Arlette stood in the dining-room door, making her silent announcement
that dinner was served. Her round eyes, which usually wore an expression
of surprise, were now frightened, and she stared at Kendall as if he
were some sort of explosive that was likely to go off at any moment with
a tremendous explosion. Then she withdrew her head and could be heard
padding out to the kitchen.
“Come on,” said Bert. “Dinner’s on.”
“I don’t want any dinner.”
“You don’t deserve any dinner,” said Bert, hotly, “but you’ve got to
eat.” He pushed Ken toward the dining-room. “In with you.”
Kendall obeyed apathetically, took his chair and began to eat
automatically, without interest in his food. He had anticipated a sort
of barbarous pleasure from his harshness toward Andree, but found it
ashes in his mouth. He was ashamed of himself, and then ashamed of
himself again for being ashamed. He had done right, exactly right, he
insisted. She had deserved what he had given her, but nevertheless he
was ashamed of himself. There are two identities in every man, the
emotional, the sentimental, the natural—and the intellectual. Either of
these identities may perform actions satisfactory to itself but
abhorrent to the other. Kendall’s intellectual and logical self was
content; his emotional self accused him.... If one would be happy, if he
would gain and retain affection, if he would have the best gifts of life
for himself and those with whom he comes in contact, he should place
confidence in his emotional self rather than his intellectual. The
emotions are natural and for the most part kindly. They do not operate
by rule and precept, but spontaneously; intellect is artificial and
logic is without the warmth of life.... Even the law recognizes a
distinction, for it does not punish a crime of emotion with the severity
that it metes out to the crime of cold reason. Peter was emotional, he
denied his Master, yet was forgiven and stands chief of the companions
of Christ; Judas took logical thought and betrayed. He committed the
unforgivable sin. The difference was not so much in kind as in cause....
“What would you have done?” he demanded, suddenly, of Bert.
“I wouldn’t have been so infernally brutal.... You and I have been
friends a long time, haven’t we?... Well, right now I’m nearer to
wanting to give you a thrashing than I thought I could ever come. It was
rotten!... Poor kid!... And the way she took it! Without a word or a
whimper!... But did you see her face?... I came darn near blubbing.”
“She deserved it.... She did. She did a rotten thing—and anybody would
think it was I who was to blame. I won’t be put in the wrong.”
“I’m not going to quarrel with you. You asked me what I thought, and I
told you.... I wouldn’t have the confounded conscience you have to live
with for a million dollars. I’m no angel. I suppose I do a lot of things
the righteous folks back home would think were pretty bad. I’m not much
on religion, either. But, all the same, if there is a God, I’ll bet He’s
a lot more apt to take a liking to the fellow who is a bit off color,
but tries to be sort of kind and tolerant, and not to hurt folks, than
He is to the man who lives up to every letter and punctuation mark of
the law, and does it like a brute.... From what I’ve seen of you
stiff-necked, righteous folks, if I were God I’d be pretty average sore
to think I had to have heaven crowded with you. You’d irritate me till I
let in a bunch of sinners just to get some decent company....”
“Right is right and wrong is wrong.”
“Huh!... Maybe! But who knows what is right and what is wrong? It’s a
guess, and everybody does his own guessing.... There are your Ten
Commandments, sure enough, but you can’t regulate the whole world and
all it does with ten little rules.... Let’s see! Wasn’t there an
eleventh commandment later on? I used to go to Sunday-school myself.
Something to the effect that you ought to love your neighbor as
yourself? A God that could make that sort of a commandment isn’t going
to be too stiff-backed about the other ten. No, sir.... Things are too
mixed up for _anything_ to be all wrong or all right. Everything’s a
mixture—and the more of that love-your-neighbor stuff there is in it,
why, my notion is, the nearer it is to what is really good.”
Ken was surprised. He had never accused Bert of so much abstract
speculation, and perhaps Bert had not been speculating consciously
before. It was rather that these ideas had been taking root in him and
growing spontaneously. Possibly Bert was himself astonished to find
himself uttering such ideas.
“It’s over now,” Bert said, presently, “so let’s shut up about it.
You’re in a devil of a state of mind, and the only thing to get rid of
_that_ is to walk it off. As soon as I finish this cheese I’m going to
take you out and walk you till you’re human again—or till you drop.”
“I’ll walk.... I’ll do anything. I want to get outdoors and move.”
“Come on, then, sonny, but be genial—be genial. It’s a walk we’re going
for, not a march to the grave.”
They walked over to the rue du Faubourg St.-Honoré, which presented to
them a face of little second-class shops, dairy products, bakeries,
locksmiths, antiques, wine-shops, variety-stores, in front of every
second one of which was its cat—a huge, sleek Thomas or a matronly old
Tabby keeping an eye on two or three adventurous kittens. The street
seemed to have a special leaning toward the feline in pets. But, then,
all Paris is a sanctuary for cats, which is remarkable when one takes
into account the number of dogs, and even jackals and young foxes, the
latter affected by the ladies. It may be that there is a permanent truce
between the dogs and cats in Paris. Bert remarked that he had never seen
a cat chased by a dog there. Possibly, he declared, it might be the
system. American dogs chased cats. It was their moral code to do so;
Parisian dogs left cats alone, for a similar reason.
“It’s all a matter of where you live,” he said, in an effort to arouse
Kendall. “Maybe there’s a place in the world where they put deacons in
jail and look up reverently to burglars. You can’t tell. I suppose folks
could agree among themselves to almost anything.”
“Except to alter a natural law,” said Ken, harshly.
“Natural law, eh? What’s a natural law? To be sure, I get you. The
shortest distance between two points, and gravitation, and that sort of
thing. I guess nobody could change them, but, so far as I can see,
they’re the only settled things in the world. Natural laws—pretty good
name for them. Means they come right from nature without people’s
tinkering with them at all, doesn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“That’s the kind of law for me—the sort you can’t disobey and so get in
wrong.... But the other kind—what’ll we call ’em—that’s something else
again, Mawrus. The kind of law that has to be agreed upon by a majority
before it goes to work isn’t such a serious matter in the long run. I
mean, it is important only to the majority that agrees on it. Some other
majority in the next county might agree to its exact opposite. Like
local option. It’s a sin to sell liquor on one side of a fence and a
legitimate business on the other.... Huh!... I never got to thinking how
funny it all was before.”
How curious it was, thought Kendall, with quickened interest, that Bert
should rather clumsily be following a line of reasoning that he himself
had followed with deeper study and more particularity during the past
weeks!... Could there really be something in it, after all? He had been
sure of it yesterday, but yesterday was gone forever, and that had
happened since which made the affairs and reasonings of yesterday
repulsive to him.... But—the dogmatism, the harsh, uncompromising,
puritanical attitude he had chosen to take quivered a very little on its
foundations....
They proceeded onward past the Ministry of the Interior on their left,
and on their right the building with its great central court, and its
archway through which could be seen broad, red-carpeted steps, which was
the French White House—the residence of France’s President. Now small
cafés and wine-shops became more numerous, and the shops to partake of a
better quality.
“Hey!” said Bert, stopping, “want to introduce you to a friend.” He
stepped into a little wine-shop and spoke to the young woman behind the
bar, who lifted her voice loudly, calling a name that Kendall could not
catch. In a moment a rather dirty, but very bright-eyed, bull-terrier
appeared from the rear and stood looking at Bert expectantly. Bert
selected a copper from his pocket and put it in the dog’s mouth. The
creature waggled his tail violently and trotted out into the street.
“Watch him,” Bert urged.
The dog trotted into the adjoining baker’s shop, barked once sharply
with a note of command. A young woman leaned far over the counter,
holding out her hand, into which the dog dropped his coin and stood
expectant while she selected a roll and handed it to him. Then, in the
most dignified manner, he paced back to Bert, waggled his tail in
thanks, waited to be patted, and withdrew under a table to eat his
dainty.
“There!” said Bert. “Finest dog in Paris. Wish I could buy him. Say,
wasn’t that great?”
“Huh!...” grunted Kendall, rather astonished that anybody could be
interested in dogs when the world was coming down in awful ruin as his
world was coming down.
Bert was offended. To him that dog was one of the sights of Paris, and,
when he returned to America, it would be that animal and his little
piece of cleverness that he would describe rather than anything else he
had seen in Paris. The dog was worth coming to see.... Notre Dame was
just a dingy pile of stones.... Yet, somewhere in him was a strain that
was able to speculate on the attitude of God toward Pharisees and
sinners....
They continued in silence until they reached the Place du Théâtre
Français, with the Palais Royal before them and the Comédie Française,
and with the magnificent breadth of the Avenue de l’Opéra angling
sharply to the left. Across the open space was the University Union, and
Bert suggested dropping in to see if any acquaintances were lounging
about, when suddenly they were hailed from a distance, and, turning, saw
Jacques, wooden leg grotesquely swinging at an angle from his body, hat
swinging about his head, and cane describing enthusiastic circles.
Jacques was trying to run to catch them. His method was to take two hops
with his sound leg and then one lurch with the artificial one. There was
a devil-may-care jauntiness about this unusual gait and a
good-fellowship about his eccentric salutations that, somehow, always
gained him a welcome.
“Ah,” he shouted, when yet he was thirty feet away, “I have find you! I
have surround you—eh? Where ’ave you been? I have not seen you for
_longtemps_.... And Monsieur Kendall. It ees well. We are friends and
_camarades_.... I have speak about you thees evening—you, Monsieur
Kendall. Ho! you have the great good fortune, _n’est-ce pas_? I give you
my felicitations. I salute you.... Ah, messieurs, eet was _magnifique,
splendide_!...”
“What was magnificent, Jacques? Take a breath and start in fresh,” Bert
admonished.
Jacques patted Ken on the back. “Oh, he ees a good boy, thees Monsieur
Kendall. He deserve the good fortune, _mais_, messieurs, it ees of a
grandeur. Again I make the congratulations.”
“Why? Why? Why?”
“Bicause,” said Jacques, becoming preternaturally solemn, “bicause
monsieur ees loved.” He paused. “_Oui_, he ees loved ver’ well by
beautiful yo’ng girl who ees ver’ _fidèle_. It ees one beautiful theeng.
I make to weep w’en it ees tol’ to me. _Vraiment!_ The tear she stand in
my eyes. _Sacré nom d’une pipe!_ but it ees the theme for a poem.”
“What in thunder are you talking about? Light on a bough, little bird,
light.” Bert grasped Jacques by the shoulder and pretended to hold him
down to earth. “Now, little man, come clean. Tell the story and don’t
bubble over.”
“It ees the leetle sweetheart of Monsieur Kendall—thees so graceful and
beautiful yo’ng girl that has for her name Andree. She weesh for enter
into the _Académie_ and _après_ to be an actress. It is so.... To do
this is ver’ _difficile_. It is necessary first to have much influence.
Monsieur Kendall know thees. Yes. _Alors_, Monsieur Kendall introduce
thees yo’ng girl to Monsieur Robert. I am present and see. Also I warn
monsieur that thees Robert loves all young girl.... What would you? The
theeng befalls yesterday. As Monsieur Robert emerges from the Metro near
the Place St.-Michel he see bifore him thees Mademoiselle Andree,
walking weeth her eyes so careful upon the sidewalk—so.” Jacques
imitated Andree’s demure glance. “She do not see Robert until he address
her. She is startle’—ver’ much startle’, but Monsieur Robert he is
polite, _oui_, he is _très-gentil_. He ask mademoiselle will she
promenade weeth heem, and she cannot refuse. Next he ask will she dine
weeth heem, and she ees too sweet and gentle to hurt hees feeling, so
she consent....”
Bert felt Kendall grasp his arm with fingers that gripped to the bone.
“Then they eat, this Mademoiselle Andree and Monsieur Robert, and he say
to her if she will be kind to heem he make her to enter into the
_Académie_, and give her hees influence, which is much, that she bicome
a success, weeth all Paris at her feet.... It was wonderful chance for
poor yo’ng girl, _n’est-ce pas_? One million girl they jump at it.
Truly.... But thees mademoiselle she shake her head and say no—and why,
messieurs?... Bicause she love thees yo’ng man here ver’ true and is
_fidèle_. It ees the truth, and it ees ver’ beautiful.... Monsieur
Robert say thees yo’ng man make himself to go away and leave her
_solitaire_. Mademoiselle makes to him the reply that it does not
matter—for weeth Monsieur Kendall she have the wonderful little moment
of happiness w’ich is more splendid, more magnificent, more to be
desired than any other theeng in the worl’ ... bicause it ees the great
love.... Yes, she say thees theeng to Robert, who admire so much he kees
her hand, and now he tells me and others, and as he tell the tear stands
in his eyes. He theenk Mademoiselle Andree she has make the great
success, to which nothing can compare, a success much times greater than
fame or than glory—bicause it is a success of the soul.... So I make
many compliments to Monsieur Kendall—many compliments....”
“Bert ...” said Ken, in a voice that was little more than a whisper.
“Bert....”
“Ees monsieur ill?” asked Jacques.
“No, Jacques. Just out of sorts—worried,” said Bert. “I’m walking it out
of him.... Mighty glad to have met you, old man.”
Kendall turned to Jacques. “What you say about Andree—is it true? You
are sure?...”
“_Certainement_.”
“Of course,” Ken answered, slowly. “I didn’t doubt it.... It sounded
like the truth.... I thank you, Jacques. Some day I’ll thank you
better.” He held out his hand. “Good night, Jacques.”
He turned away, and Bert, after shaking hands with the exuberant little
Frenchman, followed. Jacques stood for a moment staring after them, then
waved his cane in the air for no purpose whatever, and said,
perplexedly, “_Tous les Américains sont fous...._”
Ken walked rapidly, as one in haste to reach a definite destination; he
did not speak. Bert, keeping pace with him, watched his friend’s face
covertly; it was a gray mask without expression, a mask that seemed to
tell a tale of years double that which made the total of Kendall’s life.
They diagonaled across the Place Marengo and at a more acute angle
through the Place du Louvre to the Quai du Louvre and crossed the Pont
Neuf, which carried them over the broader arm of the Seine, the upper
point of the Cité, where to their left arose the dark mass of the Palais
de Justice, and across the narrower branch of the river to the Quai des
Augustins. Presently the Place St.-Michel opened before them, and, as
Kendall turned into it Bert stopped to demand where they were going.
“To find her,” said Kendall.
Bert nodded. “I thought so.”
It was like Kendall—to start upon a search for her immediately. Just as
jealousy, made more vicious by an attack of Puritan conscience, had
caused him to drive Andree out of his life, so now that same conscience
demanded that immediate reparation be made. If Bert knew his friend,
then Kendall would be unable to rest until he had seen Andree, until he
had debased himself before her and begged her forgiveness....
“Does she live here?” he asked.
“Near the Panthéon some place.... I don’t know. I haven’t her
address.... Bert, I don’t even know her last name!”
“Eh? What’s that?”
“I don’t know her name.... Somehow that was a part of it—the mystery—not
knowing. It—I can’t explain it to you—but she seemed like something
dainty and lovely that appeared out of nothingness. I never asked,
because I didn’t want to know. She appeared and disappeared—like a
fairy.... It was as if she were immaterial and only materialized herself
for me—do you understand?”
“I’m darned if I do.”
“I always left her a little ways beyond—on the rue Soufflot. She went on
alone toward the Panthéon. That’s all I know. Just that her name was
Andree—and that she could appear and disappear. It was that unreality
that made the whole thing possible.”
“A few practical details would make the whole thing a lot more possible
now.... What do you aim to do?”
“Wait for her.”
“Huh!... Where?”
“At the corner of the rue Soufflot.... She may pass to-night.”
“And she may not pass for a month.”
“Then I’ll wait a month,” said Kendall, and Bert knew that his friend
meant what he said.
They walked on up the boulevard and took seats at a table in that very
café where Kendall had seen Andree and Monsieur Robert the night before.
He could see that table, occupied now by a _poilu_ and his
sweetheart.... Bert ordered coffee for them, which came in thick glasses
accompanied by a bottle of _saccharin_ for the sweetening. Kendall left
his glass untouched while his eyes fixed themselves on the street, now
becoming ever more rapidly hidden by the dusk. Many people were passing,
_habitués_ of the Quartier Latin; young men in uniform with girls on
their arms, skylarking, humming the chorus of “Madelon”; old women
making a last effort of the day to sell bright-colored Rintintins and
Ninettes fabricated out of worsteds, those quaint little charms which
were all the rage in Paris, and which were supposed to make one safe
from Big Bertha and the bomb of the air raid. One young girl passed
clinging to the arm of a youth in a broad hat, baggy corduroy trousers,
paint-daubed coat, and flowing tie—a figure who might have stepped out
of the pages of Henri Mürger. He seemed the very genius of the Latin
Quarter, a hungry _peintre_ with canvas under his arm, and his
gay-hearted little mistress who cooked his meals and shared his hunger
and poverty brightly.... Kendall watched them go and envied them the
thing that was theirs. Now and then a gendarme, wearing his short sword,
passed stiffly.... It became darker and darker, and the crowd in the
café thinned itself away until nobody remained but himself and Bert.
Impatient waiters began piling up chairs and moving tables against the
wall. Dim, hooded, blue street-lights glowed in the distance, making the
boulevard ghastly and somber.... The darkness became impenetrable, but
still Kendall lingered, hoping, demanding that Andree’s dainty little
figure appear.
“No use, Ken,” Bert said. “She won’t come now, and if she did you
wouldn’t be able to see her.”
“I can’t go till I’m sure,” Ken answered.
“Let’s walk, then. More chance of seeing her out on the sidewalk.”
They arose and sauntered slowly toward the Panthéon, crossing the very
spot where Andree had given Kendall that first kiss.... They retraced
their steps. The streets were now all but deserted; only here and there
was a hurrying figure, or upon some bench along the curb a pair of
lovers sitting close and whispering in each other’s ears.
“It’s eleven o’clock,” said Bert. “Come on home.”
“Yes,” said Ken. “It is too late now. She won’t come to-night....”
Suddenly the air was rent by the wail of the siren; the avions were
coming! One heard cries of anger or fright, saw dark blots resolve into
hurried action as loiterers sought places of refuge.... A fire-engine
swept by with gnome-like black figures clinging to it, and that voice
like some horrid wail from the pit rising from it as a fireman turned
the handle of the siren.... It was a voice that matched Kendall’s
humor—a voice of despair, a voice that made audible a thing which
described to his ear all that was evil and squalid and treacherous and
unforgivable that lurked in the black and stealthy warrens of the
world....
“Let’s get out of this,” said Bert.
Kendall did not want to go, and the less so now that there was
danger.... Andree was in danger and, somehow, he felt that his place, if
it could not be with her, was as near to her as he could station
himself. He was alarmed. People were killed in these air raids. There
were always casualties.... What if a bomb—what if he should never be
able to see Andree again to make matters right with her? How if he
should be prevented from entreating her pardon for the ugly wrong he had
done her and for his brutality—he could recognize it as brutality now.
Yet, mixed with all his self-accusation, his bitter heartache and
wretchedness, there ran a vein of relief—actual relief, and of something
like comfort. The pendulum of his subconscious self was swaying
downward, preparatory to the upward sweep in the opposite direction....
The world was good, there was good in the world. All was not suspicion
and sin; one might have faith in humanity.... The vestibule of the home
church with its crowd of bigots seemed cold and untrue now, though they
had appeared the one safe and living thing in the world so short a time
ago.... Andree was good. He had not been mistaken in her; and if Andree
was good, then other things and people must be good likewise.... Even
Paris....
They descended into the Metro whose underground platforms were crowded
with refuge-seekers of all classes and ages, who clustered together and
railed against the _boche_. It was impossible to find a seat.... In half
an hour many were sitting on the concrete floor: mothers with children
sleeping in their laps; youths supporting the heads of sweethearts on
willing shoulders; sleepy and frowsy old men and slatternly old women
with hair that hung gray and unpleasant before their eyes. A gendarme
prevented any from ascending the stairs to the open air.
It seemed hours, though it was only a trifle more than an hour before
the “all clear” was sounded. The mighty clamor of the barrage and of
falling bombs had penetrated only as a dim rumble to that depth. There
had been no excitement, no exhilaration, only damp, cold discomfort. The
refugees made their way stiffly to the out-of-doors, Kendall and Bert in
their midst.
“If I should never find her—” Ken said, uneasily.
“You will.”
“But if she should refuse to listen.”
“Um.... I shouldn’t blame her. But you know her, son, better than I. I
saw her eyes to-night—and I shouldn’t worry. They were the sort of eyes
that forgive much.”
“Yes,” said Kendall, slowly. “But she will remember. She is that sort,
too. She will never forget—and this thing will always be there, never to
be gotten rid of.... She will look at me, and I will see it in her eyes,
that she is wondering and that she is afraid—that I might do such a
thing again....”
“The trouble with you is too darn much imagination,” Bert said,
disgustedly. “Let’s get to bed. Work goes on to-morrow, whatever
happens.”
Work would go on and life would go on; death would continue to claim its
own and births would replenish the races of the earth; there would be
sorrow and joy, sin and repentance, squalor and luxury, in spite of
anything that happened to him.... Kendall seized upon this thought. He
was infinitely small, of less than negligible importance in the world’s
scheme.... Events would transpire as usual, and the story of mankind
would continue adding to itself chapter by chapter. It was
inevitable.... Just as it was inevitable that the _motif_ of the story
should be love, and that so long as it should continue to be love the
good should predominate the evil, and the ending, though it might
threaten to be tragic, must be happy for the majority. He saw, for the
first time, that a world in which love is the first essential cannot be
a lost world nor an unhappy world. He wondered if love, in whatever form
it showed itself, was not merely the essence of _good_ masquerading
under another style. In that case to love was to be virtuous.... He
inclined to believe it. The reflection made him easier of mind.
“I think I can sleep,” he said to Bert, and they turned their faces
homeward.