Part 23

"You could not have said that to 'Wyndam'----"

"Yes--for Skylark was singing more and more about her. I soon should have had to say it to 'Wyndam.'"

"I loved your fidelity to Skylark," she told him softly.

Dust of Pelee would fall upon the archipelago for weeks, but this of starless dark was their supreme night. "Feel the sting of the spray," he commanded. "Hear the bows sing!... It's all for us--the loveliest of earth's distances and the sky afterward----"

"But behind," she whispered pitifully.

"Yes--Pelee 'splashed at a ten-league canvas with brushes of comet's hair.'"

* * * * *

The next night had fallen, and the two were through with the shops of Fort de France. Paula's dress was white and lustrous, a strange native fabric which the man regarded with seriousness and awe. He was in white, too. His right hand was swathed for repairs, the arm slung, and a thickness of lint was fitted under his collar. About his eyes and mouth was a slight look of strain still, which could not live another day before the force of recuperative happiness.... Up through the streets of the Capital, they made their way. Casements were open to the night and the sea, but the people were dulled with grief. Martinique had lost her first born, and Fort de France, the gentle sister of Saint Pierre, was bowed with the spirit of weeping. They had loved and leaned on each other, this boy and girl of the Mother Island.

Through the silent crowds, Charter and Paula walked, a part of the silence, passing the groves and towers, where the laws of France are born again for the little aliens; treading streets of darkness and moaning. A field of fire-lights shone ahead--red glow shining upon new canvas. This was the little colony of Father Fontanel, sustained by his American friend,--brands plucked from the burning of Saint Pierre. They passed the edge of the bivouac. A woman sat nursing her babe, fire-light upon her face and breast, drowsy little ones about her. Coffee and night-air and quavering lullabies; above all, ardent Josephine in marble, smiling and dreaming of Europe among the stars.... It was a powerful moment to Quentin Charter. Great joy and thrilling tragedy breathed upon his heart. He saw a tear upon Paula's cheek, and heard the low voice of Father Fontanel--like an echo across a stream. He saw them and hastened forward, more than white in the radiance.

"It is the moment of ten thousand years!" he exclaimed, grasping their hands.

Paula started, and turned to Charter whose gaze sank into her brain.... And so it came about unexpectedly; in the fire-light among the priest's beloved, under the Seven Palms and the ardent mystic smile of the Empress....

_Go thy way, eat thy bread with joy, and drink thy wine with a merry heart; for God hath already accepted thy works.... Let thy garments be always white; and let not thy head lack ointment. Live joyfully with the wife whom thou lovest, all the days of thy life._

The words rang in their ears, when they were alone in the city's darkness, and the fire-lights far behind.

* * * * *

On the third day following, they stood together on the _Morne d'Orange_--the three. Father Fontanel had been in feverish haste to gaze once more upon his city; while Charter and Paula had a mission among the ruins.... The _Saragossa_ was sitting for a new complexion in the harbor of Fort de France, so they had been driven over from the Capital, along the old sea-road. The wind was still; the sun shone through silent towers of smoke, and it was noon. Sunlight bathed the stripped fields of cane, and, seemingly inseparable from the stillness, brooded upon the blue Caribbean. The wreck of the old plantation-house was hunched closer to the ground.

They left Father Fontanel in the carriage, and approached the cistern. Charter halted suddenly at the edge of the stricken lianas, grasping Paula's arm. The well-curbing was broken away, and the earth, for yards surrounding, had caved into the vault. They stood there without speaking for a moment or two, and then he led her back to the carriage.... Father Fontanel did not seem aware of their coming or going, but smiled when they spoke. His eyes, charmed with sunlight, were lost oversea.

At last they stood, the priest between them, at the very edge of the _Morne_ overlooking the shadowed _Rue Victor Hugo_--a collapsed artery of the whited sepulchre.... The priest caught his breath; his hands lifted from their shoulders and stretched out over the necropolis. His face was upraised.

"God, love the World!" he breathed, and the flesh sank from him.... Much death had dulled their emotions, but this was translation. For an instant they were lifted, exalted, as by the rushing winds of a chariot.

* * * * *

They did not enter the city that day, but came again, the fourth day after the cataclysm. Out of the heat from the prone city, arose a forbidding breath, so that Paula was prevailed upon to stay behind on the _Morne_.... Sickened and terrified by the actualities, dreadful beyond any imaging, Charter made his way up the cluttered road into _Rue Rivoli_. Saint Pierre, a smoky pestilential charnel, was only alive now through the lamentations of those who had come down from the hills for their dead.

The wine-shop had partly fallen in front. The stone-arch remained, but the wooden-door had been levelled and was partially devoured by fire. A breath of coolness still lingered in the dark place, and the fruity odor of spilled wine mingled revoltingly with the heaviness of death. The ash-covered floor was packed hard, and still wet from the gusts of rain that had swept in through the open door and the broken-backed roof; stained, too, from the leakage of the casks. Charter's boot touched an empty bottle, and it wheeled and careened across the stones--until he thought it would never stop.... Steady as a ticking clock, came the "drip-drip" of liquor, escaping through a sprung seam from somewhere among the merciful shadows, where the old soldier of France had fallen from his chair.

He climbed over the heap of stones, which had been the rear-door, and entered the little court from which the song-birds had flown. Across the drifts of ash, he forced his steps--into the semi-dark of the living-room behind.

The great head that he had come to find, was rigidly erect, as if the muscles were locked, and faced the aperture through which he had entered. It seemed to be done in iron, and was covered with white dust--Pelee's dust, fresh-wrought from the fire in which the stars were forged. The first impression was that of calm, but Charter's soul chilled with terror, before his eyes fathomed the reality of that look. Under the thick dust, there suddenly appeared upon the features, as if invisible demons tugged at the muscles with hideous art, a reflection from the depths.... Bellingham was sitting beside a table. He had seen Death in the open door. The colossal energies of his life had risen to vanquish the Foe, yet again. His mind had realized their failure, and what failure meant, before the End. Out of the havoc of nether-planes, where Abominations are born, had come a last call for him. That glimpse of hell was mirrored in the staring dustless eyes.... Around his shoulders, like a golden vine, and lying across his knees, clung the trophy of defeat--Soronia. Denied the lily--he had taken the tiger-lily.... Under the unset stones of the floor, a lizard croaked.

Charter, who had fallen of old into the Caverns of Devouring, backed out into the court of the song-birds, in agony for clean light, for he had seen old hells again, in the luminous decay of those staring eyes.... He recalled the end of Father Fontanel and this--with reverent awe, as one on the edge of the mystery. Through the ends of these two, had some essential balance of power been preserved in the world?

TWENTY-SEVENTH CHAPTER

PAULA AND CHARTER JOURNEY INTO THE WEST; ONE HEARS VOICES, BUT NOT THE WORDS OFTEN, FROM RAPTURE'S ROADWAY

Peter Stock had cabled to New York for officers and men to make up a ship's company. The _Saragossa_ was overhauled, meanwhile, in the harbor of Fort de France, and the owner expressed his intention of finishing his healing at sea. On the same ship, which brought his seamen from New York, arrived in Fort de France a corps of newspaper correspondents, who were not slow to discover that in the bandaged capitalist lay one of the great stones of the eruption from the American point of view. This literally unseated Peter Stock from his chair on the veranda of the hotel at the Capital. With his guests, he put to sea within thirty-six hours after the arrival of the steamer from New York; indeed, before the _Saragossa's_ paint was dry. His vitality was not abated, but the great figures of Pelee and Fontanel, enriched by M. Mondet as a sort of clown-attendant, had strangely softened and strengthened this rarely-flavored personality. As for his two guests, that month of voyaging in the Caribbean and below, is particularly their own. The three were on deck as the _Saragossa_ plied past Saint Pierre, five or six miles deep in the roadstead, a last time. The brute, Pelee, lay asleep in the sun before the gate of the whited sepulchre.

"Did I ever tell you about my last interview with M. Mondet?" Peter Stock inquired.

Charter had witnessed it, on his way to the craters that morning, but he did not say so, and was regaled with the story. "Bear witness," Peter Stock finished, pointing toward the city, "that I forgive M. Mondet. Doubtless he was writing a paragraph on the staunchness of Pelee--when his desk was closed for him."

* * * * *

They reached New York the first week in July. No sooner had Peter Stock berthed the _Saragossa_ and breathed the big city, than he discovered how dearly he loved Pittsburg.... Paula went alone to the little apartment Top-side o' Park, where Madame Nestor absolved her strong young queen; alone also first to _The States_, though there was a table set for four over in Staten Island the following day....

Charter and Reifferscheid regarded each other a trifle nervously in the latter's office, before they left for the ferry. Each, however, found in the eyes of the other a sudden grip on finer matters than obvious explanations, so that no adjustment of past affairs was required. To Charter, this moment of meeting with the editor became a singularly bright memory, like certain moments with Father Fontanel. Reifferscheid had put away all the flowerings of romance, and could not know that their imperishable lustre was in his eyes--for the deeper-seeing eyes of the woman. He was big enough to praise her happiness, big enough to burst into singing. It had been a hard moment for her, but he sprang high among the nobilities of her heart, and was sustained.... What if it were just a throat-singing? There was no discordant note. These are the men and the moments to clinch one's faith in the Great Good that Drives the World.

Selma Cross had left the _Zoroaster_, and, with Stephen Cabot, was happily on the wing, between the city, shores and mountains. _The Thing_ was to open again in September at the _Herriot_, and the initial venture into the West was over. Had she wished, Paula was not given a chance to do without the old friendship.... The story of taking the Company down into Kentucky from Cincinnati and fulfilling the old promise to Calhoun Knox proved rare listening:

"I won't soon forget that night in Cincinnati, when I parted from Stephen Cabot," she said, falling with the same old readiness into her disclosures. "'Stephen,' I told him, 'I am taking the Company down into Danube to play to-morrow night in my home. I don't want you to go....' I had seen the real man shine out through physical pain many times. It was so now, and he looked the master in the deeper hurt. He's a self-fighter--the champion. He asked me if I meant to stay long, as I took his cool, slim hand. I told him that I hoped not, but if it transpired that I must stay for a while, I should come back to Cincinnati--for one day--to tell him.... I saw he was the stronger. I was all woman that moment, all human, wanting nothing that crowds or art could give. I think my talk became a little flighty, as I watched his face, so brave and so white.

"I knew his heart, knew that his thoughts that moment would have burned to the brute husk, coarser stuff than he was made of.... Here's a Stephen who could smile up from the ground as--as they stoned.... So I left him, standing by the window, in the upper-room of the hotel, watching the moving river-lights down on the Ohio.

"Late the next afternoon I reached Danube, and was driven directly to the theatre--which was new. There was a pang in this. The town seemed just the same; the streets and buildings, the sounds and smells, even the sunset patch at the head of Main Street--all were just as they should be, except the theatre. You see, all the dreams of greatness of that savage, homely girl, had found their source and culmination in the old house of melodrama, parts of which, they told me, now were made over into darkey shanties down by the river. I felt that my success was qualified a little in that it had not come in the life of the old house.

"I joined the Company at the theatre, without seeing any of the Danube folk. The audience was already gathering. Through an eyelet of the curtain, I saw Calhoun Knox enter alone, and take a seat in the centre, five rows from the orchestra. He seemed smaller. The good brown tan was gone. There was a twitch about his mouth that twitched mine. Other faces were the same--even the lips that had spoken my doom so long ago. I had no hate for them now....

"I looked at Calhoun Knox again, looked for the charm of clean simplicity, and kept putting Stephen Cabot out of my heart and brain.... This man before me had fought for me twice, when I had needed a champion.... They pulled me away from the eyelet, and _The Thing_ was on.

"I could feel the town's group-soul that night--responded to its every thought, as if a nerve-system of my own was installed in every mind. They were listening to the woman who had startled New York. I felt their awe. It was not sweet, as I had dreamed the moment would be. After all, these were my people.

"I wanted their love, not their adulation. There had been nights back in the East, when I had felt my audience, and turned loose _The Thing_ with utmost daring, knowing that enough of the throng could follow me. But this night I played slowly, played down, so that all could get it. This was not a concession to the public, but a reconciliation. And at the last, I moved and spoke pityingly, lest I hurt them; played to the working face of Calhoun Knox with all its limitations--as you would tell a story to a child, and hasten the happy ending to steady the quivering lip.... And then it came to me slowly, after the last curtain had fallen, that Danube was calling for its own, and I stepped out from behind.

"'Once in the days of tumult and misunderstanding,' I told them, 'I was angry because you did not love me. Now I know that I was not lovable. And now I feel your goodness and your forgiveness. I pray you not to thank me any more, lest I break down under too much joy....' Then I went down among them. A woman kissed me, but the moment was so big and my eyes so clouded that I did not remember the face.... Presently the real consciousness came. Danube had dropped back to the doors. My hand was in the hand of Calhoun Knox.

"Far out the Lone Ridge pike, we walked, to the foot of the Knobs. I was breathing the smell of my old mountains. You can rely, that I had kept my voice bright. 'I have come back to you, Calhoun,' I said.

"'I shouldn't be here,' he stammered in real panic. 'You didn't write, and I married----'

"I could have hugged him in a way that would not have disturbed his wife, but I said reproachfully, 'And you let me come 'way out here alone with you, wicked Married Man?...' I started back for town, and then thought better of it--waited for him to come up, and took his hand.

"'Calhoun,' I said, 'I found you a solid friend when I needed one pitifully. Selma Cross never forgets. You have always been my Kentucky Gentleman. God bless your big bright heart. I wish you kingly happiness!'

"And then I did rush back. We separated at the edge of the town. I wanted to run and cry aloud. The joy was so new and so vast that I could scarcely hold it. Miles away, I heard the night-train whistle. My baggage was at the hotel, but I didn't care for that, and reached the depot-platform in time. The Company was there, but they had reserved a Pullman. I went into the day-coach, because I wanted to be alone--sat rigidly in the thin-backed seat. There were snoring, sprawling folks on every hand.... After a long time, some one stirred in his seat and muttered, 'High Bridge.' The brakeman came through at age-long intervals, calling stations that had once seemed to me the far country. Then across the aisle, a babe awoke and wailed. The mother had others--a sweet sort of woman sick with weariness. I took the little one, and it liked the fresh arms and fell asleep. It fitted right in--the soft helpless warm little thing--and felt good to me. Dawn dimmed the old meadows before I gave it up to be fed--and begged it back again.

"And then Cincinnati from the river--brown river below and brown smoke-clouds above. It seemed as if I had been gone ages, instead of only since yesterday. Unhampered by baggage, I sped out of the day-coach, far ahead of the Company in the Pullman, but the carriage to the hotel was insufferably slow; the elevator dragged.... It was only eight in the morning, but I knew his ways--how little he slept.... His door was partly open, and I heard the crinkle of his paper, as he answered my tap.

"'Aren't you pretty near ready for breakfast, Stephen?' I asked.... He stood in the doorway--his head just to my breast. His face was hallowed, but his body seemed to weaken. I crossed the threshold to help him, and we--we're to be married before the new season opens."

Paula loved the story.

* * * * *

And at length Paula and Charter reached the house of his mother, whose glory was about her, as she stood in the doorway. Before he kissed her, the mother-eyes had searched his heart.... Then she turned to his garland of victory.

"I am so glad you have brought me a daughter."

The women faced each other--the strangest moment in three lives.... All the ages passed between the eyes of the maid and the mother; and wisdoms finer than words, as when two suns, sweeping past in their great cycle, shine across the darkness of the infinite deep; ages of gleaning, adoring, suffering, bearing, praying; ages of listening to little children and building dreams out of pain; the weathered lustre of Naomi and the fresh radiance of Ruth; but over all, that look which passed between the women shone the secret of the meaning of men--God-taught Motherhood.

To Charter, standing afar-off, came the simple but tremendous revelation, just a glimpse into that lovely arcanum which mere man may never know in full.... He saw that these two were closer than prophets to the Lifting Heart of Things; that such are the handmaidens of the Spirit, to whom are intrusted God's avatars; that no prophet is greater than his mother.

To the man, it was new as the dream which nestled in Paula's heart; to the women, it was old as the flocks on the mountain-sides of Lebanon. They turned to him smiling. And when he could speak, he said to Paula:

"I thought you would like to see the garret, and the window that faces the East."

THE END

About Will Levington Comfort

_Author of "She Buildeth Her House" and "Routledge Rides Alone"_

(_Eight Editions_)

Well-known as one of the most successful short-story contributors to American magazines, Will Levington Comfort awoke one morning a little over a year ago to find himself famous as a long-story writer. Seldom has the first novel of an author been accorded the very essence of praise from the conservative critics as was Mr. Comfort's "Routledge Rides Alone," acknowledged to be the best book of 1910.

While young in years, Mr. Comfort, who is thirty-three, is old in experience. In 1898 he enlisted in the Fifth United States Cavalry, and saw Cuban service in the Spanish-American War. The following year he rode as a war correspondent in the Philippines a rise which resulted from vivid letters written to newspapers from the battlefields and prisons.

Stricken with fever, wearied of service and thinking of Home, he was next ordered by cable up into China to watch the lid lifted from the Legations at Peking. Here he saw General Liscum killed on the Tientsin Wall and got his earliest glance of the Japanese in war. Another attack of fever completely prostrated him and he was sent home on the hospital ship "Relief."

In the interval between the Boxer Uprising and the Russo-Japanese War, Mr. Comfort began to dwell upon the great fundamental facts of world-politics. But the call of smoke and battle was too strong, and, securing a berth as war-correspondent for a leading midwestern newspaper, he returned to the far East and the scenes of the Russo-Japanese conflict in 1904. He was present at the battle of Liaoyang his description of which in "Routledge Rides Alone" fairly overwhelms the reader.

Few novels of recent years have aroused the same enthusiasm as was evoked by this story of "Routledge." Book reviewers both in this country and in Europe have suggested that the book should win for its author the Peace prize because it is one of the greatest and most effective arguments against warfare that has ever been presented.

By WILL LEVINGTON COMFORT

ROUTLEDGE RIDES ALONE

COLORED FRONTISPIECE BY MARTIN JUSTICE

Here is a tale indeed--big and forceful, palpitating with interest, and written with the sureness of touch and the breadth of a man who is master of his art. Mr. Comfort has drawn upon two practically new story-places in the world of fiction to furnish the scenes for his narrative--India and Manchuria at the time of the Russo-Japanese War. While the novel is distinguished by its clear and vigorous war scenes, the fine and sweet romance of the love of the hero, Routledge--a brave, strange, and talented American--for the "most beautiful woman in London" rivals these in interest.

The story opens in London, sweeps up and down Asia, and reaches its most rousing pitch on the ghastly field of Liaoyang, in Manchuria. The one-hundred-mile race from the field to a free cable outside the war zone, between Routledge and an English war correspondent, is as exciting and enthralling as anything that has appeared in fiction in recent years.

"A big, vital, forceful story that towers giant-high--a romance to lure the hours away in tense interest--a book with a message for all mankind."--_Detroit Free Press._

"Three such magnificent figures as Routledge, Noreen, and Rawder never before have appeared together in fiction. Take it all in all, 'Routledge Rides Alone' is a great novel, full of sublime conception, one of the few novels that are as ladders from heaven to earth."--_San Francisco Argonaut._

"The story unfolds a vast and vivid panorama of life. The first chapters remind one strongly of the descriptive Kipling we once knew. We commend the book for its untamed interest. We recommend it for its descriptive power."--_Boston Evening Transcript._