Chapter 39

THE HERMITAGE.

It is not to be supposed from this last reflection of ours, that Leonore was not heart-whole. Leonore had merely had a few true friends, owing to her roving life, and at seventeen a girl craves friends. When, therefore, the return to America was determined upon, she had at once decided that Peter and she would be the closest of friends. That she would tell him all her confidences, and take all her troubles to him. Miss De Voe and Dorothy had told her about Peter, and from their descriptions, as well as from her father’s reminiscences, Leonore had concluded that Peter was just the friend she had wanted for so long. That Leonore held her eyes down, and tried to charm yet tantalize her intended friend, was because Leonore could not help it, being only seventeen and a girl. If Leonore had felt anything but a friendly interest and liking, blended with much curiosity, in Peter, she never would have gone to see him in his office, and would never have talked and laughed so frankly with him.

As for Peter, he did not put his feelings into good docketed shape. He did not attempt to label them at all. He had had a delicious half-hour yesterday. He had decided, the evening before, that he must see those slate-colored eyes again, if he had to go round the world in pursuit of them. How he should do it, he had not even thought out, till the next morning. He had understood very clearly that the owner of those slate-colored eyes was really an unknown quantity to him. He had understood, too, that the chances were very much against his caring to pursue those eyes after he knew them better. But he was adamant that he must see those eyes again, and prove for himself whether they were but an _ignis fatuus_, or the radiant stars that Providence had cast for the horoscope of Peter Stirling. He was studying those eyes, with their concomitants, at the present time. He was studying them very coolly, to judge from his appearance and conduct. Yet he was enjoying the study in a way that he had never enjoyed the study of somebody “On Torts.” Somebody “On Torts,” never looked like that. Somebody “On Torts,” never had luck-pieces, and silk ribbons. Somebody “On Torts,” never wrote letters and touched the end of pens to its lips. Somebody “On Torts,” never courtesied, nor looked out from under its eyelashes, nor called him Peter.

While this investigation had been progressing, Watts had looked at the shelf of law books, had looked out of the window, had whistled, and had yawned. Finally, in sheer _ennui_ he had thrown open a door, and looked to see what lay beyond.

“Ha, ha!” he cried. “All is discovered. See! Here sits Peter Stirling, the ward politician, enthroned in Jeffersonian simplicity. But here, behind the arras, sits Peter Stirling, the counsellor of banks and railroads, in the midst of all the gorgeousness of the golden East.” Watts passed into the room beyond.

“What does he mean, Peter?”

“He has gone into my study. Would you like—”

He was interrupted by Watts calling, “Come in here, Dot, and see how the unsociable old hermit bestows himself.”

So Leonore and Peter followed Watts’s lead. The room into which they went was rather a curious one. It was at least twenty-five feet square, having four windows, two looking out on Broadway, and two on the side street. It had one other door besides that by which they had entered. Here the ordinary quality ended. Except for the six openings already noted and a large fireplace, the walls were shelved from floor to ceiling (which was not a low one), with dusky oak shelving. The ceiling was panelled in dark oak, and the floor was covered with a smooth surface of the same wood. Yet though the shelves were filled with books, few could be seen, for on every upright of the shelving, were several frames of oak, hinged as one sees them in public galleries occasionally, and these frames contained etchings, engravings, and paintings. Some were folded back against the shelves. Others stood out at right angles to them and showed that the frames were double ones, both sides containing something. Four easy-chairs, three less easy chairs, and a large table desk, likewise of dusky oak were the sole other fittings of the room, if we except two large polar bear skins.

“Oh,” cried Leonore looking about, “I’m so glad to see this. People have told me so much about your rooms. And no two of them ever agreed.”

“No,” said Peter. “It seems a continual bone of contention with my friends. They scold me because I shelved it to the ceiling, because I put in one-colored wood, because I framed my pictures and engravings this way, and because I haven’t gone in for rugs, and bric-à-brac, and the usual furnishings. At times I have really wondered, from their determination to change things, whether it was for them to live in, or for my use?”

“It is unusual,” said Leonore, reluctantly, and evidently selecting a word that should not offend Peter.

“You ought to be hung for treating fine pictures so,” said Watts.

“I had to give them those broad flat mats, because the books gave no background.”

“It’s—it’s—” Leonore hesitated. “It’s not so startling, after a moment.”

“You see they had to hang this way, or go unhung. I hadn’t wall space for both pictures and books. And by giving a few frames a turn, occasionally, I can always have fresh pictures to look at.”

“Look here, Dot, here’s a genuine Rembrandt’s ‘Three Crosses,’” called Watts. “I didn’t know, old man, that you were such a connoisseur.”

“I’m not,” said Peter. “I’m fond of such things, but I never should have had taste or time to gather these.”

“Then how did you get them?”

“A friend of mine—a man of exquisite taste—gathered them. He lost his money, and I bought them of him.”

“That was Mr. Le Grand?” asked Leonore, ceasing her study of the “Three Crosses.”

“Yes.”

“Mrs. Rivington told me about it.”

“It must have been devilish hard for him to part with such a collection,” said Watts.

“He hasn’t really parted with them. He comes down here constantly, and has a good time over them. It was partly his scheme to arrange them this way.”

“And are the paintings his, too, Peter?”

Peter could have hugged her for the way she said Peter. “No,” he managed to remark. “I bought some of them, and Miss De Voe and Lispenard Ogden the others. People tell me I spoil them by the flat framing, and the plain, broad gold mats. But it doesn’t spoil them to me. I think the mixture of gold mats and white mats breaks the monotony. And the variation just neutralizes the monotone which the rest of the room has. But of course that is my personal equation.”

“Then this room is the real taste of the ‘plain man,’ eh?” inquired Watts.

“Really, papa, it is plain. Just as simple as can be.”

“Simple! Yes, sweet simplicity! Three-thousand-dollar-etching simplicity! Millet simplicity! Oh, yes. Peter’s a simple old dog.”

“No, but the woodwork and the furniture. Isn’t this an enticing chair? I must try it.” And Leonore almost dissolved from view in its depths. Peter has that chair still. He would probably knock the man down who offered to buy it.

It occurred to Peter that since Leonore was so extremely near the ground, and was leaning back so far, that she could hardly help but be looking up. So he went and stood in front of the fireplace, and looked down at her. He pretended that his hands were cold. Watts perhaps was right. Peter was not as simple as people thought.

It seemed to Peter that he had never had so much to see, all at once, in his life. There were the occasional glimpses of the eyes (for Leonore, in spite of her position, did manage to cover the larger part of them) not one of which must be missed. Then there was her mouth. That would have been very restful to the eye; if it hadn’t been for the distracting chin below it. Then there were the little feet, just sticking out from underneath the tailor-made gown, making Peter think of Herrick’s famous lines. Finally there were those two hands! Leonore was very deliberately taking off her gloves. Peter had not seen those hands ungloved yet, and waited almost breathlessly for the unveiling. He decided that he must watch and shake hands at parting before Leonore put those gloves on again.

“I say,” said Watts, “how did you ever manage to get such a place here?”

“I was a tenant for a good many years of the insurance company that owns the building, and when it came to rebuild, it had the architect fit this floor for me just as I wished it. So I put our law-offices in front and arranged my other rooms along the side street. Would you like to see them?” Peter asked this last question very obviously of Leonore.

“Very much.”

So they passed through the other door, to a little square hall, lighted by a skylight, with a stairway going up to the roof.

“I took the upper floor, so as to get good air and the view of the city and the bay, which is very fine,” Peter said. “And I have a staircase to the roof, so that in good weather I can go up there.”

“I wondered what the great firm was doing up ten stories,” said Watts.

“Ogden and Rivington have been very good in yielding to my idiosyncracies. This is my mealing closet.”

It was a room nine feet square, panelled, ceiled and floored in mahogany, and the table and six chairs were made of the same material.

“So this is what the papers call the ‘Stirling political incubator?’ It doesn’t look like a place for hatching dark plots,” said Watts.

“Sometimes I have a little dinner here. Never more than six, however, for it’s too small.”

“I say, Dot, doesn’t this have a jolly cosy feeling? Couldn’t one sit here blowy nights, with the candles lit, eating nuts and telling stories? It makes me think of the expression, ‘snug as a bug.’”

“Miss Leroy told me, Peter, what a reputation your dinners had, and how every one was anxious to be invited just once,” said Leonore.

“But not a second time, old man. You caught Dot’s inference, I hope? Once is quite enough.”

“Peter, will you invite me some day?”

“Would he?” Peter longed to tell her that the place and everything it contained, including its owner—Then Peter said to himself, “You really don’t know anything about her. Stop your foolishness.” Still Peter knew that—that foolishness was nice. He said, “People only care for my dinners because they are few and far between, and their being way down here in the city, after business hours, makes them something to talk about. Society wants badly something to talk about most of the time. Of course, my friends are invited.” Peter looked down at Leonore, and she understood, without, his saying so, that she was to be a future guest.

“How do you manage about the prog, chum?”

“Mr. Le Grand had a man—a Maryland darky—whom he turned over to me. He looks after me generally, but his true forte is cooking. For oysters and fish and game I can’t find his equal. And, as I never attempt very elaborate dinners, he cooks and serves for a party of six in very good shape. We are not much in haste down here after six, because it’s so still and quiet. The hurry’s gone up-town to the social slaves. Suppose you stay and try his skill at lunch to-day? My partners generally are with me, and Jenifer always has something good for them.”

“By all means,” said Watts.

But Leonore said: “No. We mustn’t make a nuisance of ourselves the first time we come.” Peter and Watts tried to persuade her, but she was not persuadable. Leonore had no intention, no matter how good a time it meant, of lunching sola with four men.

“I think we must be going,” she said.

“You mustn’t go without seeing the rest of my quarters,” said Peter, hoping to prolong the visit.

Leonore was complaisant to that extent. So they went into the pantry, and Leonore proceeded, apparently, to show her absolute ignorance of food matters under the pretext that she was displaying great housekeeping knowledge. She told Peter that he ought to keep his champagne on ice. “That champagne will spoil if it isn’t kept on ice.” She complained because some bottles of Burgundy had dust on them. “That’s not merely untidy,” she said, “but it’s bad for the wine. It ought to be stood on end, so that the sediment can settle.” She criticised the fact that a brace of canvas-backs were on ice. “All your game should be hung,” she said. She put her finger or her eyes into every drawer and cupboard, and found nothing to praise. She was absolutely grave over it, but before long Peter saw the joke and entered into it. It was wonderful how good some of the things that she touched tasted later.

Then they went into Peter’s sleeping-room, Leonore said it was very ordinary, but promptly found two things to interest her.

“Do you take care of your window flowers?”

“No, Mrs. Costell comes down to lunch with me once a week, and potters with them. She keeps all the windows full of flowers—perhaps you have noticed them in the other rooms, as well?”

“Yes. I liked them, but I didn’t think they could be yours. They grow too well for a man.”

“It seems as if Mrs. Costell had only to look at a plant, and it breaks out blossoming,” Peter replied.

“What a nice speech,” said Leonore.

“It’s on a nice subject,” Peter told her. “When you have that, it’s very easy to make a nice speech.”

“I want to meet Mrs. Costell. I’ve heard all about her.”

The second point of interest concerned the contents of what had evidently been planned as an umbrella-stand.

“Why do you have three swords?” she asked, taking the handsomest from its resting place.

“So that I can kill more people.”

“Why, Dot, you ought to know that an officer wants a service sword and a dress-sword.”

“But these are all dress-swords. I’m afraid you are very proud of your majorship.”

Peter only smiled a reply down at her.

“Yes,” said Leonore, “I have found out your weakness at last. You like gold lace and fixings.”

Still Peter only smiled.

“This sword is presented to Captain Peter Stirling in recognition of his gallant conduct at Hornellsville, July 25, 1877,” Leonore read on the scabbard. “What did you do at Hornellsville?”

“Various things.”

“But what did you do to get the sword?”

“My duty!”

“Tell me?”

“I thought you knew all about me.”

“I don’t know this.”

Peter only smiled at her.

“Tell me. If you don’t, somebody else will. Please.”

“Why, Dot, these are all presentation swords.”

“Yes,” said Peter; “and so gorgeous that I don’t dare use them. I keep the swords I wear at the armory.”

“Are you going to tell me what you did to get them?”

“That one was given me by my company when I was made captain. That was subscribed for by some friends. The one you have was given me by a railroad.”

“For what?”

“For doing my duty.”

“Come, papa. We’ll go home.”

Peter surrendered. “There were some substitutes for strikers in freight cars that were fitted up with bunks. The strikers fastened the doors on them, and pushed them into a car-shed.”

“And what did you do?”

“We rolled the cars back.”

“I don’t think that was much. Nothing to give a sword for. Now, have you anything more to show us?”

“No. I have a spare room, and Jenifer has a kitchen and sleeping place beyond, but they are not worth showing.”

They went out into the little square hall, and so into the study. Leonore began unfolding her gloves.

“I’ve had a very nice time,” she said. “I think I shall come again very often, I like down-town New York.” Leonore was making her first trip to it, so that she spoke from vast knowledge.

“I can’t tell you how pleasant it has been to me. It isn’t often that such sunshine gets in here,” said Peter.

“Then you do prefer sunshine to grimy old law books?” inquired Leonore, smiling demurely.

“Some sunshine,” said Peter, meaningly.

“Wherever there has been sunshine there ought to be lots of flowers. I have a good mind—yes, I will—leave you these violets,” Leonore took a little bunch that she had worn near her throat and put them and her hand in Peter’s. And she hadn’t put her glove on yet! Then she put her gloves on, and Peter shook hands. Then he remembered that he ought to see them to the elevator, so he took them out—and shook hands again. After that he concluded it was his duty to see them to the carriage—and he shook hands again.

Peter was not an experienced hand, but he was doing very well.