Part 11

THE pictures of far places had stirred him but slightly: but to travel with Annot, to see anything with Annot, would offer continual amusement and surprise; her vigorous candor, her freedom from sham and petty considerations, enveloped the most commonplace perspectives in an atmosphere of high novelty. The trace of the vagabond, the detachment of the born dweller in tents, woven so picturesquely through his being, responded to her careless indifference to the tyranny of an established and timid scheme of existence.

The following day her old, bright hardness had returned: she railed at him in French, in German, in Italian; she called him the solemn shover, Sir Anthony Absolute. And, holding Thomas Huxley's head directed toward him, recommended that resigned quadruped to emulate Anthony's austere and inflexible virtues.

XLVII

BUT there was no trace of gayety in the excited and subdued tones in which, later, she called him into the hothouse. He found her bending tense with emotion over the row of plants upon whose flowering such incalculable things depended. “Look!” she cried, taking his hand and drawing him down over the green shoots, where his cheek brushed her hair, where he felt the warm stir of her breathing. “Look! they are in full bud, to-morrow they will burst open.” She straightened up, his hand still held in hers, and a shadow fell upon her vivid countenance. “If his reasoning is wrong, this experiment... like all the others, it will kill him. They _must_ be white, it would be too cruel, too senseless not. I am afraid,” she said simply; “nature is so terrible, a Juggernaut, crushing everything to dust beneath its wheeling centuries. I am glad that you are here, Anthony.” She drew closer to him; her breast swelled in a sharp, tempestuous breath.

“I have been lonelier than I--I realized. I am dreadfully worried about father. They have lied to me; things are worse, I can see that. You have to dress him like a child; I know how considerate you are; you are bright, new gold with the clearest ring in the world.

“We must get a real chauffeur; you have never been that... in my thoughts. You know,” she laughed happily, “I said in the beginning that you were a miserable affair in details of that kind.”

A feeling of guilt rose swiftly within him, which, unwilling to acknowledge, he strove to beat down from his thoughts. But, above his endeavor, grew the clear conviction that he should immediately tell Annot his purpose in driving Rufus Hardinge's car. He must not victimize her generosity, nor take profit from the friendship she offered him so unreservedly. He was dimly conscious that the revelation of his design would end the pleasant intimacy growing up between them; the mere mention of Eliza must destroy their happy relations; girls, even Annot, were like that.

He wondered, suddenly cold, if this spelled disloyalty to Eliza! but he angrily refuted that whispered insinuation. His love for Eliza was as un-assailably above all other considerations as she herself shone starlike over a petty, stumbling humanity. White and withdrawn and fine she inhabited the skies of his aspirations. He endeavored now to capture her in his imagination, his memory; and she smiled at him palely, as from a very great distance. He realized that in the past few days he had not had that subtle sense of her nearness, he had not been conscious of that drifting odor of lilacs; and suddenly he felt impoverished, alone.

Annot smiled, warm and near.

“You are awfully kind,” he temporized; “but hadn't we better let the thing stand as it is? You see--I want money.”

“But you may have that now; whatever you want.”

“No. You are so good, it's hard to explain--I want money that I earn; real money; I couldn't think of taking any other from you.”

“Anthony, my good bourgeois! I had thought you quite without that sort of tin pride. Besides, I am not giving it to you; after all it's father's to use as he likes.”

“But I must give him something for it--”

“Do you suppose you are giving us nothing?” she interrupted him warmly; “you have brought us your clear, beautiful spirits, absolutely without price. Why, you can make father laugh; have you any idea how rarely he did that? When you imitate Margaret absolutely I can see her fat, white stockings. And your marvellous unworldliness--” she shook her head mournfully. “I fear that this is mere calculation; surely you must know the value of your innocent charms.” Anthony stood with a lowered head, floundering mentally among his warring inclinations; when, almost with relief, he saw that she had noiselessly vanished.

XLVIII

HE slept uneasily, and woke abruptly to a room flooded with sunlight, and an unaccountable sense of something gone wrong. He dressed hurriedly, and had opened his door, when he heard his name called from below. It was Annot, he knew, but her voice was strange, terrified--a helpless cry new to her accustomed poise. “Anthony! Anthony!” she called from the conservatory.

Rufus Hardinge, who, it was evident from his clothes had not been in bed, was standing rigidly before the row of plants upon whose flowering they had so intently waited. And, in a rapid glance, Anthony saw that they had blossomed in delicate, parti-colored petals--some pale lavender, others deep purple, still others reddish white. Annoys yellow wrap was thrown carelessly about her nightgown, her feet were bare, and her hair hung in a tangle about her blanched face.

When Anthony entered she clung to his arm, and he saw that she was trembling violently. For a tense moment they were silent: the sun streamed over the mathematical plant ranks and lit the white or blue tickets tied to their stems; a bubbling chorus of birds filled the world of leaves without. “It's all wrong,” she sobbed.

“So!” the biologist finally said with a wry smile; “you see that I have not solved the riddle of the universe; inheritance in pure line is not explicated.... A life of labor as void as any prostitute's; not a single fact, not a supposition warranted, not a foot advanced.”

With a sudden and violent movement for which they were entirely unprepared he swept the row of plants crashing upon the floor; where, in a scattered heap of brown loam, broken pottery, smeared bloom, their tenuous, pallid roots quivered in air. “Games with plants and animals and bones for elderly children; riddles without answer... blind ways.” His expression grew furtive, cunning. “I have been trifled with,” he declared, “I have been deliberately misled; but I desire to say that I see through--through Him: I comprehend His little joke. It's in bad taste... to leave a soul in the dark, blundering about in the cellar with the table spread above. But in the end I was not completely bamboozled. He was not quick enough... the hem of His garment.

“Your mother saw Him clear. She was considered beautiful, but beauty's a vague term. Perhaps if I saw her now it would be clearer to me. But I'll tell you His little joke,” he lowered his voice confidentially--“it's all true--that apocalyptical heaven; there's a big book, trumpets, angels all complete singing Gregorian chants. What a sell!” He laughed, a gritty, mirthless performance.

“Come up to your room, father,” Annot urged; “his arm, Anthony.” Anthony placed his hand gently upon the biologist's shoulder, but the latter wrenched himself free. Suddenly with a choked cry and arms swinging like flails he launched himself upon the orderly plants. Before he could be stopped row upon row splintered on the floor; he fought, struggled with them as though they were animate opponents, cursed them in a high, raving voice. Anthony quickly lifted him, pinning his arms to his sides. Annot had turned away, her shoulders shaking with sobs.

Rufus Hardinge's struggling unexpectedly ceased, his countenance regained completely its habitual quietude. “I shall begin once more, at the beginning,” he whispered infinitely wistful. “The little ray of light... germ of understanding. The scientific problem of the future,” his speech became labored, thick, “scientific... future. Other avenue of progress:

“Gentlemen, the Royal Society, a paper on, on--Tears, gentlemen... not only automatic,” his voice sank to a mere incomprehensible babble. Anthony carried him to his bed, while Annot telephoned for the neurologist.

After the specialist had gone Annot came in to where Anthony waited in the study. Her feet were thrust in the Turkish slippers, her hair twisted into a hasty knot, but otherwise she had not changed. She came swiftly, with pale lips and eyes brilliantly shining from dark hollows, to his side. “His wonderful brain is dead,” she told him. “Professor Jamison thinks there will be only a few empty years to the end. But actually it's all over.” In a manner utterly incomprehensible to him she was crying softly in his arms.

He must lead her to a chair, he told himself, release her at once. Yet she remained with her warm, young body pressed against him, the circle of her arms about his neck, her tears wet upon his cheek. He stepped back, but she would have fallen if he had not continued to support her. His brain whirled under the assault, the surrender, of her dynamic youth. Their mouths met; were bruised in kissing.

XLIX

HE stood with bowed shoulders, twisting lips; and, after a momentary pause, she fled from the room. Cold waves of self-hatred flowed over him--he had taken a despicable advantage of her grief. The pleasant fabric of the past, unthinking days, the new materialism with its comfortable freedom from restraint, crumbled from an old, old skeleton whose moldering lines spelled the death of all--his heart knew--that was high, desirable, immaculate. He wondered if, like Rufus Hardinge, his understanding had come too late. But, in the re-surge of his adoration for Eliza, infinitely more beautiful and serene from the pit out of which he sped his vision, he was possessed by the conviction that nothing created nor void should extinguish the bright flame of his passion, hold them separate.

In the midst of his turmoil he recalled Eliza with relief, with delight, with tumultuous longing. He soared on the wings of his ecstasy; but descended abruptly to the practical necessities which confronted him. He must leave the Hardinges immediately; with a swift touch of the humorous spirit native to him, he realized that again he would be without money. Then more seriously he considered his coming interview with Annot.

The house was charged with the vague unrest, the strange aspect of familiar things, wrought by serious illness. Luncheon was disorganized, Annot was late. She was pale, but, under an obvious concern, she radiated a suppressed content. She laid a letter before Anthony. “Registered,” she told him. “I signed.” It was, he saw, from his father, and he slipped it into his pocket, intent upon the explanation which lay before him. It would be more difficult even than he had anticipated: Annot spoke of the near prospect of a Mediterranean trip, if Rufus Hardinge rallied sufficiently. “He is as contented and gentle as a nice old lady,” she reported; then, with a subtle expansion of manner, “it will be such fun--I shall take you by the hand, 'This, my good infant, is one of Virgil's final resting places....'”

“That would be splendid,” he acknowledged, “but I'm afraid that I sha'n't be able to go. The fact is that--that I had better leave you. I can't take your money for... for....”

She glanced at him swiftly, under the shadow of a frown, then shook her head at him. “That tiresome money again! It's a strange thing for you to insist on; material considerations are ordinarily as far as possible from your thoughts. I forbid you absolutely to mention it again; every time you do I shall punish you--I shall present you with a humiliating gold piece in person.”

“I should be all kinds of a trimmer to take advantage of your goodness. No, I must go--” The gay warmth evaporated from her countenance as abruptly as though it had been congealed in a sudden icy breath; she sat motionless, upright, enveloping him in the bright resentment of her gaze.

“And I must ask you to forgive me for... for this morning,” he stumbled hastily on.

The resentment burned into a clear flame of angry contempt. “'For this morning!' because I kissed you?”

He made a vehement gesture of denial. “Oh, no!” But she would not allow him to finish. “But I did,” she announced in a hard, determined voice. “It isn't necessary for you to be polite; I don't care a damn for that sickening sort of thing. I did, and you are properly and modestly retreating. I believe that you think I am--'designing,' isn't that the word? that you might have to marry me. A kiss, I am to realize, is something sacred. Bah! you make me ill, like almost everything else in life.

“If you think for a minute that it was anything more than the expression of a passing impulse you are beyond words. And, if it had been more, you--you violet, I wouldn't marry you; I wouldn't marry any man, ever! ever! ever! I might have gone to Italy with you, but probably come home with some one else--will that get into your pretty prejudices?”

“If you had gone to Italy with me,” he declared sullenly, “you would never have come home with anybody else.”

“That sort of thing has been dismissed to the smaller rural towns and the cheap melodramas; it's no longer considered elevated to talk like that, but only pitiful. You will start next on 'God's noblest creation,' and purity, and the females of your family. Don't you know, haven't you been told, that the primitive religious rubbish about marriage has been laughed out of existence? Did you dream that I wanted to _keep_ you? or that I would allow you to keep me after the thing had got stale? It makes me cold all over to be so frightfully misunderstood. Oh, its unthinkable! Fi, to kiss you! wasn't it loose of me?”

Her contemptuous periods stung him in a thousand minute places. “I told you,” he retorted hotly, “that I wanted to make money; I don't want it given to me; it's for my wedding.”

“Of course, how stupid of me not to have guessed--the lips sacred to her,” her own trembled ever so slightly, but her scornful attitude, her direct, bright gaze, were maintained, “A knight errant adventuring for a village queen with her handkerchief in his sleeve and tempted by the inevitable Kundry.”

He settled himself to weathering this feminine storm; he owed her all the relief to be found in words. “I wanted the money to go West,” he particularized further. “There's a position waiting for me--”

“It's all very chaste,” she told him, “but terribly commonplace. I think that I don't care to hear the details.” She addressed herself to what remained of the luncheon. “Have some more sauce,” she advised coolly, then rang. “The pudding, Jane,” she directed.

“You have been wonderfully kind--” he began. But she halted him abruptly. “We'll drop all that,” she pronounced, and deliberately lit a cigarette.

A genuine admiration for her possessed Anthony; he recognized that she was extraordinarily good to look at; he had had no idea that so vigorous a spirit could have burned behind a becoming dress by Paret. He realized with a faint regret, eminently masculine, that other men, men of moment, would find her irresistibly attractive. Already it seemed incredible that she had ever been familiar, intimate, tender, with him.

“You will be wanting to leave,” she said, rising; “--whenever you like. I have written for a--a chauffeur. I think you should have, it's twenty-five dollars, isn't it?”

“Not twenty-five cents,” he returned.

“I shouldn't like to force your delicate sensibilities.” She left the room. He caught a last glimpse of her firm, young profile; her shining, coppery hair; her supple, upright carriage.

L

IN his room he assembled the battered clothing in which Rufus Hardinge had discovered him, preparatory to changing from his present more elaborate garb, but a sudden realization of the triviality of that course, born of the memory of Annot's broad disposition, halted him midway. Making a hasty bundle of his personal belongings he descended from the tower room. Through an open door he could see the still, white face of the biologist looming from a pillow, and the trim form of a nurse.

Thomas Huxley lay somnolently on the porch, beside Annot's coffee-colored wicker chair and a yellow paper book which bore a title in French. He paused on the street, gazing back, and recalled his first view of the four-square, ugly house in its coat of mustard-colored paint, the grey, dripping cupids of the fountain, the unknown girl with yellow silk stockings. Already he seemed to have crossed the gulf which divided it all from the present: its significance faded, its solidity dissolved, dropped behind, like a scene viewed from a car window. He turned, obsessed by the old, familiar impatience to hurry forward, the feeling that all time, all energy, all plans and thoughts, were vain that did not lead directly to----

A sudden and unaccountable sensation of cold swept over him, a profound emotion stirring in response to an obscure, a hidden cause. Then, with a rush, returned the feeling of Eliza's nearness: he _heard_ her, the little, indefinable noises of her moving; he felt the unmistakable thrill which she alone brought. There was a vivid sense of her hand hovering above his shoulder; her fingers _must_ descend, rest warmly.... God! how did she get here. He whirled about... nothing against the low stone-wall that bounded a sleepy garden, nothing in the paved perspective of the sunny street! He stood shaken, half terrified, miserable. He had never felt her nearness so poignantly; her distant potency had never before so mocked his hungering nerves.

Then, with the cold chilling him like a breath from an icy vault, he heard her, beyond all question, beyond all doubt:

“Anthony!” she called. “Anthony!” From somewhere ahead of him her tones sounded thin and clear; they seemed to reach him dropping from a window, lingering, neither grave nor gay, but tenderly secure, upon his hearing. He broke into a clattering run over the bricks of the unremarkable street, but soon slowed awkwardly into a walk, jeering at his fancy, his laboring heart, his mad credulity. And then, drifting across his bewildered senses, came the illusive, the penetrating, the remembered odor of lilacs, like a whisper, a promise, a magic caress.

LI

IT was with a puzzled frown that Anthony halted in the heart of the city and considered his present resources, his future, possible plans. He had three dollars and some small silver left from the Hardinges, and he regarded with skepticism the profession of chauffeur; he would rather adventure the heavier work of the garages. As the afternoon was far advanced he decided to defer his search until the following morning; and he was absorbed within the gaudy maw of a moving picture theater.

Later, he entered an elaborate maze of mirrors, where, apparently, a sheaf of Susannas unconsciously exhibited their diminishing, anatomical charms to a procession of elders advancing two by two through a perspective of sycamores.--At the bar, his glass of beer supported by two fried oysters, a sandwich and a saucer of salted almonds, he reflected upon the slough of sterility that had fastened upon his feet: something must be accomplished, decisive, immediate.

He was proceeding toward the entrance when the familiar aspect of a back brought him to a halt. The back moved, turned, and resolved into the features of Thomas Addington Meredith. The mutual, surprised recognition was followed by a greeting of friendly slaps, queries, the necessity for instant, additional beers, and they found a place at a small, polished table.

He was surprised to discover Tom Meredith the same foxy-faced boy he had left in Doctor Allhop's drugstore... it seemed to Anthony that an incalculable time had passed since the breaking of the bottles of perfume; he felt himself to be infinitely changed, older, and the other his junior by decades of experience and a vast accumulation of worldly knowledge, contact with men, women, and events. Tom's raiment did not seem so princely as it had aforetime; the ruby reputed to be the gift of a married woman, was obviously meretricious, the gold timepiece merely commonplace. But Anthony was unaffectedly glad to see him, to discuss homely, familiar topics, repeat affectionately the names of favorite localities, persons.

“I'm in a bonding house here,” Tom explained upon Anthony's query. “Nothing in Ellerton for _me_. What are you doing?”

“Nothing, until to-morrow, when I think I'll get something in one of the garages.” He thrust his hands negligently into his pockets, and came in contact with his father's forgotten letter. He opened it, gazing curiously at the words: “My dear Son,” when Tom, with an exclamation, bent and recovered a piece of yellow paper that had fallen from the envelope. “Is this all you think of these?” he demanded, placing a fifty dollar bill upon the table.

Anthony read the letter with growing incredulous wonder and joy. He looked up with burning cheeks at his companion. “Remember old Mrs. Bosbyshell?” he questioned in an eager voice. “I used to carry wood, do odd jobs, for her: well, she's dead, and left me--what do you think!--father says about forty-seven thousand dollars. It's there, waiting for me, in Ellerton.”

Suddenly he forgot Thomas Meredith, the glittering saloon, the diminishing perspective of Susannas--he saw Eliza smiling at him out of the dusk, with her arms full of white lilacs. With an unsteady pounding of his heart, a tightening of the throat, he realized that, miraculously, the happiness which he had imagined so far removed in the uncertain future had been brought to him now, to the immediate present. He could take a train at once and go to her. The waiting was over. The immeasurable joy that flooded him deepened to a great chord of happiness that vibrated highly through him. He folded the letter gravely, thoughtfully. It was but a few hours to Ellerton by train, he knew, but he doubted the possibility of a night connection to that sequestered town. He would go in the morning.

“Thomas,” he declared, “I am about to purchase you the best dinner that champagne can shoot into your debased middle. Oh, no, not here, but in a real place where you can catch your own fish and shoot a pheasant out of a painted tree.”

Thus pleasantly apostrophized that individual led Anthony to the Della Robbia room of an elaborate hostelry, where they studied the _carte de jour_ amid pink tiling and porphyry. There was a rosy flush of shaded lights over snowy linen in the long, high chamber, the subdued passage of waiters like silhouettes, low laughter, and a throbbing strain of violins falling from a balcony above their heads. They pondered nonchalantly the strange names, elaborate sauces; but were finally launched upon suave cocktails and clams. Anthony settled back into a glow of well-being, of the tranquillity that precedes an expected, secure joy. He saluted the champagne bucket by the table; when, suddenly, the necessity to speak of Eliza overcame him, he wished to hear her name pronounced by other lips... perhaps he would tell Tom all; he was the best of fellows....

“Are the Dreens home?” he asked negligently. “Have you seen Eliza Dreen about--you know with that soft, shiny hair?”

Thomas Meredith directed at him a glance of careless surprise. “Why,” he answered, “I thought you knew; it seemed to me she died before you left. Anyhow, it was about the same time, it must have been the next week. Pneumonia. This soup's great, Anthony.”

LII