Claire
by Leslie Burton Blades
THE BLIND LOVE OF A BLIND HERO
_BY A BLIND AUTHOR_
[Transcriber's Note: This novel was originally serialized in four
installments in All-Story Weekly magazine from October 5, 1918, to
October 26, 1918. The original breaks in the serial have been retained,
but summaries of previous events preceding the second and third
installments have been moved to the end of this e-book. The Table of
Contents which follows the introduction was created for this electronic
edition.]
On the editorial page of last week's ALL-STORY WEEKLY we announced a new
serial by a new author. "Claire" is a story of such subtle insight, of
so compassionate an understanding of human nature, and of so honest an
attack on the eternal problem of love and living, that it can well
afford to take its chances on its own merits. But _Lawrence Gordon_, the
blind hero of the triangle tragedy, which runs its inevitable course in
the mountain cabin of _Philip Ortez_, takes on a new interest, when we
learn that his creator is himself a blind man.
Born of mining people in Colorado, Blades lost two fingers and the sight
of both eyes when as a lad of nine years he refused to take the dare of
some playmates and set off a giant firecracker. While still a youth he
entered the Colorado State School for the Blind. Here he spent six
years. In the crash at Creede, when the bottom fell out of so many
mining fortunes, the Blades family lost their all. Then young Blades
took up the burden of his own keep. For two successful years he
maintained himself at the University of Colorado by teaching music. When
the family moved to Oregon, the indomitable Leslie followed. At Eugene
he entered the State University and continued to support himself by
music and lectures. After receiving his degrees of B.A. and M.A. he was
a substitute teacher in the English Department.
For some time he has made his home at San Dimas, where his regular
contributions on a variety of themes to the magazine section of _The
Express_ have brought him something more than local prestige. He is
deeply interested in the drama, and has several plays to his credit.
"When He Came Home," a play of his dealing with the return of a blind
soldier from the war, has become a favorite with one of the California
circuits.
"Claire" is his first novel, and though he is still on the sunny side of
thirty, this arresting story is a promising portent of what we may
expect from the powerful pen of this blind man with an artist's
vision.--THE EDITOR.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
I. DISASTER. 256
II. THE WATER OF LIFE. 260
III. THE WAY OF THE PRIMITIVE. 262
IV. MUTUAL DISLIKE. 266
V. THE FACE OF DEATH. 269
VI. THE STONE THREAT. 274
VII. PLAYING WITH FIRE. 498
VIII. THE TIGHTENING NET. 501
IX. CLAIRE'S ABASEMENT. 505
X. HOW SIMPLE THE SOLUTION! 509
XI. THE MAKING OF A KNIGHT ERRANT. 513
XII. THE UNHORSING OF A KNIGHT ERRANT. 697
XIII. FAINT HEART AND FAIR LADY. 702
XIV. PHILIP TO THE RESCUE. 706
XV. UTTER EXHAUSTION. 711
XVI. THE QUESTION ANSWERED. 714
XVII. ANGLES OF A TRIANGLE. 151
XVIII. THE ROMANTIC REALIST. 155
XIX. THE LAST DISCUSSION. 160
XX. THE LAW OF LIFE. 164
XXI. INTO THE SUNLIGHT. 168
CHAPTER I.
DISASTER.
In the confusion Lawrence stood still. Over the howling wind and
smashing sea, he heard thin voices shouting orders. Another mass of
water swept over the deck. Near him a woman screamed piteously.
Instinctively, the masculine desire to protect womanhood made him ache
to help her, but he bit his lip and clung to the rail. If he could only
see! Never before in his five years of blindness had he felt the full
horror of it. He had taught himself to forget his loss of sight. It is
useless to waste time in sentimental moping, he would say, but now--
"God, when will it end?" he muttered savagely.
The City of Panama lurched back and forth like a rocking-horse.
Somewhere forward they must be lowering the boats. He stumbled along the
deck, holding to the rail for support. The spray dashed in his face, and
he could feel the water from his hair trickling into his ears. He shook
his head and laughed grimly, but he could not hear his own laughter. The
terrific noise of the wind drowned everything else. It became
increasingly difficult to keep his hold on the rail. He was wet to the
waist. Each time the wave struck him higher, and he noticed that the
lurching grew heavier. He was strong, six feet of hard muscle, but the
water was stronger. His mouth was filled with it, and his ears seemed
bursting. His rugged features twisted into hard lines. As he struggled
forward, he raged at the blindness that kept him from seeing.
"Not a chance, not a chance," he repeated over and over, as he strained
to hold the deck. There was a lull in the wind, and he marveled at the
absence of human sound. Suddenly he divined the cause. His mind became a
chaos of rage and fear.
"They have left me," he cried; "left me without a thought." He shut his
teeth hard, then ducked as another heavy beating weight of water crashed
over him. It seemed it would never lift and leave him free to breathe.
His arms and feet no longer seemed a part of him. He wondered if the
vessel were under the surface, and nerved himself to let go. But he
could not. The rail was his only hope of life. Slowly the water began to
draw his fingers away from it. The next surge sent his body
out--somewhere. He struck forward with both hands and kicked his feet
mechanically. Was it the roar of the wind or the weight of the water
itself that beat into his ears? The sudden pain in his lungs, told him
that he had reached the surface. How good the air felt! Shaking the
water out of his ears, he listened. Nothing but the wind was audible.
It seemed to him that he had been swimming for hours in the icy waves.
Events on the ship, the shock of the boiler explosion, the rush for the
deck, all seemed to have happened long ago.
"If I could only see," he thought, "I might find the ship again." It
occurred to him that he might be swimming in a circle, and he resolved
to keep in one direction, but how? He remembered that he had always
tended to swim to the left, so he increased his right-arm stroke.
Suddenly a heavy timber struck him. He gasped with pain, and sank under
the surface. When he came up, his hand struck the same piece of wood.
With a desperate effort, he dragged himself up on it, twisting his arms
and legs about it to maintain his hold.
The water, swirled by the wind, lashed him as he lay on the timber.
"Land may be within sight," he thought, "and I shall never know." His
fear and the cold began to work upon his imagination. He had a clear
mental picture of a sandy beach backed with trees. He felt sure he was
being carried past it into the open sea.
Hours passed. He began to rave at the water, at life, at everything.
Mixed, tangled masses of images heaped themselves in utter disorder in
his brain: passages of verse, bits of his trained laboratory jargon,
phrases from half-forgotten books, the delicate curves of the Water
Sprite at the exposition, and, above all, a fierce gnawing pain in his
side.
Over the roar of the wind he heard something else. Was it the tumbling
of breakers? He listened, then concluded that it was his imagination.
But they came nearer, louder; he sat up on his plank, his nerves tense.
The board lurched sidewise, spurn around, and the swell it was riding
broke over him with a force that knocked him from his position. Over and
over he rolled, until, almost unconscious, he felt his body dragging
along the sand. The undertow was pulling at him. He fought furiously,
digging his hands into the sand, and clawing desperately up the steep
sloping beach. The next breaker caught him and rolled him past the
water-line. He scrambled to his feet, and ran shakily ahead, neither
knowing nor caring what was before him.
Behind him he heard the water sweeping in. He was out of its reach, but
still he ran. A rock caught him above the knees and sent him headlong
into the sand. He became unconscious, and lay still, half doubled up.
When he recovered consciousness and sat up, a fierce sun was beating
down upon him. His head ached, and he was hungry. "There may be people
within call," he thought. Rising unsteadily, the soreness of his muscles
coming home to him, he gave a prolonged "Hello-o." A faint echo was his
answer. He formed a trumpet of his hands and shouted louder. The echo
came back stronger. "Only cliffs," he concluded.
The gnaw of hunger increased. "Clams are my best chance," he reasoned,
and, turning, he groped his way to the water. When the incoming breakers
washed his knees, he stopped. The intense dread that his experience had
given him was crying retreat, but he stood his ground. Stooping over, he
began digging in the sand. His cut and bleeding hands burned with the
salt water, but he dug steadily, moving rapidly along the beach. At last
his fingers turned up a round, ridged object. Feeling the edge of it he
knew that he had found what he sought. He wanted to eat the clam at
once, but reluctantly dropped it into his pocket, and went on digging.
When he had filled his pocket he straightened up and started toward the
shore. As he waded through the last shallow wash of the wave, his foot
caught in something soft, and he fell. He rose, and then on second
thought stooped to feel what had tripped him. His hand touched a mass of
wet, tangled hair. He jerked it back hurriedly and screamed. The strain
he had been under was telling. Nerving himself, he reached again, and
touched a face.
"A woman! Another human being! Thank God!"
Then he clutched his throat in desperation. She might be dead. He
stooped and dragged the body up on the sand. He was afraid to find out
if she were dead or alive, and sat beside her, timidly touching her
hair.
"Fool!" he muttered at last. "If she is not dead, she soon will be." He
leaned over, listening for her breathing. At first there was only the
sound of the waves, then he heard her breathing come faintly. He took
off his coat, emptied out the clams, and dipped it in the ocean. Coming
back, he wrung it out over her face. He knelt beside her, and rubbed her
arms and throat.
His hands were his trained observers. As he worked over her, they gave
him a detailed picture which sank deep into his memory. She was
splendidly made. His fingers caught the delicate curve of her throat and
shoulders. Her skin was satin to his touch. He knew that the fine hair,
the smooth skin, the curve and grace of her body belonged to a beautiful
woman.
Taking her arms, he worked them vigorously. When he was beginning to
despair, she coughed, moaned a little, and turned over on her side.
He wondered if she had her eyes open. He dared not feel to see, and sat
silent, anxious, waiting for her to speak.
It seemed to him that eternity passed before she murmured, "Oh, oh!
Where am I?"
"I do thank God," he exclaimed earnestly.
"Where am I?" she repeated as she sat up.
"I do not know," he answered. "Presumably somewhere on the coast of
Chile." Her eyes opened very wide and gazed at him as she said, "Are we
the only ones?"
"I cannot tell," he replied, smiling a little. "I am blind, you see."
"Yes, I know," she said softly. "I saw you on shipboard."
"The first consciousness I had of you," he continued, "was when I
stumbled over you while getting my breakfast."
"Breakfast? Where is it?"
He laid one hand on the pile of clams. She looked down at them, and
burst out laughing, uncontrollably.
"It is not much," he said, "but we primitive people are simple in our
needs. I worked to get them, goodness knows."
She was looking around her, twisting her long brown hair in her hands.
At last she shuddered. "It's desperately lonely. Nothing but sea and
mountains. I'm afraid I can't walk," she said.
"Good God!" he exclaimed. "Can't walk?"
She turned toward him, smiling faintly. "I was struck when I washed
overboard, and my ankle, I think, is broken. I am sorry," she added.
Her tone was slightly apologetic, and he laughed nervously. "Oh, that's
all right," he said, assuringly, then stammered, "I mean--" He
hesitated, and she laughed.
"I mean that we can get along," he continued, stubbornly. "Heaven knows
I am sorry. But you can't realize what it means to have some one near
you who can see."
She did not answer for a minute, then said quietly: "Shall we breakfast
before beginning anything else?"
He reached in his pocket for his penknife. It was gone. The blank
expression of disgust on his face made her ask: "What is it?"
"My knife," he said. "It is gone."
They sat opposite each other, the clams between them. Each followed a
different trend of ideas. He was raging at this last mishap, and
considering means of opening the clams. She was conjecturing over the
fate of the City of Panama and wondering what she could do, alone here
with this blind man. Her night-gown and a heavy skirt had been all she
had worn when she had rushed on deck in the night. She looked around her
at the rocks and thought how foolish she had been to leave her shoes.
At last he rose and began to grope back along the beach.
Noticing that his hands were torn and bleeding, she said, hastily:
"Don't do that. What are you looking for, anyway?"
"Stones," he answered, stopping.
"I will direct you," she to him. "Left--right--a little ahead now."
Guided by her, he moved until his hand touched a small stone. He found
two of them and came back to her side.
She watched him while he tried to break a clam-shell between the two
rocks. "Let me," she said, taking hold of one of them. "Your hands are
too badly cut." He hesitated.
"Please," she said. "I can at least do the woman's part and prepare the
meal. Especially when you bring it to me."
He laughed and gave up the stones.
"I am desperately thirsty," she said, breaking open the shells.
"I feel as though my tongue were swelling fast," he admitted.
They dug the tiny clams from the shells, and ate for a few minutes in
silence, then she said: "I can't go any more of them."
He wondered if she were not hungry, but said nothing. After eating a few
more, he understood. Then he, too, stopped.
"I've got to find water," he said. He waited for her to speak.
At last she said: "I can see nothing that might indicate fresh water.
Where will you go?"
"Up the beach, I suppose."
"There are mountains up the beach, and back of us, too. You could never
find your way out." Her tone was despairing.
"True," he admitted.
There was a long pause. Then she said slowly: "It seems to be your only
hope, doesn't it? Well, I guess you had better go. God bless you!" she
concluded as though it were her last word.
Suddenly it occurred to him that he had been thinking and talking of
himself alone. The idea of parting from this woman who could see, whom
it seemed to him he had found as his own means of salvation, immediately
became impossible.
"I am going to take you with me," he stated quietly.
"You forget," she said, "I cannot walk."
He had forgotten it for the moment. Now it filled him with new terror.
He laid his hand on hers. "I can't help it," he said finally, "I can't
leave you. I will carry you."
"Oh, no!" Her protest was genuine.
He felt her fear that she would hamper him. "Don't be foolish," he said
as though he had known her for years, "I am not being gallant. This is
not a time for gallantry. I am simply being sensible. You can't sit
here, can you?"
"I can't help myself, can I? I can't walk."
"I can help it," he retorted.
"It would simply make your chance of escape impossible," she argued. "It
is preposterous. Why should you? Your life is worth to you as much as
mine is to me. I know what that means. I would not stay here if I could
help it. I would not sacrifice my life for yours. Neither shall you
sacrifice yours for mine."
"See here," he demanded, "who are you and where did you get that
attitude toward life?"
It was one he knew. It was the hard, relentless theory of the struggle
of animal survival which his thinking in college had led him to accept.
There was in it no touch of duty, no sense of obligation, and very
little pity. He had called himself a hard materialist, and had never
lived up to his theory. Now here beside him in this outlandish
situation was a woman quietly arguing his own philosophy of life to him
against herself.
She laughed. "It's my way of thinking, and I mean it," she said,
twisting her hair up on her head. "I got it out of four years of thought
and reading in a college, and I do not thank the college for it. I find
it very inconvenient, but it is my belief. I have tried to live by it."
"So is it mine," he said, "and I mean to live by it."
"Very well," she answered. "That aggressive tone against me is not
necessary. Go ahead and get through if you can. Good-by, my friend."
"I'm afraid you do not understand," he answered her steadily. "I want to
live. To do it, you are necessary to me. I need your eyes. Very well,
whether you like it or not, you are going with me."
He rose quickly, and stretched his muscles. His head ached, his whole
being cried for water. He knew he could not carry her far, but without
her he was powerless.
"Suppose," she suggested, her eyes flashing from hazel to deep-brown,
"suppose you do take me. Have you any assurance that my eyes will serve
you rightly?"
"Your own life, which is pleasant to you, will depend upon your eyes
serving me rightly," he said coldly, as he stooped over her.
She laid a restraining hand on his arm. "And in the long days that we
may have to go on together, what will you do in return for my eyes?"
"Carry you," he answered.
"Very well, but there are two things you must know," she said quietly.
"First, that I am married; second, that I am quite as steadfast in my
belief as I said. If you make one single attempt to establish more than
a frank comradeship, based on mutual support in our unforeseen
partnership, my eyes will serve you falsely."
He laughed a little as he picked her up. She gasped with pain.
"I can't help hurting you," he said gently.
"It's all right," she answered, putting her arm around his neck so that
he might the more easily bear her. "We are off on our great adventure.
The halt and the blind! Such a mad pair!"
He smiled, and started slowly up the beach.
"I shall have to develop a system of one word guides," she mused.
"Left--right--slow--ahead--all right--and so on," he admitted.
Suddenly she laughed out merrily. "My friend, a stranger pilgrimage the
world never knew. What is your name?"
"Lawrence," he said.
"Mine," she answered, "is Claire. Go a little to the left."
He turned slightly, and plodded through the sand.