Chapter 16

This ceremony proceeded while the Cupania made her way up the Narrows, and into the North River, where the flare of lights from the crazy steeps and cliffs of architecture on the New York shore seemed a persistence of the last Fourth of July pyrotechnics. March blushed for the grotesque splendor of the spectacle, and was confounded to find some Englishmen admiring it, till he remembered that aesthetics were not the strong point of our race. His wife sat hand in hand with Miss Triscoe, and from time to time made him count the pieces of small baggage in the keeping of their steward; while General Triscoe held aloof in a sarcastic calm.

The steamer groped into her dock; the gangways were lifted to her side; the passengers fumbled and stumbled down their incline, and at the bottom the Marches found themselves respectively in the arms of their son and daughter. They all began talking at once, and ignoring and trying to remember the Triscoes to whom the young Marches were presented. Bella did her best to be polite to Agatha, and Tom offered to get an inspector for the general at the same time as for his father. Then March, remorsefully remembered the Eltwins, and looked about for them, so that his son might get them an inspector too. He found the major already in the hands of an inspector, who was passing all his pieces after carelessly looking into one: the official who received the declarations on board had noted a Grand Army button like his own in the major's lapel, and had marked his fellow-veteran's paper with the mystic sign which procures for the bearer the honor of being promptly treated as a smuggler, while the less favored have to wait longer for this indignity at the hands of their government. When March's own inspector came he was as civil and lenient as our hateful law allows; when he had finished March tried to put a bank-note in his hand, and was brought to a just shame by his refusal of it. The bed-room steward keeping guard over the baggage helped put-it together after the search, and protested that March had feed him so handsomely that he would stay there with it as long as they wished. This partly restored March's self-respect, and he could share in General Triscoe's indignation with the Treasury ruling which obliged him to pay duty on his own purchases in excess of the hundred-dollar limit, though his daughter had brought nothing, and they jointly came far within the limit for two.

He found that the Triscoes were going to a quiet old hotel on the way to Stuyvesant Square, quite in his own neighborhood, and he quickly arranged for all the ladies and the general to drive together while he was to follow with his son on foot and by car. They got away from the scene of the customs' havoc while the steamer shed, with its vast darkness dimly lit by its many lamps, still showed like a battle-field where the inspectors groped among the scattered baggage like details from the victorious army searching for the wounded. His son clapped him on the shoulder when he suggested this notion, and said he was the same old father; and they got home as gayly together as the dispiriting influences of the New York ugliness would permit. It was still in those good and decent times, now so remote, when the city got something for the money paid out to keep its streets clean, and those they passed through were not foul but merely mean.

The ignoble effect culminated when they came into Broadway, and found its sidewalks, at an hour when those of any European metropolis would have been brilliant with life, as unpeopled as those of a minor country town, while long processions of cable-cars carted heaps of men and women up and down the thoroughfare amidst the deformities of the architecture.

The next morning the March family breakfasted late after an evening prolonged beyond midnight in spite of half-hourly agreements that now they must really all go to bed. The children had both to recognize again and again how well their parents were looking; Tom had to tell his father about the condition of 'Every Other Week'; Bella had to explain to her mother how sorry her husband was that he could not come on to meet them with her, but was coming a week later to take her home, and then she would know the reason why they could not all, go back to Chicago with him: it was just the place for her father to live, for everybody to live. At breakfast she renewed the reasoning with which she had maintained her position the night before; the travellers entered into a full expression of their joy at being home again; March asked what had become of that stray parrot which they had left in the tree-top the morning they started; and Mrs. March declared that this was the last Silver Wedding Journey she ever wished to take, and tried to convince them all that she had been on the verge of nervous collapse when she reached the ship. They sat at table till she discovered that it was very nearly eleven o'clock, and said it was disgraceful.

Before they rose, there was a ring at the door, and a card was brought in to Tom. He glanced at it, and said to his father, "Oh, yes! This man has been haunting the office for the last three days. He's got to leave to-day, and as it seemed to be rather a case of life and death with him, I said he'd probably find you here this morning. But if you don't want to see him, I can put him off till afternoon, I suppose."

He tossed the card to his father, who looked at it quietly, and then gave it to his wife. "Perhaps I'd as well see him?"

"See him!" she returned in accents in which all the intensity of her soul was centred. By an effort of self-control which no words can convey a just sense of she remained with her children, while her husband with a laugh more teasing than can be imagined went into the drawing-room to meet Burnamy.

The poor fellow was in an effect of belated summer as to clothes, and he looked not merely haggard but shabby. He made an effort for dignity as well as gayety, however, in stating himself to March, with many apologies for his persistency. But, he said, he was on his way West, and he was anxious to know whether there was any chance of his 'Kasper Hauler' paper being taken if he finished it up. March would have been a far harder-hearted editor than he was, if he could have discouraged the suppliant before him. He said he would take the Kasper Hauler paper and add a band of music to the usual rate of ten dollars a thousand words. Then Burnamy's dignity gave way, if not his gayety; he began to laugh, and suddenly he broke down and confessed that he had come home in the steerage; and was at his last cent, beyond his fare to Chicago. His straw hat looked like a withered leaf in the light of his sad facts; his thin overcoat affected March's imagination as something like the diaphanous cast shell of a locust, hopelessly resumed for comfort at the approach of autumn. He made Burnamy sit down, after he had once risen, and he told him of Major Eltwin's wish to see him; and he promised to go round with him to the major's hotel before the Eltwins left town that afternoon.

While he prolonged the interview in this way, Mrs. March was kept from breaking in upon them only by the psychical experiment which she was making with the help and sympathy of her daughter at the window of the dining-room which looked up Sixteenth Street. At the first hint she gave of the emotional situation which Burnamy was a main part of, her son; with the brutal contempt of young men for other young men's love affairs, said he must go to the office; he bade his mother tell his father there was no need of his coming down that day, and he left the two women together. This gave the mother a chance to develop the whole fact to the daughter with telegrammic rapidity and brevity, and then to enrich the first-outline with innumerable details, while they both remained at the window, and Mrs. March said at two-minutely intervals, with no sense of iteration for either of them, "I told her to come in the morning, if she felt like it, and I know she will. But if she doesn't, I shall say there is nothing in fate, or Providence either. At any rate I'm going to stay here and keep longing for her, and we'll see whether there's anything in that silly theory of your father's. I don't believe there is," she said, to be on the safe side.

Even when she saw Agatha Triscoe enter the park gate on Rutherford Place, she saved herself from disappointment by declaring that she was not coming across to their house. As the girl persisted in coming and coming, and at last came so near that she caught sight of Mrs. March at the window and nodded, the mother turned ungratefully upon her daughter, and drove her away to her own room, so that no society detail should hinder the divine chance. She went to the door herself when Agatha rang, and then she was going to open the way into the parlor where March was still closeted with Burnamy, and pretend that she had not known they were there. But a soberer second thought than this prevailed, and she told the girl who it was that was within and explained the accident of his presence. "I think," she said nobly, "that you ought to have the chance of going away if you don't wish to meet him."

The girl, with that heroic precipitation which Mrs. March had noted in her from the first with regard to what she wanted to do, when Burnamy was in question, answered, "But I do wish to meet him, Mrs. March."

While they stood looking at each other, March came out to ask his wife if she would see Burnamy, and she permitted herself so much stratagem as to substitute Agatha, after catching her husband aside and subduing his proposed greeting of the girl to a hasty handshake.

Half an hour later she thought it time to join the young people, urged largely by the frantic interest of her daughter. But she returned from the half-open door without entering. "I couldn't bring myself to break in on the poor things. They are standing at the window together looking over at St. George's."

Bella silently clasped her hands. March gave cynical laugh, and said, "Well we are in for it, my dear." Then he added, "I hope they'll take us with them on their Silver Wedding Journey."

PG EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:

Declare that they had nothing to declare Despair which any perfection inspires Disingenuous, hypocritical passion of love Fundamentally incapable of taking anything seriously Held aloof in a sarcastic calm Illusions: no marriage can be perfect without them Married life: we expect too much of each other Not do to be perfectly frank with one's own country Offence which any difference of taste was apt to give him Passionate desire for excess in a bad thing Puddles of the paths were drying up with the haste Race seemed so often without philosophy Self-sacrifice which could be had, as it were, at a bargain She always came to his defence when he accused himself

PG EDITORS BOOKMARKS FOR THE COMPLETE TRILOGY:

Affected absence of mind Affectional habit All the loveliness that exists outside of you, dearest is little All luckiest or the unluckiest, the healthiest or the sickest Americans are hungrier for royalty than anybody else Amusing world, if you do not refuse to be amused Anticipative homesickness Anticipative reprisal Any sort of stuff was good enough to make a preacher out of Appearance made him doubt their ability to pay so much Artists never do anything like other people As much of his story as he meant to tell without prompting At heart every man is a smuggler Bad wars, or what are comically called good wars Ballast of her instinctive despondency Be good, sweet man, and let who will be clever Beautiful with the radiance of loving and being loved Bewildering labyrinth of error Biggest place is always the kindest as well as the cruelest Brag of his wife, as a good husband always does Brown-stone fronts But when we make that money here, no one loses it Buttoned about him as if it concealed a bad conscience Calm of those who have logic on their side Civilly protested and consented Clinging persistence of such natures Coldly and inaccessibly vigilant Collective silence which passes for sociality Comfort of the critical attitude Conscience weakens to the need that isn't Considerable comfort in holding him accountable Courage hadn't been put to the test Courtship Deadly summer day Death is peace and pardon Death is an exile that no remorse and no love can reach Decided not to let the facts betray themselves by chance Declare that they had nothing to declare Despair which any perfection inspires Did not idealize him, but in the highest effect she realized him Dinner unites the idea of pleasure and duty Disingenuous, hypocritical passion of love Dividend: It's a chicken before it's hatched Does any one deserve happiness Does anything from without change us? Dog that had plainly made up his mind to go mad Effort to get on common ground with an inferior Europe, where society has them, as it were, in a translation Evil which will not let a man forgive his victim Explained perhaps too fully Extract what consolation lurks in the irreparable Family buryin' grounds Favorite stock of his go up and go down under the betting Feeblest-minded are sure to lead the talk Feeling rather ashamed,--for he had laughed too Feeling of contempt for his unambitious destination Flavors not very sharply distinguished from one another Fundamentally incapable of taking anything seriously Futility of travel Gayety, which lasted beyond any apparent reason for it Glad; which considering, they ceased to be Got their laugh out of too many things in life Guilty rapture of a deliberate dereliction Had learned not to censure the irretrievable Had no opinions that he was not ready to hold in abeyance Handsome pittance Happiness is so unreasonable Happiness built upon and hedged about with misery He expected to do the wrong thing when left to his own devices He buys my poverty and not my will Headache darkens the universe while it lasts Heart that forgives but does not forget Held aloof in a sarcastic calm Helplessness begets a sense of irresponsibility Helplessness accounts for many heroic facts in the world Hemmed round with this eternal darkness of death Homage which those who have not pay to those who have Honest selfishness Hopeful recklessness How much can a man honestly earn without wronging or oppressing Humanity may at last prevail over nationality Hurry up and git well--or something Hypothetical difficulty I cannot endure this--this hopefulness of yours I want to be sorry upon the easiest possible terms I supposed I had the pleasure of my wife's acquaintance I'm not afraid--I'm awfully demoralized If you dread harm enough it is less likely to happen Ignorant of her ignorance Illusions: no marriage can be perfect without them Impertinent prophecies of their enjoying it so much Indispensable Indulge safely in the pleasures of autobiography Intrepid fancy that they had confronted fate It had come as all such calamities come, from nothing It must be your despair that helps you to bear up It don't do any good to look at its drawbacks all the time It 's the same as a promise, your not saying you wouldn't Jesting mood in the face of all embarrassments Justice must be paid for at every step in fees and costs Less intrusive than if he had not been there Less certain of everything that I used to be sure of Life was like the life at a sea-side hotel, but more monotonous Life of the ship, like the life of the sea: a sodden monotony Life has taught him to truckle and trick Long life of holidays which is happy marriage Love of justice hurry them into sympathy with violence Made money and do not yet know that money has made them Madness of sight-seeing, which spoils travel Man's willingness to abide in the present Married life: we expect too much of each other Married the whole mystifying world of womankind Married for no other purpose than to avoid being an old maid Marry for love two or three times Monologue to which the wives of absent-minded men resign Muddy draught which impudently affected to be coffee Nervous woes of comfortable people Never-blooming shrub Never could have an emotion without desiring to analyze it Night so bad that it was worse than no night at all No man deserves to sufer at the hands of another No longer the gross appetite for novelty No right to burden our friends with our decisions Not do to be perfectly frank with one's own country Nothing so apt to end in mutual dislike,--except gratitude Nothing so sad to her as a bride, unless it's a young mother Novelists, who really have the charge of people's thinking Oblivion of sleep Offence which any difference of taste was apt to give him Only so much clothing as the law compelled Only one of them was to be desperate at a time Our age caricatures our youth Parkman Passionate desire for excess in a bad thing Patience with mediocrity putting on the style of genius Patronizing spirit of travellers in a foreign country People that have convictions are difficult Person talks about taking lessons, as if they could learn it Poverty as hopeless as any in the world Prices fixed by his remorse Puddles of the paths were drying up with the haste Race seemed so often without philosophy Recipes for dishes and diseases Reckless and culpable optimism Reconciliation with death which nature brings to life at last Rejoice in everything that I haven't done Rejoice as much at a non-marriage as a marriage Repeated the nothings they had said already Respect for your mind, but she don't think you've got any sense Say when he is gone that the woman gets along better without him Seemed the last phase of a world presently to be destroyed Seeming interested in points necessarily indifferent to him Self-sufficiency, without its vulgarity Self-sacrifice which could be had, as it were, at a bargain Servant of those he loved She always came to his defence when he accused himself She cares for him: that she was so cold shows that She could bear his sympathy, but not its expression Shouldn't ca' fo' the disgrace of bein' poo'--its inconvenience Sigh with which ladies recognize one another's martyrdom So hard to give up doing anything we have meant to do So old a world and groping still Society: All its favors are really bargains Sorry he hadn't asked more; that's human nature Suffering under the drip-drip of his innocent egotism Superstition that having and shining is the chief good Superstition of the romances that love is once for all That isn't very old--or not so old as it used to be The knowledge of your helplessness in any circumstances There is little proportion about either pain or pleasure They were so near in age, though they were ten years apart They can only do harm by an expression of sympathy Timidity of the elder in the presence of the younger man To do whatever one likes is finally to do nothing that one likes Took the world as she found it, and made the best of it Tragical character of heat Travel, with all its annoyances and fatigues Tried to be homesick for them, but failed Turn to their children's opinion with deference Typical anything else, is pretty difficult to find Unfounded hope that sooner or later the weather would be fine Used to having his decisions reached without his knowledge Vexed by a sense of his own pitifulness Voice of the common imbecility and incoherence Voting-cattle whom they bought and sold Wages are the measure of necessity and not of merit We get too much into the hands of other people We don't seem so much our own property Weariness of buying What we can be if we must When you look it--live it Wilful sufferers Willingness to find poetry in things around them Wish we didn't always recognize the facts as we do Without realizing his cruelty, treated as a child Woman harnessed with a dog to a cart Wooded with the precise, severely disciplined German forests Work he was so fond of and so weary of Would sacrifice his best friend to a phrase