"Little fast, I guess."
Old man Minick shook off this conversation impatiently. This wasn't
conversation. This was oral death, though he did not put it thus. He
joined the other men. They were discussing Spiritualism. He listened,
ventured an opinion, was heard respectfully and then combated
mercilessly. He rose to the verbal fight, and won it.
"Let's see," said one of the old men. "You're not living at the Grant
Home, are you?"
"No," old man Minick made reply, proudly. "I live with my son and his
wife. They wouldn't have it any other way."
"Hm. Like to be independent myself."
"Lonesome, ain't it? Over there?"
"Lonesome! Say, Mr.--what'd you say your name was? Minick? Mine's
Hughes--I never was lonesome in my life 'cept for six months when I
lived with my daughter and her husband and their five children. Yes,
sir. That's what I call lonesome, in an eight-room flat."
George and Nettie said, "It's doing you good, Father, being out in the
air so much." His eyes were brighter, his figure straighter, his colour
better. It was that day he had held forth so eloquently on the
emigration question. He had to read a lot--papers and magazines and one
thing and another--to keep up. He devoured all the books and pamphlets
about bond issues and national finances brought home by George. In the
Park he was considered an authority on bonds and banking. He and a
retired real-estate man named Mowry sometimes debated a single question
for weeks. George and Nettie, relieved, thought he ambled to the Park
and spent senile hours with his drooling old friends discussing nothing
amiably and witlessly. This while he was eating strong meat, drinking
strong drink.
Summer sped. Was past. Autumn held a new dread for old man Minick. When
winter came where should he go? Where should he go? Not back to the
five-room flat all day, and the little back bedroom, and nothingness. In
his mind there rang a childish old song they used to sing at school. A
silly song:
Where do all the birdies go?
_I_ know. _I_ know.
But he didn't know. He was terror-stricken. October came and went. With
the first of November the Park became impossible, even at noon, and with
two overcoats and the sweater. The first frost was a black frost for
him. He scanned the heavens daily for rain or snow. There was a cigar
store and billiard room on the corner across the boulevard and there he
sometimes went, with a few of his Park cronies, to stand behind the
players' chairs and watch them at pinochle or rum. But this was a dull
business. Besides, the Grant men never came there. They had card rooms
of their own.
He turned away from this smoky little den on a drab November day, sick
at heart. The winter. He tried to face it, and at what he saw he shrank
and was afraid.
He reached the apartment and went around to the rear, dutifully. His
rubbers were wet and muddy and Nettie's living-room carpet was a
fashionable grey. The back door was unlocked. It was Canary's day
downstairs, he remembered. He took off his rubbers in the kitchen and
passed into the dining room. Voices. Nettie had company. Some friends,
probably, for tea. He turned to go to his room, but stopped at hearing
his own name. Father Minick. Father Minick. Nettie's voice.
"Of course, if it weren't for Father Minick I would have. But how can we
as long as he lives with us? There isn't room. And we can't afford a
bigger place now, with rents what they are. This way it wouldn't be fair
to the child. We've talked it over, George and I. Don't you suppose? But
not as long as Father Minick is with us. I don't mean we'd use the
maid's room for a--for the--if we had a baby. But I'd have to have
someone in to help, then, and we'd have to have that extra room."
He stood there in the dining room, quiet. Quiet. His body felt queerly
remote and numb, but his mind was working frenziedly. Clearly, too, in
spite of the frenzy. Death. That was the first thought. Death. It would
be easy. But he didn't want to die. Strange, but he didn't want to die.
He liked Life. The Park, the trees, the Club, the talk, the whole
show.... Nettie was a good girl.... The old must make way for the young.
They had the right to be born.... Maybe it was just another excuse.
Almost four years married. Why not three years ago?... The right to
live. The right to live....
He turned, stealthily, stealthily, and went back into the kitchen, put
on his rubbers, stole out into the darkening November afternoon.
In an hour he was back. He entered at the front door this time, ringing
the bell. He had never had a key. As if he were a child they would not
trust him with one. Nettie's women friends were just leaving. In the air
you smelled a mingling of perfume, and tea, and cakes, and powder. He
sniffed it, sensitively.
"How do you do, Mr. Minick!" they said. "How are you! Well, you
certainly look it. And how do you manage these gloomy days?"
He smiled genially, taking off his greatcoat and revealing the red
sweater with the big white "C" on it. "I manage. I manage." He puffed
out his cheeks. "I'm busy moving."
"Moving!" Nettie's startled eyes flew to his, held them. "Moving,
Father?"
"Old folks must make way for the young," he said, gaily. "That's the law
of life. Yes, sir! New ones. New ones."