"Your look suggested that you were having a--a severe attack of
conscience," said he, laughingly. He was in soaring good humor now,
for he saw his way clear to election.
"I was," said Jane, suddenly stern. A pause, then she laughed--rather
hollowly. "Davy, I guess I'm almost as big a fraud as you are. What
fakirs we human beings are?--always posing as doing for others and
always doing for our selfish selves."
Davy's face took on its finest expression. "Do you think it's
altogether selfishness for me to fight for Victor Dorn and give him a
chance to get out his paper again--when he has warned me that he is
going to print things that may defeat me?"
"You know he'll not print them now," retorted Jane.
"Indeed I don't. He's not so forbearing."
"You know he'll not print them now," repeated Jane. "He'd not be so
foolish. Every one would forget to ask whether what he said about you
was true or false. They'd think only of how ungenerous and ungrateful
he was. He wouldn't be either. But he'd seem to be--and that comes to
the same thing." She glanced mockingly at Hull. "Isn't that your
calculation?"
"You are too cynical for a woman, Jane," said Davy. "It's not
attractive."
"To your vanity?" retorted Jane. "I should think not."
"Well--good-by," said Davy, taking his hat from the rail. "I've got a
hard evening's work before me. No time for dinner."
"Another terrible sacrifice for public duty," mocked Jane.
"You must be frightfully out of humor with yourself, to be girding at
me so savagely," said Davy.
"Good-by, Mr. Mayor."
"I shall be--in six weeks."
Jane's face grew sombre. "Yes--I suppose so," said she. "The people
would rather have one of us than one of their own kind. They do look up
to us, don't they? It's ridiculous of them, but they do. The idea of
choosing you, when they might have Victor Dorn."
"He isn't running for Mayor," objected Hull. "The League's candidate
is Harbinger, the builder."
"No, it's Victor Dorn," said Jane. "The best man in a party--the
strongest man--is always the candidate for all the offices. I don't
know much about politics, but I've learned that much.... It's Victor
Dorn against--Dick Kelly--or Kelly and father."
Hull reddened. She had cut into quick. "You will see who is Mayor
when I'm elected," said he with all his dignity.
Jane laughed in the disagreeably mocking way that was the climax of her
ability to be nasty when she was thoroughly out of humor. "That's
right, Davy. Deceive yourself. It's far more comfortable. So long!"
And she went into the house.
Davy's conduct of the affair was masterly. He showed those rare
qualities of judgment and diplomacy that all but insure a man a
distinguished career. His statement for the press was a model of
dignity, of restrained indignation, of good common sense. The most
difficult part of his task was getting Hugo Galland into condition for
a creditable appearance in court. In so far as Hugo's meagre
intellect, atrophied by education and by luxury, permitted him to be a
lawyer at all, he was of that now common type called the corporation
lawyer. That is, for him human beings had ceased to exist, and of
course human rights, also; the world as viewed from the standpoint of
law contained only corporations, only interests. Thus, a man like
Victor Dorn was in his view the modern form of the devil--was a
combination of knave and lunatic who had no right to live except in the
restraint of an asylum or a jail.
Fortunately, while Hugo despised the "hoi polloi" as only a stupid,
miseducated snob can despise, he appreciated that they had votes and so
must be conciliated; and he yearned with the snob's famished yearning
for the title and dignity of judge. Davy found it impossible to
convince him that the injunctions and indictments ought to be attacked
until he had convinced him that in no other way could he become Judge
Galland. As Hugo was fiercely prejudiced and densely stupid and
reverent of the powers of his own intellect, to convince him was not
easy. In fact, Davy did not begin to succeed until he began to suggest
that whoever appeared before Judge Lansing the next morning in defense
of free speech would be the Alliance and Democratic and Republican
candidate for judge, and that if Hugo couldn't see his way clear to
appearing he might as well give up for the present his political
ambitions.
Hugo came round. Davy left him at one o'clock in the morning and went
gloomily home. He had known what a prejudiced ass Galland was, how
unfit he was for the office of judge; but he had up to that time hidden
the full truth from himself. Now, to hide it was impossible. Hugo had
fully exposed himself in all his unfitness of the man of narrow upper
class prejudices, the man of no instinct or enthusiasm for right,
justice and liberty. "Really, it's a crime to nominate such a chap as
that," he muttered. "Yet we've got to do it. How Selma Gordon's eyes
would shame me, if she could see me now!"
Davy had the familiar fondness for laying on the secret penitential
scourge--wherewith we buy from our complacent consciences license to
indulge in the sins our appetites or ambitions crave.
Judge Lansing--you have never seen a man who LOOKED the judge more
ideally than did gray haired, gray bearded, open browed Robert
Lansing--Judge Lansing was all ready for his part in the farce. He
knew Hugo and helped him over the difficult places and cut him short as
soon as he had made enough of his speech to give an inkling of what he
was demanding. The Judge was persuaded to deliver himself of a
high-minded and eloquent denunciation of those who had misled the court
and the county prosecutor. He pointed out--in weighty judicial
language--that Victor Dorn had by his conduct during several years
invited just such a series of calamities as had beset him. But he went
on to say that Dorn's reputation and fondness for speech and action
bordering on the lawless did not withdraw from him the protection of
the law. In spite of himself the law would protect him. The
injunctions were dissolved and the indictments were quashed.
The news of the impending application, published in the morning papers,
had crowded the court room. When the Judge finished a tremendous cheer
went up. The cheer passed on to the throng outside, and when Davy and
Hugo appeared in the corridor they were borne upon the shoulders of
workingmen and were not released until they had made speeches. Davy's
manly simplicity and clearness covered the stammering vagueness of hero
Galland.
As Davy was gradually clearing himself of the eager handshakers and
back-slappers, Selma suddenly appeared before him. Her eyes were
shining and her whole body seemed to be irradiating emotion of
admiration and gratitude. "Thank you--oh, thank you!" she said,
pressing his hand. "How I have misjudged you!"
Davy did not wince. He had now quite forgotten the part selfish
ambition had played in his gallant rush to the defense of imperilled
freedom--had forgotten it as completely as the now ecstatic Hugo had
forgotten his prejudices against the "low, smelly working people." He
looked as exalted as he felt. "I only did my plain duty," replied he.
"How could any decent American have done less?"
"I haven't seen Victor since yesterday afternoon," pursued Selma. "But
I know how grateful he'll be--not so much for what you did as that YOU
did it."
The instinct of the crowd--the universal human instinct--against
intruding upon a young man and young woman talking together soon
cleared them of neighbors. An awkward silence fell. Said he
hesitatingly:
"Are you ready to give your answer?--to that question I asked you the
other day."
"I gave you my answer then," replied she, her glance seeking a way of
escape.
"No," said he. "For you said then that you would not marry me. And I
shall never take no for an answer until you have married some one else."
She looked up at him with eyes large and grave and puzzled. "I'm sure
you don't want to marry me," she said. "I wonder why you keep asking
me."
"I have to be honest with you," said Davy. "Somehow you bring out all
the good there is in me. So, I can't conceal anything from you. In a
way I don't want to marry you. You're not at all the woman I have
always pictured as the sort I ought to marry and would marry.
But--Selma, I love you. I'd give up anything--even my career--to get
you. When I'm away from you I seem to regain control of myself. But
just as soon as I see you, I'm as bad as ever again."
"Then we mustn't see each other," said she.
Suddenly she nodded, laughed up at him and darted away--and Hugo
Galland, long since abandoned by the crowd, had seized him by the arm.
Selma debated whether to take Victor the news or to continue her walk.
She decided for the walk. She had been feeling peculiarly toward
Victor since the previous afternoon. She had not gone back in the
evening, but had sent an excuse by one of the Leaguers. It was plain
to her that Jane Hastings was up to mischief, and she had begun to
fear--sacrilegious though she felt it to be to harbor such a
suspicion--that there was man enough, weak, vain, susceptible man
enough, in Victor Dorn to make Jane a danger. The more she had thought
about Jane and her environment, the clearer it had become that there
could be no permanent and deep sincerity in Jane's aspirations after
emancipation from her class. It was simply the old, old story of a
woman of the upper class becoming infatuated with a man of a genuine
kind of manhood rarely found in the languor-producing surroundings of
her own class. Would Victor yield? No! her loyalty indignantly
answered. But he might allow this useless idler to hamper him, to
weaken his energies for the time--and during a critical period.
She did not wish to see Victor again until she should have decided what
course to take. To think at her ease she walked out Monroe Avenue on
her way to the country. It was a hot day, but walking along in the
beautiful shade Selma felt no discomfort, except a slight burning of
the eyes from the fierce glare of the white highway. In the distance
she heard the sound of an engine.
A few seconds, and past her at high speed swept an automobile. Its
heavy flying wheels tore up the roadway, raised an enormous cloud of
dust. The charm of the walk was gone; the usefulness of roadway and
footpaths was destroyed for everybody for the fifteen or twenty minutes
that it would take for the mass of dust to settle--on the foliage, in
the grass, on the bodies and clothing of passers-by and in their lungs.
Selma halted and gazed after the auto. Who was tearing along at this
mad speed? Who was destroying the comfort of all using that road, and
annoying them and making the air unfit to breathe! Why, an idle,
luxuriously dressed woman, not on an errand of life or death, but going
down town to amuse herself shopping or calling.
The dust had not settled before a second auto, having a young man and
young woman apparently on the way to play tennis, rushed by, swirling
up even vaster clouds of dust and all but colliding with a baby
carriage a woman was trying to push across the street. Selma's blood
was boiling! The infamy of it! These worthless idlers! What utter
lack of manners, of consideration for their fellow beings. A GENTLEMAN
and a LADY insulting and bullying everyone who happened not to have an
automobile. Then--she laughed. The ignorant, stupid masses! They
deserved to be treated thus contemptuously, for they could stop it if
they would. "Some day we shall learn," philosophized she. "Then these
brutalities of men toward each other, these brutalities big and little,
will cease." This matter of the insulting automobiles, with insolent
horns and criminal folly of speed and hurling dust at passers-by, worse
than if the occupants had spat upon them in passing--this matter was a
trifle beside the hideous brutalities of men compelling masses of their
fellow beings, children no less than grown people, to toil at things
killing soul, mind and body simply in order that fortunes might be
made! THERE was lack of consideration worth thinking about.
Three more autos passed--three more clouds of dust, reducing Selma to
extreme physical discomfort. Her philosophy was severely strained.
She was in the country now; but even there she was pursued by these
insolent and insulting hunters of pleasure utterly indifferent to the
comfort of their fellows. And when a fourth auto passed, bearing Jane
Hastings in a charming new dress and big, becoming hat--Selma, eyes and
throat full of dust and face and neck and hands streaked and dirty,
quite lost her temper. Jane spoke; she turned her head away,
pretending not to see!
Presently she heard an auto coming at a less menacing pace from the
opposite direction. It drew up to the edge of the road abreast of her.
"Selma," called Jane.
Selma paused, bent a frowning and angry countenance upon Jane.
Jane opened the door of the limousine, descended, said to her
chauffeur: "Follow us, please." She advanced to Selma with a timid
and deprecating smile. "You'll let me walk with you?" she said.
"I am thinking out a very important matter," replied Selma, with frank
hostility. "I prefer not to be interrupted."
"Selma!" pleaded Jane. "What have I done to turn you against me?"
Selma stood, silent, incarnation of freedom and will. She looked
steadily at Jane. "You haven't done anything," she replied. "On
impulse I liked you. On sober second thought I don't. That's all."
"You gave me your friendship," said Jane. "You've no right to withdraw
it without telling me why."
"You are not of my class. You are of the class that is at war with
mine--at war upon it. When you talk of friendship to me, you are
either false to your own people or false in your professions to me."
Selma's manner was rudely offensive--as rude as Jane's dust, to which
it was perhaps a retort. Jane showed marvelous restraint. She told
herself that she felt compassionate toward this attractive, honest,
really nice girl. It is possible, however, that an instinct of
prudence may have had something to do with her ultra-conciliatory
attitude toward the dusty little woman in the cheap linen dress. The
enmity of one so near to Victor Dorn was certainly not an advantage.
Instead of flaring up, Jane said:
"Now, Selma--do be human--do be your sweet, natural self. It isn't my
fault that I am what I am. And you know that I really belong heart and
soul with you."
"Then come with us," said Selma. "If you think the life you lead is
foolish--why, stop leading it."
"You know I can't," said Jane mournfully.
"I know you could," retorted Selma. "Don't be a hypocrite, Jane."
"Selma--how harsh you are!" cried Jane.
"Either come with us or keep away from us," said the girl inflexibly.
"You may deceive yourself--and men--with that talk of broad views and
high aspirations. But you can't deceive another woman."
"I'm not trying to deceive anybody," exclaimed Jane angrily. "Permit me
to say, Selma, that your methods won't make many converts to your
cause."
"Who ever gave you the idea that we were seeking converts in your
class?" inquired Selma. "Our whole object is to abolish your
class--and end its drain upon us--and its bad example--and make its
members useful members of our class, and more contented and happier
than they are now." She laughed--a free and merry laugh, but not
pleasant in Jane's ears. "The idea of US trying to induce young ladies
and young gentlemen with polished finger nails to sit round in
drawing-rooms talking patronizingly of doing something for the masses!
You've got a very queer notion of us, my dear Miss Hastings."
Jane's eyes were flashing. "Selma, there's a devil in you to-day.
What is it?" she demanded.
"There's a great deal of dust from your automobile in me and on me,"
said Selma. "I congratulate you on your good manners in rushing about
spattering and befouling your fellow beings and threatening their
lives."
Jane colored and lowered her head. "I--I never thought of that
before," she said humbly.
Selma's anger suddenly dissolved. "I'm ashamed of myself," she cried.
"Forgive me."
What she had said about the automobile had made an instant deep
impression upon Jane, who was honestly trying to live up to her
aspirations--when she wasn't giving up the effort as hopelessly beyond
her powers and trying to content herself with just aspiring. She was
not hypocritical in her contrition. The dust disfiguring the foliage,
streaking Selma's face and hair, was forcing the lesson in manners
vigorously home. "I'm much obliged to you for teaching me what I ought
to have learned for myself," she said. "I don't blame you for scorning
me. I am a pretty poor excuse. But"--with her most charming
smile--"I'll do better--all the faster if you'll help me."
Selma looked at her with a frank, dismayed contrition, like a child
that realizes it has done something very foolish. "Oh, I'm so horribly
impulsive!" she cried. "It's always getting me into trouble. You
don't know how I try Victor Dorn's patience--though he never makes the
least sign." She laughed up at Jane. "I wish you'd give me a
whipping. I'd feel lots better."
"It'd take some of my dust off you," said Jane. "Let me take you to
the house in the auto--you'll never see it going at that speed again, I
promise. Come to the house and I'll dust you off--and we'll go for a
walk in the woods."
Selma felt that she owed it to Jane to accept. As they were climbing
the hill in the auto, Selma said:
"My, how comfortable this is! No wonder the people that have autos
stop exercising and get fat and sick and die. I couldn't trust myself
with one."
"It's a daily fight," confessed Jane. "If I were married and didn't
have to think about my looks and my figure I'm afraid I'd give up."
"Victor says the only time one ought ever to ride in a carriage is to
his own funeral."
"He's down on show and luxury of every kind--isn't he?" said Jane.
"No, indeed," replied Selma. "Victor isn't 'down on' anything. He
thinks show and luxury are silly. He could be rich if he wished, for
he has wonderful talent for managing things and for making money. He
has refused some of the most wonderful offers--wonderful in that way.
But he thinks money-making a waste of time. He has all he wants, and
he says he'd as soon think of eating a second dinner when he'd just had
one as of exchanging time that could be LIVED for a lot of foolish
dollars."
"And he meant it, too," said Jane. "In some men that would sound like
pretense. But not in him. What a mind he has--and what a character!"
Selma was abruptly overcast and ominously silent. She wished she had
not been turned so far by her impulse of penitence--wished she had held
to the calm and deliberate part of her resolve about Jane--the part
that involved keeping aloof from her. However, Jane, the
tactful--hastened to shift the conversation to generalities of the
softest kinds--talked about her college life--about the inane and
useless education they had given her--drew Selma out to talk about her
own education--in the tenement--in the public school, at night school,
in factory and shop. Not until they had been walking in the woods
nearly two hours and Selma was about to go home, did Victor, about whom
both were thinking all the time, come into the conversation again. It
was Jane who could no longer keep away from the subject--the one
subject that wholly interested her nowadays. Said she:
"Victor Dorn is REALLY almost well, you think?"
After a significant pause Selma said in a tone that was certainly not
encouraging, "Obviously."
"I was altogether wrong about Doctor Charlton," said Jane. "I'm
convinced now that he's the only really intelligent doctor in town.
I'm trying to persuade father to change to him."
"Well, good-by," said Selma. She was eager to get away, for she
suddenly felt that Jane was determined to talk about Victor before
letting her go.
"You altered toward me when I made that confession--the night of the
riot," said Jane abruptly. "Are you in love with him, too?"
"No," said Selma.
"I don't see how you could help being," cried Jane.
"That's because you don't know what it is to be busy," retorted Selma.
"Love--what you call love--is one of the pastimes with your sort of
people. It's a lazy, easy way of occupying the thoughts."
"You don't know me as well as you think you do," said Jane. Her
expression fascinated Selma--and made her more afraid than ever.
Impulsively Selma took Jane by the arm. "Keep away from us," she said.
"You will do no good. You can only cause unhappiness--perhaps most of
all to yourself."
"Don't I know that!" exclaimed Jane. "I'm fighting it as hard as I
can. But how little control one has over oneself when one has always
been indulged and self-indulgent."
"The man for you is David Hull," said Selma.
"You could help him--could make a great deal of a person out of him."
"I know it," replied Jane. "But I don't want him, and he--perhaps you
didn't know that he is in love with you?"
"No more than you are with Victor Dorn," said Selma. "I'm different
from the women he has known, just as Victor is different from the men
you meet in your class. But this is a waste of time."
"You don't believe in me at all," cried Jane. "In some ways you are
very unjust and narrow, Selma."
Selma looked at her in that grave way which seemed to compel frankness.
"Do YOU believe in yourself?" she asked.
Jane's glance shifted.
"You know you do not," proceeded Selma. "The women of your class
rarely have sincere emotions because they do not lead sincere lives.
Part of your imaginary love for Victor Dorn is desire to fill up idle
hours. The rest of it is vanity--the desire to show your power over a
man who seems to be woman-proof." She laughed a little, turned away,
paused. "My mother used to quote a French proverb--'One cannot trifle
with love.' Be careful, Jane--for your own sake. I don't know whether
you could conquer Victor Dorn or not. But I do know IF you could
conquer him it would be only at the usual price of those conquests to a
woman."
"And what is that?" said Jane.
"Your own complete surrender," said Selma.
"How wise you are!" laughed Jane. "Who would have suspected you of
knowing so much!"
"How could I--a woman--and not unattractive to men--grow up to be
twenty-one years old, in the free life of a working woman, without
learning all there is to know about sex relations?"
Jane looked at her with a new interest.
"And," she went on, "I've learned--not by experience, I'm glad to say,
but by observation--that my mother's proverb is true. I shall not
think about love until I am compelled to. That is a peril a sensible
person does not seek."
"I did not seek it," cried Jane--and then she halted and flushed.
"Good-by, Jane," said Selma, waving her hand and moving away rapidly.
She called back--"On ne badine pas avec l'amour!"
She went straight to Colman's cottage--to Victor, lying very pale with
his eyes shut, and big Tom Colman sitting by his bed. There was a
stillness in the room that Selma felt was ominous. Victor's
hand--strong, well-shaped, useful-looking, used-looking--not
ABUSED-looking, but USED-looking-was outside the covers upon the white
counterpane. The fingers were drumming softly; Selma knew that
gesture--a certain sign that Victor was troubled in mind.
"You've told him," said Selma to Colman as she paused in the doorway.
Victor turned his head quickly, opened his eyes, gave her a look of
welcome that made her thrill with pride. "Oh--there you are!" he
exclaimed. "I was hoping you'd come."
"I saw David Hull just after it was done," said Selma. "And I thanked
him for you."
Victor's eyes had a look of amusement, of mockery. "Thank you," he
said.
She, the sensitive, was on the alert at once. "Didn't you want me to
thank him?"
Victor did not answer. In the same amused way he went on: "So they
carried him on their shoulders--him and that other defender of the
rights of the people, Hugo Galland? I should like to have seen. It
was a memorable spectacle."
"You are laughing at it," exclaimed the girl. "Why?"
"You certainly are taking the news very queer, Victor," said Colman.
Then to Selma, "When I told him he got white and I thought I'd have to
send for Doctor Charlton."
"Well--joy never kills," said Victor mockingly. "I don't want to keep
you, Tom--Selma'll sit with me."
When they were alone, Victor again closed his eyes and resumed that
silent drumming upon the counterpane. Selma watched the restless
fingers as if she hoped they would disclose to her the puzzling secret
of Victor's thoughts. But she did not interrupt.
That was one lesson in restraint that Victor had succeeded in teaching
her--never to interrupt. At last he heaved a great sigh and said:
"Well, Selma, old girl--we've probably lost again. I was glad you came
because I wanted to talk--and I can't say what's in my mind before dear
old Tom--or any of them but my sister and you."
"You didn't want those injunctions and indictments out of the way?"
said Selma.
"If they had stood, we'd have won--in a walk," replied Victor. "As the
cards lie now, David Hull will win. And he'll make a pretty good show
mayor, probably--good enough to fool a large majority of our fellow
citizens, who are politically as shallow and credulous as nursery
children. And so--our work of educating them will be the harder and
slower. Oh, these David Hulls!--these good men who keep their mantles
spotless in order to make them the more useful as covers for the dirty
work of others!" Suddenly his merry smile burst out. "And they carried
Hugo Galland on their shoulders?"
"Then you don't think Hull's motives were honorable?" inquired Selma,
perplexed and anxious.
"How could I know his motives?--any man's motives?" replied Victor.
"No one can read men's hearts. All I ever consider is actions. And
the result of his actions is probably the defeat of the League and the
election of Dick Kelly."
"I begin to understand," said Selma thoughtfully. "But--I do believe
his motive was altogether good."
"My dear girl," said Victor, "the primer lesson in the life of action
is: 'Never--NEVER look at motives. Action--only actions--always
actions.' The chief reason the human race is led patiently round by
the nose is its fondness for fussing about motives. We are interested
only in men's actions and the results to our cause. Davy Hull's
motives concern only himself--and those who care for him." Victor's
eyes, twinkling mischievously, shot a shrewd glance at Selma. "You're
not by any chance in love with Davy?"
Selma colored high. "Certainly not!" she exclaimed indignantly.
"Why not? Why not?" teased Victor. "He's tall and handsome--and
superbly solemn--and women always fancy a solemn man has intellect and
character. Not that Davy is a fool--by no means. I'd be the last man
to say that--I whom he has just cleverly checkmated in one move."
"You intended not to give bail! You intended to go to jail!" exclaimed
Selma abruptly. "I see it all! How stupid I was! Oh, I could cry,
Victor! What a chance."
"Spilt milk," said Victor. "We must forget it, and plan to meet the
new conditions. We'll start the paper at once. We can't attack him.
Very clever of him--very clever! If he were as brave as he is shrewd,
I'd almost give up hope of winning this town while he was in politics
here. But he lacks courage. And he daren't think and speak honestly.
How that does cripple a man!"
"He'll be one of us before very long," said Selma. "You misjudge him,
Victor."
Dorn smiled. "Not so long as his own class gratifies his ambitions,"
replied Victor. "If he came with us it'd be because his own class had
failed him and he hoped to rise through and upon--ours."
Selma did not agree with him. But as she always felt presumptuous and
even foolish in disagreeing with Victor, she kept silent. And
presently Victor began to lay out her share in the task of starting up
the New Day. "I shall be all right within a week," said he, "and we
must get the first number out the week following." She was realizing
now that Hull's move had completely upset an elaborate plan of campaign
into which Victor had put all his intelligence and upon which he had
staked all his hopes. She marvelled as he talked, unfolding rapidly an
entirely new campaign, different in every respect from what the other
would have been. How swiftly his mind had worked, and how well! How
little time he had wasted in vain regrets! How quickly he had
recovered from a reverse that would have halted many a strong man.
And then she remembered how they all, his associates, were like him,
proof against the evil effects of set-back and defeat. And why were
they so? Because Victor Dorn had trained them to fight for the cause,
and not for victory. "Our cause is the right, and in the end right is
bound to win because the right is only another name for the
sensible"--that had been his teaching. And a hardy army he had
trained. The armies trained by victory are strong; but the armies
schooled by defeat--they are invincible.
When he had explained his new campaign--as much of it as he deemed it
wise at that time to withdraw from the security of his own brain--she
said:
"But it seems to me we've got a good chance to win, anyhow."
"A chance, perhaps," replied he. "But we'll not bother about that.
All we've got to do is to keep on strengthening ourselves."
"Yes, that's it!" she cried. "One added here--five there--ten yonder.
Every new stone fitted solidly against the ones already in place."
"We must never forget that we aren't merely building a new party," said
Dorn. "We're building a new civilization--one to fit the new
conditions of life. Let the Davy Hulls patch and tinker away at trying
to keep the old structure from falling in. We know it's bound to fall
and that it isn't fit for decent civilized human beings to live in.
And we're getting the new house ready. So--to us, election day is no
more important than any of the three hundred and sixty-five."
It was into the presence of a Victor Dorn restored in mind as well as
in body that Jane Hastings was shown by his sister, Mrs. Sherrill, one
afternoon a week or so later.
All that time Jane had been searching for an excuse for going to see
him. She had haunted the roads and the woods where he and Selma
habitually walked. She had seen neither of them. When the pretext for
a call finally came to her, as usual, the most obvious thing in the
world. He must be suspecting her of having betrayed his confidence and
brought about the vacating of those injunctions and the quashing of the
indictments. She must go to him and clear herself of suspicion.
She felt that the question of how she should dress for this crucial
interview, this attempt to establish some sort of friendly relations
with him, was of the very highest importance. Should she wear something
plain, something that would make her look as nearly as might be like
one of his own class? HIS class!
No--no, indeed. The class in which he was accidentally born and bred,
but to which he did not belong. Or, should she go dressed frankly as
of her own class--wearing the sort of things that made her look her
finest and most superior and most beautiful? Having nothing else to do,
she spent several hours in trying various toilets. She was not long in
deciding against disguising herself as a working woman. That garb
might win his mental and moral approval; but not by mental and moral
ways did women and men prevail with each other. In plain garb--so Jane
decided, as she inspected herself--she was no match for Selma Gordon;
she looked awkward, out of her element. So much being settled, there
remained to choose among her various toilets. She decided for an
embroidered white summer dress, extremely simple, but in the way that
costs beyond the power of any but the very rich to afford. When she was
ready to set forth, she had never looked so well in her life. Her
toilet SEEMED a mere detail. In fact, it was some such subtlety as
those arrangements of lines and colors in great pictures, whereby the
glance of the beholder is unconsciously compelled toward the central
figure, just as water in a funnel must go toward the aperture at the
bottom. Jane felt, not without reason, that she had executed a stroke
of genius. She was wearing nothing that could awaken Victor Dorn's
prejudices about fine clothes, for he must have those prejudices. Yet
she was dressed in conformity with all that centuries, ages of
experience, have taught the dressmaking art on the subject of feminine
allure. And, when a woman feels that she is so dressed, her natural
allure becomes greatly enhanced.
She drove down to a point in Monroe Avenue not far from the house where
Victor and his family lived. The day was hot; boss-ridden Remsen City
had dusty and ragged streets and sidewalks. It, therefore, would not
do to endanger the freshness of the toilet. But she would arrive as if
she had come all the way on foot. Arrival in a motor at so humble a
house would look like ostentation; also, if she were seen going through
that street afoot, people would think she was merely strolling a little
out of her way to view the ruins of the buildings set on fire by the
mob. She did pause to look at these ruins; the air of the neighborhood
still had a taint of burnt wood and paper. Presently, when she was sure
the street was clear of people of the sort who might talk--she hastily
entered the tiny front yard of Victor's house, and was pleased to find
herself immediately screened from the street by the luxuriant bushes
and creepers.
There was nothing in the least pretentious about the appearance of the
little house. It was simply a well built cottage--but of brick,
instead of the usual wood, and the slate roof descended at attractive
angles. The door she was facing was superior to the usual
flimsy-looking door. Indeed, she at once became conscious of a highly
attractive and most unexpected air of substantiality and good taste.
The people who lived here seemed to be permanent people--long resident,
and looking forward to long residence. She had never seen such
beautiful or such tastefully grouped sun flowers, and the dahlias and
marigolds were far above the familiar commonplace kitchen garden
flowers.
The door opened, and a handsome, extremely intelligent looking woman,
obviously Victor's sister, was looking pleasantly at her. Said she:
"I'm sorry to have kept you waiting. But I was busy in the kitchen.
This is Miss Hastings, isn't it?"
"Yes," said Jane, smiling friendlily.
"I've heard my brother and Selma talk of you." (Jane wondered WHAT
they had said.) "You wish to see Victor?"
"If I'd not be interrupting," said Jane.
"Come right in. He's used to being interrupted. They don't give him
five minutes to himself all day long--especially now that the
campaign's on. He always does his serious work very early in the
morning."
They went through a hall, pleasantly odorous of baking in which good
flour and good butter and good eggs were being manufactured into
something probably appetizing, certainly wholesome. Jane caught a
glimpse through open doors on either side of a neat and reposeful
little library-sitting room, a plain delightfully simple little
bedroom, a kitchen where everything shone. She arrived at the rear
door somehow depressed, bereft of the feeling of upper-class
superiority which had, perhaps unconsciously, possessed her as she came
toward the house. At the far end of an arbor on which the grape vines
were so trellised that their broad leaves cast a perfect shade, sat
Victor writing at a table under a tree. He was in his shirt sleeves,
and his shirt was open at the throat. His skin was smooth and
healthily white below the collar line. The forearms exposed by his
rolled up sleeves were strong but slender, and the faint fair hair upon
them suggested a man, but not an animal.
Never had she seen his face and head so fine. He was writing rapidly,
his body easily erect, his head and neck in a poise of grace and
strength. Jane grew pale and trembled--so much so that she was afraid
the keen, friendly eyes of Alice Sherrill were seeing. Said Mrs.
Sherrill, raising her voice:
"Victor--here's Miss Hastings come to see you." Then to Jane: "Excuse
me, please. I don't dare leave that kitchen long."
She departed. Jane waited while Victor, his pencil reluctantly
slackening and his glance lingeringly rising from the paper, came back
to sense of his surroundings. He stared at her blankly, then colored a
little. He rose--stiff, for him formal. Said he:
"How d'you do, Miss Hastings?"
She came down the arbor, recovering her assurance as she again became
conscious of herself, so charmingly dressed and no doubt beautiful in
his eyes. "I know you're not glad to see me," said she. "But I'm only
stopping a very little minute."
His eyes had softened--softened under the influence of the emotion no
man can ever fail to feel at least in some degree at sight of a lovely
woman. "Won't you sit?" said he, with a glance at the wooden chair
near the other side of the table.
She seated herself, resting one gloved hand on the prettily carved end
of her white-sunshade. She was wearing a big hat of rough black straw,
with a few very gorgeous white plumes. "What a delightful place to
work," exclaimed she, looking round, admiring the flowers, the slow
ripening grapes, the delicious shade. "And you--how WELL you look!"
"I've forgotten I was ever anything but well," said he.
"You're impatient for me to go," she cried laughing. "It's very rude
to show it so plainly."
"No," replied he. "I am not impatient for you to go. But I ought to
be, for I'm very busy."
"Well, I shall be gone in a moment. I came only to tell you that you
are suspecting me wrongly."
"Suspecting you?--of what?"
"Of having broken my word. I know you must think I got father to set
Davy Hull on to upsetting your plans."
"The idea never entered my head," said he. "You had promised--and I
know you are honest."
Jane colored violently and lowered her eyes. "I'm not--not up to what
you say," she protested. "But at least I didn't break my promise.
Davy thought of that himself."
"I have been assuming so."
"And you didn't suspect me?"
"Not for an instant," Victor assured her. "Davy simply made the move
that was obviously best for him."
"And now he will be elected," said Jane regretfully.
"It looks that way," replied Victor. And he had the air of one who has
nothing more to say.
Suddenly Jane looked at him with eyes shining and full of appeal.
"Don't send me away so quickly," she pleaded. "I've not been telling
the exact truth. I came only partly because I feared you were
suspecting me. The real reason was that--that I couldn't stay away any
longer. I know you're not in the least interested in me----"
She was watching him narrowly for signs of contradiction. She hoped
she had not watched in vain.
"Why should you be?" she went on. "But ever since you opened my eyes
and set me to thinking, I can do nothing but think about the things you
have said to me, and long to come to you and ask you questions and hear
more."
Victor was staring hard into the wall of foliage. His face was set.
She thought she had never seen anything so resolute, so repelling as
the curve of his long jaw bone.
"I'll go now," she said, making a pretended move toward rising.
"I've no right to annoy you."
He stood up abruptly, without looking at her. "Yes, you'd better go,"
he said curtly.
She quivered--and it was with a pang of genuine pain.
His gaze was not so far from her as it seemed. For he must have noted
her expression, since he said hurriedly: "I beg your pardon. It isn't
that I mean to be rude. I--I--it is best that I do not see you."
She sank back in the chair with a sigh. "And I--I know that I ought to
keep away from you. But--I can't. It's too strong for me."
He looked at her slowly. "I have made up my mind to put you out of my
head," he said. "And I shall."
"Don't!" she cried. "Victor--don't!"
He sat again, rested his forearms upon the table, leaned toward her.
"Look at me," he said.
She slowly lifted her gaze to his, met it steadily. "I thought so,
Victor," she said tenderly. "I knew I couldn't care so much unless you
cared at least a little ."
"Do I?" said he. "I don't know. I doubt if either of us is in love
with the other. Certainly, you are not the sort of woman I could
love--deeply love. What I feel for you is the sort of thing that
passes. It is violent while it lasts, but it passes."
"I don't care!" cried she recklessly. "Whatever it is I want it!"
He shook his head resolutely. "No," he said. "You don't want it, and
I don't want it. I know the kind of life you've mapped out for
yourself--as far as women of your class map out anything. It's the only
kind of life possible to you. And it's of a kind with which I could,
and would, have nothing to do."
"Why do you say that?" protested she. "You could make of me what you
pleased."
"No," said he. "I couldn't make a suit of overalls out of a length of
silk. Anyhow, I have made up my life with love and marriage left out.
They are excellent things for some people, for most people. But not
for me. I must be free, absolutely free. Free to think only of the
cause I've enlisted in, free to do what it commands."
"And I?" she said with tremendous life. "What is to become of me,
Victor?"
He laughed quietly. "You are going to keep away from me--find some one
else to amuse your leisure. That's what's going to become of you, Jane
Hastings."
She winced and quivered again. "That--hurts," she said.
"Your vanity? Yes. I suppose it does. But those wounds are
healthful--when the person is as sensible as you are."
"You think I am not capable of caring! You think I am vain and shallow
and idle. You refuse me all right to live, simply because I happen to
live in surroundings you don't approve of."
"I'm not such an egotistical ass as to imagine a woman of your sort
could be genuinely in love with a man of my sort," replied he. "So,
I'll see to it that we keep away from each other. I don't wish to be
tempted to do you mischief."
She looked at him inquiringly.
But he did not explain. He said: "And you are going now. And we
shall not meet again except by accident."
She gave a sigh of hopelessness. "I suppose I have lowered myself in
your eyes by being so frank--by showing and speaking what I felt," she
said mournfully.
"Not in the least," rejoined he. "A man who is anybody or has anything
soon gets used to frankness in women. I could hardly have gotten past
thirty, in a more or less conspicuous position, without having had some
experience.... and without learning not to attach too much importance
to--to frankness in women."
She winced again. "You wouldn't say those things if you knew how they
hurt," she said. "If I didn't care for you, could I sit here and let
you laugh at me?"
"Yes, you could," answered he. "Hoping somehow or other to turn the
laugh upon me later on. But really I was not laughing at you. And you
can spare yourself the effort of convincing me that you're sincere."
He was frankly laughing at her now. "You don't understand the
situation--not at all. You fancy that I am hanging back because I am
overwhelmed or shy or timid. I assure you I've never been shy or timid
about anything I wanted. If I wanted you--I'd--TAKE you."
She caught her breath and shrank. Looking at him as he said that,
calmly and confidently, she, for the first time, was in love--and was
afraid. Back to her came Selma's warnings: "One may not trifle with
love. A woman conquers only by surrender."
"But, as I said to you a while ago," he went on, "I don't want you--or
any woman. I've no time for marriage--no time for a flirtation. And
though you tempt me strongly, I like you too well to--to treat you as
you invite."
Jane sat motionless, stunned by the sudden turning of the tables.
She who had come to conquer--to amuse herself, to evoke a strong,
hopeless passion that would give her a delightful sense of warmth as
she stood safely by its bright flames--she had been conquered.
She belonged to this man; all he had to do was to claim her.
In a low voice, sweet and sincere beyond any that had ever come from
her lips before, she said:
"Anything, Victor--anything--but don't send me away."
And he, seeing and hearing, lost his boasted self-control. "Go--go," he
cried harshly. "If you don't go----" He came round the table, seizing
her as she rose, kissed her upon the lips, upon the eyes. "You are
lovely--lovely!" he murmured. "And I who can't have flowers on my table
or in sight when I've got anything serious to do--I love your perfume
and your color and the wonderful softness of you----"
He pushed her away. "Now--will you go?" he cried.
His eyes were flashing. And she was trembling from head to foot.
She was gazing at him with a fascinated expression. "I understand what
you meant when you warned me to go," she said. "I didn't believe it,
but it was so."
"Go--I tell you!" he ordered.
"It's too late," said she. "You can't send me away now--for you have
kissed me. If I'm in your power, you're in my power, too."
Moved by the same impulse both looked up the arbor toward the rear door
of the house. There stood Selma Gordon, regarding them with an
expression of anger as wild as the blood of the steppes that flowed in
her veins. Victor, with what composure he could master, put out his
hand in farewell to Jane. He had been too absorbed in the emotions
raging between him and her to note Selma's expression. But Jane, the
woman, had seen. As she shook hands with Victor, she said neither high
nor low:
"Selma knows that I care. I told her the night of the riot."
"Good-by," said Victor in a tone she thought it wise not to dispute.
"I'll be in the woods above the park at ten tomorrow," she said in an
undertone. Then to Selma, unsmilingly: "You're not interrupting. I'm
going." Selma advanced. The two girls looked frank hostility into
each other's eyes. Jane did not try to shake hands with her. With a
nod and a forced smile of conventional friendliness upon her lips, she
passed her and went through the house and into the street.
She lingered at the gate, opening and closing it in a most leisurely
fashion--a significantly different exit from her furtive and ashamed
entrance. Love and revolt were running high and hot in her veins. She
longed openly to defy the world--her world.