Heaven--a million voices lifting themselves to the gods, the wedding of
everything earthly to everything celestial, the whole universe
dancing--man, woman and beast, mountains, oceans and stars--singing the
joy of creation.
It was music, the kind of which Fay never heard before--interlaced
songs, each one grown out of the hearts of millions of people through
thousands of years, songs breathing life, as different from the music
she had heard to then as a photograph is to the object it tends to
portray. The water going down hill, the trees of the forest spreading
their wings, the wheat actually swaying like golden waves.
Her own life passed before her as she heard the music; from early
childhood to the very minute of her thought. How had she ever dared to
insult Marco?
How had she dared bunch him together with her other admirers? She looked
at him and her eyes pleaded forgiveness, but Marco was oblivious to
everything.
And as the music continued Fay saw Marco's eyes brighten. Every line of
his face became full with an inner life she had never seen before in any
one.
Suddenly he started to sing a song as sad as the world's woes.
From the cimbalon rose chords that spoke of understanding. No one dared
even move, lest it might disturb the perfect communion between singer
and accompanist. Little by little another soul was carried in.
How dull the others were, sitting at the table disputing the quality of
the food. How was she ever so blind and stupid as not to see!
Marco now got up from the table, put both his hands on the musician's
shoulders, and sang on--and as he sang he grew bigger and bigger.
The place went wild when he finished. Moskowitz kissed him, and Fay
could plainly see that at least fifty pairs of lips longed to do
likewise.
"Marco, Marco, why have you never brought me here before?" cried Fay in
joy, as she kissed the happy man.
And now, nightly at Moskowitz's, a bushy Roumanian is drinking his
bottle in company of a pretty American girl, who dreams of the day when
she will see the country from which such songs, and such men, come.
EXPENSIVE POVERTY
It is no longer permitted to be poor; still less to appear poor. It is
not yet a legal crime but a social one. It is comparatively easy to
evade punishment for legal crimes, but punishment for a social crime is
as swift as it is merciless. No defense is possible because the
prosecutor and judge is invisible. There is no defense and no appeal. No
higher court to reverse judgment on technical or constitutional grounds.
Accusation alone is equivalent to condemnation.
"There was a time when the poor of the land were an institution, as
respectable as they were part of the scheme which recognized them. The
poor did not have to dress like the rich, did not have to live like the
rich, act like the rich, and be buried like the rich.
"But those times are gone. A fifteen dollar a week clerk is supposed to
dress in clothes as expensive as his superior who receives four times
the amount. He is not considered "ambitious" if he does not starve
himself to appear spick and span every day of the week. Sinkers and
coffee for lunch after a breakfast-less breakfast, to buy a neat silk
necktie. No lunch at all to have a suit pressed. Dinnerless dinners to
buy new shoes or a new hat. The shoemakers have forgotten how to put
patches on shoes. The mothers have forgotten how to patch up a worn-out
seat or a threaded elbow. It is no longer done."
The above is the beginning of an essay on poverty I found among the
papers of the deceased Italian poet Gagliano. Where the impetus of
thought of such a beginning would have led him is difficult to follow.
He never finished the essay. I am inclined to think that Gagliano did
not have the heart, though he had the mind, to pursue the logical
sequence of thoughts of his theory. He was a poet, a sweet singer, and
he hated and avoided what was engendered by bitterness.
He had been poor so many years that it was becoming to him. Poverty
fitted him as well as his worn coat and greenish sombrero. Should
Gagliano have suddenly exhibited signs of prosperity it would have
scandalized every one.
Daily, for years his long, thin legs kicked open the door of the
spaghetti joint at noon. Until food was brought by the old waiter, he
wiped his eyeglasses, stroked his beard and brushed back his long hair
with the flat of his hand. While eating he read a book or a magazine.
His skilled fork wound the long paste round itself and carried it
automatically to the mouth without the slightest splurging generally
attending the eating of the Italian national dish. But it is not of
Gagliano's skilled spaghetti eating that I want to speak. I want to tell
how Gagliano lost his job with Rinaldini the banker. It had kept him
alive for years. He had counted pennies, nickels, dimes and quarters
until his finger tips were calloused. He had written rhymed
advertisements and jingles to pay for the little food and the few books
in which better things were written by more fortunate though not more
talented brothers of the pen. He starved with clock-like regularity,
although his poems appeared in the "better" magazines of his language.
Rinaldini the banker, his employer, was a bluff, ignorant man who had
won the confidence of his countrymen. It was his only stock and capital.
He payed interest to one, from the capital of another. He had done that
for years. He loaned money to pay the expense of Christenings, and great
festive weddings. Most of the pompous burials of the district were
financed by Signor Rinaldini on a ten per cent weekly payment after a
generous interest was charged on the total. From these things and
commissions from undertakers, music leaders and confectioners, Rinaldini
made a living. What other expenses he incurred was from capital
deposited in his bank by the credulous customers. Rinaldini liked
Gagliano. He was proud to have such a man in his employ. Whenever some
one was pleased with some of Gagliano's rhymes in the papers the banker
accepted the praise good-naturedly; and the "fratellis" of the different
lodges and societies to which he belonged, of most of which he was the
founder and treasurer, never knew that another one wrote the "Poesia"
they liked so much.
When Italy entered the war a hundred different Italian charities were
trumpeted over the city. Several bankers were in line competing for the
treasureships. Rinaldini then started a campaign of his own. He started
the work by giving to all charities lavishly. If Postarnelli, another
banker, had given hundred dollars, he gave thousand. When Pallorie, one
of the richest bankers in the district, gave thousand dollars to a
charity fund, Rinaldini strained himself to double the amount. It
impressed everybody and drew customers. Rinaldini moved out of the
Mulberry district into a more fashionable one and began to entertain
lavishly. He fitted out his home with costly furniture and even became a
patron of the arts. A celebrated Italian sculptor received the
commission for the banker's bust and a painter did him in lively colors.
At those entertainments, Gagliano's presence was frequently requested.
He wrote out the speeches which the banker delivered. Many of the
"notabiles" were astounded by the exhibition of so much learning.
Petrarc, D'Anunzio and Negri furnished the best lines. They were like
written for the occasion. So much learning and so high a patriotism was
never expected from Rinaldini. A movement was soon on foot to call the
attention of the Italian King to Rinaldini's great devotion. The banker
anticipated being ennobled and became even more fastidious and
luxurious. The old bachelor began seriously to think of wedding bells
with some lady of nobility. He became an authority on art and
literature and his opinions were quoted by newspapers.
Gagliano, the poet, was worked harder and harder. He grew bitter and
frequently made caustic remarks. He also grew thinner and thinner. He
made real contributions, money from his own pocket, to the innumerable
war charities. The prices of food advanced in the restaurants.
On an evening as the whole cream of the colony was assembled at
Rinaldini's, the banker, to make an impression on his guests, began to
brag about his possessions.
"That chandelier in the vestibule cost me a thousand dollars. Yonder
carved table costs five hundred. Some of the bric-a-brac on the
mantelpiece costs thousands." And, pointing to a guitar standing in a
corner of the room, he remarked: "For that guitar I paid a hundred
dollars."
"That is not so much! Mine comes much higher than that!" interrupted
Gagliano lightly. Every one turned and looked at him. Every one knew
how poor he was.
"You see," Gagliano explained, "originally I paid for it only twenty
dollars. But in the six years I worked for Signor Rinaldini, I have
pawned it every Tuesday and redeemed it every Saturday so as to have it
for Sunday, and the interest and the fixed charge of twenty-five cents,
the usurer from the pawnshop forces me to pay, has brought up the cost
of the guitar to way beyond a hundred dollars."
Gagliano's words iced the enthusiasm and admiration for Rinaldini. The
poet lost his job. Rinaldini never received the coveted medal.
Treasureship of many societies was withdrawn. In six months he was
bankrupt. Gagliano died some months later.
WHY HER NAME IS MARGUERITE V. L. F. CLEMENT
Voila! Here is France--France in New York and the France of to-day. One
could forgive the Boche all the crimes he has committed but the one that
he has robbed the French of their gayety, of their lightness of heart.
Dark gray has taken the place of happy rose and green. Sparkling eyes
have been dulled and the gay ribbons pleated in the hair of women have
disappeared. A small black band on the sleeve tells the reason why. One
hears laughter no longer from the open windows and on the street.
Voila! American and Canadian soldiers pass on the street and are
cheered. Little boys and girls shake their hands. A young woman drops
her marketing bag, claps her hands and cries "Vive l'Amerique," to which
one gallant boy in khaki answers with "Vive la France!" Windows and
doors open. Women and children bend over the sills as much as they dare.
A hundred, a thousand hands applaud, a hundred, a thousand voices cheer,
from a dozen phonographs "The Marseillaise" is heard.
Voila! you are in New York, in the French quarter, on Eighth Avenue
between Twenty-eighth and Thirty-sixth Streets.
In the evenings the neighborhood still gathers at Clement's. Papa
Baviele still holds the floor, only he no longer tells the stories of
the Commune, while Blanchard and Clero are discussing the merits of a
Packard engine or of a Bleriot versus a Curtiss airplane.
The war is the topic and Clement speaks with authority, for he has been
in it, in 1870.
"We would have beaten them then, only we had a sleepy Emperor and a
coward or a traitor--in the end it amounts to the same--as a general."
"Père Clement is right," said old Bideaux. "Foch was born fifty years
too late. Look here, how many of us are missing? Bernard, Duval,
Chuffot, Denure, Carreaux, Henry--all the young ones gone to France. La
Vielle Mamma Clement, a little more wine--to forget."
"Where is Marguerite?" Papa Clement asked his wife.
Marguerite, the young wife of Clement's son, Bernard, had been living
with them since her husband returned to France to do his duty. Six
months after she had come over to this country with her widowed father,
Bideaux, the mechanician, the war broke out. But in these six months she
had loved and married Bernard.
"Ma petite," he said to her on the second day of August, "I shall go and
see my consul." And when he came back he told her, "I am going to fight
the Boches."
And he went.
She went to work. Her nimble fingers and developed sense for beauty of
line found employment in a dress shop. And each week she sent something
to her Bernard, somewhere in France, to supplement the four sous a day
the Government was paying him. Every evening, returning from work, she
asked, "Any news?"
Bernard wrote frequently and well. Twice they had had bad news. Wounded
at the Aisne. Wounded on the Verdun front. "But Marguerite's husband
won't die before he has again kissed her and told her all about the
savage Boche. Tell papa I don't want ever to see Hans Seidel at our
table again. His Socialism was only masquerade. I can swear I saw him in
one of the Aisne attacks. We must learn not to forget our wounds even
after they have healed."
Hans Seidel had never left New York, and was still a frequent guest at
Clement's, where his Alsatian French amused everybody. But after
Bernard's letter he was gently told his company was no longer desired.
"Marguerite will soon be here, père."
There was a ring at the door. Mamma Clement ran to open.
"Marguerite Clement?" a voice asked, and a uniformed boy stepped into
the room.
"She not here--but I am ze father."
And Clement's shaking hands stretched for the envelope the boy held
between his fingers.
"Ne pleure pas, don't cry. A million sons of other mothers have paid the
price. Be brave."
He did not cry. "Be French, quoi!"
But the mother cried. Clement seemed to have aged ten years in ten
minutes. The other men present withdrew to the remotest corners of the
room. Only old Bideaux emptied his glass, muttering a terrible oath.
"He has sold his life dearly--friends. The letter says we shall soon
receive his Croix de Guerre and his Legion d'Honneur medal. What a son I
had! What a son we had!"
"A brave son," they all said.
Mamma Clement was in the other room crying softly. The men tried to
console the father.
Suddenly they all stopped talking. Steps were heard on the stairway.
They looked one at the other.
"That's Marguerite's step," said her father.
The crying of the mother ceased. Was it because she realized the other
woman's pain? Was it because she wanted to be brave, or because she
wanted to postpone the news?
The men regrouped themselves around the table. A key was turned in the
latch. The door opened wide and radiantly Marguerite floated into the
room.
"Bonsoir, papa, Bonsoir, mes amis. Good news! Very good news!"
She kissed every one present as she spread a newspaper on the table.
"Yesterday the Bulgars asked for peace, to-day St. Quentin is French
again."
She took her father's hand and started to dance.
"What's the matter, quoi? Why don't you dance? Come quick, the
Marseillaise--Allons enfants de la patrie----"
But no one moved. Mamma Clement came out from her room. "Oh,
Marguerite!" she wanted to cry, but checked herself in presence of so
much exuberance.
"We can't dance, Marguerite; it's--after ten o'clock--it's New York.
People want to sleep."
"Ah! voila! you are old, all of you, that's the reason."
A group of boys passed in the street, singing. Marguerite threw open the
window, applauded and yelled at the top of her voice "Bravo!" And the
gayer she grew the sadder the men looked. It made their situation ever
so harder.
"Sure, you drink wine all alone--give me some, too--and who gives me a
glass? Oh, I want to be happy--the war will soon end. The Boche gets his
due. Why do you sit like undertakers?"
She had one look at all of them. It sobered her.
"It is about Bernard. What is it? Come, tell me, what it is."
None present dared say a word. They all stood up. Her thin voice had
changed to a deep alto. Her frivolous little head suddenly became as
stern as the image of vengeance.
Her father, old Bideaux, was the first to recover.
"Give her the letter, Clement."
In a glance she took in all the contents. Bernard was dead. The rest was
not important.
Her eyes closed. Her muscles stiffened as she gripped the edge of the
table. It looked as though she was going to faint. She remained so for a
few minutes, then she threw her head back and with all her strength she
yelled at the top of her voice:
"Vive la France! Vive la France! Vive la France!"
And the mother and the father of the dead soldier repeated the cry with
tears in their eyes, as loudly as they could, to dull the edge of their
cutting pain, to drown their sorrow.
"You said, Bideaux, I had a brave son. But how much braver is your
daughter!"
* * * * *
"What is your name, please?" Mr. Lauders asked the young Frenchwoman in
mourning applying for the position of designer in his dressmaking shop.
"My name is Marguerite V. L. F. Clement."
"Full name, please?"
"Marguerite Vive la France Clement----"
And every time Marguerite's pain is too sharp to bear she cries out:
"Vive la France!"
It's now more than four years since the Boche invaded New York through
the French quarter. Gray and black are the dominant colors of what was
the most joyous district of our city.
LULEIKA, THE RICH WIDOW
You hear people talk about the disadvantages of living in New York.
Personally, I cannot think of greater happiness than being in this great
metropolis, if only for the reason that I can be all over Europe in one
night. Five cents carfare lands you in the French district. Five more
minutes reading of the "Subway Sun" lands you in Hungary; from whence
you can tramp in fifteen minutes to Italy or Greece or Turkey, as the
spirit moves you or inclination dictates. You can eat your breakfast in
a Russian restaurant on East Fifth Street, have caviar and Bolshevik
talk; go for lunch in China, on Mott Street, where they will serve you
tea grown on the highest mountain of Asia; for dinner you can have your
choice between Persian, French, Hindu or Greek menus, and still have the
cuisines of a dozen other foreign nationalities to choose from if you
are alive the next morning.
And now, in case you ever intend going down to the Syrian Quarter for
supper and atmosphere, I will acquaint you with the story of Luleika, as
it was told to me by Malouf the jeweler, who is a Mohammedan gentleman,
born in Constantinople. Malouf believes in the glory of Allah. His face
is as dry as smoked parchment, and he touches the ground with his
forehead twice a day, at sunrise and sundown, as it is commanded in the
Koran. Malouf lives on Washington Street, which is at a stone's throw
from the Statue of Liberty in the Bay of New York.
* * * * *
"And it is written in the Koran: 'For whosoever sells his soul for gain,
shall suffer in his flesh, and whosoever sells his flesh for gain shall
suffer in his soul.'
"But you, my listener, are either a Christian Giaour or a Yehudi Kepek,
and know nothing about the Koran.
"And Luleika was young then, in her twenty-fifth year, and the Koran was
only a name to her and not the fountain of wisdom which it really is.
"She was young and beautiful when her brother, Ali, who was a rich
dealer in rugs, brought her here, to this pork-eating country. Her
brother was very proud of her. Not one woman in a thousand could wear a
diamond-studded comb in her hair as well as Luleika could; not one in a
million could carmine her nails as well; and not another in the whole
world could make the lines of her mouth harmonize so well with the
curves of her eyebrows.
"I loved Luleika. But I was poor and her brother was rich, and richer
yet were the friends he had. So Ali set up a store, not far from the
Christian church around the corner, in which he sold rugs to the rich of
this country. And in the store he put up a little cage in which sat
Luleika like an imprisoned bird. Men came to buy rugs and smile at the
girl. Ali became richer every day. As his gold piled up he forgot the
good teachings of the holy book and ate pork and drank wine. And Luleika
did as he did.
"Then my mother sent word through Mustapha Hogea, the priest, that I
should come home that she might see me before joining her father in
Allah. And I answered: 'I have bread here a-plenty, and there is a woman
my heart holds my eyes on, and you may die in peace, for I shall follow
the words of the Koran and end my daily prayers with Allah il Allah,
Mohammed rassul Allah.'
"She must have died peacefully.
"Daily, under some excuse or other, I went to see Luleika. She changed
her dress little by little as she learned the language of this country.
Her beautifully woven bournous was replaced with a white waist which
looked as if made out of tissue paper, and her heavy pantaloons, cut
from goods brought on a camel's back from Damascus, were exchanged for a
flimsy skirt, the like of which is worn by the women of the land of the
Francs.
"And one day, when I no longer could wait, I spoke to her of my love.
She listened to the end and then she said: 'Thou art young and strong. A
woman could love thee. But thou art poor, and I am afraid of poverty. I
shall therefore marry Kurguz Mehmed, the partner of my brother Ali.'
"'But Mehmed is dreadfully old!' I cried.
"'I wish he were older,' she told me.
"Luleika married Kurguz Mehmed. He was so old he could not walk without
a cane. Kurguz had become very rich in this country, rich and dissolute.
He was the shame of his people.
[Illustration: Luleika and old Kurguz walked through Washington Street]
"Ali knew, Luleika knew, yet she married him, because he was rich.
"And I, I worked myself tired and cried myself to sleep. Twice the soul
of my mother stayed my hand from murder. Thousands of rings and brooches
in silver and gold I have made for men and women, and in them I have
engraved all the tortures of my soul and flesh. I have put sapphires and
rubies in the eyes of the engraved serpents on the brooches and pale
green topazes in the mouths of the carved monsters on the rings I made.
"And every day I took an oath afresh never to see her again.
"Then one day her last words to me rang in my ears: 'I wish he were
older.'
"But Kurguz Mehmed got stronger and younger every day now. I saw him
pass the street without leaning on his cane.
"Five years later, one morning, Luleika suddenly appeared at the door of
my place.
"'That you make for me a brooch, Malouf,' she said, 'a brooch as
beautiful as you ever made.'
"I looked at her. My heart grew cold, my mouth burned. Was this the same
Luleika? She was still beautiful, but her flesh had lost its firmness,
and the corners of her mouth drooped.
"And as I worked at her brooch I cooled the white-heated golden wires
with my tears, yet I dared not speak to her of my love, for she was
the wife of another man. She must have known I still loved her; women
always do.
"Kurguz Mehmed lived on and grew richer every day. He lived on five more
years, and then five more and then some more. The last two years he lay,
with no use of limbs and eyes on his bed, and allowed not that she leave
him alone. He was still her master.
"Then he died.
"She was left alone and rich, oh very rich. Every rug sold in this
country had added something to her riches. But she was no longer young
when Kurguz died. She was no longer young and she knew it.
"My soul was dead to her. My flesh burnt to cold cinders. She came for a
ring one day. I spoke nothing at all to her save of the ring--nothing of
love.
"But there were other men, men of our people who have come here in the
last fifteen years. Young men wooed her, swore love to her. She never
believed. Was she not ten times as rich as Kurguz was when she married
him for his wealth?
"What she herself had done was the measure by which she weighed what
others may do. She would have believed the young men, ten years ago,
should Kurguz have died when she expected him to. But now, her mirror
told her: 'What else do men see to love in thee except thy gold?'
"As she grew richer she believed still less. She bedecked herself with
the costliest jewels, yet she always knew they wouldn't bring back
youth.
"Go now, you my listener, to the store of Luleika, Kurguz Mehmed's rich
widow. Buy rugs. The richer she will become the greater her punishment
will be. It will poison her mind and poison the souls of her wooers.
"Because her sin was so great Allah prolonged the life of even so great
a sinner as Kurguz Mehmed.
"I shall live my days engraving this sad story in gold and silver.
Believers and infidels, rich and poor, in the thousands are near it
without knowing."
Malouf finished his story. For the time being I thought myself somewhere
in the Orient--in Constantinople or Salonica, where roving packs of dogs
howl day and night and no soul cares about the infernal noise--somewhere
near Turkish giamies topped by the crescent moon--somewhere where men
sit with their feet in the gutter and smoke from long pipes, while
veiled women walk near the walls.