is spoiled! I don't believe I can take it outof that kind of goods without leaving a spot. Hiram, I do wish youwouldn't meddle with the children! It seems to me you've got enough to doto 'tend your own affairs at the mill. "

This was unanswerable, or so it seemed to her husband. Once more he feltin the wrong, when he knew that, somehow, he was in the right. 

But Adelaide was laughing and going forward gracefully with her duties aswaitress. "It's nothing, " she said; "the stain will come out; and, if itdoesn't, there's no harm done. The dress is an old thing. I've worn ituntil everybody's sick of the sight of it. "

Mrs. Ranger now took her turn at looking disapproval. She exclaimed:"Why, the dress is as good as new; much too good to travel in. You oughtto have worn a linen duster over it on the train. "

At this even Hiram showed keen amusement, and Mrs. Ranger herself joinedin the laugh. "Well, it was a good, sensible fashion, anyhow, " said she. 

Instead of hurrying through dinner to get back to his work with the oneo'clock whistle, Hiram Ranger lingered on, much to the astonishment ofhis family. When the faint sound of the whistles of the distant factorieswas borne to them through the open windows, Mrs. Ranger cried, "You'll belate, father. "

"I'm in no hurry to-day, " said Ranger, rousing from the seemingabstraction in which he passed most of his time with his assembledfamily. After dinner he seated himself on the front porch. Adelaidecame up behind and put her arm round his neck. "You're not feelingwell, daddy?"

"Not extra, " he answered. "But it's nothing to bother about. I thoughtI'd rest a few minutes. " He patted her in shy expression of gratitude forher little attention. It is not strange that Del overvalued the merit ofthese trivial attentions of hers when they were valued thus high by herfather, who longed for proofs of affection and, because of his shynessand silence, got few. 

"Hey, Del! Hurry up! Get into your hat and dust-coat!" was now heard, inArthur's voice, from the drive to the left of the lawns. 

Hiram's glance shifted to the direction of the sound. Arthur was perchedhigh in a dogcart to which were attached two horses, one before theother. Adelaide did not like to leave her father with that expression onhis face, but after a brief hesitation she went into the house. Hiramadvanced slowly across the lawn toward the tandem. When he had inspectedit in detail, at close range, he said: "Where'd you get it, younggentleman?" Again there was stress on the "gentleman. "

"Oh, I've had it at Harvard several months, " he replied carelessly. "Ishipped it on. I sold the horses--got a smashing good price for 'em. Yours ain't used to tandem, but I guess I can manage 'em. "

"That style of hitching's new to these parts, " continued Hiram. 

Arthur felt the queerness of his father's tone. "Two, side by side, ortwo, one in front of the other--where's the difference?"

True, reflected Hiram. He was wrong again--yet again unconvinced. Certainly the handsome son, so smartly gotten up, seated in this smarttrap, did look attractive--but somehow not as he would have had _his_son look. Adelaide came; he helped her to the lower seat. As he watchedthem dash away, as fine-looking a pair of young people as evergladdened a father's eye, this father's heart lifted with pride--butsank again. Everything _seemed_ all right; why, then, did everything_feel_ all wrong?

"I'm not well to-day, " he muttered. He returned to the porch, walkingheavily. In body and in mind he felt listless. There seemed to besomething or some one inside him--a newcomer--aloof from all that he hadregarded as himself--aloof from his family, from his work, from his ownpersonality--an outsider, studying the whole perplexedly and gloomily. 

As he was leaving the gate a truck entered the drive. It was loaded withtrunks--his son's and his daughter's baggage on the way from the station. Hiram paused and counted the boxes--five huge trunks--Adelaide's beyonddoubt; four smaller ones, six of steamer size and thereabouts--profuseand elegant Arthur's profuse and elegant array of canvas and leather. This mass of superfluity seemed to add itself to his burden. He recalledwhat his wife had once said when he hesitated over some new extravaganceof the children's: "What'd we toil and save for, unless to give them abetter time than we had? What's the use of our having money if they can'tenjoy it?" A "better time, " "enjoy"--they sounded all right, but werethey _really_ all right? Was this really a "better time"?--reallyenjoyment? Were his and his wife's life all wrong, except as they hadcontributed to this new life of thoughtless spending and useless activityand vanity and splurge?

Instead of going toward the factories, he turned east and presently outof Jefferson Street into Elm. He paused at a two-story brick housepainted brown, with a small but brilliant and tasteful garden in frontand down either side. To the right of the door was an unobtrusiveblack-and-gold sign bearing the words "Ferdinand Schulze, M. D. " He rang, was admitted by a pretty, plump, Saxon-blond young woman--the doctor'syounger daughter and housekeeper. She looked freshly clean andwholesome--and so useful! Hiram's eyes rested upon her approvingly; andoften afterwards his thoughts returned to her, lingering upon her and hisown daughter in that sort of vague comparisons which we would notentertain were we aware of them. 

Dr. Schulze was the most distinguished--indeed, the onlydistinguished--physician in Saint X. He was a short, stout, grizzled, spectacled man, with a nose like a scarlet button and a mouth like abuttonhole; in speech he was abrupt, and, on the slightest pretext or nopretext at all, sharp; he hid a warm sympathy for human nature, especially for its weaknesses, behind an uncompromising candor which heregarded as the duty of the man of science toward a vain and deluded racethat knew little and learned reluctantly. A man is either better or worsethan the manner he chooses for purposes of conciliating or defying theworld. Dr. Schulze was better, as much better as his mind was superior tohis body. He and his motherless daughters were "not in it" socially. Saint X was not quite certain whether it shunned them or they it. Hisservices were sought only in extremities, partly because he would lie tohis patients neither when he knew what ailed them nor when he did not, and partly because he was a militant infidel. He lost no opportunity toattack religion in all its forms; and his two daughters let noopportunity escape to show that they stood with their father, whomthey adored, and who had brought them up with his heart. It was Dr. Schulze's furious unbelief, investing him with a certain suggestion ofSatan-got intelligence, that attracted Saint X to him in seriousillnesses--somewhat as the Christian princes of mediaeval Europetolerated and believed in the Jew physicians. Saint X was only justreaching the stage at which it could listen to "higher criticism" withoutdread lest the talk should be interrupted by a bolt from "specialProvidence"; the fact that Schulze lived on, believing and talking as hedid, could be explained only as miraculous and mysterious forbearance inwhich Satan must somehow have direct part. 

"I didn't expect to see _you_ for many a year yet, " said Schulze, asHiram, standing, faced him sitting at his desk. 

The master workman grew still more pallid as he heard the thought thatweighted him in secret thus put into words. "I have never had a doctorbefore in my life, " said he. "My prescription has been, when you feelbadly stop eating and work harder. "

"Starve and sweat--none better, " said Schulze. "Well, why do you comehere to-day?"

"This morning I lifted a rather heavy weight. I've felt a kind oftiredness ever since, and a pain in the lower part of my back--prettybad. I can't understand it. "

"But I can--that's my business. Take off your clothes and stretchyourself on this chair. Call me when you're ready. "

Schulze withdrew into what smelled like a laboratory. Hiram could hearhim rattling glass against glass and metal, could smell the fumes ofuncorked bottles of acids. When he called, Schulze reappeared, disposedinstruments and tubes upon a table. "I never ask my patients questions, "he said, as he began to examine Hiram's chest. "I lay 'em out here and goover 'em inch by inch. I find all the weak spots, both those that arecrying out and those worse ones that don't. I never ask a man what's thematter; I tell him. And my patients, and all the fools in this town, think I'm in league with the devil. A doctor who finds out what's thematter with a man Providence is trying to lay in the grave--what can itbe but the devil?"

He had reached his subject; as he worked he talked it--religion, itsfolly, its silliness, its cruelty, its ignorance, its viciousness. Hiramlistened without hearing; he was absorbed in observing the diagnosis. Heknew nothing of medicine, but he did know good workmanship. As thephysician worked, his admiration and confidence grew. He began to feelbetter--not physically better, but that mental relief which a courageousman feels when the peril he is facing is stripped of the mystery thatmade it a terror. After perhaps three quarters of an hour, Schulzewithdrew to the laboratory, saying: "That's all. You may dress. "

Hiram dressed, seated himself. By chance he was opposite a huge imagefrom the Orient, a hideous, twisted thing with a countenance of sardonicsagacity. As he looked he began to see perverse, insidious resemblancesto the physician himself. When Schulze reappeared and busied himselfwriting, he looked from the stone face to the face of flesh withfascinated repulsion--the man and the "familiar" were so ghastly alike. Then he suddenly understood that this was a quaint double jest of theeccentric physician's--his grim fling at his lack of physical charm, hisironic jeer at the superstitions of Saint X. 

"There!" said Schulze, looking up. "That's the best I can do for you. "

"What's the matter with me?"

"You wouldn't know if I told you. "

"Is it serious?"

"In this world everything is serious--and nothing. "

"Will I die?"

Schulze slowly surveyed all Hiram's outward signs of majesty that hadbeen denied his own majestic intellect, noted the tremendous figure, theshoulders, the forehead, the massive brow and nose and chin--an_ensemble_ of unabused power, the handiwork of Nature at her best, acreation worth while, worth preserving intact and immortal. 

"Yes, " he answered, with satiric bitterness; "you will have to die, androt, just like the rest of us. "

"Tell me!" Hiram commanded. "Will I die soon?"

Schulze reflected, rubbing his red-button nose with his stubby fingers. When he spoke, his voice had a sad gentleness. "You can bear hearing it. You have the right to know. " He leaned back, paused, said in a low tone:"Put your house in order, Mr. Ranger. "

Hiram's steadfast gray eyes met bravely the eyes of the man who had justread him his death warrant. A long pause; then Hiram said "Thank you, " inhis quiet, calm way. 

He took the prescriptions, went out into the street. It looked strange tohim; he felt like a stranger in that town where he had spent half acentury--felt like a temporary tenant of that vast, strong body of hiswhich until now had seemed himself. And he--or was it the stranger withinhim?--kept repeating: "Put your house in order. Put your house in order. "

CHAPTER II

OF SOMEBODIES AND NOBODIES

At the second turning Arthur rounded the tandem out of Jefferson Streetinto Willow with a skill that delighted both him and his sister. "But whygo that way?" said she. "Why not through Monroe street? I'm sure thehorses would behave. "

"Better not risk it, " replied Arthur, showing that he, too, had had, buthad rejected, the temptation to parade the crowded part of town. "Even ifthe horses didn't act up, the people might, they're such jays. "

Adelaide's estimate of what she and her brother had acquired in the Eastwas as high as was his, and she had the same unflattering opinion ofthose who lacked it. But it ruffled her to hear him call the home folksjays--just as it would have ruffled him had she been the one to make theslighting remark. "If you invite people's opinion, " said she, "you've noright to sneer at them because they don't say what you wanted. "

"But _I_'m not driving for show if _you_ are, " he retorted, with atestiness that was confession. 

"Don't be silly, " was her answer. "You know you wouldn't take all thistrouble on a desert island. "

"Of course not, " he admitted, "but I don't care for the opinion of anybut those capable of appreciating. "

"And those capable of appreciating are only those who approve, " teasedAdelaide. "Why drive tandem among these 'jays?'"

"To keep my hand in, " replied he; and his adroit escape restored hisgood humor. 

"I wish I were as free from vanity as you are, Arthur, dear, " said she. 

"You're just as fond of making a sensation as I am, " replied he. "And, my eye, Del! but you _do_ know how. " This with an admiring glance ather most becoming hat with its great, gracefully draped _chiffon_ veil, and at her dazzling white dust-coat with its deep blue facings thatmatched her eyes. 

She laughed. "Just wait till you see my new dresses--and hats. "

"Another shock for your poor father. "

"Shock of joy. "

"Yes, " assented Arthur, rather glumly; "he'll take anything off you. But when I--"

"It's no compliment to me, " she cut in, the prompter to admit the truthbecause it would make him feel better. "He thinks I'm 'only a woman, 'fit for nothing but to look pretty as long as I'm a girl, and then todevote myself to a husband and children, without any life or even ideasof my own. "

"Mother always seems cheerful enough, " said Arthur. His content with thechanged conditions which the prosperity and easy-going generosity of theelder generation were making for the younger generation ended at his ownsex. The new woman--idle and frivolous, ignorant of all useful things, fit only for the show side of life and caring only for it, discontentedwith everybody but her own selfish self--Arthur had a reputation amonghis friends for his gloomy view of the American woman and for his couragein expressing it. 

"You are _so_ narrow-minded, Artie!" his sister exclaimed impatiently. "Mother was brought up very differently from the way she and father havebrought me up--"

"Have let you bring yourself up. "

"No matter; I _am_ different. "

"But what would you do? What can a woman do?"

"I don't know, " she admitted. "But I _do_ know I hate a humdrum life. "There was the glint of the Ranger will in her eyes as she added:"Furthermore, I shan't stand for it. "

He looked at her enviously. "You'll be free in another year, " he said. "You and Ross Whitney will marry, and you'll have a big house in Chicagoand can do what you please and go where you please. "

"Not if Ross should turn out to be the sort of man you are. "

He laughed. "I can see Ross--or any man--trying to manage _you_! You'vegot too much of father in you. "

"But I'll be dependent until--" Adelaide paused, then added asatisfactorily vague, "for a long time. Father won't give me anything. How furious he'd be at the very suggestion of dowry. Parents out heredon't appreciate that conditions have changed and that it's necessarynowadays for a woman to be independent of her husband. "

Arthur compressed his lips, to help him refrain from comment. But he feltso strongly on the subject that he couldn't let her remarks passunchallenged. "I don't know about that, Del, " he said. "It depends on thewoman. Personally, I'd hate to be married to a woman I couldn't controlif necessary. "

"You ought to be ashamed of yourself, " cried Del, indignant. "Is _that_your idea of control--to make a woman mercenary and hypocritical? You'dbetter change your way of thinking if you don't want Janet to be veryunhappy, and yourself, too. "

"That sounds well, " he retorted, "but you know better. Take our case, forinstance. Is it altogether love and affection that make us so cautiousabout offending father?"

"Speak for yourself, " said Adelaide. "_I'm_ not cautious. "

"Do try to argue fair, even if you are a woman. You're as cautious inyour way as I am in mine. "

Adelaide felt that he was offended, and justly. "I didn't mean quite whatI said, Artie. You _are_ cautious, in a way, and sometimes. But oftenyou're reckless. I'm frightened every once in a while by it, and I'mhaunted by the dread that there'll be a collision between father and you. You're so much alike, and you understand each other less and less, allthe time. "

After a silence Arthur said, thoughtfully: "I think I understand him. There are two distinct persons inside of me. There's the one that wasmade by inheritance and by my surroundings as a boy--the one that's likehim, the one that enables me to understand him. Then, there's this otherthat's been made since--in the East, and going round among people thateither never knew the sort of life we had as children or have grown awayfrom it. The problem is how to reconcile those two persons so thatthey'll stop wrangling and shaming each other. That's _my_ problem, Imean. Father's problem--He doesn't know he has one. I must do as hewishes or I'll not be at all, so far as he is concerned. "

Another and longer silence; then Adelaide, after an uneasy, affectionatelook at his serious profile, said: "I'm often ashamed of myself, Artie--about father; I don't _think_ I'm a hypocrite, for I do love himdearly. Who could help it, when he is so indulgent and when even in hisanger he's kind? But you--Oh, Artie, even though you are less, much less, uncandid with him than I am, still isn't it more--more--less manly inyou? After all, I'm a woman and helpless; and, if I seriously offend him, what would become of me? But you're a man. The world was made for men;they can make their own way. And it seems unworthy of you to be afraid tobe yourself before _any_body. And I'm sure it's demoralizing. "

She spoke so sincerely that he could not have resented it, even had herwords raised a far feebler echo within him. "I don't honestly believe, Del, that my caution with father is from fear of his shutting down on me, any more than yours is, " he replied. "I know he cares for me. And often Idon't let him see me as I am simply because it'd hurt him if he knew howdifferently I think and feel about a lot of things. "

"But are you right?--or is he?"

Arthur did not answer immediately. He had forgotten his horses; they werejogging along, heads down and "form" gone. "What do _you_ think?" hefinally asked. 

"I--I can't quite make up my mind. "

"Do you think I ought to drudge and slave, as he has? Do you think Iought to spend my life in making money, in dealing in flour? Isn't theresomething better than that?"

"I don't think it's what a man deals in; I think it's _how_ he deals. And I don't believe there's any sort of man finer and better thanfather, Arthur. "

"That's true, " he assented warmly. "I used to envy the boys atcollege--some of them--because their fathers and mothers had so muchculture and knowledge of the world. But when I came to know theirparents better--and them, too--I saw how really ignorant andvulgar--yes, vulgar--they were, under their veneer of talk and mannerwhich they thought was everything. 'They may be fit to stand beforekings' I said to myself, 'but my father _is_ a king--and of a sort theyain't fit to stand before. '"

The color was high in Del's cheeks and her eyes were brilliant. "You'llcome out all right, Artie, " said she. "I don't know just how, but you'll_do_ something, and do it well. "

"I'd much rather do nothing--well, " said he lightly, as if not surewhether he was in earnest or not. "It's so much nicer to dream than todo. " He looked at her with good-humored satire. "And you--what's thematter with your practising some of the things you preach? Why don't youmarry--say, Dory Hargrave, instead of Ross?"

She made a failure of a stout attempt to meet his eyes and to smileeasily. "Because I don't love Dory Hargrave, " she said. 

"But you wouldn't let yourself if you could--would you, now?"

"It's a poor love that lags for let, " she replied. "Besides, why talkabout me? I'm 'only a woman. ' I haven't any career, or any chance tomake one. "

"But you might help some man, " he teased. 

"Then you'd like me to marry Dory--if I could?"

"I'm just showing you how vain your theorizing is, " was his notaltogether frank reply. "You urge me to despise money when youyourself--"

"That isn't fair, Arthur. If I didn't care for Ross I shouldn't think ofmarrying him, and you know it. "

"He's so like father!" mocked Arthur. 

"No, but he's so like _you_, " she retorted. "You know he was your idealfor years. It was your praising him that--that first made me glad to doas father and mother wished. You know father approves of him. "

Arthur grinned, and Del colored. "A lot father knows about Ross as hereally is, " said he. "Oh, he's clever about what he lets father see. However, you do admit there's some other ideal of man than successfulworkingman. "

"Of course!" said Adelaide. "I'm not so silly and narrow as you try tomake out. Only, I prefer a combination of the two. And I think Ross isthat, and I hope and believe he'll be more so--afterwards. "

Adelaide's tone was so judicial that Arthur thought it discreet not todiscuss his friend and future brother-in-law further. "He isn't goodenough for Del, " he said to himself. "But, then, who is? And he'llhelp her to the sort of setting she's best fitted for. What sidethey'll put on, once they get going! She'll set a new pace--and it'llbe a grand one. "

At the top of the last curve in the steep road up from Deer Creek thehorses halted of themselves to rest; Arthur and his sister gazed out uponthe vast, dreamy vision--miles on miles of winding river shimmeringthrough its veil of silver mist, stately hills draped in gauziest blue. It was such uplifting vistas that inspired the human imagination, in thedays of its youth, to breathe a soul into the universe and make it aliving thing, palpitant with love and hope; it was an outlook that wouldhave moved the narrowest, the smallest, to think in the wide and thelarge. Wherever the hills were not based close to the water's edge orrose less abruptly, there were cultivated fields; and in each field, faror near, men were at work. These broad-hatted, blue-shirted toilers inthe ardent sun determined the turn of Adelaide's thoughts. 

"It doesn't seem right, does it, " said she, "that so many--almosteverybody--should have to work so hard just to get enough to eat and towear and a place to sleep, when there's so much of everything in theworld--and when a few like us don't have to work at all and have muchmore than they need, simply because one happened to be born in such orsuch conditions. I suppose it's got to be so, but it certainly looksunjust--and silly. "

"I'm not sure the workers haven't the best of it, " replied Arthur. "Theyhave the dinner; we have only the dessert; and I guess one gets tired ofonly desserts, no matter how great the variety. "

"It's a stupid world in lots of ways, isn't it?"

"Not so stupid as it used to be, when everybody said and thought it wasas good as possible, " replied he. "You see, it's the people in the worldthat make it stupid. For instance, do you suppose you and I, or anybody, would care for idling about and doing all sorts of things our betterjudgment tells us are inane, if it weren't that most of our fellow-beingsare stupid enough to admire and envy that sort of thing, and that we arestupid enough to want to be admired and envied by stupid people?"

"Did you notice the Sandys's English butler?" asked Adelaide. 

"_Did_ I? I'll bet he keeps every one in the Sandys family up tothe mark. "

"That's it, " continued Adelaide. "He's a poor creature, dumb andignorant. He knows only one thing--snobbishness. Yet every one of us wasin terror of his opinion. No doubt kings feel the same way about thepeople around them. Always what's expected of us--and by whom? Why, bypeople who have little sense and less knowledge. They run the world, don't they?"

"As Dory Hargrave says, " said her brother, "the only scheme for makingthings better that's worth talking about is raising the standards of themasses because their standards are ours. We'll be fools and unjust aslong as they'll let us. And they'll let us as long as they're ignorant. "

By inheritance Arthur and Adelaide had excellent minds, shrewd and withthat cast of humor which makes for justice of judgment by mocking at thesolemn frauds of interest and prejudice. But, as is often the case withthe children of the rich and the well-to-do, there had been no necessityfor either to use intellect; their parents and hirelings of variousdegrees, paid with their father's generously given money, had done theirthinking for them. The whole of animate creation is as lazy as it daresbe, and man is no exception. Thus, the Ranger children, like all othernormal children of luxury, rarely made what would have been, for theirfallow minds, the arduous exertion of real thinking. When their mindswere not on pastimes or personalities they were either rattling round intheir heads or exchanging the ideas, real and reputed, that happened tobe drifting about, at the moment, in their "set. " Those ideas they andtheir friends received, and stored up or passed on with never a thoughtas to whether they were true or false, much as they used coins or notesthey took in and paid out. Arthur and Adelaide soon wearied of theirgroping about in the mystery of human society--how little direct interestit had for them then! They drove on; the vision which had stimulated themto think vanished; they took up again those personalities about friends, acquaintances and social life that are to thinking somewhat as massage isto exercise--all the motions of real activity, but none of its spirit. They stopped for two calls and tea on the fashionable Bluffs. 

When they reached home, content with tandem, drive, themselves, theirfriends, and life in general, they found Hiram Ranger returned from work, though it was only half-past five, and stretched on the sofa in thesitting room, with his eyes shut. At this unprecedented spectacle ofinactivity they looked at each other in vague alarm; they were stealingaway, when he called: "I'm not asleep. "

His expression made Adelaide impulsively kneel beside him and gazeanxiously into his face. He smiled, roused himself to a sitting posture, well concealing the effort the exertion cost him. 

"Your father's getting old, " he said, hiding his tragedy of aching bodyand aching heart and impending doom in a hypocrisy of cheerfulness thatwould have passed muster even had he not been above suspicion. "I'm notup to the mark of the last generation. Your grandfather was fifty when Iwas born, and he didn't die till I was fifty. "

His face shadowed; Adelaide, glancing round for the cause, saw Simeon, half-sitting, half-standing in the doorway, humble apology on hisweazened, whiskered face. He looked so like her memory-picture of hergrandfather that she burst out laughing. "Don't be hard on the poor oldgentleman, father, " she cried. "How can you resist that appeal? Tell himto come in and make himself at home. "

As her father did not answer, she glanced at him. He had not heard her;he was staring straight ahead with an expression of fathomlessmelancholy. The smile faded from her face, from her heart, as the lightfades before the oncoming shadow of night. Presently he wasabsent-mindedly but tenderly stroking her hair, as if he were thinking ofher so intensely that he had become unconscious of her physical presence. The apparition of Simeon had set him to gathering in gloomy assembly avast number of circumstances about his two children; each circumstancewas so trivial in itself that by itself it seemed foolishlyinconsequential; yet, in the mass, they bore upon his heart, upon hisconscience, so heavily that his very shoulders stooped with the weight. "Put your house in order, " the newcomer within him was solemnly warning;and Hiram was puzzling over his meaning, was dreading what that meaningmight presently reveal itself to be. "Put my house in order?" mutteredHiram, an inquiring echo of that voice within. 

"What did you say, father?" asked Adelaide, timidly laying her hand onhis arm. Though she knew he was simple, she felt the vastness in him thatwas awe-inspiring--just as a mountain or an ocean, a mere aggregation ofsimple matter, is in the total majestic and incomprehensible. Beside him, the complex little individualities among her acquaintances seemed likethe acrostics of a children's puzzle column. 

"Leave me with your brother awhile, " he said. 

She glanced quickly, furtively at Arthur and admired hisself-possession--for she knew his heart must be heavier than her own. Sherose from her knees, laid her hand lingeringly, appealingly upon herfather's broad shoulder, then slowly left the room. Simeon, forgotten, looked up at her and scratched his head; he turned in behind her, caughtthe edge of her skirt and bore it like a queen's page. 

The son watched the father, whose powerful features were set in anexpression that seemed stern only because his eyes were hid, gazingsteadily at the floor. It was the father who broke the silence. "What doyou calculate to do--now?"

"Tutor this summer and have another go at those exams in September. I'llhave no trouble in rejoining my class. I sailed just a little too closeto the wind--that's all. "

"What does that mean?" inquired the father. College was a mystery tohim, a deeply respected mystery. He had been the youngest of four sons. Their mother's dream was the dream of all the mothers of those pioneerand frontier days--to send her sons to college. Each son in turn had, with her assistance, tried to get together the sum--so small, yet sohugely large--necessary to make the start. But fate, now as sickness, now as crop failure, now as flood, and again as war, had been toostrong for them. Hiram had come nearest, and his defeat had broken hismother's heart and almost broken his own. It was therefore with a senseof prying into hallowed mysteries that he began to investigate hisson's college career. 

"Well, you know, " Arthur proceeded to explain; "there are fivegrades--A, B, C, D, and E. I aimed for C, but several things cameup--interfered--and I--just missed D. "

"Is C the highest?"

Arthur smiled faintly. "Well--not in one sense. It's what's called thegentleman's grade. All the fellows that are the right sort are init--or in D. "

"And what did _you_ get?"

"I got E. That means I have to try again. "

Hiram began to understand. So _this_ was the hallowed mystery of highereducation. He was sitting motionless, his elbows on his knees, his bigchest and shoulders inclined forward, his gaze fixed upon a wreath of redroses in the pattern of the moquette carpet--that carpet upon whichAdelaide, backed by Arthur, had waged vain war as the worst of the many, to cultured nerves, trying exhibitions of "primitive taste" in Ellen'sbest rooms. When Hiram spoke his lips barely opened and his voice had noexpression. His next question was: "What does A mean?"

"The A men are those that keep their noses in their books. They're anarrow set--have no ideas--think the book side is the only side of acollege education. "

"Then you don't go to college to learn what's in the books?"

"Oh, of course, the books are part of it. But the real thing isassociation--the friendships one makes, the knowledge of human nature andof--of life. "

"What does that mean?"

Arthur had been answering Hiram's questions in a flurry, though he hadbeen glib enough. He had had no fear that his father would appreciatethat he was getting half-truths, or, rather, truths prepared skillfullyfor paternal consumption; his flurry had come from a sense that he washimself not doing quite the manly, the courageous thing. Now, however, something in the tone of the last question, or, perhaps, some elementthat was lacking, roused in him a suspicion of depth in his simpleunworldly father; and swift upon this awakening came a realization thathe was floundering in that depth--and in grave danger of submersion. Heshifted nervously when his father, without looking up and without puttingany expression into his voice, repeated: "What do you mean byassociations--and life--and--all that?"

"I can't explain exactly, " replied Arthur. "It would take a long time. "

"I haven't asked you to be brief. "

"I can't put it into words. "

"Why not?"

"You would misunderstand. "

"Why?"

Arthur made no reply. 

"Then you can't tell me what you go to college for?"

Again the young man looked perplexedly at his father. There was no angerin that tone--no emotion of any kind. But what was the meaning of the_look_, the look of a sorrow that was tragic?

"I know you think I've disgraced you, father, and myself, " said Arthur. "But it isn't so--really, it isn't. No one, not even the faculty, thinksthe less of me. This sort of thing often occurs in our set. "

"Your 'set'?"

"Among the fellows I travel with. They're the nicest men in Harvard. They're in all the best clubs--and lead in supporting the athleticsand--and--their fathers are among the richest, the most distinguished menin the country. There are only about twenty or thirty of us, and we makethe pace for the whole show--the whole university, I mean. Everybodyadmires and envies us--wants to be in our set. Even the grinds look up tous, and imitate us as far as they can. We give the tone to theuniversity!"

"What is 'the tone'?"

Again Arthur shifted uneasily. "It's hard to explain that sort ofthing. It's a sort of--of manner. It's knowing how to do the--the rightsort of thing. "

"What is the right sort of thing?"

"I can't put it into words. It's what makes you look at one man and say, 'He's a gentleman'; and look at another and see that he isn't. "

"What is a 'gentleman'--at Harvard?"

"Just what it is anywhere. "

"What is it anywhere?"

Again Arthur was silent. 

"Then there are only twenty or thirty gentlemen at Harvard? And thecatalogue says there are three thousand or more students. "

"Oh--of course, " began Arthur. But he stopped short. 

How could he make his father, ignorant of "the world" and dominated byprimitive ideas, understand the Harvard ideal? So subtle and evanescent, so much a matter of the most delicate shadings was this ideal that hehimself often found the distinction quite hazy between it and that whichlooked disquietingly like "tommy rot. "

"And these gentlemen--these here friends of yours--your 'set, ' as youcall 'em--what are they aiming for?"

Arthur did not answer. It would be hopeless to try to make Hiram Rangerunderstand, still less tolerate, an ideal of life that was elegantleisure, the patronage of literature and art, music, the drama, the turf, and the pursuit of culture and polite extravagance, wholly aloof from thefrenzied and vulgar jostling of the market place. 

With a mighty heave of the shoulders which, if it had found outwardrelief, would have been a sigh, Hiram Ranger advanced to the hard part ofthe first task which the mandate, "Put your house in order, " had set forhim. He took from the inside pocket of his coat a small bundle of papers, the records of Arthur's college expenses. The idea of accounts with hischildren had been abhorrent to him. The absolute necessity of businessmethod had forced him to make some records, and these he had expected todestroy without anyone but himself knowing of their existence. But in thenew circumstances he felt he must not let his own false shame push theyoung man still farther from the right course. Arthur watched him openeach paper in the bundle slowly, spread it out and, to put off thehateful moment for speech, pretend to peruse it deliberately beforelaying it on his knee; and, dim though the boy's conception of his fatherwas, he did not misjudge the feelings behind that painful reluctance. Hiram held the last paper in a hand that trembled. He coughed, madeseveral attempts to speak, finally began: "Your first year at Harvard, you spent seventeen hundred dollars. Your second year, you spentfifty-three hundred. Last year--Are all your bills in?"

"There are a few--" murmured Arthur. 

"How much?"

He flushed hotly. 

"Don't you know?" With this question his father lifted his eyes withoutlifting his shaggy eyebrows. 

"About four or five thousand--in all--including the tailors and othertradespeople. "

A pink spot appeared in the left cheek of the old man--very brightagainst the gray-white of his skin. Somehow, he did not like that word"tradespeople, " though it seemed harmless enough. "This last year, thetotal was, " said he, still monotonously, "ninety-eight hundred odd--ifthe bills I haven't got yet ain't more than five thousand. "

"A dozen men spend several times that much, " protested Arthur. 

"What for?" inquired Hiram. 

"Not for dissipation, father, " replied the young man, eagerly. "Dissipation is considered bad form in our set. "

"What do you mean by dissipation?"

"Drinking--and--all that sort of thing, " Arthur replied. "It's consideredungentlemanly, nowadays--drinking to excess, I mean. "

"What do you spend the money for?"

"For good quarters and pictures, and patronizing the sports, andclub dues, and entertainments, and things to drive in--for living asa man should. "

"You've spent a thousand, three hundred dollars for tutoring since you'vebeen there. "

"Everybody has to do tutoring--more or less. "

"What did you do with the money you made?"

"What money, father?"

"The money you made tutoring. You said everybody had to do tutoring. Isuppose you did your share. "

Arthur did not smile at this "ignorance of the world"; he grew red, andstammered: "Oh, I meant everybody in our set employs tutors. "

"Then who does the tutoring? Who're the nobodies that tutor theeverybodies?"

Arthur grew cold, then hot. He was cornered, therefore roused. He stood, leaned against the table, faced his father defiantly. "I see what you'redriving at, father, " he said. "You feel I've wasted time and money atcollege, because I haven't lived like a dog and grubbed in books day inand day out, and filled my head with musty stuff; because I've tried toget what I believe to be the broadest knowledge and experience; becauseI've associated with the best men, the fellows that come from the goodfamilies. You accept the bluff the faculty puts up of pretending the Afellows are really the A fellows, when, in fact, everybody there and allthe graduates and everyone everywhere who knows the world knows that thefellows in our set are the ones the university is proud of--the fellowswith manners and appearance and--"

"The gentlemen, " interjected the father, who had not changed either hisposition or his expression. 

"Yes--the gentlemen!" exclaimed Arthur. "There are other ideals of lifebesides buying and selling. "

"And working?" suggested Hiram. 

"Yes--and what you call working, " retorted Arthur, angry through andthrough. "You sent me East to college to get the education of a man in myposition. "

"What is your position?" inquired Hiram--simply an inquiry. 

"Your son, " replied the young man; "trying to make the best use of theopportunities you've worked so hard to get for me. I'm not you, father. You'd despise me if I didn't have a character, an individuality, of myown. Yet, because I can't see life as you see it, you are angry with me. "

For answer Hiram only heaved his great shoulders in another suppressedsigh. He _knew_ profoundly that he was right, yet his son'splausibilities--they could only be plausibilities--put him clearly in thewrong. "We'll see, " he said; "we'll see. You're wrong in thinking I'mangry, boy. " He was looking at his son now, and his eyes made his son'spassion vanish. He got up and went to the young man and laid his hand onhis shoulder in a gesture of affection that moved the son the moreprofoundly because it was unprecedented. "If there's been any wrongdone, " said the old man--and he looked very, very old now--"I've done it. I'm to blame--not you. "

A moment after Hiram left the room, Adelaide hurried in. A glance at herbrother reassured her. They stood at the window watching their father ashe walked up and down the garden, his hands behind his back, hisshoulders stooped, his powerful head bent. 

"Was he very angry?" asked Del. 

"He wasn't angry at all, " her brother replied. "I'd much rather he hadbeen. " Then, after a pause, he added: "I thought the trouble between uswas that, while I understood him, he didn't understand me. Now I knowthat he has understood me but that I don't understand him"--and, after apause--"or myself. "

CHAPTER III

MRS. WHITNEY INTERVENES

As Hiram had always been silent and seemingly abstracted, no one butEllen noted the radical change in him. She had brought up her children inthe old-fashioned way--her thoughts, and usually her eyes, upon them allday, and one ear open all night. When she no longer had them to guard, she turned all this energy of solicitude to her husband; thus thepassionate love of her youth was having a healthy, beautiful old age. Theyears of circumventing the easily roused restiveness of her spirited boyand girl had taught her craft; without seeming to be watching Hiram, nodetail of his appearance or actions escaped her. 

"There's mighty little your pa don't see, " had been one of her stockobservations to the children from their earliest days. "And you needn'tflatter yourselves he don't care because he don't speak. " Now she notedthat from under his heavy brows his eyes were looking stealthily out, more minutely observant than ever before, and that what he saw eitheradded to his sadness or took a color of sadness from his mood. Sheguessed that the actions of Adelaide and Arthur, so utterly differentfrom the actions of the children of her and Hiram's young days--exceptthose regarded by all worth-while people as "trifling and trashy"--hadsomething to do with Hiram's gloom. She decided that Arthur's failure andhis lightness of manner in face of it were the chief trouble--this untilHiram's shoulders began to stoop and hollows to appear in his cheeks andunder his ears, and a waxlike pallor to overspread his face. Then sheknew that he was not well physically; and, being a practical woman, shedismissed the mental causes of the change. "People talk a lot about theirmental troubles, " she said to herself, "but it's usually three-fourthsstomach and liver. "

As Hiram and illness, real illness, could not be associated in her mind, she gave the matter no importance until she heard him sigh heavily onenight, after they had been in bed several hours. "What is it, father?"she asked. 

There was no answer, but a return to an imitation of the regularbreathing of a sleeper. 

"Hiram, " she insisted, "what is it?"

"Nothing, Ellen, nothing, " he answered; "I must have ate something thatdon't sit quite right. "

"You didn't take no supper at all, " said she. 

This reminded him how useless it was to try to deceive her. "I ain't beenfeeling well of late, " he confessed, "but it'll soon be over. " He did notsee the double meaning of his words until he had uttered them; he stirreduneasily in his dread that she would suspect. "I went to the doctor. "

"What did he say?--though I don't know why I should ask what such a foolas Milbury said about anything. "

"I got some medicine, " replied he, evading telling her what doctor. 

Instantly she sat up in bed. "I haven't seen you take no drugs!" sheexclaimed. Drugs were her especial abhorrence. She let no one in thefamily take any until she had passed upon them. 

"I didn't want to make a fuss, " he explained. 

"Where is it?" she demanded, on the edge of the bed now, ready to rise. 

"I'll show it to you in the morning, mother. Lie down and go to sleep. I've been awake long enough. "

"Where is it?" she repeated, and he heard her moving across the roomtoward the gas fixture. 

"In my vest pocket. It's a box of pills. You can't tell nothin'about it. "

She lit the gas and went to his waistcoat, hanging where it always hungat night--on a hook beside the closet door. He watched her fumblethrough the pockets, watched her take her spectacles from the corner ofthe mantel and put them on, the bridge well down toward the end of hernose. A not at all romantic figure she made, standing beside thesputtering gas jet, her spectacles balanced on her nose, her thin neckand forearms exposed, and her old face studying the lid of the pill boxheld in her toil- and age-worn hands. The box dropped from her fingersand rolled along the floor. He saw an awful look slowly creep over herfeatures as the terrible thought crept over her mind. As she began toturn her face toward him, with a motion of the head like that of amachine on unoiled bearings, he closed his eyes; but he felt herlooking at him. 

"Dr. Schulze!" she said, an almost soundless breathing of the name thatalways meant the last resort in mortal illness. 

He was trying to think of lies to tell her, but he could think ofnothing. The sense of light upon his eyelids ceased. He presently felther slowly getting into bed. A pall-like silence; then upon his cheek, inlong discontinued caress, a hand whose touch was as light and soft as thefall of a rose leaf--the hand of love that toil and age cannot makeharsh, and her fingers were wet with her tears. Thus they lay in thedarkness and silence, facing together the tragedy of the eternalseparation. 

"What did he say, dearest?" she asked. She had not used that word to himsince the first baby came and they began to call each other "father" and"mother. " All these years the children had been between them, and eachhad held the other important chiefly as related to them. Now it was asin their youth--just he and she, so close that only death could comebetween them. 

"It's a long way off, " said Hiram. He would not set ringing in her earsthat knell which was clanging to him its solemn, incessant, menacing "Putyour house in order!"

"Tell me what he said, " she urged gently. 

"He couldn't make out exactly. The medicine'll patch me up. "

She did not insist--why fret him to confess what she knew the instantshe read "Schulze" on the box? After an hour she heard him breathing asonly a sleeper can breathe; but she watched on until morning. When theywere dressing, each looked at the other furtively from time to time, agreat tenderness in his eyes, and in hers the anguish of a dread thatmight not be spoken. 

On the day after Mrs. Whitney's arrival for the summer, she descended instate from the hills to call upon the Rangers. 

When the front bell rang Mrs. Ranger was in the kitchen--and was dressedfor the kitchen. As the "girl" still had not been replaced she answeredthe door herself. In a gingham wrapper, with her glasses thrust up intoher gray hair, she was facing a footman in livery. 

"Are Mrs. Ranger and Miss Ranger at home?" asked he, mistaking her fora servant and eying her dishevelment with an expression which was notlost on her. 

She smiled with heartiest good nature. "Yes, I'm here--I'm Mrs. Ranger, " said she; and she looked beyond him to the victoria in whichsat Mrs. Whitney. "How d'ye do, Matilda?" she called. "Come right in. As usual when the canneries are running, I'm my own upstairs girl. Ireckon your young man here thinks I ought to discharge her and get onethat's tidier. "

"Your young man here" was stiffly touching the brim of his top hat andsaying: "Beg parding, ma'am. "

"Oh, that's all right, " replied Mrs. Ranger; "I am what I look to be!"

Behind her now appeared Adelaide, her cheeks burning in mortification shewas ashamed of feeling and still more ashamed of being unable to conceal. "Go and put on something else, mother, " she urged in an undertone; "I'lllook after Mrs. Whitney till you come down. "

"Ain't got time, " replied her mother, conscious of what was in herdaughter's mind and a little contemptuous and a little resentful of it. "I guess Tilly Whitney will understand. If she don't, why, I guess we canbear up under it. "

Mrs. Whitney had left her carriage and was advancing up the steps. Shewas a year older than Ellen Ranger; but so skillfully was she gottogether that, had she confessed to forty or even thirty-eight, one whodidn't know would have accepted her statement as too cautious by hardlymore than a year or so. The indisputably artificial detail in herelegant appearance was her hair; its tinting, which had to be madestronger year by year as the gray grew more resolute, was reaching thestage of hard, rough-looking red. "Another year or two, " thoughtAdelaide, "and it'll make her face older than she really is. Even nowshe's getting a tough look. "

Matilda kissed Mrs. Ranger and Adelaide affectedly on both cheeks. "I'mso glad to find you in!" said she. "And you, poor dear"--this to Mrs. Ranger--"are in agony over the servant question. " She glanced behind herto make sure the carriage had driven away. "I don't know what we'recoming to. I can't keep a man longer than six months. Servants don'tappreciate a good home and good wages. As soon as a man makesacquaintances here he becomes independent and leaves. If something isn'tdone, the better class of people will have to move out of the country. "

"Or go back to doing their own work, " said Mrs. Ranger. 

Mrs. Whitney smiled vaguely--a smile which said, "I'm too polite toanswer that remark as it deserves. "

"Why didn't you bring Jenny along?" inquired Mrs. Ranger, when they werein the "front parlor, " the two older women seated, Adelaide movingrestlessly about. 

"Janet and Ross haven't come yet, " answered Mrs. Whitney. "They'll be onnext week, but only for a little while. They both like it better in theEast. All their friends are there and there's so much more to do. " Mrs. Whitney sighed; before her rose the fascination of all there was to "do"in the East--the pleasures she was denying herself. 

"I don't see why you don't live in New York, " said Mrs. Ranger. "You'realways talking about it. "

"Oh, I can't leave Charles!" was Mrs. Whitney's answer. "Or, ratherhe'd not hear of my doing it. But I think he'll let us take anapartment at Sherry's next winter--for the season, just--unless Janetand I go abroad. "

Mrs. Ranger had not been listening. She now started up. "If you'll excuseme, Mattie, I must see what that cook's about. I'm afraid to let her outof my sight for five minutes for fear she'll up and leave. "

"What a time your poor mother has!" said Mrs. Whitney, when she andAdelaide were alone. 

Del had recovered from her attack of what she had been denouncing toherself as snobbishness. For all the gingham wrapper and spectaclesanchored in the hair and general air of hard work and no "culture, " shewas thinking, as she looked at Mrs. Whitney's artificiality and listenedto those affected accents, that she was glad her mother was Ellen Rangerand not Matilda Whitney. "But mother doesn't believe she has a hardtime, " she answered, "and everything depends on what one believesoneself; don't you think so? I often envy her. She's always busy andinterested. And she's so useful, such a happiness-maker. "

"I often feel that way, too, " responded Mrs. Whitney, in her mostprofusely ornate "_grande dame_" manner. "I get _so_ bored with leadingan artificial life. I often wish fate had been more kind to me. I wasreading, the other day, that the Queen of England said she had the tastesof a dairy maid. Wasn't that charming? Many of us whom fate has condemnedto the routine of high station feel the same way. "

It was by such deliverances that Mrs. Whitney posed, not without success, as an intellectual woman who despised the frivolities of a fashionableexistence--this in face of the obvious fact that she led a fashionableexistence, or, rather, it led her, from the moment her _masseuse_awakened her in the morning until her maid undressed her at night. But, although Adelaide was far too young, too inexperienced to know thatjudgment must always be formed from actions, never from words, she wasnot, in this instance, deceived. "It takes more courage than most of ushave, " said she, "to do what we'd like instead of what vanity suggests. "

Mrs. Whitney did not understand this beyond getting from it a vague sensethat she had somehow been thrust at. "You must be careful of that skin ofyours, Adele, " she thrust back. "I've been looking at it. You can't havebeen home long, yet the exposure to the sun is beginning to show. Youhave one of those difficult, thin skins, and one's skin is more than halfone's beauty. You ought never to go out without a veil. The last thingRoss said to me was, 'Do tell Adelaide to keep her color down. ' You knowhe admires the patrician style. "

Adelaide could not conceal the effect of the shot. Her skin was a greattrial to her, it burned so easily; and she hated wrapping herself inunder broad brims and thick veils when the feeling of bareheadedness wasso delightful. "At any rate, " said she sweetly, "it's easier to keepcolor down than to keep it up. "

Mrs. Whitney pretended not to hear. She was now at the window which gaveon the garden by way of a small balcony. "There's your father!" sheexclaimed; "let's go to him. "

There, indeed, was Hiram, pacing the walk along the end of the gardenwith a ponderousness in the movements of his big form that bespoke ageand effort. It irritated Mrs. Whitney to look at him, as it had irritatedher to look at Ellen; very painful were the reminders of the ravages oftime from these people of about her own age, these whom she as a childhad known as children. Crow's-feet and breaking contour and thin hair inthose we have known only as grown people, do not affect us; but the samesigns in lifelong acquaintances make it impossible to ignore Decayholding up the mirror to us and pointing to aging mouth and throat, as hewags his hideous head and says, "Soon--_you_, too!"

Hiram saw Matilda and his daughter the instant they appeared on thebalcony, but he gave no hint of it until they were in the path of hismonotonous march. He was nerving himself for Mrs. Whitney as one nerveshimself in a dentist's chair for the descent of the grinder upon asensitive tooth. Usually she got no further than her first sentencebefore irritating him. To-day the very sight of her filled him withseemingly causeless anger. There was a time when he, watching Matildaimprove away from her beginnings as the ignorant and awkward daughter ofthe keeper of a small hotel, had approved of her and had wished thatEllen would give more time to the matter of looks. But latterly he hadcome to the conclusion that a woman has to choose between improving herexterior and improving her interior, and that it is impossible or all butimpossible for her to do both; he therefore found in Ellen's veryindifference to exteriors another reason why she seemed to him sosplendidly the opposite of Charles's wife. 

"You certainly look the same as ever, Hiram, " Matilda said, advancingwith extended, beautifully gloved hand. The expression of his eyes as heturned them upon her gave her a shock, but she forced the smile back intoher face and went on, "Ross says you always make him think of a tower ontop of a high hill, one that has always stood there and always will. "

The gray shadow over Hiram's face grew grayer. "But you ought to rest, "Mrs. Whitney went on. "You and Charles both ought to rest. It'sridiculous, the way American men act. Now, Charles has never taken a realvacation. When he does go away he has a secretary with him and works allday. But at least he gets change of scene, while you--you rarely miss aday at the mills. "

"I haven't missed a whole day in forty-three years, " replied Hiram, "except the day I got married, and I never expect to. I'll drop in theharness. I'd be lost without it. "

"Don't you think that's a narrow view of life?" asked Mrs. Whitney. "Don't you think we ought all to take time to cultivate our highernatures?"

"What do you mean by higher natures?"

Mrs. Whitney scented sarcasm and insult. To interrogate a glitteringgenerality is to slur its projector; she wished her hearers to bedazzled, not moved to the impertinence of cross-examination. "I think youunderstand me, " she said loftily. 

"I don't, " replied Hiram. "I'm only a cooper and miller. I haven't hadthe advantages of a higher education"--this last with a steady looktoward his son, approaching from the direction of the stables. The youngman was in a riding suit that was too correct at every point for goodtaste, except in a college youth, and would have made upon anyone whohad been born, or initiated into, the real mysteries of "good form" animpression similar to that of Mrs. Whitney's costume and accent andmanner. There was the note of the fashion plate, the evidence of pains, of correctness not instinctive but studied--the marks our new-sprungobstreperous aristocracy has made familiar to us all. It would havestruck upon a sense of humor like a trivial twitter from the oboetrickling through a lull in the swell of brasses and strings; but HiramRanger had no sense of humor in that direction, had only his instinctfor the right and the wrong. The falseness, the absence of the qualitycalled "the real thing, " made him bitter and sad. And, when his sonjoined them and walked up and down with them, he listened with heavierdroop of face and form to the affected chatter of the young "man of theworld" and the old "_grande dame_" of Chicago society. They talked thelanguage and the affairs of a world he had never explored and had nowish to explore; its code and conduct, his training, his reason and hisinstinct all joined in condemning as dishonorable shirking of a man'sand woman's part in a universe so ordered that, to keep alive in it, everyone must either work or steal. 

But his boy was delighted with the conversation, with Mrs. Whitney, and, finally, with himself. A long, hard ride had scattered his depression ofmany weeks into a mere haze over the natural sunshine of youth andhealth; this haze now vanished. When Mrs. Whitney referred to Harvard, hesaid lightly, "You know I was plucked. "

"Ross told me, " said she, in an amused tone; "but you'll get back allright next fall. "

"I don't know that I care to go, " said Arthur. "I've been thinking itover. I believe I've got about all the good a university can do a man. Itseems to me a year or so abroad--traveling about, seeing the world--wouldbe the best thing for me. I'm going to talk it over with father--as soonas he gets through being out of humor with me. "

Hiram did not look at his son, who glanced a little uneasily at him ashe unfolded this new scheme for perfecting his education as "man ofthe world. "

"Surely your father's not _angry_" cried Mrs. Whitney, in a tone intendedto make Hiram ashamed of taking so narrow, so rural, a view of his son'sfashionable mischance. 

"No, " replied Hiram, and his voice sounded curt. He added, in anundertone: "I wish I were. "

"You're wrong there, Hiram, " said Mrs. Whitney, catching the words notintended for her, and misunderstanding them. "It's not a case forseverity. "

Arthur smiled, and the look he gave his father was a bright indication ofthe soundness of his heart. Severity! The idea was absurd in connectionwith the most generous and indulgent of fathers. "You don't get hismeaning, Mrs. Whitney, " said he. "I, too, wish he were angry. I'm afraidI've made him sad. You know he's got old-fashioned views of many things, and he can't believe I've not really disgraced him and myself. "

"Do _you_ believe it?" inquired Hiram, with a look at him as sudden andsharp as the ray of a search light. 

"I _know_ it, father, " replied Arthur earnestly. "Am I not right, Mrs. Whitney?"

"Don't be such an old fogy, Hiram, " said Mrs. Whitney. "You ought to bethankful you've got a son like Arthur, who makes a splendid impressioneverywhere. He's the only western man that's got into exclusive societiesat Harvard in years simply on his own merits, and he's a great favoritein Boston and in New York. "

"My children need no one to defend them to me, " said Hiram, in what mightbe called his quiet tone--the tone he had never in his life used withoutdrying up utterly the discussion that had provoked it. Many people hadnoted the curious effect of that tone and had resolved to defy it at thenext opportunity, "just to see what the consequences would be. " But whenthe opportunity had come, their courage had always withered. 

"You can't expect me to be like you, father. You wouldn't, want it, " saidArthur, after the pause. "I must be myself, must develop my ownindividuality. "

Ranger stopped and that stopped the others. Without looking at his son, he said slowly: "I ain't disputing that, boy. It ain't the question. "There was tremendousness in his restrained energy and intensity as hewent on: "What I'm thinking about is whether I ought to keep on _helping_you to 'develop' yourself, as you call it. That's what won't let merest. " And he abruptly walked away. 

Mrs. Whitney and Arthur stared after him. "I don't think he's quite well, Artie, " she said reassuringly. "Don't worry. He'll come round all right. But you ought to be a little more diplomatic. "

Arthur was silent. Diplomacy meant deceit, and he hadn't yet reached thestage of polite and comfortable compromise where deceit figures merely asan amiable convenience for promoting smoothness in human intercourse. Buthe believed that his father would "come round all right, " as Mrs. Whitneyhad so comfortingly said. How could it be otherwise when he had donenothing discreditable, but, on the contrary, had been developing himselfin a way that reflected the highest credit upon his family, as it marchedup toward the lofty goal of "cultured" ambition, toward high and securesocial station. 

Mrs. Whitney, however, did not believe her own statement. In large parther reputation of being a "good, kind sort, " like many such reputations, rested on her habit of cheering on those who were going the wrong way andwere disturbed by some suspicion of the truth. She had known Hiram Rangerlong, had had many a trying experience of his character, gentle as atrade wind--and as steady and unchangeable. Also, beneath her surface ofdesperate striving after the things which common sense denounces, oraffects to denounce, as foolishness, there was a shrewd, practicalperson. "He means some kind of mischief, " she thought--an unreasoned, instinctive conclusion, and, therefore, all-powerful with a woman. 

That evening she wrote her daughter not to cut short her visit to get toSaint X. "Wait until Ross is ready. Then you can join him at Chicago andlet him bring you. "

Just about the hour she was setting down this first result of herinstinct's warning against the danger signal she had seen in HiramRanger's manner, he was delivering a bombshell. He had led in the familyprayers as usual and had just laid the Bible on the center-table in theback parlor after they rose from their knees. With his hands resting onthe cover of the huge volume he looked at his son. There was asacrificial expression in his eyes. "I have decided to withdraw Arthur'sallowance, " he said, and his voice sounded hollow and distant, asunfamiliar to his own ears as to theirs. "He must earn his own living. Ifhe wants a place at the mills, there's one waiting for him. If he'drather work at something else, I'll do what I can to get him a job. "

Silence; and Hiram left the room. 

Adelaide was first to recover sufficiently to speak. "O mother, " criedshe, "you're not going to allow this!"

To Adelaide's and Arthur's consternation, Ellen replied quietly: "Itain't no use to talk to him. I ain't lived all these years with yourfather without finding out when he means what he says. "

"It's so unjust!" exclaimed Adelaide. 

There came into Ellen's face a look she had never seen there before. Itmade her say: "O mother, I didn't mean that; only, it does seem hard. "

Mrs. Ranger thought so, too; but she would have died rather than havemade the thought treason by uttering it. She followed her husbandupstairs, saying: "You and Arthur can close up, and put out the lights. "

Adelaide, almost in tears over her brother's catastrophe, was thrilledwith admiration of his silent, courageous bearing. "What are you going todo, Artie?"

This incautious question drew his inward ferment boiling to the surface. "He has me down and I've got to take his medicine, " said the young man, teeth together and eyes dark with fury. 

This she did not admire. Her first indignation abated, as she sat onthere thinking it out. "Maybe father is nearer right than we know, " shesaid to herself finally. "After all, Arthur will merely be doing asfather does. There's _something_ wrong with him, and with me, too, or weshouldn't think that so terrible. " But to Arthur she said nothing. Encourage him in his present mood she must not; and to try to dissuadehim would simply goad him on. 

CHAPTER IV

THE SHATTERED COLOSSUS

That night there was sleep under Hiram Ranger's roof for Mary the cookonly. Of the four wakeful ones the most unhappy was Hiram himself, theprecipitator of it all. Arthur had the consolation of his conviction thathis calamity was unjust; Adelaide and her mother, of their convictionthat in the end it could not but be well with Arthur. For Hiram there wasno consolation. He reviewed and re-reviewed the facts, and each time hereached again his original conclusion; the one course in repairing themistakes of the boy's bringing up was a sharp rightabout. "Don't waste notime gettin' off the wrong road, once you're sure it's wrong, " had been amaxim of his father, and he had found it a rule with no exceptions. Heappreciated that there is a better way from the wrong road into the rightthan a mad dash straight across the stumpy fields and rocky gulliesbetween. That rough, rude way, however, was the single way open to himhere. Whenever it had become necessary for him to be firm with those heloved, it had rarely been possible for him to do right in the right way;he had usually been forced to do right in the wrong way--to hide himselffrom them behind a manner of cold and silent finality, and, so, toprevent them from forming an alliance and a junction of forces with thetraitor softness within him. Besides, gentle, roundabout, gradualmeasures would require time--delay; and he must "put his house in order"forthwith. 

Thus, even the consolation that he was at least doing right was deniedhim. As he lay there he could see himself harshly forcing the bittermedicine upon his son, the cure for a disease for which he was himselfresponsible; he could see his son's look and could not deny its justice. "I reckon he hates me, " thought Hiram, pouring vitriol into his ownwounds, "and I reckon he's got good cause to. "

But there was in the old miller a Covenanter fiber tough as ironwood. The idea of yielding did not enter his head. He accepted his sufferingsas part of his punishment for past indulgence and weakness; he wouldendure, and go forward. His wife understood him by a kind of intuitionwhich, like most of our insight into the true natures of those closeabout us, was a gradual permeation from the one to the other rather thanclear, deliberate reasoning. But the next morning her sore and anxiousmother's heart misread the gloom of his strong face into sternnesstoward her only son. 

"When did you allow to put the boy to work, father?" she finally said, and her tone unintentionally made Hiram feel more than ever as if he hadsentenced "the boy" to hard labor in the degradation and disgrace of achain gang. 

As he waited some time for self-control before answering, she thought herinquiry had deepened his resentment. "Not that I don't think you'reright, maybe, " she hastened to add, "though"--this wistfully, in afeminine and maternal subtlety of laying the first lines for sapping andmining his position--"I often think about our life, all work and no play, and wonder if we oughtn't to give the children the chance we never had. "

"No good never came of idleness, " said Hiram, uncompromisingly, "and tobe busy about foolishness is still worse. Work or rot--that's life. "

"That's so; that's so, " she conceded. And she was sincere; for that washer real belief, and what she had hinted was a mere unthinking repetitionof the shallow, comfortable philosophy of most people--those "go easys"and "do nothings" and "get nowheres" wherewith Saint X and thesurrounding country were burdened. "Still, " she went on, aloud, "Arthurhasn't got any bad habits, like most of the young men round here withmore money than's good for them. "

"Drink ain't the only bad habit, " replied Hiram. "It ain't the worst, though it looks the worst. The boy's got brains. It ain't right to allowhim to choke 'em up with nonsense. "

Ellen's expression was assent. 

"Tell him to come down to the mill next Monday, " said Hiram, afteranother silence, "and tell him to get some clothes that won't lookridiculous. " He paused, then added; "A man that ain't ready to doanything, no matter what so long as it's useful and honest, is goodfor nothing. "

The night had bred in Arthur brave and bold resolves. He would not tamelysubmit; he would cast his father off, would go forth and speedily carve abrilliant career. He would show his father that, even if the training ofa gentleman develops tastes above the coarseness of commerce, it alsodevelops the mental superiority that makes fleeing chaff of the obstaclesto fame and wealth. He did not go far into details; but, as his essays atHarvard had been praised, he thought of giving literature's road todistinction the preference over the several others that must be smoothbefore him. Daylight put these imaginings into silly countenance, and hefelt silly for having lingered in their company, even in the dark. As hedressed he had much less than his wonted content with himself. He did nottake the same satisfaction in his clothes, as evidence of his good taste, or in his admired variations of the fashion of wearing the hair and tyingthe scarf. Midway in the process of arranging his hair he put down hismilitary brushes; leaning against the dressing table, he fixed his mindupon the first serious thoughts he had ever had in his wholeirresponsible, sheltered life. "Well, " he said, half-aloud, "there _is_something wrong! If there isn't, why do I feel as if my spine hadcollapsed?" After a long pause, he added: "And it has! All that held itsteady was father's hand. "

The whole lofty and beautiful structure of self-complacence upon whichhe had lounged, preening his feathers and receiving social triumphs andthe adulation of his "less fortunate fellows" as the due of his ownpersonal superiority, suddenly slipped from under him. With a ruefulsmile at his plight, he said: "The governor has called me down. " Then, resentfully, and with a return of his mood of dignity outraged and pridetrampled upon: "But he had no right to put me up there--or let me climbup there. " Once a wrong becomes "vested, " it is a "vested right, " sacred, taboo. Arthur felt that his father was committing a crime against him. 

When he saw Adelaide and his mother their anxious looks made him furious. So! They knew how helpless he was; they were pitying him. _Pitying_ him!Pitying _him_! He just tasted his coffee; with scowling brow he hastenedto the stables for his saddle horse and rode away alone. "Wait a fewminutes and I'll come with you, " called Adelaide from the porch as hegalloped by. He pretended not to hear. When clear of the town he "took itout" on his horse, using whip and spur until it gripped the bit and ranaway. He fought savagely with it; at a turn in the road it slipped andfell, all but carrying him under. He was in such a frenzy that if he hadhad a pistol he would have shot it. The chemical action of his crisisprecipitated in a black mass all the poison his nature had been absorbingin those selfish, supercilious years. So long as that poison was held insuspense it was imperceptible to himself as well as to others. But now, there it was, unmistakably a poison. At the sight his anger vanished. "I'm a beast!" he ejaculated, astonished. "And here I've been imagining Iwas a fairly decent sort of fellow. What the devil have I been up to, tomake me like this?"

He walked along the road, leading his horse by the bridle slipped overhis arm. He resumed his reverie of the earlier morning, and began alittle less dimly to see his situation from the new viewpoint. "I deservewhat I'm getting, " he said to himself. Then, at a twinge from theresentment that had gone too deep to be ejected in an instant, he added:"But that doesn't excuse _him_. " His father was to blame for the wholeugly business--for his plight within and without. Still, fixing the blamewas obviously unimportant beside the problem of the way out. And for thatproblem he, in saner mood, began to feel that the right solution was todo something and so become in his own person a somebody, instead of beingmere son of a somebody. "I haven't got this shock a minute too soon, " hereflected. "I must take myself in hand. I--"

"Why, it's you, Arthur, isn't it?" startled him. 

He looked up, saw Mrs. Whitney coming toward him. She was in a winterwalking suit, though the day was warm. She was engaged in the pursuitthat was the chief reason for her three months' retirement to the bluffsoverlooking Saint X--the preservation of her figure. She hated exercise, being by nature as lazy, luxurious, and self-indulgent physically as shewas alert and industrious mentally. From October to July she ate anddrank about what she pleased, never set foot upon the ground if she couldhelp it, and held her tendency to hips in check by daily massage. FromJuly to October she walked two or three hours a day, heavily dressed, andhad a woman especially to attend to her hair and complexion, in additionto the _masseuse_ toiling to keep her cheeks and throat firm for thefight against wrinkles and loss of contour. 

Arthur frowned at the interruption, then smoothed his features into acordial smile; and at once that ugly mass of precipitated poison began toredistribute itself and hide itself from him. 

"You've had a fall, haven't you?"

He flushed. She, judging with the supersensitive vanity of all herself-conscious "set, " thought the flush was at the implied criticism ofhis skill; but he was far too good a rider to care about hismisadventure, and it was her unconscious double meaning that stung him. She turned; they walked together. After a brief debate as to the time forconfessing his "fall, " which, at best, could remain a secret no longerthan Monday, he chose the present. "Father's begun to cut up rough, " saidhe, and his manner was excellent. "He's taken away my allowance, and I'mto go to work at the mill. " He was yielding to the insidious influence ofher presence, was dropping rapidly back toward the attitude as well asthe accent of "our set. "

At his frank disclosure Mrs. Whitney congratulated herself on hershrewdness so heartily that she betrayed it in her face; but Arthur didnot see. "I suppose your mother can do nothing with him. " This was spokenin a tone of conviction. She always felt that, if she had had Hiram todeal with, she would have been fully as successful with him as shethought she had been with Charles Whitney. She did not appreciate thefundamental difference in the characters of the two men. Both were ironof will; but there was in Whitney--and not in Hiram--a selfishness thattook the form of absolute indifference to anything and everything whichdid not directly concern himself--his business or his physical comfort. Thus his wife had had her way in all matters of the social career, and hewould have forced upon her the whole responsibility for the children ifshe had not spared him the necessity by assuming it. He cheerfully paidthe bills, no matter what they were, because he thought his money's powerto buy him immunity from family annoyances one of its chief values. She, and everyone else, thought she ruled him; in fact, she not only did notrule him, but had not even influence with him in the smallest trifle ofthe matters he regarded as important. 

The last time he had looked carefully at her--many, many years before--hehad thought her beautiful; he assumed thenceforth that she was stillbeautiful, and was therefore proud of her. In like manner he had made uphis mind favorably to his children. As the bills grew heavier andheavier, from year to year, with the wife and two children assiduouslyexpanding them, he paid none the less cheerfully. "There is somesatisfaction in paying up for them, " reflected he. "At least a man canfeel that he's getting his money's worth. " And he contrasted his luckwith the bad luck of so many men who had to "pay up" for "homely frumps, that look worse the more they spend. "

But Arthur was replying to Mrs. Whitney's remark with a bitter "Nobodycan do anything with father; he's narrow and obstinate. If you argue withhim, he's silent. He cares for nothing but his business. "

Arthur did not hesitate to speak thus frankly to Mrs. Whitney. She seemeda member of the family, like a sister of his mother or father who hadlived with them always; also he accepted her at the valuation she and allher friends set upon her--he, like herself and them, thought her generousand unselfish because she was lavish with sympathetic words and withalms--the familiar means by which the heartless cheat themselves into areputation for heart. She always left the objects of her benevolence thepoorer for her ministrations, though they did not realize it. She adoptedas the guiding principle of her life the cynical philosophy--"Give peoplewhat they want, never what they need. " By sympathizing effusively withthose in trouble, she encouraged them in low-spiritedness; by lavishingalms, she weakened struggling poverty into pauperism. But she took awayand left behind enthusiasm for her own moral superiority and humanity. Also she deceived herself and others with such fluid outpourings of finephrases about "higher life" and "spiritual thinking" as so exasperatedHiram Ranger. 

Now, instead of showing Arthur what her substratum of shrewd senseenabled her to see, she ministered soothingly unto his vanity. His fatherwas altogether wrong, tyrannical, cruel; he himself was altogether right, a victim of his father's ignorance of the world. 

"I decided not to submit, " said Arthur, as if the decision were one whichhad come to him the instant his father had shown the teeth and claws oftyranny, instead of being an impulse of just that moment, inspired byMrs. Whitney's encouragement to the weakest and worst in his nature. 

"I shouldn't be too hasty about that, " she cautioned. "He is old andsick. You ought to be more than considerate. And, also, you shouldbe careful not to make him do anything that would cut you out ofyour rights. "

It was the first time the thought of his "rights"--of the share of hisfather's estate that would be his when his father was no more--haddefinitely entered his head. That he would some day be a rich man he hadaccepted just as he accepted the other conditions of his environment--allto which he was born and in which consisted his title to be regarded asof the "upper classes, " like his associates at Harvard. Thinking now onthe insinuated proposition that his father might disinherit him, hepromptly rejected it. "No danger of his doing that, " he assured her, withthe utmost confidence. "Father is an honest man, and he wouldn't think ofanything so dishonest, so dishonorable. "

This view of a child's rights in the estate of its parents amused Mrs. Whitney. She knew how quickly she would herself cut off a child of herswho was obstinately disobedient, and, while she felt that it would be anoutrage for Hiram Ranger to cut off his son for making what she regardedas the beginning of the highest career, the career of "gentleman, " stillshe could not dispute his right to do so. "Your father may not see yourrights in the same light that you do, Arthur, " said she mildly. "If Iwere you, I'd be careful. "

Arthur reflected. "I don't think it's possible, " said he, "but I guessyou're right. I must not forget that I've got others to think ofbesides myself. "

This patently meant Janet; Mrs. Whitney held her discreet tongue. 

"It will do no harm to go to the office, " she presently continued. "Youought to get some knowledge of business, anyhow. You will be a man ofproperty some day, and you will need to know enough about business to beable to supervise the managers of your estate. You know, I had Janet takea course at a business college, last winter, and Ross is in with hisfather and will be active for several years. "

 * * * * *

Thus it came about that on Monday morning at nine Arthur sauntered intothe offices of the mills. He was in much such a tumult of anger, curiosity, stubbornness, and nervousness as agitates a child on itsfirst appearance at school; but in his struggle not to show his feelingshe exaggerated his pose into a seeming of bored indifference. The door ofhis father's private room was open; there sat Hiram, absorbed indictating to a stenographer. When his son appeared in the doorway, heapparently did not realize it, though in fact the agitation the young manwas concealing under that unfortunate manner was calmness itself incomparison with the state of mind behind Hiram's mask of somberstolidity. 

"He's trying to humiliate me to the depths, " thought the son, as he stoodand waited, not daring either to advance or to retreat. How could he knowthat his father was shrinking as a criminal from the branding iron, thatevery nerve in that huge, powerful, seemingly impassive body was intorture from this ordeal of accepting the hatred of his son in order thathe might do what he considered to be his duty? At length the young mansaid: "I'm here, father. "

"Be seated--just a minute, " said the father, turning his face toward hisboy but unable to look even in that direction. 

The letter was finished, and the stenographer gathered up her notes andwithdrew. Hiram sat nerving himself, his distress accentuating the sternstrength of his features. Presently he said: "I see you haven't comedressed for work. "

"Oh, I think these clothes will do for the office, " said Arthur, withapparent carelessness. 

"But this business isn't run from the office, " replied Hiram, with agentle smile that to the young man looked like the sneer of a tyrant. "It's run from the mill. It prospers--it always has prospered--becauseI work with the men. I know what they ought to do and what they aredoing. We all work together here. There ain't a Sunday clothes jobabout the place. "

Arthur's fingers were trembling as he pulled at his small mustache. Whatdid this tyrant expect of him? He had assumed that a place was to be madefor him in the office, a dignified place. There he would master thebusiness, would gather such knowledge as might be necessary successfullyto direct it, and would bestow that knowledge in the humble, out-of-the-way corner of his mind befitting matters of that kind. Andhere was his father, believing that the same coarse and toilsome methodswhich had been necessary for himself were necessary for a trained andcultured understanding!

"What do you want me to do?" asked Arthur. 

Hiram drew a breath of relief. The boy was going to show good sense andwillingness after all. "I guess you'd better learn barrel-making first, "said he. He rose. "I'll take you to the foreman of the cooperage, andto-morrow you can go to work in the stave department. The first thing isto learn to make a first-class barrel. "

Arthur slowly rose to follow. He was weak with helpless rage. If hisfather had taken him into the office and had invited him to help indirecting the intellectual part of that great enterprise, the part thatin a way was not without appeal to the imagination, he felt that he mightgradually have accustomed himself to it; but to be put into the mindlessroutine of the workingman, to be set about menial tasks which a meremuscular machine could perform better than he--what waste, whatdegradation, what insult!

He followed his father to the cooperage, the uproar of its machineryjarring fiercely upon him, but not so fiercely as did the common-lookingmen slaving in torn and patched and stained clothing. He did not look atthe foreman as his father was introducing them and ignored his profferedhand. "Begin him at the bottom, Patrick, " explained Hiram, "and show himno favors. We must give him a good education. "

"That's right, Mr. Ranger, " said Patrick, eying his new pupil dubiously. He was not skilled in analysis of manner and character, so Arthur'ssuperciliousness missed him entirely and he was attributing the cold andvacant stare to stupidity. "A regular damn dude, " he was saying tohimself. "As soon as the old man's gone, some fellow with brains'll dohim out of the business. If the old man's wise, he'll buy him an annuity, something safe and sure. Why do so many rich people have sons like that?If I had one of his breed I'd shake his brains up with a stave. "

Arthur mechanically followed his father back to the office. At the doorHiram, eager to be rid of him, said: "I reckon that's about all we can doto-day. You'd better go to Black and Peters's and get you some clothes. Then you can show up at the cooperage at seven to-morrow morning, readyto put in a good day's work. "

He laid his hand on his son's shoulder, and that gesture and theaccompanying look, such as a surgeon might give his own child upon whomhe was performing a cruelly painful operation, must have caused some partof what he felt to penetrate to the young man; for, instead of burstingout at his father, he said appealingly: "Would it be a very greatdisappointment to you if I were to go into--into some--some other line?"

"What line?" asked Hiram. 

"I haven't settled--definitely. But I'm sure I'm not fitted for this. " Hechecked himself from going on to explain that he thought it would mean awaste of all the refinements and elegancies he had been at so much painsto acquire. 

"Who's to look after the business when I'm gone?" asked Hiram. "Most ofwhat we've got is invested here. Who's to look after your mother's andsister's interests, not to speak of your own?"

"I'd be willing to devote enough time to it to learn the management, "said Arthur, "but I don't care to know all the details. "

It was proof of Hiram's great love for the boy that he had no impulse ofanger at this display of what seemed to him the most priggish ignorance. "There's only one way to learn, " said he quietly. "That's the way I'vemarked out for you. Don't forget--we start up at seven. You can breakfastwith me at a quarter past six, and we'll come down together. "

As Arthur walked homeward he pictured himself in jumper and overalls onhis way from work of an evening--meeting the Whitneys--meeting JanetWhitney! Like all Americans, who become inoculated with "grand ideas, "he had the super-sensitiveness to appearances that makes foreigners callus the most snobbishly conventional people on earth. What would it availto be in character _the_ refined person in the community and in position_the_ admired person, if he spent his days at menial toil and wore thelivery of labor? He knew Janet Whitney would blush as she bowed to him, and that she wouldn't bow to him unless she were compelled to do sobecause she had not seen him in time to escape; and he felt that shewould be justified. The whole business seemed to him a hideous dream, asardonic practical joke upon him. Surely, surely, he would presently wakefrom this nightmare to find himself once more an unimperiled gentleman. 

In the back parlor at home he found Adelaide about to set out for theWhitneys. As she expected to walk with Mrs. Whitney for an hour beforelunch she was in walking costume--hat, dress, gloves, shoes, stockings, sunshade, all the simplest, most expensive-looking, mostunpractical-looking white. From hat to heels she was the embodiment ofluxurious, "ladylike" idleness, the kind that not only is idle itself, but also, being beautiful, attractive, and compelling, is the cause ofidleness in others. She breathed upon Arthur the delicious perfume of theelegant life from which he was being thrust by the coarse hand of hisfather--and Arthur felt as if he were already in sweaty overalls. 

"Well?" she asked. 

"He's going to make a common workman of me, " said Arthur, sullen, mentally contrasting his lot with hers. "And he's got me on the hip. Idon't dare treat him as he deserves. If I did, he's got just devil enoughin him to cheat me out of my share of the property. A sweet revenge hecould take on me in his will. "

Adelaide drew back--was rudely thrust back by the barrier between her andher brother which had sprung up as if by magic. Across it she studied himwith a pain in her heart that showed in her face. "O Arthur, how can youthink such a thing!" she exclaimed. 

"Isn't it so?" he demanded. 

"He has a right to do what he pleases with his own. " Then she softenedthis by adding, "But he'd never do anything unjust. "

"It isn't his own, " retorted her brother. "It belongs to us all. "

"We didn't make it, " she insisted. "We haven't any right to it, except towhat he gives us. "

"Then you think we're living on his charity?"

"No--not just that, " she answered hesitatingly. "I've never thought itout--never have thought about it at all. "

"He brought us into the world, " Arthur pursued. "He has accustomed us toa certain station--to a certain way of living. It's his duty in honestyand in honor to do everything in his power to keep us there. "

Del admitted to herself that this was plausible, but she somehow feltthat it was not true. "It seems to me that if parents bring theirchildren up to be the right sort--useful and decent and a credit, " saidshe, "they've done the biggest part of their duty. The money isn't soimportant, is it? At least, it oughtn't to be. "

Arthur looked at her with angry suspicion. "Suppose he made a will givingit all to you, Del, " he said, affecting the manner of impartial, disinterested argument, "what would _you_ do?"

"Share with you, of course, " she answered, hurt that he should raise thequestion at a time when raising it seemed an accusation of her, or atleast a doubt of her. 

He laughed satirically. "That's what you think now, " said he. "But, whenthe time came, you'd be married to Ross Whitney, and he'd show you howjust father's judgment of me was, how wicked it would be to break hislast solemn wish and will, and how unfit I was to take care of money. Andyou'd see it; and the will would stand. Oh, you'd see it! I know humannature. If it was a small estate--in those cases brothers and sistersalways act generously--no, not always. Some of 'em, lots of 'em, quarreland fight over a few pieces of furniture and crockery. But in a case ofa big estate, who ever heard of the one that was favored giving up hisadvantage unless he was afraid of a scandal, or his lawyers advised himhe might as well play the generous, because he'd surely lose the suit?"

"Of course, Arthur, I can't be sure what I'd do, " she replied gently;"but I hope I'd not be made altogether contemptible by inheriting alittle money. "

"But it wouldn't seem contemptible, " he retorted. "It'd be legal andsensible, and it'd seem just. You'd only be obeying a dead father's lastwishes and guarding the interests of your husband and your children. Theycome before brothers. "

"But not before self-respect, " she said very quietly. She put her armaround his neck and pressed her cheek against his. "Arthur--dear--dear--"she murmured, "please don't talk or think about this any more. It--it--hurts. " And there were hot tears in her eyes, and at her heart asense of sickness and of fright; for his presentation of the other sideof the case made her afraid of what she might do, or be tempted to do, inthe circumstances he pictured. She knew she wouldn't--at least, not solong as she remained the person she then was. But how long would that be?How many years of association with her new sort of friends--with the sortRoss had long been--with the sort she was becoming more and morelike--how many, or, rather, how few years would it take to complete theprocess of making her over into a person who would do precisely whatArthur had pictured?

Arthur had said a great deal more than he intended--more, even, than hebelieved true. For a moment he felt ashamed of himself; then he remindedhimself that he wasn't really to blame; that, but for his father'sharshness toward him, he would never have had such sinister thoughtsabout him or Adelaide. Thus his apology took the form of an outburstagainst Hiram. "Father has brought out the worst there is in me!" heexclaimed. "He is goading me on to--"

He looked up; Hiram was in the doorway. He sprang to his feet. "Yes, Imean it!" he cried, his brain confused, his blood on fire. "I don't carewhat you do. Cut me off! Make me go to work like any common laborer!Crush out all the decency there is in me!"

The figure of the huge old man was like a storm-scarred statue. Thetragedy of his countenance filled his son and daughter with awe andterror. Then, slowly, like a statue falling, he stiffly tilted forward, crashed at full length face downward on the floor. He lay as he hadfallen, breathing heavily, hoarsely. And they, each tightly holding theother's hand like two little children, stood pale and shuddering, unableto move toward the stricken colossus. 

CHAPTER V

THE WILL

When Hiram had so far improved that his period of isolation was obviouslywithin a few days of its end, Adelaide suggested to Arthur, somewhattimidly, "Don't you think you ought to go to work at the mills?"

He frowned. It was bad enough to have the inward instinct to this, and tofight it down anew each day as a temptation to weakness and cowardice. That the traitor should get an ally in his sister--it was intolerable. The frown deepened into a scowl. 

But Del had been doing real thinking since she saw her father strickendown, and she was beginning clearly to see his point of view as toArthur. That angry frown was discouraging, but she felt too strongly tobe quite daunted. "It might help father toward getting well, " she urged, "and make _such_ a difference--in _every_ way. "

"No more hypocrisy. I was right; he was wrong, " replied her brother. Hehad questioned Dr. Schulze anxiously about his father's seizure; andSchulze, who had taken a strong fancy to him and had wished to put him atease, declared that the attack must have begun at the mills, and wouldprobably have brought Hiram down before he could have reached home, hadhe not been so powerful of body and of will. And Arthur, easily reassuredwhere he must be assured if he was to have peace of mind, now believedthat his outburst had had no part whatever in causing his father'sstroke. So he was all for firm stand against slavery. "If I yield an inchnow, " he went on to Adelaide, "he'll never stop until he has made me hisslave. He has lorded it over those workingmen so long that the leastopposition puts him in a frenzy. "

Adelaide gave over, for the time, the combat against a stubbornness whichwas an inheritance from his father. "I've only made him more set by whatI've said, " thought she. "Now, he has committed himself. I ought not tohave been so tactless. "

Long after Hiram got back in part the power of speech, he spoke only whendirectly addressed, and then after a wait in which he seemed to have castabout for the fewest possible words. After a full week of this emphasizedreticence, he said, "Where is Arthur?"

Arthur had kept away because--so he told himself and believed--while hewas not in the least responsible for his father's illness, still seeinghim and being thus reminded of their difference could not but have a badeffect. That particular day, as luck would have it, he for the first timesince his father was stricken had left the grounds. "He's out driving, "said his mother. 

"In the tandem?" asked Hiram. 

"Yes, " replied Ellen, knowing nothing of the last development of thestrained relations between her husband and her "boy. "

"Then he hasn't gone to work?"

"He's stayed close to the house ever since you were taken sick, Hiram, "said she, with gentle reproach. "He's been helping me nurse you. "

Hiram did not need to inquire how little that meant. He knew that, whenanyone Ellen Ranger loved was ill, she would permit no help in thenursing, neither by day nor by night. He relapsed into his brooding overthe problem which was his sad companion each conscious moment, now thatthe warning "Put your house in order" had been so sternly emphasized. 

The day Dr. Schulze let them bring him down to the first floor, Mrs. Hastings--"Mrs. Fred, " to distinguish her from "Mrs. Val"--happened tocall. Mrs. Ranger did not like her for two reasons--first, she hadmarried her favorite cousin, Alfred Hastings, and had been the"ruination" of him; second, she had a way of running on and on toeveryone and anyone about the most intimate family affairs, andclose-mouthed Ellen Ranger thought this the quintessence of indiscretionand vulgarity. But Hiram liked her, was amused by her always interestingand at times witty thrusts at the various members of her family, including herself. So, Mrs. Ranger, clutching at anything that mightlighten the gloom thick and black upon him, let her in and left themalone together. With so much to do, she took advantage of every momentwhich she could conscientiously spend out of his presence. 

At sight of Henrietta, Hiram's face brightened; and well it might. Inold-fashioned Saint X it was the custom for a married woman to "settledown" as soon as she returned from her honeymoon--to abandon allthoughts, pretensions, efforts toward an attractive exterior, and tobecome a "settled" woman, "settled" meaning purified of the last grain ofthe vanity of trying to please the eye or ear of the male. Andconversation with any man, other than her husband--and even with him, ifa woman were soundly virtuous, through and through--must be as cleanshorn of allurement as a Quaker meetinghouse. Mrs. Fred had defied thisancient and sacred tradition of the "settled" woman. She had kept herlooks; she frankly delighted in the admiration of men. And the fact thatthe most captious old maid in Saint X could not find a flaw in hercharacter as a faithful wife, aggravated the offending. For, did not herdevotion to her husband make dangerous her example of frivolity retainedand flaunted, as a pure private life in an infidel made his heresiesplausible and insidious? At "almost" forty, Mrs. Hastings looked "about"thirty and acted as if she were a girl or a widow. Each group of godsseems ridiculous to those who happen not to believe in it. Saint X's setof gods of conventionality doubtless seems ridiculous to those who knockthe dust before some other set; but Saint X cannot be blamed for having asober face before its own altars, and reserving its jeers and pityingsmiles for deities of conventionality in high dread and awe elsewhere. And if Mrs. Fred had not been "one of the Fuller heirs, " Saint X wouldhave made her feel its displeasure, instead of merely gossiping andthreatening. 

"I'm going the round of the invalids to-day, " began Henrietta, after shehad got through the formula of sick-room conversation. "I've just comefrom old John Skeffington. I found all the family in the depths. Hefooled 'em again last night. "

Hiram smiled. All Saint X knew what it meant for old Skeffington to "fool'em again. " He had been dying for three years. At the first news that hewas seized of a mortal illness his near relations, who had been drivenfrom him by his temper and his parsimony, gathered under his roof fromfar and near, each group hoping to induce him to make a will in itsfavor. He lingered on, and so did they--watching each other, trying tooutdo each other in complaisance to the humors of the old miser. And hegot a new grip on life through his pleasure in tyrannizing over them andin putting them to great expense in keeping up his house. He favoredfirst one group, then another, taking fagots from fires of hope burningtoo high to rekindle fires about to expire. 

"How is he?" asked Hiram. 

"_They_ say he can't last till fall, " replied Henrietta; "but he'll lastanother winter, maybe ten. He's having more and more fun all the time. Hehas made them bring an anvil and hammer to his bedside, and whenever hehappens to be sleeping badly--and that's pretty often--he bangs on theanvil until the last one of his relations has got up and come in; then, maybe he'll set 'em all to work mending his fishing tackle--right in thedead of night. "

"Are they all there still?" asked Hiram. "The Thomases, the Wilsons, theFrisbies, and the two Cantwell old maids?"

"Everyone--except Miss Frisbie. She's gone back home to Rushville, butshe's sending her sister on to take her place to-morrow. I saw DoryHargrave in the street a while ago. You know his mother was a firstcousin of old John's. I told him he ought not to let strangers get theold man's money, that he ought to shy _his_ castor into the ring. "

"And what did Dory say?" asked Hiram. 

"He came back at me good and hard, " said Mrs. Fred, with a good-humoredlaugh. "He said there'd been enough people in Saint X ruined byinheritances and by expecting inheritances. You know the creek that flowsthrough the graveyard has just been stopped from seeping into thereservoir. Well, Dory spoke of that and said there was, and always hadbeen, flowing from every graveyard a stream far more poisonous than anygraveyard creek, yet nobody talked of stopping it. "

The big man, sitting with eyes downcast, began to rub his hands, one overthe other--a certain sign that he was thinking intently. 

"There's a good deal of truth in what he said, " she went on. "Look at ourfamily, for instance. We've been living on an allowance from GrandfatherFuller in Chicago for forty years. None of us has ever done a stroke ofwork; we've simply been waiting for him to die and divide up hismillions. Look at us! Bill and Tom drunkards, Dick a loafer without eventhe energy to be a drunkard; Ed dead because he was too lazy to keepalive. Alice and I married nice fellows; but as soon as they got into ourfamily they began to loaf and wait. We've been waiting in decent, or Ishould say, indecent, poverty for forty years, and we're still waiting. We're a lot of paupers. We're on a level with the Wilmots. "

"Yes--there are the Wilmots, too, " said Hiram absently. 

"That's another form of the same disease, " Henrietta went on. "Did youknow General Wilmot?"

"He was a fine man, " said Hiram, "one of the founders of this town, andhe made a fortune out of it. He got overbearing, and what he thought wasproud, toward the end of his life. But he had a good heart and worked forall he had--honest work. "

"And he brought his family up to be real down-East gentlemen andladies, " resumed Henrietta. "And look at 'em. They lost the money, because they were too gentlemanly and too ladylike to work to hold on toit. And there they live in the big house, half-starved. Why, really, Mr. Ranger, they don't have enough to eat. And they dress in clothes thathave been in the family for a generation. They make their underclothesout of old bed linen. And the grass on their front lawns is three feethigh, and the moss and weeds cover and pry up the bricks of their walks. They're too 'proud' to work and too poor to hire. How much have theyborrowed from you?"

"I don't know, " said Hiram. "Not much. "

"I know better--and you oughtn't to have lent them a cent. Yesterday oldWilmot was hawking two of his grandfather's watches about. And all theWilmots have got brains, just as our family has. Nothing wrong witheither of us, but that stream Dory Hargrave was talking about. "

"There's John Dumont, " mused Ranger. 

"Yes--_he_ is an exception. But what's he doing with what his father lefthim? I don't let them throw dust in my eyes with his philanthropy as theycall it. The plain truth is he's a gambler and a thief, and he uses whathis father left him to be gambler and thief on the big scale, and so keepout of the penitentiary--'finance, ' they call it. If he'd been poor, he'dhave been in jail long ago--no, he wouldn't--he'd have done differently. It was the money that started him wrong. "

"A great deal of good can be done with money, " said Hiram. 

"Can it?" demanded Mrs. Fred. "It don't look that way to me. I'm full ofthis, for I was hauling my Alfred over the coals this very morning"--shelaughed--"for being what I've made him, for doing what I'd do in hisplace--for being like my father and my brothers. It seems to me, preciouslittle of the alleged good that's done with wealth is really good; andwhat little isn't downright bad hides the truth from people. Talk aboutthe good money does! What does it amount to--the good that's good, andthe good that's rotten bad? What does it all amount to beside the goodthat having to work does? People that have to work hard are usuallyhonest and have sympathy and affection and try to amount to something. And if they are bad, why at least they can't hurt anybody but themselvesvery much, where a John Dumont or a Skeffington can injurehundreds--thousands. Take your own case, Mr. Ranger. Your money has neverdone you any good. It was your hard work. All your money has ever donehas been--Do you think your boy and girl will be as good a man and woman, as useful and creditable to the community, as you and Cousin Ellen?"

Hiram said nothing; he continued to slide his great, strong, useful-looking hands one over the other. 

"A fortune makes a man stumble along if he's in the right road, makes himrace along if he's in the wrong road, " concluded Henrietta. 

"You must have been talking a great deal to young Hargrave lately, " saidHiram shrewdly. 

She blushed. "That's true, " she admitted, with a laugh. "But I'm notaltogether parroting what he said. I do my own thinking. " She rose. "I'mafraid I haven't cheered you up much. "

"I'm glad you came, " replied Hiram earnestly; then, with anadmiring look, "It's a pity some of the men of your family haven'tgot your energy. "

She laughed. "They have, " said she. "Every one of us is a first-ratetalker--and that's all the energy I've got--energy to wag my tongue. Still--You didn't know I'd gone into business?"

"Business?"

"That is, I'm backing Stella Wilmot in opening a little shop--to sellmillinery. "

"A Wilmot at work!" exclaimed Hiram. 

"A Wilmot at work, " affirmed Henrietta. "She's more like her greatgrandfather; you know how a bad trait will skip several generations andthen show again. The Wilmots have been cultivating the commonness of workout of their blood for three generations, but it has burst in again. Shemade a declaration of independence last week. She told the family shewas tired of being a pauper and beggar. And when I heard she wanted to dosomething I offered to go in with her in a business. She's got a lot oftaste in trimming hats. She certainly has had experience enough. "

"She always looks well, " said Hiram. 

"And you'd wonder at it, if you were a woman and knew what she's had towork on. So I took four hundred dollars grandfather sent me as a birthdaypresent, and we're going to open up in a small way. She's to put her nameout--my family won't let me put mine out, too. 'Wilmot & Hastings' wouldsound well, don't you think? But it's got to be 'Wilmot & Co. ' We'vehired a store--No. 263 Monroe Street. We have our opening in August. "

"Do you need any--" began Hiram. 

"No, thank you, " she cut in, with a laugh. "This is a close corporation. No stock for sale. We want to hold on to every cent of the profits. "

"Well, " said Hiram, "if you ever do need to borrow, you know where tocome. "

"Where the whole town comes when it's hard up, " said Henrietta; and sheastonished the old man by giving him a shy, darting kiss on the brow. "Now, don't you tell your wife!" she exclaimed, laughing and blushingfuriously and making for the door. 

When Adelaide, sent by her mother, came to sit with him, he said: "Drawthe blinds, child, and leave me alone. I want to rest. " She obeyed him. At intervals of half an hour she opened the door softly, looked in athim, thought he was asleep, and went softly away. But he had never beenfurther from sleep in his life. Henrietta Hastings's harum-scarumgossiping and philosophizing happened to be just what his troubled mindneeded to precipitate its clouds into a solid mass that could be clearlyseen and carefully examined. Heretofore he had accepted the conventionalexplanations of all the ultimate problems, had regarded philosophers astime wasters, own brothers to the debaters who whittled on dry-goodsboxes at the sidewalk's edge in summer and about the stoves in the rearof stores in winter, settling all affairs save their own. But now, sitting in enforced inaction and in the chill and calm which diffusesfrom the tomb, he was using the unused, the reflective, half of his mind. 

Even as Henrietta was talking, he began to see what seemed to him thehidden meaning in the mysterious "Put your house in order" that wouldgive him no rest. But he was not the man to make an important decision inhaste, was the last man in the world to inflict discomfort, much lesspain, upon anyone, unless the command to do it came unmistakably in theone voice he dared not disobey. Day after day he brooded; night afternight he fought to escape. But, slowly, inexorably, his iron inheritancefrom Covenanter on one side and Puritan on the other asserted itself. Heartsick, and all but crying out in anguish, he advanced toward thestern task which he could no longer deny or doubt that the Most High Godhad set for him. 

He sent for Dory Hargrave's father. 

Mark Hargrave was president of the Tecumseh Agricultural and ClassicalUniversity, to give it its full legal entitlements. It consisted in afaculty of six, including Dr. Hargrave, and in two meager and modest, almost mean "halls, " and two hundred acres of land. There were at thattime just under four hundred students, all but about fifty working theirway through. So poor was the college that it was kept going only byefforts, the success of which seemed miraculous interventions ofProvidence. They were so regarded by Dr. Hargrave, and the stubbornestinfidel must have conceded that he was not unjustified. 

As Hargrave, tall and spare, his strong features illumined by life-longunselfish service to his fellow-men, came into Hiram Ranger's presence, Hiram shrank and grew gray as his hair. Hargrave might have been theofficer come to lead him forth to execution. 

"If you had not sent for me, Mr. Ranger, " he began, after the greetings, "I should have come of my own accord within a day or two. Latterly Godhas been strongly moving me to lay before you the claims of my boys--ofthe college. "

This was to Hiram direct confirmation of his own convictions. He tried toforce his lips to say so, but they would not move. 

"You and Mrs. Ranger, " Hargrave went on, "have had a long life, full ofthe consciousness of useful work well done. Your industry, your fitnessfor the just use of God's treasure, has been demonstrated, and He hasmade you stewards of much of it. And now approaches the final test, thegreatest test, of your fitness to do His work. In His name, my oldfriend, what are you going to do with His treasure?"

Hiram Ranger's face lighted up. The peace that was entering his soul layupon the tragedy of his mental and physical suffering soft and sereneand sweet as moonlight beautifying a ruin. "That's why I sent for you, Mark, " he said. 

"Hiram, are you going to leave your wealth so that it may continue to dogood in the world? Or, are you going to leave it so that it may temptyour children to vanity and selfishness, to lives of idleness and folly, to bring up their children to be even less useful to mankind than they, even more out of sympathy with the ideals which God has implanted? All ofthose ideals are attainable only through shoulder-to-shoulder work suchas you have done all your life. "

"God help me!" muttered Hiram. The sweat was beading his forehead and hishands were clasped and wrenching each at the other, typical of the twoforces contending in final battle within him. "God help me!"

"Have you ever looked about you in this town and thought of the meaningof its steady decay, moral and physical? God prospered the hard-workingmen who founded it; but, instead of appreciating His blessings, theyregarded the wealth He gave them as their own; and they left it to theirchildren. And see how their sin is being visited upon the third andfourth generations! Industry has been slowly paralyzing. The youngpeople, whose wealth gave them the best opportunities, are leading idlelives, are full of vanity of class and caste, are steeped in the sinsthat ever follow in the wake of idleness--the sins of selfishness andindulgence. Instead of being workers, leading in the march upward, instead of taking the position for which their superior opportunitiesshould have fitted them, they set an example of idleness and indolence. They despise their ancestry of toil which should be their pride. Theypride themselves upon the parasitism which is their shame. And they setbefore the young an example of contempt for work, of looking on it as acurse and a disgrace. "

"I have been thinking of these things lately, " said Hiram. 

"It is the curse of the world, this inherited wealth, " cried Hargrave. "Because of it humanity moves in circles instead of forward. The groundgained by the toiling generations, is lost by the inheriting generations. And this accursed inheritance tempts men ever to long for and hope forthat which they have not earned. God gave man a trial of the plan ofliving in idleness upon that which he had not earned, and man fell. ThenGod established the other plan, and through it man has been rising--butrising slowly and with many a backward slip, because he has tried tothwart the Divine plan with the system of inheritance. Fortunately, thegreat mass of mankind has had nothing to leave to heirs, has had no hopeof inheritances. Thus, new leaders have ever been developed in place ofthose destroyed by inherited prosperity. But, unfortunately, the law ofinheritance has been able to do its devil's work upon the best element inevery human society, upon those who had the most efficient and exemplaryparents, and so had the best opportunity to develop into men and women ofthe highest efficiency. No wonder progress is slow, when the leaders ofeach generation have to be developed from the bottom all over again, andwhen the ideal of useful work is obscured by the false ideal of livingwithout work. Waiting for dead men's shoes! Dead men's shoes instead ofshoes of one's own. "

"Dead men's shoes, " muttered Hiram. 

"The curse of unearned wealth, " went on his friend. "Your life, Hiram, leaves to your children the injunction to work, to labor cheerfully andequally, honestly and helpfully, with their brothers and sisters; butyour wealth--If you leave it to them, will it not give that injunctionthe lie, will it not invite them to violate that injunction?"

"I have been watching my children, my boy, especially, " said Hiram. "Idon't know about all this that you've been saying. It's a big subject;but I do know about this boy of mine. I wish I'd 'a' taken your advice, Mark, and put him in your school. But his mother was set on the East--onHarvard. " Tears were in his eyes at this. He remembered how she, knowingnothing of college, but feeling it was her duty to have her childreneducated properly, a duty she must not put upon others, had sent for thecatalogues of all the famous colleges in the country. He could see herporing over the catalogues, balancing one offering of educationaladvantage against another, finally deciding for Harvard, the greatest ofthem all. He could hear her saying: "It'll cost a great deal, Hiram. Asnear as I can reckon it out it'll cost about a thousand dollars ayear--twelve hundred if we want to be v-e-r-y liberal, so the cataloguesays. But Harvard's the biggest, and has the most teachers and scholars, and takes in all the branches. And we ought to give our Arthur the best. "And now--By what bitter experience had he learned that the college is notin the catalogue, is a thing apart, unrelated and immeasurably different!His eyes were hot with anger as he thought how the boy's mother, honest, conscientious Ellen, had been betrayed. 

"Look here, Mark, " he blazed out, "if I leave money to your college Iwant to see that it can't ever be like them eastern institutions oflearning. " He made a gesture of disgust. "Learning!"

"If you leave us anything, Hiram, leave it so that any young man who getsits advantages must work for them. "

"That's it!" exclaimed Hiram. "That's what I want. Can you draw me upthat kind of plan? No boy, no matter what he has at home, can come tothat there college without working his way through, without learning towork, me to provide the chance to earn the living. "

"I have just such a plan, " said Hargrave, drawing a paper from hispocket. "I've had it ready for years waiting for just such anopportunity. "

"Read it, " said Hiram, sinking deep in his big chair and closing his eyesand beginning to rub his forehead with his great hand. 

And Hargrave read, forgetting his surroundings, forgetting everything inhis enthusiasm for this dream of his life--a university, in fact as wellas in name, which would attract the ambitious children of rich andwell-to-do and poor, would teach them how to live honestly and nobly, would give them not only useful knowledge to work with but also the lightto work by. "You see, Hiram, I think a child ought to begin to be a manas soon as he begins to live--a man, standing on his own feet, in his ownshoes, with the courage that comes from knowing how to do well somethingwhich the world needs. "

He looked at Hiram for the first time in nearly half an hour. He wasalarmed by the haggard, ghastly gray of that majestic face; and histhought was not for his plan probably about to be thwarted by the man'spremature death, but of his own selfishness in wearying and imperilinghim by importunity at such a time. "But we'll talk of this again, " hesaid sadly, putting the paper in his pocket and rising for instantdeparture. 

"Give me the paper, " said Hiram, putting out his trembling hand, but notlifting his heavy, blue-black lids. 

Mark gave it to him hesitatingly. "You'd better put it off till you'restronger, Hiram. "

"I'll see, " said Hiram. "Good morning, Mark. "

 * * * * *

Judge Torrey was the next to get Ranger's summons; it came towardmid-afternoon of that same day. Like Hargrave, Torrey had been hislife-long friend. 

"Torrey, " he said, "I want you to examine this plan"--and he held up thepaper Hargrave had left--"and, if it is not legal, put it into legalshape, and incorporate it into my will. I feel I ain't got much time. "With a far-away, listening look--"I must put my house in order--in order. Draw up a will and bring it to me before five o'clock. I want you towrite it yourself--trust no one--no one!" His eyes were bright, hischeeks bluish, and he spoke in a thick, excited voice that broke andshrilled toward the end of each sentence. 

"I can't do it to-day. Too much haste--"

"To-day!" commanded Hiram. "I won't rest till it's done!"

"Of course, I can--"

"Read the paper now, and give me your opinion. "

Torrey put on his glasses, opened the paper. "Oh!" he exclaimed. "Iremember this. It's in my partner's handwriting. Hargrave had Watsondraw it up about five years ago. We were very careful in preparing it. It is legal. "

"Very well, " continued Hiram. "Now I'll give you the points of my will. "

Torrey took notebook and pencil from his pocket. 

"First, " began Hiram, as if he were reciting something he had learned byheart, "to my wife, Ellen, this house and everything in it, and thegrounds and all the horses and carriages and that kind of thing. "

"Yes, " said Torrey, looking up from his note making. 

"Second, to my wife an income of seven thousand a year for life--that iswhat it cost her and me to live last year, and the children--except theextras. Seven thousand for life--but only for life. "

"Yes, " said Torrey, his glance at Hiram now uneasy and expectant. 

"Third, to my daughter, Adelaide, two thousand a year for her life--to bedivided among her daughters equally, if she have any; if not, to revertto my estate at her death. "

"Yes, " said Torrey. 

"Fourth, to my son, five thousand dollars in cash. "

A long pause, Torrey looking at his old friend and client as if hethought one or the other of them bereft of his senses. At last, he said, "Yes, Hiram. "

"Fifth, to my brothers, Jacob and Ezra, four hundred dollars each, "continued Hiram, in his same voice of repeating by rote, "and to mysister Prudence, five thousand dollars--so fixed that her husband can'ttouch it. "

"Yes, " said Torrey. 

"Sixth, the rest of my estate to be made into a trust, with CharlesWhitney and Mark Hargrave and Hampden Scarborough trustees, with power toselect their successors. The trust to be administered for the benefit ofTecumseh University under the plan you have there. "

Torrey half-rose from his chair, his usually calm features reflecting hisinner contention of grief, alarm, and protest. But there was in Hiram'sface that which made him sink back without having spoken. 

"Seventh, " continued Hiram, "the mills and the cooperage to be continuedas now, and not to be sold for at least fifteen years. If my son Arthurwishes to have employment in them, he is to have it at the proper wagesfor the work he does. If at the end of fifteen years he wishes to buythem, he to have the right to buy, that is, my controlling interest inthem, provided he can make a cash payment of ten per cent of the thenvalue; and, if he can do that, he is to have ten years in which tocomplete the payment--or longer, if the trustees think it wise. "

A long pause; Hiram seemed slowly to relax and collapse like a manstretched on the rack, who ceases to suffer either because the torture isended or because his nerves mercifully refuse to register any more pain. "That is all, " he said wearily. 

Torrey wiped his glasses, put them on, wiped them again, hung them on thehook attached to the lapel of his waistcoat, put them on, studied thepaper, then said hesitatingly: "As one of your oldest friends, Hiram, andin view of the surprising nature of the--the--"

"I do not wish to discuss it, " interrupted Hiram, with that grufffinality of manner which he always used to hide his softness, and whichdeceived everyone, often even his wife. "Come back at five o'clock withtwo witnesses. "

Torrey rose, his body shifting with his shifting mind as he cast aboutfor an excuse for lingering. "Very well, Hiram, " he finally said. As heshook hands, he blurted out huskily, "The boy's a fine young fellow, Hi. It don't seem right to disgrace him by cutting him off this way. "

Hiram winced. "Wait a minute, " he said. He had been overlooking thepublic--how the town would gossip and insinuate. "Put in this, Torrey, "he resumed after reflecting. And deliberately, with long pauses toconstruct the phrases, he dictated: "I make this disposal of my estatethrough my love for my children, and because I have firm belief in thesoundness of their character and in their capacity to do and to be. Ifeel they will be better off without the wealth which would tempt my sonto relax his efforts to make a useful man of himself and would cause mydaughter to be sought for her fortune instead of for herself. "

"That may quiet gossip against your children, " said Torrey, when he hadtaken down Hiram's slowly enunciated words, "but it does not change theextraordinary character of the will. "

"John, " said Hiram, "can you think of a single instance in whichinherited wealth has been a benefit, a single case where a man has becomemore of a man than he would if he hadn't had it?"

Hiram waited long. Torrey finally said: "That may be, but--" But what?Torrey did not know, and so came to a full stop. 

"I've been trying for weeks to think of one, " continued Hiram, "andwhenever I thought I'd found one, I'd see, on looking at all the facts, that it only _seemed_ to be so. And I recalled nearly a hundred instancesright here in Saint X where big inheritances or little had been ruinous. "

"I have never thought on this aspect of the matter before, " said Torrey. "But to bring children up in the expectation of wealth, and then to leavethem practically nothing, looks to me like--like cheating them. "

"It does, John, " Hiram answered. "I've pushed my boy and my girl faralong the broad way that leads to destruction. I must take theconsequences. But God won't let me divide the punishment for my sins withthem. I see my duty clear. I must do it. Bring the will at five o'clock. "

Hiram's eyes were closed; his voice sounded to Torrey as if it were theutterance of a mind far, far away--as far away as that other world whichhad seemed vividly real to Hiram all his life; it seemed real and near toTorrey, looking into his old friend's face. "The power that's guidinghim, " Torrey said to himself, "is one I daren't dispute with. " And hewent away with noiseless step and with head reverently bent. 

CHAPTER VI

MRS. WHITNEY NEGOTIATES

The Rangers' neighbors saw the visits of Hargrave and Torrey. Immediatelya rumor of a bequest to Tecumseh was racing through the town and up theBluffs and through the fashionable suburb. It arrived at Point Helen, theseat of the Whitneys, within an hour after Torrey left Ranger. It hadaccumulated confirmatory detail by that time--the bequest was large; wasvery large; was half his fortune--and the rest of the estate was to go tothe college should Arthur and Adelaide die childless. 

Mrs. Whitney lost no time. At half-past four she was seated in the samechair in which Hargrave and Torrey had sat. It was not difficult to bringup the subject of the two marriages, which were doubly to unite thehouses and fortunes of Ranger and Whitney--the marriages of Arthur andJanet, of Ross and Adelaide. "And, of course, " said Mrs. Whitney, "we allwant the young people started right. I don't believe children ought tofeel dependent on their parents. It seems to me that puts filial andparental love on a very low plane. Don't you think so?"

"Yes, " said Hiram. 

"The young people ought to feel that their financial position is secure. And, as you and Ellen and Charles and I have lived for our children, havetoiled to raise them above the sordid cares and anxieties of life, weought to complete our work now and make them--happy. "

Hiram did not speak, though she gave him ample time. 

"So, " pursued Mrs. Whitney, "I thought I wouldn't put off any longertalking about what Charles and I have had in mind some months. Ross andJanet will soon be here, and I know all four of the children are anxiousto have the engagements formally completed. "

"Completed?" said Hiram. 

"Yes, " reaffirmed Matilda. "Of course they can't be completed until weparents have done our share. You and Ellen want to know that Arthur andAdelaide won't be at the mercy of any reverse in business Charles mighthave--or of any caprice which might influence him in making his will. AndCharles and I want to feel the same way as to our Ross and Janet. "

"Yes, " said Hiram. "I see. " A smile of stern irony roused his featuresfrom their repose into an expressiveness that made Mrs. Whitneyexceedingly uncomfortable--but the more resolute. 

"Charles is willing to be liberal both in immediate settlement and inbinding himself in the matter of his will, " she went on. "He often says, 'I don't want my children to be impatient for me to die. I want to make'em feel they're getting, if anything, more because I'm alive. '"

A long pause, then Hiram said: "That's one way of looking at it. "

"That's _your_ way, " said Matilda, as if the matter were settled. Andshe smiled her softest and sweetest. But Hiram saw only the glitter inher cold brown eyes, a glitter as hard as the sheen of herhenna-stained hair. 

"No, " said he emphatically, "that's _not_ my way. That's the broad andeasy way that leads to destruction. Ellen and I, " he went on, hisexcitement showing only in his lapses into dialect, "we hain't workedall our lives so that our children'll be shiftless idlers, settin''round, polishin' their fingernails, and thinkin' up foolishness andbreedin' fools. "

Matilda had always known that Hiram and Ellen were hopelessly vulgar; butshe had thought they cherished a secret admiration for the "higherthings" beyond their reach, and were resolved that their son should be agentleman and their daughter a lady. She found in Hiram's energeticbitterness nothing to cause her to change her view. "He simply wants tohold on to his property to the last, and play the tyrant, " she said toherself. "All people of property naturally feel that way. " And she heldsteadily to her programme. "Well, Hiram, " she proceeded tranquilly, "ifthose marriages are to take place, Charles and I will expect you to meetus halfway. "

"If Ross and my Delia and Arthur and your Jane are fond of each other, let 'em marry as you and Charles, as Ellen and I married. I ain't buyin'your son, nor sellin' my daughter. That's my last word, Tillie. "

On impulse, he pressed the electric button in the wall behind him. When the new upstairs girl came, he said: "Tell the children I wantto see 'em. "

Arthur and Adelaide presently came, flushed with the exercise of thetennis the girl had interrupted. 

"Mrs. Whitney, here, " said Hiram, "tells me her children won't marrywithout settlements, as it's called. And I've been tellin' her that myson and daughter ain't buyin' and sellin'. "

Mrs. Whitney hid her fury. "Your father has a quaint way of expressinghimself, " she said, laughing elegantly. "I've simply been trying topersuade him to do as much toward securing the future of you two as Mr. Whitney is willing to do. Don't be absurd, Hiram. You know better than totalk that way. "

Hiram looked steadily at her. "You've been travelin' about, 'Tilda, "he said, "gettin' together a lot of newfangled notions. Ellen and Iand our children stick to the old way. " And he looked at Arthur, thenat Adelaide. 

Their faces gave him a twinge at the heart. "Speak up!" he said. "Do youor do you not stick to the old way?"

"I can't talk about it, father, " was Adelaide's evasive answer, her facescarlet and her eyes down. 

"And you, sir?" said Hiram to his son. 

"You'll have to excuse me, sir, " replied Arthur coldly. 

Hiram winced before Mrs. Whitney's triumphant glance. He leaned forwardand, looking at his daughter, said: "Del, would you marry a man whowouldn't take you unless you brought him a fortune?"

"No, father, " Adelaide answered. She was meeting his gaze now. "But, atthe same time, I'd rather not be dependent on my husband. "

"Do you think your mother is dependent on me?"

"That's different, " said Adelaide, after a pause. 

"How?" asked Hiram. 

Adelaide did not answer, could not answer. To answer honestly would beto confess that which had been troubling her greatly of late--thefeeling that there was something profoundly unsatisfactory in therelations between Ross and herself; that what he was giving her wasdifferent not only in degree but even in kind from what she wanted, orought to want, from what she was trying to give him, or thought sheought to try to give him. 

"And you, Arthur?" asked Hiram in the same solemn, appealing tone. 

"I should not ask Janet to marry me unless I was sure I could support herin the manner to which she is accustomed, " said Arthur. "I certainlyshouldn't wish to be dependent upon her. "

"Then, your notion of marrying is that people get married for aliving, for luxury. I suppose you'd expect her to leave you if youlost your money?"

"That's different, " said Arthur, restraining the impulse to reason withhis illogical father whose antiquated sentimentalism was as unfitted tothe new conditions of American life as were his ideas about work. 

"You see, Hiram, " said Mrs. Whitney, good-humoredly, "your childrenoutvote you. "

The master workman brought his fist down on the arm of his chair--not agesture of violence, but of dignity and power. "I don't stand for thenotion that marriage is living in luxury and lolling in carriages andshowing off before strangers. I told you what my last word was, Matilda. "

Mrs. Whitney debated with herself full half a minute before shespoke. In a tone that betrayed her all but departed hope of changinghim, she said: "It is a great shock to me to have you even pretend tobe so heartless--to talk of breaking these young people's hearts--justfor a notion. "

"It's better to break their hearts before marriage, " replied Hiram, "thanto let them break their lives, and their hearts, too, on such marriages. The girl that wants my son only if he has money to enable her to make afool of herself, ain't fit to be a wife--and a mother. As for Del andRoss--The man that looks at what a woman _has_ will never look at whatshe _is_--and my daughter's well rid of him. "

A painful silence, then Mrs. Whitney rose. "If I hadn't suspected, Hiram, that you intended to cheat your children out of their rights in order toget a reputation as a philanthropist, I'd not have brought this matter upat this time. I see my instincts didn't mislead me. But I don't give uphope. I've known you too many years, Hiram Ranger, not to know that yourheart is in the right place. And, after you think it over, you will giveup this wicked--yes, wicked--plan old Doctor Hargrave has taken advantageof your sickness to wheedle you into. "

Hiram, his face and hands like yellow wax, made no answer. Arthur andAdelaide followed Mrs. Whitney from the room. "Thank you, Mrs. Whitney, "said Arthur, gratefully, when they were out of his father's hearing. "Idon't know what has come over him of late. He has gone back to hischildhood and under the spell of the ideas that seemed, and no doubtwere, right then. I believe you have set him to thinking. He's the bestfather in the world when he is well and can see things clearly. "

Mrs. Whitney was not so sanguine, but she concealed it. She appreciatedwhat was troubling Hiram. While she encouraged her own son, her Ross, tobe a "gentleman, " she had enough of the American left to see the flaws inthat new ideal of hers--when looking at another woman's son. And thesuperciliousness which delighted her in Ross, irritated her in Arthur;for, in him, it seemed a sneering reflection upon the humble andtoilsome beginnings of Charles and herself. She believed--not withoutreason--that, under Ross's glossy veneer of gentleman, there was a shrewdand calculating nature; it, she thought, would not permit the gentlemanto make mess of those matters, which, coarse and sordid though they were, still must be looked after sharply if the gentleman was to be kept going. But she was, not unnaturally, completely taken in by Arthur's similargame, the more easily as Arthur put into it an intensity of energy whichRoss had not. She therefore thought Arthur as unpractical as he sofashionably professed, thought he accepted without reservation "ourset's" pretenses of aristocracy for appearance's sake. "Of course, yourfather'll come round, " she said, friendly but not cordial. "All that'snecessary is that you and Adelaide use a little tact. "

And she was in her victoria and away, a very grand-looking lady, indeed, with two in spick and span summer livery on the box, with her exquisitewhite and gold sunshade, a huge sapphire in the end of the handle, astring of diamonds worth a small fortune round her neck, a gold bag, studded with diamonds, in her lap, and her superb figure clad in aclose-fitting white cloth dress. In the gates she swept past Torrey andhis two clerks accompanying him as witnesses. She understood; her facewas anything but an index to her thoughts as she bowed and smiledgraciously in response to the old judge's salutation. 

 * * * * *

Torrey read the will to Hiram slowly, pausing after each paragraph forsign of approval or criticism. But Hiram gave no more indication of histhought, by word or expression or motion, than if he had been a seatedstatue. The reading came to an end, but neither man spoke. The choir ofbirds, assembled in the great trees round the house, flooded the roomwith their evening melody. At last, Hiram said: "Please move that tablein front of me. "

Torrey put the table before him, laid the will upon it ready forthe signing. 

Hiram took a pen; Torrey went to the door and brought in the two clerkswaiting in the hall. The three men stood watching while Hiram's eyesslowly read each word of the will. He dipped the pen and, with a handthat trembled in spite of all his obvious efforts to steady it, wrote hisname on the line to which Torrey silently pointed. The clerks signed aswitnesses. 

"Thank you, " said Hiram. "You had better take it with you, judge. "

"Very well, " said Torrey, tears in his eyes, a quaver in his voice. 

A few seconds and Hiram was alone staring down at the surface of thetable, where he could still see and read the will. His conscience toldhim he had "put his house in order"; but he felt as if he had set fire toit with his family locked within, and was watching it and them burn toashes, was hearing their death cries and their curses upon him. 

 * * * * *

The two young people, chilled by Mrs. Whitney's manner, flawless thoughit was, apparently, had watched with sinking hearts the disappearance ofher glittering chariot and her glistening steeds. Then they had gone intothe garden before Torrey and the clerks arrived. And they sat therethinking each his own kind of melancholy thoughts. 

"What did she mean by that remark about Doctor Hargrave?" asked Arthur, after some minutes of this heavy silence. 

"I don't know, " said Adelaide. 

"We must get mother to go at father, " Arthur continued. 

Adelaide made no answer. 

Arthur looked at her irritably. "What are you thinking about, Del?"he demanded. 

"I don't like Mrs. Whitney. Do you?"

"Oh, she's a good enough imitation of the real thing, " said Arthur. "Youcan't expect a lady in the first generation. "

Adelaide's color slowly mounted. "You don't mean that, " said she. 

He frowned and retorted angrily: "There's a great deal of truth thatwe don't like. Why do you always get mad at me for saying what weboth think?"

"I admit it's foolish and wrong of me, " said she; "but I can't help it. And if I get half-angry with you, I get wholly angry with myself forbeing contemptible enough to think those things. Don't you get angry atyourself for thinking them?"

Arthur laughed mirthlessly--an admission. 

"We and father can't both be right, " she pursued. "I suppose we're bothpartly right and partly wrong--that's usually the way it is. But I can'tmake up my mind just where he begins to be wrong. "

"Why not admit he's right through and through, and be done with it?"cried Arthur impatiently. "Why not tell him so, and square yourselfwith him?"

Adelaide, too hurt to venture speech, turned away. She lingered a whilein the library; on her way down the hall to ascend to her own room shelooked in at her father. There he sat so still that but for the regularrise and fall of his chest she would have thought him dead. "He'sasleep, " she murmured, the tears standing in her eyes and raining in herheart. Her mother she could judge impartially; her mother's disregard ofthe changes which had come to assume so much importance in her own andArthur's lives often made her wince. But the same disregard in a man didnot offend her; it had the reverse effect. It seemed to her, to the womanin her, the fitting roughness of the colossal statue. "That's a _man_!"she now said to herself proudly, as she gazed at him. 

His eyes opened and fixed upon her in a look so agonized, that sheleaned, faint, against the door jamb. "What is it, father?" she gasped. 

He did not answer--did not move--sat rigidly on, with that expressionunchanging, as if it had been fixed there by the sculptor who had madethe statue. She tried to go to him, but at the very thought she wasoverwhelmed by such fear as she had not had since she, a child, lay inher little bed in the dark, too terrified by the phantoms that beset herto cry out or to move. "Father! What is it?" she repeated, then wheeledand fled along the hall crying: "Mother! Mother!"

Ellen came hurrying down the stairs. 

"It's father!" cried Adelaide. 

Together they went into the back parlor. He was still motionless, withthat same frozen yet fiery expression. They went to him, tried to lifthim. Ellen dropped the lifeless arm, turned to her daughter. And Adelaidesaw into her mother's inmost heart, saw the tragic lift of one of thosetremendous emotions, which, by their very coming into a human soul, giveit the majesty and the mystery of the divine. 

"Telephone for Dr. Schulze, " she commanded; then, as Adelaide sped, shesaid tenderly to her husband: "Where is the pain? What can I do?"

But he did not answer. And if he could have answered, what could she havedone? The pain was in his heart, was the burning agony of remorse forhaving done that which he still believed to be right, that which he nowthought he would give his soul's salvation for the chance to undo. For, as the paralysis began to lock his body fast in its vise, the awfulthought had for the first time come to him: "When my children know what Ihave done they will _hate_ me! They will hate me all their lives. "

Dr. Schulze examined him. "Somewhat sooner than I expected, " he muttered. 

"How long will it last?" said Ellen. 

"Some time--several weeks--months--perhaps. " He would let her learngradually that the paralysis would not relax its grip until it had bornehim into the eternal prison and had handed him over to the jailer whomakes no deliveries. 

CHAPTER VII

JILTED

Mrs. Ranger consented to a third girl, to do the additional heavy work;but a nurse--no! What had Hiram a wife for, and a daughter, and a son, ifnot to take care of him? What kind of heartlessness was this, to talk ofpermitting a stranger to do the most sacred offices of love? And only bybeing on the watch early and late did Adelaide and Arthur prevent herdoing everything for him herself. 

"Everybody, nowadays, has trained nurses in these cases, " said Dr. Schulze. "I don't think you ought to object to the expense. "

But the crafty taunt left her as indifferent as did the argument fromwhat "everybody does. "

"I don't make rules for others, " replied she. "I only say that nobodyshall touch Hiram but us of his own blood. I won't hear to it, and thechildren won't hear to it. They're glad to have the chance to do a littlesomething for him that has done everything for them. "

The children thus had no opportunity to say whether they would "hear toit" or not. But Arthur privately suggested to Adelaide that she oughtto try to persuade her mother. "It will make her ill, all this extrawork, " said he. 

"Not so quickly as having some one about interfering with her, "replied Adelaide. 

"Then, too, it _looks_ so bad--so stingy and--and--old-fashioned, " hepersisted. 

"Not from mother's point of view, " said Adelaide quietly. 

Arthur flushed. "Always putting me in the wrong, " he sneered. Then, instantly ashamed of this injustice, he went on in a different tone, "Isuppose this sort of thing appeals to the romantic strain in you. "

"And in mother, " said Del. 

Whereupon they both smiled. Romantic was about the last word anyone wouldthink of in connection with frankly practical Ellen Ranger. She wouldhave died without hesitation, or lived in torment, for those she loved;but she would have done it in the finest, most matter-of-fact way in theworld, and without a gleam of self-conscious heroics, whether of boastingor of martyr-meekness or of any other device for signaling attention tooneself. Indeed, it would not have occurred to her that she was doinganything out of the ordinary. Nor, for that matter, would she have been;for, in this world the unheroic are, more often than not, heroes, and theheroic usually most unheroic. We pass heroism by to toss our silly capsat heroics. 

"There are some things, Artie, our education has been taking out of us, "continued Del, "that I don't believe we're the better for losing. I'vebeen thinking of those things a good deal lately, and I've come to theconclusion that there really is a rotten streak in what we've beengetting there in the East--you at Harvard, I at Mrs. Spenser's SelectSchool for Young Ladies. There are ways in which mother and father arebetter educated than we. "

"It does irritate me, " admitted Arthur, "to find myself caring so muchabout the _looks_ of things. "

"Especially, " said Adelaide, "when the people whose opinion we are afraidof are so contemptibly selfish and snobbish. "

"Still mother and father are narrow-minded, " insisted her brother. 

"Isn't everybody, about people who don't think as they do?"

"I've not the remotest objection to their having their own views, " saidArthur loftily, "so long as they don't try to enforce those views on me. "

"But do they? Haven't we been let do about as we please?"

Arthur shrugged his shoulders. The discussion had led up to propertyagain--to whether or not his father had the right to do as he pleasedwith his own. And upon that discussion he did not wish to reenter. He hadnot a doubt of the justice of his own views; but, somehow, to state themmade him seem sordid and mercenary, even to himself. Being reallyconcerned for his mother's health, as well as about "looks, " he stronglyurged the doctor to issue orders on the subject of a nurse. "If youdemand it, mother'll yield, " he said. 

"But I shan't, young man, " replied Schulze curtly and with a conclusivesqueezing together of his homely features. "Your mother is right. Shegives your father what money can't buy and skill can't replace, what hasoften raised the as-good-as-dead. Some day, maybe, you'll find out whatthat is. You think you know now, but you don't. " And there the matterrested. 

The large room adjoining Hiram and Ellen's bedroom was made over into asitting room. The first morning on which he could be taken from his bedand partially dressed, Mrs. Ranger called in both the children to assisther. The three tried to conceal their feelings as they, not withoutphysical difficulty, lifted that helpless form to the invalid's chairwhich Ellen wheeled close to the bedside. She herself wheeled him intothe adjoining room, to the window, with strands of ivy waving in and outin the gentle breeze, with the sun bright and the birds singing, and allthe world warm and vivid and gay. Hiram's cheeks were wet with tears;they saw some tremendous emotion surging up in him. He looked at Arthur, at Adelaide, back to Arthur. Evidently he was trying to saysomething--something which he felt must be said. His right arm trembled, made several convulsive twitches, finally succeeded in lifting his righthand the few inches to the arm of the chair. 

"What is it, father?" said Ellen. 

"Yes--yes--yes, " burst from him in thick, straining utterances. "Yes--yes--yes. "

Mrs. Ranger wiped her eyes. "He is silent for hours, " she said; "then heseems to want to say something. But when he speaks, it's only as justnow. He says 'Yes--yes--yes' over and over again until his strengthgives out. "

The bursting of the blood vessels in his brain had torn out the nerveconnection between the seat of power of speech and the vocal organs. Hecould think clearly, could put his thoughts into the necessary words; butwhen his will sent what he wished to say along his nerves toward thevocal organs, it encountered that gap, and could not cross it. 

What did he wish to say? What was the message that could not get through, though he was putting his whole soul into it? At first he would beginagain the struggle to speak, as soon as he had recovered from the lasteffort and failure; then the idea came to him that if he would hoardstrength, he might gather enough to force a passage for the words--for hedid not realize that the connection was broken, and broken forever. So, he would wait, at first for several hours, later for several days; and, when he thought himself strong enough or could no longer refrain, hewould try to burst the bonds which seemed to be holding him. With hischildren, or his wife and children, watching him with agonized faces, hewould make a struggle so violent, so resolute, that even that dead bodywas galvanized into a ghastly distortion of tortured life. Always invain; always the same collapse of despair and exhaustion; the chasmbetween thought and speech could not be bridged. They brought everythingthey could think of his possibly wanting; they brought to his roomeveryone with whom he had ever had any sort of more than casualrelations--Torrey, among scores of others. But he viewed each object andeach person with the same awful despairing look, his immobile lips givingmuffled passage to that eternal "Yes! Yes! Yes!" And at last they decidedthey were mistaken, that it was no particular thing he wanted, but onlythe natural fierce desire to break through those prison walls, invisible, translucent, intangible, worse than death. 

 * * * * *

Sorrow and anxiety and care pressed so heavily and so unceasingly uponthat household for several weeks that there was no time for, no thoughtof, anything but Hiram. Finally, however, the law of routine mercifullyreasserted itself; their lives, in habit and in thought, readjusted, conformed to the new conditions, as human lives will, however chaotic hasbeen the havoc that demolished the old routine. Then Adelaide took fromher writing desk Ross's letters, which she had glanced at rather thanread as they came; when she finished the rereading, or reading, she wasnot only as unsatisfied as when she began, but puzzled, to boot--andpuzzled that she was puzzled. She read them again--it did not take long, for they were brief; even the first letter after he heard of her father'sillness filled only the four sides of one sheet, and was written largeand loose. "He has sent short letters, " said she, "because he did notwant to trouble me with long ones at this time. " But, though this excusewas as plausible as most of those we invent to assist us to believe whatwe want to believe, it did not quite banish a certain hollow, hungryfeeling, a sense of distaste for such food as the letters did provide. She was not experienced enough to know that the expression of thecountenance of a letter is telltale beyond the expression of thecountenance of its writer; that the face may be controlled to lie, butnever yet were satisfying and fully deceptive lies told upon paper. Without being conscious of the action of the sly, subconscious instinctwhich prompted it, she began to revolve her friend, Theresa Howland, whose house party Ross was honoring with such an extraordinarily longlingering. "I hope Theresa is seeing that he has a good time, " she said. "I suppose he thinks as he says--that he'd only be in the way here. That's a man's view! It's selfish, but who isn't selfish?"

Thus, without her being in the least aware of the process, her mind waspreparing her for what was about to happen. It is a poor mind, or poorlyserved by its subconscious half, that is taken wholly by surprise by anyblow. There are always forewarnings; and while the surface mindhabitually refuses to note them, though they be clear as sunsetsilhouettes, the subconscious mind is not so stupid--so blind under thesweet spells of that arch-enchanter, vanity. 

At last Ross came, but without sending Adelaide word. His telegram to hismother gave just time for a trap to meet him at the station. As he wasascending the broad, stone approaches of the main entrance to the houseat Point Helen, she appeared in the doorway, her face really beautifulwith mother-pride. For Janet she cared as it is the duty of parent tocare for child; Ross she loved. It was not mere maternal imagination thatmade her so proud of him; he was a distinguished and attractive figure ofthe kind that dominates the crowds at football games, polo and tennismatches, summer resort dances, and all those events which gather togetherthe youth of our prosperous classes. Of the medium height, with a stronglook about the shoulders, with sufficiently, though not aggressively, positive features and a clear skin, with gray-green eyes, good teeth, anda pleasing expression, he had an excellent natural basis on which tobuild himself into a particularly engaging and plausible type offashionable gentleman. He was in traveling tweeds of pronounced plaidwhich, however, he carried off without vulgarity. His trousers wererolled high, after the fashion of the day, to show dark red socks of thesame color as his tie and of a shade harmonious to the stripe in thepattern of shirt and suit and to the stones in his cuff links. He lookedclean, with the cleanness of a tree after the measureless drenching of astorm; he had a careless, easy air, which completely concealed hisassiduous and self-complacent self-consciousness. He embraced his motherwith enthusiasm. 

"How well you look!" he exclaimed; then, with a glance round, "How well_everything_ looks!"

His mother held tightly to his arm as they went into the house; sheseemed elder sister rather than mother, and he delighted her bytelling her so--omitting the qualifying adjective before the sister. "But you're not a bit glad to see me, " he went on. "I believe you don'twant me to come. "

"I'm just a little cross with you for not answering my letters, "replied she. 

"How is Del?" he asked, and for an instant he looked embarrassed andcuriously ashamed of himself. 

"Adelaide is very well, " was her reply in a constrained voice. 

"I couldn't stay away any longer, " said he. "It was tiresome up atWindrift. "

He saw her disappointment, and a smile flitted over his face whichreturned and remained when she said: "I thought you were finding TheresaHowland interesting. "

"Oh, you did?" was his smiling reply. "And why?"

"Then you have come because you were bored?" she said, evading. 

"And to see you and Adelaide. I must telephone her right away. "

It seemed to be secretly amusing him to note how downcast she was bythis enthusiasm for Adelaide. "I shouldn't be too eager, " counseledshe. "A man ought never to show eagerness with a woman. Let the womenmake the advances, Ross. They'll do it fast enough--when they find thatthey must. "

"Not the young ones, " said Ross. "Especially not those that have choiceof many men. "

"But no woman has choice of many men, " replied she. "She wants the best, and when _you're_ in her horizon, you're the best, always. "

Ross, being in the privacy of his own family, gave himself the pleasureof showing that he rather thought so himself. But he said: "Nonsense. IfI listened to your partiality, I'd be making a fearful ass of myself mostof the time. "

"Well--don't let Adelaide see that you're eager, " persisted hismother subtly. "She's very good-looking and knows it and I'm afraidshe's getting an exaggerated notion of her own value. She feels _so_certain of you. "

"Of course she does, " said Ross, and his mother saw that he was unmovedby her adroit thrust at his vanity. 

"It isn't in human nature to value what one feels sure of. "

"But she _is_ sure of me, " said Ross, and while he spoke withemphasis, neither his tone nor his look was quite sincere. "We'reengaged, you know. "

"A boy and girl affair. But nothing really settled. "

"I've given my word and so has she. "

Mrs. Whitney had difficulty in not looking as disapproving as she felt. A high sense of honor had been part of her wordy training of herchildren; but she had relied--she hoped, not in vain--upon their commonsense to teach them to reconcile and adjust honor to the exigencies ofpractical life. "That's right, dear, " said she. "A man or a woman can'tbe too honorable. Still, I should not wish you to make her and yourselfunhappy. And I know both of you would be unhappy if, by marrying, youwere to spoil each other's careers. And your father would not be ableto allow or to leave you enough to maintain an establishment such asI've set my heart on seeing you have. Mr. Ranger has been acting verystrange of late--almost insane, I'd say. " Her tone became constrainedas if she were trying to convey more than she dared put into words. "Ifeel even surer than when I wrote you, that he's leaving a large partof his fortune to Tecumseh College. " And she related--with judiciousomissions and embroideries--her last talk with Hiram, and the eventsthat centered about it. 

Ross retained the impassive expression he had been cultivating ever sincehe read in English "high life" novels descriptions of the bearing of menof the "_haut monde_. " "That's of no consequence, " was his comment, in atone of indifference. "I'm not marrying Del for her money. "

"Don't throw yourself away, Ross, " said she, much disquieted. "I feelsure you've been brought up too sensibly to do anything reckless. Atleast, be careful how you commit yourself until you are sure. In ourstation people have to think of a great many things before they think ofanything so uncertain and so more or less fanciful as love. Rest assured, Adelaide is thinking of those things. Don't be less wise than she. "

He changed the subject, and would not go back to it; and after a fewminutes he telephoned Adelaide, ordered a cart, and set out to take herfor a drive. Mrs. Whitney watched him depart with a heavy heart and sopiteous a face that Ross was moved almost to the point of confiding inher what he was pretending not to admit to himself. "Ross is sensiblebeyond his years, " she said to herself sadly, "but youth is _so_romantic. It never can see beyond the marriage ceremony. "

Adelaide, with as much haste as was compatible with the demands of soimportant an occasion, was getting into a suitable costume. Suddenly shelaid aside the hat she had selected from among several that were what theFifth Avenue milliners call the "_dernier cri_. " "No, I'll not go!" sheexclaimed. 

Ever since her father was stricken she had stayed near him. Ellen had hiscomfort and the household to look after, and besides was not good atinitiating conversation and carrying it on alone; Arthur's tongue wasparalyzed in his father's presence by his being unable for an instant toforget there what had occurred between them. So Del had borne practicallythe whole burden of filling the dreary, dragging hours for him--who couldnot speak, could not even show whether he understood or not. He had neverbeen easy to talk to; now, when she could not tell but that what she saidjarred upon a sick and inflamed soul, aggravating his torture byreminding him of things he longed to know yet could not inquire about, tantalizing him with suggestions--She dared not let her thoughts go farin that direction; it would soon have been impossible to send him anymessage beyond despairing looks. 

Sometimes she kissed him. She knew he was separated from her as by aheavy, grated prison door, and was unable to feel the electric thrillof touch; yet she thought he must get some joy out of the sight ofthe dumb show of caress. Again, she would give up trying to lookcheerful, and would weep--and let him see her weep, having an instinctthat he understood what a relief tears were to her, and that she lethim see them to make him feel her loving sympathy. Again, she would beso wrought upon by the steady agony of those fixed eyes that she wouldleave him abruptly to hide herself and shudder, tearless, at the uttermisery and hopelessness of it all. She wondered at her mother's calmuntil she noticed, after a few weeks, how the face was withering withthat shriveling which comes from within when a living thing is dyingat the core. 

She read the Bible to him, selecting consolatory passage with the aid ofa concordance, in the evenings after he had been lifted into bed for thenight. She was filled with protest as she read; for it seemed to her thatthis good man, her best of fathers, thus savagely and causelesslystricken, was proof before her eyes that the sentences executed againstmen were not divine, but the devilish emanations of brute chance. "Theremay be a devil, " she said to herself, frightened at her own blasphemy, "but there certainly is no God. " Again, the Bible's promises, soconfident, so lofty, so marvelously responsive to the longings andcravings of every kind of desolation and woe, had a soothing effect uponher; and they helped to put her in the frame of mind to find forconversation--or, rather, for her monologues to him--subjects which herinstinct told her would be welcome visitors in that prison. 

She talked to him of how he was loved, of how noble his influence hadbeen in their lives. She analyzed him to himself, saying things she wouldnever have dared say had there been the slightest chance of so muchresponse as the flutter of an eyelid. And as, so it seemed to her, thesympathetic relations and understanding between them grew, she becamefranker, talked of her aspirations--new-born aspirations in harmony withhis life and belief. And, explaining herself for his benefit and bringingto light her inmost being to show to him, she saw it herself. And whenshe one day said to him, "Your illness has made a better woman of me, father, dear father, " she felt it with all her heart. 

It was from this atmosphere, and enveloped in it, that she went out togreet Ross; and, as she went, she was surprised at her own calmnessbefore the prospect of seeing him again, after six months'separation--the longest in their lives. 

His expression was scrupulously correct--joy at seeing her shadowed bysympathy for her calamity. When they were safely alone, he took her handand was about to kiss her. Her beauty was of the kind that is differentfrom, and beyond, memory's best photograph. She never looked exactly thesame twice; that morning she seemed to him far more tempting than he hadbeen thinking, with his head for so many weeks full of worldly ideas. Hewas thrilled anew, and his resolve hesitated before the fine pallor ofher face, the slim lines of her figure, and the glimpses of her smoothwhite skin through the openwork in the yoke and sleeves of her blouse. But, instead of responding she drew back, just a little. He instantlysuspected her of being in the state of mind into which he had been tryingto get himself. He dropped her hand. A trifling incident, but a trifle isenough to cut the communications between two human beings; it oftenaccomplishes what the rudest shocks would not. They went to the far, secluded end of the garden, he asking and she answering questions abouther father. 

"What is it, Del?" he said abruptly, at length. "You act strained towardme. " He did not say this until she had been oppressed almost into silenceby the height and the thickness of the barrier between them. 

"I guess it's because I've been shut in with father, " she suggested. "I've seen no one to talk to, except the family and the doctor, forweeks. " And she tried to fix her mind on how handsome and attractive hewas. As a rebuke to her heart's obstinate lukewarmness she forced herselfto lay her hand in his. 

He held it loosely. Her making this slight overture was enough torestore his sense of superiority; his resolve grew less unsteady. "It'sthe first time, " he went on, "that we've really had the chance to judgehow we actually feel toward each other--that's what's the matter. " Hisface--he was not looking at her--took on an expression of sad reproach. "Del, I don't believe you--care. You've found it out, and don't want tohurt my feelings by telling me. " And he believed what he was saying. Itmight have been--well, not quite right, for him to chill toward her andcontemplate breaking the engagement, but that she should have been doingthe same thing--his vanity was erect to the last feather. "It's most kindof you to think so considerately of me, " he said satirically. 

She took her hand away. "And you?" she replied coldly. "Are yourfeelings changed?"

"I--oh, you know I love you, " was his answer in a deliberatelycareless tone. 

She laughed with an attempt at raillery. "You've been too long up atWindrift--you've been seeing too much of Theresa Howland, " said she, merely for something to say; for Theresa was neither clever nor pretty, and Del hadn't it in her to suspect him of being mercenary. 

He looked coldly at her. "I have never interfered with your manyattentions from other men, " said he stiffly. "On the contrary, I haveencouraged you to enjoy yourself, and I thought you left me free in thesame way. "

The tears came to her eyes; and he saw, and proceeded to value still lesshighly that which was obviously so securely his. 

"Whatever is the matter with you, Ross, this morning?" she cried. "Or isit I? Am I--"

"It certainly is not I, " he interrupted icily. "I see you again after sixmonths, and I find you changed completely. "

A glance from her stopped him. "Oh!" she exclaimed, with a dangeroussmile. "You are out of humor this morning and are seeking a quarrel. "

"That would be impossible, " he retorted. "_I_ never quarrel. Evidentlyyou have forgotten all about me. "

Her pride would not let her refuse the challenge, convert in his words, frank in his eyes. 

"Possibly, " mocked she, forcing herself to look amusedly at him. "I don'tbother much about people I don't see. "

"You take a light view of our engagement, " was his instant move. 

"I should take a still lighter view, " retorted she, "if I thought the wayyou're acting was a fair specimen of your real self. "

This from Adelaide, who had always theretofore shared in his almostreverent respect for himself. Adelaide _judging_ him, criticising _him_!All Ross's male instinct for unquestioning approval from the female wasastir. "You wish to break our engagement?" he inquired, with a glance ofcold anger that stiffened her pride and suppressed her impulse to try togain time. 

"You're free, " said she, and her manner so piqued him, that to nervehimself to persist he had to think hard on the magnificence of Windriftand the many Howland millions and the rumored Ranger will. She, in aseries of jerks and pauses, took off the ring; with an expression and agesture that gave no further hint of how she had valued it, both for itsown beauty and for what it represented, she handed it to him. "If that'sall, " she went on, "I'll go back to father. " To perfect her pretense, sheshould have risen, shaken hands cheerfully with him, and sent himcarelessly away. She knew it; but she could not. 

He was not the man to fail to note that she made no move to rise, or tofail to read the slightly strained expression in her eyes and about thecorners of her mouth. That betrayal lost Adelaide a triumph; for, seeingher again, feeling her beauty and her charm in all his senses, remindedof her superiority in brains and in taste to the women from whom he mightchoose, he was making a losing fight for the worldly wise course. "Anyhow, I must tame her a bit, " he reflected, now that he was sure shewould be his, should he find on further consideration that he wanted herrather than Theresa's fortune. He accordingly took his hat, drew himselfup, bowed coldly. 

"Good morning, " he said. And he was off, down the drive--to the lower endwhere the stableboy was guarding his trap--he was seated--he was drivingaway--he was gone--_gone_!

She did not move until he was no longer in sight. Then she rushed intothe house, darted up to her room, locked herself in and gave way. It wasthe first serious quarrel she had ever had with him; it was so littlelike a quarrel, so ominously like a--No; absurd! It could not be afinality. She rejected that instantly, so confident had beauty andposition as a prospective heiress made her as to her powers over any manshe chose to try to fascinate, so secure was she in the belief that Rossloved her and would not give her up in any circumstances. She went overtheir interview, recalled his every sentence and look--this withsurprising coolness for a young woman as deeply in love as she fanciedherself. And her anger rose against him--a curious kind of anger, tospring and flourish in a loving heart. "He has been flattered by Theresauntil he has entirely lost his point of view, " she decided. "I'll givehim a lesson when he comes trying to make it up. "

 * * * * *

He drove the part of his homeward way that was through streets with hiswonted attention to "smartness. " True "man of the world, " he never formany consecutive minutes had himself out of his mind--how he wasconducting himself, what people thought of him, what impression he hadmade or was making or was about to make. He estimated everybody andeverything instinctively and solely from the standpoint of advantage tohimself. Such people, if they have the intelligence to hide themselvesunder a pleasing surface, and the wisdom to plan, and the energy toexecute, always get just about what they want; for intelligence andenergy are invincible weapons, whether the end be worthy or not. As soon, however, as he was in the road up to the Bluffs, deserted at that hour, his body relaxed, his arms and hands dropped from the correct angle fordriving, the reins lay loose upon the horse's back, and he gave himselfto dejection. He had thought--at Windrift--that, once he was free fromthe engagement which was no longer to his interest, he would feelbuoyant, elated. Instead, he was mentally even more downcast a figurethan his relaxed attitude and gloomy face made him physically. Hismother's and his "set's" training had trimmed generous instincts close tothe roots, and, also, such ideals as were not purely for materialmatters, especially for ostentation. But, being still a young man, thoseroots not only were alive, but also had an under-the-soil vigor; theyeven occasionally sent to the surface sprouts--that withered in theuncongenial air of his surroundings and came to nothing. Just now thesesprouts were springing in the form of self-reproaches. Remembering withwhat thoughts he had gone to Adelaide, he felt wholly responsible for thebroken engagement, felt that he had done a contemptible thing, had doneit in a contemptible way; and he was almost despising himself, lookingabout the while for self-excuses. The longer he looked the worse off hewas; for the more clearly he saw that he was what he called, and thought, in love with this fresh young beauty, so swiftly and alluringlydeveloping. It exasperated him with the intensity of selfishness'savarice that he could not have both Theresa Howland's fortune andAdelaide. It seemed to him that he had a right to both. Not in the coldlyselfish only is the fact of desire in itself the basis of right. By thetime he reached home, he was angry through and through, and bent uponfinding some one to be angry with. He threw the reins to a groom and, savagely sullen of face, went slowly up the terrace-like steps. 

His mother, on the watch for his return, came to meet him. "How is Mr. Ranger this morning?" she asked. 

"Just the same, " he answered curtly. 

"And--Del?"

No answer. 

They went into the library; he lit a cigarette and seated himself at thewriting table. She watched him anxiously but had far too keen insight tospeak and give him the excuse to explode. Not until she turned to leavethe room did he break his surly silence to say: "I might as well tellyou. I'm engaged to Theresa Howland. "

"O Ross, I'm _so_ glad!" she exclaimed, lighting up with pride andpleasure. Then, warned by his expression, she restrained herself. "I havefelt certain for a long time that you would not throw yourself away onAdelaide. She is a nice girl--pretty, sweet, and all that. But womendiffer from each other only in unimportant details. A man ought to see toit that by marrying he strengthens his influence and position in theworld and provides for the standing of his children. And I think Theresahas far more steadiness; and, besides, she has been about the world--shewas presented at court last spring a year ago, wasn't she? She is _such_a lady. It will be so satisfactory to have her as the head of yourestablishment--probably Mr. Howland will give her Windrift. And hercousin--that Mr. Fanning she married--is connected with all the bestfamilies in Boston, New York, and Philadelphia. They are at the top ofour aristocracy. "

This recital was not to inform, but to inspire--to remind him what a wiseand brilliant move he had made in the game of life. And it had preciselythe effect she intended. Had she not herself created and fostered in himthe nature that would welcome such stuff as a bat welcomes night?

"I'm going back to Windrift to-morrow, " he said, still sullen, but withthe note of the quarrel-seeker gone from his voice. 

"When do you wish me to write to her?"

"Whenever you like, " he said. The defiance in his tone was for Adelaide. "The engagement is to be announced as soon as I get back. "

Mrs. Whitney was called away, and Ross tried to write to Theresa. But thewords wouldn't come. He wandered restlessly about the room, ordered theelectric, went to the Country Club. After an hour of bitterness, hecalled up his mother. "You needn't send that note we were talking aboutjust yet, " he said. 

"But I've already sent it, " his mother answered. In fact, the note wasjust then lying on the table at her elbow. 

"What were you in such a devil of a hurry for?" he stormed--anunnecessary question, for he knew his mother was the sort of personthat loses no time in settling an important matter beyond possibilityof change. 

"I'm sorry, Ross, " she replied soothingly. "I thought I might as wellsend it, as you had told me everything was settled. "

"Oh--all right--no matter. " He could break with Theresa whenever hewished. Perhaps he would not wish to break with her; perhaps, after a fewdays he would find that his feeling for Adelaide was in reality nostronger than he had thought it at Windrift, when Theresa was temptinghim with her huge fortune. There was plenty of time before it would benecessary to make final choice. 

Nevertheless, he did not leave Saint X, but hung round, sour and morose, hoping for some sign from "tamed" Adelaide. 

 * * * * *

As soon as Theresa got Mrs. Whitney's note, she wrote to Adelaide. "I'vepromised not to tell, " her letter began, "but I never count any promiseof that kind as including _you_, dear, sweet Adelaide--"

Adelaide smiled as she read this; Theresa's passion for intimateconfession had been the joke of the school. "Besides, " Adelaide read on, "I think you'll be especially interested as Ross tells me there was somesort of a boy-and-girl flirtation between you and him. I don't see howyou could get over it. Now--you've guessed. Yes--we're engaged, and willprobably be married up here in the fall--Windrift is simply divine then, you know. And I want you to be my 'best man. ' The others'll be Edna andClarice and Leila and Annette and perhaps Jessie and Anita. We're to livein Chicago--father will give us a house, I'm sure. And you must come tovisit us--"

It is hardly fair to eavesdrop upon a young woman in such an hour asthis of Adelaide's. Only those might do so who are willing freely toconcede to others that same right to be human which they themselvesexercise, whether they will or no, when things happen that smash theveneer of "gentleman" or "lady" like an eggshell under a plowboy's heel, and penetrate to and roil that unlovely human nature which is in us all. Criticism is supercilious, even when it is just; so, without criticism, the fact is recorded that Adelaide paced the floor and literally raved inher fury at this double-distilled, double treachery. The sense that shehad lost the man she believed she loved was drowned in the oceanic floodof infuriated vanity. She raged now against Ross and now against Theresa"She's marrying him just because she's full of envy, and can't bear tosee anybody else have anything, " she fumed. "Theresa couldn't loveanybody but herself. And he--he's marrying her for her money. She isn'tgood to look at; to be in the house with her is to find out how mean andsmall and vain she is. It serves me right for being snob enough to havesuch a friend. If she hadn't been immensely rich and surrounded by suchbeautiful things I'd never have had anything to do with her. She's buyinghim; he's selling himself. How vile!"

But the reasons why they were betraying her did not change or mitigatethe fact of betrayal; and that fact showed itself to proud, confidentAdelaide Ranger in the form of the proposition that she had been jilted, and that all the world, all her world, would soon know it. Jilted!She--Adelaide Ranger--the all-conqueror--flung aside, flouted, jilted. She went back to that last word; it seemed to concentrate all the insultand treason and shame that were heaped upon her. And she never oncethought of the wound to her heart; the fierce fire of vanity seemed tohave cauterized it--if there was a wound. 

What could she do to hide her disgrace from her mocking, sneeringfriends? For, hide it she must--must--_must_! And she had not amoment to lose. 

A little thought, and she went to the telephone and called up her brotherat the Country Club. When she heard his voice, in fear and fright, demanding what she wanted, she said:

"Will you bring Dory Hargrave to dinner to-night? And, of course, don'tlet him know I wanted you to. "

"Is _that_ all!" exclaimed Arthur in a tone of enormous relief, which shewas too absorbed in her calamity to be conscious of. 

"You will, won't you? Really, Arthur, it's _very_ important; and don'tsay a _word_ of my having telephoned--not to _anybody_. "

"All right! I'll bring him. " A pause, then. "Father's just the same?"

"Yes, " she answered, in sudden confusion and shame. 

CHAPTER VIII

A FRIEND IN NEED

In the turmoil of his own affairs Arthur forgot his promise almost whilehe was making it. Fortunately, as he was driving home, the sight of Dr. Hargrave, marching absent-mindedly along near the post office, brought itto his mind again. With an impatient exclamation--for he prided himselfupon fidelity to his given word, in small matters as well as inlarger--he turned the horse about. He liked Dory Hargrave, and in a wayadmired him; Dory was easily expert at many of the sports at which Arthurhad had to toil before he was able to make even a passable showing. ButDory, somehow, made him uncomfortable. They had no point of view incommon; Dory regarded as incidental and trivial the things which seemedof the highest importance to Arthur. Dory had his way to make in theworld; Arthur had been spared that discomfort and disadvantage. Yet Dorypersisted in pretending to regard Arthur as in precisely the sameposition as himself; once he had even carried the pretense to theimpertinence of affecting to sympathize with Arthur for being so sorelyhandicapped. On that occasion Arthur had great difficulty in restrainingplain speech. He would not have been thus tactful and gentlemanly had henot realized that Dory meant the best in the world, and was whollyunconscious that envy was his real reason for taking on such apreposterous pose. "Poor chap!" Arthur had reflected. "One shouldn'tblame him for snatching at any consolation, however flimsy. " In thosedays Arthur often, in generous mood, admitted--to himself--that fortunehad been shamefully partial in elevating him, without any effort on hispart, but merely by the accident of birth, far above the overwhelmingmajority of young men. He felt doubly generous--in having such broadviews and in not aggravating the misfortunes of the less lucky byexpressing them. 

Dr. Hargrave and his son--his only child--and his dead wife's sister, Martha Skeffington, lived in a quaint old brick house in UniversityAvenue. A double row of ancient elms shaded the long walk straight upfrom the gate. On the front door was a huge bronze knocker which Arthurlifted and dropped several times without getting response. "Probably thegirl's in the kitchen; and old Miss Skeffington is so deaf she couldn'thear, " he thought. He had known the persons and the habits of thathousehold from earliest boyhood. He followed the path round the houseand thus came in sight of a small outbuilding at the far corner of theyard, on the edge of the bank overlooking and almost overhanging theriver--Dory's "workshop. " Its door was open and Arthur could see thewhole of the interior. Dory and a young woman were standing by a bench atthe window, were bending over something in which they seemed to beabsorbed. Not until Arthur stepped upon the doorsill did they lift theirheads. 

"Hello, Artie!" cried Dory, coming forward with extended hand. 

Arthur was taking off his hat and bowing to the young woman. "Hello, Theo, " said he. "How d'ye do, Estelle?"

Miss Wilmot shook hands with him, a shade constrainedly. "How are you, Arthur?" she said. 

It was in his mouth to ask why she hadn't been to see Adelaide. Hechecked himself just in time. She and Adelaide were great friends asyoungsters at the public school, but the friendship cooled intoacquaintance as Adelaide developed fashionable ideas and tastes. Also, Estelle had been almost a recluse since she was seventeen. The rest ofthe Wilmots went into Saint X's newly developed but flourishingfashionable society. They had no money to give return entertainments oreven to pay their share of the joint, dances and card parties Arthurdecided to sheer off. "I came to ask you to the house for sup--dinnerto-night, " said he. "It's lonely--just mother and Del and me. Come andcheer us up. Come along with me now. "

Dory looked confused. "I'm afraid I can't, " he all but stammered. 

"Of course, I can't blame you for not caring about coming. " This apoliteness, for Arthur regarded his invitation as an honor. 

"Oh, you didn't understand me, " protested Dory. "I was thinking ofsomething entirely different. " A pause during which he seemed to bereflecting. "I'll be glad to come, " he finally said. 

"You needn't bother to dress, " continued Arthur. 

Dory laughed--a frank, hearty laugh that showed the perfect white teethin his wide, humorous-looking mouth. "Dress!" said he. "My other suit is, if anything, less presentable than this; and they're all I've got, exceptthe frock--and I'm miserable in that. "

Arthur felt like apologizing for having thus unwittingly brought outyoung Hargrave's poverty. "You look all right, " said he. 

"Thanks, " said Dory dryly, his eyes laughing at Arthur. 

And, as a matter of fact, though Arthur had not been sincere, Dory didlook "all right. " It would have been hard for any drapery not to have setwell on that strong, lithe figure. And his face--especially the eyes--wasso compelling that he would have had to be most elaborately overdressedto distract attention from what he was to what he wore. 

On the way to the Rangers, he let Arthur do the talking; and if Arthurhad been noticing he would have realized that Dory was not listening, butwas busy with his own thoughts. Also Arthur would have noticed that, asthey came round from the stables to the steps at the end of the frontveranda, and as Dory caught sight of Adelaide, half-reclining in thehammock and playing with Simeon, his eyes looked as if he had beensuddenly brought from the darkness into the light. 

"Here's Dory Hargrave, Del, " cried Arthur, and went on into the house, leaving them facing each other. 

"So glad you've come, " said Adelaide, her tone and manner at theirfriendliest. 

But as she faced his penetrating eyes, her composure became less assured. He looked straight at her until her eyes dropped--this while they wereshaking hands. He continued to look, she feeling it and growing more andmore uncomfortable. 

"Why did you send for me?" he asked. 

She would have liked to deny or to evade; but neither was possible. Nowthat he was before her she recalled his habit of compelling her always tobe truthful not only with him but--what was far worse--also with herself. "Did Arthur tell you I asked him to bring you?" she said, to gain time. 

"No, " was his reply. "But, as soon as he asked me, I knew. "

It irritated her that this young man who was not at all a "man of theworld" should be able so easily to fathom her. She had yet to learn that"man of the world" means man of a very small and insignificant world, while Dory Hargrave had been born a citizen of the big world, the realworld--one who understands human beings, because his sympathies are broadas human nature itself, and his eyes clear of the scales of pretense. Hewas an illustration of the shallowness of the talk about the lonelinessof great souls. It is the great souls that alone are not alone. Theyunderstand better than the self-conscious, posing mass of mankind theweakness and the pettiness of human nature; but they also appreciate itsother side. And in the pettiest creature, they still see the greatnessthat is in every human being, in every living thing for that matter, itsmajesty of mystery and of potentiality--mystery of its living mechanism, potentiality of its position as a source of ever-ascending forms of life. From the protoplasmal cell descends the genius; from the loins of thesodden toiler chained to the soil springs the mother of genius or geniusitself. And where little people were bored and isolated, Dory Hargravecould without effort pass the barriers to any human heart, could enter inand sit at its inmost hearth, a welcome guest. He never intruded; henever misunderstood; he never caused the slightest uneasiness lest heshould go away to sneer or to despise. Even old John Skeffington wasconfidential with him, and would have been friendly had not Dory avoidedhim. 

Adelaide soon fell under the spell of this genius of his for inspiringconfidence. She had not fully disclosed her plans to herself; shehesitated at letting herself see what her fury against Theresa and Rosshad goaded her on to resolve. So she had no difficulty in persuadingherself that she had probably sent for Dory chiefly to consult with him. "There's something I want to talk over with you, " said she; "but waittill after din--supper. Have you and Artie been playing tennis?"

"No, he found me at home. Estelle Wilmot and I were playing with amicroscope. "

"Estelle--she has treated me shamefully, " said Adelaide. "I haven't seenher for more than a year--except just a glimpse as I was driving downMonroe Street one day. How beautiful she has become! But, then, shealways was pretty. And neither her father nor her mother, nor any of therest of the family is especially good-looking. She doesn't in the leastresemble them. "

"There probably was a time when her father and mother really loved, " saidDory. "I've often thought that when one sees a beautiful man or woman, one is seeing the monument to some moment of supreme, perfect happiness. There are hours when even the meanest creatures see the islands ofenchantment floating in the opal sea. "

Adelaide was gazing dreamily into the sunset. It was some time before shecame back, dropped from the impersonal to the personal, which is thenormal attitude of most young people and of all the self-absorbed. Simeon, who had been inspecting Dory from the far upper end of thehammock, now descended to the floor of the veranda, and slowly advancedtoward him. Dory put out his hand. "How are you, cousin?" he said, gravely shaking Simeon's extended paw. Simeon chattered delightedly andsprang into Dory's lap to nestle comfortably there. 

"I always thought you would fall in love with Estelle, some day, "Adelaide was saying. 

Dory looked at Simeon with an ironical smile. "Why does she say thosethings to me?" he asked. Simeon looked at Adelaide with a puzzled frownthat said, "Why, indeed?"

"You and Estelle are exactly suited to each other, " explained she. 

"Exactly unsuited, " replied he. "I have nothing that she needs; she hasnothing that I need. And love is an exchange of needs. Now, I have hurtyour vanity. "

"Why do you say that?" demanded Adelaide. 

"You'd like to feel that your lover came to you empty-handed, askingeverything, humbly protesting that he had nothing to give. And you knowthat I--" He smiled soberly. "Sometimes I think you have really nothing Ineed or want, that I care for you because you so much need what I cangive. You poor pauper, with the delusion that you are rich!"

"You are frank, " said she, smiling, but not liking it. 

"And why shouldn't I be? I've given up hope of your ever seeing thesituation as it is. I've nothing to lose with you. Besides, I shouldn'twant you on any false terms. One has only to glance about him to shrinkfrom the horrors of marriage based on delusions and lies. So, I canafford to be frank. "

She gave him a puzzled look. She had known him all her life; they hadplayed together almost every day until she was seventeen and went East, to school, with Janet Whitney. It was while she was at home on her firstlong vacation that she had flirted with him, had trapped him into anavowal of love; and then, having made sure of the truth which her vanityof conquest and the fascination of his free and frank manliness for her, though she denied it to herself, had led her on to discover beyond doubt, she became conscience-stricken. And she confessed to him that she lovedRoss Whitney and was engaged to him; and he had taken the disclosure socalmly that she almost thought he, like herself, had been simplyflirting. And yet--She dimly understood his creed of making the best ofthe inevitable, and of the ridiculousness of taking oneself tooseriously. "He probably has his own peculiar way of caring for a woman, "she was now reflecting, "just as he has his own peculiar way in everyother respect. "

Arthur came, and their mother; and not until long after supper, when herfather had been got to bed, did she have the chance to continue theconversation. As soon as she appeared on the veranda, where Dory andArthur were smoking, Arthur sauntered away. She was alone with Dory; butshe felt that she had nothing to say to him. The surge of fury againstRoss and Theresa had subsided; also, now that she had seen TheodoreHargrave again, she realized that he was not the sort of man one tries touse for the purpose she had on impulse formed, nor she the sort of womanwho, in the deliberateness of the second thought, carries into effect animpulse to such a purpose. 

When they had sat there in the moonlight several minutes in silence, shesaid: "I find I haven't anything especial to say to you, after all. "

A wait, then from him: "I'm sorry. I had hoped--" He halted. 

"Hoped--what?"

"Hoped it was off with you and Whitney. "

"Has some one been saying it was?" she asked sharply. 

"No. I thought I felt it when I first saw you. "

"Oh!" she said, enormously relieved. A pause, then constrainedly, "Yourguess was right. "

"And was that why you sent for me?"

The assent of silence. 

"You thought perhaps you might--care for--me?"

It seemed almost true, with him looking so earnestly and hopefully ather, and in the moonlight--moonlight that can soften even falsehood untiltrue and false seem gently to merge. She hesitated to say No. "I don'tknow just what I thought, " she replied. 

But her tone jarred on the young man whose nerves were as sensitive as athermostat. "You mean, when you saw me again, you felt you really didn'tcare, " he said, drawing back so that she could not see his face. 

"No, " she replied, earnestly and honestly. "Not that. " And then she flungout the truth. "Ross has engaged himself to Theresa Howland, a girl witha huge big fortune. And I--I--"

"You needn't say it, " he interrupted, feeling how it was distressing herto confess. "I understand. "

"I wasn't altogether--wicked, " she pleaded. "I didn't think of you whollybecause I thought you cared for me. I thought of you chiefly because Ifeel more at home with you than with anyone else. It has always seemed tome that you see me exactly as I am, with all the pretenses andmeannesses--yet not unkindly, either. And, while you've made me angrysometimes, when you have refused to be taken in by my best tricks, stillit was as one gets angry with--with oneself. It simply wouldn't last. And, as you see, I tell you anything and everything. "

"You thought you'd engage yourself to me--and see how it worked out?"

"I'm afraid I did. "

A pause. She knew what he was going to say next, and waited for him tosay it. At last it came. "Well, now that there's no deception, whyshouldn't you?"

"Somehow, I don't seem to mind--about Ross, so much. It--it was while Iwas in with father this evening. You haven't seen him since he became soill, but you will understand why he is a rebuke to all mean thoughts. Isuppose I'll be squirming again to-morrow, but to-night I feel--"

"That Ross has done you a great service. That you've lost nothing but adangerous illusion; that you have been honorable with him, and all thewrong and the shame are upon him. You must feel it, for it is true. "

Adelaide sighed. "I wish I were strong enough to feel it with my friendsjeering at me, as I can feel it now, Dory. "

He moved nearer the hammock in which she was sitting. "Del, " he said, "shall we become engaged, with the condition that we'll not marry unlesswe both wish to, when the time comes?"

"But you're doing this only to help me--to help me in a weakness I oughtto be ashamed of. "

"Not altogether, " he replied. "You on your part give me a chance to winyou. You will look at me differently--and there's a great deal in that, avery great deal, Del. "

She smiled--laughed. "I see what you mean. "

But he looked gravely at her. "You promise to do your best to care? Anengagement is a very solemn thing, Del. You promise?"

She put out her hand. "Yes, " she answered. And, after a moment, in toneshe would have known meant opportunity had he been less in love with her, less modest about his own powers where she was concerned, she went on:"The night you told me you loved me I did not sleep. What you said--whatI saw when you opened your heart to me--oh, Dory, I believed then, and Ibelieve now, that the reason I have not loved you is because I am notworthy of you. And I'm afraid I never can--for just that reason. "

He laughed and kissed her hand. "If _that's_ all that stands in the way, "said he, "you'll love me to distraction. "

Her spirits went soaring as she realized that she had gained honorablyall she had been tempted to gain by artifice. "But you said a while ago, "she reminded him mischievously, "that you didn't need me. "

"So I did, " said he, "but the fox shouldn't be taken too literally as hetalks about the grapes that are out of reach. "

Suddenly she was longing for him to take her in his arms and compel herto feel, and to yield to, his strength and his love. But he, realizingthat he was in danger of losing his self-control, released her hand anddrew away--to burn aloof, when he might have set her on fire. 

Ross Whitney found his cousin, Ernest Belden, in the Chicago expressnext morning. When they were well on their way, Belden said: "I'm reallysorry it's all off between you and Adelaide, Ross. "

Ross was silent, struggling against curiosity. Finally curiosity won. "How did you know, Ernest?" he asked. 

"On the way to the station I met Dory Hargrave looking like a sunrise. Iasked him what was up--you know, he and I are like brothers. And he said:'I've induced Adelaide Ranger to promise to marry me. ' 'Why, I never knew_you_ cared about her in that way, ' said I. And he said: 'There's lots ofthings in this world you don't know, Ernest, a lot of _important_ things, and this is one of 'em. I've never cared about anybody else. '"

Belden had been thinking that the engagement between Ross and Adelaidewas dissolved by mutual consent. A glance at Ross and he changed hismind; for, Ross was so amazed at Adelaide's thus challenging him--itcould be nothing more than an audacious challenge--that he showed it. "Ibeg your pardon, old man, " Belden said impulsively. "I didn't appreciatethat I was making a prying brute of myself. "

Ross decided that a "gentleman" would be silent under the suspicion ofhaving been jilted, and that therefore _he_ must be silent--on thatsubject. "Not at all, " said he. "I suppose you haven't heard yet that I'mengaged to Miss Howland, of Chicago. "

"Ah--Really--I congratulate you, " said Belden. 

And Ross, seeing that his cousin understood precisely what he hadintended he should, felt meaner than ever. 

CHAPTER IX

THE LONG FAREWELL

Not until Adelaide told Arthur and saw the expression that succeeded hisfirst blank stare of incredulity did she realize what the world, her"world, " would think of her engagement to Theodore Hargrave. It wasilluminative of her real character and of her real mind as to Ross, andas to Dory also, that, instead of being crushed by her brother's look ofdownright horror, she straightway ejected the snobbish suggestions withwhich her vanity had been taunting her, and called her heart, as well asher pride, to the defense of Dory. 

"You're joking, " said Arthur, when he was able to articulate; "and amighty poor joke it is. Dory! Why, Del, it's ridiculous. And in place ofRoss Whitney!"

"Be careful what you say, Artie, " she warned in a quiet, ominous tone, with that in her eyes which should in prudence have halted him. "I amengaged to Dory, remember. "

"Nonsense!" cried Arthur. "Why, he hasn't a cent, except his beggarlysalary as professor at that little jay college. And even if he shouldamount to something some day, he'll never have anything or any standingin society. I thought you had pride, Del. Just wait till I see him! I'lllet him know what I think of his impudence. Of course, I don't blame him. Naturally, he wants to get up in the world. But _you_--" Arthur's laughwas a sneer--"And I thought you were _proud_!"

From Del's eyes blazed that fury which we reserve for those we love whenthey exasperate us. "Shame on you, Arthur Ranger!" she exclaimed. "Shameon you! See what a snob you have become. Except that he's poor, DoryHargrave has the advantage of any man we know. He's got more in his headany minute than you or your kind in your whole lives. And he is honorableand a gentleman--a _real_ gentleman, not a pretender. You aren't bigenough to understand him; but, at least, you know that if it weren't foryour prospects from father, you wouldn't be in the same class with him. _He_ is somebody in himself. But you--and--and your kind--what do _you_amount to, in yourselves?"

Arthur lowered at her. "So this is what you've been leading up to, with all the queer talk you've been giving me on and off, ever sincewe came home. "

That remark seemed to Adelaide for an instant to throw a flood of lightin amazing revelation upon her own innermost self. "I believe it is!" sheexclaimed, as if dazed. Then the light seemed to go, seemed to have beenonly imaginary. It is not until we are much older than Del then was, thatwe learn how our acts often reveal us to ourselves. 

"So you're in love with Dory, " scoffed Arthur. "You're a wonder--you are!To go about the world and get education and manners and culture, and thento come back to Saint X and take up with a jay--a fellow that's neverbeen anywhere. "

"Physically, he hasn't traveled much, " said Del, her temper curiouslyand suddenly restored. "But mentally, Artie, dear, he's been distancesand to places and in society that your poor brain would ache just athearing about. "

"You've lost your senses!"

"No, dear, " replied Del sweetly; "on the contrary, I've put myself in theway of finding them. "

"You needn't 'bluff' with me, " he retorted. He eyed her suspiciously. "There's some mystery in this. "

Del showed that the chance shot had landed; but, instantly recoveringherself, she said: "It may interest you to know that a while ago, whenI told you I was engaged to him, I felt a little uneasy. You see, I'vehad a long course at the same school that has made such a gentleman ofyou. But, as the result of your talk and the thoughts it suggested, Ihaven't a doubt left. I'd marry Dory Hargrave now, if everybody in theworld opposed me. Yes, the more opposition, the prouder I'll be to behis wife!"

"What's the matter, children?" came in their mother's voice. "What areyou quarreling about?" Mrs. Ranger was hurrying through the room on herway to the kitchen; she was too used to heated discussions between themto be disturbed. 

"What do you think of this, mother?" almost shouted Arthur. "Del heresays she's engaged to Dory Hargrave!"

Mrs. Ranger stopped short. "Gracious!" she ejaculated. 

She felt for her "specs, " drew them down from her hair, and hastilyadjusted them for a good look, first at Arthur, then at Del. She lookedlong at Del, who was proudly erect and was at her most beautiful best, eyes glittering and cheeks aglow. "Have you and Ross had a falling out, Del?" she asked. 

"No, mother, " replied Adelaide; "but we--we've broken our engagement, and--What Artie says is true. "

No one spoke for a full minute, though the air seemed to buzz withthe thinking and feeling. Then, Mrs. Ranger: "Your father mustn'thear of this. "

"Leave me alone with mother, Artie, " commanded Adelaide. 

Arthur went, pausing in the doorway to say: "I'm sorry to have hurt you, Del. But I meant every word, only not in anger or meanness. I know youwon't do it when you've thought it over. "

When Arthur had had time to get far enough away, Adelaide said: "Mother, I want you to hear the whole truth--or as much of it as I know myself. Ross came and broke off our engagement so that he could marry TheresaHowland. And I've engaged myself to Dory--partly to cover it, but notaltogether, I hope. Not principally, I believe. I'm sick and ashamed ofthe kind of things I've been so crazy about these last few years. Beforethis happened, before Ross came, being with father and thinking overeverything had made me see with different eyes. And I--I want to try tobe--what a woman ought to be. "

Ellen Ranger slowly rolled her front hair under her fingers. At lengthshe said: "Well--I ain't sorry you've broke off with Ross. I've beennoticing the Whitneys and their goings on for some time. I saw they'd gotclean out of _my_ class, and--I'm glad my daughter hasn't. There's acommon streak in those Whitneys. I never did like Ross, though I neverwould have said anything, as you seemed to want him, and your father hadalways been set on it, and thought so high of him. He laid himself out tomake your pa think he was a fine character and full of business--and Iain't denying that he's smart, mighty smart--too smart to suit me. " Along reflective pause, then: "But--Dory--Well, my advice is to think itover before you jump clear in. Of course, you'll have enough for both, but I'd rather see you taking up with some man that's got a goodbusiness. Teachin' 's worse than preachin' as a business. Still, there'splenty of time to think about that. You're only engaged. "

"Teachin' 's worse than preachin'"--Adelaide's new, or, rather, reviveddemocracy was an aspiration rather than an actuality, was--as to the partabove the soil, at least--a not very vigorous looking forced growththrough sordid necessity. In this respect it was like many, perhaps most, human aspirations--and, like them, it was far more likely to wither thanto flourish. "Teachin' 's worse than preachin'"--Del began to slipdismally down from the height to which Arthur's tactless outburst hadblown her. Down, and down, and down, like a punctured balloon--gently, but steadily, dishearteningly. She was ashamed of herself, as ashamed asany reader of these chronicles is for her--any reader with one standardfor judging other people and another for judging himself. To the creditof her character must be set down her shame at her snobbishness. Thesnobbishness itself should not be set down to her discredit, but shouldbe charged up to that class feeling, as old as property, and fosteredand developed by almost every familiar fact in our daily environment. 

"I shouldn't be surprised but your father'd be glad, if he knew, " hermother was saying. "But it's no use to risk telling him. A shockmight--might make him worse. " She started up. "I must go to him. Icame to send you, while I was looking after Mary and the dinner, and Iclean forgot. "

She hurried away. Adelaide sat thinking, more and more forlorn, thoughnot a whit less determined. "I ought to admire him more than I did Ross, and I ought to want to marry him--and I _will_!"

The birds had stopped singing in the noonday heat. The breeze had dieddown. Outdoors, in the house, there was not a sound. She felt as if shemust not, could not breathe. The silence, like a stealthy hand, liftedher from her chair, drew her tiptoeing and breathless toward the room inwhich her father was sitting. She paused at its threshold, looked. Therewas Hiram, in his chair by the window, bolt upright, eyes open andgazing into the infinite. Beside that statue of the peace eternal kneltEllen, a worn, wan, shrunken figure, the hands clasped, the eyes closed, the lips moving. 

"Mother! Mother!" cried Del. 

Her mother did not hear. She was moaning, "I believe, Lord, I believe!Help Thou my unbelief!"

CHAPTER X

"THROUGH LOVE FOR MY CHILDREN"

On the day after the funeral, Mrs. Ranger and the two children and youngHargrave were in the back parlor, waiting for Judge Torrey to come andread the will. The well-meant intrusions, the services, the burial--allthose barbarous customs that stretch on the rack those who really lovethe dead whom society compels them publicly to mourn--had left cruelmarks on Adelaide and on Arthur; but their mother seemed unchanged. Shewas talking incessantly now, addressing herself to Dory, since he alonewas able to heed her. Her talk was an almost incoherent stream, as if sheneither knew nor cared what she was saying so long as she could keep thatstream going--the stream whose sound at least made the voice in herheart, the voice of desolation, less clear and terrible, though not lessinsistent. 

There was the beat of a man's footsteps on the side veranda. Mrs. Rangerstarted up, listened, sat again. "Oh, " she said, in the strangest tone, and with a hysterical little laugh, "I thought it was your father cominghome to dinner!" Then from her throat issued a stifled cry like nothingbut a cry borne up to the surface from a deep torture-chamber. And shewas talking on again--with Adelaide sobbing and Arthur fighting back thetears. Hargrave went to the door and admitted the old lawyer. 

He had a little speech which he always made on such occasions; butto-day, with the knowledge of the astounding contents of that will on hismind, his lips refused to utter it. He simply bowed, seated himself, andopened the document. The old-fashioned legal phrases soon were steadyinghim as the harness steadies an uneasy horse; and he was monotonously andsonorously rolling off paragraph after paragraph. Except the judge, youngHargrave was the only one there who clearly understood what those wordyprovisions meant. As the reading progressed Dory's face flushed a deepred which slowly faded, leaving him gray and haggard. His father'sbeloved project! _His_ father's! To carry out his father's project, Arthur and Adelaide, the woman he loved and her brother, were to losetheir inheritance. He could not lift his eyes. He felt that they were alllooking at him, were hurling reproaches and denunciations. 

Presently Judge Torrey read: "I make this disposal of my estate throughmy love for my children and because I have firm belief in the soundnessof their character, and in their capacity to do and to be. I feel theywill be better off without the wealth which would tempt my son to relaxhis efforts to make a useful man of himself and would cause my daughterto be sought for her fortune instead of for herself. "

At the words "without the wealth, " Arthur shifted sharply in his chair, and both he and Adelaide looked at Judge Torrey in puzzled wonder. Thejudge read on, read the names of signer and witnesses, then laid the willdown and stared gloomily at it. Mrs. Ranger said: "And now, judge, canyou tell us in plain words just what it means?"

With many a pause and stammer the old lawyer made it clear: the house andits contents and appurtenances, and seven thousand a year to the widowfor life; two thousand a year to Adelaide; five thousand in cash toArthur and the chance to earn the mill and factory; the rest, practicallythe whole estate, to Tecumseh University. 

"Any further questions?" he asked, breaking the silence that followed hisexplanation. 

No one spoke. 

Still without looking at anyone, he put away his glasses? "Then Iguess I'll be going. It won't be necessary to do anything further fora day or two. "

And, with face like that of criminal slinking from scene of crime, hegot himself to the door by a series of embarrassed bows and shufflingsteps. Outside, he wiped the streaming sweat from his forehead. "Itwasn't my fault, " he muttered, as if some one were accusing him. Then, alittle further from the house, "I ain't sure Hiram hasn't done right. But, God help me, I couldn't never save _my_ children at such a price. "

He was clear of the grounds before Adelaide, the first to move, cast afurtive glance at her brother. Her own disaster was swallowed up for herin the thought of how he had been struck down. But she could read nothingin his face. He was simply gazing straight ahead, and looking _so_ likehis father at his most unfathomable. As soon as he had fully realizedwhat the will meant, his nerves had stopped feeling and his brain hadstopped thinking. Adelaide next noted Dory, and grew cold from head tofoot. All in a rush it came over her how much she had relied upon herprospective inheritance, how little upon herself. What would Dory thinkof her _now_? And Ross--what a triumph for him, what a narrow escape! Hadhe suspected? Had others in the town known that of which they of thefamily were in complete ignorance? Oh, the horror of the descent--thehorror of the rude snatching away of the golden aureole! "Father, father, how could you do it? How could you hurt us so?" she muttered. Then, upbefore her rose his face with that frightful look in the eyes. "But howdoing it made _him_ suffer!" she thought. And the memory of those hourson hours she had spent with him, buried alive, flooded over her. "Doingit killed him!" she said to herself. 

She felt cruel fingers grinding into her arm. With a sharp cry she sprangup. Her brother was facing her, his features ablaze with all the evilpassions in his untrained and unrestrained nature. "_You knew_!" hehissed. "You traitor! You knew he was doing this. You honeyfugled him. And you and Hargrave get it all!"

Adelaide shrank as she would not have shrunk under a lash. 

"O Arthur! Arthur!" she cried, clasping her hands and stretching themtoward him. 

"You admit it, do you?" he shouted, seizing her by the shoulders like amadman. "Yes, your guilty face admits it. But I'll undo your work. I'llbreak the will. Such an outrage as that, such a robbery, won't stand incourt for a minute. "

Dory had risen, was moving to fling the brother from the sister; but Mrs. Ranger was before him. Starting up from the stupor into which JudgeTorrey's explanation had thrown her, she thrust herself between herchildren. "Arthur!" she said, and her voice was quiet and solemn. "Yourfather is dead. " She drew herself up, and facing her son in her widow'sblack, seemed taller than he. "If I had needed any proof that he wasright about what he did with his own, " she went on, "I'd have found it inyour face and in what you just said to your sister. Go to the glassthere, boy! Look at your face and remember your words!"

Young Hargrave left the room, went to the garden where they could see himfrom the windows and call him if they wished. Arthur hung his head beforehis mother's gaze. "It isn't _his_ will, " he muttered. "Father in hisright mind would never have made such a will. "

"He never would have made such a will if his children had been in theirright mind, " replied his mother sternly; and sternness they had neverbefore seen in those features or heard in that voice. "I know now what hewas broodin' over for weeks. Yes--" and her voice, which rose shrill, wasthe shriek of the tempest within her--"and I know now what made himbreak so sudden. I noticed you both driftin' off into foolishness, ashamed of the ways of your parents, ashamed of your parents, too. But Ididn't give no attention to it, because I thought it was the silliness ofchildren and that you'd outgrow it. But _he_ always did have a good headon him, and he saw that you were ridin' loose-rein to ruin--to be likethem Whitneys. Your pa not in his right mind? I see _God_ in that will. "

She paused, but only for breath to resume: "And you, Arthur Ranger, whatwas in your head when you came here to-day? Grief and love andwillingness to carry out your dead father's last wishes? No! You camethinking of how you were to benefit by his death. Don't deny! I saw yourface when you found you weren't going to get your father's money. "

"Mother!" exclaimed Arthur. 

She waved him down imperiously; and he was afraid before her, before heroutraged love for her outraged dead. "Take care how you stamp on myHiram's grave, Arthur Ranger!"

"He didn't mean it--you know he didn't, " pleaded Adelaide. At that momentshe could not think of this woman as her mother, but only as the wife, the widow. 

But Ellen's instinct told her that her son, though silent, was still intraitorous rebellion against her idol. And she kept on at him: "WithHiram hardly out of the house, you've forgot all he did for you, all heleft you--his good name, his good example. You think only of his money. I've heard you say children owe nothing to their parents, that parentsowe everything to the children. Well, that's so. But it don't mean whatyou think. It don't mean that parents ought to _ruin_ their children. And your pa didn't spare himself to do his duty by you--not even thoughit killed him. Yes, it killed him! You'd better go away and fall on yourknees and ask God to forgive you for having shortened your father'slife. And I tell you, Arthur Ranger, till you change your heart, you'reno son of mine. "

"Mother! Mother!" cried Arthur, rushing from the room. 

Mrs. Ranger looked vacantly at the place where he had been, dropped intoa chair and burst into a storm of tears. 

"Call him back, mother, " entreated Del. 

"No! no!" sobbed Ellen Ranger. "He spoke agin' my dead! I'll not forgivehim till his heart changes. "

Adelaide knelt beside her mother and tried to put her arms around her. But her mother shrank away. "Don't touch me!" she cried; "leave mealone. God forgive me for having bore children that trample on theirfather's grave. I'll put you both out of the house--" and she started upand her voice rose to a shriek. "Yes--I'll put you both out! Yourfoolishness has ate into you like a cancer, till you're both rotten. Goto the Whitneys. Go among the lepers where you belong. You ain't fit fordecent people. "

She pushed Adelaide aside, and with uncertain steps went into the halland up toward her own room. 

CHAPTER XI

"SO SENSITIVE"

Adelaide was about to go in search of her brother when he came huntingher. A good example perhaps excepted, there is no power for good equal toa bad example. Arthur's outburst before his mother and her, and in whatseemed the very presence of the dead, had been almost as potent inturning Adelaide from bitterness as the influence her father'spersonality, her father's character had got over her in his last illness. And now the very sight of her brother's face, freely expressing histhoughts, since Ellen was not there to shame him, gave double force tothe feelings her mother's denunciations had roused in her. "We've got tofight it, Del, " Arthur said, flinging himself down on the grass at herfeet. "I'll see Torrey to-morrow morning. "

Adelaide was silent. 

He looked fiercely at her. "You're going to help me, aren't you?"

"I must have time to think, " she replied, bent on not provoking him togreater fury. 

He raised himself to a sitting posture. "What has that Hargrave fellowbeen saying to you?" he cried. "You'll have to break off with him. Hisfather--the old scoundrel!--got at father and took advantage of hisillness and his religious superstition. I know just how it was done. We'll bring it all out. "

Adelaide did not answer. 

"What did Dory say to you?" repeated Arthur. 

"He went as soon as I came out from mother, " she replied. She thought itbest not to tell him that Dory had stopped long enough to urge her to goto her brother, and to make and keep peace with him, no matter what hemight say to anger her. "Don't you think, " she continued, "that you oughtto see Janet and talk with her?"

Artie sank back and stared somberly at the ground. 

"When is she coming?" asked his sister. 

"I don't know, " he answered surlily. "Not at all, perhaps. The Whitneyswon't especially care about having any of us in the family now. " Helooked furtively at Adelaide, as if he hoped she would protest that hewas mistaken, would show him that Janet would be unchanged. 

"Mrs. Whitney won't, " said Adelaide. "But Janet--she's different, Ithink. She seems to be high-minded, and I believe she loves you. "

Arthur looked relieved, though Adelaide was too honest to have been ableto make her tone as emphatic as her words. Yes, Janet was indeedhigh-minded, he said to himself; did indeed love him. Her high-mindednessand the angel purity of her love had often made him uneasy, not to sayuncomfortable. He hated to be at the trouble of pretenses; but Janet, living on a far higher plan than he, had simply compelled it. To let hersee his human weaknesses, to let her suspect that he was not ashigh-minded as she told him he was, to strip from himself the saintlyrobes and the diadem with which she had adorned him--well, he would putit off until after marriage, he had always told himself, and perhaps bythat time he would feel a little less like a sinner profaning a sanctuarywhen he kissed her. He had from time to time found in himself a sinfullonging that she were just a little less of an angel, just a little moreof a fellow sinner--not too much, of course, for a man wants a pure wife, a pure mother for his children. But, while the attitudes of worship andof saintliness were cramped, often severely so, still on the whole Arthurhad thought he was content with Janet just as she was. 

"Why don't you go to Chicago and see her?" suggested Adelaide. "You oughtto talk with her before anyone else has a chance. I wouldn't put_anything_ past her mother. "

"That's a good idea!" exclaimed Arthur, his face clearing before theprospect of action. "I'll take the night train. Yes, I must be the one totell her. "

Adelaide had a sense of relief. Arthur would see Janet; Janet wouldpour balm upon his wounds, would lift him up to a higher, more generousview. Then, whatever he might do would be done in the right spirit, with respect for the memory of their father, with consideration fortheir mother. 

"You had better not see mother again until you come back, " she suggested. 

His face shadowed and shame came into it that was from the real ArthurRanger, the son of Hiram and Ellen. "I wish I hadn't burst out as I did, Del, " he said. "I forgot everything in my own wrongs. I want to try tomake it all right with mother. I can't believe that I said what Iremember I did say before her who'd be glad to die for us. "

"Everything'll be all right when you come back, Artie, " she assured him. 

As they passed the outbuilding where the garden tools were kept they bothglanced in. There stood the tools their father had always used inpottering about the garden, above them his old slouch and old straw hats. Arthur's lip quivered; Adelaide caught her breath in a sob. "O Artie, "she cried brokenly, "He's gone--gone--gone for ever. " And Artie sat onthe little bench just within the door and drew Del down beside him, and, each tightly in the other's arms, they cried like the children that theywere, like the children that we all are in face of the great tragedy. 

A handsome and touching figure was Arthur Ranger as he left his cab andslowly ascended the lawn and the steps of the Whitney palace in the LakeDrive at eleven the next morning. His mourning garments were mostbecoming to him, contrasting with the fairness of his hair, the blue ofhis eyes, and the pallor of his skin. He looked big and strong and sad, and scrupulously fashionable, and very young. 

The Whitneys were leading in Chicago in building broad and ever broaderthe barriers, not between rich and poor, but between the very, very richand all the rest of the world. Mrs. Whitney had made a painstaking andreverent study of upper-class life in England and on the Continent, andwas endeavoring to use her education for the instruction of herassociates, and for the instilling of a proper awe into the multitude. Toenter her door was at once to get the impression that one was receiving ahigh privilege. One would have been as greatly shocked as was Mrs. Whitney herself, could one have overheard "Charley" saying to her, as heoccasionally did, with a grin which he strove to make as "common" as heknew how, "Really, Tillie, if you don't let up a little on this puttingon dog, I'll have to take to sneaking in by the back way. The butler's asight more of a gent than I am, and the housekeeper can give you pointson being a real, head-on-a-pole-over-the-shoulder lady. " A low fellow atheart was Charley Whitney, like so many of his similarly placedcompatriots, though he strove as hard as do they, almost as hard as hiswife, to conceal the deficiencies due to early training in vulgarlydemocratic ways of living and thinking. 

Arthur, ushered by the excruciatingly fashionable butler into thesmallest of the series of reception _salons_, fell straightway into themost melancholy spirits. He felt the black, icy shadow of the beginningsof doubt as to his right to admittance on terms of equality, now that histitles to nobility had been torn from him and destroyed. He felt that hewas in grave danger of being soon mingled in the minds of his fashionablefriends and their servants with the vulgar herd, the respectable but"impossible" middle classes. Indeed, he was not sure that he didn'treally belong among them. The sound of Janet's subdued, most elegantrustle, drove out of his mind everything but an awful dread of what shewould say and think and feel when he had disclosed to her the hideoustruth. She came sweeping in, her eyes full of unshed tears, her manner amodel of refined grief, sympathetic, soothing. She was tall and slim, aperfect figure of the long, lithe type; her face was small and fine anddreamy; her hair of an unusual straw color, golden, yet pale, too, likethe latest autumn leaves in the wan sun of November; her eyes were hazel, in strange and thrilling contrast to her hair. To behold her was tobehold all that man finds most fascinating in woman, but so illumined bythe soul within that to look on it with man's eye for charms feminineseemed somewhat like casting sensuous glances upon beauty enmarbled in atemple's fane. Janet was human, but the human that points the way tosexless heaven. 

"_Dear_ Artie!" she said gently. "_Dear_ Artie!" And she took both hishands and, as she looked at him, her tears fell. Arthur, in his newhumility of poverty, felt honored indeed that any loss of his couldcause her matchless soul thus to droop upon its dazzling outer wallsthe somber, showery insignia of grief. "But, " she went on, "you havehim still with you--his splendid, rugged character, the memory of allhe did for you. "

Arthur was silent. They were seated now, side by side, and he was, somewhat timidly, holding one of her hands. 

"He was so simple and so honest--such a _man_!" she continued. "Does ithurt you, dear, for me to talk about him?"

"No--no, " he stammered, "I came to you--to--to--talk about him. " Then, desperately, seizing her other hand and holding both tightly, "Janet, would it make any difference with you if I--if I--no--What am I saying?Janet, I release you from our engagement. I--I--have no prospects, " herushed on. "Father--They got round him and wheedled him into leavingeverything to the college--to Tecumseh. I have nothing--I must give youup. I can't ask you to wait--and--"

He could not go on. He longed for the throbbing, human touch that beautyof hers could make so thrilling. But she slowly drew away her hands. Herexpression made him say:

"What is it, Janet? What have I said that hurt you?"

"Did you come, " she asked, in a strange, distant voice, "because youthought your not having money would make a difference with me?"

"No, " he protested, in wild alarm. "It was only that I feel I--"

"You feel that there could be a question of money between us?" sheinterrupted. 

"Not between _us_, Janet, " he said eagerly; "but there isyour--your mother. "

"I beg you, " she replied coldly, "not to speak of mamma in that way tome, even if you have such unjust thoughts of her. "

Arthur looked at her uncertainly. He had an instinct, deep down, thatthere was something wrong--something in her that he was not fathoming. But in face of that cloud-dwelling beauty, he could only turn and lookwithin himself. "I beg your pardon, dear, " he said. "You know so littleof the practical side of life. You live so apart from it, so high aboveit, that I was afraid I'd be doing wrong by you if I did not put thatside of it before you, too. But in the bottom of my heart I knew youwould stand by me. "

She remained cold. "I don't know whether I'm glad or sorry, Arthur, thatyou let me see into your real self. I've often had doubts about ourunderstanding each other, about our two natures being in that perfectharmony which makes the true marriage. But I've shut out those doubts asdisloyal to you. Now, you've forced me to see they were only too true!"

"What do you mean, Janet? Of course, I'm not good enough for you--no oneis, for that matter; but I love you, and--Do you care for me, Janet?"

"Yes, " she replied mournfully. "But I must conquer it. O Arthur, Arthur!"Her voice was tremulous now, and her strange hazel eyes streamedsorrowful reproach. "How could you think sordidly of what was sacred andholy to me, of what I thought was holy to us both? You couldn't, if youhad been the man I imagined you were. "

"Don't blame a fellow for every loose word he utters when he's all upset, Janet, " he pleaded. "Put yourself in my place. Suppose you found youhadn't anything at all--found it out suddenly, when all along you hadbeen thinking you'd never have to bother about money? Suppose you--Butyou must know how the world, how all our friends, look on that sort ofthing. And suppose you loved--just as I love you. Wouldn't you go to herand hope she'd brace you up and make you feel that she really loved youand--all that? Wouldn't you, Janet?"

She looked sadly at him. "You don't understand, " she said, her rosebudmouth drooping pathetically. "You can't realize how you shook--how you_shattered_--my faith in you. "

He caught her by the arms roughly. "Look here, Janet Whitney. Do you loveme or don't you? Do you intend to throw me over, now that I have lost mymoney, or do you intend to be all you've pretended to be?"

The sadness in her sweet face deepened. "Let me go, Arthur, " she saidquietly. "You don't understand. You never will. "

"Yes or no?" he demanded, shaking her. Then suddenly changing totenderness, with all his longing for sympathy in his eyes and in hisvoice, "Janet--dear--yes or no?"

She looked away. "Don't persist, Arthur, " she said, "or you will make methink it is only my money that makes you, that made you, pretend to--tocare for me. "

He drew back sharply. "Janet!" he exclaimed. 

"Of course, I don't think so, " she continued, after a constrainedsilence. "But I can't find any other reason for your talking and actingas you have this morning. "

He tried to see from her point of view. "Maybe it's true, " he said, "thatother things than our love have had too much to do with it, with both ofus, in the past. But I love you for yourself alone, now, Janet. And, youhaven't a fortune of your own, but only expectations--and they're notalways realized, and in your case can't be for many a year. So we don'tstart so unevenly. Give yourself to me, Janet. Show that you believe inme, and I know I shall not disappoint you. "

Very manly his manner was as he said this, and brave and convincing wasthe show of his latent, undeveloped powers in his features and voice. She hesitated, then lowered her head, and, in a sad, gentle voice, said, "I don't trust you, Arthur. You've cut away the foundation oflove. It would be fine and beautiful for us to start empty-handed andbuild up together, if we were in sympathy and harmony. But, doubtingyou--I can't. "

Again he looked at her uneasily, suspicious, without knowing why or what. But one thing was clear--to plead further with her would beself-degradation. "I have been tactless, " he said to her. "Probably, if Iwere less in earnest, I should get on better. But, perhaps you will judgeme more fairly when you think it over. I'll say only one thing more. Ican't give up hope. It's about all I've got left--hope of you--belief inyou. I must cling to that. I'll go now, Janet. "

She said nothing, simply looked unutterable melancholy, and let her handlie listlessly in his until he dropped it. He looked back at her when hereached the door. She seemed so sad that he was about to return to herside. She sighed heavily, gazed at him, and said, "Good-by, Arthur. "After that he had no alternative. He went. "I must wait until she iscalm, " he said to himself. "She is so delicately strung. "

As he was driving toward the hotel, his gloom in his face, he did not seeMrs. Whitney dash past and give him an anxious searching glance, and sinkback in her carriage reassured somewhat. She had heard that he was on theChicago express--had heard it from her _masseuse_, who came each morningbefore she was up. She had leaped to the telephone, had ordered a specialtrain, and had got herself into it and off for her Chicago home byhalf-past eight. "That sentimental girl, full of high ideals--what mayn'tshe do!" she was muttering, almost beside herself with anxiety. "No doubthe'll try and induce her to run away with him. " And the rushing trainseemed to creep and crawl. 

She burst into the house like a dignified whirlwind. "Where's MissJanet?" she demanded of the butler. 

"Still in the blue _salon_, ma'am, I think, " he replied. "Mr. ArthurRanger just left a few moments ago. "

Clearing her surface of all traces of agitation, Mrs. Whitney went intothe presence of her daughter. "Mamma!" cried Janet, starting up. "Hasanything happened?"

"Nothing, nothing, dear, " replied her mother, kissing her tenderly. "Iwas afraid my letter might have miscarried. And, when I heard that Arthurhad slipped away to Chicago, I came myself. I've brought you up so purelyand innocently that I became alarmed lest he might lead you into somerash sentimentality. As I said in my letter, if Arthur had grown up intoa strong, manly character, I should have been eager to trust my daughterto him. But my doubts about him were confirmed by the will. And--he issimply a fortune-hunter now. "

Janet had hidden her face in her handkerchief. "Oh, no!" she exclaimed. "You wrong him, mother. "

"You haven't encouraged him, Janet!" cried Mrs. Whitney. "After what I'vebeen writing you?"

"The loss of his money hasn't made any difference about him with me, "said Janet, her pure, sweet face lighting up with the expression thatmade her mother half-ashamed of her own worldliness. 

"Of course not! Of course not, Janet, " said she. "No child of mine couldbe mercenary without being utterly false to my teachings. "

Janet's expression was respectful, yet not confirmatory. She had oftenprotested inwardly against the sordid views of life which her motherunconsciously held and veiled with scant decency in the family circle inher unguarded moments. But she had fought against the contamination, andproudly felt that her battle for the "higher plane" was successful. 

Her mother returned, somewhat awkwardly, to the main point. "I hope youdidn't encourage him, Janet. "

"I don't wish to talk of it, mother, " was Janet's reply. "I have not beenwell, and all this has upset me. "

Mrs. Whitney was gnawing her palms with her nails and her lip with herteeth. She could scarcely restrain herself from seizing her daughter andshaking the truth, whatever it was, out of her. But prudence and respectfor her daughter's delicate soul restrained her. 

"You have made it doubly hard for me, " Janet went on. "Your writing me tostay away because there was doubt about Arthur's material future--oh, mother, how could that make any difference? If I had not been feeling sodone, and if father hadn't been looking to me to keep him company, I'dsurely have gone. For I hate to have my motive misunderstood. "

"He has worked on her soft-heartedness and inexperience, " thought Mrs. Whitney, in a panic. 

"And when Arthur came to-day, " the girl continued, "I was ready to fly tohim. " She looked tragic. "And even when he repulsed me--"

"_Repulsed_ you!" exclaimed Mrs. Whitney. She laughed disagreeably. "He'ssubtler than I thought. "

"Even when he repulsed me, " pursued Janet, "with his sordid way oflooking at everything, still I tried to cling to him, to shut my eyes. "

Mrs. Whitney vented an audible sigh of relief. "Then you didn't let himdeceive you!"

"He shattered my last illusion, " said Janet, in a mournful voice. "Mother, I simply _couldn't_ believe in him, in the purity of his love. Ihad to give him up. "

Mrs. Whitney put her arms round her daughter and kissed her soothinglyagain and again. "Don't grieve, dear, " she said. "Think how much betterit is that you should have found him out now than when it was too late. "

And Janet shuddered. 

 * * * * *

Ross dropped in at the house in the Lake Drive the next morning on hisway East from the Howlands. As soon as he was alone with his mother, heasked, "How about Janet and Arthur?"

Mrs. Whitney put on her exalted expression. "I'm glad you said nothingbefore Janet, " said she. "The child is so sensitive, and Arthur has givenher a terrible shock. Men are so coarse; they do not appreciate thedelicateness of a refined woman. In this case, however, it was mostfortunate. She was able to see into his true nature. "

"Then she's broken it off? That's good. "

"Be careful what you say to her, " his mother hastened to warn him. "Youmight upset her mind again. She's so afraid of being misunderstood. "

"She needn't be, " replied Ross dryly. 

And when he looked in on Janet in her sitting room to say good-by, hebegan with a satirical, "Congratulations, Jenny. "

Jenny looked at him with wondering eyes. She was drooping like a sunlessflower and was reading poetry out of a beautifully bound volume. "What isit, Ross?" she asked. 

"On shaking Artie so smoothly. Trust you to do the right thing at theright time, and in the right way. You're a beauty, Jen, and no mistake, "laughed Ross. "I never saw your like. You really must marry atitle--Madame la Duchesse! And nobody's on to you but me. You aren'teven on to yourself!"

Janet drew up haughtily and swept into her bedroom, closing the door with_almost_ coarse emphasis. 

CHAPTER XII

ARTHUR FALLS AMONG LAWYERS

Arthur ended his far from orderly retreat at the Auditorium, and in thesitting room of his suite there set about re-forming his lines, with somevague idea of making another attack later in the day--one less timid andblundering. "I'd better not have gone near her, " said he disgustedly. "How could a man win when he feels beaten before he begins?" He was notnow hazed by Janet's beauty and her voice like bells in evening quiet, and her mystic ideas. Youth, rarely wise in action, is often wise inthought; and Arthur, having a reasoning apparatus that worked uncommonlywell when he set it in motion and did not interfere with it, was soonseeing his situation as a whole much as it was--ugly, mocking, hopeless. 

"Maybe Janet knows the real reason why she's acting this way, maybe shedon't, " thought he, with the disposition of the inexperienced to give thebenefit of even imaginary doubt. "No matter; the fact is, it's all upbetween us. " This finality, unexpectedly staring at him, gave him ashock. "Why, " he muttered, "she really has thrown me over! All her talkwas a blind--a trick. " And, further exhibiting his youth in holding theindividual responsible for the system of which the individual is merely avictim, usually a pitiable victim, he went to the opposite extreme andfell to denouncing her--cold-hearted and mercenary like her mother, acoward as well as a hypocrite--for, if she had had any of the bravery ofself-respect, wouldn't she have been frank with him? He reviewed her inthe flooding new light upon her character, this light that revealed heras mercilessly as flash of night-watchman's lantern on guilty, shrinkingform. "She--Why, she always _was_ a fakir!" he exclaimed, stupefied bythe revelation of his own lack of discernment, he who had prided himselfon his acuteness, especially as to women. "From childhood up, she hasalways made herself comfortable, no matter who was put out; she hasgotten whatever she wanted, always pretending to be unselfish, alwaysmaking it look as if the other person were in the wrong. " There hestarted up in the rate of the hoodwinked, at the recollection of anincident of the previous summer--how she had been most gracious to ayoung French nobleman, in America in search of a wife; how anybody but"spiritual" Janet would have been accused of outrageous flirting--no, notaccused, but convicted. He recalled a vague story which he had set downto envious gossip--a story that the Frenchman had departed on learningthat Charles Whitney had not yet reached the stage of fashionableeducation at which the American father appreciates titles and begins tolisten without losing his temper when the subject of settlements isbroached. He remembered now that Janet had been low-spirited for sometime after the Frenchman took himself and title and eloquent eyes and"soulful, stimulating conversation" to another market. "What a damn foolI've been!" Arthur all but shouted at his own image in a mirror which bychance was opposite him. A glance, and his eyes shifted; somehow, it gavehim no pleasure, but the reverse, to see that handsome face andwell-set-up, well-dressed figure. 

"She was marrying me for money, " he went on, when he had once more seatedhimself, legs crossed and cigarette going reflectively. The idea seemednew to him--that people with money could marry for money, just as acapitalist goes only where he hopes to increase his capital. But onexamining it more closely, he was surprised to find that it was not newat all. "What am I so virtuous about?" said he. "Wasn't _I_ after money, too? If our circumstances were reversed, what would _I_ be doing?" Hecould find but one honest answer. "No doubt I'd be trying to get out ofit, and if I didn't, it'd be because I couldn't see or make a way. " Tohis abnormally sensitized nerves the whole business began to exude adistinct, nauseating odor. "Rotten--that's the God's truth, " thought he. "Father was right!"

But there he drew back; he must be careful not to let anger sweep himinto conceding too much. "No--life's got to be lived as the worlddictates, " he hastened to add. "I see now why father did it, but he wenttoo far. He forgot my rights. The money is mine. And, by God, I'll getit!" And again he started up; and again he was caught and put out ofcountenance by his own image in the mirror. He turned away, shamefaced, but sullenly resolute. 

Base? He couldn't deny it. But he was desperate; also, he had been toolong accustomed to grabbing things to which his conscience told him hehad doubtful right or none. "It's mine. I've been cheated out of it. I'llget it. Besides--" His mind suddenly cleared of the shadow of shame--"Iowe it to mother and Del to make the fight. They've been cheated, too. Because they're too soft-hearted and too reverent of father's memory, isthat any reason, any excuse, for my shirking my duty by them? If fatherwere here to speak, I know he'd approve. " Before him rose the frightfullook in his father's eyes in the earlier stage of that second and lastillness. "_That's_ what the look meant!" he cried, now completelyjustified. "He recovered his reason. He wanted to undo the mischief thatold sneak Hargrave had drawn him into!"

The case was complete: His father had been insane when he made the will, had repented afterward, but had been unable to unmake it; his only sonArthur Ranger, now head of the family, owed it to the family's future andto its two helpless and oversentimental women to right the wrong. Acomplete case, a clear case, a solemn mandate. Interest and duty weresynonymous--as always to ingenious minds. 

He lost no time in setting about this newly discovered high task of loveand justice. Within twenty minutes he was closeted with Dawson of thegreat law firm, Mitchell, Dawson, Vance & Bischoffsheimer, who had hadthe best seats on all the fattest stranded carcasses of the Middle Westfor a decade--that is, ever since Bischoffsheimer joined the firm andtaught its intellects how on a vast scale to transubstantiate technicallylegal knowledge into technically legal wealth. Dawson--lean and keen, tough and brown of skin, and so carelessly dressed that he looked as ifhe slept in his clothes--listened with the sympathetic, unwanderingattention which men give only him who comes telling where and how theycan make money. The young man ended his story, all in a glow ofenthusiasm for his exalted motives and of satisfaction with his eloquencein presenting them; then came the shrewd and thorough cross-examinationwhich, he believed, strengthened every point he had made. 

"On your showing, " was Dawson's cautious verdict, "you seem to have acase. But you must not forget that judges and juries have a deepprejudice against breaking wills. They're usually fathers themselves, andguard the will as the parent's strongest weapon in keeping the childrenin order after they're too old for the strap or the bed slat, as the casemay be. Undue influence or mental infirmity must be mighty clearlyproven. Even then the court may decide to let the will stand, on generalprinciples. Your mother and sister, of course, join you?"

"I--I hope so, " hesitated Arthur. "I'm not sure. " More self-possessedly:"You know how it is with women--with _ladies_--how they shrink fromnotoriety. "

"No, I can't say I do, " said Dawson dryly. "Ladies need money even morethan women do, and so they'll usually go the limit, and beyond, to getit. However, assuming that for some reason or other, your mother andsister won't help, at least they won't oppose?"

"My sister is engaged to the son of Dr. Hargrave, " said Arthur uneasily. 

"That's good--excellent!" exclaimed Dawson, rubbing his gaunt, beard-discolored jaw vigorously. 

"But--he--Theodore Hargrave is a sentimental, unpractical chap. "

"So are we all--but not in money matters. "

"He's an exception, I'm afraid, " said Arthur. "Really--I think it'salmost certain he'll try to influence her to take sides against me. Andmy mother was very bitter when I spoke of contest. But, as I've shownyou, my case is quite apart from what they may or may not do. "

"Um--um, " grunted Dawson. He threw himself back in his chair; to aid himin thinking, he twisted the only remaining crown-lock of his gray-blackhair, and slowly drew his thin lips from his big sallow teeth, and asslowly returned them to place. "Obviously, " he said at length, "thedoctor is the crucial witness. We must see to it that"--a significantgrin--"that the other side does not attach him. We must anticipate themby attaching him to us. I'll see what can be done--legitimately, youunderstand. Perhaps you may have to engage additional counsel--some suchfirm as, say, Humperdink & Grafter. Often, in cases nowadays, there isdetail work of an important character that lawyers of our standingcouldn't think of undertaking. But, of course, we work in harmony withsuch other counsel as our client sees fit to engage. "

"Certainly; I understand, " said Arthur, with a knowing, "man-of-the-world" nod. His cause being good and its triumph necessary, he must not be squeamish about any alliances it might be necessary tomake as a means to that triumph, where the world was so wicked. "Then, you undertake the case. "

"We will look into it, " Dawson corrected. "You appreciate that thelitigation will be somewhat expensive?"

Arthur reddened. No, he hadn't thought of that! Whenever he had wantedanything, he had ordered it, and had let the bill go to his father;whenever he had wanted money, he had sent to his father for it, and hadgot it. Dawson's question made the reality of his position--moneyless, resourceless, friendless--burst over him like a waterspout. Dawson sawand understood; but it was not his cue to lessen that sense ofhelplessness. 

At last Arthur sufficiently shook off his stupor to say: "Unless I winthe contest, I shan't have any resources beyond the five thousand I getunder the will, and a thousand or so I have in bank at Saint X--and whatlittle I could realize from my personal odds and ends. Isn't there someway the thing could be arranged?"

"There is the method of getting a lawyer to take a case on contingentfee, " said Dawson. "That is, the lawyer gets a certain per cent of whathe wins, and nothing if he loses. But _we_ don't make such arrangements. They are regarded as almost unprofessional; I couldn't honestly recommendany lawyer who would. But, let me see--um--urn--" Dawson was reflectingagain, with an ostentation which might have roused the suspicions of aless guileless person than Arthur Ranger at twenty-five. "You could, perhaps, give us a retainer of say, a thousand in cash?"

"Yes, " said Arthur, relieved. He thought he saw light ahead. 

"Then we could take your note for say, five thousand--due in eighteenmonths. You could renew it, if your victory was by any chance delayedbeyond that time. "

"Your victory" was not very adroit, but it was adroit enough to bedazzleArthur. "Certainly, " said he gratefully. 

Dawson shut his long, wild-looking teeth and gently drew back his dry, beard-discolored lips, while his keen eyes glinted behind his spectacles. The fly had a leg in the web!

Business being thus got into a smooth way, Dawson and Arthur became greatfriends. Nothing that Dawson said was a specific statement of belief inthe ultimate success of the suit; but his every look and tone impliedconfidence. Arthur went away with face radiant and spirit erect. He feltthat he was a man of affairs, a man of consequence, he had lawyers, and abig suit pending; and soon he would be rich. He thought of Janet, andaudibly sneered. "I'll make the Whitneys sick of their treachery!" saidhe. Back had come his sense of strength and superiority; and once more hewas "gracious" with servants and with such others of the "peasantry" ashappened into or near his homeward path. 

Toward three o'clock that afternoon, as he was being whirled toward SaintX in the Eastern Express, his lawyer was in the offices of Ramsay &Vanorden, a rival firm of wreckers and pirate outfitters on the thirdfloor of the same building. When Dawson had despatched his immediatebusiness with Vanorden, he lingered to say: "Well, I reckon we'll soon belined up on opposite sides in another big suit. "

Confidences between the two firms were frequent and natural--not onlybecause Vanorden and Dawson were intimate friends and of the greatestassistance each to the other socially and politically; not only becauseRamsay and Bischoffsheimer had married sisters; but also, and chiefly, because big lawyers like to have big lawyers opposed to them in a bigsuit. For several reasons; for instance, ingenuity on each side prolongsthe litigation and makes it intricate, and therefore highly expensive, and so multiplies the extent of the banquet. 

"How so?" inquired Vanorden, put on the alert by the significantintonation of his friend. 

"The whole Ranger-Whitney business is coming into court. Ranger, youknow, passed over the other day. He cut his family off with almostnothing--gave his money to Tecumseh College. The son's engaged us toattack the will. "

"Where do _we_ come in?" asked Vanorden. 

Dawson laughed and winked. "I guess your client, old Charley Whitney, won't miss the chance to intervene in the suit and annex the wholebusiness, in the scrimmage. "

Vanorden nodded. "Oh, I see, " said he. "I see! Yes, we'll take ahand--sure!"

"There won't be much in it for us, " continued Dawson. "The boy's gotnothing, and between you and me, Len, the chances are against him. Butyou fellows and whoever gets the job of defending the college's rights--"Dawson opened his arms and made a humorous, huge, in-sweeping gesture. "And, " he added, "Whitney's one of the trustees under the will. See?"

"Thanks, old man. " Vanorden was laughing like a shrewd and mischievousbut through-and-through good-natured boy. The two brilliant young leadersof the Illinois bar shook hands warmly. 

And so it came about that Charles Whitney was soon indorsing a plan tocause, and to profit by, sly confusion--the plan of his able lawyers. They had for years steered his hardy craft, now under the flag ofpeaceful commerce and now under the black banner of the buccaneer. Thebest of pilots, they had enabled him to clear many a shoal of bankruptcy, many a reef of indictment. They served well, for he paid well. 

CHAPTER XIII

BUT IS RESCUED

By the time he reached Saint X our young "man of affairs" believed hisconscience soundly converted to his adventure; and, as he drove towardthe house, a final survey of his defenses and justifications satisfiedhim that they were impregnable. Nevertheless, as he descended from thestation hack and entered the grounds of the place that in his heart ofheart was all that the word "home" can contain, he felt strangely like atraitor and a sneak. He kept his manner of composed seriousness, but hereasoned in vain against those qualms of shame and panic. At the openfront door he dared not lift his eyes lest he should be overwhelmed bythe sight of that colossal figure, with a look in its face that wouldforce him to see the truth about his thoughts and his acts. The houseseemed deserted; on the veranda that opened out from the back parlor hefound Dory Hargrave, reading. He no longer felt bitter toward Dory. Thinking over the whole of the Ranger-Whitney relations and the suddendouble break in them, he had begun to believe that perhaps Adelaide hadhad the good luck to make an extremely clever stroke when she shiftedfrom Ross Whitney to Hargrave. Anyhow, Dory was a fine fellow, both inlooks and in brains, with surprisingly good, yes, really amazing air andmanner--considering his opportunities; he'd be an ornament to any familyas soon as he had money enough properly to equip himself--which would bevery soon, now that the great Dawson was about to open fire on the willand demolish it. 

"Howdy, " he accordingly said, with only a shade less than his oldfriendliness, and that due to embarrassment, and not at all to illfeeling. "Where's mother--and Del?"

"Your sister has taken your mother for a drive, " replied Hargrave. 

"Smoke?" said Arthur, extending his gold cigarette case, open. 

Dory preferred his own brand of cigarettes; but, feeling that he ought tomeet any advance of Arthur's, he took one of the big, powerful Egyptianswith "A. K. " on it in blue monogram. They smoked in silence a moment orso, Arthur considering whether to practise on Dory the story of hisproposed contest, to enable him to tell it in better form to his motherand sister. "I've been to Chicago to see about contesting the will, " hebegan, deciding for the rehearsal. 

"I supposed so, " said Hargrave. 

"Of course, for mother's and Del's sake I simply have to do it, " he wenton, much encouraged. "Anyone who knew father knows he must have been outof his mind when he made that will. "

"I see your point of view, " said Dory, embarrassed. Then, with an efforthe met Arthur's eyes, but met them fearlessly. "You misunderstood me. Ithink a contest is a mistake. "

Arthur flamed. "Naturally you defend your father, " he sneered. 

"Let us leave my father out of this, " said Dory. His manner made itimpossible for Arthur to persist. For Dory was one of those who havethe look of "peace with honor" that keeps to bounds even the mancrazed by anger. 

"You can't deny I have a legal right to make the contest, " pursuedArthur. 

"Undoubtedly. "

"And a moral right, too, " said Arthur, somewhat defiantly. 

"Yes, " assented Dory. The tone of the "yes"--or was it Arthur's ownself-respect--made him suspect Dory of thinking that a man might have theclearest legal and moral right and still not be able to get his honor'sconsent. "But why discuss the matter, Arthur? You couldn't be changed byanything I'd say. "

"We will discuss it!" exclaimed Arthur furiously. "I see what your planis. You know I'm bound to win; so you'll try to influence Del and motheragainst me, and get the credit for taking high ground, and at the sametime get the benefit of the breaking of the will. When the will's broken, mother'll have her third; you think you can stir up a quarrel between herand me, and she'll leave all of her third to Del and you. "

Arthur had started up threateningly. There showed at his eyes and mouththe ugliest of those alien passions which his associations had thrustinto him, and which had been master ever since the reading of the will. The signs were all for storm; but Dory sat impassive. He looked steadilyat Arthur until Arthur could no longer withstand, but had to drop hiseyes. Then he said: "I want you to think over what you have just said tome, Artie--especially your calculations on the death of your mother. "

Arthur dropped back into his chair. 

"Honestly, Artie, honestly, " Dory went on, with the friendliestearnestness, "isn't there something wrong about anything that causes theman you are by nature to think and feel and talk that way, when hisfather is not a week dead?"

Arthur forced a sneer, but without looking at Dory. 

"Do you remember the day of the funeral?" Dory went on. "It had beenannounced in the papers that the burial would be private. As we drove outof the front gates there, I looked round--you remember it was raining. There were uncovered farm wagons blocking the streets up and down. Therewere thousands of people standing in the rain with bared heads. And I sawtears thick as the rain drops streaming down faces of those who had knownyour father as boy and man, who had learned to know he was all that ahuman being should be. "

Arthur turned away to hide his features from Dory. 

"_That_ was your father, Artie. What if _he_ could have heard you a fewminutes ago?"

"I don't need to have anyone praise my father to me, " said Arthur, trying to mask his feelings behind anger. "And what you say is no reasonwhy I should let mother and Del and myself be cheated out of what hewanted us to have. "

Dory left it to Arthur's better self to discuss that point with him. "Iknow you'll do what is right, " said he sincerely. "You are more likeyour father than you suspect as yet, Artie. I should have said nothingto you if you hadn't forced your confidence on me. What I've said isonly what you'd say to me, were I in your place and you in mine--whatyou'll think yourself a month from now. What lawyer advised you toundertake the contest?"

"Dawson of Mitchell, Dawson, Vance & Bischoffsheimer. As good lawyers asthere are in the country. "

"I ought to tell you, " said Dory, after brief hesitation, "that JudgeTorrey calls them a quartette of unscrupulous scoundrels--says they'reregarded as successful only because success has sunk to mean supremacy incheating and double-dealing. Would you mind telling me what terms theygave you--about fee and expenses?"

"A thousand down, and a note for five thousand, " replied Arthur, compelled to speech by the misgivings Dory was raising within him inspite of himself. 

"That is, as the first installment, they take about all the money insight. Does that look as if they believed in the contest?"

At this Arthur remembered and understood Dawson's remark, apparentlycasual, but really crucial, about the necessity of attaching Dr. Schulze. Without Schulze, he had no case; and Dawson had told him so! What kind ofa self-hypnotized fool was he, not to hear the plainest warnings? Andwithout waiting to see Schulze, he had handed over his money!

"I know you think I am not unprejudiced about this will, " Dory went on. "But I ask you to have a talk with Judge Torrey. While he made the will, it was at your father's command, and he didn't and doesn't approve it. Heknows all the circumstances. Before you go any further, wouldn't it bewell to see him? You know there isn't an abler lawyer, and you also knowhe's honest. If there's any way of breaking the will, he'll tell youabout it. "

Hiram Ranger's son now had the look of his real self emerging from thesubsiding fumes of his debauch of folly and fury. "Thank you, Hargrave, "he said. "You are right. "

"Go straight off, " advised Dory. "Go before you've said anything to yourmother about what you intend to do. And please let me say one thing more. Suppose you do finally decide to make this contest. It means a year, twoyears, three years, perhaps five or six, perhaps ten or more, ofsuspense, of degrading litigation, with the best of you shriveling, withyour abilities to do for yourself paralyzed. If you finally lose--you'llowe those Chicago sharks an enormous sum of money, and you'll beembittered and blighted for life. If you win, they and their pals willhave most of the estate; you will have little but the barren victory; andyou will have lost your mother. For, Arthur, if you try to prove thatyour father was insane, and cut off his family in insane anger, you knowit will kill her. "

A long silence; then Arthur moved toward the steps leading down to thedrive. "I'll think it over, " he said, in a tone very different from anyhe had used before. 

Dory watched him depart with an expression of friendship and admiration. "He's going to Judge Torrey, " he said to himself. "Scratch that veneer ofhis, and you find his mother and father. "

The old judge received Arthur like a son, listened sympathetically as theyoung man gave him in detail the interview with Dawson. Even as Arthurrecalled and related, he himself saw Dawson's duplicity; for, that pastmaster of craft had blundered into the commonest error of craft of alldegrees--he had underestimated the intelligence of the man he was tryingto cozen. He, rough in dress and manners and regarding "dudishness" asunfailing proof of weak-mindedness, had set down the fashionable Arthur, with his Harvard accent and his ignorance of affairs, as an unmitigatedass. He had overlooked the excellent natural mind which false educationand foolish associations had tricked out in the motley, bells and baubleof "culture"; and so, he had taken no pains to cozen artistically. Also, as he thought greediness the strongest and hardiest passion in all humanbeings, because it was so in himself, he had not the slightest fear thatanyone or anything could deflect his client from pursuing the fortunewhich dangled, or seemed to dangle, tantalizingly near. 

Arthur, recalling the whole interview, was accurate where he had beenvisionary, intelligent where he had been dazed. He saw it all, before hewas half done; he did not need Torrey's ejaculated summary: "Theswindling scoundrel!" to confirm him. 

"You signed the note?" said the judge. 

"Yes, " replied Arthur. He laughed with the frankness of self-derisionthat augurs so well for a man's teachableness. 

"He must have guessed, " continued the judge, "that a contest is useless. "

At that last word Arthur changed expression, changed color--or, rather, lost all color. "Useless?" he repeated, so overwhelmed that he cleanforgot pride of appearances and let his feelings have full play in hisface. Useless! A contest useless. Then--

"I did have some hopes, " interrupted Judge Torrey's deliberate, judicialtones, "but I had to give them up after I talked with Schulze andPresident Hargrave. Your father may have been somewhat precipitate, Arthur, but he was sane when he made that will. He believed his wealthwould be a curse to his children. And--I ain't at all sure he wasn'tright. As I look round this town, this whole country, and see how thesecond generation of the rich is rotten with the money-cancer, I feelthat your grand, wise father had one of the visions that come only tothose who are about to leave the world and have their eyes cleared of thedust of the combat, and their minds cooled of its passions. " Here the oldman leaned forward and laid his hand on the knee of the white, haggardyouth. "Arthur, " he went on, "your father's mind may have been befoggedby his affections in the years when he was letting his children do asthey pleased, do like most children of the rich. And his mind may havebeen befogged by his affections again, _after_ he made that will and wentdown into the Dark Valley. But, I tell you, boy, he was sane _when_ hemade that will. He was saner than most men have the strength of mind tobe on the best day of their whole lives. "

Arthur was sitting with elbows on the desk; his face stared out, somberand gaunt, from between his hands. "How much he favors his father, "thought the old judge. "What a pity it don't go any deeper than looks. "But the effect of the resemblance was sufficient to make it impossiblefor him to offer any empty phrases of cheer and consolation. After a longtime the hopeless, dazed expression slowly faded from the young man'sface; in its place came a calm, inscrutable look. The irresponsible boywas dead; the man had been born--in rancorous bitterness, but in strengthand decision. 

It was the man who said, as he rose to depart, "I'll write Dawson thatI've decided to abandon the contest. "

"Ask him to return the note, " advised Torrey. "But, " he added, "I doubtif he will. "

"He won't, " said Arthur. "And I'll not ask him. Anyhow, a few dollarswould be of no use to me. I'd only prolong the agony of getting down towhere I've got to go. "

"Five thousand dollars is right smart of money, " protested the judge. "Onsecond thought, I guess you'd better let me negotiate with him. " The oldman's eyes were sparkling with satisfaction in the phrases that wereforming in his mind for the first letter to Dawson. 

"Thank you, " said Arthur. But it was evident that he was notinterested. "I must put the past behind me, " he went on presently. "Imustn't think of it. "

"After all, " suggested Torrey, "you're not as bad off as more thanninety-nine per cent of the young men. You're just where they are--on bedrock. And you've got the advantage of your education. "

Arthur smiled satirically. "The tools I learned to use at college, " saidhe, "aren't the tools for the Crusoe Island I've been cast away on. "

"Well, I reckon a college don't ruin a young chap with the right stuff inhim, even if it don't do him any great sight of good. " He looked uneasilyat Arthur, then began: "If you'd like to study law"--as if he feared theoffer would be accepted, should he make it outright. 

"No; thank you, I've another plan, " replied Arthur, though "plan" wouldhave seemed to Judge Torrey a pretentious name for the hazy possibilitiesthat were beginning to gather in the remote corners of his mind. 

"I supposed you wouldn't care for the law, " said Torrey, relieved thathis faint hint of a possible offer had not got him into trouble. He likedArthur, but estimated him by his accent and his dress, and so thought himprobably handicapped out of the running by those years of training for acareer of polite uselessness. "That East!" he said to himself, lookingpityingly at the big, stalwart youth in the elaborate fopperies offashionable mourning. "That _damned_ East! We send it most of our moneyand our best young men; and what do we get from it in return? Why, sneersand snob-ideas. " However, he tried to change his expression to one lessdiscouraging; but his face could not wholly conceal his forebodings. "It's lucky for the boy, " he reflected, "that Hiram left him a good homeas long as his mother's alive. After she's gone--and the five thousand, if I get it back--I suppose he'll drop down and down, and end by clerkingit somewhere. " With a survey of Arthur's fashionable attire, "I shouldsay he might do fairly well in a gent's furnishing store in one of thosedamn cities. " The old man was not unfeeling--far from it; he had simplybeen educated by long years of experience out of any disposition toexaggerate the unimportant in the facts of life. "He'll be better off andmore useful as a clerk than he would be as a pattern of damnfoolishnessand snobbishness. So, Hiram was right anyway I look at it, and no matterhow it comes out. But--it did take courage to make that will!"

"Well, good day, judge, " Arthur was saying, to end both their reveries. "I must, " he laughed curtly, "'get a move on. '"

"Good day, and God bless you, boy, " said the old man, with a heartyearnestness that, for the moment, made Arthur's eyes less hard. "Takeyour time, settling on what to do. Don't be in a hurry. "

"On the contrary, " said Arthur. "I'm going to make up my mind at once. Nothing stales so quickly as a good resolution. "

CHAPTER XIV

SIMEON

A crisis does not create character, but is simply its test. The young manwho entered the gates of No. 64 Jefferson Street at five that afternoonwas in all respects he who left them at a quarter before four, though heseemed very different to himself. He went direct to his own room and didnot descend until the supper bell sounded--that funny little old janglingbell he and Del had striven to have abolished in the interests offashionable progress, until they learned that in many of the best Englishhouses it is a custom as sacredly part of the ghostly BritishConstitution as the bathless bath of the basin, as the jokeless joke ofthe pun, as the entertainment that entertains not, as the ruler thatrules not and the freedom that frees not. When he appeared in thedining-room door, his mother and Del were already seated. His mother, herwhite face a shade whiter, said: "I expect you'd better sit--there. " Sheneither pointed nor looked, but they understood that she meant Hiram'splace. It was her formal announcement of her forgiveness and of herrecognition of the new head of the family. With that in his face thatgave Adelaide a sense of the ending of a tension within her, he seatedhimself where his father had always sat. 

It was a silent supper, each one absorbed in thoughts which could nothave been uttered, no one able to find any subject that would not makeoverwhelming the awful sense of the one that was not there and neveragain would be. Mrs. Ranger spoke once. "How did you find Janet?" shesaid to Arthur. 

His face grew red, with gray underneath. After a pause he answered:"Very well. " Another pause, then: "Our engagement is broken off. "

Mrs. Ranger winced and shrank. She knew how her question and the effortof that answer must have hurt the boy; but she did not make matters worsewith words. Indeed, she would have been unable to say anything, forsympathy would have been hypocritical, and hypocrisy was with herimpossible. She thought Arthur loved Janet; she realized, too, the savagewound to his pride in losing her just at this time. But she had neverliked her, and now felt justified in that secret and, so she had oftenreproached herself, unreasonable dislike; and she proceeded to hate her, the first time she had ever hated anybody--to hate her as a mother canhate one who has made her child suffer. 

After supper, Mrs. Ranger plunged into the household duties that weresaving her from insanity. Adelaide and Arthur went to the side veranda. When Arthur had lighted a cigarette, he looked at it with a grimsmile--it was astonishing how much stronger and manlier his face was, allin a few hours. "I'm on my last thousand of these, " said he. "After them, no more cigarettes. "

"Oh, it isn't so bad as all that!" said Adelaide. "We're stillcomfortable, and long before you could feel any change, you'll be makingplenty of money. "

"I'm going to work--next Monday--at the mills. "

Adelaide caught her breath, beamed on him. "I knew you would!" sheexclaimed. "I knew you were brave. "

"Brave!" He laughed disagreeably. "Like the fellow that faces the fightbecause a bayonet's pricking his back. I can't go away somewhere and geta job, for there's nothing I can do. I've got to stay right here. I'vegot to stare this town out of countenance. I've got to get it used to theidea of me as a common workingman with overalls and a dinner pail. "

She saw beneath his attempt to make light of the situation a deep andcruel humiliation. He was looking forward to the keenest torture to whicha man trained in vanity to false ideals can be subjected; and the thingitself, so Adelaide was thinking, would be more cruel than his writhinganticipation of it. 

"Still, " she insisted to him, "you are brave. You might have borrowed ofmother and gone off to make one failure after another in gentlemanlyattempts. You might have"--she was going to say, "tried to make a richmarriage, " but stopped herself in time. "Oh, I forgot, " she said, instead, "there's the five thousand dollars. Why not spend it in studyinglaw--or something?"

"I've lost my five thousand, " he replied. "I paid it for a lesson thatwas cheap at the price. " Then, thoughtfully, "I've dropped out of theclass 'gentleman' for good and all. "

"Or into it, " suggested she. 

He disregarded this; he knew it was an insincerity--one of the many heand Del were now trying to make themselves believe against the almosthopeless handicap of the unbelief they had acquired as part of their"Eastern culture. " He went on: "There's one redeeming feature of the--thesituation. "

"Only one?"

"And that for you, " he said. "At least, _you've_ got a small income. "

"But I haven't, " she replied. "Dory made me turn it over to mother. "

Arthur stared. "Dory!"

"Yes, " she answered, with a nod and a smile. It would have given Dory asurprise, a vastly different notion as to what she thought of him, had heseen her unawares just then. 

"_Made_ you?"

"Made, " she repeated. 

"And you did it?"

"I've promised I will. "

"Why?"

"I don't just know, " was her slow reply. 

"Because he was afraid it might make bad blood between you and me?"

"That was one of the reasons he urged, " she admitted. "But he thought, too, it would be bad for him and me. "

A long silence. Then Arthur: "Del, I almost think you're not making sucha mistake as I feared, in marrying him. "

"So do I--sometimes, " was his sister's, to him, astonishing answer, in anabsent, speculative tone. 

Arthur withheld the question that was on his lips. He looked curiously atthe small graceful head, barely visible in the deepening twilight. "She'sa strange one, " he reflected. "I don't understand her--and I doubt if sheunderstands herself. "

And that last was very near to the truth. Everyone has a reason foreverything he does; but it by no means follows that he always knowsthat reason, or even could extricate it from the tangle of motives, real and reputed, behind any given act. This self-ignorance is lesscommon among men than among women, with their deliberate training toself-consciousness and to duplicity; it is most common among those--menas well as women--who think about themselves chiefly. And Adelaide, having little to think about when all her thinking was hired out, had ofnecessity thought chiefly about herself. 

"You guessed that Janet has thrown me over?" Arthur said, to open the wayfor relieving his mind. 

Adelaide made a gallant effort, and her desire to console him conqueredher vanity. "Just as Ross threw me over, " she replied, with a successfulimitation of indifference. 

Instead of being astonished at the news, Arthur was astonished at his nothaving guessed it. His first sensation was the very human one ofpleasure--the feeling that he had companionship in humiliation. He movedcloser to her. Then came an instinct, perhaps true, perhaps false, thatshe was suffering, that Ross had wounded her cruelly, that she was not socalm as her slim, erect figure seemed in the deep dusk. He burst out inquiet, intense fury: "Del, I'll make those two wish to God they hadn't!"

"You can't do it, Artie, " she replied. "The only power on earth that cando them up is themselves. " She paused to vent the laugh that was asnatural in the circumstances as it was unpleasant to hear. "And I thinkthey'll do it, " she went on, "without any effort on your part--or mine. "

"You do not hate them as I do, " said he. 

"I'm afraid I'm not a good hater, " she answered. "I admit I've got a sorespot where he--struck me. But as far as he's concerned, I honestlybelieve I'm already feeling a little bit obliged to him. "

"Naturally, " said he in a tone that solicited confidences. "Haven't yougot what you really wanted?"

But his sister made no reply. 

"Look here, Del, " he said after waiting in vain, "if you don't want tomarry, there's no reason why you should. You'll soon see I'm not asgood-for-nothing as some people imagine. "

"What makes you think I don't want to marry?" asked Adelaide, her facecompletely hid by the darkness, her voice betraying nothing. 

"Why, what you've been saying--or, rather, what you've _not_ beensaying. "

A very long silence, then out of the darkness came Adelaide's voice, even, but puzzling. "Well, Artie, I've made up my mind to marry. I've gotto _do_ something, and Dory'll give me something to do. If I sat aboutwaiting, waiting, and thinking, thinking, I should do--somethingdesperate. I've got to get away from myself. I've got to forget myself. I've got to get a new self. "

"Just as I have, " said Arthur. 

Presently he sat on the arm of her chair and reached out for her handwhich was seeking his. 

When Hiram was first stricken, Adelaide's Simeon had installed himself asattendant-in-chief. The others took turns at nursing; Simeon was on dutyevery hour of every twenty-four. He lost all interest in Adelaide, ineverything except the sick man. Most of the time he sat quietly, gazingat the huge, helpless object of his admiration as if fascinated. WheneverHiram deigned to look at him, he chattered softly, timidly approached, retreated, went through all his tricks, watching the while for some signof approval. The first week or so, Hiram simply tolerated the patheticremembrancer to human humility because he did not wish to chagrin hisdaughter. But it is not in nature to resist a suit so meek, sopersistent, and so unasking as Simeon's. Soon Hiram liked to have hisadorer on his knee, on the arm of his chair, on the table beside him;occasionally he moved his unsteady hand slowly to Simeon's head to giveit a pat. And in the long night hours of wakefulness there came to be asoothing companionship in the sound of Simeon's gentle breathing in thelittle bed at the head of his bed; for Simeon would sleep nowhere else. 

The shy races of mankind, those that hide their affections and rarelygive them expression, are fondest of domestic animals, because to themthey can show themselves without fear of being laughed at or repulsed. But it happened that Hiram had never formed a friendship with a dog. Inhis sickness and loneliness, he was soon accepting and returning Simeon'sfondness in kind. And at the time when a man must re-value everything inlife and put a proper estimate upon it, this unselfish, incessant, whollydisinterested love of poor Simeon's gave him keen pleasure and content. After the stroke that entombed him, some subtle instinct seemed to guideSimeon when to sit and sympathize at a distance, when to approach andgive a gentle caress, with tears running from his eyes. But the deathSimeon did not understand at all. Those who came to make the lastarrangements excited him to fury. Adelaide had to lock him in herdressing room until the funeral was over. When she released him, he flewto the room where he had been accustomed to sit with his great and goodfriend. No Hiram! He ran from room to room, chattering wildly, made thetour of gardens and outbuildings, returned to the room in which his questhad started. He seemed dumb with despair. He had always lookedludicrously old and shriveled; his appearance now became tragic. He wouldstart up from hours of trancelike motionlessness, would make a tour ofhouse and grounds; scrambling and shambling from place to place;chattering at doors he could not open, then pausing to listen; racing tothe front fence and leaping to its top to crane up and down the street;always back in the old room in a few minutes, to resume his watch andwait. He would let no one but Adelaide touch him, and he merely enduredher; good and loving though she seemed to be, he felt that she wassomehow responsible for the mysterious vanishing of his god while she hadhim shut away. 

Sometimes in the dead of night, Adelaide or Arthur or Mrs. Ranger, waking, would hear him hurrying softly, like a ghost, along the halls orup and down the stairs. They, with the crowding interests that compel themind, no matter how fiercely the bereaved heart may fight againstintrusion, would forget for an hour now and then the cause of the blackshadow over them and all the house and all the world; and as the weekspassed their grief softened and their memories of the dead man began togive them that consoling illusion of his real presence. But not Simeon;he could think only that his friend had been there and was gone. 

At last the truth in some form must have come to him. For he gave up thesearch and the hope, and lay down to die. Food he would not touch; heneither moved nor made a sound. When Adelaide took him up, he lifted dimtragic eyes to her for an instant, then sank back as if asleep. Onemorning, they found him in Hiram's great arm chair, huddled in itsdepths, his head upon his knees, his hairy hands stiff against hischeeks. They buried him in the clump of lilac bushes of which Hiram hadbeen especially fond. 

Stronger than any other one influence for good upon Adelaide and Arthurat that critical time, was this object lesson Simeon gave--Simeon withhis single-hearted sorrow and single-minded love. 

CHAPTER XV

EARLY ADVENTURES OF A 'PRENTICE

Arthur, about to issue forth at a quarter to seven on Monday morning tobegin work as a cooper's apprentice, felt as if he would find all Saint Xlined up to watch him make the journey in working clothes. He had a boldfront as he descended the lawn toward the gates; but at the risk ofopening him to those with no sympathy for weaknesses other than theirown, and for their own only in themselves, it must be set down that heseemed to himself to be shaking and skulking. He set his teeth together, gave himself a final savage cut with the lash of "What a damned coward Iam!" and closed the gate behind him and was in the street--a workingman. He did not realize it, but he had shown his mettle; for, no man with anyreal cowardice anywhere in him would have passed through that gate andfaced a world that loves to sneer. 

From the other big houses of that prosperous neighborhood were coming, also in working clothes, the fathers, and occasionally the sons, offamilies he was accustomed to regard as "all right--for Saint X. " At thecorner of Cherry Lane, old Bolingbroke, many times a millionaire thanksto a thriving woolen factory, came up behind him and cried out, "_Well_, young man! _This_ is something like. " In his enthusiasm he put his armthrough Arthur's. "As soon as I read your father's will, I made onemyself, " he continued as they hurried along at Bolingbroke's alwaysfurious speed. "I always did have my boys at work; I send 'em down halfan hour before me every morning. But it occurred to me they might burytheir enthusiasm in the cemetery along with me. " He gave his crackling, snapping laugh that was strange and even startling in itself, but seemedthe natural expression of his snapping eyes and tight-curling, wirywhiskers and hair. "So I fixed up my will. No pack of worthless heirs tomake a mockery of my life and teachings after I'm gone. No, sir-ee!"

Arthur was more at ease. "Appearances" were no longer againsthim--distinctly the reverse. He wondered that his vanity could have madehim overlook the fact that what he was about to do was as much theregular order in prosperous Saint X, throughout the West for that matter, as posing as a European gentleman was the regular order of the "upperclasses" of New York and Boston--and that even there the Europeangentleman was a recent and rather rare importation. And Bolingbroke'shearty admiration, undeserved though Arthur felt it to be, put what hethought was nerve into him and stimulated what he then regarded as pride. "After all, I'm not really a common workman, " reflected he. "It's likemother helping Mary. " And he felt still better when, passing the littlemillinery shop of "Wilmot & Company" arm in arm with the great woolenmanufacturer, he saw Estelle Wilmot--sweeping out. Estelle would havelooked like a storybook princess about royal business, had she been downon her knees scrubbing a sidewalk. He was glad she didn't happen to seehim, but he was gladder that he had seen her. Clearly, toil was beginningto take on the appearance of "good form. "

He thought pretty well of himself all that day. Howells treated him likethe proprietor's son; Pat Waugh, foreman of the cooperage, put "Mr. Arthur" or "Mr. Ranger" into every sentence; the workingmen addressed himas "sir, " and seemed to appreciate his talking as affably with them as ifhe were unaware of the precipice of caste which stretched from him downto them. He was in a pleasant frame of mind as he went home and bathedand dressed for dinner. And, while he knew he had really been in the wayat the cooperage and had earned nothing, yet--his ease about his socialstatus permitting--he felt a sense of self-respect which was of anentirely new kind, and had the taste of the fresh air of a keen, clearwinter day. 

This, however, could not last. The estate was settled up; the fictionthat he was of the proprietorship slowly yielded to the reality; themen, not only those over him but also those on whose level he wassupposed to be, began to judge him as a man. "The boys say, " growledWaugh to Howells, "that he acts like one of them damn spying dude sonsproprietors sometimes puts in among the men to learn how to work 'emharder for less. He don't seem to catch on that he's got to get hismoney out of his own hands. "

"Touch him up a bit, " said Howells, who had worshiped Hiram Ranger and ina measure understood what had been in his mind when he dedicated his sonto a life of labor. "If it becomes absolutely necessary I'll talk to him. But maybe you can do the trick. "

Waugh, who had the useful man's disdain of deliberately useless men andthe rough man's way of feeling it and showing it, was not slow to act onHowells's license. That very day he found Arthur unconsciously and evenpatronizingly shirking the tending of a planer so that his teacher, BudRollins, had to do double work. Waugh watched this until it had "riled"him sufficiently to loosen his temper and his language. "Hi, there, Ranger!" he shouted. "What the hell! You've been here goin' on six monthsnow, and you're more in the way than you was the first day. "

Arthur flushed, flashed, clenched his fists; but the planer was betweenhim and Waugh, and that gave Waugh's tremendous shoulders and fists achance to produce a subduing visual impression. A man, even a young man, who is nervous on the subject of his dignity, will, no matter how braveand physically competent, shrink from avoidable encounter that meansdoubtful battle. And dignity was a grave matter with young Ranger inthose days. 

"Don't hoist your dander up at me, " said Waugh. "Get it up agin'yourself. Bud, next time he soldiers on you, send him to me. "

"All right, sir, " replied Bud, with a soothing grin. And when Waugh wasgone, he said to Arthur, "Don't mind him. Just keep pegging along, andyou'll learn all right. "

Bud's was the tone a teacher uses to encourage a defective child. Itstung Arthur more fiercely than had Waugh's. It flashed on him that themen--well, they certainly hadn't been looking up to him as he had beenfondly imagining. He went at his work resolutely, but blunderingly; hespoiled a plank and all but clogged the machine. His temper got cleanaway from him, and he shook with a rage hard to restrain from ventingitself against the inanimate objects whose possessing devils he couldhear jeering at him through the roar of the machinery. 

"Steady! Steady!" warned good-natured Rollins. "You'll drop a hand underthat knife. "

The words had just reached Arthur when he gave a sharp cry. With a cutas clean as the edge that made it, off came the little finger of hisleft hand, and he was staring at it as it lay upon the bed of theplaner, twitching, seeming to breathe as its blood pulsed out, while theblood spurted from his maimed hand. In an instant Lorry Tague had themachine still. 

"A bucket of clean water, " he yelled to the man at the next planer. 

He grabbed dazed Arthur's hand, and pressed hard with his powerful thumband forefinger upon the edges of the wound. 

"A doctor!" he shouted at the men crowding round. 

Arthur did not realize what had happened until he found himself forced tohis knees, his hand submerged in the ice-cold water, Lorry still holdingshut the severed veins and arteries. 

"Another bucket of water, you, Bill, " cried Lorry. 

When it came he had Bill Johnstone throw the severed finger into it. BudRollins, who had jumped through the window into the street in a dash fora physician, saw Doctor Schulze's buggy just turning out of High Street. He gave chase, had Schulze beside Arthur within two minutes. More water, both hot and cold, was brought, and a cleared work bench; with swift, sure fingers the doctor cleaned the stump, cleaned the severed finger, joined and sewed them, bandaged the hand. 

"Now, I'll take you home, " he said. "I guess you've distinguishedyourself enough for the day. "

Arthur followed him, silent and meek as a humbled dog. As they weredriving along Schulze misread a mournful look which Arthur cast at hisbandaged hand. "It's nothing--nothing at all, " he said gruffly. "In aweek or less you could be back at work. " The accompanying sardonic grinsaid plain as print, "But this dainty dandy is done with work. "

Weak and done though Arthur was, some blood came into his pale face andhe bit his lip with anger. 

Schulze saw these signs. 

"Several men are _killed_ every year in those works--and not throughtheir carelessness, either, " he went on in a milder, friendlier tone. "And forty or fifty are maimed--not like that little pin scratch ofyours, my dear Mr. Ranger, but hands lost, legs lost--accidents that makecripples for life. That means tragedy--not the wolf at the door, but withhis snout right in the platter. "

"I've seen that, " said Arthur. "But I never thought much aboutit--until now. "

"Naturally, " commented Schulze, with sarcasm. Then he addedphilosophically, "And it's just as well not to bother about it. Mankindfound this world a hell, and is trying to make it over into a heaven. Anda hell it still is, even more of a hell than at first, and it'll be stillmore of a hell--for these machines and these slave-driving capitalistswith their luxury-crazy families are worse than wars and aristocrats. They make the men work, and the women and the children--make 'em all workas the Pharaohs never sweated the wretches they set at building thepyramids. The nearer the structure gets toward completion, the worse thedriving and the madder the haste. Some day the world'll be worth livingin--probably just about the time it's going to drop into the sun. Meanwhile, it's a hell of a place. We're a race of slaves, toiling forthe benefit of the race of gods that'll some day be born into a habitableworld and live happily ever afterwards. Science will give themhappiness--and immortality, if they lose the taste for the adventure intothe Beyond. "

Arthur's brain heard clearly enough to remember afterwards; but Schulze'svoice seemed to be coming through a thick wall. When they reached theRanger house, Schulze had to lift him from the buggy and support hisweight and guide his staggering steps. Out ran Mrs. Ranger, with _the_terror in her eyes. 

"Don't lose your head, ma'am, " said Schulze. "It's only a cut finger. Theyoung fool forgot he was steering a machine, and had a sharp but slightreminder. "

Schulze was heavily down on the "interesting-invalid" habit. He held thatthe world's supply of sympathy was so small that there wasn't enough toprovide encouragement for those working hard and well; that those whofell into the traps of illness set in folly by themselves should get, atmost, toleration in the misfortunes in which others were compelled toshare. "The world discourages strength and encourages weakness, " he usedto declaim. "That injustice and cruelty must be reversed!"

"Doctor Schulze is right, " Arthur was saying to his mother, with anattempt at a smile. But he was glad of the softness and ease of the bigdivan in the back parlor, of the sense of hovering and protecting love hegot from his mother's and Adelaide's anxious faces. Sorer than the reallytrifling wound was the deep cut into his vanity. How his fellow-workmenwere pitying him!--a poor blockhead of a bungler who had thus brought toa pitiful climax his failure to learn a simple trade. And how the wholetown would talk and laugh! "Hiram Ranger, he begat a fool!"

Schulze, with proper equipment, redressed and rebandaged the wound, andleft, after cautioning the young man not to move the sick arm. "You'llbe all right to strum the guitar and sport a diamond ring in a fortnightat the outside, " said he. At the door he lectured Adelaide: "For God'ssake, Miss Ranger, don't let his mother coddle him. He's got the makingsof a man like his father--not as big, perhaps, but still a lot of a man. Give him a chance! Give him a chance! If this had happened in a footballgame or a fox-hunt, nobody would have thought anything of it. But justbecause it was done at useful work, you've got yourself all fixed to makea fearful to-do. "

How absurdly does practice limp along, far behind firm-striding theory!Schulze came twice that day, looked in twice the next day, and fussedlike a disturbed setting-hen when his patient forestalled the next day'svisit by appearing at his office for treatment. "I want to see if Ican't heal that cut without a scar, " was his explanation--but it was amere excuse. 

When Arthur called on the fifth day, Schulze's elder daughter, Madelene, opened the door. "Will you please tell the doctor, " said he, "that theworkman who cut his finger at the cooperage wishes to see him?"

Madelene's dark gray eyes twinkled. She was a tall and, so he thought, rather severe-looking young woman; her jet black hair was simply, yet notwithout a suspicion of coquetry, drawn back over her ears from a centralpart--or what would have been a part had her hair been less thick. Shewas studying medicine under her father. It was the first time he had seenher, it so happened, since she was in knee dresses at public school. Ashe looked he thought: "A splendid advertisement for the old man'sbusiness. " Just why she seemed so much healthier than even thehealthiest, he found it hard to understand. She was neither robust norradiant. Perhaps it was the singular clearness of her dead-white skin andof the whites of her eyes; again it might have been the deep crimson ofher lips and of the inside of her mouth--a wide mouth with two perfectrows of small, strong teeth of the kind that go with intense vitality. 

"Just wait here, " said she, in a businesslike tone, as she indicated thereception room. 

"You don't remember me?" said Arthur, to detain her. 

"No, I don't _remember_ you, " replied Madelene. "But I know who you are. "

"Who I _was_, " thought Arthur, his fall never far from the foreground ofhis mind. "You used to be very serious, and always perfect in yourlessons, " he continued aloud, "and--most superior. "

Madelene laughed. "I was a silly little prig, " said she. Then, notwithout a subtle hint of sarcasm, "But I suppose we all go through thatperiod--some of us in childhood, others further along. "

Arthur smiled, with embarrassment. So he had the reputation ofbeing a prig. 

Madelene was in the doorway. "Father will be free--presently, " said she. "He has another patient with him. If you don't care to wait, perhaps Ican look after the cut. Father said it was a trifle. "

Arthur slipped his arm out of the sling. 

"In here, " said Madelene, opening the door of a small room to the left ofher father's consultation room. 

Arthur entered. "This is your office?" he asked, looking round curiously, admiringly. It certainly was an interesting room, as the habitat of aninteresting personality is bound to be. 

"Yes, " she replied. "Sit here, please. "

Arthur seated himself in the chair by the window and rested his arm onthe table. He thought he had never seen fingers so long as hers, or sograceful. Evidently she had inherited from her father that sure, firmtouch which is perhaps the highest talent of the surgeon. "It seems suchan--an--such a _hard_ profession for a woman, " said he, to induce thosefascinating lips of hers to move. 

"It isn't soft, " she replied. "But then father hasn't brought us upsoft. "

This was discouraging, but Arthur tried again. "You like it?"

"I love it, " said she, and now her eyes were a delight. "It makes mehate to go to bed at night, and eager to get up in the morning. And thatmeans really living, doesn't it?"

"A man like me must seem to you a petty sort of creature. "

"Oh, I haven't any professional haughtiness, " was her laughing reply. "One kind of work seems to me just as good as another. It's the spirit ofthe workman that makes the only differences. "

"That's it, " said Arthur, with a humility which he thought genuine andwhich was perhaps not wholly false. "I don't seem to be able to give myheart to my work. "

"I fancy you'll give it _attention_ hereafter, " suggested Madelene. Shehad dressed the almost healed finger and was dexterously rebandaging it. She was necessarily very near to him, and from her skin there seemed toissue a perfumed energy that stimulated his nerves. Their eyes met. Bothsmiled and flushed. 

"That wasn't very kind--that remark, " said he. 

"What's all this?" broke in the sharp voice of the doctor. 

Arthur started guiltily, but Madelene, without lifting her eyes from hertask, answered: "Mr. Ranger didn't want to be kept waiting. "

"She's trying to steal my practice away from me!" cried Schulze. Helooked utterly unlike his daughter at first glance, but on closerinspection there was an intimate resemblance, like that between the nutand its rough, needle-armored shell. "Well, I guess she hasn't botchedit. " This in a pleased voice, after an admiring inspection of theworkmanlike bandage. "Come again to-morrow, young man. "

Arthur bowed to Madelene and somehow got out into the street. He wasastonished at himself and at the world. He had gone drearily into thatoffice out of a dreary world; he had issued forth light of heart anddelighted with the fresh, smiling, interesting look of the shaded streetsand the green hedges and lawns and flower beds. "A fine old town, " hesaid to himself. "Nice, friendly people--and the really right sort. Assoon as I'm done with the rough stretch I've got just ahead of me, I'mgoing to like it. Let me see--one of those girls was named Walpurga andone was named--Madelene--this one, I'm sure--Yes!" And he could hear theteacher calling the roll, could hear the alto voice from the serious faceanswer to "Madelene Schulze, " could hear the light voice from the facethat was always ready to burst into smiles answer to "Walpurga Schulze. "

But though it was quite unnecessary he, with a quite unnecessary show ofcarelessness, asked Del which was which. "The black one is Madelene, "replied she, and her ability to speak in such an indifferent tone of suchan important person surprised him. "The blonde is Walpurga. I used todetest Madelene. She always treated me as if I hadn't any sense. "

"Well, you can't blame her for that, Del, " said Arthur. "You've been agreat deal of a fool in your day--before you blossomed out. Do youremember the time Dory called you down for learning things to show off, and how furious you got?"

Adelaide looked suddenly warm, though she laughed too. "Why did you askabout Dr. Schulze's daughters?" she asked. 

"I saw one of them this morning--a beauty, a tip-topper. And no nonsenseabout her. As she's 'black, ' I suppose her name is Madelene. "

"Oh, I remember now!" exclaimed Adelaide. "Madelene is going to be adoctor. They say she's got nerves of iron--can cut and slash likeher father. "

Arthur was furious, just why he didn't know. No doubt what Del said wastrue, but there were ways and ways of saying things. "I suppose there issome sneering at her, " said he, "among the girls who couldn't doanything if they tried. It seems to me, if there is any profession awoman could follow without losing her womanliness, it is that of doctor. Every woman ought to be a doctor, whether she ever tries to make aliving out of it or not. "

Adelaide was not a little astonished by this outburst. 

"You'll be coming round to Dory's views of women, if you aren'tcareful, " said she. 

"There's a lot of sense in what Dory says about a lot of things, "replied Arthur. 

Del sheered off. "How did the doctor say your hand is?"

"Oh--all right, " said Arthur. "I'm going to work on Monday. "

"Did he say you could?"

"No, but I'm tired of doing nothing. I've got to 'get busy' if I'm topull out of this mess. "

His look, his tone made his words sound revolutionary. And, in fact, hismood was revolutionary. He was puzzled at his own change of attitude. Hissky had cleared of black clouds; the air was no longer heavy andoppressive. He wanted to work; he felt that by working he couldaccomplish something, could deserve and win the approval of people whowere worthwhile--people like Madelene Schulze, for instance. 

Next day he lurked round the corner below the doctor's house until he sawhim drive away; then he went up and rang the bell. This time it was the"blonde" that answered--small and sweet, pink and white, with tawny hair. This was disconcerting. "I couldn't get here earlier, " he explained. "Isaw the doctor just driving away. But, as these bandages feeluncomfortable, I thought perhaps his daughter--your sister, is shenot?--might--might fix them. "

Walpurga looked doubtful. "I think she's busy, " she said. "I don't liketo disturb her. "

Just then Madelene crossed the hall. Her masses of black hair were rolledinto a huge knot on top of her head; she was wearing a white work slipand her arms were bare to the elbows--the finest arms he had ever seen, Arthur thought. She seemed in a hurry and her face was flushed--she wouldhave looked no differently if she had heard his voice and had come forthto prevent his getting away without having seen him. "Meg!" called hersister. "Can you--"

Madelene apparently saw her sister and Arthur for the first time. "Goodmorning, Mr. Ranger. You've come too late. Father's out. "

Arthur repeated his doleful tale, convincingly now, for his hand did feelqueer--as what hand would not, remembering such a touch as Madelene's, and longing to experience it again?

"Certainly, " said Madelene. "I'll do the best I can. Come in. "

And once more he was in her office, with her bending over him. Andpresently her hair came unrolled, came showering down on his arm, on hisface; and he shook like a leaf and felt as if he were going to faint, into such an ecstasy did the soft rain of these tresses throw him. Asfor Madelene, she was almost hysterical in her confusion. She dartedfrom the room. 

When she returned she seemed calm, but that was because she did not liftthose tell-tale gray eyes. Neither spoke as she finished her work. IfArthur had opened his lips it would have been to say words which hethought she would resent, and he repent. Not until his last chance hadalmost ebbed did he get himself sufficiently in hand to speak. "It wasn'ttrue--what I said, " he began. "I waited until your father was gone. ThenI came--to see you. As you probably know, I'm only a workman, hardly eventhat, at the cooperage, but--I want to come to see you. May I?"

She hesitated. 

"I know the people in this town have a very poor opinion of me, " he wenton, "and I deserve it, no doubt. You see, the bottom dropped out of mylife not long ago, and I haven't found myself yet. But you did more forme in ten minutes the other day than everything and everybody, includingmyself, have been able to do since my father died. "

"I don't remember that I said anything, " she murmured. 

"I didn't say that what you said helped me. I said what you _did_--andlooked. And--I'd like to come. "

"We never have any callers, " she explained. "You see, father's--our--views--People don't understand us. And, too, we've foundourselves very congenial and sufficient unto one another. So--I--I--don'tknow what to say. "

He looked so cast down that she hastened on: "Yes--come whenever youlike. We're always at home. But we work all day. "

"So do I, " said Arthur. "Thank you. I'll come--some evening next week. "

Suddenly he felt peculiarly at ease with her, as if he had always knownher, as if she and he understood each other perfectly. "I'm afraid you'llfind me stupid, " he went on. "I don't know much about any of the thingsyou're interested in. "

"Perhaps I'm interested in more things than you imagine, " said she. "Mysister says I'm a fraud--that I really have a frivolous mind and that myserious look is a hollow pretense. "

And so they talked on, not getting better acquainted but enjoying therealization of how extremely well acquainted they were. When he was gone, Madelene found that her father had been in for some time. "Didn't he askfor me?" she said to Walpurga. 

"Yes, " answered Walpurga. "And I told him you were flirting withArthur Ranger. "

Madelene colored violently. "I never heard that word in this housebefore, " she said stiffly. 

"Nor I, " replied Walpurga, the pink and white. "And I think it's hightime--with you nearly twenty-two and me nearly twenty. "

At dinner her father said: "Well, Lena, so you've got a beau at last. I'dgiven up hope. "

"For Heaven's sake don't scare him away, father!" cried Walpurga. 

"A pretty poor excuse, " pursued the doctor. "I doubt if Arthur Ranger canmake enough to pay his own board in a River Street lodging house. "

"It took courage--real courage--to go to work as he did, " repliedMadelene, her color high. 

"Yes, " admitted her father, "_if_ he sticks to it. "

"He will stick to it, " affirmed Madelene. 

"I think so, " assented her father, dropping his teasing pretense andcoming out frankly for Arthur. "When a man shows that he has the courageto cross the Rubicon, there's no need to worry about whether he'll go onor turn back. "

"You mustn't let him know he's the only beau you've ever had, Meg, "cautioned her sister. 

"And why not?" demanded Madelene. "If I ever did care especially for aman, I'd not care for him because other women had. And I shouldn't want aman to be so weak and vain as to feel that way about me. "

It was a temptation to that aloof and isolated, yet anything but lonelyor lonesome, household to discuss this new and strange phenomenon--theintrusion of an outsider, and he a young man. But the earnestness inMadelene's voice made her father and her sister feel that to tease herfurther would be impertinent. 

Arthur had said he would not call until the next week because then hewould be at work again. He went once more to Dr. Schulze's, but wascareful to go in office hours. He did not see Madelene--though she, behind the white sash curtains of her own office, saw him come, watchedhim go until he was out of sight far down the street. On Monday he wentto work, really to work. No more shame; no more shirking or shrinking; nomore lingering on the irrevocable. He squarely faced the future, and, with his will like his father's, set dogged and unconquerable energy tobattering at the obstacles before him. "All a man needs, " said he tohimself, at the end of the first day of real work, "is a purpose. Henever knows where he's at until he gets one. And once he gets it, hecan't rest till he has accomplished it. "

What was his purpose? He didn't know--beyond a feeling that he mustlift himself from his present position of being an object of pity toall Saint X and the sort of man that hasn't the right to ask any womanto be his wife. 

CHAPTER XVI

A CAST-OFF SLIPPER

A large sum would soon be available; so the carrying out of the plans toextend, or, rather, to construct Tecumseh, must be begun. The trusteescommissioned young Hargrave to go abroad at once in search of educationaland architectural ideas, and to get apparatus that would make thelaboratories the best in America. Chemistry and its most closely relatedsciences were to be the foundation of the new university, as they are atthe foundation of life. "We'll model our school, not upon what theignorant wise of the Middle Ages thought ought to be life, but upon lifeitself, " said Dr. Hargrave. "We'll build not from the clouds down, butfrom the ground up. " He knew in the broad outline what was wanted for theTecumseh of his dream; but he felt that he was too old, perhaps toorusted in old-fashioned ways and ideas, himself to realize the dream; sohe put the whole practical task upon Dory, whom he had trained frominfancy to just that end. 

When it was settled that Dory was to go, would be away a year at theleast, perhaps two years, he explained to Adelaide. "They expect me toleave within a fortnight, " he ended. And she knew what was in hismind--what he was hoping she would say. 

It so happened that, in the months since their engagement, an immenseamount of work had been thrust upon Dory. Part of it was a study of thegreat American universities, and that meant long absences from home. Allof it was of the kind that must be done at once or not at all--and Workis the one mistress who, if she be enamored enough of a man to resolveto have him and no other, can compel him, whether he be enamored of heror not. However, for the beginning of the artificial relation betweenthis engaged couple, the chief cause was not his work but his attitudetoward her, his not unnatural but highly unwise regard for the peculiarcircumstances in which they had become engaged. Respect for the realfeelings of others is all very well, if not carried too far; but respectfor the purely imaginary feelings of others simply encourages them toplunge deeper into the fogs and bogs of folly. There was excuse forDory's withholding from his love affair the strong and firm hand he laidupon all his other affairs; but it cannot be denied that he deserved whathe got, or, rather, that he failed to deserve what he did not get. Andthe irony of it was that his unselfishness was chiefly to blame; for aselfish man would have gone straight at Del and, with Dory's advantages, would have captured her forthwith. 

As it was, she drifted aimlessly through day after day, keeping close athome, interested in nothing. She answered briefly or not at all theletters from her old friends, and she noted with a certain bluntedbitterness how their importunities fainted and died away, as the news ofthe change in her fortunes got round. If she had been seeing them face toface every day, or if she had been persistent and tenacious, they wouldhave extricated themselves less abruptly; for not the least importantamong the sacred "appearances" of conventionality is the "appearance" ofgood-heartedness; it is the graceful cloak for that icy selfishness whichis as inevitable among the sheltered and pampered as sympathy andhelpfulness are among those naked to the joys and sorrows of real life. Adelaide was far from her friends, and she deliberately gave them everyopportunity to abandon and to forget her without qualms or fears of"appearing" mean and snobbish. There were two girls from whom she ratherhoped for signs of real friendship. She had sought them in the firstplace because they were "of the right sort, " but she had come to likethem for themselves and she believed they liked her for herself. And sothey did; but their time was filled with the relentless routine of thefashionable life, and they had not a moment to spare for their ownpersonal lives; besides, Adelaide wouldn't have "fitted in" comfortably. The men of their set would be shy of her now; the women would regard heras a waste of time. 

Her beauty and her cleverness might have saved her, had she been of oneof those "good families" whom fashionables the world over recognize, regardless of their wealth or poverty, because recognition of them givesan elegant plausibility to the pretense that Mammon is not the supremegod in the Olympus of aristocracy. But--who were the Rangers? They mightbe "all right" in Saint X, but where was Saint X? Certainly, not on anymap in the geography of fashion. 

So Adelaide, sore but too lethargic to suffer, drifted drearily along, feeling that if Dory Hargrave were not under the influence of thatbrilliant, vanished past of hers, even he would abandon her as had therest, or, at least, wouldn't care for her. Not that she doubted hissincerity in the ideals he professed; but people deceived themselves socompletely. There was her own case; had she for an instant suspected howflimsily based was her own idea of herself and of her place in theworld?--the "world" meaning, of course, "the set. " As is the rule in"sets, " her self-esteem's sole foundation had been what she had, or, rather, what the family had, and now that that was gone, she held whatwas left cheap indeed--and held herself the cheaper that she could feelthus. At the outset, Arthur, after the familiar male fashion, wasapparently the weaker of the two. But when the test came, when the timefor courageous words was succeeded by the time for deeds, the shrinkingfrom action that, since the nation grew rich, has become part of theeducation of the women of the classes which shelter and coddle theirwomen, caused Adelaide to seem feeble indeed beside her brother. Also--and this should never be forgotten in judging such a woman--Arthurhad the advantage of the man's compulsion to act, while Adelaide had thedisadvantage of being under no material necessity to act--and whatnecessity but the material is there?

Dory--his love misleading his passion, as it usually does when it hasmuch influence before marriage--reasoned that, in the interest of theAdelaide that was to be, after they were married, and in his own interestwith her as well, the wise course for him to pursue was to wait untiltime and the compulsion of new circumstances should drive away her mood, should give her mind and her real character a chance to assertthemselves. In the commission to go abroad, he saw the external force forwhich he had been waiting and hoping. And it seemed to him mosttimely--for Ross's wedding invitations were out. 

"Two weeks, " said Adelaide absently. "You will sail in two weeks. " Thenin two weeks she could be out of it all, could be far away in newsurroundings, among new ideas, among strangers. She could make the newstart; she could submerge, drown her old self in the new interests. 

"Will you come?" he said, when he could endure the suspense no longer. "Won't you come?"

She temporized. "I'm afraid I couldn't--oughtn't to leave--mother andArthur just now. "

He smiled sadly. She might need her mother and her brother; but in themood in which she had been for the last few months, they certainly didnot need her. "Adelaide, " said he, with that firmness which he knew sowell how to combine with gentleness, without weakening it, "our wholefuture depends on this. If our lives are to grow together, we must begin. This is _our_ opportunity. "

She knew that Dory was not a man she could play fast and loose with, evenhad she been so disposed. Clearly, she must decide whether she intendedto marry him, to make his life hers and her life his. She lookedhelplessly round. What but him was there to build on? Without him--Shebroke the long silence with, "That is true. We must begin. " Then, after apause during which she tried to think and found she couldn't, "Make up mymind for me. "

"Let us be married day after to-morrow, " said he. "We can leave for NewYork on the one o'clock train and sail on Thursday. "

"You had it planned!"

"I had several plans, " he answered. "That's the best one. "

What should she do? Impulsively--why, she did not know--she gave Dory heranswer: "Yes, that _is_ the best plan. I must begin--at once. " And shestarted up, in a fever to be doing. 

Dory, dazed by his unexpected, complete victory, went immediately, lesthe should say or do something that would break or weaken the current ofher aroused energy. He went without as much as touching her hand. Certainly, if ever man tempted fate to snatch from him the woman heloved, Dory did then; and at that time Del must, indeed, have beenstrongly drawn to him, or she would have been unable to persist. 

The problem of the trousseau was almost as simple for her as for him. Shehad been extravagant and luxurious, had accumulated really unmanageablequantities of clothing of all kinds, far, far more than any woman withouta maid could take care of. The fact that she had not had a maid was inpart responsible for this superfluity. She had neither the time nor thepatience for making or for directing the thousand exasperating littlerepairs that are necessary if a woman with a small wardrobe is always tolook well. So, whenever repairs were necessary, she bought instead; andas she always kept herself fresh and perfect to the smallest detail shehad to buy profusely. As soon as a dress or a hat or a blouse or aparasol, a pair of boots, slippers, stockings, or any of the costly, flimsy, all but unlaunderable underwear she affected, became not quiteperfect, she put it aside against that vague day when she should haveleisure or inclination for superintending a seamstress. Within two hoursof her decision she had a seamstress in the house, and they and hermother were at work. There was no necessity to bother about new dresses. She would soon be putting off black, and she could get in Paris what shewould then need. 

In the whirlwind of those thirty-six hours, she had not a moment to thinkof anything but the material side of the wedding--the preparations forthe journey and for the long absence. She was half an hour late ingetting down to the front parlor for the ceremony, and she looked sotired from toil and lack of sleep that Dory in his anxiety about her wasall but unconscious that they were going through the supposedly solemnmarriage rite. Looking back on it afterwards, they could remember littleabout it--perhaps even less than can the average couple, under our socialsystem which makes a wedding a social function, not a personal rite. Theyhad once in jesting earnest agreed that they would have the word "obey"left out of the vows; but they forgot this, and neither was conscious ofrepeating "obey" after the preacher. Adelaide was thinking of her trunks, was trying to recall the things she felt she must have neglected in therush; Dory was worrying over her paleness and the heavy circles under hereyes, was fretting about the train--Del's tardiness had not been in thecalculations. Even the preacher, infected by the atmosphere of haste, ranover the sentences, hardly waiting for the responses. Adelaide's motherwas hearing the trunks going down to the van, and was impatient to bewhere she could superintend--there was a very important small trunk, fullof underclothes, which she was sure they were overlooking. Arthur wasgloomily abstracted, was in fierce combat with the bitter and melancholythoughts which arose from the contrast he could not but make--this simplewedding, with Dory Hargrave as her groom, when in other circumstancesthere would have been such pomp and grandeur. He and Mary the cook andEllen the upstairs girl and old Miss Skeffington, generalissimo of theHargrave household, were the only persons present keenly conscious thatthere was in progress a wedding, a supposedly irrevocable union of a manand woman for life and for death and for posterity. Even old Dr. Hargravewas thinking of what Dory was to do on the other side, was mentallygoing over the elaborate scheme for his son's guidance which he had drawnup and committed to paper. Judge Torrey, the only outsider, was puttinginto form the speech he intended to make at the wedding breakfast. 

But there was no wedding breakfast--at least, none for bride and groom. The instant the ceremony was over, Mary the cook whispered to Mrs. Ranger: "Mike says they've just got time to miss the train. "

"Good gracious!" cried Mrs. Ranger. And she darted out to halt the vanand count the trunks. Then she rushed in and was at Adelaide's arm. "Hurry, child!" she exclaimed. "Here is my present for you. "

And she thrust into her hand a small black leather case, the cover of aletter of credit. Seeing that Del was too dazed to realize what was goingon, she snatched it away and put it into the traveling case which Marywas carrying. Amid much shaking hands and kissing and nervous crying, amid flooding commonplaces and hysterical repetitions of "Good-by! Goodluck!" the young people were got off. There was no time for Mary to bringthe rice from the kitchen table, but Ellen had sequestered one ofAdelaide's old dancing slippers under the front stair. She contrived toget it out and into action, and to land it full in Adelaide's lap by alucky carom against the upright of the coach window. 

Adelaide looked down at it vaguely. It was one of a pair of slippers shehad got for the biggest and most fashionable ball she had ever attended. She remembered it all--the gorgeousness of the rooms, the flowers, thedresses, the favors, her own ecstasy in being where it was supposed to beso difficult to get; how her happiness had been marred in the early partof the evening by Ross's attendance on Helen Galloway in whose honor theball was given; how he made her happy again by staying beside her thewhole latter part of the evening, he and more young men than any othergirl had. And here was the slipper, with its handsome buckle torn off, stained, out of shape from having been so long cast aside. Where did itcome from? How did it get here? Why had this ghost suddenly appeared toher? On the opposite seat, beside her traveling case, fashionable, obviously expensive, with her initials in gold, was a bag marked"T. H. "--of an unfashionable appearance, obviously inexpensive, painfullynew. She could not take her fascinated eyes from it; and the hammering ofher blood upon her brain, as the carriage flew toward the station, seemedto be a voice monotonously repeating, "Married--married--" She shuddered. "My fate is settled for life, " she said to herself. "I am _married_!"

She dared not look at her husband--Husband! In that moment of cruelmemory, of ghastly chopfallen vanity, it was all she could do not visiblyto shrink from him. She forgot that he was her best friend, her friendfrom babyhood almost, Theodore Hargrave. She felt only that he was herhusband, her jailer, the representative of all that divided her foreverfrom the life of luxury and show which had so permeated her young bloodwith its sweet, lingering poison. She descended from the carriage, passedthe crowd of gaping, grinning loungers, and entered the train, withcheeks burning and eyes downcast, an ideal bride in appearance of shy andrefined modesty. And none who saw her delicate, aristocratic beauty offace and figure and dress could have attributed to her the angry, ugly, snobbish thoughts, like a black core hidden deep in the heart of abewitching flower. 

As he sat opposite her in the compartment, she was exaggerating intoglaring faults the many little signs of indifference to fashion in hisdress. She had never especially noted before, but now she was noting asa shuddering exhibition of "commonness, " that he wore detachablecuffs--and upon this detail her distraught mind fixed as typical. Shecould not take her eyes off his wrists; every time he moved his arms sothat she could see the wristband within his cuff, she felt as if a pieceof sandpaper were scraping her skin. He laid his hand on her two glovedhands, folded loosely in her lap. Every muscle, every nerve of her bodygrew tense; she only just fought down the impulse to snatch her handsaway and shriek at him. 

She sat rigid, her teeth set, her eyes closed, until her real self gotsome control over the monstrous, crazy creature raving within her. Thenshe said: "Please don't--touch me--just now. I've been on such astrain--and I'm almost breaking down. "

He drew his hand away. "I ought to have understood, " he said. "Would youlike to be left alone for a while?"

Without waiting for her answer, he left the compartment to her. Shelocked the door and let herself loose. When she had had her cry "out, "she felt calm; but oh, so utterly depressed. "This is only a mood, " shesaid to herself. "I don't really feel that way toward him. Still--I'vemade a miserable mistake. I ought not to have married him. I must hideit. I mustn't make him suffer for what's altogether my own fault. I mustmake the best of it. "

When he came back, she proceeded to put her programme into action. Allthe afternoon he strove with her sweet gentleness and exaggeratedconsideration for him; he tried to make her see that there was nonecessity for this elaborate pose and pretense. But she was too absorbedin her part to heed him. In the evening, soon after they returned to thecompartment from the dining car, he rose. "I am going out to smoke, " hesaid. "I'll tell the porter to make up your berth. You must be verytired. I have taken another--out in the car--so that you will not bedisturbed. "

She grew white, and a timid, terrified look came into her eyes. 

He touched her shoulder--gently. "Don't--please!" he said quietly. "Inall the years we've known each other, have you ever seen anything in meto make you feel--like--that?"

Her head drooped still lower, and her face became crimson. 

"Adelaide, look at me!"

She lifted her eyes until they met his uncertainly. 

He put out his hand. "We are friends, aren't we?"

She instantly laid her hand in his. 

"Friends, " he repeated. "Let us hold fast to that--and let the rest takecare of itself. "

"I'm ashamed of myself, " said she. And in her swift revulsion offeeling there was again opportunity for him. But he was not in the moodto see it. 

"You certainly ought to be, " replied he, with his frank smile that was sofull of the suggestions of health and sanity and good humor. "You'llnever get a martyr's crown at _my_ expense. "

At New York he rearranged their steamer accommodations. It was no longerdiffidence and misplaced consideration that moved him permanently toestablish the most difficult of barriers between them; it was pride now, for in her first stormy, moments in the train he had seen farther intoher thoughts than he dared let himself realize. 

CHAPTER XVII

POMP AND CIRCUMSTANCE

The day after the wedding, as Arthur was going home from work, he sawRoss on the lofty seat of a dogcart, driving toward him along lowerMonroe Street. His anger instantly flamed and flared; he crushed an oathbetween his teeth and glanced about for some way to avoid the humiliatingmeeting. But there was no cross street between him and the on-comingcart. Pride, or vanity, came to his support, as soon as he was convincedthat escape was impossible. With an air that was too near to defiance tocreate the intended impression of indifference, he swung along and, justas the cart was passing, glanced at his high-enthroned former friend. 

Ross had not seen him until their eyes met. He drew his horse in sosharply that it reared and pawed in amazement and indignation at thebit's coarse insult to thoroughbred instincts for courteous treatment. Heknew Arthur was at work in the factory; but he did not expect to see himin workman's dress, with a dinner pail in his hand. And from his height, he, clad in the carefully careless, ostentatiously unostentatiousgarments of the "perfect gentleman, " gazed speechless at the spectacle. Arthur reddened violently. Not all the daily contrasts thrust upon him inthose months at the cooperage had so brought home to his soul thedifferences of caste. And there came to him for the first time thathatred of inequalities which, repulsive though it is in theory, is yetthe true nerver of the strong right arm of progress. It is ascharacteristic of the homely, human countenance of Democracy as thesupercilious smirk is of the homely, inhuman countenance of caste. Arthur did not want to get up where Ross was seated in such elegantstate; he wanted to tear Ross, all the Rosses down. "The damn fool!" hefumed. "He goes lounging about, wasting the money _we_ make. It's allwrong. And if we weren't a herd of tame asses, we wouldn't permit it. "

And now he began to feel that he was the superior of this showy idler, that his own garments and dinner pail and used hands were the titles to anobility which could justly look down upon those who filched from thetreasury of the toiler the means to buzz and flit and glitter indronelike ease. "As for these Whitneys, " he thought, "mother's rightabout them. " Then he called out in a tone of good-natured contempt, whichhis stature and his powerful frame and strong, handsome face madeeffective: "Hello, Ross! When did _you_ come to town?"

"This morning, " replied Ross. "I heard you were working, but I had noidea it was--I've just been to your house, looking for you, and was onthe way to the factory. Father told me to see that you get a suitableposition. I'm going to Howells and arrange it. You know, father's been inthe East and very busy. "

"Don't bother, " said Arthur, and there was no pretense in his air ofease. "I've got just what I want. I am carrying out father's plan, andI'm far enough into it to see that he was right. "

In unbelieving silence Ross looked down at his former equal withcondescending sympathy; how well Arthur knew that look! And he rememberedthat he had once, so short a time before, regarded it as kindly, and thethoughts behind it as generous!

"I like my job, " he continued. "It gives me a sense of doing somethinguseful--of getting valuable education. Already I've had a thousanddamn-fool ideas knocked out of my head. "

"I suppose it _is_ interesting, " said Ross, with gracious encouragement. "The associations must be rather trying. "

"They _were_ rather trying, " replied Arthur with a smile. "Trying to theother men, until I got my bearings and lost the silliest of the sillyideas put in my head by college and that sort of thing. But, now that Irealize I'm an apprentice and not a gentleman deigning to associate withthe common herd, I think I'm less despicable--and less ridiculous. Still, I'm finding it hard to get it through my head that practically everythingI learned is false and must be unlearned. "

"Don't let your bitterness over the injustice to you swing you too farthe other way, Artie, " said Ross with a faint smile in his eyes and asuspicious, irritating friendliness in his voice. "You'll soon work outof that class and back where you belong. "

Arthur was both angry and amused. No doubt Ross was right as to theorigin of this new breadth of his; but a wrong motive may start a manright just as readily as a right motive may start him wrong. Arthur wouldhave admitted frankly his first feelings about his changed position, would have admitted that those feelings still lingered, still seemed toinfluence him, as grown people often catch themselves thinking in termsof beliefs impressed on them in childhood, but exploded and abandoned atthe very threshold of youth. But he knew, also, that his present beliefsand resolves and aspirations were sincere, were sane, were final--theexpression of the mind and heart that were really himself. Of what use, however, to argue with Ross? "I could no more convince him, " thoughtArthur, "than I could myself have been convinced less than a year ago. "Besides, of what importance were Ross's beliefs about him or about hisviews? So he said to him, and his tone and manner were now convincing:"Well, we'll see. However, as long as I'm a workman, I'll stand with myclass--just as you stand with your class. And while you are pretending tobe generous to us, we'll pretend to be contemptuous of you. You'll thinkwe are living off of your money; we'll think you are living off of ourwork. You'll say we're earning less than half what we get; we'll sayyou're stealing more than half what you get. It may amuse you to hearthat I am one of the organizers of the trades union that's starting. I'mon the committee on wages. So some day you and I are likely to meet. "

"I don't know much about those things, " said Ross politely. "I cansee that you're right to ingratiate yourself with those workingchaps. It will stand you in good stead when you get on top and haveto manage them. "

Arthur laughed, and so did Ross. They eyed each the other with coverthostility. "Poor creature!" thought Ross. And "Pup!" thought Arthur. "Howcould I have wanted Del to marry _him_?" He wished to pass on, but wasdetained by some suggestion in Ross's manner that he had not yetdischarged his mind of its real burden. 

"I was glad to see your mother so well, " said Ross. 

"I wish she were, " replied Arthur. "She seemed to be better while theexcitement about Del's wedding was on; but as soon as Del and Dory went, she dropped back again. I think the only thing that keeps her from--fromjoining father is the feeling that, if she were to go, the family incomewould stop. I feel sure we'd not have her, if father had left us wellprovided for, as they call it. "

"That is true, " said Ross, the decent side of his nature now full to thefore. "I can't tell you what a sense of loss I had when your father died. Artie, he was a splendid gentleman. And there is a quality in your motherthat makes me feel very humble indeed before her. "

Arthur passed, though he noted, the unconscious superciliousness in thistribute; he felt that it was a genuine tribute, that, for all itsdiscoloration in its passage through the tainted outer part of Ross'snature, it had come from the unspoiled, untainted, deepest part. Fortunately for us all, the gold in human nature remains gold, whateverits alloys from base contacts; and it is worth the mining, though therebe but a grain of it to the ton of dross. As Ross spoke Arthur warmed tohim. "You must come to see us, " he said cordially. 

Ross became embarrassed, so embarrassed that all his ability to commandhis feelings went for nothing. "Thank you, " said he hurriedly, "but I'mhere only for a few hours. I go away to-night. I came about a matterthat--that--I want to get back as soon as possible. "

Arthur was mystified by the complete transformation of theself-complacent, superior Ross of a few minutes before. He now noted thatRoss was looking almost ill, his eyes sunken, the lids red at the edges, as if from loss of sleep. Under Arthur's scrutiny his embarrassmentincreased to panic. He nervously shifted the reins, made the horserestless, shook hands with Arthur, reined in, tried to speak, said only, "I must be off--my horse is getting nervous, " and was gone. 

Arthur looked after him. "That's the sort of chap I was on the way tobeing when father pulled me up, " he reflected. "I wonder if I'll ever getsense enough not to have a sneaking envy of him--and regret?"

If he could have looked in upon Ross's mind, he might have been abruptlythrust far along the toilsome road toward his goal. In this world, rosesand thorns have a startling, preposterous way of suddenly exchangingnatures so that what was thorn becomes fairest rose, and what was rosebecomes most poisonous of thorns. Ross had just fallen an amazed andincredulous victim to this alchemy. Though somewhat uncomfortable anddownright unhappy at times, he had been, on the whole, well pleased withhimself and his prospects until he heard that Adelaide was actually aboutto marry Dory. His content collapsed with the foundation on which it wasbuilt--the feeling that Adelaide was for no other man, that if at anytime he should change his mind he would find her waiting to welcome himgratefully. He took train for Saint X, telling himself that after he gotthere he could decide what to do. In fact, when he had heard that thewedding was about to be, it was over and Adelaide and Dory were off forNew York and Europe; but he did not find this out until he reached SaintX. The man who gave him that final and overwhelming news noticed nochange in his face, though looking for signs of emotion; nor did Rossleave him until he had confirmed the impression of a heart at ease. Faralong the path between the Country Club and Point Helen he struck intothe woods and, with only the birds and the squirrels as witnesses, gaveway to his feelings. 

Now, now that she was irrevocably gone, he knew. He had made a hideousmistake; he had been led on by his vanity, led on and on until the trapwas closed and sprung; and it was too late. He sat there on a fallen treewith his head aching as if about to explode, with eyes, dry and burningand a great horror of heart-hunger sitting before him and staring at him. In their sufferings from defeated desire the selfish expiate their sins. 

He had forgotten his engagement to Theresa Howland, the wedding onlytwo weeks away. It suddenly burst in upon his despair like a shoutof derisive laughter. "I'll _not_ marry her!" he cried aloud. "I_can't_ do it!"

But even as he spoke he knew that he could, and would, and must. He hadbeen a miserable excuse for a lover to Theresa; but Theresa had never hadlove. All the men who had approached her with "intentions" had beenfighting hard against their own contempt of themselves for seeking a wifefor the sake of her money, and their efforts at love-making had been tameand lame; but Theresa, knowing no better, simply thought men not up tothe expectations falsely raised by the romances and the songs. Shebelieved _she_ could not but get as good a quality of love as there wasgoing; and Ross, with his delightful, aristocratic indifference, wasperfectly satisfactory. Theresa had that thrice-armored self-complacencewhich nature so often relentingly gives, to more than supply the lack ofthe charms withheld. She thought she was fascinating beyond any woman ofher acquaintance, indeed, of her time. She spent hours in admiringherself, in studying out poses for her head and body and arms, especiallyher arms, which she regarded as nature's last word on that kind ofbeauty--a not wholly fanciful notion, as they were not bad, if a bit tooshort between elbow and wrist, and rather fat at the shoulders. Shealways thought and, on several occasions in bursts of confidence, hadimparted to girl friends that "no man who has once cared for me can evercare for another woman. " Several of her confidantes had precisely thesame modest opinion of their own powers; but they laughed atTheresa--behind her back. 

Ross knew how vain she was. To break with her, he would have to tell herflatly that he would not marry her. "I'd be doing her no injury, " thoughthe. "Her vanity would root out some explanation which would satisfy herthat, whatever might be the cause, it wasn't lack of love for her on mypart. " But--To break off was unthinkable. The invitations out; thearrangements for the wedding all made; quantities of presentsarrived--"I've got to go through with it. I've got to marry her, " saidRoss. "But God help me, how I shall hate her!"

And, stripped clean of the glamour of her wealth, she rose beforehim--her nose that was red and queer in the mornings; her little personalhabits that got on the nerves, especially a covert self-infatuated smilethat flitted over her face at any compliment, however obviouslyperfunctory; her way of talking about every trivial thing she did--andwhat did she do that was not trivial?--as if some diarist ought to takeit down for the delight of ages to come. As Ross looked at thenew-created realistic image of her, he was amazed. "Why, I've alwaysdisliked her!" he cried. "I've been lying to myself. I am too low forwords, " he groaned. "Was there ever such a sneaking cur?" Yes, many aone, full as unconscious of his own qualities as he himself had beenuntil that moment; nor could he find consolation in the fact that he hadcompany, plenty of company, and it of the world's most "gentlemanly" andmost "ladylike. "

The young man who left that wood, the young man whom Arthur saw that day, had in his heart a consciousness, an ache, of lonely poverty that dressand dogcarts and social position could do little--something, butlittle--to ease. 

 * * * * *

He stopped at Chicago and sent word to Windrift that he was ill--notseriously ill, but in such a state that he thought it best to take careof himself, with the wedding so near. Theresa was just as well pleasedto have him away, as it gave her absolute freedom to plan and tosuperintend her triumph. For the wedding was to be her individual andexclusive triumph, with even Ross as part of the background--the mostconspicuous part, but still simply background for her personal splendor. 

Old Howland--called Bill until his early career as a pedlar and keeper ofa Cheap Jack bazaar was forgotten and who, after the great fire, whichwiped out so many pasts and purified and pedigreed Chicago's presentaristocracy, called himself William G. Howland, merchant prince, had, inhis ideal character for a wealth-chaser, one weakness--a doting fondnessfor his daughter. When she came into the world, the doctors told him hiswife would have no more children; thereafter his manner was alwaysinsulting, and usually his tone and words, whenever and of whatever hespoke to her. Women were made by the Almighty solely to bear children tomen; his woman had been made to bear him a son. Now that she would neverhave a son, she was of no use, and it galled him that he could find noplausibly respectable excuse for casting her off, as he cast off worn-outservants in his business. But as the years passed and he saw the variousvarieties of thorns into which the sons of so many of his fellow-princesdeveloped, he became reconciled to Theresa--_not_ to his wife. Thatunfortunate woman, the daughter of a drunkard and partially deranged byillness and by grief over her husband's brutality toward her, became--orrather, was made by her insistent doctor--what would have been called adrunkard, had she not been the wife of a prince. Her "dipsomania" took anunaggressive form, as she was by nature gentle and sweet; she simply usedto shut herself in and drink until she would cry herself into a timid, suppressed hysteria. So secret was she that Theresa never knew the truthabout these "spells. "

Howland did not like Ross; but when Theresa told him she was going tomarry him she had only to cry a little and sit in the old man's lap andtease. "Very well, then, " said her father, "you can have him. But he's agambler, like his father. They call it finance, but changing the name ofa thing only changes the smell of it, not the thing itself. I'm going totie my money up so that he can't get at it. "

"I want you to, papa, " replied Theresa, giving him a kiss and a great hugfor emphasis. "I don't want anybody to be able to touch _my_ property. "

For the wedding, Howland gave Theresa a free hand. "I'll pay the bills, no matter what they are, " said he. "Give yourself a good time. " AndTheresa, who had been brought up to be selfish, and was prudent about herimpulses only where she suspected them of being generous, proceeded toarrange for herself the wedding that is still talked about in Chicago"society" and throughout the Middle West. A dressmaker from the Rue de laPaix came over with models and samples, and carried back a huge order anda plaster reproduction of Theresa's figure, and elaborate notes on thecolor of her skin, hair, eyes, and her preferences in shapes of hats. Ajeweler, also of the Rue de la Paix, came with jewels--nearly a milliondollars' worth--for her to make selections. Her boots and shoes andslippers she got from Rowney, in Fifth Avenue, who, as everybody knows, makes nothing for less than thirty-five dollars, and can put a hundreddollars worth of price, if not of value, into a pair of evening slippers. Theresa was proud of her feet; they were short and plump, and had thoseabrupt, towering insteps that are regarded by the people who have them asunfailing indications of haughty lineage, just as the people who haveflat feet dwell fondly upon the flat feet of the Wittlesbachs, kings inBavaria. She was not easy to please in the matter of casements for thosefeet; also, as she was very short in stature, she had to get three and ahalf extra inches of height out of her heels; and to make that sort ofheel so that it can even be hobbled upon is not easy or cheap. OnceTheresa, fretting about her red-ended nose and muddy skin, had gone to aspecialist. "Let me see your foot, " said he; and when he saw the heel, heexclaimed: "Cut that tight, high-heeled thing out or you'll never get adecent skin, and your eyes will trouble you by the time you are thirty. "But Theresa, before adopting such drastic measures, went to a beautydoctor. He assured her that she could be cured without the sacrifice ofthe heel, and that the weakness of her eyes would disappear a year or soafter marriage. And he was soon going into ecstasies over herimprovement, over the radiance of her beauty. She saw with his eyes andceased to bother about nose or skin--they were the least beautiful of herbeauties, but--"One can't expect to be absolutely perfect. Besides, theabsolutely perfect kind of beauty might be monotonous. "

The two weeks before the wedding were the happiest of her life. All daylong, each day, vans were thundering up to the rear doors of Windrift, each van loaded to bursting with new and magnificent, if not beautifulcostliness. The house was full of the employees of florists, dressmakers, decorators, each one striving to outdo the other in servility. Theresawas like an autocratic sovereign, queening it over these menials andfancying herself adored. They showed _so_ plainly that they were awed byher and were in ecstasies of admiration over her taste. And, as thegrounds and the house were transformed, Theresa's exaltation grew untilshe went about fairly dizzy with delight in herself. 

The bridesmaids and ushers came. They were wealth-worshipers all, andtheir homage lifted Theresa still higher. They marched and swept about inher train, lording it over the menials and feeling that they were not awhit behind the grand ladies and gentlemen of the French courts of theeighteenth century. They had read the memoirs of that idyllic perioddiligently, had read with minds only for the flimsy glitter which hid thevulgarity and silliness and shame as a gorgeous robe hastily donned by adirty chambermaid might conceal from a casual glance the sardonic andrepulsive contrast. The wedding day approached all too swiftly forTheresa and her court. True, that would be the magnificent climax; butthey knew it would also dissipate the spell--after the wedding, life intwentieth century America again. 

"If only it don't rain!" said Harry Legendre. 

"It won't, " replied Theresa with conviction--and her look of commandtoward the heavens made the courtiers exchange winks and smiles behindher back. They were courtiers to wealth, not to Theresa, just as theirEuropean prototypes are awed before a "king's most excellent Majesty, "not before his swollen body and shrunken brain. 

And it did not rain. Ross arrived in the red sunset of the wedding eve, Tom Glenning, his best man, coming with him. They were put, with theushers, in rooms at the pavilion where were the squash courts and wintertennis courts and the swimming baths. Theresa and Ross stood on the frontporch alone in the moonlight, looking out over the enchantment-like sceneinto which the florists and decorators had transformed the terraces andgardens. She was a little alarmed by his white face and sunken eyes; butshe accepted his reassurances without question--she would havedisbelieved anything which did not fit in with her plans. And now, asthey gazed out upon that beauty under the soft shimmer of the moonlight, her heart suddenly expanded in tenderness. "I am _so_ happy, " shemurmured, slipping an arm through his. 

Her act called for a return pressure. He gave it, much as a woman'ssalutation would have made him unconsciously move to lift his hat. 

"While Adele was dressing me for dinner--" she began. 

At that name, he moved so that her arm dropped from his; but she did notconnect her maid with her former bosom friend. 

"I got to thinking about those who are not so well off as we, " she wenton; "about the poor. And so, I've asked papa to give all his employeesand the servants nice presents, and I've sent five thousand dollars to bedivided among the churches in the town, down there--for the poor. Do youthink I did wrong? I'm always afraid of encouraging those kind of peopleto expect too much of us. "

She had asked that he might echo the eulogies she had been bestowingupon herself. But he disappointed her. "Oh, I guess it was wellenough, " he replied. "I must go down to the pavilion. I'm fagged, andyou must be, too. "

The suggestion that he might not be looking his best on the morrow wasenough to change the current of her thoughts. "Yes, _do_, dear!" sheurged. "And don't let Tom and Harry and the rest keep you up. "

They did not even see him. He sat in the shed at the end of theboat-landing, staring out over the lake until the moon set. Then he wentto the pavilion. It was all dark; he stole in, and to bed, but not tosleep. Before his closed but seeing eyes floated a vision of twowomen--Adelaide as he had last seen her, Theresa as she looked in themornings, as she had looked that afternoon. 

He was haggard next day. But it was becoming to him, gave thefinishing touch to his customary bored, distinguished air; and hewas dressed in a way that made every man there envy him. As Theresa, oninsignificant-looking little Bill Howland's arm, advanced to meet him atthe altar erected under a canopy of silk and flowers in the bower oflilies and roses into which the big drawing-room had been transformed, she thrilled with pride. _There_ was a man one could look at withdelight, as one said, "My husband!"

It was a perfect day--perfect weather, everything going forward withouthitch, everybody looking his and her best, and "Mama" providentiallycompelled by one of her "spells" to keep to her room. Those absences ofhers were so frequent and so much the matter of course that no one gavethem a second thought. Theresa had studied up the customs at fashionableEnglish and French weddings, and had combined the most aristocraticfeatures of both. Perhaps the most successful feature was when she andRoss, dressed for the going away, walked, she leaning upon his arm, across the lawns to the silk marquee where the wedding breakfast wasserved. Before them, walking backward, were a dozen little girls from thevillage school, all in white, strewing roses from beribboned baskets, andsinging, "Behold! The bride in beauty comes!"

"Well, I'm glad it's all over, " said Theresa as she settled back in achair in the private car that was to take them to Wilderness Lodge, innorthern Wisconsin for the honeymoon. 

"So am I, " Ross disappointed her by saying. "I've felt like a damn foolever since I began to face that gaping gang. "

"But you must admit it was beautiful, " objected Theresa pouting. 

Ross shut his teeth together to keep back a rude reply. He wasunderstanding how men can be brutal to women. To look at her was to havean all but uncontrollable impulse to rise up and in a series of noisy andprofane explosions reveal to her the truth that was poisoning him. Aftera while, a sound from her direction made him glance at her. She wassobbing. He did not then know that, to her, tears were simply the meansto getting what she wanted; so his heart softened. While she was thinkingthat she was looking particularly well and femininely attractive, he waspitying her as a forlorn creature, who could never inspire love and oughtto be treated with consideration, much as one tries to hide by aneffusive show of courtesy the repulsion deformity inspires. 

"Don't cry, Theresa, " he said gently, trying to make up his mind to touchher. But he groaned to himself, "I can't! I must wait until I can't seeher. " And he ordered the porter to bring him whisky and soda. 

"Won't you join me?" he said. 

"You know, I never touch anything to drink, " she replied. "Papa and Dr. Massey both made me promise not to. "

Ross's hand, reaching out for the bottle of whisky, drew slowly back. Heaverted his face that she might not see. He knew about her mother--andknew Theresa did not. It had never entered his head that the weakness ofthe mother might be transmitted to the daughter. Now--Just before theyleft, Dr. Massey had taken him aside and, in a manner that would haveimpressed him instantly but for his mood, had said: "Mr. Whitney, I wantyou never to forget that Theresa must not be depressed. You must take thegreatest care of her. We must talk about it again--when you return. "

And _this_ was what he meant!

He almost leaped to his feet at Theresa's softly interrupting voice, "Areyou ill, dear?"

"A little--the strain--I'll be all right--" And leaving the whiskyuntouched, he went into his own compartment. As he was closing the door, he gave a gasp of dismay. "She might begin now!" he muttered. He rang forthe porter. "Bring that bottle, " he said. Then, as an afterthought of"appearances, " "And the soda and a glass. "

"I can get you another, sir, " said the porter. 

"No--that one, " ordered Ross. 

Behind the returning porter came Theresa. "Can't I do something for you, dear? Rub your head, or fix the pillows?"

Ross did not look at her. "Do, please--fix the pillows, " he said. "Thenif I can sleep a little, I'll be all right, and will soon rejoin you. "

"Can't I fix your drink for you?" she asked, putting her hand onthe bottle. 

Ross restrained an impulse to snatch it away from her. "Thanks, no--dear, " he answered. "I've decided to swear off--with you. Is it ago?"

She laughed. "Silly!" she murmured, bending and kissing him. "Ifyou wish. "

"That settles it, " said Ross, with a forced, pained smile. "We'll neitherof us touch it. I was getting into the habit of taking too much--notreally too much--but--Oh, you understand. "

"That's the way father feels about it, " said Theresa, laughing. "We neverdrink at home--except mother when she has a spell, and has to be kept upon brandy. "

Ross threw his arm up to hide his face. "Let me sleep, do, " hesaid gently. 

CHAPTER XVIII

LOVE, THE BLUNDERER

As Dory had several months' work before him at Paris, he and Del took afurnished apartment in the Rue de Rivoli, high up, attractive within, before its balconied windows the stately trees, the fountains, the brightflower beds, the thronged playgrounds of the Tuileries. But they were notlong left to themselves; in their second week, the _concierge's_ littlegirl late one afternoon brought Janet's card up to Adelaide. As Janetentered, Del regretted having yielded to impulse and admitted her. For, the granddaughter of "blue-jeans Jones, " the tavern keeper, was lookingthe elegant and idle aristocrat from the tip of the tall, graceful plumein her most Parisian of hats to the buckles of shoes which matched herdress, parasol, and jewels. A lovely Janet, a marvelous Janet; a toiletteit must have taken her two hours to make, and spiritual hazel eyes thatforbade the idea of her giving so much as a moment's thought to anymaterial thing, even to dress. Adelaide had spent with the dressmakers agood part of the letter of credit her mother slipped into her travelingbag at the parting; she herself was in a negligee which had as much styleas Janet's costume and, in addition, individual taste, whereof Janet hadbut little; and besides, while her beauty had the same Americandelicateness, as of the finest, least florid Sèvres or Dresden, it alsohad a look of durability which Janet's beauty lacked--for Janet's beautydepended upon those fragilities, coloring and contour. Adelaide was notnotably vain, had a clear sense of her defects, tended to exaggeratethem, rather than her many and decisive good points. It was not Janet'sappearance that unsettled Del; she brought into the room the atmosphereDel had breathed during all those important years of girlhood, and hadnot yet lost her fondness for. It depressed her at once about herself tonote how this vision of the life that had been but would never be againaffected her. 

"You are sad, dear, " said Janet, as she kissed her on both cheeks with adiffusing of perfume that gave her a sense of a bouquet of pricelessexotics waving before her face. 

"You are sad, dear, " she repeated, with that air of tenderest sympathywhich can be the safest cover for subtle malice. 

Adelaide shrank. 

"I'm so glad I've come when I may be able to do some good. "

Adelaide winced. 

"How cozy these rooms are--"

At "cozy" Adelaide shuddered. No one ever used, except apologetically, that word, which is the desperate last resort of compliment. 

"And what a beautiful view from the windows--so much better than ours atthe pompous old Bristol, looking out on that bare square!"

Adelaide laughed. Not by chance, she knew, did Miss Janet, with hersoftly sheathed but swift and sharp cat claws, drag in the delicate hintthat while Adelaide was "cozy" in an unaristocratic _maison meublée_, sheherself was ensconced in the haunts of royalty; and it suddenly came backto Del how essentially cheap was "aristocracy. "

"But I mustn't look at those adorable gardens, " continued Janet. "Theyfill me with longing for the country, for the pure, simple things. I amso sick of the life mamma and I lead. And you are married to dearDory--how romantic! And I hear that Arthur is to marry MargaretSchultz--or whatever her name was--that splendid creature! She was a_dear_ friend of the trained nurse I had last spring, and what the nursetold me about her made me positively love her. Such character! Andgetting ready to lead _such_ a useful life. " This without the leastsuggestion of struggle with a difficult subject. "Arthur is a noblefellow, too. If we had been in spiritual accord, I'd have loved to go andlead his life with him. "

Adelaide was in high good humor now--Janet was too preposterous to betaken seriously. "What do you want me to do for you, Jen?" said she. 

"Why, nothing!" exclaimed Janet, looking a little wonder and muchreproach. 

Del laughed. "Now, really, Jen, " said she. "You know you never in theworld went to all the trouble of getting my address, and then leftroyalty at the Bristol for a _maison meublée_, four flights up and noelevator, just to _see_ me!"

"I had thought of something I was sure would give you pleasure, " saidJanet, injured. 

"What do you want me to do for you?" repeated Adelaide, with smilingpersistence. 

"Mamma and I have an invitation to spend a week at Besançon--you know, it's the splendid old chateau Louis Treize used to love to visit. It'sstill the seat of the Saint Berthè family, and the present Marquis, a_dear_ friend of ours, is such a wonderful, fine old nobleman--so simpleand gracious and full of epigrams. He really ought to wear lace andruffles and a beautiful peruke. At any rate, as I was saying, he hasasked us down. But mamma has to go to England to see papa before hesails, and I thought you'd love to visit the chateau--you and Dory. It'sso poetic--and historic, too. "

"Your mother is going away and you'll be unable to make this visit unlessyou get a chaperon, and you want me to chaperon you, " said Adelaide, whowas not minded to be put in the attitude of being the recipient of afavor from this particular young woman at this particular time, when intruth she was being asked to confer a favor. "Adversity" had alreadysharpened her wits to the extent of making her alert to the selfishnessdisguised as generosity which the prosperous love to shower upon theirlittle brothers and sisters of the poor. She knew at once that Janet musthave been desperately off for a chaperon to come to her. 

A look of irritation marred Janet's spiritual countenance for aninstant. But she never permitted anything whatsoever to stand between herand what she wished. She masked herself and said sweetly: "Won't you go, dear? I know you'll enjoy it--you and Dory. And it would be a great favorto me. I don't see how I can go unless you consent. You know, I mayn't gowith just anyone. "

Adelaide's first impulse was to refuse; but she did not. She put offdecision by saying, "I'll ask Dory to-night, and let you know in themorning. Will that do?"

"Perfectly, " said Janet, rising to go. "I'll count on you, for I knowDory will want to see the chateau and get a glimpse of life in the oldaristocracy. It will be _so_ educational. "

Dory felt the change in Del the instant he entered their little_salon_--felt that during the day some new element had intruded intotheir friendly life together, to interrupt, to unsettle, and to cloud thebrightening vistas ahead. At the mention of Janet he began to understand. He saw it all when she said with a show of indifference that deceivedonly herself, "Wouldn't you like to go down to Besançon?"

"Not I, " replied he coldly. "Europe is full of that kind of places. Youcan't glance outdoors without seeing a house or a ruin where the sweatand blood of peasants were squandered. "

"Janet thought you'd be interested in it as history, " persisted Adelaide, beginning to feel irritated. 

"That's amusing, " said Dory. "You might have told her that scandal isn'thistory, that history never was made in such places. As for the peoplewho live there now, they're certainly not worth while--the samepretentious ignoramuses that used to live there, except they no longerhave fangs. "

"You ought not to be so prejudiced, " said Adelaide, who in those daysoften found common sense irritating. She had the all but universal habitof setting down to "prejudice" such views as are out of accord with theset of views held by one's business or professional or social associates. 

Her irritation confirmed Dory's suspicions. "I spoke only for myself, "said he. "Of course, you'll accept Janet's invitation. She included meonly as a matter of form. "

"I couldn't, without you. "

"Why not?"

"Well--wouldn't, then. "

"But I urge you to go--want you to go! I can't possibly leave Paris, notfor a day--at present. "

"I shan't go without you, " said Adelaide, trying hard to make her tonefirm and final. 

Dory leaned across the table toward her--they were in the garden of acafe in the Latin Quarter. "If you don't go, Del, " said he, "you'll makeme feel that I am restraining you in a way far meaner than a directrequest not to go. You want to go. I want you to go. There is _no_ reasonwhy you shouldn't. "

Adelaide smiled shamefacedly. "You honestly want to get rid of me?"

"Honestly. I'd feel like a jailer, if you didn't go. "

"What'll you do in the evenings?"

"Work later, dine later, go to bed and get up earlier. "

"Work--always work, " she said. She sighed, not wholly insincerely. "Iwish I weren't so idle and aimless. If I were the woman I ought to be--"

"None of that--none of that!" he cried, in mock sternness. 

"I ought to be interested in your work. "

"Why, I thought you were!" he exclaimed, in smiling astonishment. 

"Oh, of course, in a way--in an 'entertainment' sort of way. I like tohear you talk about it--who wouldn't? But I don't give the kind ofinterest I should--the interest that thinks and suggests and stimulates. "

"Don't be too sure of that, " said Dory. "The 'helpful' sort of people areusually a nuisance. "

But she knew the truth, though passion might still be veiling it fromhim. Life, before her father's will forced an abrupt change, had been toher a showman, submitting his exhibits for her gracious approval, shifting them as soon as she looked as if she were about to be bored; andthe change had come before she had lived long enough to exhaust and wearyof the few things he has for the well-paying passive spectator, but notbefore she had formed the habit of making only the passive spectator'sslight mental exertion. 

"Dory is so generous, " she thought, with the not acutely painful kind ofremorse we lay upon the penitential altar for our own shortcomings, "thathe doesn't realize how I'm shirking and letting him do all the pulling. "And to him she said, "If you could have seen into my mind while Janet washere, you'd give me up as hopeless. "

Dory laughed. "I had a glimpse of it just now--when you didn't like itbecause I couldn't see my way clear to taking certain people so seriouslyas you think they deserve. "

"But you _are_ prejudiced on that subject, " she maintained. 

"And ever shall be, " admitted he, so good-humoredly that she could notbut respond. "It's impossible for me to forget that every luxurious idlermeans scores who have to work long hours for almost nothing in order thathe may be of no use to the world or to himself. "

"You'd have the whole race on a dead level, " said Adelaide. 

"Of material prosperity--yes, " replied Dory. "A high dead level. I'dabolish the coarse, brutal contrasts between waste and want. Then there'dbe a chance for the really interesting contrasts--the infinite varietiesof thought and taste and character and individuality. "

"I see, " said Adelaide, as if struck by a new idea. "You'd have thecontrasts, differences among flowers, not merely between flower and weed. You'd abolish the weeds. "

"Root and stalk, " answered Dory, admiring her way of putting it. "Myobjection to these aristocratic ideals is that they are so vulgar--and sodishonest. Is that prejudice?"

"No--oh, no!" replied Del sincerely. "Now, it seems to me, I don't careto go with Janet. "

"Not to oblige me--very particularly? I want you to go. I want you tosee for yourself, Del. "

She laughed. "Then I'll go--but only because you ask it. "

 * * * * *

That was indeed an elegant company at Besançon--elegant in dress, elegantin graceful carelessness of manners, elegant in graceful sinuosities ofcleverly turned phrases. But after the passing of the first and seconddays' sensations, Hiram and Ellen Ranger's daughter began to havesomewhat the same feeling she remembered having as a little girl, whenshe went to both the afternoon and the evening performances of thecircus. These people, going through always the same tricks in the sameold narrow ring of class ideas, lost much of their charm after a fewrepetitions of their undoubtedly clever and attractive performance; sheeven began to see how they would become drearily monotonous. "No wonderthey look bored, " she thought. "They are. " What enormous importance theyattached to trifles! What ludicrous tenacity in exploded delusions! Andwhat self-complacent claiming of remote, powerful ancestors who hadfounded their families, when those ancestors would have disclaimed themas puny nonentities. Their ideas were wholly provided for them, preciselyas were their clothes and every artistic thing that gave them"background. " They would have made as absurd a failure of trying toevolve the one as the other. Yet they posed--and were widely accepted--asthe superiors of those who made their clothes and furniture and of thosewho made their ideas. And she had thought Dory partly insincere, partlyprejudiced when he had laughed at them. Why, he had only shown theplainest kind of American good sense. As for snobbishness, was not thesilly-child American brand of it less ridiculous than this unblushing andunconcealed self-reverence, without any physical, mental or materialjustification whatsoever? They hadn't good manners even, because--as Doryhad once said--no one could have really good manners who believed, andacted upon the belief, that he was the superior of most of the members ofhis own family--the human race. 

"I suppose I could compress myself back into being satisfied with thissort of people and things, " she thought, as she looked round the ballroomfrom which pose and self-consciousness and rigid conventionality hadbanished spontaneous gayety. "I suppose I could even again come tofancying this the only life. But I certainly don't care for it now. "

But, although Adelaide was thus using her eyes and her mind--her own eyesand her own mind--in observing what was going on around her, she did notdisconcert the others, not even Janet, by expressing her thoughts. Commonsense--absolute common sense--always sounds incongruous in a conventionalatmosphere. In its milder forms it produces the effect of wit; instronger doses it is a violent irritant; in large quantity, it causesthose to whom it is administered to regard the person administering it asinsane. Perhaps Adelaide might have talked more or less frankly to Janethad Janet not been so obviously in the highest of her own kind ofheavens. She was raised to this pinnacle by the devoted attentions of theViscount Brunais, eldest son of Saint Berthè and the most agreeable andadaptable of men, if the smallest and homeliest. Adelaide spoke of hisintelligence to Janet, when they were alone before dinner on the fourthday, and Janet at once responded. 

"And such a soul!" she exclaimed. "He inherits all the splendid, nobletraditions of their old, _old_ family. You see in his face that he isdescended from generations of refinement and--and--freedom from contactwith vulgarizing work, don't you?"

"That hadn't struck me, " said Adelaide amiably. "But he's a well-meaning, good-hearted little man, and, of course, he feels as at home in thesurroundings he's had all his life as a bird on a bough. Who doesn't?"

"But when you know him better, when you know him as I know him--" Janet'sexpression disclosed the secret. 

"But won't you be lonely--away off here--among--foreign people?"said Adelaide. 

"Oh, I should _love_ it here!" exclaimed Janet. "It seems to me I--heand I--must have lived in this very chateau in a former existence. Wehave talked about it, and he agrees with me. We are _so_ harmonious. "

"You've really made up your mind to--to marry him?" Adelaide had almostsaid "to buy him"; she had a sense that it was her duty to disregardJanet's pretenses, and "buy" was so exactly the word to use with thesepeople to whom money was the paramount consideration, the thought behindevery other thought, the feeling behind every other feeling, themainspring of their lives, the mainstay of all the fictions of theiraristocracy. 

"That depends on father, " replied Janet. "Mother has gone to talk to himabout it. "

"I'm sure your father won't stand between you and happiness, " saidAdelaide. 

"But he doesn't understand these aristocratic people, " replied she. "Ofcourse, if it depended upon Aristide and me, we should be married withoutconsulting anybody. But he can't legally marry without his father'sconsent, and his father naturally wants proper settlements. It's a cruellaw, don't you think?"

Adelaide thought not; she thought it, on the contrary, an admirabledevice to "save the face" of a mercenary lover posing as a sentimentalistand money-spurner. But she merely said, "I think it's mostcharacteristic, most aristocratic. " She knew Janet, how shrewd she was, how thoroughly she understood the "coarse side of life. " She added, "Andyour father'll come round. "

"I wish I could believe it, " sighed Janet. "The Saint Berthès have anexaggerated notion of papa's wealth. Besides, they need a good deal. Theywere robbed horribly by those dreadful revolutionists. They used to ownall this part of the country. All these people round here with theirlittle farms were once the peasants of Aristide's ancestors. Now--eventhis chateau has a mortgage on it. I couldn't keep back the tears, whileAristide was telling me. "

Adelaide thought of Charles Whitney listening to that same recital, andalmost laughed. "Well, I feel sure it will turn out all right, " she said. "Your mother'll see to that. And I believe you'll be very, very happy. "Theatricals in private life was Janet's passion--why should she not behappy? Frenchmen were famous for their politeness and consideration totheir wives; Aristide would never let her see or feel that she bored him, that her reverence for the things he was too intelligent and modern notto despise appealed to him only through his sense of humor. Janet wouldpush her shrewd, soulful way into social leadership, would bring herchildren up to be more aristocratic than the children of the oldestaristocrats. 

Adelaide smiled as she pictured it all--smiled, yet sighed. She was notunder Janet's fixed and unshakable delusions. She saw that high-soundingtitles were no more part of the personalities bearing them than the massof frankly false hair so grandly worn by Aristide's grand-aunt was partof the wisp-like remnant of natural head covering. But that other self ofhers, so reluctant to be laughed or frowned down and out by the self thatwas Hiram Ranger's daughter, still forced her to share in the ancient, ignorant allegiance to "appearances. " She did not appreciate how boredshe was, how impatient to be back with Dory, the never monotonous, thealways interesting, until she discovered that Janet, with her usualsubtlety, had arranged for them to stay another week, had made itimpossible for her to refuse without seeming to be disobliging and evendownright rude. They were to have returned to Paris on a Monday. OnSunday she wrote Dory to telegraph for her on Tuesday. 

"I'd hate to be looking forward to that life of dull foolery, " thoughtshe, as the mossy bastions of Besançon drifted from her horizon--she wasjourneying up alone, Janet staying on with one of the Saint Berthè womenas chaperone. "It is foolery and it is dull. I don't see how grown-uppeople endure it, unless they've never known any better. Yet I seemunable to content myself with the life father stands for--and Dory. " Sheappreciated the meaning of the legend of the creature with the twobodies and the two wills, each always opposed to the other, with theresult that all motion was in a dazing circle in which neither wished togo. "Still, " she concluded, "I _am_ learning"--which was the truth;indeed, she was learning with astonishing rapidity for a girl who had hadsuch an insidiously wrong start and was getting but slight encouragement. 

Dory, of course, was helping her, but not as he might. Instead ofbringing to bear that most powerful of influences, the influence ofpassionate love, he held to his stupid compact with his supersensitiveself--the compact that he would never intrude his longings upon her. Heconstantly reminded himself how often woman gives through a sense of dutyor through fear of alienating or wounding one she respects and likes;and, so he saw in each impulse to enter Eden boldly a temptation to himto trespass, a temptation to her to mask her real feelings and suffer it. The mystery in which respectable womanhood is kept veiled from the male, has bred in him an awe of the female that she does not fully realize oraltogether approve--though she is not slow to advantage herself of it. Inthe smaller cities and towns of the West, this awe of respectablewomanhood exists in a degree difficult for the sophisticated to believepossible, unless they have had experience of it. Dory had never had thatfamiliarity with women which breeds knowledge of their absolute andunmysterious humanness. Thus, not only did he not have the key whichenables its possessor to unlock them; he did not even know how to use itwhen Del offered it to him, all but thrust it into his hand. Poor Dory, indeed--but let only those who have not loved too well to love wiselystrut at his expense by pitying him; for, in matters of the heart, sophisticated and unsophisticated act much alike. "Men would dare muchmore, if they knew what women think, " says George Sand. It is also truethat the men who dare most, who win most, are those who do not stop tobother about what the women think. Thought does not yet govern the world, but appetite and action--bold appetite and the courage of it. 

CHAPTER XIX

MADELENE

To give himself, journeyman cooper, the feeling of ease and equality, Arthur dressed, with long-discontinued attention to detail, from hisextensive wardrobe which the eighteen months since its last accessionshad not impaired or antiquated. And, in the twilight of an earlySeptember evening, he went forth to settle the matter that had become themost momentous. 

There is in dress a something independent of material and cut and even ofthe individuality of the wearer; there is a spirit of caste. If the ladydons her maid's dress, some subtle essence of the menial permeates her, even to her blood, her mind, and heart. The maid, in madame's dress, putting on "airs, " is merely giving an outlet to that which has enteredinto her from her clothes. Thus, Arthur assumed again with his "_grandetoilette_" the feeling of the caste from which he had been ejected. Madelene, come herself to open the door for him, was in a summer dress ofno pretentions to style other than that which her figure, with its large, free, splendid lines, gave whatever she happened to wear. His nerves, hisblood, responded to her beauty, as always; her hair, her features, thegrace of the movements of that strong, slender, supple form, gave him thesense of her kinship with freedom and force and fire and all things keenand bright. But stealthily and subtly it came to him, in this moodsuperinduced by his raiment, that in marrying her he was, after all, making sacrifices--she was ascending socially, he descending, condescending. The feeling was far too vague to be at all conscious; itis, however, just those hazy, stealthy feelings that exert the mostpotent influence upon us. When the strong are conquered is it not alwaysby feeble forces from the dark and from behind?

"You have had good news, " said Madelene, when they were in the dimdaylight on the creeper-screened back porch. For such was her generousinterpretation of his expression of self-confidence andself-satisfaction. 

"Not yet, " he replied, looking away reflectively. "But I hope for it. "

There wasn't any mistaking the meaning of that tone; she knew what wascoming. She folded her hands in her lap, and there softly entered andpervaded her a quiet, enormous content that made her seem the crown ofthe quiet beauty of that evening sky whose ocean of purple-tinted crystalstretched away toward the shores of the infinite. 

"Madelene, " he began in a self-conscious voice, "you know what myposition is, and what I get, and my prospects. But you know what I was, too; and so, I feel I've the right to ask you to marry me--to wait untilI get back to the place from which I had to come down. "

The light was fading from the sky, from her eyes, from her heart. Amoment before he had been there, so near her, so at one with her; nowhe was far away, and this voice she heard wasn't his at all. And hiswords--She felt alone in the dark and the cold, the victim of a cheatupon her deepest feelings. 

"I was bitter against my father at first, " he went on. "But since I havecome to know you I have forgiven him. I am grateful to him. If it hadn'tbeen for what he did I might never have learned to appreciate you, to--"

"Don't--_please_!" she said in the tone that is from an aching heart. "Don't say any more. "

Arthur was astounded. He looked at her for the first time since he began;instantly fear was shaking his self-confidence at its foundations. "Madelene!" he exclaimed. "I know that you love me!"

She hid her face in her hands--the sight of them, long and narrow andstrong, filled him with the longing to seize them, to feel the throb oftheir life thrill from them into him, troop through and through him likevictory-bringing legions into a besieged city. But her broken voicestopped him. "And I thought you loved me, " she said. 

"You know I do!" he cried. 

She was silent. 

"What is it, Madelene?" he implored. "What has come between us? Does yourfather object because I am--am not well enough off?"

She dropped her hands from before her face and looked at him. The firsttime he saw her he had thought she was severe; ever since he had wonderedhow he could have imagined severity into a countenance so gentle andsweet. Now he knew that his first impression was not imaginary; for shehad again the expression with which she had faced the hostile world ofSaint X until he, his love, came into her life. "It is I that must askyou what has changed you, Arthur, " she said, more in sadness than inbitterness, though in both. "I don't seem to know you this evening. "

Arthur lost the last remnant of his self-consciousness. He saw he wasabout to lose, if indeed he had not already lost, that which had come tomean life to him--the happiness from this woman's beauty, the strengthfrom her character, the sympathy from her mind and heart. It was interror that he asked: "Why, Madelene? What is it? What have I done?" Andin dread he studied her firm, regular profile, a graceful strength thatwas Greek, and so wonderfully completed by her hair, blue black and thickand wavy about the temple and ear and the nape of the neck. 

The girl did not answer immediately; he thought she was refusing to hear, yet he could find no words with which to try to stem the current of thoseominous thoughts. At last she said: "You talk about the position you have'come down from' and the position you are going back to--and that you aregrateful to your father for having brought you down where you were humbleenough to find me. "

"Madelene!"

"Wait!" she commanded. "You wish to know what is the matter with me. Letme tell you. We didn't receive you here because you are a cooper orbecause you had been rich. I never thought about your position or yourprospects. A woman--at least a woman like me--doesn't love a man for hisposition, doesn't love him for his prospects. I've been taking you atjust what you were--or seemed to be. And you--you haven't come, asking meto marry you. You treat me like one of those silly women in what theycall 'society' here in Saint X. You ask me to wait until you can supportme fashionably--I who am not fashionable--and who will always supportmyself. What you talked isn't what I call love, Arthur. I don't want tohear any more about it--or, we might not be able to be even friends. "

She paused; but Arthur could not reply. To deny was impossible, and hehad no wish to attempt to make excuses. She had shown him to himself, andhe could only echo her just scorn. 

"As for waiting, " she went on, "I am sure, from what you say, that if youever got back in the lofty place of a parasite living idly and foolishlyon what you abstracted from the labor of others, you'd forget me--just asyour rich friends have forgotten you. " She laughed bitterly. "O Arthur, Arthur, what a fraud you are! Here, I've been admiring your fine talkabout your being a laborer, about what you'd do if you ever got thepower. And it was all simply envy and jealousy and trying to makeyourself believe you weren't so low down in the social scale as youthought you were. You're too fine a gentleman for Madelene Schulze, Arthur. Wait till you get back your lost paradise; then take a wife whogives her heart only where her vanity permits. You don't want _me_, andI--don't want you!"

Her voice broke there. With a cry that might have been her name or justan inarticulate call from his heart to hers, he caught her in his arms, and she was sobbing against his shoulder. "You can't mean it, Madelene, "he murmured, holding her tight and kissing her cheek, her hair, her ear. "You don't mean it. "

"Oh, yes, I do, " she sobbed. "But--I love you, too. "

"Then everything else will straighten out of itself. Help me, Madelene. Help me to be what we both wish me to be--what I can't help being, withyou by my side. "

When a vanity of superiority rests on what used to be, it dies muchharder than when it rests upon what is. But Arthur's self-infatuation, based though it was on the "used-to-be, " then and there crumbled andvanished forever. Love cleared his sight in an instant, where reasonwould have striven in vain against the stubborn prejudices of snobbism. Madelene's instinct had searched out the false ring in his voice andmanner; it was again instinct that assured her all was now well. And shestraightway, and without hesitation from coquetry or doubt, gave herselffrankly to the happiness of the love that knows it is returned in kindand in degree. 

"Yes, everything else will come right, " she said. "For you _are_strong, Arthur. "

"I shall be, " was his reply, as he held her closer. "Do I not love awoman who believes in me?"

"And who believes because she knows. " She drew away to look at him. "You_are_ like your father!" she exclaimed. "Oh, my dear, my love, how richhe made you--and me!"

 * * * * *

At breakfast, the next morning, he broke the news to his mother. Insteadof returning his serene and delighted look she kept her eyes on her plateand was ominously silent. "When you are well acquainted with her, mother, you'll love her, " he said. He knew what she was thinking--Dr. Schulze's"unorthodox" views, to put it gently; the notorious fact that hisdaughters did not frown on them; the family's absolute lack of standingfrom the point of view of reputable Saint X. 

"Well, " said his mother finally, and without looking at her big, handsomeson, "I suppose you're set on it. "

"Set--that's precisely the word, " replied Arthur. "We're only waiting foryour consent and her father's. "

"_I_ ain't got anything to do with it, " said she, with a patheticattempt at a smile. "Nor the old doctor, either, judging by the look ofthe young lady's eyes and chin. I never thought you'd take to astrong-minded woman. "

"You wouldn't have her _weak_-minded, would you, mother?"

"There's something between. "

"Yes, " said he. "There's the woman whose mind is weak when it ought to bestrong, and strong when it ought to be weak. I decided for one like you, mother dear--one that would cure me of foolishness and keep me cured. "

"A female doctor!"

Arthur laughed. "And she's going to practice, mother. We shouldn'thave enough to live on with only what I'd make--or am likely to makeanyway soon. "

Mrs. Ranger lifted her drooping head in sudden panic. 

"Why, you'll live _here_, won't you?"

"Of course, " replied Arthur, though, as a matter of fact, he hadn'tthought where they would live. He hastened to add, "Only we've got topay board. "

"I guess we won't quarrel about that, " said the old woman, so immenselyrelieved that she was almost resigned to the prospect of a Schulze, astrong-minded Schulze and a practicing female doctor, as adaughter-in-law. 

"Madelene is coming up to see you this morning, " continued Arthur. "Iknow you'll make her--welcome. " This wistfully, for he was now awake tothe prejudices his mother must be fighting. 

"I'll have the horses hitched up, and go and see her, " said Ellen, promptly. "She's a good girl. Nobody could ever say a word against hercharacter, and that's the main thing. " She began to contrast Madelene andJanet, and the situation brightened. At least, she was getting adaughter-in-law whom she could feel at ease with, and for whom she couldhave respect, possibly even liking of a certain reserved kind. 

"I suggested that you'd come, " Arthur was replying. "But Madelene saidshe'd prefer to come to you. She thinks it's her place, whether it'setiquette or not. We're not going to go in for etiquette--Madeleneand I. "

Mrs. Ranger looked amused. This from the young man who had for yearsbeen "picking" at her because she was unconventional! "People willmisunderstand you, mother, " had been his oft-repeated polite phrase. Shecouldn't resist a mild revenge. "People'll misunderstand, if she comes. They'll think she's running after me. "

Like all renegades, the renegades from the religion of conventionalityare happiest when they are showing their contempt for that before whichthey once knelt. "Let 'em think, " retorted Arthur cheerfully. "I'lltelephone her it's all right, " he said, as he rose from the table, "andshe'll be up here about eleven. "

And exactly at eleven she came, not a bit self-conscious or confused. Mrs. Ranger looked up at her--she was more than a head the taller--andfound a pair of eyes she thought finest of all for their honestylooking down into hers. "I reckon we've got--to kiss, " said she, with anervous laugh. 

"I reckon so, " said Madelene, kissing her, and then, after a glance andan irresistible smile, kissing her again. "You were awfully put out whenArthur told you, weren't you?"

"Well, you know, the saying is 'A bad beginning makes a good ending, '"said Ellen. "Since there was only Arthur left to me, I hadn't beencalculating on a daughter-in-law to come and take him away. "

Madelene felt what lay behind that timid, subtle statement of thecase. Her face shadowed. She had been picturing a life, a home, withjust Arthur and herself; here was a far different prospect opening up. But Mrs. Ranger was waiting, expectant; she must be answered. "Icouldn't take him away from you, " Madelene said. "I'd only lose himmyself if I tried. "

Tears came into Ellen's eyes and her hands clasped in her lap to steadytheir trembling. "I know how it is, " she said. "I'm an old woman, and"--with an appeal for contradiction that went straight to Madelene'sheart--"I'm afraid I'd be in the way?"

"In the way!" cried Madelene. "Why, you're the only one that can teach mehow to take care of him. He says you've always taken care of him, and Isuppose he's too old now to learn how to look after himself. "

"You wouldn't mind coming here to live?" asked Ellen humbly. She hardlydared speak out thus plainly; but she felt that never again would therebe such a good chance of success. 

It was full a minute before Madelene could trust her voice to make reply, not because she hesitated to commit herself, but because she was moved tothe depths of her tender heart by this her first experience of about themost tragic of the everyday tragedies in human life--a lone old womanpleading with a young one for a little corner to sit in and wait fordeath. "I wish it weren't quite such a grand house, " she said at lastwith a look at the old woman--how old she seemed just then!--a look thatwas like light. "We're too poor to have the right to make any such start. But, if you'd let me--if you're sure you wouldn't think me anintruder--I'd be glad to come. "

"Then that's settled, " said Mrs. Ranger, with a deep sigh of relief. But her head and her hands were still trembling from the nervous shockof the suspense, the danger that she would be left childless and alone. "We'll get along once you're used to the idea of having me about. Iknow my place. I never was a great hand at meddling. You'll hardly knowI'm around. "

Again Madelene had the choke in her throat, the ache at the heart. "Butyou wouldn't throw the care of this house on my hands!" she exclaimed inwell-pretended dismay. "Oh, no, you've simply got to look after things!Why, I was even counting on your helping me with my practice. "

Ellen Ranger thrilled with a delight such as she had not had in many ayear--the matchless delight of a new interest. Her mother had been famousthroughout those regions in the pioneer days for skill at "yarbs" and atnursing, and had taught her a great deal. But she had had small chance topractice, she and her husband and her children being all and always sohealthy. All those years she had had to content herself with thinking andtalking of hypothetical cases and with commenting, usually ratherseverely, upon the conduct of every case in the town of which she heard. Now, in her old age, just as she was feeling that she had no longer anexcuse for being alive, here, into her very house, was coming a careerfor her, and it the career of which she had always dreamed!

She forgot about the marriage and its problems, and plunged at once intoan exposition of her views of medicine--her hostility to the allopaths, with their huge, fierce doses of dreadful poisons that had ruined most ofthe teeth and stomachs in the town; her disdain of the homeopaths, withtheir petty pills and their silly notion that the hair of the dog wouldcure its bite. She was all for the medicine of nature and common sense;and Madelene, able honestly to assent, rose in her esteem by leaps andbounds. Before the end of that conversation Mrs. Ranger was convincedthat she had always believed the doctors should be women. "Whounderstands a woman but a woman? Who understands a child but a woman? Andwhat's a man when he's sick but a child?" She was impatient for themarriage. And when Madelene asked if she'd object to having a smalldoctor's sign somewhere on the front fence, she looked astounded at thequestion. "We must do better than that, " she said. "I'll have you anoffice--just two or three rooms--built down by the street so as to savepeople coming clear up here. That'd lose you many a customer. "

"Yes, it might lose us a good many, " said Madelene, and you'd never havethought the "us" deliberate. 

That capped the climax. Mrs. Ranger was her new daughter's thenceforth. And Madelene went away, if possible happier than when she and Arthur hadstraightened it all out between themselves the night before. Had she notlifted that fine old woman up from the grave upon which she was wearilylying, waiting for death? Had she not made her happy by giving hersomething to live for? Something to live for! "She looked yearsyounger immediately, " thought Madelene. "That's the secret ofhappiness--something to live for, something real and useful. "

"I never thought you'd find anybody good enough for you, " said Mrs. Ranger to her son that evening. "But you have. She's got a heart and ahead both--and most of the women nowadays ain't got much of either. "

And it was that night as Ellen was saying her prayers, that she asked Godto forgive her the sin of secret protest she had let live deep in a darkcorner of her heart--reproach of Hiram for having cut off their son. "Itwas for the best, " she said. "I see it now. "

CHAPTER XX

LORRY'S ROMANCE

When Charles Whitney heard Arthur was about to be married, he offered hima place on the office staff of the Ranger-Whitney Company at fifteenhundred a year. "It is less than you deserve on your record, " he wrote, "but there is no vacancy just now, and you shall go up rapidly. I takethis opportunity to say that I regard your father's will as the finestact of the finest man I ever knew, and that your conduct, since he leftus, is a vindication of his wisdom. America has gone stark mad on thesubject of money. The day is not far distant when it has got to decidewhether property shall rule work or work shall rule property. Your fatherwas a courageous pioneer. All right-thinking men honor him. "

This, a fortnight after his return from Europe, from marrying Janet toAristide, Viscount Brunais. He had yielded to his secretsnobbishness--Matilda thought it was her diplomacy--and had given Janet adowry so extravagant that when old Saint Berthè heard the figures, hetook advantage of the fact that only the family lawyer was present topermit a gleam of nature to show through his mask of elegant indifferenceto the "coarse side of life. " Whitney had the American good sense todespise his wife, his daughter, and himself for the transaction. Foryears furious had been his protestations to his family, to hisacquaintances, and to himself against "society, " and especially againstthe incursions of that "worm-eaten titled crowd from the other side. " Sooften had he repeated those protests that certain phrases had becomefixedly part of his conversation, to make the most noise when he wasviolently agitated, as do the dead leaves of a long-withered but stillfirmly attached bough. Thus he was regarded in Chicago as an American ofthe old type; but being human, his strength had not been strong enough toresist the taint in the atmosphere he had breathed ever since he began tobe very rich and to keep the company of the pretentious. His originallysound constitution had been gradually undermined, just as "doing likeeverybody else"--that is, everybody in his set of pirates disguised undermerchant flag and with a few deceptive bales of goods piled on deck--hadundermined his originally sound business honor. 

Arthur answered, thanking him for the offered position, but declining it. "What you say about my work, " he wrote, "encourages me to ask a favor. Iwish to be transferred from one mechanical department to another until Ihave made the round. Then, perhaps, I may venture to ask you to renewyour offer. "

Whitney showed this to Ross. "Now, _there's_ the sort of son I'd be proudof!" he exclaimed. 

Ross lifted his eyebrows. "Really!" said he. "Why?"

"Because he's a _man_, " retorted his father, with obvious intent ofsatirical contrast. "Because within a year or two he'll know the businessfrom end to end--as his father did--as I do. "

"And what good will that do him?" inquired Ross, with fine irony. "Youknow it isn't in the manufacturing end that the money's made nowadays. Wecan hire hundreds of good men to manufacture for us. I should say he'd bewiser were he trying to get a _practical_ education. "

"Practical!"

"Precisely. Studying how to stab competitors in the back and establishmonopoly. As a manager, he may some day rise to ten or fifteen thousand ayear--unless managers' salaries go down, as it's likely they will. As afinancier, he might rise to--to _our_ class. "

Whitney grunted, the frown of his brows and the smile on his sardonicmouth contradicting each other. He could not but be pleased by theshrewdness of his son's criticism of his own half-sincere, half-hypocritical tribute to virtues that were on the wane; but at thesame time he did not like such frank expression of cynical truth from ason of his. Also, he at the bottom still had some of the squeamishnessthat was born into him and trained into him in early youth; he did notlike to be forced squarely to face the fact that real business had beenrelegated to the less able or less honest, while the big rewards ofriches and respect were for the sly and stealthy. Enforcing what Ross hadsaid, there came into his mind the reflection that he himself had justbribed through the Legislature, for a comparatively trifling sum, a lawthat would swell his fortune and income within the next five years morethan would a lifetime of devotion to business. 

He would have been irritated far more deeply had he known that Arthurwas as well aware of the change from the old order as was Ross, and thatdeliberately and on principle he was refusing to adapt himself to thenew order, the new conditions of "success. " When Arthur's manlinessfirst asserted itself, there was perhaps as much of vanity as of pridein his acceptance of the consequences of Hiram's will. But to anintelligent man any environment, except one of inaction or futileaction, soon becomes interesting; the coming of Madelene was all thatwas needed to raise his interest to enthusiasm. He soon understood hisfellow-workers as few of them understood themselves. Every human group, of whatever size or kind, is apt to think its characteristics peculiarto itself, when in fact they are as universal as human nature, and themodifications due to the group's environment are insignificant mattersof mere surface. Nationality, trade, class no more affect the oneness ofmankind than do the ocean's surface variations of color or weatheraffect its unchangeable chemistry. Waugh, who had risen from the ranks, Howells, who had begun as shipping clerk, despised those above whom theyhad risen, regarded as the peculiar weaknesses of the working classessuch universal failings as prejudice, short-sightedness, and shirking. They lost no opportunity to show their lack of sympathy with the classfrom which they had sprung and to which they still belonged in reality, their devotion to the class plutocratic to which they aspired. Arthur, in losing the narrowness of the class from which he had been ejected, lost all class narrowness. The graduates from the top have the bestchance to graduate into the wide, wide world of human brotherhood. By anartificial process--by compulsion, vanity, reason, love--he became whatMadelene was by nature. She was one of those rare human beings born witha just and clear sense of proportion. It was thus impossible for her toexaggerate into importance the trivial differences of mental stature. She saw that they were no greater than the differences of men's physicalstature, if men be compared with mountains or any other just measure ofthe vast scale on which the universe is constructed. And so it camenaturally to her to appreciate that the vital differences among men arematters of character and usefulness, just as among things they arematters of beauty and use. 

Arthur's close friend was now Laurent Tague, a young cooper--huge, deep-chested, tawny, slow of body and swift of mind. They had beenfriends as boys at school. When Arthur came home from Exeter from hisfirst long vacation, their friendship had been renewed after a fashion, then had ended abruptly in a quarrel and a pitched battle, from whichneither had emerged victor, both leaving the battle ground exhausted andanguished by a humiliating sense of defeat. From that time Laurent hadbeen a "damned mucker" to Arthur, Arthur a "stuck-up smart Alec" toLaurent. The renewal of the friendship dated from the accident toArthur's hand; it rapidly developed as he lost the sense of patronizingLaurent, and as Laurent for his part lost the suspicion that Arthur wassecretly patronizing him. Then Arthur discovered that Lorry had, severalyears before, sent for a catalogue of the University of Michigan, hadselected a course leading to the B. S. Degree, had bought the necessarytext-books, had studied as men work only at that which they love for itsown sake and not for any advantage to be got from it. His father, acaptain of volunteers in the Civil War, was killed in the Wilderness; hismother was a washerwoman. His father's father--Jean Montague, the firstblacksmith of Saint X--had shortened the family name. In those early, nakedly practical days, long names and difficult names, such as naturallydevelop among peoples of leisure, were ruthlessly taken to the choppingblock by a people among whom a man's name was nothing in itself, wassimply a convenience for designating him. Everybody called Jean Montague"Jim Tague, " and pronounced the Tague in one syllable; when he finallyacquiesced in the sensible, popular decision, from which he could notwell appeal, his very children were unaware that they were Montagues. 

Arthur told Lorry of his engagement to Madelene an hour after he told hismother--he and Lorry were heading a barrel as they talked. This supremeproof of friendship moved Laurent to give proof of appreciation. Thatevening he and Arthur took a walk to the top of Reservoir Hill, to seethe sun set and the moon rise. It was under the softening and expandinginfluence of the big, yellow moon upon the hills and valleys and ghostlyriver that Laurent told his secret--a secret that in the mere telling, and still more in itself, was to have a profound influence upon thepersons of this narrative. 

"When I was at school, " he began, "you may remember I used to carry thewashing to and fro for mother. "

"Yes, " said Arthur. He remembered how he liked to slip away from home andhelp Lorry with the big baskets. 

"Well, one of the places I used to go to was old Preston Wilmot's;they had a little money left in those days and used to hire mother nowand then. "

"So the Wilmots owe her, too, " said Arthur, with a laugh. Theuniversal indebtedness of the most aristocratic family in Saint X wasthe town joke. 

Lorry smiled. "Yes, but she don't know it, " he replied. "I used to do allher collecting for her. When the Wilmots quit paying, I paid for 'em--outof money I made at odd jobs. I paid for 'em for over two years. Then, oneevening--Estelle Wilmot"--Lorry paused before this name, lingered on it, paused after it--"said to me--she waylaid me at the back gate--I alwayshad to go in and out by the alley way--no wash by the front gate forthem! Anyhow, she stopped me and said--all red and nervous--'Youmustn't come for the wash any more. '

"'Why not?' says I. 'Is the family complaining?'

"'No, ' says she, 'but we owe you for two years. '

"'What makes you think that?' said I, astonished and pretty badly scaredfor the minute. 

"'I've kept account, ' she said. And she was fiery red. 'I keep a list ofall we owe, so as to have it when we're able to pay. '"

"What a woman she is!" exclaimed Arthur. "I suppose she's putting by outof the profits of that little millinery store of hers to pay off thefamily debts. I hear she's doing well. "

"A smashing business, " replied Lorry, in a tone that made Arthur glancequickly at him. "But, as I was saying, I being a young fool andfrightened out of my wits, said to her: 'You don't owe mother a cent, Miss Estelle. It's all been settled--except a few weeks lately. I'mcollectin', and I ought to know. '

"I ain't much of a hand at lying, and she saw straight through me. Iguess what was going on in her head helped her, for she looked as if shewas about to faint. 'It's mighty little for me to do, to get to see you, 'I went on. 'It's my only chance. Your people would never let me in at thefront gate. And seeing you is the only thing I care about. ' Then I setdown the washbasket and, being desperate, took courage and lookedstraight at her. 'And, ' said I, 'I've noticed that for the last year youalways make a point of being on hand to give me the wash. '"

Somehow a lump came in Arthur's throat just then. He gave hisHercules-like friend a tremendous clap on the knee. "Good for you, Lorry!" he cried. "_That_ was the talk!"

"It was, " replied Lorry. "Well, she got red again, where she had beenwhite as a dogwood blossom, and she hung her head. 'You don't deny it, doyou?' said I. She didn't make any answer. 'It wasn't altogether to ask mehow I was getting on with my college course, was it, Miss Estelle?' Andshe said 'No' so low that I had to guess at it. "

Lorry suspended his story. He and Arthur sat looking at the moon. Finally Arthur asked, rather huskily, "Is that the end, Lorry?"

Lorry's keen, indolent face lit up with an absent and tender smile. "Thatwas the end of the beginning, " replied he. 

Arthur thrilled and resisted a feminine instinct to put his arm round hisfriend. "I don't know which of you is the luckier, " he said. 

Lorry laughed. "You're always envying me my good disposition, " he wenton. "Now, I've given away the secret of it. Who isn't happy when he's gotwhat he wants--heaven without the bother of dying first? I drop into herstore two evenings a week to see her. I can't stay long or people wouldtalk. Then I see her now and again--other places. We have to becareful--mighty careful. "

"You must have been, " said Arthur. "I never heard a hint of this; and ifanyone suspected, the whole town would be talking. "

"I guess the fact that she's a Wilmot has helped us. Who'd ever suspect aWilmot of such a thing?"

"Why not?" said Arthur. "She couldn't do better. "

Lorry looked amused. "What'd you have said a few months ago, Ranger?"

"But _my_ father was a workingman. "

"That was a long time ago, " Lorry reminded him. "That was when Americaused to be American. Anyhow, she and I don't care, except about themother. You know the old lady isn't strong, especially the last year orso. It wouldn't exactly improve her health to know there was anythingbetween her daughter and a washerwoman's son, a plain workingman at that. We--Estelle and I--don't want to be responsible for any harm to her. So--we're waiting. "

"But there's the old gentleman, and Arden--_and_ Verbena!"

Lorry's cheerfulness was not ruffled by this marshaling of the full andformidable Wilmot array. "It'd be a pleasure to Estelle to give _them_ ashock, especially Verbena. Did you ever see Verbena's hands?"

"I don't think so, " replied Arthur; "but, of course, I've heard ofthem. "

"Did you know she wouldn't even take hold of a knob to open a door, forfear of stretching them?"

"She _is_ a lady, sure. "

"Well, Estelle's not, thank God!" exclaimed Lorry. "She says one of hergrandmothers was the daughter of a fellow who kept a kind of pawn shop, and that she's a case of atavism. "

"But, Lorry, " said Arthur, letting his train of thought come to thesurface, "this ought to rouse your ambition. You could get anywhere youliked. To win her, I should think you'd exert yourself at the factory asyou did at home when you were going through Ann Arbor. "

"To win her--perhaps I would, " replied Lorry. "But, you see, I've wonher. I'm satisfied with my position. I make enough for us two to live onas well as any sensible person'd care to live. I've got four thousanddollars put by, and I'm insured for ten thousand, and mother's got twelvethousand at interest that she saved out of the washing. I like to _live_. They made me assistant foreman once, but I was no good at it. I couldn't'speed' the men. It seemed to me they got a small enough part of whatthey earned, no matter how little they worked. Did you ever think, ittakes one of us only about a day to make enough barrels to pay his week'swages, and that he has to donate the other five days' work for theprivilege of being allowed to live? If I rose I'd be living off thosefive days of stolen labor. Somehow I don't fancy doing it. So I do my tenhours a day, and have evenings and Sundays for the things I like. "

"Doesn't Estelle try to spur you on?"

"She used to, but she soon came round to my point of view. She saw what Imeant, and she hasn't, any more than I, the fancy for stealing time frombeing somebody, to use it in making fools think and say you're somebody, when you ain't. "

"It'd be a queer world if everybody were like you. "

"It'd be a queer world if everybody were like any particular person, "retorted Lorry. 

Arthur's mind continually returned to this story, to revolve it, tofind some new suggestion as to what was stupid or savage or silly in thepresent social system, as to what would be the social system ofto-morrow, which is to to-day's as to-day's is to yesterday's; for Lorryand Dr. Schulze and Madelene and his own awakened mind had lifted himout of the silly current notion that mankind is never going to grow anymore, but will wear its present suit of social clothes forever, willalways creep and totter and lisp, will never learn to walk and to talk. He was in the habit of passing Estelle's shop twice each day--early inthe morning, when she was opening, again when the day's business wasover; and he had often fancied he could see in her evening expressionhow the tide of trade had gone. Now, he thought he could tell whether itwas to be one of Lorry's evenings or not. He understood why she had soeagerly taken up Henrietta Hastings's suggestion, made probably with noidea that anything would come of it--Henrietta was full of schemes, evolved not for action, but simply to pass the time and to cause talk inthe town. Estelle's shop became to him vastly different from a mereplace for buying and selling; and presently he was looking on the otherside, the human side, of all the shops and businesses and materialactivities, great and small. Just as a knowledge of botany makes everystep taken in the country an advance through thronging miracles, so hisnew knowledge was transforming surroundings he had thought commonplaceinto a garden of wonders. "How poor and tedious the life I marked outfor myself at college was, " he was presently thinking, "in comparisonwith this life of realities!" He saw that Lorry, instead of beingwithout ambitions, was inspired by the highest ambitions. "A good son, agood lover, a good workman, " thought Arthur. "What more can a man be, oraspire to be?" Before his mind's eyes there was, clear as light, vividas life, the master workman--his father. And for the first time Arthurwelcomed that vision, felt that he could look into Hiram's grave, kindeyes without flinching and without the slightest inward reservation ofblame or reproach. 

It was some time before the bearing of the case of Lorry and Estelleupon the case of Arthur and Madelene occurred to him. Once he saw this hecould think of nothing else. He got Lorry's permission to tell Madelene;and when she had the whole story he said, "You see its message to us?"

And Madelene's softly shining eyes showed that she did, even before herlips had the chance to say, "We certainly have no respectable excusefor waiting. "

"As soon as mother gets the office done, " suggested Arthur. 

 * * * * *

On the morning after the wedding, at a quarter before seven, Arthur andMadelene came down the drive together to the new little house by thegate. And very handsome and well matched they seemed as they stood beforeher office and gazed at the sign: "Madelene Ranger, M. D. " She unlockedand opened the door; he followed her in. When, a moment later, hereappeared and went swinging down the street to his work, his expressionwould have made you like him--and envy him. And at the window watchinghim was Madelene. There were tears in her fine eyes, and her bosom washeaving in a storm of emotion. She was saying, "It almost seems wicked tofeel as happy as I do. "

CHAPTER XXI

HIRAM'S SON

In Hiram Ranger's last year the Ranger-Whitney Company made half amillion; the first year under the trustees there was a small deficit. Charles Whitney was most apologetic to his fellow trustees who had givenhim full control because he owned just under half the stock and was thebusiness man of the three. "I've relied wholly on Howells, " explained he. "I knew Ranger had the highest opinion of his ability, but evidently he'sone of those chaps who are good only as lieutenants. However, there's noexcuse for me--none. During the coming year I'll try to make up for mynegligence. I'll give the business my personal attention. "

But at the end of the second year the books showed that, while thecompany had never done so much business, there was a loss of half amillion; another such year and the surplus would be exhausted. At thetrustees' meeting, of the three faces staring gloomily at these ruinousfigures the gloomiest was Charles Whitney's. "There can be only oneexplanation, " said he. "The shifting of the centers of production ismaking it increasingly difficult to manufacture here at a profit. "

"Perhaps the railways are discriminating against us, " suggestedScarborough. 

Whitney smiled slightly. "That's your reform politics, " said he. "Youfellows never seek the natural causes for things; you at once accuse thefinanciers. "

Scarborough smiled back at him. "But haven't there been instances ofrings in control of railways using their power for plants they wereinterested in and against competing plants?"

"Possibly--to a limited extent, " conceded Whitney. "But I hold to theold-fashioned idea. My dear sir, this is a land of opportunity--"

"Still, Whitney, " interrupted Dr. Hargrave, "there _may_ be something inwhat Senator Scarborough says. "

"Undoubtedly, " Whitney hastened to answer. "I only hope there is. Thenour problem will be simple. I'll set my lawyers to work at once. If thatis the cause"--he struck the table resolutely with his clenchedfist--"the scoundrels shall be brought to book!"

His eyes shifted as he lifted them to find Scarborough looking at him. "You have inside connections with the Chicago railway crowd, have younot, Mr. Whitney?" he inquired. 

"I think I have, " said Whitney, with easy candor. "That's why I feelconfident your suggestion has no foundation--beyond your suspicion of allmen engaged in large enterprises. It's a wonder you don't suspect me. Indeed, you probably will. "

He spoke laughingly. Scarborough's answer was a grave smile. 

"My personal loss may save me from you, " Whitney went on. "I hesitate tospeak of it, but, as you can see, it is large--almost as large as theuniversity's. "

"Yes, " said Scarborough absently, though his gaze was still fixed onWhitney. "You think you can do nothing?"

"Indeed I do not!" exclaimed Whitney. "I shall begin with the assumptionthat you are right. And if you are, I'll have those scoundrels in courtwithin a month. "

"And then?"

The young senator's expression and tone were calm, but Whitney seemed tofind covert hostility in them. "Then--justice!" he replied angrily. 

Dr. Hargrave beamed benevolent confidence. "Justice!" he echoed. "ThankGod for our courts!"

"But _when_?" said Scarborough. As there was no answer, he went on: "Infive--ten--fifteen--perhaps twenty years. The lawyers are in no hurry--abrief case means a small fee. The judges--they've got their places forlife, so there's no reason why they should muss their silk gowns inundignified haste. Besides--It seems to me I've heard somewhere thephrase 'railway judges. '"

Dr. Hargrave looked gentle but strong disapproval. "You are toopessimistic, Hampden, " said he. 

"The senator should not let the wounds from his political fightsgangrene, " suggested Whitney, with good-humored raillery. 

"Have you nothing but the court remedy to offer?" asked Scarborough, aslight smile on his handsome face, so deceptively youthful. 

"That's quite enough, " answered Whitney. "In my own affairs I've neverappealed to the courts in vain. "

"I can believe it, " said Scarborough, and Whitney looked as if he hadscented sarcasm, though Scarborough was correctly colorless. "But, if youshould be unable to discover any grounds for a case against therailways?"

"Then all we can do is to work harder than ever along the old lines--cutdown expenses, readjust wages, stop waste. " Whitney sneered politely. "But no doubt you have some other plan to propose. "

Scarborough continued to look at him with the same faint smile. "I'venothing to suggest--to-day, " said he. "The court proceedings will do noharm--you see, Mr. Whitney, I can't get my wicked suspicion of yourfriends out of my mind. But we must also try something less--lessleisurely than courts. I'll think it over. "

Whitney laughed rather uncomfortably; and when they adjourned he lingeredwith Dr. Hargrave. "We must not let ourselves be carried away by ouryoung friend's suspicions, " said he to his old friend. "Scarborough is afine fellow. But he lacks your experience and my knowledge of practicalbusiness. And he has been made something of a crank by combating theopposition his extreme views have aroused among conservative people. "

"You are mistaken, Whitney, " replied the doctor. "Hampden's views aresound. He is misrepresented by the highly placed rascals he has exposedand dislodged. But in these business matters we rely upon you. " He linkedhis arm affectionately in that of the powerful and successful "captain ofindustry" whom he had known from boyhood. "I know how devoted you are toTecumseh, and how ably you manage practical affairs; and I have not for amoment lost confidence that you will bring us safely through. "

Whitney's face was interesting. There was a certain hangdog look in it, but there was also a suggestion--very covert--of cynical amusement, as ofa good player's jeer at a blunder by his opponent. His tone, however, wasmelancholy, tinged with just resentment, as he said: "Scarborough forgetshow my own personal interest is involved. I don't like to lose twohundred and odd thousand a year. "

"Scarborough meant nothing, I'm sure, " said Hargrave soothingly. "Heknows we are all single hearted for the university. "

"I don't like to be distrusted, " persisted Whitney sadly. Thenbrightening: "But you and I understand each other, doctor. And we willcarry the business through. Every man who tries to do anything in thisworld must expect to be misunderstood. "

"You are mistaken about Scarborough, I know you are, " said Hargraveearnestly. 

Whitney listened to Hargrave, finally professed to be reassured; but, before he left, a strong doubt of Scarborough's judgment had beenimplanted by him in the mind of the old doctor. That was easy enough;for, while Hargrave was too acute a man to give his trust impulsively, hegave without reserve when he did give--and he believed in CharlesWhitney. The ability absolutely to trust where trust is necessary is asessential to effective character as is the ability to withhold trustuntil its wisdom has been justified; and exceptions only confirm a rule. 

Scarborough, feeling that he had been neglecting his trusteeship, nowdevoted himself to the Ranger-Whitney Company. 

He had long consultations with Howells, and studied the daily and weeklybalance sheets which Howells sent him. In the second month after theannual meeting he cabled Dory to come home. The entire foundation uponwhich Dory was building seemed to be going; Saint X was, therefore, theplace for him, not Europe. 

"And there you have all I have been able to find out, " concludedScarborough, when he had given Dory the last of the facts and figures. "What do you make of it?"

"There's something wrong--something rotten, " replied Dory. 

"But where?" inquired Scarborough, who had taken care not to speak orhint his vague doubts of Whitney. "Everything _looks_ all right, exceptthe totals on the balance sheets. "

"We must talk this over with some one who knows more about the businessthan either of us. " Then he added, as if the idea had just come to him, "Why not call in Arthur--Arthur Ranger?"

Scarborough looked receptive, but not enthusiastic. 

"He has been studying this business in the most practical way ever sincehis father died, " urged Dory. "It can't do any harm to consult with him. We don't want to call in outside experts if we can help it. "

"If we did we'd have to let Mr. Whitney select them, " said Scarborough. And he drew Dory out upon the subject of Arthur and got such complete andintelligent answers that he presently had a wholly new and true idea ofthe young man whose boyish follies Saint X had not yet forgotten. "Yes, let's give Arthur a chance, " he finally said. 

Accordingly, they laid the case in its entirety before Arthur, and hetook home with him the mass of reports which Scarborough had gathered. Night after night he and Madelene worked at the problem; for both knewthat its solution would be his opportunity, _their_ opportunity. 

It was Madelene who discovered the truth--not by searching the figures, not by any process of surface reasoning, but by that instinct for motivewhich woman has developed through her ages of dealing with and inmotives only. "They must get a new management, " said she; "one thatCharles Whitney has no control over. "

"Why?"

"Because he's wrecking the business to get hold of it. He wants the wholething, and he couldn't resist the chance the inexperience and confidenceof the other two gave him. "

"I see no indication of it, " objected Arthur, to draw her out. "On thecontrary, wherever he directly controls there's a good showing. "

"That's it!" exclaimed Madelene, feeling that she now had her feet onthe firm ground of reason on which alone stupid men will discusspractical affairs. 

Arthur had lived with Madelene long enough to learn that her mind wasindeed as clear as her eyes, that when she looked at anything she saw itas it was, and saw all of it. Like any man who has the right material inhim, he needed only the object lesson of her quick dexterity at strippinga problem of its shell of nonessentials. He had become what theineffective call a pessimist. He had learned the primer lesson of largesuccess--that one must build upon the hard, pessimistic facts of humannature's instability and fate's fondness for mischief, not upon theoptimistic clouds of belief that everybody is good and faithful andfriendly disposed and everything will "come out all right somehow. " Theinstant Madelene suggested Whitney as the cause, Arthur's judgment echoedapproval; but, to get her whole mind as one gives it only in combatingopposition, he continued to object. "But suppose, " said he, "Whitneyinsists on selecting the new management? As he's the only one competent, how can they refuse?"

"We must find a way round that, " replied Madelene. "It's perfectly plain, isn't it, that there's only one course--an absolutely new management. Andhow can Mr. Whitney object? If he's not guilty he won't object, becausehe'll be eager to try the obvious remedy. If he's guilty he won'tobject--he'll be afraid of being suspected. "

"Dory suggested--" began Arthur, and stopped. 

"That you be put in as manager?"

"How did _you_ know _that_?"

"It's the sensible thing. It's the only thing, " answered his wife. "AndDory has the genius of good sense. You ought to go to Scarborough and askfor the place. Take Dory with you. "

"That's good advice, " said Arthur, heartily. 

Madelene laughed. "When a man praises a woman's advice, it means she hastold him to do what he had made up his mind to do anyhow. "

 * * * * *

Next day Scarborough called a meeting of the trustees. Down from Chicagocame Whitney--at the greatest personal inconvenience, so he showed hiscolleagues, but eager to do anything for Tecumseh. Scarborough gave aclear and appalling account of how the Ranger-Whitney Company'sprosperity was slipping into the abyss like a caving sand bank, on allsides, apparently under pressure of forces beyond human control. "In viewof the facts, " said he, in conclusion, "our sole hope is in puttingourselves to one side and giving an entirely new management an entirelyfree hand. "

Whitney had listened to Scarborough's speech with the funerealcountenance befitting so melancholy a recital. As Scarborough finishedand sank back in his chair, he said, with energy and heartiness, "I agreewith you, senator. The lawyers tell me there are as yet no signs of acase against the railways. Besides, the trouble seems to be, as I feared, deeper than this possible rebating. Jenkins--one of my best men--I senthim down to help Howells out--he's clearly an utter failure--utter! And Iam getting old. The new conditions of business life call for young menwith open minds. "

"No, no!" protested Dr. Hargrave. "I will not consent to any change thattakes your hand off the lever, my friend. These are stormy times in ourindustrial world, and we need the wise, experienced pilot. "

Scarborough had feared this; but he and Dory, forced to choose betweentaking him into their confidence and boldly challenging the man in whomhe believed implicitly, had chosen the far safer course. "While Mr. Whitney must appreciate your eulogy, doctor, " said he, suave yet with acertain iciness, "I think he will insist upon the trial of the only planthat offers. In our plight we must not shrink from desperateremedies--even a remedy as desperate as eliminating the one man whounderstands the business from end to end. " This last with slight emphasisand a steady look at Whitney. 

Whitney reddened. "We need not waste words, " said he, in his bluff, sharpvoice. "The senator and I are in accord, and we are the majority. "

"At least, Mr. Whitney, " said the doctor, "you must suggest the new man. You know the business world. We don't. "

A long pause; then from Whitney: "Why not try young Ranger?"

Scarborough looked at him in frank amazement. By what process of infernaltelepathy had he found out? Or was there some deep reason why Arthurwould be the best possible man for his purpose, if his purpose was indeedmalign? Was Arthur his tool? Or was Arthur subtly making tools of bothWhitney and himself?

Dr. Hargrave was dumfounded. When he recovered himself sufficiently tospeak, it was to say, "Why, he's a mere boy, Whitney--not yet thirty. Hehas had no experience!"

"Inexperience seems to be what we need, " replied Whitney, eyes twinklingsneeringly at Scarborough. "We have tried experience, and it is adisastrous failure. "

Scarborough was still reflecting. 

"True, " pursued Whitney, "the young man would also have the motive ofself-interest to keep him from making a success. "

"How is that?" inquired Scarborough. 

"Under the will, " Whitney reminded him, "he can buy back the propertyat its market value. Obviously, the less the property is worth, thebetter for him. "

Scarborough was staggered. Was Arthur crafty as well as able? With thehuman conscience ever eager to prove that what is personally advantageousis also right, how easy for a man in his circumstances to convincehimself that any course would be justifiable in upsetting the "injustice"of Hiram Ranger's will. 

"However, " continued Whitney, "I've no doubt he's as honest as hisfather--and I couldn't say more than that. The only question is whetherwe can risk giving him the chance to show what there is in him. "

Dr. Hargrave was looking dazedly from one of his colleagues to the other, as if he thought his mind were playing him a trick. "It isimpossible--preposterous!" he exclaimed. 

"A man has to make a beginning, " said Whitney. "How can he show whatthere is in him unless he gets a chance? It seems to me, doctor, we oweit to Hiram to do this for the boy. We can keep an eye and a hand on him. What do you think, senator?"

Scarborough had won at every stage of his career, not merely because hehad convictions and the courage of them, but chiefly because he had thecourage to carry through the plans he laid in trying to make hisconvictions effective. He had come there, fixed that Arthur was the manfor the place; why throw up his hand because Whitney was playing into it?Nothing had occurred to change his opinion of Arthur. "Let us try ArthurRanger, " he now said. "But let us give him a free hand. "

He was watching Whitney's face; he saw it change expression--a slightfrown. "I advise against the free hand, " said Whitney. 

"I _protest_ against it!" cried Dr. Hargrave. "I protest against evenconsidering this inexperienced boy for such a responsibility. "

Scarborough addressed himself to Whitney. "If we do not give our newmanager, whoever he may be, a free hand, and if he should fail, how shallwe know whether the fault is his or--yours?"

At the direct "yours" Scarborough thought Whitney winced; but his replywas bland and frank enough. He turned to Dr. Hargrave. "The senator isright, " said he. "I shall vote with him. "

"Then it is settled, " said Scarborough. "Ranger is to have absolutecharge. "

Dr. Hargrave was now showing every sign of his great age; the anguish ofimminent despair was in his deep-set eyes and in his broken, tremblingvoice as he cried: "Gentlemen, this is madness! Charles, I implore you, do not take such precipitate action in so vital a matter! Let us talk itover--think it over. The life of the university is at stake!"

It was evident that the finality in the tones and in the faces of hiscolleagues had daunted him; but with a tremendous effort he put down theweakness of age and turned fiercely upon Whitney to shame him fromindorsing Scarborough's suicidal policy. But Whitney, with intent ofbrutality, took out his watch. "I have just time to catch my train, " saidhe, indifferently; "I can only use my best judgment, doctor. Sorry tohave to disagree with you, but Senator Scarborough has convinced me. " Andhaving thus placed upon Scarborough the entire responsibility for theevent of the experiment, he shook hands with his colleagues and hurriedout to his waiting carriage. 

Dr. Hargrave dropped into a chair and stared into vacancy. In all thoselong, long years of incessant struggle against heartbreaking obstacles hehad never lost courage or faith. But this blow at the very life of theuniversity and from its friends! He could not even lift himself enough tolook to his God; it seemed to him that God had gone on a far journey. Scarborough, watching him, was profoundly moved. "If at the end of threemonths you wish Ranger to resign, " said he, "I shall see to it that hedoes resign. Believe me, doctor, I have not taken this course withoutconsidering all the possibilities, so far as I could foresee them. "

The old president, impressed by his peculiar tone, looked up quickly. "There is something in this that I don't understand, " said he, searchingScarborough's face. 

Scarborough was tempted to explain. But the consequences, should he failto convince Hargrave, compelled him to withhold. "I hope, indeed I feelsure, you will be astonished in our young friend, " said he, instead. "Ihave been talking with him a good deal lately, and I am struck by thestrong resemblance to his father. It is more than mere physicallikeness. "

With a sternness he could have shown only where principle was at stake, the old man said: "But I must not conceal from you, senator, that I havethe gravest doubts and fears. You have alienated the university's bestfriend--rich, powerful, able, and, until you exasperated him, devoted toits interests. I regard you as having--unintentionally, and no doubt forgood motives--betrayed the solemn trust Hiram Ranger reposed in you. " Hewas standing at his full height, with his piercing eyes fixed upon hisyoung colleague's. 

All the color left Scarborough's face. "Betrayed is a strongword, " he said. 

"A strong word, senator, " answered Dr. Hargrave, "and used deliberately. I wish you good day, sir. "

Hargrave was one of those few men who are respected without anyreservation, and whose respect is, therefore, not given up without asense of heavy loss. But to explain would be to risk rousing in him aneven deeper anger--anger on account of his friend Whitney; so, withoutanother word, Scarborough bowed and went. "Either he will be apologizingto me at the end of three months, " said he to himself, "or I shall beapologizing to Whitney and shall owe Tecumseh a large sum of money. "

 * * * * *

Both Madelene and Arthur had that instinct for comfort and luxury whichis an even larger factor in advancement than either energy orintelligence. The idea that clothing means something more than warmth, food something more than fodder, a house something more than shelter, isthe beginning of progress; the measure of a civilized man or woman is themeasure of his or her passion for and understanding of the art of living. 

Madelene, by that right instinct which was perhaps the finest part of hersane and strong character, knew what comfort really means, knew thedifference between luxury and the showy vulgarity of tawdriness orexpensiveness; and she rapidly corrected, or, rather, restored, Arthur'sgood taste, which had been vitiated by his associations with fashionablepeople, whose standards are necessarily always poor. She was devoted toher profession as a science; but she did not neglect the vital materialconsiderations. She had too much self-respect to become careless abouther complexion or figure, about dress or personal habits, even if she hadnot had such shrewd insight into what makes a husband remain a lover, awife a mistress. She had none of those self-complacent delusions whichlure vain women on in slothfulness until Love vacates his neglectedtemple. And in large part, no doubt, Arthur's appearance--none of thestains and patches of the usual workingman, and this though he workedhard at manual labor and in a shop--was due to her influence of example;he, living with such a woman, would have been ashamed not to keep "up tothe mark. " Also her influence over old Mrs. Ranger became absolute; andswiftly yet imperceptibly the house, which had so distressed Adelaide, was transformed, not into the exhibit of fashionable ostentation whichhad once been Adelaide's and Arthur's ideal, but into a house of comfortand beauty, with colors harmonizing, the look of newness gone from the"best rooms, " and finally the "best rooms" themselves abolished. AndEllen thought herself chiefly responsible for the change. "I'm graduallygetting things just about as I want 'em, " said she. "It does take a longtime to do anything in this world!" Also she believed, and a boundlessdelight it was to her, that she was the cause of Madelene's professionalsuccess. Everyone talked of the way Madelene was getting on, and wonderedat her luck. "She deserves it, though, " said they, "for she can all butraise the dead. " In fact, the secret was simple enough. She had beentaught by her father to despise drugs and to compel dieting and exercise. She had the tact which he lacked; she made the allowances for humannature's ignorance and superstition which he refused to make; shelessened the hardship of taking her common-sense prescriptions by veilingthem in medical hocus-pocus--a compromise of the disagreeable truth whichher father had always inveighed against as both immoral and unwholesome. 

Within six months after her marriage she was earning as much as herhusband; and her fame was spreading so rapidly that not only women butalso men, and men with a contempt for the "inferior mentality of thefemale, " were coming to her from all sides. "You'll soon have a hugeincome, " said Arthur. "Why, you'll be rich, you are so grasping. "

"Indeed I am, " replied she. "The way to teach people to strive for highwages and to learn thrift is to make them pay full value for what theyget. I don't propose to encourage dishonesty or idleness. Besides, we'llneed the money. "

Arthur had none of that mean envy which can endure the prosperity ofstrangers only; he would not even have been able to be jealous of hiswife's getting on better than did he. But, if he had been so disposed, hewould have found it hard to indulge such feelings because of Madelene. She had put their married life on the right basis. She made him feel, with a certainty which no morbid imagining could have shaken, that sheloved and respected him for qualities which could not be measured by anyof the world's standards of success. He knew that in her eyes he wasalready an arrived success, that she was absolutely indifferent whetherothers ever recognized it or not. Only those who realize how powerful isthe influence of intimate association will appreciate what an effectliving with Madelene had upon Arthur's character--in withering the uglyin it, in developing its quality, and in directing its strength. 

When Scarborough gave Arthur his "chance, " Madelene took it as the matterof course. "I'm sorry it has come so soon, " said she, "and in just thisway. But it couldn't have been delayed long. With so much to be done andso few able or willing to do it, the world can't wait long enough for aman really to ripen. It's lucky that you inherit from your father so manyimportant things that most men have to spend their lives in learning. "

"Do you think so?" said he, brightening; for, with the "chance" secure, he was now much depressed by the difficulties which he had beenresurveying from the inside point of view. 

"You understand how to manage men, " she replied, "and you understandbusiness. "

"But, unfortunately, this isn't business. "

He was right. The problem of business is, in its two main factors, perfectly simple--to make a wanted article, and to put it where those whowant it can buy. But this was not Arthur Ranger's problem, nor is it theproblem of most business men in our time. Between maker and customer, nowadays, lie the brigands who control the railways--that is, thehighways; and they with equal facility use or defy the law, according totheir needs. When Arthur went a-buying grain or stave timber, he andthose with whom he was trading had to placate the brigands before theycould trade; when he went a-selling flour, he had to fight his way to themarkets through the brigands. It was the battle which causes more thanninety out of every hundred in independent business to fail--and of theremaining ten, how many succeed only because they either escaped thenotice of the brigands or compromised with them?

"I wish you luck, " said Jenkins, when, at the end of two weeks of histutelage, Arthur told him he would try it alone. 

Arthur laughed. "No, you don't, Jenkins, " replied he, with good-humoredbluntness. "But I'm going to have it, all the same. "

Discriminating prices and freight rates against his grain, discriminatingfreight rates against his flour; the courts either powerless to aid himor under the rule of bandits; and, on the top of all, a strike within twoweeks after Jenkins left--such was the situation. Arthur thought ithopeless; but he did not lose courage nor his front of serenity, evenwhen alone with Madelene. Each was careful not to tempt the malice offate by concealments; each was careful also not to annoy the other withunnecessary disagreeable recitals. If he could have seen where goodadvice could possibly help him, he would have laid all his troublesbefore her; but it seemed to him that to ask her advice would be as ifshe were to ask him to tell her how to put life into a corpse. Heimagined that she was deceived by his silence about the details of hisaffairs because she gave no sign, did not even ask questions beyondgeneralities. She, however, was always watching his handsome face withits fascinating evidences of power inwardly developing; and, as it washer habit to get valuable information as to what was going on inside herfellow-beings from a close study of surface appearances, the growinggauntness of his features, the coming out of the lines of sternness, didnot escape her, made her heart throb with pride even as it ached withsympathy and anxiety. At last she decided for speech. 

He was sitting in their dressing room, smoking his last cigarette as hewatched her braid her wonderful hair for the night. She, observing him inthe glass, saw that he was looking at her with that yearning for sympathywhich is always at its strongest in a man in the mood that was his atsight of those waves and showers of soft black hair on the pallidwhiteness of her shoulders. Before he realized what she was about she wasin his lap, her arms round his neck, his face pillowed against her cheekand her hair. "What is it, little boy?" she murmured, with that minglingof the mistress and the mother which every woman who ever loved feels forand, at certain times, shows the man she loves. 

He laughed. "Business--business, " said he. "But let's not talk aboutit. The important thing is that I have _you_. The rest is--smoke!" Andhe blew out a great cloud of it and threw the cigarette through theopen window. 

"Tell me, " she said; "I've been waiting for you to speak, and I can'twait any longer. "

"I couldn't--just now. It doesn't at all fit in with my thoughts. " Andhe kissed her. 

She moved to rise. "Then I'll go back to the dressing table. Perhapsyou'll be able to tell me with the width of the room between us. "

He drew her head against his again. "Very well--if I must, I will. Butyou know all about it. For some mysterious reason, somebody--you say it'sWhitney, and probably it is--won't let me buy grain or anything else ascheaply as others buy it. And for the same mysterious reason, somebody, probably Whitney again, won't let me get to market without paying aheavier toll than our competitors pay. And now for some mysterious reasonsomebody, probably Whitney again, has sent labor organizers from Chicagoamong the men and has induced them to make impossible demands and to walkout without warning. "

"And you think there's nothing to do but walk out, too, " said Madelene. 

"Or wait until I'm put out. "

His tone made those words mean that his desperate situation had rousedhis combativeness, that he would not give up. Her blood beat faster andher eyes shone. "You'll win, " she said, with the quiet confidence whichstrengthens when it comes from a person whose judgment one has tested andfound good. And he believed in her as absolutely as she believed in him. 

"I've been tempted to resign, " he went on. "If I don't everybody'll sayI'm a failure when the crash comes. But--Madelene, there's something inme that simply won't let me quit. "

"There is, " replied she; "it's your father. "

"Anyhow, _you_ are the only public opinion for me. "

"You'll win, " repeated Madelene. "I've been thinking over that wholebusiness. If I were you, Arthur"--she was sitting up so that she couldlook at him and make her words more impressive--"I'd dismiss strike andfreight rates and the mill, and I'd put my whole mind on Whitney. There'sa weak spot somewhere in his armor. There always is in a scoundrel's. "

Arthur reflected. Presently he drew her head down against his; it seemedto her that she could feel his brain at work, and soon she knew from thechange in the clasp of his arms about her that that keen, quick mind ofhis was serving him well. "What a joy it is to a woman, " she thought, "toknow that she can trust the man she loves--trust him absolutely, always, and in every way. " And she fell asleep after awhile, lulled by therhythmic beat of his pulse, so steady, so strong, giving her such arestful sense of security. She did not awaken until he was gently layingher in the bed. 

"You have found it?" said she, reading the news in the altered expressionof his face. 

"I hope so, " replied he. 

She saw that he did not wish to discuss. So she said, "I knew you would, "and went contentedly back into sleep again. 

 * * * * *

Next day he carefully read the company's articles of incorporation tomake sure that they contained no obstacle to his plan. Then he went toScarborough, and together they went to Judge Torrey. Three days laterthere was a special meeting of the board of directors; the president, Charles Whitney, was unable to attend, but his Monday morning mailcontained this extract from the minutes:

"Mr. Ranger offered a resolution that an assessment of two thousanddollars be at once laid upon each share of the capital stock, theproceeds to be expended by the superintendent in betterments. Secondedby Mr. Scarborough. Unanimously passed. "

Whitney reread this very carefully. He laid the letter down and stared atit. Two thousand dollars a share meant that he, owner of four hundred andeighty-seven shares, would have to pay in cash nine hundred andseventy-four thousand dollars. He ordered his private car attached to thenoon express, and at five o'clock he was in Scarborough's library. 

"What is the meaning of this assessment?" he demanded, asScarborough entered. 

"Mr. Ranger explained the situation to us, " replied Scarborough. "Heshowed us we had to choose between ruin and a complete reorganizationwith big improvements and extensions. "

"Lunacy, sheer lunacy!" cried Whitney. "A meeting of the board must becalled and the resolution rescinded. "

Scarborough simply looked at him, a smile in his eyes. 

"I never heard of such an outrage! You ask me to pay an assessment ofnearly a million dollars on stock that is worthless. "

"And, " replied Scarborough, "at the end of the year we expect to levyanother assessment of a thousand a share. "

Whitney had been tramping stormily up and down the room. As Scarboroughuttered those last words he halted. He eyed his tranquil fellow-trustee, then seated himself, and said, with not a trace of his recent fury: "Youmust know, Scarborough, the mills have no future. I hadn't the heart tosay so before Dr. Hargrave. But I supposed you were reading the signsright. The plain truth is, this is no longer a good location for theflour industry. "

Scarborough waited before replying; when he did speak his tones weredeliberate and suggestive of strong emotion well under control. "True, "said he, "not just at present. But Judge Beverwick, your friend andsilent partner who sits on the federal bench in this district, is at thepoint of death. I shall see to it that his successor is a man with a lessintense prejudice against justice. Thus we may be able to convince someof your friends in control of the railways that Saint X is as good aplace for mills as any in the country. "

Whitney grunted. His face was inscrutable. He paced the length of theroom twice; he stood at the window gazing out at the arbors, at the beesbuzzing contentedly, at the flies darting across the sifting sunbeams. "Beautiful place, this, " said he at last; "very homelike. No wonderyou're a happy man. " A pause. "As to the other matter, I'll see. Nodoubt I can stop this through the courts, if you push me to it. "

"Not without giving us a chance to explain, " replied Scarborough; "andthe higher courts may agree with us that we ought to defend theuniversity's rights against your railway friends and your 'labor' menwhom you sent down here to cause the strike. "

"Rubbish!" said Whitney; and he laughed. "Rubbish!" he repeated. "It'snot a matter either for argument or for anger. " He took his hat, made aslight ironic bow, and was gone. 

He spent the next morning with Arthur, discussing the main phases of thebusiness, with little said by either about the vast new project. Theylunched together in the car, which was on a siding before the offices, ready to join the early afternoon express. Arthur was on his guardagainst Whitney, but he could not resist the charm of the financier'smanner and conversation. Like all men of force, Whitney had greatmagnetism, and his conversation was frank to apparent indiscretion, amost plausible presentation of the cynical philosophy of practical lifeas it is lived by men of bold and generous nature. 

"That assessment scheme was yours, wasn't it?" he said, when he andArthur had got on terms of intimacy. 

"The first suggestion came from me, " admitted Arthur. 

"A great stroke, " said Whitney. "You will arrive, young man. I thought itwas your doing, because it reminded me of your father. I never knew amore direct man than he, yet he was without an equal at flankingmovements. What a pity his mind went before he died! My first impulse wasto admire his will. But, now that I've come to know you, I see that if hehad lived to get acquainted with you he'd have made a very; differentdisposition of the family property. As it is, it's bound to go to pieces. No board ever managed anything successfully. It's always a man--one man. In this case it ought to be you. But the time will come--soon, probably--when your view will conflict with that of the majority of theboard. Then out you'll go; and your years of intelligent labor will bedestroyed. "

It was plain in Arthur's face that this common-sense statement of thecase produced instant and strong effect. He merely said: "Well, one musttake that risk. "

"Not necessarily, " replied Whitney; he was talking in the most careless, impersonal way. "A man of your sort, with the strength and the abilityyou inherit, and with the power that they give you to play an importantpart in the world, doesn't let things drift to ruin. I intend, ultimately, to give my share of the Ranger-Whitney Company toTecumseh--I'm telling you this in confidence. "

Arthur glanced quickly at the great financier, suspicion and wonderin his eyes. 

"But I want it to be a value when I give it, " continued Whitney; "not theworse than worthless paper it threatens to become. Scarborough and Dr. Hargrave are splendid men. No one honors them more highly than I do. Butthey are not business men. And who will be their successors? Probably meneven less practical. "

Arthur, keen-witted but young, acute but youthfully ready to attributethe generous motive rather than the sinister, felt that he was getting anew light on Whitney's character. Perhaps Whitney wasn't so unworthy, after all. Perhaps, in trying to wreck the business and so get hold ofit, he had been carrying out a really noble purpose, in the unscrupulousway characteristic of the leaders of the world of commerce and finance. To Whitney he said: "I haven't given any thought to these matters. " Witha good-natured laugh of raillery: "You have kept me too busy. "

Whitney smiled--an admission that yet did not commit him. "When you'velived a while longer, Arthur, " said he, "you'll not be so swift and harshin your judgments of men who have to lay the far-sighted plans and haveto deal with mankind as it is, not as it ought to be. However, by thattime the Ranger-Whitney Company will be wiped out. It's a pity. If onlythere were some way of getting the control definitely in yourhands--where your father would have put it if he had lived. It's a shameto permit his life work and his plans for the university to bedemolished. In your place I'd not permit it. "

Arthur slowly flushed. Without looking at Whitney, he said: "I don't seehow I could prevent it. "

Whitney studied his flushed face, his lowered eyes, reflected carefullyon the longing note in the voice in which he had made that statement, anote that changed it to a question. "Control could be got only byownership, " explained he. "If I were sure you were working with adefinite, practical purpose really to secure the future of the company, I'd go heartily into your assessment plan. In fact, I'd--" Whitney wasfeeling his way. The change in Arthur's expression, the sudden tighteningof the lips, warned him that he was about to go too far, that he hadsowed as much seed as it was wise to sow at that time. He dropped thesubject abruptly, saying: "But I've got to go up to the bank before traintime. I'm glad we've had this little talk. Something of value may growout of it. Think it over, and if any new ideas come to you run up toChicago and see me. "

Arthur did indeed think it over, every moment of that afternoon; andbefore going home he took a long walk alone. He saw that Charles Whitneyhad proposed a secret partnership, in which he was to play Whitney's gameand, in exchange, was to get control of the Ranger-Whitney Company. Andwhat Whitney had said about the folly of board managements, about theinsecurity of his own position, was undeniably true; and the sacrifice ofthe "smaller morality" for the "larger good" would be merely doing whatthe biographies of the world's men of achievement revealed them as doingagain and again. Further, once in control, once free to put into actionthe plans for a truly vast concern, of which he had so often dreamed, hecould give Tecumseh a far larger income than it had ever hoped to havethrough his father's gift, and also could himself be rich and powerful. To the men who have operated with success and worldly acclaim under thecode of the "larger good, " the men who have aggrandized themselves at theexpense of personal honor and the rights of others and the progress ofthe race, the first, the crucial temptation to sacrifice "smallermorality" and "short-sighted scruples" has always come in some such formas it here presented itself to Arthur Ranger. The Napoleons begin asdefenders of rational freedom against the insane license of the mob; theRockefellers begin as cheapeners of a necessity of life to the straitenedmillions of their fellow-beings. 

If Arthur had been weak, he would have put aside the temptation throughfear of the consequences of failure. If he had been ignorant, he wouldhave put it aside through superstition. Being neither weak nor ignorant, and having a human passion for wealth and power and a willingness to getthem if he could do it without sacrifice of self-respect, he sat calmlydown with the temptation and listened to it and debated with it. He wassilent all through dinner; and after dinner, when he and Madelene were intheir sitting room upstairs, she reading, he sat with his eyes upon her, and continued to think. 

All at once he gave a curious laugh, went to the writing table and wrotea few moments. Then he brought the letter to her. "Read that, " said he, standing behind her, his hands on her shoulders and an expression in hisface that made his resemblance to Hiram startling. 

She read:

"MY DEAR MR. WHITNEY: I've been 'thinking it over' as you suggested. I'vedecided to plug along in the old way, between the old landmarks. Let meadd that, if you should offer to give your stock to Tecumseh now, I'dhave to do my utmost to persuade the trustees not to take it until thecompany was once more secure. You see, I feel it is absolutely necessarythat you have a large pecuniary interest in the success of our plans. "

When Madelene had read she turned in the chair until she was looking upat him. "Well?" she inquired. "What does it mean?"

He told her. "And, " he concluded, "I wish I could be a great man, but Ican't. There's something small in me that won't permit it. No doubtFranklin was right when he said life was a tunnel and one had to stoop, and even occasionally to crawl, in order to get through it successfully. Now--if I hadn't married you--"

"Always blaming me, " she said, tenderly. "But even if you hadn'tmarried me, I suspect that sooner or later you'd have decided for beinga large man in a valley rather than a very small imitation man on amountain. " Then, after a moment's thought, and with sudden radiance:"But a man as big as you are wouldn't be let stay in the valley, nomatter how hard he tried. "

He laughed. "I've no objection to the mountain top, " said he. "But I seethat, if I get there, it'll have to be in my own way. Let's go out andmail the letter. "

And they went down the drive together to the post box, and, strollingback, sat under the trees in the moonlight until nearly midnight, feelingas if they had only just begun life together--and had begun it right. 

 * * * * *

When Charles Whitney had read the letter he tore it up, saying half-aloudand contemptuously, "I was afraid there was too big a streak of fool inhim. " Then, with a shrug: "What's the use of wasting time on that littlegame--especially as I'd probably have left the university the wholebusiness in my will. " He wrote Scarborough, proposing that they delay theassessment until he had a chance to look further into the railwaysituation. "I begin to understand the troubles down there, now that I'vetaken time to think them over. I feel I can guarantee that no assessmentwill be necessary. "

And when the railways had mysteriously and abruptly ceased to misbehave, and the strike had suddenly fizzled out, he offered his stock to theuniversity as a gift. "I shall see to it, " he wrote, "that the company isnot molested again, but is helped in every way. " Arthur was for holdingoff, but Scarborough said, "No. He will keep his word. " And Scarboroughwas right in regarding the matter as settled and acceptance of thesplendid gift as safe. Whitney had his own code of honesty, of honor. Itwas not square dealing, but doing exactly what he specifically engaged todo. He would have stolen anything he could--anything he regarded as worthhis while. On the other hand, he would have sacrificed nearly all, if notall, his fortune, to live up to the letter of his given word. This, though no court would have enforced the agreement he had made, thoughthere was no written record of it, no witness other than himself, theother party, and the Almighty--for Charles Whitney believed in anAlmighty God and an old-fashioned hell and a Day of Judgment. Heconducted his religious bookkeeping precisely as he conducted hisbusiness bookkeeping, and was confident that he could escape hell as hehad escaped the penitentiary. 

CHAPTER XXII

VILLA D'ORSAY

Adelaide did not reach home until the troubles with and through CharlesWhitney were settled, and Arthur and Dory were deep in carrying out theplans to make the mills and factories part of the university and notmerely its property. When Scarborough's urgent cable came, Dory foundthat all the steamers were full. Adelaide could go with him only bytaking a berth in a room with three women in the bottom of the ship. "Impossible accommodations, " thought he, "for so luxurious a person andso poor a sailor"; and he did not tell her that this berth could be had. "You'll have to wait a week or so, " said he. "As you can't well stay onhere alone, why not accept Mrs. Whitney's invitation to join her?"

Adelaide disliked Mrs. Whitney, but there seemed to be no alternative. Mrs. Whitney was at Paris, on the way to America after the wedding and asevere cure at Aix and an aftercure in Switzerland. She had come for thefinishing touches of rejuvenation--to get her hair redone and to gothrough her biennial agony of having Auguste, beauty specialist to theroyalty, nobility and fashion, and demimonde, of three continents, burnoff her outer skin that nature might replace it with one new and freshand unwrinkled. She was heavily veiled as she and Adelaide traveled downto Cherbourg to the steamer. As soon as she got aboard she retired to herroom and remained hidden there during the voyage, seen only by her maid, her face covered day and night with Auguste's marvelous skin-coaxingmask. Adelaide did not see her again until the morning of the last day, when she appeared on deck dressed beautifully and youthfully for theshore, her skin as fair and smooth as a girl's, and looking like an eldersister of Adelaide's--at a distance. 

She paused in New York; Adelaide hastened to Saint X, though she waslooking forward uneasily to her arrival because she feared she would haveto live at the old Hargrave house in University Avenue. Miss Skeffingtonruled there, and she knew Miss Skeffington--one of those old-fashionedold maids whose rigid ideas of morality extend to the ordering ofpersonal habits in minutest detail. Under her military sway everyone hadto rise for breakfast at seven sharp, had to dine exactly at noon, supwhen the clock struck the half hour after five. Ingress and egress formembers of the family was by the side door only, the front door beingreserved for company. For company also was the parlor, and for companythe front stairs with their brilliant carpet, new, though laid for thefirst time nearly a quarter of a century before; for company also was thebest room in the house, which ought to have been attractive, but was alittle damp from being shut up so much, and was the cause of many a coldto guests. "I simply can't stand it to live by the striking of clocks!"thought Adelaide. "I must do something! But what?"

Her uneasiness proved unnecessary, however. Dory disappointed his aunt, of a new and interestingly difficult spirit to subdue, by taking rooms atthe Hendricks Hotel until they should find a place of their own. Mrs. Ranger asked them to live with her; but Adelaide shrank from puttingherself in a position where her mother and Arthur could, and hersister-in-law undoubtedly would, "know too much about our privateaffairs. " Mrs. Ranger did not insist. She would not admit it to herself, but, while she worshiped Del and thought her even more beautiful than shewas, and just about perfection in every way, still Madelene was moresatisfactory for daily companionship. Also, Ellen doubted whether twosuch positive natures as Madelene's and Adelaide's would be harmoniousunder the same roof. "What's more, " she reflected, "there may be ababy--babies. "

Within a fortnight of Del's return, and before she and Dory had gotquite used to each other again, she fixed on an abode. "Mrs. Dorsey washere this afternoon, " said she, with enthusiasm which, to Dory's acuteperceptions, seemed slightly exaggerated, in fact, forced, "and offeredus her house for a year, just to have somebody in it whom she could trustto look after things. You know she's taking her daughter abroad tofinish. It was too good a chance to let pass; so I accepted at once. "

Dory turned away abruptly. With slow deliberation he took a cigarettefrom his case, lighted it, watched the smoke drift out at the openwindow. She was observing him, though she seemed not to be. And hisexpression made her just a little afraid. Unlike most men who leadpurely intellectual lives, he had not the slightest suggestion ofsexlessness; on the contrary, he seemed as strong, as positivephysically, as the look of his forehead and eyes showed him to bementally. And now that he had learned to dress with greater care, out ofdeference to her, she could find nothing about him to help her inprotecting herself by criticising him. 

"Do you think, Del, " said he, "that we'll be able to live in that bigplace on eighteen hundred a year?"

It wasn't as easy for him thus to remind her of their limited means as ittheoretically should have been. Del was distinctly an expensive-lookingluxury. That dress of hers, pale green, with hat and everything to matchor in harmony, was a "simple thing, " but the best dressmaker in the Ruede la Paix had spent a great deal of his costly time in producing thateffect of simplicity. Throughout, she had the cleanness, the freshness, the freedom from affectations which Dory had learned could be got only bylarge expenditure. Nor would he have had her any different. He wantedjust the settings she chose for her fair, fine beauty. The only change hewould have asked would have been in the expression of those violet eyesof hers when they looked at him. 

"You wish I hadn't done it!" she exclaimed. And if he had not glancedaway so quickly he would have seen that she was ready to retreat. 

"Well, it's not exactly the start I'd been thinking of, " replied he, reluctantly but tentatively. 

It is not in human nature to refuse to press an offered advantage. SaidDel: "Can't we close up most of the house--use only five or six rooms onthe ground floor? And Mrs. Dorsey's gardener and his helpers will bethere. All we have to do is to see that they've not neglected thegrounds. " She was once more all belief and enthusiasm. "It seemed to me, taking that place was most economical, and so comfortable. Really, Dory, I didn't accept without thinking. "

Dory was debating with himself: To take that house--it was one of thosetrifles that are anything but trifles--like the slight but crucial motionat the crossroads in choosing the road to the left instead of the road tothe right. Not to take the house--Del would feel humiliated, reasoned he, would think him unreasonably small, would chafe under the restraint theirlimited means put upon them, whereas, if he left the question of livingon their income entirely to her good sense, she would not care about thedeprivations, would regard them as self-imposed. 

"Of course, if you don't like it, Dory, " she now said, "I suppose Mrs. Dorsey will let me off. But I'm sure you'd be delighted, once we gotsettled. The house is so attractive--at least, I think I can make itattractive by packing away her showy stuff and rearranging the furniture. And the grounds--Dory, I don't see how you can object!"

Dory gave a shrug and a smile. "Well, go ahead. We'll scramble throughsomehow. " He shook his head at her in good-humored warning. "Only, pleasedon't forget what's coming at the end of your brief year of grandeur. "

Adelaide checked the reply that was all but out. She hastily reflectedthat it might not be wise to let him know, just then, that Mrs. Dorseyhad said they could have the house for two years, probably for three, perhaps for five. Instead, she said, "It isn't the expense, after all, that disturbs you, is it?"

He smiled confession. "No. "

"I know it's snobbish of me to long for finery so much that I'm evenwilling to live in another person's and show off in it, " she sighed. "But--I'm learning gradually. "

He colored. Unconsciously she had put into her tone--and this not for thefirst time, by any means--a suggestion that there wasn't the slightestdanger of his wearying of waiting, that she could safely take her time ingetting round to sensible ideas and to falling in love with him. His eyeshad the look of the veiled amusement that deliberately shows through, ashe said, "That's good. I'll try to be patient. "

It was her turn to color. But, elbowing instinctive resentment, cameuneasiness. His love seemed to her of the sort that flowers in theromances--the love that endures all, asks nothing, lives forever upon itsown unfed fire. As is so often the case with women whose charms move mento extravagance of speech and emotion, it was a great satisfaction toher, to her vanity, to feel that she had inspired this wonderful immortalflame; obviously, to feed such a flame by giving love for love wouldreduce it to the commonplace. All women start with these exaggeratednotions of the value of being loved; few of them ever realize and rousethemselves, or are aroused, from their vanity to the truth that the valueis all the other way. Adelaide was only the natural woman in blindlyfancying that Dory was the one to be commiserated, in not seeing that sheherself was a greater loser than he, that to return his love would not bea concession but an acquisition. Most men are content to love, to compelwomen to receive their love; they prefer the passive, the receptiveattitude in the woman, and are even bored by being actively loved inreturn; for love is exacting, and the male is impatient of exaction. Adelaide did not understand just this broad but subtle difference betweenDory and "most men"--that he would feel that he was violating her were heto sweep her away in the arms of his impetuous released passion, as heknew he could. He felt that such a yielding was, after all, like theinert obedience of the leaf to the storm wind--that what he could compel, what women call love, would be as utterly without substance as an imagein a mirror, indeed, would be a mere passive reflection of his ownlove--all most men want, but worthless to him. 

Could it be that Dory's love had become--no, not less, but less ardent?She saw that he was deep in thought--about her, she assumed, with anunconscious vanity which would have excited the mockery of many who havemore vanity than had she, and perhaps with less excuse. In fact, he wasnot thinking of her; having the ability to turn his mind completely wherehe willed--the quality of all strong men, and the one that often makesthe weak-willed think them hard--he was revolving the vast and inspiringplans Arthur and he had just got into practical form--plans for newfactories and mills such as a university, professing to be in theforefront of progress need not be ashamed to own or to offer to itsstudents as workshops. All that science has bestowed in the way of makinglabor and its surroundings clean and comfortable, healthful andattractive, was to be provided; all that the ignorance and theshortsighted greediness of employers, bent only on immediate profits andkeeping their philanthropy for the smug penuriousness and degradingstupidity of charity, deny to their own self-respect and to justice fortheir brothers in their power. Arthur and he had wrought it all out, haddiscovered as a crowning vindication that the result would be profitablein dollars, that their sane and shrewd utopianism would produce largerdividends than the sordid and slovenly methods of their competitors. "Itis always so. Science is always economical as well as enlightened andhumane, " Dory was thinking when Adelaide's voice broke into his reverie. 

"You are right, Dory, " said she. "And I shall give up the house. I'll goto see Mrs. Dorsey now. "

"The house?--What--Oh, yes--well--no--What made you change?"

She did not know the real reason--that, studying his face, the curve andset of his head, the strength of the personality which she was too apt totake for granted most of the time because he was simple and free frompretense, she had been reminded that he was not a man to be trifled with, that she would better bestir herself and give more thought and attentionto what was going on in that superbly shaped head of his--about her, about her and him. "Oh, I don't just know, " replied she, quite honestly. "It seems to me now that there'll be too much fuss and care and--sham. And I intend to interest myself in _your_ work. You've hardly spoken ofit since I got back. "

"There's been so little time--"

"You mean, " she interrupted, "I've been so busy unpacking my sillydresses and hats and making and receiving silly calls. "

"Now you're in one of your penitential moods, " laughed Dory. "Andto-morrow you'll wish you hadn't changed about the house. No--that'ssettled. We'll take it, and see what the consequences are. "

Adelaide brightened. His tone was his old self, and she did want thathouse so intensely! "I can be useful to Dory there; I can do so much onthe social side of the university life. He doesn't appreciate the valueof those things in advancing a career. He thinks a career is made by workonly. But I'll show him! I'll make his house the center of theuniversity!"

Mrs. Dorsey had "Villa d'Orsay" carved on the stone pillars of her greatwrought-iron gates, to remind the populace that, while her latefather-in-law, "Buck" Dorsey, was the plainest of butchers and meatpackers, his ancestry was of the proudest. With the rise of its "upperclass" Saint X had gone in diligently for genealogy, had developedreverence for "tradition" and "blood, " had established a Society ofFamily Histories, a chapter of the Colonial Dames, another of Daughtersof the Revolution, and was in a fair way to rival the seaboard cities indevotion to the imported follies and frauds of "family. " Dory at firstindulged his sense of humor upon their Dorsey or d'Orsay finery. Itseemed to him they must choose between making a joke of it and having itmake a joke of them. But he desisted when he saw that it grated on Delfor him to speak of her and himself as "caretakers for the rich. " Andpresently his disposition to levity died of itself. It sobered anddisheartened and, yes, disgusted him as he was forced to admit to himselfthe reality of her delight in receiving people in the great drawing room, of her content in the vacuous, time-wasting habits, of her sense ofsuperiority through having at her command a troop of servants--Mrs. Dorsey's servants! He himself disliked servants about, hated to abet afellow-being in looking on himself or herself as an inferior; and heregarded as one of the basest, as well as subtlest poisons ofsnobbishness, the habit of telling others to do for one the menial, personal things which can be done with dignity only by oneself. Once, inParis--after Besançon--Janet spoke of some of her aristocraticacquaintances on the other side as "acting as if they had always beenused to everything; so different from even the best people at home. " Doryremembered how Adelaide promptly took her up, gave instance afterinstance in proof that European aristocrats were in fact as vulgar intheir satisfaction in servility as were the newest of the newlyaristocratic at home, but simply had a different way of showing it. "Amore vulgar way, " she said, Janet unable to refute her. "Yes, far morevulgar, Jen, because deliberately concealed; just as vanity that swellsin secret is far worse than frank, childish conceit. "

And now--These vanities of hers, sprung from the old roots which in Parisshe had been eager to kill and he was hoping were about dead, sprung invigor and spreading in weedy exuberance! He often looked at her in sadwonder when she was unconscious of it. "What _is_ the matter?" he wouldrepeat. "She is farther away than in Paris, where the temptation to thissort of nonsense was at least plausible. " And he grew silent with her andshut himself in alone during the evening hours which he could not spendat the university. She knew why, knew also that he was right, ceased tobore herself and irritate him with attempts to make the Villa d'Orsay thesocial center of the university. But she continued to waste her days inthe inane pastimes of Saint X's fashionable world, though ashamed ofherself and disgusted with her mode of life. For snobbishness isessentially a provincial vice, due full as much to narrowness as toignorance; and, thus, it is most potent in the small "set" in the smalltown. In the city even the narrowest are compelled to at least anoccasional glimpse of wider horizons; but in the small town only thevigilant and resolute ever get so much as a momentary point of view. Shetold herself, in angry attempt at self-excuse, that he ought to take herin hand, ought to snatch her away from that which she had not the courageto give up of herself. Yet she knew she would hate him should he try todo it. She assumed that was the reason he didn't; and it was part of thereason, but a lesser part than his unacknowledged, furtive fear of whathe might discover as to his own feelings toward her, were there just thena casting up and balancing of their confused accounts with each other. 

Both were relieved, as at a crisis postponed, when it became necessaryfor him to go abroad again immediately. "I don't see how _you_ canleave, " said he, thus intentionally sparing her a painful effort insaying what at once came into the mind of each. 

"We could cable Mrs. Dorsey, " she suggested lamely. She was at the LouisQuinze desk in the Louis Quinze sitting room, and her old gold negligeematched in charmingly, and the whole setting brought out the sheen, faintly golden, over her clear skin, the peculiarly fresh and intenseshade of her violet eyes, the suggestion of gold in her thick hair, withits wan, autumnal coloring, such as one sees in a field of dead ripegrain. She was doing her monthly accounts, and the showing was notpleasant. She was a good housekeeper, a surprisingly good manager; butshe did too much entertaining for their income. 

Dory was too much occupied with the picture she made as she sat there toreply immediately. "I doubt, " he finally replied, "if she could arrangeby cable for some one else whom she would trust with her treasures. No, Iguess you'll have to stay. "

"I _wish_ I hadn't taken this place!" she exclaimed. It was the firstconfession of what her real, her sane and intelligent self had beenproclaiming loudly since the first flush of interest and pleasure inher "borrowed plumage" had receded. "Why _do_ you let me make a foolof myself?"

"No use going into that, " replied he, on guard not to take too seriouslythis belated penitence. He was used to Del's fits of remorse, so used tothem that he thought them less valuable than they really were, or mighthave been had he understood her better--or, not bothered about trying tounderstand her. "I shan't be away long, I imagine, " he went on, "and I'llhave to rush round from England to France, to Germany, to Austria, toSwitzerland. All that would be exhausting for you, and only a little ofthe time pleasant. "

His words sounded to her like a tolling over the grave of that formerfriendship and comradeship of theirs. "I really believe you'll be glad toget away alone, " cried she, lips smiling raillery, eyes full of tears. 

"Do you think so?" said Dory, as if tossing back her jest. But both knewthe truth, and each knew that the other knew it. He was as glad to escapefrom those surroundings as she to be relieved of a presence which edgedon her other-self to scoff and rail and sneer at her. It had becomebitterness to him to enter the gates of the Villa d'Orsay. His nerveswere so wrought up that to look about the magnificent but toopalace-like, too hotel-like rooms was to struggle with a longing to runamuck and pause not until he had reduced the splendor to smithereens. Andin that injustice of chronic self-excuse which characterizes all humanbeings who do not live by intelligently formed and intelligently executedplan, she was now trying to soothe herself with blaming him for her lowspirits; in fact, they were wholly the result of her consciously unworthymode of life, and of an incessant internal warfare, exhausting anddepressing. Also, the day would surely come when he would ask how she wascontriving to keep up such imposing appearances on their eighteen hundreda year; and then she would have to choose between directly deceiving himand telling him that she had broken--no, not broken, that was tooharsh--rather, had not yet fulfilled the promise to give up the incomeher father left her. 

After a constrained silence, "I really don't need anyone to stop herewith me, " she said to him, as if she had been thinking of it and not ofthe situation between them, "but I'll get Stella Wilmot and her brother. "

"Arden?" said Dory, doubtfully. "I know he's all right in some ways, andhe has stopped drinking since he got the place at the bank. But--"

"If we show we have confidence in him, " replied Adelaide, "I think itwill help him. "

"Very well, " said Dory. "Besides, it isn't easy to find people of thesort you'd be willing to have, who can leave home and come here. "

Adelaide colored as she smiled. "Perhaps that _was_ my reason, ratherthan helping him, " she said. 

Dory flushed. "Oh, I didn't mean to insinuate that!" he protested, andchecked himself from saying more. In their mood each would search theother's every word for a hidden thrust, and would find it. 

The constraint between them, which thus definitely entered the stage ofdeep cleavage where there had never been a joining, persisted until theparting. Since the wedding he had kissed her but once--on her arrivalfrom Europe. Then, there was much bustle of greeting from others, andneither had had chance to be self-conscious. When they were at thestation for his departure, it so happened that no one had come with them. As the porter warned them that the train was about to move, they shookhands and hesitated, blushing and conscious of themselves and ofspectators, "Good-by, " stammered Dory, with a dash at her cheek. 

"Good-by, " she murmured, making her effort at the same instant. 

The result was a confusion of features and hat brims that threw theminto a panic, then into laughter, and so made the second attempt easyand successful. It was a real meeting of the lips. His arm went roundher, her hand pressed tenderly on his shoulder, and he felt a tremblingin her form, saw a sudden gleam of light leap into and from her eyes. And all in that flash the secret of his mistake in managing his loveaffair burst upon him. 

"Good-by, Dory--dear, " she was murmuring, a note in her voice like theshy answer of a hermit thrush to the call of her mate. 

"All aboard!" shouted the conductor, and the wheels began to move. 

"Good-by--good-by, " he stammered, his blood surging through his head. 

It came into her mind to say, "I care for you more than I knew. " But hisfriend the conductor was thrusting him up the steps of the car. "I wish Ihad said it, " thought she, watching the train disappear round the curve. "I'll write it. "

But she did not. When the time came to write, that idea somehow would notfit in with the other things she was setting down. "I think I do care forhim--as a friend, " she decided. "If he had only compelled me to find outthe state of my own mind! What a strange man! I don't see how he can loveme, for he knows me as I am. Perhaps he really doesn't; sometimes I thinkhe couldn't care for a woman as a woman wants to be cared for. " Then ashis face as she had last seen it rose before her, and her lips once moretingled, "Oh, yes, he _does_ care! And without his love how wretched I'dbe! What a greedy I am--wanting his love and taking it, and givingnothing in return. " That last more than half-sincere, though she, likenot a few of her sisters in the "Woman's Paradise, " otherwise known asthe United States of America, had been spoiled into greatly exaggeratingthe value of her graciously condescending to let herself be loved. 

And she was lonely without him. If he could have come back at the end ofa week or a month, he would have been received with an ardor that wouldhave melted every real obstacle between them. Also, it would havedissipated the far more obstructive imaginary obstacles from theirinfection with the latter-day vice of psychologizing about matters whichlie in the realm of physiology, not of psychology. But he did not come;and absence, like bereavement, has its climax, after which the thingthat was begins to be as if it had not been. 

He was gone; and that impetuous parting caress of his had roused in heran impulse that would never again sleep, would pace its cage restlessly, eager for the chance to burst forth. And he had roused it when he wouldnot be there to make its imperious clamor personal to himself. 

As Estelle was at her shop all day, and not a few of the evenings, Delbegan to see much of Henrietta Hastings. Grandfather Fuller was now deadand forgotten in the mausoleum into which he had put one-fifth of hisfortune, to the great discontent of the heirs. Henrietta's income hadexpanded from four thousand a year to twenty; and she spent her days inthinking of and talking of the careers to which she could help herhusband if he would only shake off the lethargy which seized him the yearafter his marriage to a Fuller heiress. But Hastings would not; he washappy in his books and in his local repute for knowing everything therewas to be known. Month by month he grew fatter and lazier and slower ofspeech. Henrietta pretended to be irritated against him, and the town hadthe habit of saying that "If Hastings had some of his wife's 'get up' hewouldn't be making her unhappy but would be winning a big name forhimself. " In fact, had Hastings tried to bestir himself at somethingdefinite in the way of action, Henrietta would have been really disturbedinstead of simply pretending to be. She had a good mind, a keen wit thathad become bitter with unlicensed indulgence; but she was as indolent andpurposeless as her husband. All her energy went in talk about doingsomething, and every day she had a new scheme, with yesterday's forgottenor disdained. 

Adelaide pretended to herself to regard Henrietta as an energetic andstimulating person, though she knew that Henrietta's energy, like herown, like that of most women of the sheltered, servant-attended class, was a mere blowing off of steam by an active but valveless engine of amind. But this pretense enabled her to justify herself for long morningsand afternoons at the Country Club with Henrietta. They talked ofactivity, of accomplishing this and that and the other; they readfitfully at serious books; they planned novels and plays; they separatedeach day with a comfortable feeling that they had been usefully employed. And each did learn much from the other; but, as each confirmed the otherin the habitual mental vices of the women, and of an increasing number ofthe men, of our quite comfortable classes, the net result of theirintercourse was pitifully poor, the poorer for their fond delusions thatthey were improving themselves. They laughed at the "culture craze"which, raging westward, had seized upon all the women of Saint X withincomes, or with husbands or fathers to support them in idleness--thecraze for thinking, reading, and talking cloudily or muddily on cloudy ormuddy subjects. Henrietta and Adelaide jeered; yet they were themselvesthe victims of another, and, if possible, more poisonous, bacillus of thesame sluggard family. 

One morning Adelaide, in graceful ease in her favorite nook in the smallnorthwest portico of the club house, was reading a most imposingly boundand illustrated work on Italian architecture written by a smatterer forsmatterers. She did a great deal of reading in this direction because itwas also the direction of her talent, and so she could make herself thinkshe was getting ready to join in Dory's work when he returned. She heardfootsteps just round the corner, and looked up. She and Ross Whitney wereface to face. 

There was no chance for evasion. He, with heightened color, lifted hishat; she, with a nonchalance that made her proud of herself, smiled andstretched out her hand. "Hello, Ross, " said she, languidly friendly. "When did _you_ come to town?" And she congratulated herself that herhair had gone up so well that morning and that her dress was one of hermost becoming--from Paris, from Paquin--a year old, it is true, butlater than the latest in Saint X and fashionable even for Sherry's atlunch time. 

Ross, the expert, got himself together and made cover without anyseeming of scramble; but his not quite easy eyes betrayed him to her. "About two hours ago, " replied he. 

"Is Theresa with you?" She gazed tranquilly at him as she fired thiscenter shot. She admired the coolness with which he received it. 

"No; she's up at her father's place--on the lake shore, " he answered. He, too, was looking particularly well, fresh yet experienced, and in dress amodel, with his serge of a strange, beautiful shade of blue, his red tieand socks, and his ruby-set cuff-links. "Mr. Howland is ill, and she'snursing him. I'm taking a few days off--came down to try to sell father'splace for him. "

"You're going to sell Point Helen?" said Adelaide, politely regretful. "Then I suppose we shan't see your people here any more. Your mother'llno doubt spend most of her time abroad, now that Janet is married there. "

Ross did not answer immediately. He was looking into the distance, hisexpression melancholy. His abstraction gave Adelaide a chance to verifythe impression she had got from a swift but femininely penetrating firstglance. Yes, he did look older; no, not exactly older--sad, rather. Evidently he was unhappy, distinctly unhappy. And as handsome and astasteful as ever--the band of his straw hat, the flower in hisbuttonhole, his tie, his socks--all in harmony; no ostentation, just theunerring, quiet taste of a gentleman. What a satisfactory person to lookat! To be sure, his character--However, character has nothing to do withthe eye-pleasures, and they are undeniably agreeable. Then there were hismanners, and his mind--such a man of the world! Of course he wasn't forone instant to be compared with Dory--who was? Still, it was a pity thatDory had a prejudice against showing all that he really was, a pity hehad to be known to be appreciated--that is, appreciated by the "rightsort" of people. Of course, the observant few could see him in his face, which was certainly distinguished--yes, far more distinguished thanRoss's, if not so regularly handsome. 

"I've been looking over the old place, " Ross was saying, "and I'vedecided to ask father to keep it. Theresa doesn't like it here; but I do, and I can't bring myself to cut the last cords. As I wandered over theplace I found myself getting so sad and sentimental that I hurried awayto escape a fit of the blues. "

"We're accustomed to that sort of talk, " said Adelaide with a mockingsmile in her delightful eyes. "People who used to live here and come backon business occasionally always tell us how much more beautiful Saint Xis than any other place on earth. But they take the first train forChicago or Cincinnati or anywhere at all. "

"So you find it dull here?"

"I?" Adelaide shrugged her charming shoulders slightly. "Not so very. Mylife is here--the people, the things I'm used to. I've a sense of peacethat I don't have anywhere else. " She gazed dreamily away. "And peace isthe greatest asset. "

"The greatest asset, " repeated Ross absently. "You are to be envied. "

"_I_ think so, " assented she, a curious undertone of defiance in hervoice. She had a paniclike impulse to begin to talk of Dory; but, thoughshe cast about diligently, she could find no way of introducing him thatwould not have seemed awkward--pointed and provincially prudish. 

"What are you reading?" he asked presently. 

She turned the book so that he could see the title. His eyes wanderedfrom it to linger on her slender white fingers--on the one where a plainband of gold shone eloquently. It fascinated and angered him; and she sawit, and was delighted. Her voice had a note of triumph in it as she said, putting the book on the table beside her, "Foolish, isn't it, to bereading how to build beautiful houses"--she was going to say, "when onewill probably never build any house at all. " She bethought her that thismight sound like a sigh over Dory's poverty and over the might-have-been. So she ended, "when the weather is so deliciously lazy. "

"I know the chap who wrote it, " said Ross, "Clever--really unusualtalent. But the fashionable women took him up, made him a toady and asnob, like the rest of the men of their set. How that sort of thing eatsout manhood and womanhood!"

Just what Dory often said! "My husband says, " she answered, "thatwhenever the world has got a fair start toward becoming civilized, alonghave come wealth and luxury to smother and kill. It's very interesting toread history from that standpoint, instead of taking the usual view--thatluxury produces the arts and graces. "

"Dory is a remarkable man, " said Ross with enthusiasm. "He's amazinglymodest; but there are some men so big that they can't hide, no matter howhard they try. He's one of them. "

Adelaide was in a glow, so happy did this sincere and just tribute makeher, so relieved did she feel. She was talking to one of Dory's friendsand admirers, not with an old sweetheart of hers about whom her heart, perhaps, might be--well, a little sore, and from whom radiated arespectful, and therefore subtle, suggestion that the past was verymuch the present for him. She hastened to expand upon Dory, upon hiswork; and, as she talked of the university, she found she had a pridein it, and an interest, and a knowledge, too, which astonished her. AndRoss listened, made appreciative comments. And so, on and on. WhenHenrietta came they were laughing and talking like the best of oldfriends; and at Ross's invitation the three lunched at the club andspent the afternoon together. 

"I think marriage has improved Ross, " said Henrietta, as she and Adelaidewere driving home together after tea--tea with Ross. 

"Theresa is a very sweet woman, " said Adelaide dutifully. 

"Oh, I don't mean that--any more than you do, " replied Henrietta. "I meanmarriage has chastened him--the only way it ever improves anybody. "

"No doubt he and Theresa are happy together, " said Adelaide, clinging toher pretense with a persistence that might have given her interesting andvaluable light upon herself had she noted it. 

"Happy?" Henrietta Hastings laughed. "Only stupid people are happy, mydear. Theresa may be happy, but not Ross. He's far too intelligent. AndTheresa isn't capable of giving him even those moments of happiness thatrepay the intelligent for their routine of the other sort of thing. "

"Marriage doesn't mean much in a man's life, " said Adelaide. "He has hisbusiness or profession. He is married only part of each day, and that theleast important part to him. "

"Yes, " replied Henrietta, "marriage is for a man simply a peg in hisshoe--in place or, as with Ross Whitney, out of place. One look at hisface was enough to show me that he was limping and aching and groaning. "

Adelaide found this pleasantry amusing far beyond its merits. "You can'ttell, " said she. "Theresa doesn't seem the same to him that she doesto--to us. "

"Worse, " replied Henrietta, "worse. It's fortunate they're rich. If thebetter class of people hadn't the money that enables them to put buffersround themselves, wife-beating wouldn't be confined to the slums. Thinkof life in one of two small rooms with a Theresa Howland!"

Adelaide had fallen, as far as could one of her generous and tolerantdisposition, into Henrietta's most infectious habit of girding ateveryone humorously--the favorite pastime of the idle who are profoundlydiscontented with themselves. By the time Mrs. Hastings left her at thelofty imported gates of Villa d'Orsay, they had done the subject ofTheresa full justice, and Adelaide entered the house with that sense ofself-contempt which cannot but come to any decent person after meting outuntempered justice to a fellow-mortal. This did not last, however; thepleasure in the realization that Ross did not care for Theresa and didcare for herself was too keen. As the feminine test of feminine successis the impression a woman makes upon men, Adelaide would have beenneither human nor woman had she not been pleased with Ross's discreet andsincerely respectful, and by no means deliberate or designing disclosure. It was not the proof of her power to charm the male that had made herindignant at herself. "How weak we women are!" she said to herself, trying to assume a penitence she could not make herself feel. "We reallyought to be locked away in harems. No doubt Dory trusts meabsolutely--that's because other women are no temptation to him--that is, I suppose they aren't. If he were different, he'd be afraid I had hisweakness--we all think everybody has at least a touch of our infirmities. Of course I can be trusted; I've sense enough not to have my head turnedby what may have been a mere clever attempt to smooth over the past. "Then she remembered Ross's look at her hand, at her wedding ring, andHenrietta's confirmation of her own diagnosis. "But why should _that_interest _me_, " she thought, impatient with herself for lingering whereher ideal of self-respect forbade. "I don't love Ross Whitney. He pleasesme, as he pleases any woman he wishes to make an agreeable impressionupon. And, naturally, I like to know that he really did care for me andis ashamed and repentant of the baseness that made him act as he did. Butbeyond that, I care nothing about him--nothing. I may not care for Doryexactly as I should; but at least knowing him has made it impossible forme to go back to the Ross sort of man. "

That seemed clear and satisfactory. But, strangely, her mind jumped tothe somewhat unexpected conclusion, "And I'll not see him again. "

She wrote Dory that night a long, long letter, the nearest to a loveletter she had ever written him. She brought Ross in quite casually;yet--What is the mystery of the telltale penumbra round the written word?Why was it that Dory, in far-away Vienna, with the memory of her strongand of the Villa d'Orsay dim, reading the letter for the first time, thought it the best he had ever got from her; and the next morning, reading it again, could think of nothing but Ross, and what Adelaide hadreally thought about him deep down in that dark well of the heart wherewe rarely let even our own eyes look intently?

CHAPTER XXIII

A STROLL IN A BYPATH

Ross had intended to dine at the club; but Mrs. Hastings's trap washardly clear of the grounds when he, to be free to think uninterruptedly, set out through the woods for Point Helen. 

Even had he had interests more absorbing than pastimes, display, andmoney-making by the "brace" game of "high finance" with its small risksof losing and smaller risks of being caught, even if he had been marriedto a less positive and incessant irritant than Theresa was to him, hewould still not have forgotten Adelaide. Forgetfulness comes with thefinished episode, never with the unfinished. In the circumstances, therecould be but one effect from seeing her again. His regrets blazed up intofierce remorse, became the reckless raging of a passion to whichobstacles and difficulties are as fuel to fire. 

Theresa, once the matter of husband-getting was safely settled, had norestraint of prudence upon her self-complacence. She "let herself go"completely, with results upon her character, her mind, and her personalappearance that were depressing enough to the casual beholder, butappalling to those who were in her intimacy of the home. Ross watched herdeteriorate in gloomy and unreproving silence. She got herself togethersufficiently for as good public appearance as a person of her wealth andposition needed to make, he reasoned; what did it matter how she lookedand talked at home where, after all, the only person she could hope toplease was herself? He held aloof, drawn from his aloofness occasionallyby her whim to indulge herself in what she regarded as proofs of hislove. Her pouting, her whimpering, her abject but meaninglessself-depreciation, her tears, were potent, not for the flattering reasonshe assigned, but because he, out of pity for her and self-reproach, anddread of her developing her mother's weakness, would lash himself intothe small show of tenderness sufficient to satisfy her. 

And now, steeped in the gall of as bitter a draught as experience forcesfolly to drink anew each day to the dregs--the realization that, thoughthe man marries the money only, he lives with the wife only--Ross had metAdelaide again. "I'll go to Chicago in the morning, " was his conclusion. "I'll do the honorable thing"--he sneered at himself--"since trying theother would only result in her laughing at me and in my being still moremiserable. "

But when morning came he was critical of the clothes his valet offeredhim, spent an hour in getting himself groomed for public appearance, thenappeared at the Country Club for breakfast instead of driving to thestation. And after breakfast, he put off his departure "until to-morrowor next day, " and went to see Mr. And Mrs. Hastings. And what morenatural then than that Henrietta should take him to the Villa d'Orsay "toshow you how charmingly Del has installed herself. " "And perhaps, " saidHenrietta, "she and Arden Wilmot will go for a drive. He has quit thebank because they objected to his resting two hours in the middle of theday. " What more natural than that Adelaide should alter her resolutionunder the compulsion of circumstance, should spend the entire morning inthe gardens, she with Ross, Henrietta with Arden? Finally, to avoidstrain upon her simple domestic arrangements in that period ofretrenchment, what more natural than falling in with Ross's proposal oflunch at Indian Mound? And who ever came back in a hurry from IndianMound, with its quaint vast earthworks, its ugly, incredibly ancientpotteries and flint instruments that could be uncovered anywhere with thepoint of a cane or parasol; its superb panorama, bounded by the far bluehills where, in days that were ancient when history began, fires werelighted by sentinels to signal the enemy's approach to a people whosevery dust, whose very name has perished? It was six o'clock before theybegan the return drive; at seven they were passing the Country Club, and, of course, they dined there and joined in the little informal danceafterwards; and later, supper and cooling drinks in a corner of theveranda, with the moon streaming upon them and the enchanted breath ofthe forest enchaining the senses. 

What a day! How obligingly all unpleasant thoughts fled! How high andbright rose the mountains all round the horizon of the present, shuttingout yesterday and to-morrow! "This has been _the_ happy day of my life, "said Ross as they lingered behind the other two on the way to the last'bus for the town. "The happiest"--in a lower tone--"thus far. "

And Del was sparkling assent, encouragement even; and her eyes weregleaming defiantly at the only-too-plainly-to-be-read faces of the fewhilltop people still left at the club house. "Surely a woman has theright to enjoy herself innocently in the twentieth century, " she wassaying to herself. "Dory wouldn't want me to sit moping alone. I amyoung; I'll have enough of that after I'm old--one is old so much longerthan young. " And she looked up at Ross, and very handsome he was in thatsoft moonlight, his high-blazing passion glorifying his features. "I, too, have been happy, " she said to him. Then, with a vain effort to seemand to believe herself at ease, "I wish Dory could have been along. "

But Ross was not abashed by the exorcism of that name; her bringing it inwas too strained, would have been amusing if passion were not devoid ofthe sense of humor. "She _does_ care for me!" he was thinking dizzily. "And I can't live without her--and _won't_!"

His mother had been writing him her discoveries that his father, inwretched health and goaded by physical torment to furious play at thegreen tables of "high finance, " was losing steadily, swiftly, heavily. But Ross read her letters as indifferently as he read Theresa's appealsto him to come to Windrift. It took a telegram--"Matters much worse thanI thought. You must be here to talk with him before he begins businessto-morrow"--to shock him into the realization that he had been imperilingthe future he was dreaming of and planning--his and Del's future. 

On the way to the train he stopped at the Villa d'Orsay, saw her andHenrietta at the far end of Mrs. Dorsey's famed white-and-gold garden. Henrietta was in the pavilion reading. A few yards away Adelaide, headbent and blue sunshade slowly turning as it rested on her shoulder, wasstrolling round the great flower-rimmed, lily-strewn outer basin of Mrs. Dorsey's famed fountain, the school of crimson fish, like a streak offire in the water, following her. When she saw him coming toward them intraveling suit, instead of the white serge he always wore on such daysas was that, she knew he was going away--a fortunate forewarning, forshe thus had time to force a less telltale expression before heannounced the reason for his call. "But, " he added, "I'll be back in afew days--a very few. "

"Oh!" was all Del said; but her tone of relief, her sudden brightening, were more significant than any words could have been. 

Henrietta now joined them. "You take the afternoon express?" said she. 

Ross could not conceal how severe a test of his civility thisinterruption was. "Yes, " said he. "My trap is in front of the house. "

There he colored before Henrietta's expression, a mingling of amusement, indignation, and contempt, a caustic comment upon his disregard of theeffect of such indiscretion upon a Saint X young married woman'sreputation. "Then, " said she, looking straight and significantly at him, "you'll be able to drop me at my house on the way. "

"Certainly, " was his prompt assent. When Saint X's morality police shouldsee him leaving the grounds with her, they would be silenced as to thisparticular occurrence at least. After a few minutes of awkwardcommonplaces, he and Henrietta went up the lawns, leaving Del there. Atthe last point from which the end of the garden could be seen, hedropped behind, turned, saw her in exactly the same position, thefountain and the water lilies before her, the center and climax of thosestretches of white-and-gold blossoms. The sunshade rested lightly uponher shoulder, and its azure concave made a harmonious background for hersmall, graceful head with the airily plumed hat set so becomingly uponthose waves of dead-gold hair. He waved to her; but she made no sign ofhaving seen. 

When Henrietta returned, Adelaide had resumed her reverie and her slowmarch round the fountain. Henrietta watched with a quizzical expressionfor some time before saying: "If I hadn't discouraged him, I believe he'dhave blurted it all out to me--all he came to say to you. "

Del was still absent-minded as she answered: "It's too absurd. People areso censorious, so low-minded. "

"They are, " rejoined Mrs. Hastings. "And, I'm sorry to say, as a rulethey're right. "

The curve of Del's delicate eyebrows and of her lips straightened. 

"All the trouble comes through our having nothing to do, " pursuedHenrietta, disregarding those signs that her "meddling" was unwelcome. "The idle women! We ought to be busy at something useful--you and I andthe rest of 'em. Then we'd not be tempted to kill time doing things thatcause gossip, and may cause scandal. " Seeing that Adelaide was about tomake some curt retort, she added: "Now, don't pretend, Del. You know, yourself, that they're always getting into mischief and getting the meninto mischief. "

"Don't you ever feel, Henrietta, that we're simply straws in thestrong wind?"

"Fate sometimes does force mischief on men and women, " was Henrietta'sretort, "and it ceases to be mischief--becomes something else, I'm notsure just what. But usually fate has nothing to do with the matter. It'swe ourselves that course for mischief, like a dog for rabbits. "

Del, in sudden disdain of evasion, faced her with, "Well, Henrietta, what of it?"

Mrs. Hastings elevated and lowered her shoulders. "Simply that you'reseeing too much of Ross--too much for his good, if not for your own. "

Del's sunshade was revolving impatiently. 

"It's as plain as black on white, " continued Mrs. Hastings, "that he'smadly in love with you--in love as only an experienced man can be with anexperienced and developed woman. "

"Well, what of it?" Del's tone was hostile, defiant. 

"You can't abruptly stop seeing him. Everyone'd say you and he weremeeting secretly. "

"Really!"

"But you can be careful how you treat him. You can show him, andeverybody, that there's nothing in it. You must--" Henrietta hesitated, dared; "you must be just friendly, as you are with Arden and the restof the men. "

Hiram's daughter was scarlet. Full a minute, and a very full minute, ofsilence. Then Adelaide said coldly: "Thank you. And now that you've freedyour mind I hope you'll keep it free for your own affairs. "

"Ouch!" cried Henrietta, making a wry face. And she devoted the rest ofthe afternoon to what she realized, at the parting, was the vain task ofmollifying Del. She knew that thenceforth she and Adelaide would driftapart; and she was sorry, for she liked her--liked to talk with her, liked to go about with her. Adelaide's beauty attracted the men, and amale audience was essential to Henrietta's happiness; she found theconversation of women--the women she felt socially at ease with--tedious, and their rather problematic power of appreciation limited to what camefrom men. As she grew older, and less and less pleasing to the eye, themen showed more and more clearly how they had deceived themselves inthinking it was her brains that had made them like her. As Henrietta, with mournful cynicism, put it: "Men the world over care little aboutwomen beyond their physical charm. To realize it, look at us Americanwomen, who can do nothing toward furthering men's ambitions. We've onlyour physical charms to offer; we fall when we lose them. And so our oldwomen and our homely women, except those that work or that have bighouses and social power, have no life of their own, live on sufferance, alone or the slaves of their daughters or of some pretty young woman towhom they attach themselves. "

The days dragged for Adelaide. "I'm afraid he'll write, " saidshe--meaning that she hoped he would. Indeed, she felt that he hadwritten, but had destroyed the letters. And she was right; almost allthe time he could spare from his efforts to save his father from a sickbut obstinately active man's bad judgment was given to writing toher--formal letters which he tore up as too formal, passionate letterswhich he destroyed as unwarranted and unwise, when he had not yet, faceto face, in words, told her his love and drawn from her what he believedwas in her heart. The days dragged; she kept away from Henrietta, fromall "our set, " lest they should read in her dejected countenance thetruth, and more. 

CHAPTER XXIV

DR. MADELENE PRESCRIBES

Madelene's anteroom was full of poor people. They flocked to her, thoughshe did not pauperize them by giving her services free. She had got thereputation of miraculous cures, the theory in the tenements being thather father had swindled his satanic "familiar" by teaching his daughterwithout price what he had had to pay for with his immortal soul. Adelaiderefused the chair a sick-looking young artisan awkwardly pressed uponher. Leaning against the window seat, she tried to interest herself inher fellow-invalids. But she had not then the secret which unlocks themystery of faces; she was still in the darkness in which most of usproudly strut away our lives, deriding as dreamers or cranks those whoare in the light and see. With almost all of us the innate sympathies ofrace, which give even wolves and vultures the sense of fraternalcompanionship in the storm and stress of the struggle for existence, aredeep overlaid with various kinds of that egotistic ignorance called classfeeling. Adelaide felt sorry for "the poor, " but she had yet to learnthat she was of them, as poor in other and more important ways as they inmoney and drawing-room manners. Surfaces and the things of the surfaceobscured or distorted all the realities for her, as for most of us; andthe fact that her intelligence laughed at and scorned her pervertedinstincts was of as little help to her as it is to most of us. 

When Madelene was free she said to her sister-in-law, in mockseriousness, "Well, and what can I do for _you_!" as if she wereanother patient. 

Adelaide's eyes shifted. Clearly Madelene's keen, pretense-scatteringgaze was not one to invite to inspect a matter which might not look atall well stripped of its envelopes of phrase and haze. She wished she hadnot come; indeed, she had been half-wishing it during the wholethree-quarters of an hour of watching and thinking on Madelene'swonderful life, so crowded with interest, with achievement, with all thatHiram Ranger's daughter called, and believed, "the real thing. "

"Nothing, nothing at all, " replied she to Madelene's question. "I justdropped in to annoy you with my idle self--or, maybe, to please you. Youknow we're taught at church that a large part of the joy of the savedcomes from watching the misery of the damned. "

But Madelene had the instinct of the physician born. "She has somethingon her mind and wants me to help her, " she thought. Aloud she said: "Ifeel idle, myself. We'll sit about for an hour, and you'll stay to dinnerwith Arthur and me--we have it here to-day, as your mother is going out. Afterwards I must do my round. "

A silence, with Adelaide wondering where Ross was and just when he wouldreturn. Then Madelene went on: "I've been trying to persuade your motherto give up the house, change it into a hospital. "

The impudence of it! _Their_ house, _their_ home; and this newcomer intothe family--a newcomer from nowhere--trying to get it away from them!"Mother said something about it, " said Adelaide frostily. "But shedidn't say _you_ had been at her. I think she ought to be left alone inher old age. "

"The main thing is to keep her interested in life, don't you think?"suggested Madelene, noting how Adelaide was holding herself in check, butdisregarding it. "Your mother's a plain, natural person and never hasfelt at home in that big house. Indeed, I don't think any human beingever does feel at home in a big house. There was a time when they fittedin with the order of things; but now they've become silly, it seems tome, except for public purposes. When we all get sensible and go in forbeing somebody instead of for showing off, we'll live in convenient, comfortable, really tasteful and individual houses and have big buildingsonly for general use. "

"I'm afraid the world will never grow up into your ideals, Madelene, "said Del with restrained irony. "At least not in our day. "

"I'm in no hurry, " replied Madelene good-naturedly. "The mostsatisfactory thing about common sense is that one can act on it withoutwaiting for others to get round to it. But we weren't talking of thosewho would rather be ignorantly envied than intelligently happy. We weretalking of your mother. "

"Mother was content with her mode of life until you put these 'advanced'ideas into her head. "

"'Advanced' is hardly the word, " said Madelene. "They used to be herideas--always have been, underneath. If it weren't that she is afraid ofhurting your feelings, she'd not hesitate an instant. She'd take thesmall house across the way and give herself the happiness of helping withthe hospital she'd install in the big house. You know she always had apassion for waiting on people. Here's her chance to gratify it to goodpurpose. Why should she let the fact that she has money enough not tohave to work stand between her and happy usefulness?"

"What does Arthur think?" asked Del. Her resentment was subsiding inspite of her determined efforts to keep it glowing; Madelene knew thesecret of manner that enables one to be habitually right without givingothers the sense of being put irritatingly in the wrong. "But, " smiling, "I needn't inquire. Of course he assents to whatever _you_ say. "

"You know Arthur better than that, " replied Madelene, with no trace ofresentment. She had realized from the beginning of the conversation thatDel's nerves were on edge; her color, alternately rising and fading, andher eyes, now sparkling now dull, could only mean fever from a tempest ofsecret emotion. "He and I usually agree simply because we see things inabout the same light. "

"You furnish the light, " teased Adelaide. 

"That was in part so at first, " admitted her sister-in-law. "Arthur hadgot many foolish notions in his head through accepting thoughtlessly theideas of the people he traveled with. But, once he let his good sense getthe upper hand--He helps me now far more than I help him. "

"Has he consented to let them give him a salary yet?" asked Adelaide, not because she was interested, but because she desperately felt thatthe conversation must be kept alive. Perhaps Ross was even now on hisway to Saint X. 

"He still gets what he fixed on at first--ten dollars a week more thanthe foreman. "

"Honestly, Madelene, " said Adelaide, in a flush and flash ofirritation, "don't you think that's absurd? With the responsibility ofthe whole business on his shoulders, you know he ought to have morethan a common workman. "

"In the first place you must not forget that everyone is paid very highwages at the university works now. "

"And he's the cause of that--of the mills doing so well, " said Del. Shecould see Ross entering the gates--at the house--inquiring--What was shetalking to Madelene about? Yes, about Arthur and the mills. "Even the menthat criticise him--Arthur, I mean--most severely for 'sowing discontentin the working class, ' as they call it, " she went on, "concede that hehas wonderful business ability. So he ought to have a huge salary. "

"No doubt he earns it, " replied Madelene. "But the difficulty is that hecan't take it without it's coming from the other workmen. You see, moneyis coined sweat. All its value comes from somebody's labor. He deservesto be rewarded for happening to have a better brain than most men, andfor using it better. But there's no fund for rewarding the clever forbeing cleverer than most of their fellow-beings, any more than there's afund to reward the handsome for being above the average in looks. So hehas to choose between robbing his fellow-workmen, who are in his power, and going without riches. He prefers going without. "

"That's very noble of you both, I'm sure, " said Adelaide absently. The Chicago express would be getting in at four o'clock--about fivehours. Absurd! The morning papers said Mr. Whitney had had a relapse. "Very noble, " she repeated absently. "But I doubt if anybody willappreciate it. "

Madelene smiled cheerfully. "That doesn't worry Arthur or me, " said she, with her unaffected simplicity. "We're not looking for appreciation. We're looking for a good time. " Del, startled, began to listen toMadelene. A good time--"And it so happens, " came in Madelene's sweet, honest voice, "that we're unable to have it, unless we feel that wearen't getting it by making some one else have a not-so-good time or avery bad time indeed. You've heard of Arthur's latest scheme?"

"Some one told me he was playing smash at the mills, encouraging theworkmen to idleness and all that sort of thing, " said Del. Somehow shefelt less feverish, seemed compelled to attention by Madelene's voice andeyes. "But I didn't hear or understand just how. "

"He's going to establish a seven-hours' working day; and, if possible, cut it down to six. " Madelene's eyes were sparkling. Del watched herlongingly, enviously. How interested she was in these useful things. Howfine it must be to be interested where one could give one's whole heartwithout concealment--or shame! "And, " Madelene was saying, "theuniversity is to change its schedules so that all its practical courseswill be at hours when men working in the factory can take them. It'ssimply another development of his and Dory's idea that a factorybelonging to a university ought to set a decent example--ought not tocompel its men to work longer than is necessary for them to earn athonest wages a good living for themselves and their families. "

"So that they can sit round the saloons longer, " suggested Adelaide, andthen she colored and dropped her eyes; she was repeating Ross's commenton this sort of "concession to the working classes. " She had thought itparticularly acute when he made it. Now--

"No doubt most of them will spend their time foolishly at first, "Madelene conceded. "Working people have had to work so hard forothers--twelve, fourteen, sixteen hours a day, just to be allowed tolive--that they've had really no free time at all; so they've had nochance to learn how to spend free time sensibly. But they'll learn, thoseof them that have capacity for improvement. Those that haven't will soondrop out. "

"The factories can't make money on such a plan as that, " said Adelaide, again repeating a remark of Ross's, but deliberately, because shebelieved it could be answered, wished to hear it answered. 

"No, not dividends, " replied Madelene. "But dividends are to be abolishedin that department of the university, just as they are in the otherdepartments. And the money the university needs is to come from tuitionfees. Everyone is to pay for what he gets. Some one has to pay for it;why not the person who gets the benefit? Especially when the university'sfarms and workshops and factories give every student, man and woman, achance to earn a good living. I tell you Adelaide, the time is comingwhen every kind of school except kindergarten will be self-supporting. And then you'll see a human race that is really fine, really capable, hasa real standard of self-respect. "

As Madelene talked, her face lighted up and all her latent magnetism wasradiating. Adelaide, for no reason that was clear to her, yielded to asurge of impulse and, half-laughing, half in tears, suddenly kissedMadelene. "No wonder Arthur is mad about you, stark mad, " she cried. 

Madelene was for a moment surprised out of that perfectself-unconsciousness which is probably the rarest of human qualities, andwhich was her greatest charm to those who knew her well. She blushedfuriously and angrily. Her and Arthur's love was to her most sacred, absolutely between themselves. When any outsider could observe them, even her sister Walpurga, she seemed so much the comrade andfellow-worker in her attitude toward him that people thought and spoke oftheir married life as "charming, but cold. " Alone with him, she showedthat which was for him alone--a passion whose strength had made himstrong, as the great waves give their might to the swimmer who does notshrink from adventuring them. Adelaide's impulsive remark, had violatedher profoundest modesty; and in the shock she showed it. 

"I beg your pardon!" exclaimed Adelaide, though she did not realizewherein she had offended. Love was an unexplored, an unsuspected mysteryto her then--the more a mystery because she thought she knew from havingread about it and discussed it and reasoned about it. 

"Oh, I understand, " said Madelene, contrite for her betraying expression. "Only--some day--when you really fall in love--you'll know why I wasstartled. "

Adelaide shrank within herself. "Even Madelene, " thought she, "whohas not a glance for other people's affairs, knows how it is betweenDory and me. "

It was Madelene's turn to be repentant and apologetic. "I didn't meanquite that, " she stammered. "Of course I know you care for Dory--"

The tears came to Del's eyes and the high color to her cheeks. "Youneedn't make excuses, " she cried. "It's the truth. I don't care--in_that_ way. "

A silence; then Madelene, gently: "Was this what you came to tell me?"

Adelaide nodded slowly. "Yes, though I didn't know it. "

"Why tell _me_?"

"Because I think I care for another man. " Adelaide was not looking away. On the contrary, as she spoke, saying the words in an even, reflectivetone, she returned her sister-in-law's gaze fully, frankly. "And I don'tknow what to do. It's very complicated--doubly complicated. "

"The one you were first engaged to?"

"Yes, " said Del. "Isn't it pitiful in me?" And there was realself-contempt in her voice and in her expression. "I assumed that Idespised him because he was selfish and calculating, and _such_ a snob!Now I find I don't mind his selfishness, and that I, too, am a snob. " Shesmiled drearily. "I suppose you feel the proper degree of contempt andaversion. "

"We are all snobs, " answered Madelene tranquilly. "It's one of thedeepest dyes of the dirt we came from, the hardest to wash out. "

"Besides, " pursued Adelaide, "he and I have both learned byexperience--which has come too late; it always does. "

"Not at all, " said Madelene briskly. "Experience is never too late. It'salways invaluably useful in some way, no matter when it comes. "

Adelaide was annoyed by Madelene's lack of emotion. She had thought hersister-in-law would be stirred by a recital so romantic, so dark with themenace of tragedy. Instead, the doctor was acting as if she were dealingwith mere measles. Adelaide, unconsciously, of course--we are neverconscious of the strong admixture of vanity in our "great" emotions--waspiqued into explaining. "We can never be anything to each other. There'sDory; then there's Theresa. And I'd suffer anything rather than bringshame and pain on others. "

Madelene smiled--somehow not irritatingly--an appeal to Del's sense ofproportion. "Suffer, " repeated she. "That's a good strong word for awoman to use who has health and youth and beauty, and materialcomfort--and a mind capable of an infinite variety of interests. "Adelaide's tragic look was slipping from her. "Don't take too gloomy aview, " continued the physician. "Disease and death and one other thingare the only really serious ills. In this case of yours everything willcome round quite smooth, if you don't get hysterical and if Ross Whitneyis really in earnest and not"--Madelene's tone grew even moredeliberate--"not merely getting up a theatrical romance along the linesof the 'high-life' novels you idle people set such store by. " She saw, inDel's wincing, that the shot had landed. "No, " she went on, "your case isone of the commonplaces of life among those people--and they're in allclasses--who look for emotions and not for opportunities to be useful. "

Del smiled, and Madelene hailed the returning sense of humor as anencouraging sign. 

"The one difficult factor is Theresa, " said Madelene, pushing on with theprescription. "She--I judge from what I've heard--she's what's commonlycalled a 'poor excuse for a woman. ' We all know that type. You may besure her vanity would soon find ways of consoling her. Ninety-nine timesout of a hundred where one holds on after the other has let go the reasonis vanity, wounded vanity--where it isn't the material consideration thatexplains why there are so many abandoned wives and so few abandonedhusbands. Theresa doesn't really care for her husband; love that isn'tmutual isn't love. So she'd come up smiling for a second husband. "

"She's certainly vain, " said Del. "Losing him would all but kill her. "

"Not if it's done tactfully, " replied Madelene. "Ross'll no doubt be gladto sacrifice his own vanity and so arrange matters that she'll be able tosay and feel that she got rid of him, not he of her. Of course that meansa large sacrifice of his vanity--and of yours, too. But neither of youwill mind that. "

Adelaide looked uncomfortable; Madelene took advantage of her abstractionto smile at the confession hinted in that look. 

"As for Dory--"

At that name Del colored and hung her head. 

"As for Dory, " repeated Madelene, not losing the chance to emphasize theeffect, "he's no doubt fond of you. But no matter what he--or you--mayimagine, his fondness cannot be deeper than that of a man for a womanbetween whom and him there isn't the perfect love that makes one of two. "

"I don't understand his caring for me, " cried Del. "I can't believe hedoes. " This in the hope of being contradicted. 

But Madelene simply said: "Perhaps he'd not feel toward you as he seemsto think he does if he hadn't known you before you went East and got fondof the sort of thing that attracts you in Ross Whitney. Anyhow, Dory'sthe kind of man to be less unhappy over losing you than over keeping youwhen you didn't want to stay. You may be like his eyes to him, but youknow if that sort of man loses his sight he puts seeing out of thecalculation and goes on just the same. Dory Hargrave is a _man_; and areal man is bigger than any love affair, however big. "

Del was trying to hide the deep and smarting wound to her vanity. "Youare right, Madelene, " said she. "Dory _is_ cold. "

"But I didn't say that, " replied Madelene. "Most of us prefer people likethose flabby sea creatures that are tossed aimlessly about by the wavesand have no permanent shape or real purposes and desires, but takewhatever their feeble tentacles can hold without effort. " Del winced, andit was the highest tribute to Dr. Madelene's skill that the patient didnot hate her and refuse further surgery. "We're used to that sort, "continued she. "So when a really alive, vigorous, pushing, and resistingpersonality comes in contact with us, we say, 'How hard! How unfeeling!'The truth, of course, is that Ross is more like the flabby things--hisenvironment dominates him, while Dory dominates his environment. But youlike the Ross sort, and you're right to suit yourself. To suit yourselfis the only way to avoid making a complete failure of life. Wait tillDory comes home. Then talk it out with him. Then--free yourself and marryRoss, who will have freed himself. It's quite simple. People arebroad-minded about divorce nowadays. It never causes serious scandal, except among those who'd like to do the same, but don't dare. "

It certainly was easy, and ought to have been attractive. Yet Del was notattracted. "One can't deal with love in such a cold, calculatingfashion, " thought she, by way of bolstering up her weakening confidencein the reality and depth of those sensations which had seemed sothrillingly romantic an hour before. "I've given you the impression thatRoss and I have some--some understanding, " said she. "But we haven't. Forall I know, he may not care for me as I care for him. "

"He probably doesn't, " was Madelene's douche-like reply. "You attract himphysically--which includes his feeling that you'd show off better thanTheresa before the world for which he cares so much. But, after all, that's much the way you care for him, isn't it?"

Adelaide's bosom was swelling and falling agitatedly. Her eyes flashed;her reserve vanished. "I'm sure he'd love me!" cried she. "He'd give mewhat my whole soul, my whole body cry out for. Madelene, you don'tunderstand! I am so starved, so out in the cold! I want to go in whereit's warm--and--human!" The truth, the deep-down truth, was out at last;Adelaide had wrenched it from herself. 

"And Dory will not give you that?" said Madelene, all gentleness andsympathy, and treading softly on this dangerous, delicate ground. 

"He gives me nothing!" exclaimed Adelaide bitterly. "He is waiting for meto learn to love him. He ought to know that a woman has to be taught tolove--at least the sort of woman I am. He treats me as if I were hisequal, when he ought to see that I'm not; that I'm like a child, and haveto be shown what's good for me, and _made_ to take it. "

"Then, perhaps, after all, " said Madelene slowly, "you do care for Dory. "

"Of course I care for him; how could anyone help it? But he won't letme--he won't let me!" She was on the verge of hysteria, and her loss ofself-control was aggravated by the feeling that she was making a weak, silly exhibition of herself. 

"If you do care for Dory, and Dory cares for you, and you don't care forRoss--" began Madelene. 

"But I do care for Ross, too! Oh, I must be bad--bad! Could a nice womancare for two men at the same time?"

"I'd have said not, " was Madelene's answer. "But now I see that shecould--and I see why. "

"Dory means something to me that Ross does not. Ross means something thatDory does not. I want it all--all that both of them represent. I can'tgive up Dory; I can't give up Ross. You don't understand, Madelene, because you've had the good luck to get it all from Arthur. "

After a silence, Madelene said: "Well, Del, what are you going to do?"

"Nothing. "

"That's sensible!" approved Madelene. "If Ross really loves you, then, whether he can have you or not, he'll free himself from Theresa. Hesimply couldn't go on with her. And if you really care for him, then, when Dory comes home he'll free you. "

"That ought to be so, " said Adelaide, not seeing the full meaning ofMadelene's last words. "But it isn't. Neither Ross nor I is strongenough. We're just ordinary people, the sort that most everybody is andthat most everybody despises when they see them or read about them asthey really are. No, he and I will each do the conventional thing. We'llgo our separate ways "--contemptuously--"the _easiest_ ways. And we'llregard ourselves as martyrs to duty--that's how they put it in thenovels, isn't it?"

"At least, " said Madelene, with a calmness she was far from feeling, "both you and Ross have had your lesson in the consequence of doingthings in a hurry. "

"That's the only way people brought up as we've been ever do anything. Ifwe don't act on impulse, we don't act at all; we drift on. "

"Drifting is action, the most decisive kind of action. " Madelene wasagain thinking what would surely happen the instant Dory found howmatters stood; but she deemed it tactful to keep this thought to herself. Just then she was called to the telephone. When she came back she foundAdelaide restored to her usual appearance--the fashionable, light-hearted, beautiful woman, mistress of herself, and seeming assecure against emotional violence from within as against discourtesy fromwithout. But she showed how deep was the impression of Madelene'scommon-sense analysis of her romance by saying: "A while ago you saidthere were only three serious ills, disease and death, but you didn'tname the third. What is it?"

"Dishonor, " said Madelene, with a long, steady look at her. 

Adelaide paled slightly, but met her sister-in-law's level gaze. "Yes, "was all she said. 

A silence; then Madelene: "Your problem, Del, is simple; is no problemat all, so far as Dory or Ross's wife is concerned; or the whole outsideworld, for that matter. It's purely personal; it's altogether theproblem of bringing pain and shame on yourself. The others'll get overit; but can you?"

Del made no reply. A moment later Arthur came; after dinner she leftbefore he did, and so was not alone with Madelene again. Reviewing heramazing confessions to her sister-in-law, she was both sorry and notsorry. Her mind was undoubtedly relieved, but at the price of showing toanother her naked soul, and that other a woman--true, an unusual woman, by profession a confessor, but still a woman. Thenceforth some one otherthan herself would know her as she really was--not at all the nice, delicate lady with instincts as fine as those of the heroines of novels, who, even at their most realistic, are pictured as fully and grandlydressed of soul in the solitude of bedroom as in crowded drawing-room. "Idon't care!" concluded Adelaide. "If she, or anyone, thinks the worse ofme for being a human being, it will show either hypocrisy or ignorance ofhuman nature. "

CHAPTER XXV

MAN AND GENTLEMAN

A few evenings later, Del, in a less strained, less despondent frame ofmind, coming home from supper at her mother's, found Estelle Wilmot onthe front veranda talking with Lorry Tague. She had seen this same sightperhaps half-a-dozen times since Estelle and Arden had come to stop withher at the Villa d'Orsay. On this particular evening his manner towardEstelle was no different from what it had been the other times; yet, asDel approached them, she felt the electric atmosphere which so oftenenvelops two who love each other, and betrays their secret carefullyguarded behind formal manner and indifferent look and tone. She wonderedthat she had been blind to what was now obvious. 

"Well, Arthur has at last compelled you to go to work, " said shesmilingly to the big cooper with the waving tawny hair and the keen, kindgray eyes. Then, to show her respect for the secret, she said to Estelle, "Perhaps he hasn't told you that he was made superintendent of thecooperage to-day?"

Estelle blushed a little, her eyes dancing. "He was just telling me, "replied she. 

"I understand why you yielded, " continued Adelaide to Lorry. "Arthur hasbeen showing me the plans for the new factories. Gardens all round, bigwindows, high ceilings, everything done by electricity, no smoke or soot, a big swimming pool for winter or summer, a big restaurant, dressingrooms--everything! Who'd have believed that work could be carried on insuch surroundings?"

"It's about time, isn't it, " said Lorry, in his slow, musical voice, "that idleness was deprived of its monopoly of comforts and luxuries?"

"How sensible that is!" said Del admiringly. "Yet nobody thinks of it. "

"Why, " Lorry went on, "the day'll come when they'll look back on the waywe work nowadays, as we do on the time when a lot of men never went outto work except in chains and with keepers armed with lashes. The fellowsthat call Dory and Arthur crazy dreamers don't realize what ignorantsavages they themselves are. "

"They have no imagination, " said Estelle. 

"No imagination, " echoed Lorry. "That's the secret of the stupidity andthe horror of change, and of the notion that the way a thing's doneto-day is the way it'll always be done. "

"I'm afraid Arthur is going to get himself into even deeper trouble whenthese new plans are announced, " said Del. 

Arthur's revolution had already inflamed the other manufacturers at SaintX against him. Huge incomes were necessary to the support of theirextravagant families and to the increase of the fortunes they were pilingup "to save their children from fear of want"--as if that same "fear ofwant" were not the only known spur to the natural lethargy of the humananimal! They explained to their workmen that the university industrieswere not business enterprises at all, and therefore must not be confusedand compared with enterprises that were "practical"; but the workmenfixed tenaciously upon the central fact that the university's men workedat mechanical labor fewer hours each day by four to seven, and eveneight, got higher wages, got more out of life in every way. Nor was thereany of the restraint and degradation of the "model town. " The workerscould live and act as they pleased; it was by the power of an intelligentpublic opinion that Arthur was inducing his fellows and their families tobuild for themselves attractive homes, to live in tasteful comfort, toacquire sane habits of eating, drinking, and personal appearance. And noone was more amazed than himself at the swiftness with which theoverwhelming majority responded to the opportunity. Small wonder thatthe other manufacturers, who at best never went beyond the crafty, inexpensive schemes of benevolent charity, were roaring against theuniversity as a "hotbed of anarchy. "

At Adelaide's suggestion of the outburst that would follow the new andstill more "inflammatory" revolution, Lorry shrugged his shoulders andlaughed easily. "Nobody need worry for that brother of yours, Mrs. Hargrave, " said he. "There may be some factories for sale cheap beforemany years. If so, the university can buy them in and increase itsusefulness. Dory and Arthur are going to have a university that will beup to the name before they get through--one for all ages and kinds, andboth sexes, and for everybody all his life long and in all hisrelations. "

"It's a beautiful dream, " said Del. She was remembering how Dory used toenlarge upon it in Paris until his eloquence made her feel that she lovedhim at the same time that it also gave her a chilling sense of his beingfar from her, too big and impersonal for so intimate and personal a thingas the love she craved. "A beautiful dream, " she repeated with a sigh. 

"That's the joy of life, " said Estelle, "isn't it? To have beautifuldreams, and to help make them come true. "

"And this one is actually coming true, " said Lorry. "Wait a few years, only a few, and you'll see the discoveries of science make everything socheap that vulgar, vain people will give up vulgarity and vanity indespair. A good many of the once aristocratic vulgarities have beencheapened into absurdity already. The rest will follow. "

"Only a few years?" said Del, laughing, yet more than half-convinced. 

"Use your imagination, Mrs. Hargrave, " replied Lorry, in his large, good-humored way. "Don't be afraid to be sensible just because mostpeople look on common sense as insanity. A hundred things that used to beluxuries for the king alone are now so cheap that the day-laborer hasthem--all in less than two lifetimes of real science! To-morrow or nextday some one will discover, say, the secret of easily and cheaplyinterchanging the so-called elements. Bang! the whole structure ofswagger and envy will collapse!"

They all laughed, and Del went into the house. "Estelle--no woman, nomatter who--could hope to get a better husband than Lorry, " she wasthinking. "And, now that he's superintendent, there's no reason why theyshouldn't marry. What a fine thing, what an American thing, that a manwith no chance at all in the start should be able to develop himself sothat a girl like Estelle could--yes, and should--be proud of his love andproud to love him. " She recalled how Lorry at the high school was aboutthe most amusing of the boys, with the best natural manner, and far andaway the best dancer; how he used to be invited everywhere, untilexcitement about fashion and "family" reached Saint X; how he was thengradually dropped until he, realizing what was the matter, haughtily"cut" all his former friends and associates. "We've certainly been racingdownhill these last few years. Where the Wilmots used to be about theonly silly people in town, there are scores of families now with noses inthe air and eyes looking eagerly about for chances to snub. But, on theother hand, there's the university, and Arthur--and Dory. " She dismissedLorry and Estelle and Saint X's fashionable strivings and, in thelibrary, sat down to compose a letter to Dory--no easy task in thosedays, when there were seething in her mind and heart so much that shelonged to tell him but ought not, so much that she ought to tell butcould not. 

Lorry had acted as if he were about to depart, while Adelaide was there;he resumed his seat on the steps at Estelle's feet as soon as shedisappeared. "I suppose I ought to go, " said he, with a humorous glanceup at her face with its regular features and steadfast eyes. 

She ran her slim fingers through his hair, let the tips of them linger aninstant on his lips before she took her hand away. 

"I couldn't let you go just yet, " said she slowly, absently. "This is theclimax of the day. In this great, silent, dim light all my dreams--allour dreams--seem to become realities and to be trooping down from the skyto make us happy. "

A pause, then he: "I can see them now. " But soon he moved to rise. "Itfrightens me to be as happy as I am this evening. I must go, dear. We'regetting bolder and bolder. First thing you know, your brother will besuspecting--and that means your mother. "

"I don't seem to care any more, " replied the girl. "Mother is really inmuch better health, and has got pretty well prepared to expect almostanything from me. She has become resigned to me as a 'working person. 'Then, too, I'm thoroughly inoculated with the habit of doing as I please. I guess that's from being independent and having my own money. What agood thing money is!"

"So long as it means independence, " suggested Lorry; "but not after itmeans dependence. "

But Estelle was thinking of their future. The delay, the seeminglyendless delay, made her even more impatient than it made him, as isalways the case where the woman is really in love. In the man love holdsthe impetuosity of passion in leash; in the woman it rouses the deeper, the more enduring force of the maternal instinct--not merely theunconscious or, at most, half-conscious longing for the children that areto be, but the desire to do for the man--to look after his health, hisphysical comfort, to watch over and protect him; for, to the woman inlove, the man seems in those humble ways less strong than she--a helplesscreature, dependent on her. "It's going to be much harder to wait, " saidshe, "now that you are superintendent and I have bought out Mrs. Hastings's share of my business. "

They both laughed, but Lorry said: "It's no joke. A little too much moneyhas made fools of as wise people as we are--many and many's the time. "

"Not as wise a person as you are, and as you'll always make me be, orseem to be, " replied Estelle. 

Lorry pressed his big hand over hers for an instant. "Now that I've leftoff real work, " said he, "I'll soon be able to take your hand withoutgiving you a rough reminder of the difference between us. "

He held out his hands, palms upward. They were certainly not soft andsmooth, but they more than made up in look of use and strength what theylacked in smoothness. She put her small hands one on either side of his, and they both thrilled with the keen pleasure the touch of edge of handagainst edge of hand gave them. In the ends of her fingers were the marksof her needlework. He bent and kissed those slightly roughened fingerends passionately. "I love those marks!" he exclaimed. "They make me feelthat we belong to each other. "

"I'd be sorry to see _your_ hands different, " said she, her eyes shiningupon his. "There are many things you don't understand about me--forinstance, that it's just those marks of work that make you so dear to me. A woman may begin by liking a man because he's her ideal in certain ways, but once she really cares, she loves whatever is part of him. "

In addition to the reasons she had given for feeling "bolder" about her"plebeian" lover, there was another that was the strongest of all. A fewmonths before, a cousin of her father's had died in Boston, where he wasthe preacher of a most exclusive and fashionable church. He had endearedhimself to his congregation by preaching one Easter Sunday a sermoncalled "The Badge of Birth. " In it he proceeded to show from theScriptures themselves how baseless was the common theory that Jesus wasof lowly origin. "The common people heard Him gladly, " cried the Rev. Eliot Wilmot, "because they instinctively felt His superiority of birth, felt the dominance of His lineage. In His veins flowed the blood of theroyal house of Israel, the blood of the first anointed kings of AlmightyGod. " And from this interesting premise the Reverend Wilmot deduced thedivine intent that the "best blood" should have superiorrights--leadership, respect, deference. So dear was he to his flock thatthey made him rich in this world's goods as well as in love and honor. The Wilmots of Saint X had had lively expectations from his estate. Theythought that one holding the views eloquently set forth in "The Badge ofBirth" must dedicate his fortune to restoring the dignity and splendor ofthe main branch of the Wilmot family. But, like all their dreams, thiscame to naught. His fortune went to a theological seminary to endowscholarships and fellowships for decayed gentlemen's sons; he rememberedonly Verbena Wilmot. On his one visit to the crumbling, weed-choked seatof the head of the house, he had seen Verbena's wonderful hands, soprecious and so useless that had she possessed rings and deigned to wearthem she would not have permitted the fingers of the one hand to put themon the fingers of the other. The legacy was five thousand dollars, atfour per cent. , an income of two hundred dollars a year. Verbena investedthe first quarterly installment in a long-dreamed-of marble reproductionof her right hand which, after years of thinking daily about the matter, she had decided was a shade more perfect than the left. 

If one dim eye makes a man king among blind men--to translate to thevernacular Verbena's elegant reasoning--an income, however trifling, ifit have no taint of toil, no stench of sweat upon it, makes its possessorentitled to royal consideration in a family of paupers and dead beats, degraded by harboring a breadwinner of an Estelle. No sudden recipient ofa dazzling, drenching shower of wealth was ever more exalted than wasVerbena, once in possession of "_my_ legacy. " Until the Rev. EliotWilmot's posthumous blessing descended upon her, the Wilmots livedtogether in comparative peace and loving kindness. They were all, exceptfor their mania of genealogy, good-humored, extremely well-manneredpeople, courteous as much by nature as by deliberate intent. But, withthe coming of the blessing, peace and friendliness in that family were atan end. Old Preston Wilmot and Arden railed unceasingly against the"traitor" Eliot; Verbena defended him. Their mother and Estelle weredrawn into the battle from time to time, Estelle always against her will. Before Verbena had been a woman of property three months, she was hatingher father and brother for their sneers and insults, Arden had gone backto drinking, and the old gentleman was in a savage and most ungentlemanlyhumor from morning until night. 

Estelle, the "black sheep" ever since she began to support them byengaging in trade, drew aloof now, was at home as little as she couldcontrive, often ate a cold supper in the back of her shop. She saidnothing to Lorry of the family shame; she simply drew nearer to him. Andout of this changed situation came, unconsciously to herself, a deepcontempt for her father and her brother, a sense that she was indeed asalien as the Wilmots so often alleged, in scorn of her and her shop;Verbena's income went to buy adornments for herself, dresses that wouldgive the hands a fitting background; Estelle's earnings went to hermother, who distributed them, the old gentleman and Arden ignoring whenceand how the money came. 

As Estelle and Lorry lingered on the porch of the Villa d'Orsay thatAugust evening, alone in the universe under that vast, faintly luminous, late-twilight sky, Arden Wilmot came up the lawn. Neither Lorry norEstelle saw or heard him until his voice, rough with drink and passion, savagely stung them with, "What the hell does _this_ mean?"

Lorry dropped Estelle's hand and stood up, Estelle behind him, arestraining hand on his shoulder. Both were white to the lips; their sky, the moment before so clear and still, was now black and thunderous with afrightful storm. Estelle saw that her brother was far from sober; and thesight of his sister caressed by Lorry Tague would have maddened him evenhad he not touched liquor. She darted between the two men. "Don't be agoose, Arden, " she panted, with a hysterical attempt to laugh. 

"That fellow was touching you!" stormed Arden. "You miserable disgrace!"And he lifted his hand threateningly to her. 

Lorry put his arm round her and drew her back, himself advancing. "Youmust be careful how you act toward the woman who is to be my wife, Mr. Wilmot, " he said, afire in all his blood of the man who has the right todemand of the whole world the justice he gives it. 

Arden Wilmot stared dumfounded, first at Lorry, then at Estelle. In thepause, Adelaide, drawn from the library by the sound of Arden's fury, reached the front doorway, saw the three, instantly knew the whole causeof this sudden, harsh commotion. With a twitch that was like the shakingoff of a detaining grasp, with a roar like a mortally wounded beast's, Arden recovered the use of limbs and voice. "You infernal lump of dirt!"he yelled. Adelaide saw his arm swing backward, then forward, and up--sawsomething bright in his hand. A flash--"O God, God!" she moaned. But shecould not turn her eyes away or close them. 

Lorry stood straight as a young sycamore for an instant, turned towardEstelle. "Good-by--my love!" he said softly, and fell, face downward, with his hands clasping the edge of her dress. 

And Estelle--

She made no sound. Like a ghost, she knelt and took Lorry's head in herlap; with one hand against each of his cheeks she turned his head. "Lorry! Lorry!" she murmured in a heartbreaking voice that carried farthrough the stillness. 

Arden put the revolver back in his pocket, seized her by theshoulder. "Come away from that!" he ordered roughly, and half-liftedher to her feet. 

With a cry so awful that Adelaide swayed and almost swooned at hearingit, Estelle wrenched herself free, flung herself on her lover's body, buried her fingers in his hair, covered his dead face with kisses, bathedher lips in the blood that welled from his heart. Shouts and heavy, quicktramping from many directions--the tempest of murder was drawing peopleto its center as a cyclone sucks in leaves. Fright in Arden Wilmot'sface, revealed to Adelaide in the light streaming from the bigdrawing-room windows. A group--a crowd--a multitude--pouring upon thelawns from every direction--swirling round Arden as he stood over theprostrate intermingled forms of his sister and her dead lover. 

Then Adelaide, clinging to the door frame to steady herself, heard Ardensay in a loud blustering voice: "I found this fellow insulting my sister, and I treated him as a Wilmot always treats an insult. " And as the wordsreached her, they fired her. All her weakness, all her sense ofhelplessness fled. 

Out of the circle came a man bearing unconscious Estelle, blood upon herface, upon her bosom, blood dripping from her hands. "Where shall I takeher?" asked the man of Adelaide. "A doctor's been sent for. "

"Into the hall--on the sofa--at the end--and watch by her, " said Del, inquick, jerking tones. Her eyes were ablaze, her breath came in gusts. Without waiting to see where he went with his burden, she rushed down thebroad steps and through the crowd, pushing them this way and that. Shefaced Arden Wilmot--not a lady, but a woman, a flaming torch of outragedhuman feeling. 

"You lie!" she cried, and he seemed to wither before her. "You lie abouthim and about her! You, with the very clothes you're dressed in, the veryliquor you're drunk with, the very pistol that shot him down, paid for by_her_ earnings! He never offended you--not by look or word. You murderedhim--I saw--heard. You murdered the man she was to marry, the man sheloved--murdered him because she loved him. Look at him!"

The crowd widened its circle before the sweep of her arm. Lorry'sblood-stained body came into view. His face, beautiful and, in its palecalm, stronger than life, was open to the paling sky. "There lies a man, "she sobbed, and her tears were of the kind that make the fires of passionburn the fiercer. "A man any woman with a woman's heart would have beenproud to be loved by. And you--you've murdered him!"

"Take care, Mrs. Hargrave, " a voice whispered in her ear. "They'lllynch him. "

"And why not?" she cried out. "Why should such a creature live?"

A hundred men were reaching for Arden, and from the crowd rose thathoarse, low, hideous sound which is the first deep bay of the unleashedblood-madness. "No, no!" she begged in horror, and waved them back. 

"Adelaide!" gasped Arden, wrenching himself free and crouching at herfeet and clinging to her skirts. "Save me! I only did my duty as agentleman. "

She looked down at him in unpitying scorn, then out at the crowd. "Hearthat!" she cried, with a wild, terrible laugh. "A gentleman! Yes, that'strue--a gentleman. Saving your sister from the coarse contamination of anhonest man!" Then to the men who were dragging at him: "No, I say--_no_!Let him alone! Don't touch the creature! He'll only foul your hands. " Andshe pushed them back. "Let him live. What worse fate could he have thanto be pointed at every day of a long life as the worthless drunken thingwho murdered a man, and then tried to save himself by defaming his victimand his own sister?"

Under cover of her barrier of command, the constable led Arden into thehouse, past where his sister lay in a swoon, and by the back way got himto jail. The crowd, fascinated by her beauty, which the tempest ofpassion had transfigured into terrible and compelling majesty, wascompletely under her control. She stayed on, facing that throng of men, many of whom she knew by name, until Lorry's body was taken away. She wasabout to go into the house, as the crowd began quietly to disperse, whenthere arose a murmur that made her turn quickly toward the doors. Therewas Estelle, all disheveled and bloodstained. Her face was like death;her movements were like one walking in a deep sleep as she descended tothe lawn and came toward them. 

"Where is he? Where is he?" she wailed, pushing this way and that throughthe crowd, her hands outstretched, her long fair hair streaming like abridal veil. Her feet slipped on the wet grass--where it was wet with hisblood. She staggered, swayed uncertainly, fell with her arms outstretchedas if the earth were he she sought. She lay there moaning--the cry of hertortured nerves alone, for her mind was unconscious. 

Adelaide and Madelene, who had just come, bent to lift her. But theirstrength failed them and they sank to their knees in terror; for, fromthe silent crowd there burst a shriek: "Kill him, kill him!" And all inan instant the grounds were emptied of those thousands; and to the twowomen came an ever fainter but not less awful roar as the mob swept onuptown toward the jail. 

Madelene was first to recover. "Let us carry her in, " she said. And whenthe limp form was once more on the big sofa and the eyelids weretrembling to unclose, she ripped open the right sleeve and thrust in theneedle that gives oblivion. 

Adelaide went to the window and listened. Before her in the moonlight wasthe place where that tempest of hate and murder had burst and raged. Oncemore her heart hardened in the pitiless fury of outraged mercy. A moanfrom Estelle stung her, and she leaned forward the better to catch themusic of the mob's distant shriek. Silence for full five minutes; then asound like that which bursts from the throats of the bloodhounds as theybury their fangs in their quarry. She gave a faint scream, covered herface. "Oh, spare him! Spare him!" she cried. And she sank to the floor ina faint, for she knew that Arden Wilmot was dead. 

 * * * * *

Adelaide took Estelle's store until Estelle came back to it, her surfacecalm like the smooth river that hides in its tortured bosom thedeep-plunged rapids below the falls. The day after Estelle's returnAdelaide began to study architecture at the university; soon she was madean instructor, with the dean delighted and not a little mystified by herenergy and enthusiasm. Yet the matter was simple and natural: she hademerged from her baptism of blood and fire--a woman; at last she hadlearned what in life is not worth while; she was ready to learn what ithas to offer that is worth while--the sole source of the joys that haveno reaction, of the content that is founded upon the rock. 

CHAPTER XXVI

CHARLES WHITNEY'S HEIRS

Eight specialists, including Romney, of New York and Saltonstal, ofChicago, had given Charles Whitney their verdicts on why he was weak andlethargic. In essential details these diagnoses differed as widely asopinions always differ where no one knows, or can know, and so everyoneis free to please his own fancy in choosing a cloak for his ignorance. Some of the doctors declared kidneys sound but liver suspicious; othersexonerated liver but condemned one or both kidneys; others viewed kidneysand liver with equal pessimism; still others put those organs aside andshook their heads and unlimbered their Latin at spleen and pancreas. Inone respect, however, the eight narrowed to two groups. "Let's figure itout trial-balance fashion, " said Whitney to his private secretary, Vagen. "Five, including two-thousand-dollar Romney, say I 'may go soon. ' Three, including our one-thousand-dollar neighbor, Saltonstal, say I am 'in noimmediate danger. ' But what the Romneys mean by 'soon, ' and what theSaltonstals mean by 'immediate, ' none of the eight says. "

"But they all say that 'with proper care'--" began Vagen, with the faithof the little in the pretentious. 

"So they do! So they do!" interrupted Whitney, whom life had taught notto measure wisdom by profession of it, nor yet by repute for it. And hewent on in a drowsy drawl, significantly different from his wonted ratherexplosive method of speech: "But does any of 'em say what 'proper care'is? Each gives his opinion. Eight opinions, each different and eachcautioning me against the kind of 'care' prescribed by the other seven. And I paid six thousand dollars!" A cynical smile played round histhin-lipped, sensual, selfish mouth. 

"Sixty-three hundred, " corrected Vagen. He never missed this sort ofchance to impress his master with his passion for accuracy. 

"Sixty-three, then. I'd better have given you the money to blow in onyour fliers on wheat and pork. "

At this Vagen looked much depressed. It was his first intimation that hischief knew about his private life. "I hope, sir, nobody has beenpoisoning your mind against me, " said he. "I court the fullestinvestigation. I have been honest--"

"Of course, of course, " replied Whitney. "There never was a man as timidas you are that wasn't honest. What a shallow world it is! How often envyand cowardice pass for virtue!"

"I often say, sir, " replied Vagen, with intent to soothe and flatter, "there ain't one man in ten million that wouldn't have done the thingsyou've done if they'd had the brains and the nerve. "

"And pray what are the 'things I've done'?" inquired Whitney. But theflame of irritation was so feeble that it died down before his words wereout. "I'm going down to Saint X to see old Schulze, " he drawled on. "Schulze knows more than any of 'em--and ain't afraid to say when hedon't know. " A slow, somewhat sardonic smile. "That's why he's unknown. What can a wise man, who insists on showing that he's wise, expect in aworld of damn fools?" A long silence during which the uncomfortable Vagenhad the consolation of seeing in that haggard, baggy, pasty-white facethat his master's thoughts were serving him much worse than merediscomfort. Then Whitney spoke again: "Yes, I'm going to Saint X. I'mgoing home to--"

He did not finish; he could not speak the word of finality. Vagen saw thelook in his pale, blue-green eyes, saw that the great financier knew hewould never again fling his terrible nets broadcast for vast hauls ofgolden fish, knew his days were numbered and that the number was small. But, instead of this making him feel sympathetic and equal toward hismaster, thus unmasked as mere galvanized clay, it filled him with greaterawe; for, to the Vagens, Death seems to wear a special costume and walkwith grander step to summon the rich and the high. 

"Yes, I'll go--this very afternoon, " said Whitney more loudly, turninghis face toward the door through which came a faint femininerustling--the _froufrou_ of the finest, softest silk and finest, softest linen. 

He looked attentively at his wife as she crossed the threshold--lookedwith eyes that saw mercilessly but indifferently, the eyes of those whoare out of the game of life, out for good and all, and so care nothingabout it. He noted in her figure--in its solidity, its settledness--thesigns of age the beauty doctors were still almost successful in keepingout of that masklike face which was their creation rather than nature's;he noted the rough-looking red of that hair whose thinness was notaltogether concealed despite the elaborate care with which it wasarranged to give the impression of careless abundance. He noted herhands; his eyes did not linger there, for the hands had the wrinkles andhollows and age marks which but for art would have been in the face, andthey gave him a feeling--he could not have defined it, but it made himshudder. His eyes rested again upon her face, with an expression of pitythat was slightly satirical. This struggle of hers seemed so petty andsilly to him now; how could any human being think any other factimportant when the Great Fact hung from birth threateningly over all?

"You feel worse to-day, dear?" said she, in the tones that soundcarefully attuned to create an impression of sympathy. Hers had nowbecome the mechanically saccharine voice which sardonic time ultimatelyfastens upon the professionally sympathetic to make them known and mockedof all, even of the vainest seekers after sympathy. 

"On the contrary, I feel better, " he drawled, eyes half-shut. "No pain atall. But--horribly weak, as if I were going to faint in a minute ortwo--and I don't give a damn for anything. " There was a personal flingin that last word, an insinuation that he knew her state of mind towardhim, and reciprocated. 

"Well, to-morrow Janet and her baby will be here, " said Mrs. Whitney, andher soothing tones seemed to stimulate him by irritation. "Then we'll allgo down to Saint X together, if you still wish it. "

"Don't take that tone with me, I tell you!" he said with some energy inhis drawl. "_Don't_ talk to me as if you were hanging over my deathbedlying to me about my going to live!" And he closed his eyes, and hisbreath made his parted, languid lips flutter. 

"Mr. Vagen, " said Matilda, in her tone of sweet graciousness, "may Itrouble you to go and--"

"Go to the devil, Vagen, " said Charles, starting up again that slowstream of fainting words and sentences. "Anywhere to get you out of theroom so you won't fill the flapping ears of your friends with gossipabout Whitney and his wife. Though why she should send you out I can'tunderstand. If you and the servants don't hear what's going on, you makeup and tattle worse than what really happens. "

Mrs. Whitney gave Vagen a look of sweet resignation and Vagen respondedwith an expression which said: "I understand. He is very ill. He is notresponsible. I admire your ladylike patience. " As Whitney's eyes wereclosed he missed this byplay. 

"Here, Vagen--before you go, " he drawled, waving a weary hand toward thetable at his elbow. "Here's a check for ten thousand. You don't deserveit, for you've used your position to try to get rich on the sly. Butinasmuch as I was 'on to' you, and dropped hints that made you lose, I'veno hard feelings. Then, too, you did no worse than any other would havedone in your place. A man's as good, and as bad, as he has the chance tobe. So take it. I've not made my will yet, and as I may not be able to, Igive you the money now. You'll find the check in this top drawer, andsome other checks for the people near me. I suppose they'll expectsomething--I've got 'em into the habit of it. Take 'em and run along andsend 'em off right away. "

Vagen muttered inarticulate thanks. In fact, the check was making smallimpression on him, or the revelation that his chief had eyes as keen forwhat was going on under his nose as for the great movements in the bigfield. He could think only of that terrifying weakness, that significantgarrulousness. 

When Vagen was out of the way, Charles repeated: "I'm going thisafternoon. " His listless eyes were gazing vacantly at the carved rosewoodceiling. His hands--the hands of a corpse--looked horribly like sheathed, crumpled claws in the gold silk cuffs of his dark-blue dressing gown. Hisnose, protruding from his sunken cheeks, seemed not like a huge beak, butindeed a beak. 

"But Janet--" began Mrs. Whitney, thinking as she spoke that he surelywould "not be spared to us much longer. "

"Janet can follow--or stay here--or--I don't care what she does, " dronedWhitney. "Do you suppose I'm thinking about anybody but myself now? Wouldyou, if you were in my fix. I should say, " he amended cynically, "_will_you, when you're in my fix?"

"Charles!" exclaimed Matilda. 

Whitney's smile checked her. "I'm not a fool, " he rambled on. "Do yousuppose I haven't seen what was going on? Do you suppose I don't knowall of you wish I was out of it? Yes, out of it. And you needn't botherto put on that shocked look; it doesn't fool me. I used to say: 'I'llbe generous with my family and give 'em more than they'd have if I wasgone. ' 'No children waiting round eager for me to pass off, ' said I, 'so that they can divide up my fortune. ' I've said that often andoften. And I've acted on it. And I've raised up two as pampered, selfish children as ever lived. And now--The last seven months I'vebeen losing money hand over fist. Everything I've gone into has turnedout bad. I'm down to about half what I had a year ago--maybe less thanhalf. And you and Ross--and no doubt that marchioness ex-daughter ofmine--all know it. And you're afraid if I live on, I'll lose more, maybe everything. Do you deny it?"

Matilda was unable to speak. She had known he was less rich; buthalf!--"maybe less!" The cuirass of steel, whalebone, kid, and linenwhich molded her body to a fashionable figure seemed to be closing in onher heart and lungs with a stifling clutch. 

"No, you don't deny it. You couldn't, " Whitney drawled on. "And so my'indulgent father' damned foolishness ends just where I might have knownit'd end. We've brought up the children to love money and show off, instead of to love us and character and self-respect--God forgive me!"

The room was profoundly silent: Charles thinking drowsily, yet vividly, too, of his life; Matilda burning in anguish over the lost half, or more, of the fortune--and Charles had always been secretive about his wealth, so she didn't know how much the fortune was a year ago and couldn't judgewhether much or little was left! Enough to uphold her social position? Oronly enough to keep her barely clear of the "middle class"?

Soon Whitney's voice broke in upon her torments. "I've been thinking agreat deal, this last week, about Hiram Ranger. "

Matilda, startled, gave him a wild look. "Charles!" she exclaimed. 

"Exactly, " said Whitney, a gleam of enjoyment in his dull eyes. 

In fact, ever since Hiram's death his colossal figure had often dominatedthe thoughts of Charles and Matilda Whitney. The will had set Charles toobserving, to _seeing_; it had set Matilda to speculating on thepossibilities of her own husband's stealthy relentlessness. At thesedefinite, dreadful words of his, her vague alarms burst into a deafeningchorus, jangling and clanging in her very ears. 

"Arthur Ranger, " continued Whitney, languid and absent, "has got out ofthe beaten track of business--"

"Yes; look at Hiram's children!" urged Matilda. "Everybody that isanybody is down on Arthur. See what his wife has brought him to, with hercrazy, upsetting ideas! They tell me a good many of the best people inSaint X hardly speak to him. Yes, Charles, _look_ at Hiram's doings. "

"Thanks to Hiram--what he inherited from Hiram and what Hiram had thegood sense not to let him inherit--he has become a somebody. He's doingthings, and the fact that they aren't just the kind of things I likedoesn't make me fool enough to underestimate them or him. Success is thetest, and in his line he's a success. "

"If it hadn't been for his wife he'd not have done much, " saidMatilda sourly. 

"You've lived long enough, I'd think, to have learned not to say suchshallow things, " drawled he. "Of course, he has learned from her--don'teverybody have to learn somewhere? Where a man learns is nothing; theimportant thing is his capacity to learn. If a man's got the capacity tolearn, he'll learn, he'll become somebody. If he hasn't, then no man norno woman can teach him. No, my dear, you may be sure that anybody whoamounts to anything has got it in himself. And Arthur Ranger is a creditto any father. He's becoming famous--the papers are full of what he'saccomplishing. And he's respected, honest, able, with a wife that loveshim. Would he have been anybody if his father had left him the money thatwould have compelled him to be a fool? As for the girl, she's got a showystreak in her--she's your regular American woman of nowadays--the kind ofdaughter your sort of mother and my sort of damn-fool father breed up. But Del's mother wasn't like you, Mattie, and she hadn't a fool fatherlike me, so she's married to a young fellow that's already doing bigthings, in his line--and a good line his is, a better line than trimmingdollars and donkeys. Our Jenny--Jane that used to be--We've sold her to aFrenchman, and she's sold herself to the devil. Hiram's daughter--Godforgive us, Matilda, for what we've done to Janet. " All this, includingthat last devout appeal, in the manner of a spectator of a scene at whichhe is taking a last, indifferent, backward glance as he is leaving. 

His wife's brain was too busy making plans and tearing them up to followhis monotonous garrulity except in a general way. He waited in vain forher to defend her daughter and herself. 

"As for Ross, " he went on, "he's keen and quick enough. He's gottogether quite a fortune of his own--and he'll hold on to it and getmore. It's easy enough to make money if you've got money--and ain'ttoo finicky about the look and the smell of the dollars before yougulp 'em down. Your Ross has a good strong stomach that way--as goodas his father's--and mother's. But--He ain't exactly the man I used topicture as I was wheeling him up and down the street in his babycarriage in Saint X. "

That vulgar reminiscence seemed to be the signal for which Matilda waswaiting. "Charles Whitney, " she said, "you and I have brought up ourchildren to take their proper place in our aristocracy of wealth andbirth and breeding. And I know you're not going to undo what we've done, and done well. "

"That's your 'bossy' tone, Mattie, " he drawled, his desire to talkgetting a fresh excuse for indulging itself. "I guess this is a goodtime to let you into a secret. You've thought you ran me ever since wewere engaged. That delusion of yours nearly lost you the chance to leadthese thirty years of wedded bliss with me. If you hadn't happened tomake me jealous and afraid the one man I used to envy in those dayswould get you--I laughed the other day when he was appointed postmasterat Indianapolis--However, I did marry you, and did let you imagine youwore the pants. It seemed to amuse you, and it certainly amusedme--though not in the same way. Now I want you to look back and thinkhard. You can't remember a single time that what you bossed me to do wasever done. I was always fond of playing tricks and pulling secret wires, and I did a lot of it in making you think you were bossing me when youwere really being bossed. "

It was all Mrs. Whitney could do to keep her mind on how sick he was, andhow imperative it was not to get him out of humor. "I never meant to tryto influence you, Charles, " she said, "except as anyone tries to helpthose about one. And certainly you've been the one that has put us all inour present position. That's why it distressed me for you even to talk ofundoing your work. "

Whitney smiled satirically, mysteriously. "I'll do what I think best, "was all he replied. And presently he added, "though I don't feel likedoing anything. It seems to me I don't care what happens, or whether Ilive--or--don't. I'll go to Saint X. I'm just about strong enough tostand the trip--and have Schulze come out to Point Helen this evening. "

"Why not save your strength and have him come here?" urged Matilda. 

"He wouldn't, " replied her husband. "Last time I saw him he looked meover and said: 'Champagne. If you don't stop it you won't live. Don'tcome here again unless you cut out that poison. ' But I never could resistchampagne. So I told myself he was an old crank, and found a great doctorI could hire to agree with me. No use to send for Schulze to come allthis distance. I might even have to go to his office if I was at Saint X. He won't go to see anybody who's able to move about. 'As they want _me_, let 'em come _to_ me, just as I'd go to them if I wanted them, ' he says. 'The air they get on the way is part of the cure. ' Besides, he and I hada quarrel. He was talking his nonsense against religion, and I saidsomething, and he implied I wasn't as straight in business as I shouldbe--quoted something about 'He that hasteth to be rich shall not beinnocent, ' and one thing led to another, and finally he said, with thatugly jeer of his: 'You pious bandits are lucky to have a forgiving God togo to. Now we poor devils have only our self-respect, and _it_ neverforgives anything. '" Whitney laughed, reflected, laughed again. "Yes, Imust see Schulze. Maybe--Anyhow, I'm going to Saint X--going home, or asnear home as anything my money has left me. "

He drowsed off. She sat watching him--the great beak, the bulgingforehead, the thin, cruel lips; and everywhere in the garden ofartificial flowers which formed the surface of her nature, hiding itsreality even from herself, there appeared the poisonous snakes of hatefulthoughts to shoot their fangs and hiss at him. She shrank and shuddered;yet--"It's altogether his own fault that I feel this way toward him as helies dying, " she said to herself, resorting to human nature's unfailing, universally sought comforter in all trying circumstances--self-excuse. "He always was cold and hard. He has become a monster. And even in hisbest days he wasn't worthy to have such a woman as I am. And now he isthinking of cheating me--and will do it--unless God prevents him. "

He drowsed on, more asleep than awake, not even rousing when they put himto bed. He did not go to Saint X that day. But he did go later--went tolie in state in the corridor of the splendid hall he had given Tecumseh;to be gaped at by thousands who could not see that they were viewing afew pounds of molded clay, so busy were their imaginations with the vastfortune it was supposed he left; to be preached over, the sermon by Dr. Hargrave, who believed in him--and so, in estimating the man asdistinguished from what the system he lived under had made of him, perhaps came nearer the truth than those who talked only of the facts ofhis public career--his piracy, his bushwhacking, his gambling with themarked cards and loaded dice of "high finance"; to be buried in the oldCedar Grove Cemetery, with an imposing monument presently over him, before it fresh flowers every day for a year--the Marchioness of St. Berthè contracted with a florist to attend to that. 

 * * * * *

Four days after the funeral Janet sent a servant down to Adelaide and toMrs. Ranger with notes begging them to come to Point Helen for lunch. "We are lonely and _so_ dreary, " she wrote Adelaide. "We want you--needyou. " Only one answer was possible, and at half-past twelve they set outin Mrs. Ranger's carriage. As they drove away from the Villa d'Orsay Mrs. Ranger said: "When does Mrs. Dorsey allow to come home?"

"Not for two years more, " replied Del. 

Ellen's expression suggested that she was debating whether or not tospeak some thought which she feared Del might regard as meddlesome. "Whenyou finally do have to get out, " she said presently, "it'll be likegiving up your own home, won't it?"

"No, " said Del. "I hate the place!" A pause, then: "I wrote Mrs. Dorseyyesterday that we wouldn't stay but three months longer--not in anycircumstances. "

The old woman's face brightened. "I'm mighty glad of that, " she saidheartily. "Then, you'll have a home of your own at last. "

"Not exactly, " was Del's reply, in a curious tone. "The fact is, I'mgoing to live with Dr. Hargrave. "

Ellen showed her astonishment. "And old Martha Skeffington!"

"She's not so difficult, once you get to know her, " replied Del. "I findthat everything depends on the point of view you take in looking atpeople. I've been getting better acquainted with Dory's aunt the last fewweeks. I think she has begun to like me. We'll get along. "

"Don't you think you'd better wait till Dory gets back?"

"No, " said Adelaide firmly, a look in her eyes which made her mother sayto herself: "There's the Ranger in her. "

They drove in silence awhile; then Del, with an effort which brought abright color to her cheeks, began: "I want to tell you, mother, that Iwent to Judge Torrey this morning, and made over to you the incomefather left me. "

"Whatever did you do _that_ for?" cried Ellen, turning in the seat tostare at her daughter through her glasses. 

"I promised Dory I would. I've spent some of the money--about fifteenhundred dollars--You see, the house was more expensive than I thought. But everything's paid up now. "

"I don't need it, and don't want it, " said Ellen. "And I won't take it!"

"I promised Dory I would--before we were married. He thinks I've done it. I've let him think so. And--lately--I've been having a sort of housecleaning--straightening things up--and I straightened that up, too. "

Ellen Ranger understood. A long pause, during which she looked lovinglyat her daughter's beautiful face. At last she said: "No, there don't seemto be no other way out of it. " Then, anxiously, "You ain't written Dorywhat you've done?"

"No, " replied Del. "Not yet. "

"Not never!" exclaimed her mother. "That's one of the things a bodymustn't ever tell anyone. You did wrong; you've done right--and it's allsettled and over. He'd probably understand if you told him. But he'dnever quite trust you the same again--that's human nature. "

"But _you'd_ trust me, " objected Del. 

"I'm older'n Dory, " replied her mother; "and, besides, I ain't yourhusband. There's no end of husbands and wives that get into hot waterthrough telling, where it don't do any earthly good and makes the otherone uneasy and unhappy. "

Adelaide reflected. "It _is_ better not to tell him, " she concluded. 

Ellen was relieved. "That's common sense, " said she. "And you can't usetoo much common sense in marriage. The woman's got to have it, for themen never do where women are concerned. " She reflected a few minutes, then, after a keen glance at her daughter and away, she said with anappearance of impersonality that evidenced diplomatic skill of no meanorder: "And there's this habit the women are getting nowadays of alwayspeeping into their heads and hearts to see what's going on. How can theyexpect the cake to bake right if they're first at the fire door, then atthe oven door, openin' and shuttin' 'em, peepin' and pokin' andtastin'--that's what _I'd_ like to know. "

Adelaide looked at her mother's apparently unconscious face in surpriseand admiration. "What a sensible, wonderful woman you are, Ellen Ranger!"she exclaimed, giving her mother the sisterly name she always gave herwhen she felt a particular delight in the bond between them. And half toherself, yet so that her mother heard, she added: "And what a fool yourdaughter has been!"

"Nobody's born wise, " said Ellen, "and mighty few takes the troubleto learn. "

At Point Helen the mourning livery of the lodge keeper and of the hallservants prepared Ellen and her daughter for the correct and eleganthabiliments of woe in which Matilda and her son and daughter were garbed. If Whitney had died before he began to lose his fortune, and while hisfamily were in a good humor with him because of his careless generosity, or, rather, indifference to extravagance, he would have been mourned assincerely as it is possible for human beings to mourn one by whose deaththey are to profit enormously in title to the material possessions theyhave been trained to esteem above all else in the world. As it was, thoselast few months of anxiety--Mrs. Whitney worrying lest her luxury andsocial leadership should be passing, Ross exasperated by the dailystruggle to dissuade his father from fatuous enterprises--had changedWhitney's death from a grief to a relief. However, "appearances"constrained Ross to a decent show of sorrow, compelled Mrs. Whitney to astill stronger exhibit. Janet, who in far-away France had not beentouched by the financial anxieties, felt a genuine grief that gave her anadmirable stimulus to her efflorescent oversoul. She had "prepared forthe worst, " had brought from Paris a marvelous mourning wardrobe--dressesand hats and jewelry that set off her delicate loveliness as it had neverbeen set off before. She made of herself an embodiment, an apotheosis, rather, of poetic woe--and so, roused to emulation her mother's passionfor pose. Ross had refused to gratify them even to the extent of taking aspectator's part in their refined theatricals. The coming of Mrs. Rangerand Adelaide gave them an audience other than servile; they proceeded tostrive to rise to the opportunity. The result of this struggle betweenmother and daughter was a spectacle so painful that even Ellen, determined to see only sincerity, found it impossible not to suspect agrief that could find so much and such language in which to vent itself. She fancied she appreciated why Ross eyed his mother and sister withunconcealed hostility and spoke almost harshly when they compelled him tobreak his silence. 

Adelaide hardly gave the two women a thought. She was surprised to findthat she was looking at Ross and thinking of him quite calmly and mostcritically. His face seemed to her trivial, with a selfishness that morethan suggested meanness, the eyes looking out from a mind whichhabitually entertained ideas not worth a real man's while. What was thematter with him--"or with me?" What is he thinking about? Why is helooking so mean and petty? Why had he no longer the least physicalattraction for her? Why did her intense emotions of a few brief weeksago seem as vague as an unimportant occurrence of many years ago? Whathad broken the spell? She could not answer her own puzzled questions;she simply knew that it was so, that any idea that she did, or evercould, love Ross Whitney was gone, and gone forever. "It's so, " shethought. "What's the difference why? Shall I never learn to let thestove doors alone?"

As soon as lunch was over Matilda took Ellen to her boudoir and Ross wentaway, leaving Janet and Adelaide to walk up and down the shaded westterrace with its vast outlook upon the sinuous river and the hills. Todraw Janet from the painful theatricals, she took advantage of a casualquestion about the lynching, and went into the details of that redevening as she had not with anyone. It was now almost two months into thepast; but all Saint X was still feverish from it, and she herself hadonly begun again to have unhaunted and unbroken sleep. While she wasrelating Janet forgot herself; but when the story was told--all of itexcept Adelaide's own part; that she entirely omitted--Janet went back toher personal point of view. "A beautiful love story!" she exclaimed. "Andright here in prosaic Saint X!"

"Is it Saint X that is prosaic, " said Adelaide, "or is it we, in failingto see the truth about familiar things?"

"Perhaps, " replied Janet, in the tone that means "not at all. " To her athrill of emotion or a throb of pain felt by a titled person differedfrom the same sensation in an untitled person as a bar of supernal orinfernal music differs from the whistling of a farm boy on his way togather the eggs; if the title was royal--Janet wept when an empress diedof a cancer and talked of her "heroism" for weeks. 

"Of course, " she went on musingly, to Adelaide, "it was very beautifulfor Lorry and Estelle to love each other. Still, I can't help feelingthat--At least, I can understand Arden Wilmot's rage. After all, Estellestepped out of her class; didn't she, Del?"

"Yes, " said Del, not recognizing the remark as one she herself might havemade not many months before. "Both she and Lorry stepped out of theirclasses, and into the class where there is no class, but only just menand women, hearts and hands and brains. " She checked herself just in timeto refrain from adding, "the class our fathers and mothers belonged in. "

Janet did not inquire into the mystery of this. "And Estelle has gone tolive with poor Lorry's mother!" said she. "How noble and touching! Suchbeautiful self-sacrifice!"

"Why self-sacrifice?" asked Del, irritated. "She couldn't possibly gohome, could she? And she is fond of Lorry's mother. "

"Yes, of course. No doubt she's a dear, lovely old woman. But--awasherwoman, and constant, daily contact--and not as lady and servant, but on what must be, after all, a sort of equality--" Janet finished hersentence with a ladylike look. 

Adelaide burned with the resentment of the new convert. "A woman whobrought into the world and brought up such a son as Lorry was, " said she, "needn't yield to anybody. " Then the silliness of arguing such a matterwith Madame la Marquise de Saint Berthè came over her. "You and I don'tlook at life from the same standpoint, Janet, " she added, smiling. "Yousee, you're a lady, and I'm not--any more. "

"Oh, yes, you are, " Janet, the devoid of the sense of humor, hastened toassure her earnestly. "You know we in France don't feel as they do inAmerica, that one gets or loses caste when one gets or loses money. Besides, Dory is in a profession that is quite aristocratic, and thoselectures he delivered at Göttingen are really talked about everywhere onthe other side. "

But Adelaide refused to be consoled. "No, I'm not a lady--not what you'dcall a lady, even as a Frenchwoman. "

"Oh, but _I_'m a good American!" Janet protested, suddenly prudent andrushing into the pretenses our transplanted and acclimatized sisters arecareful to make when talking with us of the land whence comes their soleclaim to foreign aristocratic consideration--their income. "I'm reallyquite famous for my Americanism. I've done a great deal towardestablishing our ambassador at Paris in the best society. Coming from arepublic and to a republic that isn't recognized by our set in France, hewas having a hard time, though he and his wife are all right at home. Nowthat there are more gentlemen in authority at Washington, our diplomatsare of a much better class than they used to be. Everyone over there saysso. Of course, you--that is we, are gradually becoming civilized andbuilding up an aristocracy. "

"Yes, I suppose so, " said Adelaide, feeling that she must change thesubject or show her exasperation, yet unable to find any subject whichJanet would not adorn with refined and cultured views. "Isn't Ross, there, looking for you?"

He had just rushed from the house, his face, his manner violentlyagitated. As he saw Adelaide looking at him, he folded and put in hispocket a letter which seemed to be the cause of his agitation. When thetwo young women came to where he was standing, he joined them and walkedup and down with them, his sister, between him and Del, doing all thetalking. Out of the corner of her eye Del saw that his gaze was bentsavagely upon the ground and that his struggle for self-control was stillon. At the first opportunity she said: "I must get mother. We'll have tobe going. "

"Oh, no, not yet, " urged Janet, sincerity strong in her affected accents. Del felt that the sister, for some reason, as strongly wished not to beleft alone with the brother as the brother wished to be left alone withthe sister. In confirmation of this, Janet went on to say: "Anyhow, Rosswill tell your mother. "

Ross scowled at his sister, made a hesitating, reluctant movement towardthe steps; just then Matilda and Ellen appeared. Adelaide saw that hermother had succeeded in getting through Matilda's crust of sham and intouch with her heart. At sight of her son Mrs. Whitney's softenedcountenance changed--hardened, Adelaide thought--and she said to himeagerly: "Any news, any letters?"

"This, " answered Ross explosively. He jerked the letter from his pocket, gave it to his mother. 

"You'll excuse me--Ellen--Adelaide, " said Matilda, as she unfolded thepaper with ringers that trembled. "This is very important. " Silence, asshe read, her eager glance leaping along the lines. Her expression becameterrible; she burst out in a voice that was both anger and despair: "Nowill! He wasn't just trying to torment me when he said he hadn't madeone. No will! Nothing but the draft of a scheme to leave everything toTecumseh--there's your Hiram's work, Ellen!"

Adelaide's gentle pressure on her mother's arm was unnecessary; it wastoo evident that Matilda, beside herself, could not be held responsiblefor anything she said. There was no pretense, no "oversoul" in heremotion now. She was as different from the Matilda of the luncheon tableas the swollen and guttered face of woe in real life is different fromthe graceful tragedy of the stage. 

"No will; what of it?" said Ellen gently. "It won't make the leastdifference. There's just you and the children. "

Adelaide, with clearer knowledge of certain dark phases of human natureand of the Whitney family, hastily interposed. "Yes, we must go, " saidshe. "Good-by, Mrs. Whitney, " and she put out her hand. 

Mrs. Whitney neither saw nor heard. "Ellen!" she cried, her voice likeher wild and haggard face. "What do you think of such a daughter as minehere? Her father--"

Janet, with eyes that dilated and contracted strangely, interrupted witha sweet, deprecating, "Good-by, Adelaide dear. As I told you, I amleaving to-night--"

There Ross laid his hand heavily on Janet's shoulder. "You are going tostay, young lady, " he said between his teeth, "and hear what your motherhas to say about you. " His voice made Adelaide shudder, even before shesaw the black hate his eyes were hurling at his sister. 

"Yes, we want you, Ellen, and you, Del, to know her as she is, " Mrs. Whitney now raged on. "When she married, her father gave her a dowry, bought that title for her--paid as much as his whole fortune now amountsto. He did it solely because I begged him to. She knows the fight I hadto win him over. And now that he's gone, without making a will, she saysshe'll have her _legal_ rights! Her _legal_ rights! She'll take_one-third_ of what he left. She'll rob her brother and her mother!"

Janet was plainly reminding herself that she must not forget that she wasa lady and a marchioness. In a manner in which quiet dignity was mingledwith a delicate soul's shrinking from such brawling vulgarity as thisthat was being forced upon her, she said, looking at Adelaide: "Papanever intended that my dowry should be taken out of my share. It was apresent. " She looked calmly at her mother. "Just like your jewels, mamma. " She turned her clear, luminous eyes upon Ross. "Just like theopportunities he gave you to get your independent fortune. "

Mrs. Whitney, trembling so that she could scarcely articulate, retorted:"At the time he said, and I told you, it was to come out of your share. And how you thanked me and kissed me and--" She stretched toward Ellenher shaking old woman's hands, made repellent by the contrasting splendorof magnificent black pearl rings. "O Ellen, Ellen!" she quavered. "Ithink my heart will burst!"

"You did _say_ he said so, " replied Janet softly, "but _he_ nevertold _me_. "

"You--you--" stuttered Ross, flinging out his arms at her in aparoxysm of fury. 

"I refuse to discuss this any further, " said Janet, drawing herself upin the full majesty of her black-robed figure and turning her longshapely back on Ross. "Mrs. Ranger, I'm sure you and Del realize thatmother and Ross are terribly upset, and not--"

"They'll realize that you are a cheat, a vulture in the guise of woman!"cried Mrs. Whitney. "Ellen, tell her what she is!"

Mrs. Ranger, her eyes down and her face expressing her agonizedembarrassment, contrived to say: "You mustn't bring me in, Mattie. Adelaide and I must go. "

"No, you _shall_ hear!" shrieked Mrs. Whitney, barring the way. "All theworld shall hear how this treacherous, ingrate daughter of mine--oh, thesting of that!--how she purposes to steal, yes, steal four times as muchof her father's estate as Ross or I get. Four times as much! I can'tbelieve the law allows it! But whether it does or not, Janet Whitney, _God_ won't allow it! God will hear my cry, my curse on you. "

"My conscience is clear, " said Janet, and her gaze, spiritual, exalted, patient, showed that she spoke the truth, that her mother's looks andwords left her quite unscathed. 

Ross vented a vicious, jeering laugh. His mother, overcome with thesense of helplessness, collapsed from rage to grief and tears. Sheturned to Mrs. Ranger. "Your Hiram was right, " she wailed, "and myCharles said so just before he went. Look at my daughter, Ellen. Look atmy son--for he, too, is robbing me. He has his own fortune that his deadfather made for him; yet he, too, talks about his legal rights. Hedemands his full third!"

Adelaide did not look at Ross; yet she was seeing him inside and out, theinside through the outside. 

"My heartless children!" sobbed Matilda. "I can't believe that they arethe same I brought into the world and watched over and saw that they hadeverything. God forgive them--and me. Your Hiram was right. Money hasdone it. Money has made monsters of them. And I--oh, how I am punished!"

All this time Ellen and Adelaide had been gradually retreating, theWhitneys following them. When Mrs. Whitney at last opened wide thecasket of her woe and revealed Ross there, too, he wheeled on Adelaidewith a protesting, appealing look. He was confident that he was in theright, that his case was different from Janet's; confident also thatAdelaide would feel that in defending his rights he was also defendinghers that were to be. But before Del there had risen the scene after thereading of her own father's will. She recalled her rebellious thoughts, saw again Arthur's fine face distorted by evil passions, heard again hermother's terrible, just words: "Don't trample on your father's grave, Arthur Ranger! I'll put you both out of the house! Go to the Whitneys, where you belong!" And then she saw Arthur as he now was, and herselfthe wife of Dory Hargrave. And she for the first time realized, as werealize things only when they have become an accepted and unshakablebasic part of our lives, what her father had done, what her father was. Hiram had won his daughter. 

"We are going now, " said Ellen, coming from the stupor of shame andhorror into which this volcanic disgorging of the secret minds and heartsof the Whitneys had plunged her. And the expression she fixed first uponJanet, then upon Ross, then upon Matilda, killed any disposition theymight have had to try to detain her. As she and Adelaide went toward hercarriage, Ross followed. Walking beside Adelaide, he began to protest ina low tone and with passionate appeal against the verdict he could notbut read in her face. "It isn't fair, it isn't just!" he pleaded. "Adelaide, hear me! Don't misjudge me. You know what your--your goodopinion means to me. "

She took her mother's arm, and so drew farther away from him. 

"Forgive me, " he begged. "Janet put me out of my mind. It drove me mad tohave her rob--_us_. "

At that "us" Adelaide fixed her gaze on his for an instant. And what hesaw in her eyes silenced him--silenced him on one subject forever. 

He left for Chicago without seeing either his sister or his motheragain. His impulse was to renounce to his mother his share of hisfather's estate. But one does not act hastily upon an impulse to give upnearly a million dollars. On reflection he decided against suchexpensive and futile generosity. If it would gain him Adelaide--then, yes. But when it would gain him nothing but the applause of people whoin the same circumstances would not have had even the impulse to foregoa million--"Mother's proper share will give her as much of an income asa woman needs at her age and alone, " reasoned he. "Besides, she maymarry again. And I must not forget that but for her Janet would neverhave got that dowry. She brought this upon herself. Her folly has costme dearly enough. If I go away to live abroad or in New York--anywhereto be free of the Howlands--why I'll need all I've got properly toestablish myself. "

Janet and her baby left on a later train for the East. Before going shetried to see her mother. Her mother had wronged her in thought, hadslandered her in word; but Janet forgave her and nobly wished her to havethe consolation of knowing it. Mrs. Whitney, however, prevented theexecution of this exalted purpose by refusing to answer the gentlepersistent knocking and gentle appealing calls of "Mother, mother dear!"at her locked boudoir door. 

CHAPTER XXVII

THE DOOR AJAR

Judge Torrey succeeded Whitney as chairman of the overseers of Tecumsehand in the vacant trusteeship of the Ranger bequest. Soon Dr. Hargrave, insisting that he was too old for the labors of the presidency of such ahuge and varied institution as the university had become, was madehonorary president, and his son, still in Europe, was elected chairman ofthe faculty. Toward the middle of a fine afternoon in early September Dr. Hargrave and his daughter-in-law drove to the railway station in theancient and roomy phaeton which was to Saint X as much part of hispersonality as the aureole of glistening white hair that framed hismajestic head, or as the great plaid shawl that had draped his bigshoulders with their student stoop every winter day since anyone couldremember. Despite his long exposure to the temptation to sink into theemasculate life of unapplied intellect, mere talker and writer, and toadopt that life's flabby ideals, he had remained the man of ideas, theman of action. His learning was all but universal, yet he had the rugged, direct vigor of the man of affairs. His was not the knowledge thatenfeebles, but the knowledge that empowers. As his son, the new executiveof the university--with the figure of a Greek athlete, with positivecharacter, will as well as intellect, stamped upon his youngface--appeared in the crowd, the onlookers had the sense that a"somebody" had arrived. Dory's always was the air an active mind neverfails to give; as Judge Torrey once said: "You've only got to look at himto see he's the kind that does things, not the kind that tells how theyused to be done or how they oughtn't to be done. " Now there was in hisface and bearing the subtly but surely distinguishing quality that comesonly with the strength a man gets when his fellows acknowledge hisleadership, when he has seen the creations of his brain materialize inwork accomplished. Every successful man has this look, and shows itaccording to his nature--the arrogant arrogantly; the well-balanced withtranquil unconsciousness. 

As he moved toward his father and Adelaide, her heart swelled with pridein him, with pride in her share in him. Ever since the sending of thecablegram to recall him, she had been wondering what she would feel atsight of him. Now she forgot all about her once-beloved self-analysis. She was simply proud of him, enormously proud; other men seemed trivialbeside this personage. Also she was a little afraid; for, as their eyesmet, it seemed to her that his look of recognition and greeting was notso ardent as she was accustomed to associate with his features whenturned toward her. But before she could be daunted by her misgiving itvanished; for he impetuously caught her in his arms and, utterlyforgetting the onlookers, kissed her until every nerve in her body wastingling in the sweeping flame of that passion which his parting caresshad stirred to vague but troublesome restlessness. And she, too, forgotthe crowd, and shyly, proudly gave as well as received; so there began tovibrate between them the spark that clears brains and hearts of the fogsand vapors and keeps them clear. And it was not a problem in psychologythat was revealed to those admiring and envying spectators in thebrilliant September sunshine, but a man and a woman in love in the waythat has been "the way of a man with a maid" from the beginning; in love, and each looking worthy of the other's love--he handsome in his blueserge, she beautiful in a light-brown fall dress with pale-gold facings, and the fluffy, feathery boa close round her fair young face. Civilization has changed methods, but not essentials; it is still notwhat goes on in the minds of a man and woman that counts, but what goeson in their hearts and nerves. 

The old doctor did not in the least mind the momentary neglect ofhimself. He had always assumed that his son and Del loved each other, there being every reason why they should and no reason why theyshouldn't; he saw only the natural and the expected in this outburstwhich astonished and somewhat embarrassed them with the partial return ofthe self-consciousness that had been their curse. He beamed on them fromeyes undimmed by half a century of toil, as bright under his shaggy whitebrows as the first spring flowers among the snows. As soon as he hadDory's hand and his apparent attention, he said: "I hope you've beengetting your address ready on the train, as I suggested in my telegram. "

"I've got it in my bag, " replied Dory. 

In the phaeton Del sat between them and drove. Dory forgot the honors hehad come home to receive; he had eyes and thoughts only for her, wasimpatient to be alone with her, to reassure himself of the meaning of theblushes that tinted her smooth white skin and the shy glances that stoletoward him from the violet eyes under those long lashes of hers. Dr. Hargrave resumed the subject that was to him paramount. "You see, Theodore, your steamer's being nearly two days late brings you home justa day before the installation. You'll be delivering, your address ateleven to-morrow morning. "

"So I shall, " said Dory absently. 

"You say it's ready. Hadn't you better let me get it type-written foryou?"

Dory opened the bag at his feet, gave his father a roll of paper. "Pleaselook it over, and make any changes you like. "

Dr. Hargrave began the reading then and there. He had not finished thefirst paragraph when Dory interrupted with, "Why, Del, you're passingour turning. "

Del grew crimson. The doctor, without looking up or taking his mind offthe address, said: "Adelaide gave up Mrs. Dorsey's house several weeksago. You are living with us. "

Dory glanced at her quickly and away. She said nothing. "He'llunderstand, " thought she--and she was right. 

Only those who have had experience of the older generation out Westwould have suspected the pride, the affection, the delight hiding behindMartha Skeffington's prim and formal welcome, or that it was notindifference but the unfailing instinct of a tender heart that made hersay, after a very few minutes: "Adelaide, don't you think Dory'd like tolook at the rooms?"

Del led the way, Dory several feet behind her--deliberately, lest heshould take that long, slender form of hers in his arms that he mightagain feel her bosom swelling and fluttering against him, and her fine, thick, luminous hair caressing his temple and his cheek. Miss Skeffingtonhad given them the three large rooms on the second floor--the two Doryused to have and one more for Del. As he followed Del into the sittingroom he saw that there had been changes, but he could not note them. Shewas not looking at him; she seemed to be in a dream, or walking with theslow deliberate steps one takes in an unfamiliar and perilous path. 

"That is still your bedroom, " said she, indicating one of the doors. "A stationary stand has been put in. Perhaps you'd like to freshenup a bit. "

"A stationary stand, " he repeated, as if somewhat dazed before thispractical detail. "Yes--I think so. "

She hesitated, went into her room, not quite closing the door behind her. He stared at it with a baffled look. "And, " he was thinking, "I imaginedI had trained myself to indifference. " An object near the window caughthis eye--a table at which he could work standing. He recalled that he hadseen its like in a big furniture display at Paris when they were theretogether, and that he had said he would get one for himself some day. This hint that there might be more than mere matter in those surroundingsset his eyes to roving. That revolving bookcase by the desk, the circularkind he had always wanted, and in it the books he liked to have athand--Montaigne and Don Quixote, Shakespeare and Shelley and Swinburne, the Encyclopedia, the statistical yearbooks; on top, his favorites amongthe magazines. And the desk itself--a huge spread of cleared surface--anenormous blotting pad, an ink well that was indeed a well--all just whathe had so often longed for as he sat cramped at little desks where anattempt to work meant overflow and chaos of books and papers. And thatbig inlaid box--it was full of his favorite cigarettes; and thedrop-light, and the green shade for the eyes, and the row of pencilssharpened as he liked them--

He knocked at her door. "Won't you come out here a moment?" cried he, putting it in that form because he had never adventured her intimatethreshold. 

No answer, though the door was ajar and she must have heard. 

"Please come out here, " he repeated. 

A pause; then, in her voice, shy but resolute, the single word, "Come!"

CHAPTER XXVIII

THE DEAD THAT LIVE

On the green oval within and opposite the entrance to the main campus ofthe great university there is the colossal statue of a master workman. The sculptor has done well. He does not merely show you the physicalman--the mass, the strength, of bone and sinew and muscle; he reveals theman within--the big, courageous soul. Strangers often think this statue apersonation of the force which in a few brief generations has erectedfrom a wilderness our vast and splendid America. And it is that; but toArthur and Adelaide, standing before it in a June twilight, long afterthe events above chronicled, it is their father--Hiram. 

"How alive he seems, " says his daughter. 

And his son answers: "How alive he _is_!"