Then up and spake Reynard, the Fox, King Leo's throne before:
"My clients, haled before you, Sire, deserve not frown nor roar!
These flocks and herds and sties, dread lord, should thanks
give for our care--
The care of Isegrim the Wolf, and Bruin strong, the Bear!
Its usefulness, its innocence, our Syndicate protests.
We crave the Court's support for our legitimate interests!"
--_An Appeal to King Leo_.
The sifting of St. Peter
Seems quite credible to me,
When I see what's done to absentees
At our Society!
--_Annals of Sorosis_.
Any business man will be able to appreciate the difficulties which
beset the president of the Brassfield Oil Company, on the discharge of
Mr. Stevens. On the morning after the lodge meeting, behold Mr. Amidon
at his desk, contemplating a rising pile of unanswered letters. His
countenance expresses defeat, despair and aversion. His politeness
toward Miss Strong is never-failing; but that he is not himself grows
more and more apparent to that clear-headed young woman.
"Here's the third letter from the Bayonne refinery," she said. "An
immediate reply is demanded."
"Oh, yes," said Amidon; "certainly; that has gone too long! We must
get at that matter at once: let me see the contracts and
correspondence."
"That is the business," said Miss Strong, "which they claim to have
arranged with you in a conversation over the long-distance 'phone.
That's what seems to be the matter with them--they want to make a
record of it."
"I don't remember---- Well," said Amidon, "lay that by for a moment.
And this piece of business with the A. B. & C. Railway. Who knows
anything about this claim for demurrage?"
"Mr. Stevens," said Miss Strong, "had that in hand, and said he told
you all about it before you went away, and that you were going to see
about it in----"
"In New York, I suppose!" exclaimed Amidon. "Well, I didn't. Can't
you and Mr. Alderson take up this pile of letters and bring 'em to me
with the correspondence, and--and papers--and things? I've been too
lax in the past, in not referring to the records. I must have the
records, Miss Strong, in every case."
"Yes, sir," said Miss Strong; "but since we adopted that new system of
filing, I don't see how the records can be made any fuller, or how you
can be more fully acquainted with them than you now are----"
"Not at all," asseverated Mr. Amidon. "I find myself uncertain as to a
great many things. Let's have the records constantly."
"Yes, sir, but these are cases where there isn't anything. Nobody but
you and Mr. Stevens knows anything about them."
"Well, I can't answer them now," protested Mr. Amidon. "I've a
headache! My--my mind isn't clear--is confused on some of these
things; and they'll all have to wait a while. Who's that tapping? Oh,
it's you, is it, Mr. Alderson--you startled me so that I---- Mr.
Edgington here? Well, why don't you show him in? After luncheon, Miss
Strong, you may come in again."
Mr. Edgington had a tightly-curled mustache, a pink flush on his
cheeks, wore an obviously new sack suit, had a carnation in his
buttonhole, came in with an air of marked hurry, and carried a roll of
papers.
"I thought I must have a talk with you," said he, "on the evidence in
that Bunn's Ferry land case. The time for taking evidence is rapidly
passing, and the court warned us that it wouldn't be extended again.
That proof you must furnish, or we shall be beaten."
"Yes--yes, I see," said Amidon, who knew absolutely nothing about the
matter. "We should feel really annoyed by such a termination!"
"Annoyed!" exclaimed the lawyer. "Say, Brassfield, that reminds me of
Artemus Ward's statement that he was 'ashamed' when some one died!
You'd lose the best wells you've got. And it would involve those
transfers to the Waldrons, and might carry them down."
"The Waldrons!" exclaimed Florian.
"Why, I mean Miss Bessie and her aunt," said Edgington. "I mean
bankruptcy---- But we've gone all over that before."
Amidon nodded, with an air of knowing all about the matter.
"Lots of times," said he. "And this evidence is----? Please give me
the exact requirements--er, again."
"The exact requirements," said Edgington, "as I have frequently shown
you, and without its doing much good, are to prove that some time in
March, 1896, you did not make a partnership agreement with this man
Corkery by which you were to share with him the proceeds of your
oil-prospecting, and under which he went into possession of this tract
of land. He has a line of testimony which shows that you did. Proving
a negative is rather unusual, but about the only thing which will save
you is an alibi. Now you must pardon the expression, but you've always
evaded my questions as to your whereabouts prior to June of that year.
You've never flatly denied Corkery's story, but if it weren't for the
inherent improbability of it, I'd have given up the fight long ago, for
you have not helped as a client should. You haven't confided----"
"But I will!" said Amidon energetically. "The man's a perjurer, and
I'll prove it! All that time I was in Wisconsin. I was--I'll prove
where I was----"
"Good!" cried Edgington, noting a tendency to falter. "And now for the
names and addresses of a few witnesses, and we'll go after them!"
"Witnesses--yes, yes--we shall need witnesses, won't we?" faltered
Amidon. "Say, Mr. Edgington, I'll tell you what I'll do: I'll turn you
over to Blodgett."
"The old gentleman at the hotel?"
"The same," replied Amidon. "He was my lawyer, years ago. I'll send
him to you directly this afternoon."
Edgington made some notes in a book.
"Very well," said he. "I'm glad that puzzle is in process of solution.
And now one thing further, and I am done. This is a question of local
politics. You know the talks we've had with the fellows about this
trolley franchise, and the advisability of making you mayor. We all
agree that your interests and mine and those of all our crowd demand
your election to the place----"
"Me mayor!" shouted Amidon. "Me run for office! Why, Mr. Edgington,
you must be crazy!"
"Well, this--certainly--is refreshing!" expostulated Edgington, in
apparent amazement. "When can anything be supposed to be settled,
between gentlemen, if that isn't? Why, confound it, didn't we make up
the complete slate, including control of the Common Council? And
aren't we to have an exclusive franchise on all the streets, with your
signature as mayor? Of course, you're joking now. Why, we're right on
the eve of the caucuses, and with Conlon in line everything will go as
it ought. I mean Barney Conlon, the labor leader. Since you've come
back from this trip of yours, everything seems to be going in
unexpected ways--and somehow you've given offense to Conlon. Do you
know what it was?"
"No," answered Amidon, with some heat. "I don't know what it was! I
don't know Conlon, and I don't know anything about this business except
this: that if you think I'm going to sneak into office for the purpose
of stealing the streets of this town, you don't know Florian Amidon,
that's all!"
"Don't know what? Don't know whom?"
"Don't know Flo--ah--me! Me!"
"Then you won't see Barney Conlon?"
"I won't foul my hands with the dirty mess! I won't----"
"Dirty mess, indeed!" retorted Edgington, "when the best business
men---- Oh, well, if that's the way you feel---- Why didn't you say
so, instead of---- I think we'd best not discuss the thing any
further, Mr. Brassfield; and returning to legal matters, where we are
happily at one, let me remind you that you are to send Judge Blodgett
up to see me regarding the Corkery case this afternoon. Good day, Mr.
Brassfield!"
Mr. Edgington went forth from Amidon's presence in a state of mind
which can be appreciated by no one but some "good" citizen who has
perfected all the preliminaries for securing a particularly fat
financial prize by the cheap and simple device of a popular vote, and
finds the man on whom he relies going off into a fanciful ism induced
by some maggot of so-called conscientiousness. Any one ought to be
able to see that there is nothing wrong in accepting gifts from those
able to give: and who is more able than the public? Everybody would be
better off for the arrangement contemplated, and no one the worse. So
reasoned Mr. Edgington as he saw with chagrin the Bellevale franchise
slipping away, and with it the core of their ambitious project of
interurban lines connecting half a dozen cities. Bellevale, with its
water-power, was the hub of it; and to lose here by such a sudden
exhibition of so-called "civic patriotism"--Edgington knew the patter
of these reformers--was disgusting, and all the more so from the fact
that the one to blame was Brassfield, whose ethical attitude had always
been so "safe and sane" in business matters.
He must find some way of re-forming the lines, and adjusting the action
of the machine--now engaged in grinding out Brassfield's nomination--so
as to produce other grist just as good, if that were possible. It was
ticklish business, but it must be done. The time was short, but before
the caucuses met a new candidate must be found, and the word passed
down the line that the dear people had changed their minds over night
on the subject of the next mayor.
To decide, with Mr. Edgington (who fancied that he resembled the first
Napoleon), was to act, and almost instantly, his forces, hastily
mobilized, began an enveloping movement for the purpose of surrounding
and bringing into camp a proper candidate for the local chief
magistracy.
Mr. Amidon was flushed after this encounter. Mr. Edgington's cool
manner of approaching him with this questionable and shady political
job had generated some heat in Florian--a man always possessed of
strong convictions concerning civic purity. He was offended; yet he
knew that it was to the turpitude of Brassfield that he owed this,
rather than to any fault of Edgington's.
"How could such a fellow as Brassfield reap such success!" was Amidon's
mental ejaculation. "Ready to rob the community, he enjoys the
confidence of all; full of the propensities of Don Juan, he wins the
respect and love of Elizabeth Waldron! Shameful commentary upon
society, and---- Yes, Miss Strong, who is there? Judge Blodgett: send
him right in. . . . Judge, I'm glad you came in. I'm very glad! I
need your advice and aid."
"All right," said the judge, biting a cigar. "What's up, Florian?"
"You've seen a Mr. Edgington?"
"Your lawyer," replied the judge. "The _Notes_ tell all about him."
"Well," resumed Amidon, "he's been here, and I learn that there is some
very important litigation pending, which we've got to win, because it
involves others--Miss Waldron and her aunt--and this man Brassfield
never could give Edgington the evidence he needed in order to win."
"Why couldn't he?"
"Because," said Amidon, with the air of a man uttering something of the
deepest significance, "it involves matters happening before June, 1896,
and Brassfield was not in existence until the twenty-seventh of June!
I've promised Edgington that you will get him the evidence he wants."
"What's the nub of the case?" asked the judge.
"A man claims I gave him some rights--or that Brassfield did--you
understand?--"
"I see."
"--in March, 1896."
"H'm!" exclaimed the judge contemptuously. "March, eh? Why, we can
subpoena the whole town of Hazelhurst, and show that you were at that
time acting as a pillar of society there, every day in that year, up to
June twenty-seventh!"
"But don't you see," said Amidon, "that proving this makes my whole
story public?"
Judge Blodgett thoughtfully gazed into space.
"Yes, it would appear that way," said he, at last; "but is it
necessarily so? You can testify that you were in Hazelhurst at that
time, and legally, that's the same thing as saying that Brassfield
was--I guess; and I'll swear to it, too; and if they aren't too
searching on cross-examination, we may slide through--but there'll be
some ticklish spots. I'll see Mr. Edgington, and find out just how
strong a fabric of perjury we've got to go against. We may have to get
more witnesses--and that'll be thin ice, too. I'll look in again this
afternoon."
"Please do so," replied Mr. Amidon. "Look at these letters! Do you
suppose your _Notes_ would shed any light on what they're driving at?"
The judge looked them over.
"I don't remember anything in the _Notes_," said he, "regarding these
matters. But you could take 'em up to the hotel, and Madame le Claire
could put you to sleep and talk it out of you in five minutes."
"I'll do it!" said Amidon. "I'll get Brassfield's views on them,
confound him. I'll do this while you're with Edgington. Good-by until
after luncheon."
Madame le Claire was examining Mr. Brassfield with reference to the
unanswered letters. Professor Blatherwick was engaged in taking down
his answers. In a disastrous moment, Mr. Alderson knocked at the door,
and, following his knocking, delivered a breathless message to
Brassfield that an important telegram demanded instant attention.
"All right," replied Mr. Brassfield cheerily, "I'll toddle right down
to the office with you, my boy. Excuse me, Madame; you may rely on my
seeking a resumption of this pleasant interview at the earliest
possible moment. _Au revoir_!"
Madame le Claire was perplexed. Should she allow him to go out in this
hypnotic state? Could she exercise her art in Alderson's presence?
While she debated, Mr. Brassfield airily bowed himself out, and was
gone!
Brassfield was gone, that was clear: but no system of Subliminal
Engineering had any rule for calculating the results of his escape back
into the world from which he had for a fortnight or so been absent.
What would he be, and what would he do? Would he return the same
hard-headed man of business who had won riches in five short years? Or
would he be changed by the return to the normal--his equilibrium made
unstable by the tendency to revert to his older self? How would he
adjust himself to the things done by Amidon? How would the change
affect his relations with Miss Waldron and this bright-haired inamorata
so balefully nearing the foreground, like an approaching comet? How
would the professor and Judge Blodgett stand with this new factor in
the problem? Would he continue to care for her, his rescuer? Owing to
some things which had taken place in the Brassfield intervals, her
heart fluttered at the thought of a possibly permanent Eugene.
For be it remembered, that many things had taken place in these days of
Bellevale life. The situation had, of course, been changing daily by
subsurface mutations which the intelligent student of this history will
not need to have explained to him. For instance (and herein the
explanation of that fluttering of Madame le Claire's heart) such things
as these:
Bellevale is not so large a place that neighbors' affairs are not
observed of neighbor. Prior to the elaboration of the law of
thought-transference, there was no way of accounting for the
universality of knowledge of other people's affairs which certain
Bellevale circles enjoyed. The good gossiping housewives along the
highways leading into the town are often able to tell the exact
contents of the packages brought home by their neighbors, under the
seats of their buggies and farm-wagons and late at night; but this is a
phenomenon not at all unusual. Neither is it in the least strange
that, in town or country, John and Sarah could not sit out an evening
together in the parlor or settin'-room without all that occurred being
talked over, with perfect certainty as to facts, in the next day's
meeting of the Missionary Society or the Monday Club. But what Phyllis
thought, what were the plans of Thestylis, and how Jane felt when
William jilted her, and why William did it--all of which difficult
circumstances were canvassed with equal certitude--are things, the
knowledge of which, as I said above, was not to be accounted for on any
theory at all consistent with respect for the people possessing it,
until thought-transference came into fashion. Now all is clear, and
our debt to science is increased by another large item.
Mr. Brassfield and his affairs were as a city set upon a hill, and
could not be hid. There was a maid in Elizabeth's home, and a maiden
aunt who had confidential friends. A stenographer and bookkeepers were
employed in the counting-room of the Brassfield Oil Company, and the
stenographer had a friend in the milliner's shop, and an admirer who
was a clerk in one of the banks. There were clubs and other
organizations, social, religious and literary; and the people in all of
them had tongues wherewith to talk, and ears for hearing.
Hence:
At the meeting of the Society for Ethical Research, Mrs. Meyer read an
essay on "What _Parsifal_ Has Taught Me," during the reading of which
Mrs. Alvord described Miss Waldron's trousseau to Miss Finch and Doctor
Julia Brown. Because of the conversation among these three, the
president asked Doctor Brown, first of all, to discuss the paper. And
Doctor Julia, who talked bass and had coquettish fluffy blond bangs and
a greatly overtaxed corsage, said that she fully agreed with the many
and deeply beautiful thoughts expressed in the paper.
"I'm sincerely glad _Parsifal_ taught her something!" said the fair
M.D. to her companions, as she resumed her seat. Mrs. Meyer was the
only woman in the town who had ever been to Bayreuth, she added
short-windedly in explanation of her remarks, and had lobbied herself
into a place on the program on the strength of that fact.
"Does Bess know," asked Miss Finch, "about this mesmerist person?"
"Oh, there isn't anything there," said Doctor Brown, "I feel sure.
Though his inti--ah, friendship with this Le Claire woman is, just at
this time, in bad taste. But all men are natural polygamists, you
know."
"They say," said the voice of a member from across the room, "that it
will be quite a palace--throw everything else in Bellevale in the
shade--entirely so."
"They are all talking of it," said Mrs. Alvord. "Jim says it seems odd
to have this Mr. Blodgett looking into the Brassfield business. But
everything is odd, now--the hypnotist and Mr. Blodgett, and Daisy
Scarlett; she's still here."
"O----o!" said Doctor Brown, in a sinuous barytone circumflex.
"Really," said Miss Finch, who wore her dress high about the neck, and
whose form was a symphony in angles, "such promiscuous associations may
be shocking, but as to surprise--who knows anything of his life before
he came here?"
"Judge Blodgett," said Doctor Brown, "told a friend of mine that he had
known Brassfield from infancy."
"The first light Bellevale has ever received on a dark past," said Miss
Finch, "if it is light. And how strangely he acts! Everybody notices
it. Always so chatty and almost voluble before, and now--why, he's
dreadfully boorish. You know how he treated you, Miss Brown!"
"Yes, and he knows how I treated him for it!" said Doctor Brown. "I
propose to call people down when they act so with me!"
"Quite right," said Mrs. Alvord, "quite correct, Doctor. Oh, what a
change! And who has changed for the worse lately more than Bessie
Waldron? Pale, silent and clearly unhappy. I can't attach any
importance to that affair of the strange woman with the striped hair;
but that Miss Scarlett matter--that's quite different. Jim and I saw
the beginning of that up in the mountains last summer. Daisy Scarlett
is a queer girl, so wild and hoidenish--but the people who know her in
Allentown just think the world of her, the same as do the people in
Bellevale--and her appearance here right after the announcement of the
engagement means something. Poor Bess! Hush! There she comes. Oh,
Bessie, it's so sweet of you to come, even if you are late! Everybody
has been saying such sweet things of you!"
"How kind of them!" said Elizabeth. "Has _Parsifal_ received any
attention?"
At the club, of course, no such gossip as that uttered at the meeting
of the Society for Ethical Research was heard. Men are above such
things. To be sure Alvord and Slater and Edgington and the rest of the
"the gang" did exchange views on some matters involving the welfare of
the club--and in the course of duty.
"I tell you," said Slater, "Brass has been practising that French
doctrine about hunting for the woman--a little too industriously.
They're getting to be something--something----"
"Fierce," suggested Alvord.
"Well, that isn't quite what I meant to say," said Slater, "but pretty
near. 'Terrible as an army with banners,' you know, and condemned near
as numerous."
"It's changed Brassfield like a coat of paint, this engagement," said
Edgington. "I saw something last week that showed me more than you
could print in a book as big as the Annual Digest. You see, he went
sort of gravitating down by where the sewer gang was at work, like a
man in a strange country full of hostiles, and although he must have
been conscious of the fact that he's slated for mayor in the spring, he
never showed that he knew of the presence of a human being, to say
nothing of a voter, in the whole gang, and Barney Conlon's gang, too.
Why, he'd better have done anything than ignore 'em! He'd better a
darn sight have stood and sung _Drill, Ye Tarriers, Drill!_ as a
political move. Now that shows a revolution in his nature. It's
uncanny, and it'll play the very deuce with the slate if it goes on."
"Well, you all know what took place at his counting-room," asked
Slater, "the day after he got back from New York? Old Stevens
resigned, on the street the night before, and Brass didn't seem to know
any more than to accept his resignation. Hired him back since, I've
heard, but he ought not to have noticed it. He certainly has gone off
badly."
"I knew a fellow once," said Edgington, "who went sort of crazy on the
girl question--batty. D'ye s'pose this engagement----"
"They change to their lady friends," said Slater, "sometimes. But
he--why, he passed me a dozen times with a cold stare!"
"Me, too," said Edgington, "and he didn't seem to know Flossie Smith
when he met her, and Doctor Julia Brown gave him a calling-down on the
street--a public lecture on etiquette. Colonel McCorkle claims to have
been insulted by him, and won't serve any longer on the same committees
with him in the Commercial Association. And he stays at the hotel all
the time, and seems afraid to leave this old judge, and collogues with
the German professor and the occultist--and, let me say, I've seen
cripples in the hospital that were worse-looking than she is!--and what
in thunder it means beats me."
"He wants the judge and the professor at our supper next week," added
Slater.
"I've sent 'em invitations," said Alvord. "Anything to please the
patient. I could tell you a good deal about this, fellows; but 'Gene
and I are brothers and closer than brothers; and F. D. and B. goes with
me; but it won't hurt anything for you to know that he's got carloads
of trouble, and you haven't any of you come within a mile of the mark.
He told me all about it the night he got back from New York. I think
it will blow over if things can be kept from blowing up instead, for a
few days--slumbering volcano--woman scorned--hell's fury, you know;
don't ask me any more. But this hiding out won't do."
"Well, I should think not," said Slater. "We've got to get him going
about as usual or there'll be questions asked and publicity--those
red-headed women are pretty vivacious conversationalists when they get
mad, and you can't tell what may be pulled off, even if he acts as
natural as life."
"This supper ought to help some," said Edgington.
"It will," said Alvord. "We must make it a hum-dinger. And we must
see that he shows himself of tenor at the club and lodge meetings and
hops. Why, it's shameful, the way we've let him drop out."
And men being above gossip, at this point the meeting dissolved.
At the hotel, conference after conference had taken place in the parlor
of Professor Blatherwick, and Blodgett and Blatherwick's _Notes_ had
been studied out most assiduously. Judge Blodgett and Florian Amidon
had spent their days at the counting-house, and an increased force of
clerks worked ceaselessly in making up statements and balances showing
the condition of the business. Amidon could now draw checks in the
name of Brassfield with no more than a dim sense of committing forgery.
The banks, however, refused to honor them at first, and the tellers
noted the fact that after his return from New York Mr. Brassfield
adopted a new style of signature, and wondered at it. Some noticed a
change in all his handwriting, but in these days of the typewriter such
a thing makes little difference. His abstention from bowling (to the
playing of which Brassfield had been devoted), and his absolute failure
at billiards, were discussed in sporting circles, and accounted for on
the theory that he had "gone stale" since this love-affair had become
the absorbing business of his life. No one understood, however, his
sudden interest in photography, and his marvelous skill in it. He
seemed to be altogether a transformed man.
"I am beginning to see through this," said Amidon, referring to the
business.
"Yes," said the judge, "this side of the affair is assuming a pretty
satisfactory aspect. But your reputation is suffering by the sort of
constraint you've been under. These things are important. A man's
behavior is worth money to him. Many a man gets credit at the bank on
the strength of the safe and conservative vices he practises. Business
requires you to act more like Brassfield. A man who uses a good deal
of money must be like other people who use a good deal of money. He
mustn't have isms, and he mustn't be for any reforms except impractical
ones, and he mustn't have the reputation of being 'queer.' Isn't that
so, Professor?"
"Kvite uncontrofertible," said the professor. "You must minkle up vit
more beople."
"And in other matters besides business," said the judge; "boxes of
flowers every few minutes are all right, but some things require
personal attention."
Amidon blushed.
"You see," said he, "if every one were not so strange; if part of the
people were as familiar to me as I am to them, it wouldn't be so
trying. I suppose these receptions, and other functions to follow, I
must attend alone. But you two are going to that banquet with me?"
"Oh, certainly," said the judge. "I want to see just what sort of a
gang you've been forgathering with here. The folks at Hazelhurst----"
"Must never know, Judge! And you, Professor?"
"I shall be more tan bleaced. Supliminally gonsidered, I rekard it as
te shance of a lifetime."
"Well," said Amidon, "you are very good, and I am glad that's settled.
Now I want you to grant me another favor--or Clara, rather. I should
be more than glad if she would ask Brassfield about some things that
there's no need for you people to hear. It's nothing about the
business. Won't you see if she will give me a--a--demonstration?"
The judge and the professor disappeared, and soon word came that Madame
le Claire would give him audience. Amidon's heart beat stiflingly as
he came into her presence. For this man's conscience was a most
insubordinate conscience, and held as wrong the things felt and
thought, as well as things said and done; and his remorse was as that
of an abandoned but repentant jilt. But when he saw how cheerfully she
smiled, he grew easier in his mind. The women always have such a
matter fully under control--I mean the other party's mind.
"Well?" said she interrogatively--"at last? I have been wondering why
I was brought down here?"
"It must have been very dull and lonesome----"
"Oh, no!" she answered. "I am a business woman, you know, and I
haven't been idle. And now, there is something you need, my friend?
Let us begin at once."
There were definite repudiation of claims to tenderness, clear denial
of resentment, in her tone. Amidon brightened and reddened. He
stammered like a boy teased by reference to his first love-affair.
"You are wonderfully kind," he said. "I wanted to ask you to have this
Brassfield tell you all he will about the wedding--the date, and
everything you can get out of the fellow. And have him act as
naturally as you can, so as to see more clearly how he carries himself.
You see what I want, don't you?"
"I think so," she returned. "Conversation must be a little difficult,
isn't it? You remembered some of the things I told you about?"
"Difficult?" he exclaimed. "Oh, Clara, it's impossible! It's so much
so, that I hardly dare go back any more. I'm sending flowers and notes
and doing the best I can; but it won't do at all: I must call
oftener--must! And I'm afraid I have spoiled everything."
"Then you find the lady quite--quite endurable?"
"She's adorable," went on Florian, with the gush which comes at the
first opportunity to discuss the dear one with a sympathetic third
party. "She's perfectly exquisite! I have thought of nothing, dreamed
of nothing, since I left her, except, except----"
"Ah!" said Clara, "the situation must be perfectly lovely--for
you--both---- And I'm sure you got along nicely."
"No, no! I spoiled everything, I know I did. But bring this fellow up
and ask him those things, please; and also about a Miss Scarlett----
No, leave that out. Just about the wedding, and about--I was going to
ask about our house; but the judge found that out, where it is, and
all. Just about the--the things between her and me, a little more, you
know!"
The hypnotic subject yields to control more and more readily by
repeated surrender. So there was little of gazing into the
party-colored eyes now.
"You will soon sleep," said Madame le Claire, in that dominating way of
hers; "and when you wake you will be Eugene Brassfield just as he used
to be, and the room and all the surroundings, and myself--all will seem
familiar, and you will be quite at home with me. Sleep, sleep!"
Her hand swept down and closed his eyes, and he lay back in his chair
entranced. Madame le Claire sat long and looked at him yearningly.
She smoothed back the hair from his brow with many soft touches, and
stooped and softly kissed his forehead. Then she lightly tapped his
wrist, and sharply said, "Wake!"
Eugene Brassfield opened his eyes with a smile. There was something
still faintly suggestive of tenderness in the look with which Madame le
Claire regarded him, and he returned it with the air of a man to whom
such looks are neither unusual nor repugnant.
"We were just talking," said she, with the air of reminding him of a
topic from which he had wandered, "about your wedding. When is it to
be?"
"The appointed date," said he, "is April the fifth; but, of course, I
shall move for an earlier one if possible."
"I should think," remarked Madame le Claire, "that the date fixed would
give Miss Waldron all too short a time for preparation."
"From a woman's standpoint," said Mr. Brassfield, "it probably seems
so. But you and I can surely find matters of more mutual interest to
talk about, can't we?"
"Perhaps," said the girl, "but I don't think of anything just now. Do
you?"
"Well, for one thing," said he, "I have just found out what makes your
eyes so beautiful."
"Wouldn't it be just as well to cease discovering things of that kind?
It's so short a time to the fifth of April, you know."
"I've made all my money," said Brassfield, "by never quitting
discovering. I like it. And this last find especially."
"I think there are other lines of investigation," said she, "which
demand your time and attention."
"Oh, pshaw!" said he. "Don't be so prudish. You know that your eyes
are beautiful, and you are not really offended when I tell you so.
Such eyes are the books in which I like to read--I can understand them
better than Browning, or the old Persian soak. It's not unpleasant to
get a volume you understand--at times."
"Why, Mr. Amidon--Brassfield, I mean--aren't you ashamed of yourself!"
"A little," said he; "not much, though. And who is this 'Mr. Amman,'
or whatever the name is, that is so much in your mind that you call me
by his name when you speak without thinking?"
"A dear friend of mine!"
"Well, now, if you should happen to see something agreeable in me, and
should let me know about it, I shouldn't throw your Mr. Amden, or
Amidon, at your head. Why not forget about the rest of the world for a
while? We can be in only one place at a time, and so, really, our
whole world just now has only us two. You oughtn't to repel the only
person in the wide, wide world; you won't, will you?"
"Don't be foolish!"
"Don't be wasteful! This may be the only world of this kind we shall
be allowed to have. Come over and sit by me and be nice to me, won't
you?"
"I certainly shall do nothing of the kind!"
"No? Ah, how wasteful of opportunity! Well, then, I shall have to
come to you!"
Oh, the depravity of society in these days, and oh, the unpleasantness
of setting these things down! But, on the other hand, what a comfort
it is to think that men as base as Brassfield are so rare that you and
I, my boy, have probably never met a specimen. And if you ever find,
my love, that any person in whom you have any tender interest has ever
behaved in a way similar to the conduct of Brassfield, you should give
the prisoner the benefit of every doubt, and accord full weight to the
precedent contained in this history, and to the fact that it was
Brassfield and not Amidon who did this. A man can not be blamed for
lapsing into the Brassfield state. A man should be acquitted--eh?
Defending some one? Why, certainly not! And how long this paragraph
is growing! Yes, I feel sure Clara Blatherwick repulsed these advances
as she should, and that Brassfield, being fully under "control," did
not--why, of course not, as you say!
But I am going no further with the matter now; except to say that in
something like an hour Mr. Amidon departed much perturbed by the
prospect of the nearness of his happiness, fully convinced of his
unworthiness, and quakingly uncertain as to many things, but most of
all, just then, as to his clothes!
"This man Brassfield," said he to himself, "seems to have been a good
deal of a dude, and Elizabeth--the darling!--will expect me to be fully
up to vogue in this regard--as she will be in all things. And I don't
believe a thing has been done about clothes."
Meantime, Madame le Claire walked up and down in a locked chamber,
struggling with her grief.
"Oh, it is hopeless, hopeless!" said the poor girl to herself, over and
over again. "Florian, my darling Florian, whom I found blind and
wandering in the wilderness, and took by the hand and guided to the
light--Florian has gone from me! She has taken him, just as she took
him before. But the man she thinks loves her--her Eugene--I'm sure
he's coming to love me; and to be tired of her! And I could keep him
Brassfield, if I chose--if I chose! I wonder--I wonder if it would be
wrong? What would she do if she had my power? Twice I had to try,
before I could restore him. I could! I could!"
Small wonder, therefore, that Madame le Claire sat wild-eyed and
excited, and flew fearfully to Judge Blodgett and the professor, when
Mr. Brassfield went free, with Alderson at heel. And all the time, as
the crew of a ship carry on the routine of drill while the torpedo is
speeding for her hull, these social amenities went on all unconscious
of the explosion now imminent.