And in order to make clear the truth of the statement just made, namely,
that Fate had achieved something when it brought Galusha Bangs to the
door of Martha Phipps' home that rainy night in October--in order to
emphasize the truth of that statement it may be well, without waiting
further, to explain just who Galusha Cabot Bangs was, and who and what
his family was, and how, although the Bangses were all very well in
their way, the Cabots--his mother's family--were “the banking Cabots of
Boston,” and were, therefore, very great people indeed.
“The banking Cabots” must not be confused with any other branch of the
Cabots, of which there are many in Boston. All Boston Cabots are “nice
people,” many are distinguished in some way or other, and all are
distinctly worth while. But “the banking Cabots” have been deep in
finance from the very beginning, from the earliest of colonial times.
The salary of the Reverend Cotton Mather was paid to him by a Cabot, and
another Cabot banked whatever portion of it he saved for a rainy day.
In the Revolution a certain Galusha Cabot, progenitor of the line of
Galusha Cabots, assisted the struggling patriots of Beacon Hill to pay
their troops in the Continental army. During the Civil War his grandson,
the Honorable Galusha Hancock Cabot, one of Boston's most famous bankers
and financiers, was of great assistance to his state and nation in the
sale of bonds and the floating of loans. His youngest daughter, Dorothy
Hancock Cabot, married--well, she should, of course, have married a
financier or a banker or, at the very least, a millionaire stockbroker.
But she did not, she married John Capen Bangs, a thoroughly estimable
man, a scholar, author of two or three scholarly books which few read
and almost nobody bought, and librarian of the Acropolis, a library that
Bostonians and the book world know and revere.
The engagement came as a shock to the majority of “banking Cabots.” John
Bangs was all right, but he was not in the least “financial.” He was
respected and admired, but he was not the husband for Galusha Hancock
Cabot's daughter. She should have married a Kidder or a Higginson or
some one high in the world of gold and securities. But she did not, she
fell in love with John Bangs and she married him, and they were happy
together for a time--a time all too brief.
In the second year of their marriage a baby boy was born. His mother
named him, her admiring husband being quite convinced that whatever she
did was sure to be exactly the right thing. So, in order to keep up the
family tradition and honors--“He has a perfect Cabot head. You see it,
don't you, John dear”--she named him Galusha Cabot Bangs. And then, but
three years afterward, she died.
John Capen Bangs remained in Boston until his son was nine. Then his
health began to fail. Years of pawing and paring over old volumes amid
the dust and close air of book-lined rooms brought on a cough, a cough
which made physicians who heard it look grave. It was before the days
of Adirondack Mountain sanitariums. They told John Bangs to go South,
to Florida. He went there, leaving his son at school in Boston, but
the warm air and sunshine did not help the cough. Then they sent him to
Colorado, where the boy Galusha joined him. For five years he and the
boy lived in Colorado. Then John Capen Bangs died.
Dorothy Hancock Cabot had a sister, an older sister, Clarissa Peabody
Cabot. Clarissa did not marry a librarian as her sister did, nor did
she marry a financier, as was expected of her. This was not her fault
exactly; if the right financier had happened along and asked, it is
quite probable that he would have been accepted. He did not happen
along; in fact, no one happened along until Clarissa was in her thirties
and somewhat anxious. Then came Joshua Bute of Chicago, and when wooed
she accepted and married him. More than that, she went with him to
Chicago, where stood the great establishment which turned out “Bute's
Banner Brand Butterine” and “Bute's Banner Brand Leaf Lard” and “Bute's
Banner Brand Back-Home Sausage” and “Bute's Banner Brand Better Baked
Beans.” Also there was a magnificent mansion on the Avenue.
Aunt Clarissa had family and culture and a Boston manner. Uncle Joshua
had a kind heart, a hemispherical waistcoat and a tremendous deal of
money. Later on the kind heart stopped beating and Aunt Clarissa was
left with the money, the mansion and--but of course the “manner” had
been all her own all the time.
So when John Bangs died, Aunt Clarissa Bute sent for the son, talked
with the latter, and liked him. She wrote to her relative, Augustus
Adams Cabot, of Cabot, Bancroft and Cabot, in Boston, who, although
still a young man, was already known as a financier, and looked out for
her various investments, saying that she found young Galusha “a nice
boy, though rather odd, like his father,” and that she thought of taking
his rearing and education into her own hands. “I have no children of
my own, Augustus. What do you think of the idea?” Augustus thought it a
good one; at least he wrote that he did. So Aunt Clarissa took charge of
Galusha Bangs.
The boy was fourteen then, a dreamy, shy youngster, who wore spectacles
and preferred curling up in a corner with a book to playing baseball. It
was early spring when he came to live with Aunt Clarissa and before the
summer began he had already astonished his relative more than once.
On one occasion a visitor, admiring the Bute library, asked how many
volumes it contained. Aunt Clarissa replied that she did not know. “I
have added from time to time such books as I desired and have discarded
others. I really have no idea how many there are.” Then Galusha, from
the recess by the window, looked up over the top of the huge first
volume of Ancient Nineveh and Its Remains which he was reading and
observed: “There were five thousand six hundred and seventeen yesterday,
Auntie.”
Aunt Clarissa started so violently that her eyeglasses fell from her
aquiline nose to the end of their chain.
“Good heavens, child! I didn't know you were there. What did you say?”
“I said there were five thousand six hundred and seventeen books on the
shelves here yesterday.”
“How do you know?”
“I counted them.”
“COUNTED them? Mercy! What for?”
Galusha's spectacles gleamed. “For fun,” he said.
On another occasion his aunt found him still poring over Ancient Nineveh
and Its Remains; it was the fifth volume now, however.
“Do you LIKE to read that?” she asked.
“Yes, Auntie. I've read four already and, counting this one, there are
five more to read.”
Now Aunt Clarissa had never read Ancient Nineveh herself. Her bookseller
had assured her that it was a very remarkable set, quite rare and
complete. “We seldom pick one up nowadays, Mrs. Bute. You should buy
it.” So Aunt Clarissa bought it, but she had never thought of reading
it.
She looked down over her nephew's shoulder at the broad page with its
diagram of an ancient temple and its drawings of human-headed bulls in
bas-relief.
“Why do you find it so interesting?” she asked.
Galusha looked up at her. His eyes were alight with excitement.
“They dig those things up over there,” he said, pointing to one of
the bulls. “It's all sand and rocks--and everything, but they send an
expedition and the people in it figure out where the city or the temple
or whatever it is ought to be, and then they dig and--and find it. And
you can't tell WHAT you'll find, exactly. And sometimes you don't find
much of anything.”
“After all the digging and work?”
“Yes, but that's where the fun comes in. Then you figure all over
again and keep on trying and trying. And when you DO find 'em there are
sculptures like this--oh, yards and yards of 'em--and all sort of queer,
funny old inscriptions to be studied out. Gee, it must be great! Don't
you think so, Auntie?”
Aunt Clarissa's reply was noncommittal. That evening she wrote a letter
to Augustus Cabot in Boston. “He is a good boy,” she wrote, referring to
Galusha, “but queer--oh, dreadfully queer. It's his father's queerness
cropping out, of course, but it shouldn't be permitted to develop. I
have set my heart on his becoming a financier like the other Galushas in
our line. Of course he will always be a Bangs--more's the pity--but
his middle name is Cabot and his first IS Galusha. I think he had best
continue his schooling in or near Boston where you can influence
him, Augustus. I wish him well grounded in mathematics and--oh, you
understand, the financial branches. Select a school, the right sort of
school, for him, to oblige me, will you, Gus?”
Augustus Cabot chose a school, a select, aristocratic and expensive
school near the “Hub of the Universe.” Thither, in the fall, went
Galusha and there he remained until he was eighteen, when he entered
Harvard. At college, as at school, he plugged away at his studies,
and he managed to win sufficiently high marks in mathematics. But his
mathematical genius was of a queer twist. In the practical dollars and
cents sort of figuring he was almost worthless. Money did not interest
him at all. What interested him was to estimate how many bricks there
were in “Mem” and how many more there might have been if it had been
built a story higher.
“This room,” he said to a classmate, referring to his study in old
Thayer, “was built in ----” naming the year. “Now allowing that a
different fellow lived in it each year, which is fair enough because
they almost always change, that means that at least so many fellows,”
giving the number, “have occupied this room since the beginning. That
is, provided there was but one fellow living in the room at a time. Now
we know that, for part of the time, this was a double room, so--”
“Oh, for the love of Mike, Loosh!” exclaimed the classmate, “cut it out.
What do you waste your time doing crazy stunts like that for?”
“But it's fun. Say, if they had all cut their initials around on the
door frames and the--ah--mop boards it would be great stuff to puzzle
'em out and make a list of 'em, wouldn't it? I wish they had.”
“Well, I don't. It would make the old rat hole look like blazes and it
is bad enough as it is. Come on down and watch the practice.”
One of young Bangs' peculiar enjoyments, developed during his senior
year, was to visit every old cemetery in or about the city and examine
and copy the ancient epitaphs and inscriptions. Pleasant spring
afternoons, when normal-minded Harvard men were busy with baseball or
track or tennis, or the hundred and one activities which help to keep
young America employed in a great university, Galusha might have
been, and was, seen hopping about some grass-grown graveyard, like
a bespectacled ghoul, making tracings of winged death's-heads or
lugubrious tombstone poetry. When they guyed him he merely grinned,
blushed, and was silent. To the few--the very few--in whom he confided
he made explanations which were as curious as their cause.
“It's great fun,” he declared. “It keeps you guessing, that's it. Now,
for instance, here's one of those skull jiggers with wings on it. See?
I traced this over at Copp's Hill last spring, a year ago. But there are
dozens of 'em all about, in all the old graveyards. Nobody ever saw a
skull with wings; it's a--a--ah--convention, of course. But who made the
first one? And why did it become a convention? And--and--why do some
of 'em have wings like this, and some of 'em crossbones like a pirate's
flag, and some of 'em no wings or bones, and why--”
“Oh, good Lord! I don't know. Forget it. You make a noise like a hearse,
Loosh.”
“Of course you don't know. _I_ don't know. I don't suppose anybody
knows, exactly. But isn't it great fun to study 'em up, and see the
different kinds, and think about the old chaps who carved 'em, and
wonder about 'em and--”
“No, I'll be banged if it is! It's crazy nonsense. You've got pigeons in
your loft, Loosh. Come on out and give the birds an airing.”
This was the general opinion of the class of 19--, that old “Loosh had
pigeons in his loft.” However, it was agreed that they were harmless
fowl and that Galusha himself was a good old scout, in spite of his
aviary.
He graduated with high honors in the mathematical branches and in
languages. Then the no less firm because feminine hand of Aunt Clarissa
grasped him, so to speak, by the collar and guided him to the portals
of the banking house of Cabot, Bancroft and Cabot, where “Cousin Gussie”
took him in charge with the instructions to make a financier of him.
“Cousin Gussie,” junior member of the firm, then in his early thirties,
thrust his hands into the pockets of his smart tweed trousers, tilted
from heels to toes of his stylish and very shiny shoes and whistled
beneath his trim mustache. He had met Galusha often before, but that
fact did not make him more optimistic, rather the contrary.
“So you want to be a banker, do you, Loosh?” he asked.
Galusha regarded him sadly through the spectacles.
“Auntie wants me to be one,” he said.
The experiment lasted a trifle over six months. At the end of that time
the junior partner of Cabot, Bancroft and Cabot had another interview
with his firm's most recent addition to its list of employees.
“You're simply no good at the job, that's the plain truth,” said the
banker, with the candor of exasperation. “You've cost us a thousand
dollars more than your salary already by mistakes and forgetfulness
and all the rest of it. You'll never make your salt at this game in a
million years. Don't you know it, yourself?”
Galusha nodded.
“Yes,” he said, simply.
“Eh? Oh, you do! Well, that's something.”
“I knew it when I came here.”
“Knew you would be no good at the job?”
“At this job, yes.”
“Then for heaven's sake why did you take it?”
“I told you. Aunt Clarissa wanted me to.”
“Well, you can't stay here, that's all. I'm sorry.”
“So am I, for Auntie's sake and yours. I realize I have made you a lot
of--ah--trouble.”
“Oh, that's all right, that's all right. Hang it all, I feel like a
beast to chuck you out this way, but I have partners, you know. What
will you do now?”
“I don't know.”
Cousin Gussie reflected. “I think perhaps you'd better go back to Aunt
Clarissa,” he said. “Possibly she will tell you what to do. Don't you
think she will?”
“Yes.”
“Humph! You seem to be mighty sure of it. How do you know she will?”
For the first time a gleam, a very slight and almost pathetic gleam, of
humor shone behind Galusha's spectacles.
“Because she always does,” he said. And thus ended his connection with
the banking profession.
Aunt Clarissa was disgusted and disappointed, of course. She expressed
her feelings without reservation. However, she laid most of the blame
upon heredity.
“You got it from that impractical librarian,” she declared. “Why did
Dorothy marry him? She might have known what the result would be.”
Galusha was more downcast even than his relative.
“I'm awfully sorry, Aunt Clarissa,” he said. “I realize I am a dreadful
disappointment to you. I tried, I honestly did, but--”
And here he coughed, coughed lengthily and in a manner which caused his
aunt to look alarmed and anxious. She had heard John Capen Bangs cough
like that. That very afternoon the Bute family physician saw, questioned
and examined Galusha. The following day an eminent specialist did the
same things. And both doctors looked gravely at each other and at their
patient.
Within a week Galusha was on his way to an Arizona ranch, a place where
he was to find sunshine and dry climate. He was to be out of doors as
much as possible, he was to ride and walk much, he was to do all sorts
of distasteful things, but he promised faithfully to do them, for his
aunt's sake. As a matter of fact, he took little interest in the matter
for his own. His was a sensitive spirit, although a quiet, shy and
“queer” one, and to find that he was “no good” at any particular
employment, even though he had felt fairly certain of that fact
beforehand, hurt more than he acknowledged to others. Galusha went to
Arizona because his aunt, to whose kindness and generosity he owed so
much, wished him to do so. For himself he did not care where he went or
what became of him.
But his feelings changed a few months later, when health began to return
and the cough to diminish in frequency and violence. And then came to
the ranch where he lodged and boarded an expedition from an eastern
museum. It was an expedition sent to explore the near-by canyon for
trace of the ancient “cliff dwellers,” to find and, if need be, excavate
the villages of this strange people and to do research work among them.
The expedition was in charge of an eminent scientist. Galusha met and
talked with the scientist and liked him at once, a liking which was to
grow into adoration as the acquaintanceship between the two warmed into
friendship. The young man was invited to accompany the expedition upon
one of its exploring trips. He accepted and, although he did not then
realize it, upon that trip he discovered, not only an ancient cliff
village, but the life work of Galusha Cabot Bangs.
For Galusha was wild with enthusiasm. Scrambling amid the rocks,
wading or tumbling into the frigid waters of mountain streams, sleeping
anywhere or not sleeping, all these hardships were of no consequence
whatever compared with the thrill which came with the first glimpse of,
high up under the bulging brow of an overhanging cliff, a rude wall and
a cluster of half ruined dwellings sticking to the side of the precipice
as barn swallows' nests are plastered beneath eaves. Then the climb
and the glorious burrowing into the homes of these long dead folk, the
hallelujahs when a bit of broken pottery was found, and the delightfully
arduous labor of painstakingly uncovering and cleaning a bit of rude
carving. The average man would have tired of it in two days, a week of
it would have bored him to distraction. But the longer it lasted and
the harder the labor, the brighter Galusha's eyes sparkled behind his
spectacles. Years before, when his aunt had asked him concerning his
interest in the books about ancient Nineveh, he had described to her the
work of the explorers and had cried: “Gee, it must be great!” Well,
now he was, in a very humble way, helping to do something of the sort
himself, and--gee, it WAS great!
Such enthusiasm as his and such marked aptitude, amounting almost to
genius, could not help but make an impression. The distinguished savant
at the head of the expedition returned the young man's liking. Before
returning East, he said:
“Bangs, next fall I am planning an expedition to Ecuador. I'd like to
have you go with me. Oh, this isn't offered merely for your sake, it is
quite as much for mine. You're worth at least three of the average young
fellows who have trained for this sort of thing. There will be a salary
for you, of course, but it won't be large. On the other hand, there will
be no personal expense and some experience. Will you go?”
Would he GO? Why--
“Yes, I know. But there is your health to be considered. I can't afford
to have a sick man along. You stay here for the present and put in your
time getting absolutely fit.”
“But--but I AM fit.”
“Um--yes; well, then, get fitter.”
Galusha went to Ecuador. Aunt Clarissa protested, scolded, declared him
insane--and capitulated only when she found that he was going anyhow. He
returned from the expedition higher than ever in favor with his chief.
He was offered a position in the archeological department of the museum.
He accepted first and then told Aunt Clarissa.
That was the real beginning. After that the years rolled placidly along.
He went to Egypt, under his beloved chief, and there found exactly what
he had dreamed. The desert, the pyramids, the sculptures, the ancient
writings, the buried tombs and temples--all those Galusha saw and took,
figuratively speaking, for his own. On his return he settled down to
the study of Egyptology, its writings, its history, its every detail. He
made another trip to the beloved land and distinguished himself and his
museum by his discoveries. His chief died and Galusha was offered the
post left vacant. He accepted. Later--some years later--he was called to
the National Institute at Washington.
When he was thirty-seven his Aunt Clarissa died. She left all her
property to her nephew. But she left it in trust, in trust with Cousin
Gussie. There was a letter to the latter in the envelope with the will.
“He is to have only the income, the income, understand--until he is
forty-five,” Aunt Clarissa had written. “Heaven knows, I am afraid
even THAT is too young for a child such as he is in everything except
pyramids.”
Cousin Gussie, now the dignified and highly respected senior partner
of Cabot, Bancroft and Cabot, took charge of the Bute--now the
Bangs--property. There was not as much of it as most people had
supposed; since Uncle Joshua passed on certain investments had gone
wrong, but there was income enough to furnish any mortal of ordinary
tastes with the means of gratifying them and still have a substantial
residue left. Galusha understood this, in a vague sort of way, but he
did not care. Outside of his beloved profession he had no tastes and
no desires. Life for him was, as Cousin Gussie unfeelingly put it, “one
damned mummy after the other.” In fact, after the arrival of the first
installment of income, he traveled posthaste to the office of his Boston
relative and entered a protest.
“You--you mustn't send any more, really you mustn't,” he declared,
anxiously. “I don't know what to do with it.”
“DO with it? Do with the money, you mean?”
“Yes--yes, that's it.”
“But don't you need it to live on?”
“Oh, dear me, no!”
“What DO you live on?”
“Why, my salary.”
“How much is your salary, if you don't mind telling us?”
Galusha did not in the least mind. The figure he named seemed a small
one to his banking relative, used to big sums.
“Humph!” grunted the latter; “well, that isn't so tremendous. They don't
overpay you mummy-dusters, do they? And you really don't want me to send
you any more?”
“No, not if you're sure you don't mind.”
“Oh, I don't mind. Then you want me to keep it and reinvest it for you;
is that it?”
“I--I think so. Yes, reinvest it or--ah--something.”
“But you may need some of it occasionally. If you do you will notify me,
of course.”
“Oh, yes; yes, indeed. Thank you very much. It's quite a weight off my
mind, really it is.”
Cabot could not help laughing. Then a thought struck him.
“Did you bring back the check I sent you?” he asked. Galusha looked
somewhat confused.
“Why, why, no, I didn't,” he admitted. “I had intended to, but you
see--Dear me, dear me, I hope you will feel that I did right. You see,
our paleontological department had been hoping to fit out an expedition
to the Wyoming fossil fields, but it was lamentably short of funds,
appropriations--ah--and so on. Hambridge and I were talking of the
matter. A very adequate man indeed, Hambridge. Possibly you've read some
of his writings. He wrote Lesser Reptilian Life in the Jurassio. Are you
acquainted with that?”
Cousin Gussie shook his head. “Never have been introduced,” he observed,
with a chuckle. Galusha noted the chuckle and smiled.
“I imagine not,” he observed. “I fear it isn't what is called
a--ah--best seller. Well--ah--Dear me, where was I? Oh, yes! Hambridge,
poor fellow, was very much upset at the prospect of abandoning his
expedition and I, knowing from experience what such a disappointment
means, sympathized with him. Your check was at that moment lying on my
desk. So--so--It was rather on the spur of the moment, I confess--I--”
The banker interrupted.
“Are you trying to tell me,” he demanded, “that you handed that check
over to that other--that other--”
He seemed rather at a loss for the word.
Galusha nodded.
“To finance Hambridge's expedition? Yes,” he said.
“ALL of it?”
“Yes--ah--yes.”
“Well, by George!”
“Perhaps it was impulsive on my part. But, you see, Hambridge DID need
the money. And of course I didn't. The only thing that troubles me is
the fact that, after all, it was money Aunt Clarissa left to me and I
should prefer to do what she would have liked with it. I fear she might
not have liked this.”
Cabot nodded, grimly. He had known Aunt Clarissa very, very well.
“You bet she wouldn't,” he declared.
“Yes. So don't send me any more, will you? Ah--not unless I ask for it.”
“No, I won't.” Then he added, “And not then unless I know WHY you ask
for it, you can bet on that.”
Galusha was as grateful as if he had been granted a great favor. As they
walked through the outer office together he endeavored to express his
feelings.
“Thank you, thank you very much, Cousin Gussie,” he said, earnestly. His
relative glanced about at the desks where rows of overjoyed clerks were
trying to suppress delighted grins and pretend not to have heard.
“You're welcome, Loosh,” he said, as they parted at the door, “but don't
you ever dare call me 'Cousin Gussie' again in public as long as you
live.”
Galusha Bangs returned to his beloved work at the National Institute
and his income was reinvested for him by the senior partner of Cabot,
Bancroft and Cabot. Occasionally Galusha requested that a portion of
it be sent him, usually for donation to this department or that or to
assist in fitting out an expedition of his own, but, generally speaking,
he was quite content with his modest salary. He unwrapped his mummies
and deciphered his moldering papyri, living far more in ancient Egypt
than in modern Washington. The Great War and its demands upon the youth
of the world left the Institute short-handed and he labored harder than
ever, doing the work of two assistants as well as his own. It was the
only thing he could do for his country, the only thing that country
would permit him to do, but he tried to do that well. Then the
Hindenburg line was broken, the armistice was signed and the civilized
world rejoiced.
But Galusha Bangs did not rejoice, for his health had broken, like the
enemy's resistance, and the doctors told him that he was to go away at
once.
“You must leave all this,” commanded the doctor; “forget it. You must
get away, get out of doors and stay out.”
For a moment Galusha was downcast. Then he brightened.
“There is an expedition from the New York museum about to start for
Syria,” he said. “I am quite sure I would be permitted to accompany it.
I'll write at once and--”
“Here, here! Wait! You'll do nothing of the sort. I said forget that
sort of thing. You can't go wandering off to dig in the desert; you
might as well stay in this place and dig here. Get away from it all. Go
where there are people.”
“But, Doctor Raymond, there are people in Syria, a great many of them,
and most interesting people. I have--”
“No. You are to forget Syria and Egypt and your work altogether. Keep
out of doors, meet people, exercise--play golf, perhaps. The main
trouble with you just now is nerve weariness and lack of strength. Eat,
sleep, rest, build up. Eat regular meals at regular times. Go to bed at
a regular hour. I would suggest your going to some resort, either in the
mountains or at the seashore. Enjoy yourself.”
“But, doctor, I DON'T enjoy myself at such places. I am quite wretched.
Really I am.”
“Look here, you must do precisely as I tell you. Your lungs are quite
all right at present, but, as you know, they have a tendency to become
all wrong with very little provocation. I tell you to go away at once,
at once. And STAY away, for a year at least. If you don't, my friend,
you are going to die. Is that plain?”
It was plain, certainly. Galusha took off his spectacles and rubbed
them, absently.
“Dear me!... Dear me!--ah--Oh, dear!” he observed.
A resort? Galusha knew precious little about resorts; they were places
he had hitherto tried to avoid. He asked his stenographer to name a
resort where one would be likely to meet--ah--a good many people and
find--ah--air and--ah--that sort of thing. The stenographer suggested
Atlantic City. She had no idea why he asked the question.
Galusha went to Atlantic City. Atlantic City in August! Two days of
crowds and noise were sufficient. A crumpled, perspiring wreck, he
boarded the train bound for the mountains. The White Mountains were his
destination. He had never visited them, but he knew them by reputation.
The White Mountains were not so bad. The crowds at the hotels were not
pleasant, but one could get away into the woods and walk, and there was
an occasional old cemetery to be visited. But as the fall season drew on
the crowds grew greater. People persisted in talking to Galusha when
he did not care to be talked to. They asked questions. And one had to
dress--or most DID dress--for dinner. He tired of the mountains; there
were too many people there, they made him feel “queerer” than ever.
On his way from Atlantic City to the mountains he happened upon the
discarded magazine with the advertisement of the Restabit Inn in it.
Just why he had torn out that “ad” and kept it he was himself, perhaps,
not quite sure. The “rest” and “sea air” and “pleasant people” were
exactly what the doctor had prescribed for him, but that was not the
whole reason for the advertisement's retention. An association of ideas
was the real reason. Just before he found the magazine he had received
Mrs. Hall's postcard with its renewal of the invitation to visit the
Hall cottage at Wellmouth. And the Restabit Inn was at East Wellmouth.
His determination to accept the Hall invitation and make the visit was
as sudden as it was belated. The postcard came in August, but it was not
until October that Galusha made up his mind. His decision was brought to
a focus by the help of Mrs. Worth Buckley. Mrs. Buckley's help had
not been solicited, but was volunteered, and, as a matter of fact, its
effect was the reverse of that which the lady intended. Nevertheless,
had it not been for Mrs. Buckley it is doubtful if Galusha would have
started for Wellmouth.
She came upon him first one brilliant afternoon when he was sitting upon
a rock, resting his weary legs--they wearied so easily nowadays--and
looking off at the mountain-side ablaze with autumn coloring. She
was large and commanding, and she spoke with a manner, a very decided
manner. She asked him if--he would pardon her for asking, wouldn't
he?--but had she, by any chance, the honor of addressing Doctor Bangs,
the Egyptologist. Oh, really? How very wonderful! She was quite certain
that it was he. She had heard him deliver a series of lectures--oh,
the most WONDERFUL things, they were, really--at the museum some
years before. She had been introduced to him at that time, but he had
forgotten her, of course. Quite natural that he should. “You meet so
many people, Doctor Bangs--or should I say 'Professor'?”
He hoped she would say neither. He had an odd prejudice of his own
against titles, and to be called “Mister” Bangs was the short road to
his favor. He tried to tell this woman so, but it was of no use. In
a little while he found it quite as useless to attempt telling her
anything. The simplest way, apparently, was silently and patiently to
endure while she talked--and talked--and talked.
Memories of her monologues, if they could have been taken in shorthand
from Galusha's mind, would have been merely a succession of “I” and
“I” and “I” and “Oh, do you really think so, Doctor Bangs?” and “Oh,
Professor!” and “wonderful” and “amazing” and “quite thrilling” and much
more of the same.
She followed him when he went to walk; that is, apparently she did, for
he was continually encountering her. She came and sat next him on the
hotel veranda. She bowed and smiled to him when she swept into the
dining room at meal times. Worst of all, she told others, many others,
who he was, and he was aware of being stared at, a knowledge which made
him acutely self-conscious and correspondingly miserable. There was a
Mr. Worth Buckley trotting in her wake, but he was mild and inoffensive.
His wife, however--Galusha exclaimed, “Oh, dear me!” inwardly or aloud
whenever he thought of her.
And she WOULD talk of Egypt. She and her husband had visited Cairo once
upon a time, so she felt herself as familiar with the whole Nile basin
as with the goldfish tank in the hotel lounge. To Galusha Egypt was an
enchanted land, a sort of paradise to which fortunate explorers might
eventually be permitted to go if they were very, very good. To have
this sacrilegious female patting the Sphinx on the head was more than he
could stand.
So he determined to stand it no longer; he ran away. One evening Mrs.
Buckley informed him that she and a little group--“a really select
group, Professor Bangs”--of the hotel inmates were to picnic somewhere
or other the following day. “And you are to come with us, Doctor,
and tell us about those wonderful temples you and I were discussing
yesterday. I have told the others something of what you told me and they
are quite WILD to hear you.”
Galusha was quite wild also. He went to his room and, pawing amid the
chaos of his bureau drawer for a clean collar, chanced upon the postcard
from Mrs. Hall. The postcard reminded him of the advertisement of the
Restabit Inn, which was in his pocketbook. Then the idea came to him.
He would go to the Hall cottage and make a visit of a day or two. If he
liked the Cape and Wellmouth he would take lodgings at the Restabit
Inn and stay as long as he wished. The suspicion that the inn might
be closed did not occur to him. The season was at its height in the
mountains, and Atlantic City, so they had told him there, ran at full
blast all the year. So much he knew, and the rest he did not think
about.
He spent most of that night packing his trunk and his suitcase. He left
word for the former to be sent to him by express and the latter he took
with him. He tiptoed downstairs, ate a hasty breakfast, and took the
earliest train for Boston, The following afternoon he started upon his
Cape Cod pilgrimage, a pilgrimage which was to end in a fainting fit
upon the sofa in Miss Martha Phipps' sitting room.