Lorelei's family continued to smart under a sense of bitter injustice,
but although they kept aloof they were by no means uninterested in her
experiment. On the contrary, they watched it with derisive enjoyment,
predicting certain failure. After Hannibal Wharton's insult Jim was all
for a prompt revenge, but he could not determine just how to use his
dangerous knowledge to the best advantage. He considered the
advisability of enlisting the aid of Max Melcher; but, not liking the
thought of dividing the loot, he decided provisionally to engineer a
separation between Bob and Lorelei.
His desire to make mischief arose in only a slight degree from
resentment--Jim's method of making a living had long since dulled the
edge of feeling--it was merely the first step in a comprehensive
scheme. With Bob and Lorelei estranged, a divorce would follow, and
divorces were profitable. A divorce, moreover, would open the way for a
second inroad upon the Wharton wealth, for with Lorelei's skirts clear
Jim could proceed with a larger scheme of extortion, based on the
Hammon murder.
One evening after Lorelei had gone to the theater Jim appeared at the
apartment and found Bob in a mood so restless and irritable that he
dared not go out.
"I had a hunch you were lonesome," the caller began, "so I came up to
whittle and spit at the stove."
Now Jim could be agreeable when he chose; his parasitic life had
developed in him a certain worldly good-fellowship; he was frankly
unregenerate, and he had sufficient tact never to apologize nor to
explain. Therefore he kept Bob entertained.
A few nights later he returned with a fund of new stories, and during
the evening he confessed to a consuming thirst.
"Death Valley has nothing on this place," he mourned.
Bob explained apologetically, "I'm sorry, but there's nothing in the
house wetter than Croton water."
"I understand! Will you object if I sweeten a glass of it with some
Scottish rites? I'm afraid of germs, and if water rots leather think
what it must do to the sensitive lining of a human stomach?" Jim drew a
flask from his pocket, then hesitated as if in doubt.
"Don't mind me," Bob assured him, hastily. "I'm strapped in the
driver's seat." But he looked on with eager appreciation as his
brother-in-law filled a long glass and sipped it.
Bob had never been a whisky-drinker, yet the faint odor of the liquor
tantalized him. When in the course of time he saw Jim preparing a
second drink he stirred.
"Kind of itchy, eh? Let's whip across the street and have a game of
pool," suggested Jim; and Bob was glad to escape from the room.
An agreeable hour followed; but Bob played badly, and found that his
eye had lost its sureness. His hand was uncertain, too, and this lack
of co-ordination disgusted him. He was sure that with a steadying drink
he could beat Jim, and eventually he proved it; but, mindful of his
resolution, he compromised on beer, which, Jim agreed, could not
reasonably be called an intoxicant.
On his way to the theater Bob chewed cinnamon bark, and when he kissed
Lorelei he held his breath.
This was the first of several pool matches, and after a while Bob was
gratified to find that beer in moderation left no disagreeable effect
whatever upon him. He rejoiced in his power of restraint.
There came a night when he failed to meet his wife. After waiting
nearly half an hour Lorelei went home, only to find the apartment
deserted. She nibbled at a lonely lunch, trying to assure herself that
nothing was seriously amiss; but she could not make up her mind to go
to bed. She tried to read, and failed. An hour passed, then another; a
thousand apprehensions crowded in upon her, and she finally found
herself walking the floor, but pulled herself together with a mirthless
laugh. So it had come, she reflected, with mingled bitterness and
relief; her fight was over, her part of the bargain was ended, she was
free to live her own life as she chose. Certainly she had done her
best, and above all question she was not the sort of wife who could
wait patiently, night after night, for a drunken husband.
Bob, when he did arrive, entered with elaborate caution. He paused in
the little hall, then tossed his hat into the living-room, where his
wife was waiting. After a moment his head came slowly into view, and he
said:
"When the hat stays in, go in; when it comes out, beat it."
Lorelei saw that he was quite drunk.
"I just came from the theater," he explained, "but it was dark. Has the
show failed, dearie?" He tried to kiss her, but she turned her face
away. "Come! Must have my little kiss," he insisted; then as she rose
and moved away, leaving him swaying in his tracks, he began gravely to
unroll an odd, thin package that resembled a tennis-racket. Removing a
soiled white wrapping, then an inner layer of oiled paper, he exposed
the sad remains of what had been an elaborate bouquet of double English
violets fringed with gardenias. He stared at the flowers in some
bewilderment.
"Must have sat on 'em," he opined at last; then he cried brightly: "Ha!
Pressed flowers! I'm full of old-fashioned sentiment." After studying
Lorelei's unsmiling face his tone altered. "Oh, I know! I slipped, but
it couldn't be helped. Nature insisted, and I yielded gracefully, but
no harm done, none whatever. This isn't a defeat, my dear; it's a
victory. I licked the demon rum and proved myself a man of iron. I
subjugated the cohorts of General Benjamin Booze, then I signed a
treaty of peace, and there was no bad blood on either side." After an
uncomfortable pause, during which he vainly waited for her to speak, he
explained more fully: "My dear, nothing is absolute! Life is a series
of compromises. Have a heart. Would you rob the distiller of his
livelihood? Think of the struggling young brewer with a family. Could
you take the bread from the mouths of his little ones? The president of
a bottling-works may be a Christian; he may have a sick wife. Remember
the boys that work in the hop-fields and the joyous peasant girls of
France. Moderation is the thing. Live and let live."
Lorelei nodded. "Exactly! We shall live as we choose, only, of course,
we can't live together after this." Then her disgust burst its control,
and she demanded, bitterly, "Haven't you any strength whatever? Haven't
you any balance, Bob?"
He grinned at her cheerfully. "I should say I had. I walked a fence on
the way home just to prove it; and I scarcely wabbled. Balance!
Strength! Why, you ought to see Jim. They had to CARRY him."
"Jim? Was--Jim with you?"
"In spirit, yes; in body--only for a time. For a brief while we went
gaily, hand in hand, then Jim lagged. He's a nice boy, but weak; he
falters beneath a load; and, as for pool, why, I've slept on
pool-tables, so naturally I know the angles better than he. Ha! that's
a funny line, isn't it? I know the angles of pool-tables because I've
slept on 'em, see? Don't hurry; I'll wait for you. Even an 'act' like
mine needs applause."
But Lorelei was in no laughing mood. She questioned Bob searchingly and
soon learned of Jim's visits, of the flask, of the pool games. When she
understood it all her eyes were glowing, but she found nothing to say.
At last she got Bob to bed, then lay down beside him and stared into
the darkness through many wakeful hours.
In the morning he was not only contrite, but badly frightened, yet when
he undertook to make his peace he found her unexpectedly mild.
"If you're sorry, that's all I ask," she said. "I changed my mind
during the night."
"Never again!" he promised, feelingly. "I thought I had cured myself."
Lorelei smiled at him faintly. "Cured! How long have you been a
drinker?"
"Oh, nearly always."
"When were you first drunk?"
"I was eighteen, I think."
"You've been undergoing a bodily change for ten years. During all that
time your brain-cells have been changing their structure, and they'll
never be healthy or normal until they've been made over. You can't
accomplish that in a few weeks."
"Say, you don't mean I'm going to stay thirsty until my egg-shaped dome
becomes round again?"
"Well, yes."
"Why, that might take years!"
"It took ten years to work the damage--it will probably take ten years
to repair it."
Bob was aghast. "Good heavens! In ten years I'll be too old to
drink--I'd tremble so that I'd spill it. But where did you get all this
M. D. dope?"
"I've been reading. I've been talking to a doctor, too. You see, I
wanted to help."
"Let's change doctors. Ten years! It can't be done."
"I'm afraid you're right. There's no such thing as reformation. A born
criminal never reforms; only those who go wrong from weakness or from
bad influences ever make good."
"Drinking isn't a crime," Bob declared, angrily, "any more than
freckles. It's just a form of diversion."
Lorelei shook her head. "If you're a born alcoholic you'll probably die
a drunkard. I'm hoping that you didn't inherit the taste."
"Well, whether it was left to me or whether I bought it, I can't go dry
for ten years."
"Then our bargain is ended."
He looked up sharply. "Oh no, it isn't!"
"Yes."
He extended a shaking hand, and his voice was supplicating as he said:
"I can't get along without you, kid. You're a part of me--the vital
part. I'd go to pieces quick if you quit now."
"When we made our agreement I meant to live up to every bit of it,"
Lorelei told him, gently, "but we're going to try again, for this was
Jim's fault."
"Jim? Jim was sorry for me. He tried to cheer--"
Lorelei's smile was bitter. "Jim was never sorry for anybody except
himself. My family hate you just as your family hate me, and they'd
like to separate us."
"Say, that's pretty rotten!" Bob exclaimed. "If he weren't your brother
I'd--"
Lorelei laughed mirthlessly. "Go ahead! I wish you would. It might
clear the atmosphere."
"Then I will." After a moment he continued, "I suppose you feel you
must go on supporting them?"
"Of course."
"Just as you feel you must support me. Is it entirely duty in my case?"
Seeing her hesitate, he insisted, "Isn't there any love at all?"
"I'm afraid not, Bob."
The man pondered silently. "I suppose if I were the right sort," he
said, at length, with some difficulty, "I'd let you go under these
circumstances. Well, I'm not the right sort; I'm not big or noble. I'm
just an ordinary, medium-sized man, and I'm going to keep you. However,
I'm through side-stepping; I've tried to outrun the Barleycorn
Brothers, but it's no use, so I'm going to turn and face them. If they
lick me I'll go under. But if I go under I'll take you with me. I won't
give you up. I won't!"
"I sha'n't let you pull me down," she told him, soberly.
"Then you'll have to bear me up. When a man's drowning he grabs and
holds on. That's me! There's nothing fine about me, understand? I'm
human and selfish. I'd be happy in hell with you."
"You're not fair."
"I don't pretend to be. This isn't a bridge game; this is life. I'll
cheat, I'll hold out, I'll deal from the bottom, if I can't win in any
other way. Good God! Don't you understand that you're the only thing I
ever loved, the only thing I ever wanted and couldn't get? I've never
had but half of you; don't expect me to give that up." He rose, jammed
his hat upon his head as if to escape from the room, then turned and
crushed his wife to him with a fierce cruelty of possession. Lorelei
could feel him shaking as he covered her face with kisses, but nothing
within her stirred even faintly in answer to his passion.
When Bob reached the financial district that day and resumed his quest
for work he was ablaze with resentment at himself and at the world in
general.
He took up the search with a dogged determination that was quite unlike
him. One after another he canvassed his friends for a position, and
finally, as if ill fortune could not withstand his fervor, he was
successful. It was not much of a job that was offered him, but he
snapped at it, and returned home that evening in the best of humor.
Already the serious issues of the morning were but a memory; he burst
in upon Lorelei like a gale, shouting:
"I'm chalk-boy at Crosset & Meyers, so you can give Bergman your notice
to-night."
"What's the salary?"
"It isn't a salary; it's a humiliation--twenty-five a week is the total
insult."
"Why, Bob! That won't keep two and the family--"
"Damn the family!" He quieted himself with an effort. "Well, you give
your notice, anyhow. I'll spear the coin for both establishments
somehow. Come! I insist. I want to be able to shave myself without
blushing."
Lorelei's objections were not easily overcome, but at last, in view of
the fact that the summer run of the Revue was drawing to a close and
the show would soon take to the road, she allowed herself to be
persuaded.
Throughout the next week Bob Wharton really tried to make good. He was
enthusiastic; the excitement of actual accomplishment was so novel that
he had not time to think of liquor. When Saturday came and he found
himself in possession of honestly earned funds he felt a
soul-satisfying ease. He decided to invest his first savings in a
present for Lorelei, then a graver sense of responsibility seized him,
and he wrote to Mrs. Knight as follows:
MY DEAR MOTHER-IN-NEW-JERSEY-LAW,--Inclosed find five handsome examples
of the engraver's skill, same being the result of six industrious days.
I know your passion for these objets d'art, I appreciate your eagerness
to share my father's celebrated collection, and I join you in regrets
at your failure to do so. But remember, "As a moth gnaws a garment, so
doth envy consume a man." Take these photogravures, love them, cherish
them, share them with the butcher, the baker, the hobble-skirt maker,
and console yourself with the thought that, although you have lost
much, you have gained something above price in me.
Thine in everlasting fetters,
ROBERT.
Having despatched this missive, he set out to find Jim, for the
afternoon was young and he wished to settle his obligations in full. It
is well to be systematic; business is largely a matter of system,
anyhow, and the tag ends of one week's work should never be allowed to
lap over into another.
A round of popular up-town resorts failed to discover Jim, but Bob's
search finally brought him to Tony the Barber's shop; and here, in the
rear room, he found his brother-in-law playing cards with a pop-eyed
youth and a repellent person with a cauliflower ear.
Bob's greeting was hearty. "Evening, James," he cried. "Feel like
taking your beating here?"
"Eh? What's the matter?" Jim rose from his chair with a shocked
intensity of gaze.
"I'm just cleaning up my affairs for the day of rest, and I've come to
return your last call. Alas, James, I am a weak vessel! Your work was
coarse, but I fell for it." To the other occupants of the room he
apologized. "I'm sorry to spoil your little game of authors, but
necessity prods me." He extended a muscular hand for Jim's collar and
found it.
Mr. Armistead was of the emotional kind; he leaped to his feet and went
to the rescue of his friend; but his first blow was wild. Seizing a
chair, he swung it aloft--a manoeuver which more effectively distracted
Bob's attention--but this attack also failed when Bob's fist buried
itself in the spongy region of Mr. Armistead's belt-buckle, and that
young man promptly lost all interest in Jimmy Knight's affairs. There
had been a time when he might have weathered such a blow, but of late
years easy living had left its marks; therefore he sat down heavily,
all but missing the chair he had just occupied. His eyes bulged more
prominently than usual; he became desperately concerned with a strange
difficulty in breathing.
Alert, aggressive, Bob turned to face the man with the swollen ear; but
young Sullivan, being a professional fighter, made no capital of
amateur affairs, and declined the issue with an upraised palm.
"Friends, eh?" Bob panted.
"Brothers!" heartily ejaculated Sullivan, whereupon Bob foiled Jimmy
Knight's short cut for the door and proceeded with the purpose of his
call.
It was no difficult matter to chastise Jim, whose spirit was as
wretched as his strength; as the wind whips a flag, as a man flaps a
dusty garment, so did Bob shake his victim. Jim felt his spine crack
and his limbs unjoint. His teeth snapped, he bit his tongue, his heels
rattled upon the floor. Bob seemed bent upon shaking the bones from his
flesh and the marrow from his bones; but, try as he would, Jim could
not prevent the outrage. He struggled, he clawed, he kicked, he yelled;
his arms threshed loosely, like the limber appendages to a stuffed
figure.
Mr. Armistead, unnaturally pale, remained seated. He emitted harrowing
sounds like those made by air leaking into a defective pump. Sullivan
looked on with the lively appreciation of a rough-house expert.
When Bob emerged from the rear room he found the barber shop in
confusion. Tony was leading a charge at the head of his assistants, who
were supported in turn by the customers; but he fell back at sight of
the flushed victor.
"It was nothing but a little family affair," Bob reassured him. "Now,
if you please, I'll borrow a hair-brush." In front of a mirror he
tidied himself, settled his scarf with a deft jerk, then went out
whistling. As it was nearly closing-time for the matinees, he strolled
toward the Circuit Theater, full of a satisfying contentment with the
world. Now that he owed it nothing, he resolved to meet his future
obligations as they arose.
Early on Monday morning Bob reported for work, only to receive from Mr.
Crosset, whom he had always regarded as a warm friend, the notice of
his discharge.
"What's the matter? Didn't I make good?" he demanded.
Crosset was a young man; more than once he and Bob had scandalized
Broadway; some of their exploits were epic. Now he shrugged carelessly,
saying:
"Oh, you made good, I guess; but we can't take a chance with you."
"I suppose you're afraid I'll steal some of your chalk."
Crosset grinned, then deponed with extreme gravity: "Bob, you drink.
You're unsteady in your habits. It's too bad, but we can't--"
"I don't drink as much as you do."
"Nobody does; but that's beside the question."
"As a matter of fact, I've quit."
This announcement drew a hearty chuckle. "You're a great comedian,
Bob," said Crosset.
After surveying his friend for a moment Bob responded with great
earnestness: "But you're not. This fails to hand me a laugh. Now tell
me, how did you wet your feet, and whence comes the icy draught?"
"Well, from the direction of Pittsburg, if you must know. It seems you
are an undesirable citizen, Bob--a dangerous character. There's a can
tied to you, and we can't afford to antagonize the whole Steel Trust."
"I see. I'm afraid I'll have to disown that father of mine."
"What's the trouble, anyhow?"
At Bob's explanation Crosset whistled. "Funny I didn't hear about it.
Married and happy, eh? Well, I'm sorry I can't help you--"
"You can."
"How?"
"Lend me five hundred."
"Certainly!" Crosset lunged at his desk, scribbled a line to the
cashier, and handed it to Bob, then, in response to a call from the
customers' room, dashed away with a hearty farewell.
As Bob passed through the outer office he ran his eye over the opening
prices, being half inclined to "scalp" with his sudden wealth; but luck
had never run his way, and he reconsidered. Anyhow, there were more
agreeable uses to which he could put this money; for one thing he
needed several suits, for another it was high time he gave Lorelei some
little remembrance--he hadn't given her a present in nearly two weeks,
and women set great store by such attentions. He decided to invest his
money in Maiden Lane and demand credit from his tailor. But a half-hour
at a jewelry shop convinced him that nothing suitable to so splendid a
creature as his wife could be purchased for a paltry five hundred
dollars, and he was upon the point of returning to Crosset with a
request to double the loan when his common sense asserted itself.
Poverty was odious, but not shameful, he reflected; ostentation, on the
other hand, was vulgar. Would it not be in bad taste to squander this
happy windfall upon jewelry when Lorelei needed practical things?
Bob was cheered by the breadth of these sentiments; they showed that he
was beginning soberly to realize the leaden responsibilities of a
family man. No, instead of a jewel he would buy his wife a dog.
At a fashionable up-town kennel he found exactly what he wanted, in the
shape of a Pekingese--a playful, pedigreed pocket dog scarcely larger
than his two fists. It was a creature to excite the admiration of any
woman; its family tree was taller than that of a Spanish nobleman, and
its name was Ying. But here again Bob was handicapped by poverty, for
sleeve dogs are expensive novelties, and the price of Ying was seven
hundred dollars--marked down from one thousand, and evidently the
bargain of a lifetime at that price.
Bob hated to haggle, but he showed that his ability to drive a sharp
bargain was merely latent, and he finally bore the animal away in
triumph. To outgeneral a dog-fancier was a tribute to his shrewdness;
to save two hundred dollars on a single purchase was economy of a high
order. Much elated, he set out briskly for his tailor's place of
business.