Chapter 7

"Ah, well! Ah, well! Ye did all ye could for him," said McDermott, genially, "and it's probably for the best. Everything is, you know," he added. "But I thought you might be interested to hear something of the little girl. She has just sailed for France. I saw her off. _Transatlantique_--yesterday. She has gone to Paris to study with Josef."

Both men scrutinized each other steadily for a short time, but at the game they were now playing Francis was by far the keener.

"Mother wrote me nearly six weeks ago about somebody's suggesting such a plan for Miss Dulany. Wait a minute," he continued, feeling in his pockets, "here's her letter now."

He gave his mother's screed to McDermott, determined that the Irishman should not suspect the part which he had taken in Katrine's affairs, and was rewarded by seeing McDermott return the letter apparently convinced.

"Nick van Rensselaer! So that's the way of it," he remarked. "Josef simply wrote her to come, that everything had been arranged by some great lady. There were no conditions save that she should write to her unknown benefactor once a month. The money is to be repaid when Katrine becomes a great singer.

"It's just as well--just as well!" Dermott said, after a silence, peering into the cloud of smoke he had blown ceilingward, as though to foretell the future. "Ye see, Mr. Ravenel, if she will so far honor me, I'm intending some day to marry Katrine Dulany."

There was again the challenge of the eyes, but Frank's training stood him well as he raised his brows with genuine surprise. "So?" he said. "I think no one suspected in Carolina." "I hope not," McDermott returned. "You see, she's but a child; eighteen years! And a man protects that age from mistakes, as you, of course, know."

The lids came down over his inscrutable gray-blue eyes as McDermott spoke.

"And, besides, I have had so little to offer her." There was real humility in the tone now. "When the Almighty gives special attention to the making of such a person as Katrine Dulany, it behooves the rest of us mortals to respect His handiwork, doesn't it? I've some poor gifts, some money, a nine-century-old name. There's a title, too, been lying loose in the family since sixteen hundred and I forget what year. But I want her to be sure of herself. As for the study with Josef, it will be good for her, but the idea of Katrine on the stage is an absurdity. I've a cousin in Paris--the Countess de Nemours, a very great lady, though I say it as shouldn't," he said, with a laugh, "whom I am hoping to interest in the little girl. She's no longer young. By-the-way, perhaps you've met her! Her miniature hangs in the hail of Ravenel House."

"In the hall at Ravenel?" Francis repeated, in genuine surprise.

Dermott nodded. "Under the sconces on the left of the mantel-shelf."

"Ah!" Frank cried. "I remember, a beautiful girl in green. It was found among my father's papers only last year. It was a relic of his life abroad."

"Yes," Dermott answered, with a curious smile, "that's just what it was. A relic of his life abroad. Well, good-bye and good luck to you," he said, rising, and Francis noted anew the grace of movement, the distinctive pallor, the humor of the great gray eyes as McDermott turned suddenly to come back to him. "Forgive me, Ravenel," he said, taking his hat and stick from a self-abasing waiter, "for dragging you into my private affairs in the way I have done, but somehow I thought it might interest you to know of my love for Katrine," and, humming an old song, he went his devious Celtic way.

"Three seventeen! Three seventeen! Mr. Ravenel! Three seventeen!" Dreaming over McDermott's story, Frank realized that a call-boy was charging around the dining-room screaming his name and room number. "Mr. Philip de Peyster."

"Hello, old man!" Frank cried, with genuine pleasure, as Mr. de Peyster came forward. "I found so many messages from you, I fear the worst. You're wanting me to stand up with you, I take it."

De Peyster shook his head. "Nothing so bad as that. I _have_ rather overwhelmed you with messages and things, haven't I? It's only business, however, not matrimony. I'm sorry, Frank," he added, laughing, "to let you in for a business talk this way. I know how you hate it. Therefore, I hurry. Ravenel Plantation lies between two large railroads. To get from one to another it is necessary to make triangles. There were a half-dozen of us here last spring who conceived the idea of building a direct road along the south bank of the Silver Fork, joining the two roads, like the middle line of the letter H. We believed that the growth in that region of cotton mills, tanneries, and wood manufacture warranted it. You know Dermott McDermott?" he asked, abruptly.

"Know him!" Frank answered. "The Almighty alone does that, I fancy. I am acquainted with him."

"Whether he got word of the scheme, or whether by pure accident he went South about the time the plans were maturing, no one knows; but he bought a mica-mine, started a tannery, and secured, on the south side of the Silver Fork, a tract of land which lies almost in the centre of our proposed line. It's but ten or fifteen acres, but it goes from the river's edge to Owl Mountain, and we are forced to buy from him, at his own price, tunnel the mountain or go around it, a distance of twenty-two miles, with two streams to bridge. A cheerful prospect! He is holding the piece of land for which he paid ten or twelve hundred dollars, probably, at forty-five thousand! About a week ago I discovered, through O'Grady, that the title was in your name until quite recently."

"It was," Francis answered, with a queer smile, "it was; but, with unusual business foresight, I sold it to Mr. McDermott myself for eleven hundred dollars. He said he was going to raise eagles on it," he explained, with a laugh.

The flowers, the lights, and the music of the night he had dined at the lodge came back to him. He recalled a touch on his arm, an upturned face with wistful gray eyes, and remembered Katrine's warning. As he did so a great anger came to him at the way he had been used, and his newly awakened manhood called to him for action. There should be another side to the matter, he determined. McDermott's overheard misprisement of the South! His statement of his intentions toward Katrine! The cut of the words, "_She is but eighteen, and one protects that age_," came back to him. There had never come a time in his life before when he would have been in the mood to do the thing he now offered.

"Phil," he said, "there is another bank to the Silver Fork River."

"But it is in your own plantation, and we knew the hopelessness of any proposition to you, Southerner that you are!"

"It would be at least nine miles from Ravenel House," Frank answered, determinedly. "I find I have changed a great deal in my views of things lately," and here he leaned forward on the table toward his friend. "De Peyster," he said, "let us build the railroad together!"

XIV

DERMOTT DISCOVERS A NEW SIDE TO FRANK'S CHARACTER

The next morning news came to McDermott that his land on the Silver Fork was no longer desired by the newly formed company. It was nearly a fortnight, however, before he learned the railroad was to be built on the Ravenel side of the river.

The information came with abruptness from John Marix, a gaminlike broker, who encountered McDermott in the elevator to their mutual offices.

"Say, McDermott," he cried, with a cheerful laugh, "Ravenel didn't do a thing to you, did he? _He didn't do a thing to you!_" he repeated, with a lively chuckle.

McDermott's eyes were bland on the instant. He did not understand the little man's meaning. What he did understand, always understood, however, was that he must never be taken off guard in the game of life.

"I am the football of the Street," he said, with a kind of cheerful despondency. "Everybody does me!"

"Yes they do!" the other responded, derisively. "It's because you've done everybody that we're glad somebody's got even for a minute! But"--dropping the bantering tone--"this Ravenel is something of a wonder. I was at the meeting of the new company to-day. He's full of the scheme, knows every foot of the land, and is willing to put a whole bunch of money into it. We've elected him president of the concern."

By the same afternoon the facts of the case were in McDermott's possession, and the following morning, upon seeing Frank about to enter the De Peyster offices, he advanced toward him, hand outstretched. He was entirely unprepared for the manner in which he was received. Frank nodded to him slightingly, with the scant courtesy he might have accorded a domestic whom he disliked, and said, with directness, looking him squarely in the eyes, "I don't care to shake hands with you, McDermott."

Dermott regarded him steadily in return, the gray gleam in his eyes a bit brighter, the lines of his mouth harder. Whatever the grave faults of these two men may have been, there was not a whit of cowardice between them as they stood facing each other.

"So!" said Dermott. "So!" And yet a third time he repeated "so!"--his tone one of grave consideration. "Had another done what ye have just done, Mr. Ravenel," he said, at length, "this little episode might not have ended so gayly. But for you I have so slight a respect that there's nothing you could do to me that would make me call ye to account for it." And, raising his hat high and jauntily, he said, with a laugh: "Good-morning, Ravenel!"

Frank turned white at the words, but the Irishman had disappeared in an elevator, and any immediate action seemed impossible and theatric. In the short time he had spent in New York he had learned many things, and the narrow, tiled halls of an office building twenty-three stories high, in Wall Street, did not seem the fitting background for a personal encounter to which the hills of North Carolina might have lent themselves with picturesqueness.

He sat thinking the matter over in the club that night with two things fixed in his mind. First, that he would go to see Katrine in Paris immediately; of the outcome of such a meeting he took no thought whatever. Second, that he would put this railroad scheme through; already the feeling of power, of the consciousness of unsystematized ability, was stirring within him.

The affair with McDermott rankled, however, and it was with drawn brows and tightened lips that he answered a telephone call--a call which changed both of the plans which he had so carefully arranged.

His mother's doctor at Bar Harbor had rung him up to say Mrs. Ravenel was seriously ill and wanted him to come to her at once. He started at midnight, to find his mother in a high fever, unconscious of his arrival, and facing an operation, as the only chance to save her life.

He had been to her always, as she herself put it, "a perfect son," and for the next three months, which made the time well into December, he proved the words true, living by her bedside, and allowing himself scant sleep from the watching and service. It was when she was far toward the recovery of her health and her old-time beauty that he spoke to her of his newly formed intentions with characteristic unwordiness.

"I am going into business, mother," he said, "with Philip de Peyster."

She was knitting at the time, counting stitches on large needles, and she went placidly on with the counting until the set was finished, when she looked up pleasantly. "You think it will amuse you?" she asked, with the kind interest which she might have shown concerning a polo game in which he was to play.

"I am beginning to think a man should have some fixed duties in life," Frank explained.

"Yes, certainly," Mrs. Ravenel answered. "The Bible says something like that, I believe. What are you thinking of doing?"

"Buying and selling things, like railroads and mines," he answered, smiling at her indifference.

"I'm glad it's Phil de Peyster you are going to buy and sell things with," Mrs. Ravenel said. "His mother was maid of honor at my wedding, and a charming girl, Patty Beauregarde, of Charleston. And I am delighted at anything you do to make you happy, Frank. I have thought you have not been very gay of late. There is, perhaps, a trouble--"

"What an idea!" he answered.

"Will you have offices and things?" Mrs. Ravenel inquired, vaguely. "I have always had ideas for office furnishings, you know."

"If you could see Phil's office, mother, I think you would weep. It's very dirty, and he likes it. It's the dust of his great-grandfathers."

"Well, dearest," Mrs. Ravenel said, "if it amuses you, I'm glad you thought of doing it," and she folded up her work and put it into her bag. "Life's a rather dreary affair at best," she concluded, "and anything that interests one is a positive boon."

XV

JOSEF

There is in the Faubourg St. Honoré, not far from the Hotel of the Silver Scissors, an old house set far back in a court-yard of its own. A gray stone wall, the height of the first two stories, protects both garden and house from the eyes of the passer-by; and, save for the sound of singing, the place seems uninhabited most of the time.

On a misty morning in late November Katrine clapped the knocker of this old house with fear in her heart, for her future hung on the word of the great teacher who lived here, Josef, whose genius, generosity, and brutal frankness were the talk of the musical world. A Brittany peasant woman opened the door with no salutation whatever, for the huge Brigitte, in her white _coiffe_ and blue flannel frock, spoke in awed whispers only, when the master was at home.

"Mademoiselle Dulany?" she asked.

Katrine nodded an affirmative.

"The master is expecting you," Brigitte said, leading the way up a wide oak staircase to the second floor, which had been made into one great room. It was a bare place, with no draperies and little furniture. Two grand pianos stood at one end near a small platform, like a model-stand. There were photographs of some great singers on the walls, and a few chairs huddled together.

In the corner at a desk a woman was writing from the dictation of a man who stood gazing out of the window. He turned at Katrine's entrance. She has seen his picture frequently, and knew on the instant that it was Josef, the greatest teacher in Europe--in the world.

"You may go, Zelie," he said to the woman. "I shall not need you till to-morrow." And the dismissal over, he came forward toward Katrine as she stood by the entrance, uncertain what to do.

He was a man about fifty years of age, below the medium height, heavily built, and dressed in black, with a waistcoat buttoned to the collar like a priest's. His hair was iron-gray, his eyes brown, and the pupils of them widened and contracted when he spoke. He had a clean-shaven face of ivory paleness, a sensuous mouth and chin, and when he looked at Katrine she understood his power, for it seemed to her as though he could see backward to her past and forward to all of her future.

Being alone with her, he motioned her to a seat by the window, near which he remained standing.

"I have been hearing that you have a voice. I have heard great things concerning it. I hope they are true." His tone implied that he had small belief that they were. "You have a serious drawback. You are too rich." She started at this. "The management of your income, however, is given to me, as I suppose you know. Will you be so good as to remove your jacket and hat, and walk up and down the room several times?"

Katrine obeyed.

"Good!" he said, at the first turn; and at the last, "_Very_ good! Sing," he said, as abruptly as he had issued his former order.

In the after years she was given to making light of her choice, but the command was scarcely spoken before she began, in her lovely, sonorous voice, the song which it was her heritage to sing well:

"'Tis the most distressful country that ever I have seen, They're hanging men and women there for wearing of the green."

As she sang the three great stanzas, Josef stood motionless, his lips drawn, his eyes half shut, his face like a wooden man's; but his hands trembled, and as she ended her singing he opened the piano and seated himself in front of it. "Take the notes I strike," he said, "little--very little--so--so--so!" he sang.

Up and down, over and over, listening with his head turned to one side like a dog, he had her sing the tones, saying only, "Once more!" and "yet again!" and "over--over--over!" At last, with a sigh, he closed the instrument. "I am not one given to extravagance in language," he said, "but you have the greatest _natural_ voice I have ever heard. It is almost placed. Sit down a minute, I want to talk to you. Two kinds of pupils I have had in my life: those with voice and no temperament, and those with temperament and no voice. God seldom gives both; if He does, it is the great artist that may be made. To be great one must have both. But even with both given, one must have the ability to work, to work like a galley-slave, to work when all the world is resting, at the dead of night, in the small hours of the morning. When all the others have let go, you must hold on, till your head is tired and your body aches and you faint by the wayside; but you must never let go, you must learn to endure to the end. You will understand me. It is the _mental_ part of which I speak. I do not mean that you are to wear your voice or your body out practising. It's something far harder. You must learn to surrender yourself, to lose your life to have it!" He looked at her keenly. She was drinking his words in, as it were, and the expression on her face assured even him. "Do you want me," he said, suddenly coming nearer, "to tell you about yourself; what I see in you?"

She bent her head, quivering from head to foot, before the power of this man, who seemed uncanny in his knowledge.

"You have had some great sorrow. It is an unhappy love-affair. I understand." Here he smiled his critical, unfathomable, remote smile. "You are not yet eighteen, and have been capable of a great sorrow! Child," he said, "thank God for it! You have a voice of gold. We will make of that sorrow diamonds and rubies and pearls to set in the voice, so that the world will stand at gaze before you. When you have real insight you will know that nothing was ever taken from us that more was not put in its place."

"Master," she said, with something of his own abruptness, "may I talk to you a little, a very little, about myself?"

Already Josef realized the charm of her companionship as well as the adoring humility with which her eyes shone into his and the unquestioning way she placed herself under his direction. He nodded his permission with a smile.

"I want to be taught in _everything_. I know so little. It is not book studies I mean. I want to learn to be bigger, to think great thoughts. I want, most of all, to develop the power to be happy, to make the people around me happy. _Most_, I want"--she drew up her chest and made an outward gesture with her arms, a gesture significant of her whole nature in its indication of courage and generosity--"I want," she repeated, "to grow soul!"

Josef laughed aloud. "Ah," he cried, "you funny, little, unusual thing! I'm glad you've come to me. We will study, study, _and grow soul together_, you and I. We will not accumulate facts to be laid on shelves, like mental lumber, but grow bigger thoughts: see ourselves and people clearer that the work may be broadened. And we will find our ideals changing, changing, getting bigger, higher. And the little people will fall away from us, like Punch-and-Judy shows, painlessly, with kind thoughts, because we will have no further use for them. Wait! Trust the master! Nothing makes one forget like a great art! In three--four years, you will meet the man, and say: 'Ach, Heaven! is it for this I suffered? Stupid me! Praise God things are as they are, and that I still have Josef.'"

"I have thought sometimes," Katrine went on, "that men have many fine traits, which, without becoming masculine, women might study to acquire. I remember once I went to spend the day with a boy and a girl whose mother punished them both for some slight misdemeanor. Afterward the girl cried all the rest of the morning, but the boy went out and made a swing, and in a little while was quite happy. I was only five, but I saw then, and later, that women bear their sorrows differently from men. I don't want to cry; I want to make swings."

"Very well. It is _very_ well," said the great man, and there was a mist in his eyes as he looked at the valiant little creature. "It's a great gospel--that! I wish I could teach it to every woman on earth. _Don't cry! Make swings_!"

She had resumed her hat and jacket, and, with the lesson-day slip in her hand, was at the farther door, when she turned with sweetest pleading in her eyes. "Illustrious One!" she said, "I've not told you all. I've not asked you what I really want to know."

Already there was between them that quick comprehension of each other which exists for those people who have special gift.

"Well?" he said, waiting with a smile.

"You remember a pupil of yours named Charlotte Hopkins?"

"Very well, indeed."

"You changed her greatly."

"It is to be hoped so," he answered, with a laugh.

"She told me much of you: of your power, of your ability to make people over. And she said you had studied in the East, and had learned how to make people do your will, even when they were far away from you. Is it true?"

"Some say so," he answered.

"It is not hypnotism?" she questioned.

"I'm no Svengali, if that's what you mean," he responded, grimly. "I'll watch you, Katrine Dulany, and, if I find you worthy, some day I may tell you more."

More moved by her personality than he had been by any other in the twenty-five years of his teaching, he stood by the window and watched her cross the court-yard below and disappear through the great iron gates.

"Poor little girl!" he thought. "Beauty and gift and a divine despair. Everything ready to make the great artist. And then the heart of a woman, which is like quicksilver, to reckon with. I spoke bravely about her forgetting, but I have doubts. Sometimes I wonder if it be possible for a person with a fine and generous nature to become a really great artist. Perhaps it is necessary to have great egotism and selfishness for the arts' development. I wonder," he said, aloud; repeating, after a minute's silence, "I wonder--"

XVI

MRS. RAVENEL UNWITTINGLY BECOMES AN ALLY OF KATRINE

After his mother's recovery Frank went back to New York immediately, keen to arrange the railroad matters and get the actual work started. In the first interview with De Peyster, however, he found that Dermott McDermott was far from being out of the reckoning.

"It is rumored," said De Peyster, "that he is trying to elect himself president of N.C. & T. road. If he succeeds he can control the traffic in Carolina to such an extent that our line would be a failure, even if built."

"Then," returned Frank, and any one who loved him would have gloried at the set of his mouth and chin as he spoke, "he mustn't be allowed to be president of the N.C. & T. We must buy up the proxies."

Before the end of the week, however, they were surprised again by the news that McDermott had refused to consider the presidency of the N.C. & T. road, even if tendered him, and had given out that he would sail for Europe within a fortnight for an indefinite stay.

"But," De Peyster ended, as he repeated the news to Frank, "if you think he's whipped you don't know him! I'm more anxious over this last move than if he stayed right here and fought us openly. There is more to it than we know."