THE RETURN FROM THE WEST
It was October already. The old White house stood and shivered when the
wind came sharp from the steely river. Lena, making ineffectual war upon
fallen leaves, could not even keep the porch free from them, and they
skirled and whirled and gently slid and madly rushed, while in the house
their movement could be distinctly heard like light pattering footsteps,
ever seeking, never resting.
They even disturbed Lena's nerves. She looked about uneasily, while
Dorothy laughed as they tied up each other's fingers, for they had been
engaged in what Lena called "veather vending," and what Dorothy called
"battening" the windows in her mother's room. For there was no question
about it, the Lawtons had to face the winter right where they were. So
Lena, with Dorothy's help, was doing her best to make a few rooms
comfortable, and the hammering of nails and tacks had included
thumb-nails as well. But what of that; their "veather vending" was
turning lots of cold air from the rooms, and there was a comforting
smell of freshly baked cookies coming from the kitchen, and great
crimson and dappled branches of dogwood--Sybil's favorite autumn
leaf--were over mantel and door, while dark purple and pale grayish
lavender asters were nodding from corner and vase. For joy! oh joy!
Sybil was coming home from the West--that vague, chaotic place that had
swallowed her sister, an outsider, and now cast her back a professional,
a "for-true" actress, with three real newspaper notices of her work,
though they had been won under an assumed name. Dear Syb! how proud they
all were! Papa had split up a cigar-box and made a little frame for her
very first newspaper notice and had it hanging in the corner by the
window where he shaved.
And then, late that night, poor, pallid Jim Roberts had handed Sybil out
of the shaky old hack at the White house door, and saying "Good-night,"
had turned to go, when grateful hands had drawn him inside, to receive
courteous thanks from John Lawton and an explanation from Mrs. Lawton as
to her present inability to send a comfortable carriage for her daughter
and her escort.
"Oh, Mrs. Jones was Miss Lawton's escort quite as much as I was!"
stammered Roberts. "I--I only looked after the checks and things,
and----"
"And," said Sybil, "hungry and tired, came away up here with me instead
of going straight to your supper and your bed. And, papa, he had no
overcoat with him, and he shivered dreadfully in the hack after the
fearful heat of the car." Whereupon Dorothy insisted upon coffee being
brought to him, and Sybil cried out: "I smell fresh cookies! Oh, Lena,
bring some here!" Then, still in hat and gloves, she stood before him,
saying: "You shall not miss the next train down. I will watch the time
for you, so please drink your coffee and eat your cookies in peace!"
"Cookies and coffee!" moaned Mrs. Lawton. "Barbarous combination! Mr.
Roberts's dinner will be destroyed, or, to speak more correctly, his
appetite will be destroyed. And while I'll not call it vulgar, still
there is something so very domestic, so very intimate about a home-made
cookie, that personally--no, my daughter, I could not have offered one
to a stranger! Still I suppose we must expect these touches of
bohemianism, now that you have become a professional actress!"
In the few moments that he sat there, Jim saw the poverty surrounding
them. He could not help noticing the carpets and curtains, worn to the
bone; the ancient and honorable furniture, the severity of the chairs;
and yet the Lawtons were, temporarily at least, unconscious of it all.
They were caught up in a golden glory of family love, of mutual
admiration, of ineffable tenderness, and while all other eyes were
turned with pride upon the dear wanderer returned, she, still timing
him, still holding the plate of cookies, with an impulse that would not
be denied, stretched out her free arm and drew her sister close to her
side, gazing at her with an expression of love so protecting, so
maternal, she might have been Dorrie's elder by ten years instead of
two.
"Ah!" thought Roberts, "you'd be quick to suspect danger for her, and
you'd be strong to protect; but to your own peril you'd be as blind as
a young white owl facing the sun!"
With almost a groan he sprang to his feet, a movement that wrung a
disappointed "Ach!" from Lena, who, to the amusement of Dorothy and the
fuming indignation of Mrs. Lawton, had been eagerly peering through the
crack of the door, trying to get a good look at "Vun of dem Herr actin'
mens, ven dey vasn't makin' no believes to nobody," and her betraying
"Ach!" came with such a pony-like snort that even Mr. Lawton had joined
in his daughters' laughter.
Then Sybil stepped close to Roberts and whispered, swiftly: "Will you be
vexed if I ask you just to speak one word to our little German maid, who
is the staff of the whole family, and whose manner is the only bad thing
about her? Ah, you are good! [What would he not have done for Sybil's
asking?] Dorrie, you call her. She wouldn't come for anyone else now."
"Lena! Lena!" called Dorothy's gay voice. "Lena! Quick, please!" And
then, very, very red in the face, the sturdy, square little
serving-woman stood in the doorway.
"We are in such a hurry, Lena," said Sybil, "because Mr. Roberts has to
catch this next train; but, as he is the gentleman who brought me safe
home after helping me to learn to act, I know you too want to thank
him."
"Oh, ja! I doos so!" answered Lena, heartily, making her peasant-like
bob of a courtesy.
But Jim Roberts went over to her, saying, with a laugh: "If there's any
thanking to be done, I'm the one to do it; for, Mistress Lena, I haven't
tasted cookies like yours since, as a bad boy, I came home at recess to
hook them fresh and warm from my mother's pantry. Thank you, Lena!"
As she backed smilingly out of the doorway, Sybil laughed: "You have
saved her life by granting her a good look at that wondrous thing, a
real, sure-enough actor!"
"Carefully edited and lavishly illustrated, this tale will doubtless
reach her grandchildren," smiled John Lawton.
"Oh!" cried the girls, "hear papa making jokes!"
"You all seem to forget that you have an actress of your own in the
family now for your little maid to feast her eyes upon," remarked
Roberts.
"Oh!" exclaimed Sybil, flushing beautifully, "not yet. I am only 'a
trying-to-be actress' yet! There, your time's up!" And she caught up his
travelling cap and tossed it to him.
"Sybil!" remonstrated Mrs. Lawton, "Sybil! a little more decorum, even
in the protecting presence of your family! Good-night, sir! In former
days I should have sent you in my own brougham to the----"
But Mr. Lawton had swept the actor out of the room to a chorus of
"Good-nights." On the porch, he said: "Mr. Roberts, I have some
clippings from the papers about my little daughter's work. Can you tell
me, for I am very ignorant of such things, whether those--er--those
notices were inspired, or--you understand me, were they--er--commanded
from the box-office, or at--er--a manager's suggestion, or were they
unsought by anyone?" The old gentleman's voice trembled with eagerness
and anxiety.
"My dear sir," replied Roberts, "what may happen in that line in the
future I dare not say, but as to the past, nothing was inspired. Those
notices commending Miss Lawton's work were honestly earned, for she has
natural gifts, neither is she afraid of work, and does not resent
criticism--as yet."
Mr. Lawton took his hand and pressed it gratefully. "Thank you!" he
said, "thank you, for your goodness to my Sybil!"
Roberts flung himself into the old hack, muttering, as he slammed the
door: "Hear him! Just hear him!" He burst into a laugh that ended in a
groan. "Oh!" he continued, "I wonder if God, in some mighty shuffle of
His worlds, has dropped this one out of His hands entirely! For surely
nothing higher, nothing wiser than blind fate or a malicious devil can
be guiding the affairs of man!"
He threw off his cap and held his head hard between his bony, long
hands, and broke out again: "That gentle, helpless old fool, with his
unmistakably aristocratic elbows nearly out of his sleeves, is the
natural protector of two lovely daughters! How the devil will laugh when
he takes note of the situation! If so weak a creature was to be trusted
with daughters at all, they should for their own sakes have been plain
girls, whose homeliness would have acted as a prohibitory tariff on
folly of any kind! Again, the circling arms of some mothers would be as
towers of strength for the guarding of innocent beauty; but not this
mother--this elegant 'has been,' who twists her memories of past wealth
and power into thongs to lash her friends and family with! And, by Jove,
the old rattle can carry herself well! She's been a fine-looking woman
in her day--a fact she will never forget in this world, probably not in
the next! But selfish? Lord! I'll bet her time is principally given to
pulling out for her own use any plum of comfort to be found in their
economical family pie! But they see nothing amiss! It's 'this chair for
mamma!' One places a stool for her feet, and another brings a cushion
for her back, and papa throws a scarf about her shoulders and lowers the
light to suit her eyes; and when they have all made her quite
comfortable, she rewards them with sighs and moans and tales of her
former glory. But for family love commend me to this Lawton set. I never
saw anything so beautiful in my life as the palpitating pride of that
old gentleman in his daughters and their protecting love for him! And
there it is. The natural position of father and child is reversed, and
that lovely creature, Sybil, with father and mother both living, is as
absolutely unprotected as any orphan on earth! Lord! How I wish I had a
drink of whiskey! My nerves will jump clear through my skin before I get
to the city! I wonder what Stewart would say if he knew I'd been
travelling without a flask? Wouldn't believe it, I suppose. Gad! I've
had heaven and hell pretty thoroughly well mixed together these last few
weeks. Thrall gave me a bit of heaven when he sent me to act as
sheep-dog for this girl, and I ordered up a portion from the other place
when I doomed myself to sobriety, out of consideration for her trust in
me! Not a drop of anything to be had either at this infernal, suicidal
station, and I've had nothing since Albany! Well, I must grin and bear
it! I wish I hadn't to see Thrall to-night, and yet I want to know just
what he's up to. Of course I'm dead sure he's going to coach this
ambitious child for Juliet, but maybe he'll pass her over to old mother
Mordaunt. She's clever and knows her business. Perhaps, too, he means to
put young Fitzallen up for Romeo, and play Mercutio himself? May be! Ah,
bah! May-bees don't fly at this time of year. I'd bet my bottom
dollar--a coin always within easy reach--that he will coach her
himself--yes, and play Romeo, too! But as I live by bread, Stewart, my
boy, there must be no Bessie in this case, or something will
happen--something that would have happened five years ago had I not been
as completely under the spell of your fascination as ever she was, poor
little maid! Hello, here we are, and the train coming, thank the Lord!"
Roberts hurried through the little waiting-room, past the small office,
from which came the curt, short "tick-tick tack" that is as the voice of
the ever-imperative telegraph wire, crossed the open space, tripping
over the line of rails in the darkness, clambered up the steps, and
entered the purgatorial heat of the car, made nauseating by the odor of
banana and stale orange-peel, and dropped into a seat by the side of a
sleeping man, only to spring up again when suddenly aware that he had
sat upon a bottle.
The movement aroused the sleeper, who, with his hat on the back of his
head and a lock of hair clinging damply to his forehead, muttered
apologies as he gathered up his overcoat out of the way. Having felt
carefully in one of its outer pockets, he turned to Roberts with that
loose smile of world-embracing geniality peculiar to the good-natured
man who is "three sheets in the wind," and thickly remarked: "I's all
right! Best kind of glass! I've sat on that flask dozen times myself 'nd
never cracked it!" His head wobbled a moment, then he added,
confidentially: "Soon's I can think--w-where in thunder I put
cup--w-we'll have a drink together--like little men, eh? Why h-here it
is, r-right in other pocket! Been a b-bear it might 'a' tore my
g-gizzard out! Join me?"
Jim Roberts glanced a moment down the brilliantly lighted, well-filled
car, then clenched his hands and, drawing a long, almost sobbing
breath--declined.
"W-what's--w-what's reason you won't join me?" demanded the stranger,
indignantly, yet showing at the same time a disposition to weep. "W-what
have I done--say, now, w-what have I done? Slept with my m-mouth open, I
s'pose? Slept out loud, too--very likely? But w-what of that? It isn't
pretty, of course--but's no crime--eh?" He brought forth the metal cup
and carefully wiped it out with a stubby forefinger, while he tearfully
added that "the very dogs in the streets'd bark at him when they knew a
gentleman had refused to drink with him!"
And Roberts, with set jaws and feet twisting together, tried to control
the leaping muscles and nerves that seemed to be crying out with a
thousand gasping mouths for liquor! liquor! The tears of self-inflicted
disappointment were stinging beneath his lids when there came to his
ears, with infernal power to charm, the delicious "blub-blub-blub" of
whiskey poured from a full bottle. He gave a gasp. In an instant his
left hand held his hat before his face, his right hand grasped the cup
and poured the contents straight and raw down his aching throat. The
drink was followed by that convulsive shudder, so familiar to most
drunkards. Heart shock someone has called it; but almost before he had
returned the cup to its rejoicing owner a delicious warmth and comfort
was stealing over him, a sense of well-being made him tolerant even of
the disjointed conversation of his chance acquaintance.
* * * * *
He reported presently at the private office of Manager Thrall, who
received him eagerly and greeted him with unusual heartiness. The
interview was long and confidential--very. When Jim Roberts finally
reached his own room he had been drinking heavily and had been tramping
the streets for hours. He was at his very worst. Flinging off only his
hat and coat, he cast himself across the bed, and rolling his head face
downward on his folded arms, he groaned: "I can't do anything! I'm less
than a fly on the wheel! He's all right now--he means well--he honestly
does! But, oh! good God! don't I know the man better than he knows
himself! Don't I know that Stewart Thrall is never more dangerous than
when he means well?" and the poor wretch lay there and grovelled in
helpless, drunken misery.