DAVID'S ROSE AND SOME THORNS
"Now," said David, "if you'll just put away a few of those ancient pipes
and puddle your papers a bit in your own cozy corner we can call these
quarters ready to receive the ladies, God bless 'em! Does it look kinder
bare to you? We might borrow a few drapes from the madam, or would you
trust to the flowers? I'll send them up for you to fix around tasty.
A blasted poet ought to know how to bunch spinach to look well."
As he spoke David Kildare stood in the middle of the living-room in his
bachelor quarters, which were in the Colonial, a tall pillared, wide
windowed, white brick apartment-house that stood across the street from
the home of Major Buchanan, and surveyed the long rooms upon which he and
his man Eph had been expending their energies for more than an hour.
Andrew Sevier sank down upon the arm of a chair and lighted a long and
villainous pipe. "Trust to the flowers," he answered. "I think Phoebe
doesn't care for the drapes of this life so much as some women do and as
this is for her birthday let's have the flowers, sturdy ones with stiff
stems and good head pieces."
"That's right, Phoebe's nobody's clinging vine," answered David moodily.
"She doesn't want any trellis either--wish something would wilt her! Look
here, Andrew, on the square, what's the matter that I can't get Phoebe?
You're a regular love pilot on paper, point me another course; this one
is no good; I've run into a sand bank." The dark red forelock on David's
brow was ruffled and his keen eyes were troubled, while his large sweet
mouth was set in a straight firm line. He looked very strong, forceful
and determined as he stopped in front of his friend and squared himself
as if for a blow.
Andrew Sevier looked at him thoughtfully for a few seconds straight
between the eyes, then his mouth widened into an affectionate smile as he
laid his hand on the sturdy shoulder and said:
"Not a thing on God's green earth the matter with you, Davie; it's the
modernism of the situation that you seem unable to handle. May I use your
flower simile? Once they grew in gardens and were drooping and sweet and
overran trellises, to say nothing of clinging to oak trees, but we've
developed the American Beauty, old man! It stands stiff and glossy and
holds its head up on its own stem, the pride of the nation! We can get
them, though they come high. Ah, but they are sweet! Phoebe is one of the
most gorgeous to be found--it will be a price to pay, but you'll pay it,
David, you'll pay."
"God knows I'm paying it all day long every day and have been paying it
for ten years. Never at peace about her for an instant. Protection at
long distance is no joke. I can't sleep at night until she telephones me
she is at home from the office on her duty nights and then I have to beg
like a dog for the wire, just the word or two. She _will_ overwork and
undereat and--"
"David," interrupted Sevier thoughtfully, "what do you really think is
the matter? Let's get down to facts while we are about it."
"Do you know, Andy, lately it has dawned upon me that Phoebe would like
to dictate a life policy to me; hand me out a good, stiff life job. I
believe she would marry me to-morrow if she could see me permanently
installed on the front seat of a grocery wagon--_permanently_. And I'll
come to it yet."
"I believe you are right," laughed Andrew. "She really glories in her
wage earning; it's a phase of them these days. She would actually hate
living on your income."
"Don't I know it? I suppose she would be content if she sewed on buttons
and did the family wash to conserve the delivery wagon income. I wish
she'd marry me for love and then I'd hire her at hundreds per week to
dust around the house and cook pies for me, gladly, gladly."
"We've developed thorns with our new rose, Dave," chuckled Andrew as he
relighted his pipe.
"Sweet hope of heaven, yes," groaned David. "My gore drips all the time
from the gashes. I suppose it is a killing grief to her that I haven't a
star corporation practise instead of fooling around the criminal court
fighting old Taylor to get a square deal for the darky rag-tag most of my
time. But, Andy, it makes me blaze house-high to see the way he hands the
law out to 'em. They can cut and fight as long as it is in a whisky dive
and no indictment returned; but let one of 'em sidestep an inch in any
other ignorant pitiful way and it's the workhouse and the county road for
theirs.
"And the number of ways that the coons can get up to call on me to square
the deal, is amazing. Just look at the week I've had! All Monday and
Tuesday I spent on the Darky Country Club affair; the poor nigs just
hungering for some place to go off and act white in for a few hours.
Nobody would sell them an acre of ground near a car line and the dusky
smart set was about to get its light put out. Jeff and Tempie told me
about it. What did little Dave do but run around to persuade old man
Elton to sell them that little point that juts out into the river two
miles from town and just across from the rock quarry. No neighbors to
kick and the interurban runs through the field. It really is a choice
spot and I started their subscription with a hundred or two and got
Williams to draw them some plans to fix up an old house that stands on
the bank for a club-house. They are wide-mouthed with joy; but it sliced
two days to do it, which I might have spent on the grocery wagon."
"You always did have the making of a philanthropist in you, Dave," said
Andrew thoughtfully. "You're a near-one at present speaking."
"Philanthropist go hang--the rest of the week I have spent getting the
old Confeds together and having everything in shape for the unveiling of
the statue out at the Temple of Arts. I tell you we are going to have a
turn-out. General Clopton is coming all the way to make the dedication
speech. Caroline is about to bolt and I have to steady her at off times.
I've promised to hold her hand through it all. Major is getting up the
notes for General Clopton and he's touching on Peters Brown only in high
places. It'll be mostly a show-down of old General Darrah and the three
governors I'm thinking.
"The Dames of the Confederacy and the Art League are going to have
entries on the program without number. I have been interviewed and
interviewed. Why, even the august Susie Carrie Snow sent for me and
talked high art and city beautiful to me until I could taste it.
"And all that sopped up the rest of the week when I ought to have been
delivering pork steaks and string-beans at people's back doors to please
Phoebe. Money grubbing doesn't appeal to me and I don't need it, but from
now on I'm the busy grub--until after the 'no man put asunder'
proclamation."
"How you can manage to do one really public-spirited job after another,
'things that count,' and then elude all the credit for them is more than
I can understand, Dave," said Andrew as he smiled through a blue ring of
smoke. "Some day, if you don't look out, you'll be a leading citizen.
In the meantime hustle about those flowers. Time flies."
"I'll send them right up," said David as he donned his coat and hat and
took up his crop. The hours David spent out of the saddle were those of
his indoors occupations. "I'll be back soon. Just fix the flowers; Eph
and the cook will do all the rest. And put the cards on the table any
old way. I want to sit between Phoebe and Caroline Darrah Brown--well,
whose party is it? You can sit next on either side."
"Wait a minute, are--"
"No, I must hurry and go brace up Milly for a pair of minutes. She
wouldn't promise to come until I insisted on sending a trained nurse to
sit with old Mammy Betty and the babies until she got back to 'em. Billy
Bob is as wild as a kid about coming, he hasn't been anywhere for so
long. I talked a week before I could persuade Milly, but she's got her
glad rags and is as excited as Billy Bob. I tried to buy that boy twin
for Phoebe's present but Milly said I had better get an old silver and
amethyst bracelet. It's on my table in the white box. Bye!" and Kildare
departed as far as the front door, but returned to stick his head in the
door and say:
"You'd better put Hob by Caroline Darrah on the other side; he's savage
when he's crossed. And tack in Payt opposite her. I invited Polly the
Fluff for you--she is a débutante and such a coo-child that she'll just
suit a poet."
He dodged just in time to escape the lighted pipe that was hurled upon
him, and he couldn't have suspected that a hastily-formed plan to place
himself opposite Caroline Darrah had gone up in the smoke that followed
the death of life in Andrew's pipe.
Then following the urgent instructions of David, Andrew began to right up
the papers in his den which opened off the living-room. His desk was
littered with manuscript, for the three days past had been golden ones
and he had written under a strong impetus. The thought suddenly shot
through him that he had been writing as he had once read, to eyes whose
"depths on depths of luster" had misted and glowed and answered as he
turned his pages in the twilight. Can ice in a man's breast burn like
fire? Andrew crushed the sheets and thrust them into a drawer.
Then came Eph and the cook to lay the cloth in the dining-room, and a man
brought up the flowers. For a time he worked away with a strange
excitement in his veins.
When they had finished and he was alone in the apartment he walked slowly
through the rooms. Where David happened to keep his household gods had
been home to Andrew for many years. His books were in the dark Flemish
oak cases and some of the prints on the walls were his. Most of the rugs
he had picked up in his travels upon which his commissions led him, and
some interesting skins had been added since his jungle experiences. It
was all dark and rich and right-toned--the home of a gentleman. And David
was like the rooms, right-toned and clean.
Andrew found himself wondering if there would be men like David in the
next generation, happy David with his cavalier nature and modern wit. The
steady stream of wealth that was pouring into the South, down her
mountain sides and welling up under her pasture lands, would it bring in
its train death to the purity and sanity of her social institutions?
Would swollen fortunes bring congestion of standards and grossness of
morals? Suddenly he smiled for Billy Bob and Milly and a lot of the
industrious young folks seemed to answer him. He had found eleven little
new cousins on the scene of action when he had returned after five
years--clear-eyed young Anglo-Americans, ready to take charge of the
future.
And he, what was his place in the building of his native city? His
trained intelligence, his wide experience, his genius were being given to
cutting a canal thousands of miles away while the streets of his own home
were being cut up and undermined by half-trained bunglers. The beautiful
forest suburbs were being planned and plotted by money-mad schemers who
neither pre-visioned, nor cared to, the city of the future which was to
be a great gateway of the nation to its Panama world-artery. He knew how
to value the force of a man of his kind, with his reputation and
influence, and he would gage just what he would be able to do for the
city with the municipal backing he could command if he set his shoulder
to the wheel.
A talk he had had with the major a day or two ago came back to him. The
old fellow's eyes had glowed as he told him the plan they had been
obliged to abandon in the early seventies for a boulevard from the
capitol to the river because of the lack of city construction funds.
Andrew's own father had formulated the plan and gone before the city
fathers with it, and for a time there had been hope of its
accomplishment. And the major had declared emphatically that a time was
coming when the city would want and ask for it again. That other Andrew
Sevier of the major's youth had conceived the scheme; the major had
repeated the fact slowly. Did he mean it as a call to him?
Andrew's eyes glowed. He could see it all, with its difficulties and its
possibilities. He rested his clenched hand on the table and the artist in
him had the run of his pulses. He could see it all and he knew in all
humbleness that he could construct the town as no other man of his
generation would be able to do; the beautiful hill-rimmed city!
And just as potent he felt the call of the half-awakened spirit of art
and letters that had lain among them poverty-bound for forty
reconstructive years. For what had he been so richly dowered? To sing
his songs from the camp of a wanderer and write his plays with a foreign
flavor, when he might voice his own people in the world of letters, his
own with their background of traditions and tragedy and their foreground
of rough-hewn possibilities? Was not the meed of his fame, small or
large, theirs?
Suddenly the tension snapped and sadness chilled through his veins. Here
there would always be that memory which brought its influences of
bitterness and depression to kill the creative in him. The old mad desire
to be gone and away from it beat up into his blood, then stilled on the
instant. What was it that caught his breath in his breast at the thought
of exile? Could he go now, _could_--
Just at this moment he was interrupted by Mrs. Matilda who came hurrying
into the room with ribbons and veil aflutter. She evidently had only the
moment to stay and she took in his decorative schemes with the utmost
delight.
"Andrew," she said with enthusiasm in every tone, "it is all lovely,
lovely. You boys are wonders! These bachelor establishments are
threatening to make women wonder what they were born for. And what do you
think? The major is coming! The first place he has gone this winter--and
he wants to sit between Phoebe and Caroline Darrah. I just ran over to
tell you. Good-by! We must both dress."
And Andrew smiled as he rearranged the place-cards.
And it happened that in more ways than one David Kildare found himself
the perturbed host. He rushed home and dressed with lightning-like
rapidity and whirled away in the limousine for Milly and Billy Bob.
He went for them early, for he had bargained to come for Phoebe as late
as possible so as to give her time to reckon with her six-thirty
freckled-faced devil at the office. But at the Overtons he found
confusion confounded.
"I'm so sorry, David," Milly almost sobbed, "but Mammy Betty's daughter
has run away and got married and she has gone to see about it, and the
trained nurse can't come. There has been an awful wreck up the road and
all the doctors in town have gone and taken all the nurses with them. She
didn't consider the babies serious, so she just had some one telephone at
the last minute that she had gone. I can't go; but please make Billy go
with you! There is no use--" and she turned to Billy Bob who stood by in
pathetically gorgeous array, but firm in his intention not to desert the
home craft.
"We just can't make it, Dave, old man," he said manfully, as he caught
his tearful wife's outstretched hand in his. "Go on before we both cry!"
"Go on, nothing--with Milly looking like a lovely pink apple-blossom!
You've got to come. I wouldn't dare face Phoebe without you. It's the
whole thing to her to have you there. It's been so long since you've
gladded with the crowd once and it's her birthday and--" David's voice
trailed off into a perfect wail.
"But what can we do?" faltered Milly, dissolved at the mention of the new
frock. "We certainly can't leave them and we can't take them and--"
"Glory, that's the idea, let's _take_ the whole bunch!" exclaimed David
with radiant countenance. "I ought to have invited them in the first
place. Come on and let's begin to bundle!" and he made a dive in the
direction of the door of the nursery.
"Oh, no, indeed we can't!" gasped Milly while Billy Bob stood stricken,
unable to utter a word.
"I'll show you whether we will or not," answered David. "Catch me losing
a chance like this to ring one on Phoebe for several reasons. Hurry up!"
and as he spoke he had lifted little Mistake from his cot and was
dextrously winding him in his blanket. The youngster opened his big dewy
eyes and chuckled at the sight of his side partner, David Kildare.
"That's all right, he's all for his Uncle Davie. Here, you take him Billy
Bob and I'll help Milly roll up the twins. She can bring down Crimie
while I bring them," and as he spoke he began a rapid swathing of the two
limp little bodies from the white crib.
"But, David," gasped Milly, "it is _impossible_! They are not
dressed--they will take cold--"
"The limousine is as hot as smoke--can't hurt 'em--plenty of blankets,"
with which he thrust the nodding young Crimie into her arms and lifted
carefully the large bundle which contained both twins in his own. "Go
on!" he commanded the paralyzed pair. "I will pull the door to with my
free foot." And he actually forced the helpless parents of the four to
embark with him on this most unusual of adventures.
When they were all seated in the car Milly looked at Billy Bob and burst
into a gale of hysterical laughter. But Billy Bob's spunk was up by this
time and he was all on the side of the resourceful David.
"Why not?" he asked brazenly. "Nine-tenths of the people in the world
take the kids with them on all the frolics they get, why not we? _They_
know it's all right, _they_ haven't objected." And indeed there had not
been a single chirp from any of the swathings. Big Brother was the only
one awake and he was, as usual, entranced at the very sight of his Uncle
David, who held the twins with practised skill on his knees.
"Now," he said jubilantly, "don't anybody warn Phoebe and I'm going to
put them on the big divan with her presents. You'll see something crash,
I'm thinking."
And it was worth it all when Phoebe did see her unexpected guests. Big
Brother, divested of his blanket and clad in a pink Teddy Bear garment,
sat bolt upright in the center of the divan, and Crimie lay snuggled
against him with his thumb in his mouth and entranced eyes on the
brilliant chandelier. The twins were nestled contentedly down in the
corner together like two little kittens in a basket. Before them knelt
Polly with one finger clasped by the one whose golden fuzz declared her
to be Little Sister, while Caroline Darrah leaned over Big Brother who
was fingering a string of sapphires that fell from her neck, with obvious
delight. The rest of the party stood in an admiring and uproarious
circle.
"Why," exclaimed Phoebe in blank astonishment, "why David Kildare!"
"You said you wanted your most intimate friends to-night, Phoebe, and
here they are," he answered with pride in every tone of his voice.
"Oh, dearie," said Milly as she clasped Phoebe's hand, "we couldn't come
without them--everything happened wrong. I know it's awful and I ought to
take them right back now and--"
"David Kildare," said Phoebe as she divined in an instant the whole
situation, "I love--I love you for doing it," and she sank on her knees
by Caroline. Mistake let go the chain and bobbed forward to bestow a
moist kiss on this, his friend of long standing; and as he chuckled and
snuggled his little nose under her white chin Phoebe's echo was a sigh of
such absolute rapture that the whole circle shouted with glee.
And late as it was dinner was announced three times before the host or
the guests could be persuaded to think of food. And not until David's bed
was made ready for the little guests did they begin to make their way
into the dining-room. It was Andrew who finally insisted on carrying the
babes away and tucking them in--only Caroline went with him with Little
Sister in her arms and laid her gently on the pillow. She refused to lift
her eyes to him for so much as a half-second until he drew her chair from
the table for her; but then her shy glance was deep with innocent
tenderness.
"Now," said the major as they settled laughingly into their places,
"everybody's glass high to the silent guests!" And they drank his toast
with enthusiasm.
"And," added David Kildare as he set down his glass, "they needn't be
'silent guests' unless it suits them. When they want to rough-house they
know Uncle David's is the place to come to do it in."
"But let's hope they won't want to, David," laughed Milly, radiant with
excitement.
"I tell you what let's do," said the enlivened Hobson from the coveted
seat next Caroline Darrah Brown, "let's all give them hard sleeping
suggestions, all at the same time.... Maybe they won't wake up for a
week."
"Andrew," said Mrs. Buchanan as she looked with delight in his direction,
"these are delicious things you and David have to eat. I am so glad you
are well again and can enjoy them."
"Better go slow, Andy," called David from down the table. "Sure you don't
need a raw egg? Phoebe has a couple up her sleeve here she can lend you.
The major has persuaded her to take a bit of duck and some asparagus and
a brandied peach and--"
"David Kildare," said Phoebe in a coolly dangerous voice, "I will get
even with you for that if it takes me a week. This is the first thing I
have had to eat since meal before last and I lost two and a half pounds
last week. So I'll see that you--"
"Please, please, Phoebe, I'll be good! Just let me off this time. I'm
giddy from looking at you!" And before a delighted audience David Kildare
abased himself.
"Anyway, I've got news to relate," he hastened to offer by way of
propitiation. "What do you think has happened to Andrew? I didn't promise
not to tell," he drawled, prolonging the agony to its limit.
"Hurry, David, do!" exclaimed Phoebe with suspended fork. Caroline leaned
forward eagerly, while Andrew began a laughing protest.
"It's only that Hetherton is going to put the great Mainwright on in
Andy's new play in the fall--letter came to-day. Now, doesn't he shove
his pen to some form--some?" he demanded as he beamed upon his friend
with the greatest pride.
"Oh," said Caroline Darrah, "Mainwright is great enough to do
it--almost!"
A pulse of joy shot through Andrew as her excited eyes gleamed into his.
Of them all she and the major only had read his play and could
congratulate him really. He had turned to her instantly when David had
made his announcement, and she had answered him as instantly with her
delight.
"And Cousin Andy," asked Polly who sat next to him, "will I have to cry
at the third act? Please don't make me, it's so unbecoming. Why can't
people do all the wonderful things they do in plays without being so
mussy?"
"Child," jeered David Kildare as they all laughed, "don't you know a
heart-throb when you're up against it--er--beg pardon--I mean to say that
plays are sold at so much a sob. Seems to me you get wise very slowly."
Polly pouted and young Boston who sat next her went red up to his hair.
"Better let me look over the contracts for you, Andrew," said Tom
Cantrell with friendly interest in his shrewd eyes. If the material was
all Tom had to offer his friends he did that with generosity and
sincerity.
So until the roses fell into softly wilting heaps and the champagne broke
in the glasses they sat and talked and laughed. Pitched battles raged up
and down the table and there were perfect whirlpools of argument and
protestation. Phoebe was her most brilliant self and her laughter rang
out rich and joyous at the slightest provocation. The major delighted in
a give and take encounter with her and their wit drew sparks from every
direction.
"No, Major," she said as the girls rose with Mrs. Buchanan after the last
toast had been drunk, "toast my wit, toast my courage, toast my loyalty,
but my beauty--ah, aren't women learning not to use it as an asset?"
As she spoke she stretched out one white hand and bare rounded arm to him
in entreaty. Phoebe was more lovely than she knew as she flung her
challenge into the camp of her friends and they all felt the call in her
dauntless dawn-gray eyes. Her unconsciousness amounted to a positive
audacity.
"Phoebe," answered the major as he rose and stood beside her chair, "all
those things stir at times our cosmic consciousness, but beauty is the
bouquet to the woman-wine--and _you_ can't help it!"
"How do you old fellows down at the bivouac really feel about this
conduit business, Major," said Tom Cantrell as he moved his chair close
around by the major's after the last swish and rustle had left the men
alone in the dining-room for a few moments. "Just a question starts
father fire-eating, so I thought I would ask you to put me next. It's up
in the city council."
"Tom," answered the major as he blew a ring of smoke between himself and
the shrewd eyes, "what on earth have a lot of broken-down old Confederate
soldiers got to do with the management of the affairs of the city? You
young men are to attend to that--give us a seat in the sun and our
pipes--of peace."
"Oh, hang, Major! Look at the way you old fellows swung that gas contract
in the council. You 'sit in the sun' all right but they all know that the
bivouac pulls the plurality vote in this city when it chooses--and they
jump when you speak. What are you going to do about this conduit?"
"Is it pressing? Not much being said about it."
"That's it--they want to make it a sneak in. Mayor Potts is pushing
hard and we know he's just the judge's catspaw. Judge Taylor owns the
city council since that last election and I believe he has bought the
board of public works outright. The conduit is just a whisky ring scheme
to hand out jobs before the judge's election. They have got to keep the
criminal court fixed, Major, for this town is running wide open day and
night--with prohibition voted six months ago. They've got to keep Taylor
on the bench. What do you say?"
"Well," answered the major, beetling his brows over his keen eyes, "I
suppose there is no doubt that Taylor is machine-made. He's the real
blind tiger, and Potts is his striped kitten. I understand he 'lost'
four-fifths of the 'open' indictments that the grand jury 'found' on
their last sitting. The whisky men are going to sell as long as the
criminal court protects them, of course. Let's let them cut that conduit
deeper into the public mind before they begin on the streets."
"I'm looking for a nasty show-down for this town before long, Major, if
there are men enough in it to call the machine."
"Tom," answered the major as he blew a last ring from his cigar, "a town
is in a rotten fix when the criminal court is a mockery. Let's go
interrupt the women's dimity talk."
And it was quite an hour later that Milly decided in an alarmed hurry
that she and the babies must take their immediate departure. David
maneuvered manfully to send them home in his car and to have Phoebe wait
and let him take her home later--alone. But Phoebe insisted upon going
with Milly and Billy Bob and the youngsters, and the reflection that the
distance from the unfashionable quarter inhabited by the little family,
back to Phoebe's down-town apartment was very short, depressed him to the
point of defiance--almost.
However, he packed them all in and then as skilfully unpacked them at the
door of their little home. He carried up the twins and even remained a
moment to help in their unswathing before he descended to the waiting car
and Phoebe. As he gave the word and swung in beside her, David Kildare
heaved a deep and rapturous sigh. It was so much to the good to have her
to himself for the short whirl through the desolated winter streets. It
was a situation to be made the most of for it came very seldom.
He turned to speak to her in the half light and found her curled up in
the corner with her soft cheek resting against the cushions. Her attitude
was one of utter weariness, but she smiled without opening her eyes as
she nestled closer against the rough leather.
"Tired, peach-bud?" he asked softly. One of the gifts of the high gods to
David Kildare was a voice with a timbre suitable to the utmost
tenderness, when the occasion required.
"Yes," answered Phoebe drowsily, "but so happy! It was all lovely,
David." Her pink-palmed hand lay relaxed on her knee. David lifted it
cautiously in both his strong warm ones and bent over it, his heart
ahammer with trepidation. For as a general thing neither the environment
nor his mood had much influence in the softening way on Phoebe's cool
aloofness, but this once some sympathetic chord must have vibrated in her
heart for she clasped her fingers around his and received the caress on
their pink tips with opening eyes that smiled with a hint of tenderness.
"David," she said with a low laugh, "I'm too tired to be stern with you
tonight, but I'll hold you responsible to-morrow--for everything. Here we
are; do see if that red-headed devil is sitting on the door-step and tell
him that there is--no--more copy--if I _am_ a half-column short. And,
David," she drew their clasped hands nearer and laid her free one over
both his as the car drew up to the curb, "you--are--a--dear! Here's my
key in my muff. To-morrow at five? I don't know--you will have to phone
me. Good night, and thank you--dear. Yes--good night again!"