One Hour, in which she apologizes twice for her Self, her
Life and Works; and once she is beautifully forgiven, and
once she never will be, this Side of the Last Trump.
The Cooneys' door was opened, after the delay usual with the poor, by
Henrietta herself, this moment returned from the bookstore. Hen wore her
hat, but not her coat, and it was to be observed that one hand held a
hot-water bottle, imperfectly concealed behind her back.
"Hurrah!--Cally!" cried she. "We were talking of you at dinner to-day,
wondering what had become of you. Come into the house, and don't mind a
bit if this bottle leaks all over you. Such troubles!"
"How is Chas to-day? I just heard that he hadn't been at work for a
week."
"Chas?... Chas is better--Cousin Martha's worse--father's just the
same--Looloo's dancing the floor with a toothache." Hen recited this in
the manner of a chant, and added, as she ushered her Washington Street
cousin into the little parlor: "But for that, we're all doing
nicely--thank you!"
"Gracious, Hen! I'd no idea you had such a hospital. Why, what's the
matter with Uncle John?"
"Oh, just his lumbago. He's complaining, but out and about--fighting
over the Seven Days around Richmond with an old comrade somewhere, I
doubt not.... Sit down, my dear," added Hen, who had been looking at
Cally just a little curiously, "and excuse me while I run upstairs. I
forgot to explain that this bottle is for mother, who's down with a
splitting headache. Back in a jiffy...."
Thus Miss Cooney, not knowing that for one moment, at least, her society
had been preferred above that of a Canning. Such was the odd little
development. Carlisle, having been more with Henrietta in the past five
weeks than she had commonly been in a year, had discovered her as
undoubtedly a person you could talk things over with--the only person in
the world, perhaps, that you could talk _this_ over with....
Possibly Hen, being a lynx-eyed Cooney, had somehow gathered that her
lovely cousin had not dropped in merely to "inquire"; for when she
returned to the parlor, having doubtless put her hot-water bottle where
it would do the most good, she did not expend much time on reporting
upon her invalids, or become involved in the minor doings of the day.
Very soon she deflected, saying:
"But you don't look particularly fit yourself, Cally. What's wrong with
the world?"
Cally, being still uncertain how far she cared to confide in Hen, met
the direct question with a tentative lightness.
"Oh!... Well, I _did_ just have a rather unpleasant experience, though I
didn't know I showed it in my face!... We happened to look in at the
Works for a few minutes--Mr. Canning and I--and I certainly didn't
_enjoy_ it much ..." And then, the inner pressure overcoming her natural
bent toward reserve, she spoke with a little burst: "Oh, Hen, it was the
most horrible place I ever saw in my life!"
The little confidence spoke straight to the heart, as a touch of genuine
feeling always will. Quite unconsciously, Henrietta took her cousin's
hand, saying, "You poor dear ..." And within a minute or two Cally was
eagerly pouring out all that she had seen in the bunching-room, with at
least a part of how it had made her feel.
Hen listened sympathetically, and spoke reassuringly. If her "arguments"
followed close in the footsteps of Hugo,--for Hen was surprisingly
well-informed in unexpected ways,--it must have been some quality in
her, something or other in her underlying "attitude," that invested her
words with a new horsepower of solace. And Saltman's best stenographer
actually produced an argument that Hugo had altogether passed by. She
thought it worth while to point out that these things were not a
question of abstract morals at all, but only of changing points
of view....
"When Uncle Thornton learned business," declared Hen, "there wasn't a
labor law in the country--no law but supply and demand--pay your
work-people as little as you could, and squeeze them all they'd stand
for. Nobody ever _thought_ of anything different. In those days the
Works would have been a model plant--nine-hour day, high wages, no women
working at night, no children...."
If Cally was not wholly heartened by words like these, she knew where
the lack was. And perhaps Hen herself was conscious of something
missing. For, having defended her uncle's Works at least as loyally as
she honestly could, she gave the talk a more personal tone, skirting
those phases of the matter so new-thoughty that they had never even
occurred to Hugo Canning.
"Cally, are you going to speak to Uncle Thornton about it--about your
going there, I mean?"
"No, no!" cried Cally, hastily. "How could I? Of course I--realize that
that's the way business must be--as you say. What right have I, an
ignorant little fool, to set up as papa's critic?"
"Not at all--of course," said Hen, giving her hand a little squeeze.
"What I--"
"You surely can't think that I ought to go and reprove papa for the way
he runs his business--do you, Hen?... That I--I'm _responsible_ in
any way!"
Hen noted her cousin's unexplained nervousness, and it may be she
divined a little further. She answered no, not a bit of it. She said she
meant to speak to him, not as a business expert, but only as his
daughter. It was always a mistake to have secrets in a family, said Hen.
Good advice, undoubtedly. Only Hen didn't happen to know the most
peculiar circumstances....
The two girls sat side by side on a sofa that sorely needed the
ministrations of an upholsterer. Hen was sweet-faced, but habitually
pale, usually a little worn. Her eyes and expression saved her from
total eclipse in whatever company; otherwise she would have been
annihilated now by the juxtaposition of her cousin. Cally's face was
framed in an engaging little turn-down hat of gold-brown and yellow,
about which was carelessly festooned a long and fine brown veil. Hen,
gazing rather wistfully, thought that Cally grew lovelier every year.
"I'll tell you, Cally!" she said, suddenly. "Do you know what you ought
to do? Talk to V.V. about all this!"
Cally repressed a little start; though the thought, to speak truth, was
far from being a new one. But how could she possibly talk to V.V.
without the ultimate disloyalty to papa?...
"No," she said, quietly, after a brief pause. "I could hardly do that."
"Why not? He's thought out all these things further than anybody I know.
And he'll--"
"Hen, have you forgotten what he wrote in the paper about papa last
year--what he's going to write next month. Don't you see my position?"
"I don't care what he writes in the papers!... When it comes to people,
there's nobody so kind--and wise. And--"
"He's the one person," said Cally, resolutely, "I could not possibly
talk to about it."
Henrietta, falling back on the thought she had set out with, laughed
good-naturedly.
"Then, I suppose, you'll want to fly at once. He's due here at any
minute, you know--in fact, he's half an hour late now--"
"Here!... Is he coming here this afternoon?"
This time her start was without concealment. Hen looked genuinely
surprised.
"He's our doctor--I told you the other day ... But he doesn't bite, my
dear! You look as if I'd said that a grizzly bear and three mad ogres
were loping down the steps."
"I never think of him as a doctor somehow," said Cally, recovering, with
a little laugh. "So I couldn't imagine--"
"Second largest practice in town--only I'll admit that his not charging
any fees has something to do with it. In fact V.V.'s patients usually
borrow anything that's loose, including his hats, suits, and shoes ...
Cally, it's like a play, for I believe there he is now ..."
True enough, a firm but unequal footstep just then sounded on the
Cooneys' wooden steps outside. But Hen sat still, a far-away look in
her eyes.
"Did you hear what Pond said, Cally, the first time he saw V.V.?--'Who's
that man with the face like a bishop that never grew up?'... Do you
know, I never look at him without remembering mean things I've done and
said, and wishing I hadn't ..."
She rose as the bell rang, started toward the door, hesitated, turned in
the middle of the floor.
"I'd naturally ask him in here, Cally, while I went up to see if things
are ready for him upstairs. Of course, if you'd rather not see him ..."
Cally had risen too. The two girls stood looking at each other.
"No," said Cally, "I'd like to see him. Only I can't speak to him about
the Works. I cannot."
"No, no--of course not, dear, if you don't feel like it."
Hen went out to open the door. Greetings floated in....
Cally stood at the parlor window, staring out into the shabby street.
Over the way was the flaring sign of an unpained dentist, making
promises never to be redeemed, and two doors away the old stand of the
artificial limb-maker. Cally looked full at a show-window full of shiny
new legs; but she did not see the grisly spectacle, so it did
not matter.
The unexpected encounter was deeply disturbing to her. There stirred in
her the memory of another night when she had similarly met the slum
doctor in this room, between engagements with Hugo Canning. That night
he had asked her forgiveness for calling her a poor little thing, which
she was, and she had charged him with wicked untruthfulness for calling
the Works homicidal, which--she said it in her secret heart--they
were.... How history repeats itself, how time brought changed angles!
Strange, strange, that in the revolving months it had now come her turn
to apologize to Mr. V.V. in the Cooney parlor. Only she could not make
her apology, no matter how much she might want to....
"... Stop a minute," Hen was heard to say, "and pass the time of
day ..."
Unintelligible murmuring, and then: "D'you know who it was that invented
stopping and passing the time of day?" said the nearing voice of Mr.
V.V., gayer than Cally Heth had ever heard it. "Take my word, 't was
a woman."
"To make things pleasant for some man!--and we've been doing it ever
since.... Cally Heth's here ..."
The two came in. Cally, turning, held out her hand to the Cooneys'
physician, with a sufficiently natural air and greeting....
They had not met since the afternoon at the Woman's Club, a day which
had brought a strange change in their relations. But then, each of their
meetings seemed marked by some such realignment, and always to his
advantage. Again and again she had put this man down, at first with all
her strength; and each time when she turned and looked at him again,
behold he had shot up higher than ever.
So Cally had just been thinking. But now that V. Vivian stood in the
room, and she looked at him, she was suddenly reminded that he was her
good friend nevertheless. And something like ease came back to her.
When Hen had disappeared to make the sick-room ready (or for whatever
purpose she went), Cally said:
"I hope Chas isn't really going to be ill?"
"Oh, there's no trouble at all with him," replied the young man, "but to
make him stay in bed. It's all come down to a touch of sore throat, a
little sort of quinsy. We were rather afraid of diphtheria, the
other night."
"My cousins are having more than their share, just now. So many, many
invalids.... I hope you've been well, since I saw you last?"
"Oh, thank you!--I've the health of a letter-carrier. At least, I assume
they're naturally healthy, though as a matter of fact I've had three or
four postmen on my list ... I'm afraid I interrupted you and Henrietta?"
"Oh, no!--Or rather, I imagine she was only too glad to be
interrupted.... I was telling her all my troubles, you see."
"Have you troubles? I'm sorry."
The man spoke in a light tone, such as is suitable for friendships. Yet
he must have felt a throe then, remembering his articles: now so soon to
go to the "Chronicle" office and the print that cried aloud. And the
girl's case, had he but known it, was like his own, only more so.
Beneath the cover of her casual talk, she was aware of thought coursing
like a palpitating vein under a fine skin, threatening to break through
at any minute....
"Oh, so many," said Cally.
They had remained standing, for to ask the doctor to sit down had not
occurred to her. The girl glanced toward the window.
"And what do you suppose Hen's prescription was?... That I should take
them all to you."
There was the briefest silence.
"But, of course, you didn't want to do that?"