THE next day, at lunch, she asked her father what it meant, though she
did not mention Dan; and she brought out a crackling chuckle from that
old bit of hickory, now brittle and almost sapless, but still
serviceable.
“Means a bank wants its money back; that’s all,” he said. “There’s
plenty of reasons why a bank wants money—same as anybody else.”
“But suppose I’d borrowed of a bank and was a good customer, and the
bank knew I had plenty of property to cover the loan, would the First
National, for instance, ever worry me to pay it, if they knew I only
needed a little time to get all I owed it?”
“Not unless we thought you mightn’t be as able to pay us as well later
on as when we ask for it,” the old man answered. “You’d be all right as
long as the First stood by you. The First’ll protect a customer long as
anybody; and the others all follow our lead. What in time’s the matter
with you? You plannin’ to borrow money? Geemunently! I should think
you’d be able to put up with what you get out o’ me!”
His voice cracked into falsetto, as it often did nowadays; but the
vehemence that cracked it was not intended to be serious; he was in a
jocular mood; and the conversation reassured her, for he was one of the
directors of the “First”; and if Dan were really in difficulties and the
bank meant to increase them, she thought her father would have seized
upon the occasion to speak of it triumphantly. Indeed, he had once
angrily instructed her to wait for such an occasion. “You just wait till
the time comes!” he had said. “You sit there crowin’ over me because I
used to prophesy Dan Oliphant was never goin’ to amount to anything, and
you claim all this noise and gas proves he _has_! You just wait till the
day comes when I get the chance to crow over _you_, miss! You’ll hear
me!”
She was convinced that he wouldn’t have missed the chance to crow.
Nevertheless a little of her uneasiness remained, and was still with
her, two weeks later, when she went with Harlan to the concert of the
new symphony orchestra, on an evening so drenched with rain that she
inquired with some anxiety if his car was amphibious.
“If it can’t swim I’m afraid we won’t get there,” she said, as they set
off upon the splashing avenue. “Judging by the windows, we aren’t in an
automobile, but in one of those tanks that take pictures of ocean life
for the movies. I’m not sure it’s a tank though; the old avenue has
turned into a river, and perhaps we’re in a side-wheel steamboat. I’m
afraid this’ll be bad for your attendance. You’ll have a big deficit to
make up in reward for your struggle to make us an artistic people.”
There was to be no deficit, however, she discovered, as they went to
their seats in the theatre Harlan’s committee had taken for the
concert;—interest in the new organization and in the coming of the
renowned Venable had been stronger than the fear of a wetting. The place
was being rapidly filled, and, glancing about her, Martha saw “almost
everybody and a great many others,” she said.
Not far away from where she and Harlan sat, Lena was in a box with
George McMillan. The other seats in the box were vacant; and Lena,
sitting close to the velvet rail, and wearing as a contrast to her own
whiteness a Parisian interpretation of Spanish passion, in black jet and
jet-black, was the most conspicuous figure in the theatre. She leaned
back in her chair, her brilliant eyes upon the stage, though there was
nothing there except a piano and a small forest of music stands; and
Martha thought she looked excited—music was evidently a lively
stimulant for her. Her brother, not quite so much within the public
view, and possibly wishing his sister were less vividly offered to that
view, appeared to the observing Martha as somewhat depressed and
nervous. There was no conversation between the brother and sister,
though he glanced at Lena from time to time, from the side of his eye.
Martha wondered where Dan was. He would prefer a concert by Sousa’s Band
to the French and Russian programme set for this evening, she knew; but
the opening of “the Symphony” was in its way a civic occasion; one for
which the credit was in some part due to his brother; and she had
expected him to be there. “Isn’t Dan coming?” she asked Harlan.
“I think so.”
“Do you think he’s worried about business lately, Harlan?”
“No, I don’t think he ever worries about anything.”
“Oh, but you’re wrong!” she said quickly. “You don’t know him; a man
can’t sacrifice everything to just one object in life, as he has, all
these years, and not worry about it. I know your mother worries about
_him_. She says he never takes any care of himself, and it’s beginning
to tell on him. But I mean are there any—any rumours around town that
he’s in some sort of business difficulty, or anything like that?”
“No; I think not. At least I haven’t heard of anything like that being
more prevalent with him than usual. He’s always up and down, either up
to his neck or riding on the crest—that’s his way, and I don’t believe
he’d enjoy himself otherwise. The only thing he could talk about when I
saw him yesterday at home was his new house. It’s finished at last; and
they’re going to move into it. Mother’s sold our old place, you know,
and the wrecking will begin next week. Pleasant for you!”
“Oh, I’m trying to get father to go, too,” she said. “He’s terribly
obstinate, but with the house on the other side of us rebuilt into an
apartment, and now your mother’s to be torn down, he’ll have to give in.
We’ll have to move out to northern Ornaby like everybody else. You’ll
have to come, too, Harlan.”
“Thank you,” he said. “I’ve been waiting a good many years for that
invitation. May I make an appointment with your father for to-morrow
morning?”
She laughed, blushed, and touched his coat sleeve with her folded fan of
black feathers. “Hush! People will hear you!”
“You fear it may be suspected that I’m still serious in my intentions?”
“Hush!” she said again. “I mean we’re about to hear some serious music,
and it’s no time for nonsense.”
Harlan was obedient; he said no more, but brightened as he listened to
the serious music;—her tone had been kind and he hoped that he was not
mistaken in thinking he detected something a little self-conscious in
it. He was no eager lover now; his bachelorhood was pleasant to him; and
he could be content with it; but as Martha leaned forward to listen he
looked sidelong at her and felt that he had been right and wise to wish
for no other woman. They had been companions for so long, and understood
each other so well, marriage would be no disturbing change for either of
them. He was assured of happiness in it, if he could persuade her, and
something in the way she had just spoken to him made him almost sure
that he was about to persuade her at last.
After the first suite by the orchestra the great Venable appeared,
making his way among the seated musicians and coming forward with an air
of affability operatic in its sweeping expressiveness—a pale, handsome,
black-haired man of grand dimensions. He needed no costume other than
his black clothes and shapely ampleness of white front to make him seem,
not an actual man, but a figure from romantic drama, a dweller in
enchanted palaces and the master of heroic passions.
“I’ve always wanted to see one of those splendid, big, statuesque opera
or concert people at home,” Martha whispered to her escort. “I’ve never
been near them except when they moved on the grand scale, like this. It
would be an experience to see a man like that eat an egg—I can’t
imagine it at all. Do you suppose he could?”
A moment later, when he began to sing, she was sure he couldn’t; and as
the magnificent instrument in his throat continued in operation, he
carried her to such thrilling grandeurs of feeling that she could not
even imagine herself eating an egg, or eating anything, or ever again
doing anything commonplace—for while he sang she, too, dwelt in
enchanted palaces, moved on the grand scale, and knew only heroic
emotions.
But when he had finished the encore he was generous enough to add to
this part of his programme, and had left the stage, she underwent a
reaction not unusual after such stimulations. “It’s a great voice and
he’s a great artist, if I’m equal to knowing either,” she said. “But
there’s something about that man—I don’t know what, except it all seems
to end in being about himself. It’s so personal, somehow. I’m positive
he made every woman in the whole audience wish that he were singing just
for her alone. I don’t think music ought to be like that, unless perhaps
sometimes when it’s a love-song, and those things he sang weren’t
supposed to——” She broke off suddenly, as her glance wandered.
“There’s Dan. He got here, after all.”
Dan was coming down the outer aisle to the box where Lena sat; and with
him was the younger Sam Kohn, the two having just entered the theatre
after the business conference that had detained them. Sam was talking
hurriedly and earnestly in husky whispers, which he emphasized with many
quick gestures; but he left his tall companion at the curtains of the
latter’s box.
“See you right after the show,” he said, and then went slowly to the
series of boxes occupied by his father and brother and their families,
while Dan, who looked sallow and tired, Martha thought, stared after him
for a moment, then moved forward and seated himself beside George
McMillan. Lena gave her husband the greeting of a slightly lifted
eyebrow, shown to him in profile; but McMillan leaned toward him and
whispered an anxious question.
“It’s all right,” Dan said. “Sam Kohn’s got his father’s promise to hold
out against ’em. They want every inch of Ornaby I’ve got left—that’s
what they’ve really been after a long time. I’d like to see anybody get
Ornaby away from me! They want the Four, too, and they think they’ve got
both; but they won’t get either. The Kohns’ll play it through on my——”
But Lena stopped this inappropriate talk of mere business. She made a
slight gesture with her lovely little bare arm, her fingers flashing
impatient sparks; and Dan was silent. He remained so throughout the rest
of the concert, listening with an expression not unamiable, though at
times his big face, lately grown flaccid and heavier, fell into the
shapings that indicate drowsiness; and once or twice his glance was
vaguely troubled, happening to rest upon the white contours of his
wife’s shoulders;—her glittering black scarf had fallen as she leaned
forward when the godlike baritone came out again.
“That fellow looks kind of soft-soapy, but he’s got a crackin’ good
voice,” was Dan’s placid comment, at the conclusion of the last encore
of the final number. Venable was withdrawing from the stage, and most of
the audience were getting on their wraps; but an admiring and avaricious
gallery demanded more of the charmer, and clapped on. He stopped, shook
his head, smilingly; then made his last bow profoundly and obliquely,
with a shift of his large eyes in the same direction. “Not bowin’ to
_us_, is he?” Dan inquired, surprised. “I don’t know him.”
“I do,” Lena said, “I told you the other day I used to know him. I’m
going around to speak to him.”
“I can’t wait, I’m afraid. Sam Kohn’s lookin’ for me in the lobby now,
and he and I got to have a talk with his father. You take the car,
Lena—I’ll leave it in front for you, and I’ll get Sam to drive me home
from old man Kohn’s. I’ll have to hurry.”
McMillan was looking at his sister darkly and steadily. “I’ll see to
Lena,” he said. “I’ll go with her wherever she wants to go, and then
I’ll take her home.”
Lena laughed airily. “Why, no; it isn’t necessary. You’d better go with
Dan.”
“No; I believe I’d better go with you, Lena.”
“Can’t wait for you to settle it,” Dan said. “It’s pretty important I
don’t miss Sam. I may be out fairly late, Lena. Good-night.” And,
leaving the brother and sister confronting each other, before they moved
toward the stage door behind the boxes, he hurried out to the lobby,
where Sam Kohn seized his arm.
“I’ll take you over to papa’s in my car, Dan,” he said. “I been talkin’
some more to the old man durin’ the show. He’ll stick, all right, as a
favour to me, because I put it to him pretty stiff that you’re my old
friend, and what you’ve done for this town has made money for Kohn &
Sons, and’s bound to make more in the future, besides; and I told him
anyhow, by golly, he just had to! Well, he says he’ll stick, and he’ll
do it, Dan; but he ain’t none too sure he can carry them old shellbacks
with him. He ain’t never been any pessimist about anything, Dan, but he
thinks they see a chance to clean up if they call you. He’s afraid he
can’t stop ’em from doin’ it, Dan.”
Dan frowned angrily. “Well—let ’em call! They can’t break me! I’ll
_make_ it, all right, Sam—I’ve been through these things before.”
Sam’s voice had shown some emotion, but now it became tremulous with
sympathy and with anger. “That bunch of old shellbacks, they haven’t got
sense enough to see what a man like you means to their own business in
the long run. They haven’t got any what you call vision, as it were.
They belong to the old generation, the bunch of old back numbers!
Honest, they make me sick as a cat, Dan.”
He was still thus abusing the shellbacks when he and his friend passed
out of the theatre, and were almost swept from their feet by squalls of
chilling rain before they could get into his car. He did all the
talking, an unusual thing for Dan to allow a companion to do. Always
before, when misfortune had threatened, he had been jauntily voluble.
He did not come home until one o’clock, but there was a light in the
library, and, going in, he found his mother reading “In Memoriam.” She
had begun to stoop after her husband’s death, and her hair had lost its
last touch of gray; it was all white now, so that even to the glamouring
eyes of her son she had come to be a little, fragile old lady; but her
good will to all the world still looked forth through the thick glass of
her spectacles.
“Why, mother! You oughtn’t to be up this late!”
“I just got to reading——” she explained. “I like to read on a rainy
night. Did you lock the front door?”
“Yes. Isn’t Lena in?”
“Yes. Mr. McMillan brought her home an hour ago. Yes; _she’s_ in.”
Dan laughed, noting her emphasis. “‘_She_ is?’” he repeated. “Well, then
we’re _all_ in. Who else is left to come in?” He went to her and patted
her shoulder. “I believe you were sitting up for me. Don’t you know
better?”
“I might be anxious about you, such a bad night, Dan,” she said. “I
don’t like to pester you, but you ought to take some regular exercise.
You never _have_ taken any; and you eat your meals just anytime you
happen to get a minute or two. I do think you’ve been looking pretty
run-down lately; but I wasn’t sitting up for you—not exactly, that is.
I mean I was really sitting up for somebody else.”
“Who?”
She smiled apologetically. “Of course I know young people are different
nowadays, and it isn’t a grandmother’s place to interfere; but I am
afraid it was a mistake, your getting Henry that car.”
“You don’t mean to tell me he’s not in the house?”
“I’m afraid so. After the rest of you had gone he said he believed he’d
go for a drive in his car. I said he mustn’t think of it on such a
night, but he laughed, and I couldn’t get him to pay any attention. I
was hoping to hear him come in before you did. Perhaps you’d better——”
“Yes,” Dan said, as he strode into the hall. “I think I had.”